Daoist Chu returned to his own studies, clearly inspired. ng Bai carried stacks of copied diagrams with him like priceless treasures, his eyes sharper than they had ever been.
Lin Mu, anwhile, returned to ditation.
He spent the next week doing little else but sit, breathe, and feel.
He assessed how his body responded now that the immortal essence was no longer hamring it from within. He tested circulation speeds, compression limits, and recovery rates. He let the Essence ridian Casting network flow freely, then restricted it, then forced it into unusual paths.
Each test confird the sa thing.
His body had adapted completely.
By the seventh day, Lin Mu opened his eyes and rose from his ditation mat, feeling light, grounded, and wholly himself.
He stepped out into the open courtyard.
Only one presence greeted him.
Cattaleya was sprawled lazily on a stone bench, one leg dangling off the side, gnawing on a roasted piece of at that looked suspiciously like sothing pulled from the sea earlier that morning.
Lin Mu blinked.
"...Where is everyone?"
Cattaleya chewed, swallowed, and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. "City"
"All of them?" Lin Mu asked.
"Daoist Chu and ng Bai got sick of staring at lines and circles," she said. "They went to wander around, probably buying useless junk and pretending it is research. The beasts went with them. Elyon slipped away earlier. Information gathering. Spying. Creeping around. Usual stuff."
Lin Mu nodded slowly. "I see."
"They left this morning," Cattaleya added. "Might be back late. Might be tomorrow."
Lin Mu stood there for a mont, unsure what to do.
Cattaleya squinted at him, then grinned. "What. Did you forget?"
Lin Mu frowned. "Forget what?"
She raised a finger and pointed straight at his forehead.
The Silver Mirage Circlet glead faintly under the sunlight.
Lin Mu froze.
"...Ah."
Cattaleya burst out laughing. "You really forgot."
Lin Mu rubbed the back of his neck. "I was busy."
"Busy inventing cultivation realms," she said smugly. "Very impressive. Still forgot"
"I did say I would make sothing," Lin Mu admitted.
"You did," Cattaleya said, leaning forward eagerly. "And I am very patient. But my patience has limits."
Lin Mu smiled. "I will start now."
She leaned back, satisfied. "Good. I will look forward to it."
Lin Mu returned to his room, closing the door behind him.
He sat down and began to think seriously.
A circlet was the obvious choice, but also the worst one. Cattaleya's fighting style involved headbutts, ramming attacks, and reckless charges. No matter how strong the material, repeated impacts would eventually damage it.
He needed sothing durable, but also placed sowhere less likely to take direct hits.
An armlet.
Upper arm placent ant stability, less exposure, and more space for formations.
Decision made, Lin Mu began planning.
He would not use ordinary tals.
The base would be an alloy.
Thousand Tempered Steel for resilience and structural support.
Black Immortal Bronze for essence conduction and shock absorption.
Void Streak Titanium as the binding agent, rare, expensive, and incredibly stable under extre forces. Its natural affinity for spatial stability would prevent deformation even under violent impacts.
Lin Mu's eyes glead faintly as he began sketching the design in his mind.
This would not just be an accessory.
It would be sothing worthy of Cattaleya.
A few hours later...
Lin Mu sat cross legged within the sealed room, the air around him thick with heat, spatial fluctuations, and the faint tallic scent of molten immortal
materials.
Before him hovered a crucible formation, suspended in midair rather than resting on the ground. It was an old habit of his, born from years of refining dangerous materials. If anything went wrong, he could simply disperse the formation and let the contents fall into an isolated spatial pocket rather than risking damage to the surroundings.
At the mont, two pools of molten tal floated within the crucible array. One glowed a deep, dignified silver with faint golden undertones. This was Thousand Tempered Steel, a tal forged through repeated refinent cycles until its internal structure beca absurdly resilient. It was famous for its ability to recover from deformation, almost as if it rembered its original
shape.
The other was darker, almost obsidian black, but with subtle bronze highlights that pulsed softly as immortal essence flowed through it. Black Immortal Bronze was far rarer and far more valuable. It was prized not just for durability, but for how naturally it conducted and stabilized both immortal essence and immortal qi, making it ideal for tools ant to endure violent usage.
Lin Mu controlled the flas around them with ease.
His fire was no longer crude or aggressive. It was precise, layered, and obedient. The Thousand Tempered Steel lted first, followed by the Black Immortal Bronze, both reduced into perfectly uniform liquid states without
impurities.
Only then did Lin Mu turn his attention to the third tal.
Void Streak Titanium.
It sat on a separate jade platform beside him, barely larger than a fingernail clipping in total mass. Thin streaks of faintly shimring silver ran through its dark body, like frozen lightning trapped inside solid matter.
"This thing really is troubleso," Lin Mu muttered.
Void Streak Titanium was not native to any world. It was born in the void itself, condensed from unknown processes that occurred when destroyed worlds, collapsed spatial layers, and ancient debris collided and eroded over eons.
It did not behave like normal matter.
Heat barely affected it. Elental flas slid over its surface as if it they did not exist. Even immortal fire could only warm it slightly.
Little Shrubby's flas might eventually work, but even then the risk of damaging the other materials or destabilizing the crucible was too high.
Lin Mu inhaled slowly.
"This will do."
He extended a finger and carefully guided a thread of Spatial Qi into the
crucible array. The Qi did not touch the molten tals yet. Instead, it wrapped
around the Void Streak Titanium like an invisible cocoon.
The effect was imdiate.
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