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“Sorry… players?” Alex looked at the elder curiously. “What makes you say that?”
“Are you not?” the elder asked. “All the new and talented youngsters have ended up being players, which was why I asked. This young girl is a sol called player too.”
“Oh,” Alex looked towards the girl in the veil, who was curiously looking forward to his answer too. “Yes, I’m a player.”
“I knew it!” the Heaven’s Frost ancestor said.
“Calm down, old man. We all knew it. It’s obvious at this point,” the red-robed elder named Guan said. “You must have been quite lost then. Being in a new world, sent away from the immortal realms. You were tricked, huh?”
Alex was a little surprised at the woman’s words. “Sent away by an immortal?” he asked.
“Of course,” the older woman said. “It’s obvious really. You were some talented group of people that didn’t know about cultivation, so the immortal sent you here from the heavens so you can train in a relatively safe environment.”
“Well, at least that’s what we think, based on the information we have,” elder Xuan said. “After all, your world is so different from our own that it simply has to be one of the higher realms.”
“I never thought about that,” Alex said. “So we were sent here by an immortal? What would the immortal want from us?”
“Who knows, kid? For all we know, the immortal could have just been bored,” the elders said.
“Anyway, can you tell us about the Dao that you learned?” one of the elders asked.
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“No, he won’t say. Why don’t you reveal what Dao you learned?” she asked.
“Tsk! You don’t have to attack me like that. You could’ve just stopped at no,” the elder said and stood up.
The water didn’t cling to him at all as he stood, and not a single part of his cloth was wet.
At the same time, the other elders started standing up too. “Let’s go, young man. The scent has already disappeared for the most part, so it is impossible to learn dao now,” one of the elders said.
“Oh, yes,” Alex said and stood up.
One by one, they exited the hot spring and slowly started descending down the mountain.
Alex took Pearl back into his beast space and descended along with the elder.
The elders tried to talk with him, but Alex was lost in his own thought. He wasn’t thinking about the Dao he had learned, but the ones he hadn’t learned. There was something about them that simply didn’t sit right with him.
He answered a few questions here and there, most mostly Alex simply kept to himself, thinking of many things.
When they finally arrived at the gate, Alex saw many people that were already outside. There were no more boats as those were already taken by the other disciples to go back to the sect.
“Whose job is it to handle the closing this time around?” the Heaven’s Frost sect’s ancestors asked.
“I believe it’s the Frozen Heart sect’s turn,” Tai Guan, the Blazing Earth sect’s female ancestor said.
“Yes, it is ours. You may leave if you want to,” elder Xuan said.
“Good, My disciple and I were going to leave anyway. Come, little Zhu,” the elder said and the red-veiled girl walked away with the elder.
Alex watched them fly away and then saw the various other sect leaders and ancestors try and find some of their elders to fly back with.
Elder Xuan stood there and looked back at the gate as many started climbing down on their own to leave.
“Every year, one of us is tasked to make sure that everyone has left and then seal the mountain. This turn, it’s ours so I will have to stay here for 2 more days,” she explained to Alex who was standing next to her.
“I see,” Alex said, still a little lost in his own thoughts.
“So you can go back on your own if you want to,” the elder said. “Or you can wait for a few of the elders and disciples to come out so you can leave with them.”
“Elder, I wish to leave,” Alex said.
“Okay, you can go back on your own. You can do that right?” she asked.
“No, elder,” Alex’s voice grew more stern. “I wish to leave.”
The elder paused and turned around. “You don’t mean to say…”
“Yes,” Alex said. “I wish to leave the sect.”
Elder Xuan frowned. Her face grew somber as she asked, “does it have anything to do with how we treated you?”
“No, it had nothing to do with that,” Alex said.
“Wait, did one of those elders give you a better offer? Those bastards, trying the take—”
“No, elder. It has nothing to do with what you did or what anyone else did,” Alex said. “It has to do with me.”
The elder was now confused. “What do you mean?” she asked.
“Here’s the thing, elder. When I was trying to understand the dao, I came to learn that there were so many different Daos that I could potentially learn. However, I simply cannot because I haven’t been giving them enough time for a long while now.”
“I have been couped up in that small room for over a year doing nothing but making pills. While I am happy that it has helped me improve my pill-making skills, I have also regressed in other ways.”
“I haven’t trained in a long while. The sword skills that I should be improving on aren’t being improved in the slightest, and the many techniques I should practice have been something I simply don’t have the time to spend on.”
“As such, I wish to leave the sect and go explore the world and try and understand everything I can,” Alex said.
The elder stayed quiet as she listened to it. “You learned more than just Dao up there, huh?” she spoke. “I must tell you this before you make any further decision. If you do leave the sect, there is no way for you to enter this mountain ever again, until you enter the Saint realm.”
“It’s fine, elder. I don’t think another visit to the mountain next year can help me so quickly anyway, and by the year after that, I will have entered the Saint realm, so I will make it here,” he said.
“Even then, given how many important figures we will have to go through, if there are more than 2000 figures that want to enter this mountain, you might not get a chance to,” she said.
“That’s fine too, elder,” Alex said. “If we are to go through importance, then I can simply make myself an important figure.”
The elder thought for a bit and spoke. “You learned two different Dao today, and you know even more of them. Logic suggests that I should keep you however I can.”
Alex’s eyebrows narrowed in fear. “Elder, you gave me your word. I can leave the sect whenever I want,” he said.
“I did, but what if I wanted to keep you? What if I didn’t want to let you leave the sect?” she asked.
Alex was starting to get scared of the elder. Could he escape if a Saint Soul cultivator wanted to keep him there?
“Then I would resent the sect, Elder. And more than anything, I would resent you,” he said. He got ready to use Heaven’s Impact and then the Earth Devouring technique when suddenly he stopped.
The elder burst into laughter as her chuckle was heard all around the mountain. “Yeah, I definitely can’t afford that. And I’m not twisted enough to destroy that which I can’t have,” she said. “If you truly do wish to leave, then leave. However, I hope you can make an oath.”
“An oath?” Alex frowned. Oaths were powerful binding that would force him to do something or destroy him if he didn’t.
“Yes, an oath. Make an oath that if you ever learn that the Frozen Heart sect is in danger, you will come to help it as long as you can,” she said.
Alex thought for a moment and shook his head. “I’m sorry, elder. I cannot speak the oath. It isn’t a bad oath, but I do not wish to bind myself into doing something compulsorily.”
“Is that so?” the elder’s eyes turned downwards as a sad little expression appeared on it. “I guess I asked for too much.”
Alex nodded and then spoke. “While I cannot speak the oath, elder, I will give you my word. If I ever learn that the Frozen Heart sect is in trouble and that I can help it, I will definitely come to help the sect. That is the least I can do.”
The elder smiled. “Thank you,” she said. “I expect a lot from you.”
Alex nodded and bowed toward her, ready to leave.
“Before you leave, can you tell me what Daos you learned?” she asked. She was quite curious about it as well.
“Sure,” Alex said. “I learned Dao of Plant Growth, and Dao of Five Elemental Interaction.”
“Dao of… plant growth? And elemental interaction? Isn’t that…Hah!” the elder exclaimed. “As expected of an Alchemist. I should have known you would learn something related to that.”
The elder rummaged into her bag to bring out something that she tossed to him. Alex caught the thing and realized that it was a small badge.
“Frozen Heart sect Affiliation badge?” Alex asked as he read the words on it.
“It means you have some connection with the Frozen Heart sect. While it might not help a lot, it should help you get out of some sticky situation,” the Elder said. “Still, I hope instead of having to use such a badge, you would use one that belongs to an elder. If you ever do plan on returning, the Frozen Heart sect will accept you with open arms.”
“Thank you, elder.” Alex stored the badge and bowed once more.
Then he turned around and flew off to start a new adventure of his own.