Bearing through the pain, Lin Mu continued to press the Dao Shell.
His effort seemed to bear fruit a minute later as the Dao Shell managed to reduce to a fraction of its full size. But that wasn't the only thing that had happened. The most surprising change was to the Spatial Dao Traces that had been gathered within it.
They had been forcefully compressed along with the Dao shell and had become condensed.
While they were still invisible for the most part, a translucent flicker could be seen in the center of the compressed Dao shell.
"Success!" Lin Mu felt incredibly pleased.
He had done it on a whim and had managed to condense the Spatial Dao Traces.
'Now to see if they hold together…' Lin Mu pulled his hands away, letting the Dao Shell expand once more.
While doing this, he also maintained Meld, so that the Spatial Dao Traces wouldn't expand explosively and break apart the Dao shell.
"Good, good… now to repeat it again." Lin Mu morphed the shape of the Dao Shell into two frustums attached to a sphere and sucked in the surrounding Spatial Dao Traces again.
A few minutes later, he had once again filled the Dao Shell to the maximum level and it felt like they wouldn't stay together anymore. To Lin Mu though, this was the point of catalytic change.
Meld!
"Condense!" Lin Mu instantly expanded the scope of meld to cover the entire Dao Shell again before pressing it into a smaller size with his hands.
The cracks appeared on the Dao Shell once more, but Lin Mu didn't even register the pain. The excitement was overwhelming his sensation for pain at this point.
Minute after minute passed as the Dao Shell started to compress, while the Spatial Dao Traces within it were condensed. This time the process took longer as Lin Mu needed to do it with a lot more caution.
But eventually, he managed to do it for the second time.
"It is working," Lin Mu could now see the Spatial Dao Traces with naked eyes.
If before they were a translucent flicker, now they looked like a faint vapor.
'What will happen if I keep on doing this? Will a entirely new form appear?' Lin Mu's brain started to run wildly.
Intending to follow through with this, he let the Dao shell expand once more and take its suction form. He sucked in more Spatial Dao Traces before condensing them through meld.
He repeated this process again and again, resulting in the Spatial Dao Traces within it becoming more and more visible.
Lin Mu didn't even realize the passage of time at this point. To him it felt like a breeze while to others that were observing him it was five days.
"How long will he do this?" Kunzi couldn't help but ask.
"I have no idea… whatever he's doing is certainly… dangerous." Elder Niji said, his brows furrowed.
He had come to see the progress of the Spatial Channel and found it to be working perfectly. But at the same time he found Lin Mu standing in front of him, seemingly in a trace.
Dense spirit qi and immortal qi swirled around him at the same time with a portion pouring into his body and another creating a barrier around him.
But that wasn't all, as everyone could feel dangerous spatial fluctuations coming from Lin Mu.
"No one should get close or they might get ripped apart by the spatial energy." Lanbao had warned them before.
She was the only one who had watched Lin Mu from the start and understood that he was now cultivating something new. Elder Niji also informed her that Lin Mu had intended to cultivate on the island for a while, but they didn't think that he would be doing that in this manner.
"Regardless, he's fulfilled his promises so we can just let him be." Elder Niji stated. "We'll cordon off this area for the time being."
~SHUA~
Lanbao merely made a few gestures and a new barrier was set up around the area. "Done." I'll watch over him, others won't be able to handle it if the space becomes chaotic." She warned.
"That's true." Elder Niji nodded.
He knew the strength of the Artifact spirit and also that she would be unharmed by the space. After all, she didn't have a physical body and wouldn't really 'die'. Her actual body was the entire Deep Sapphire City itself.
Unless the city was destroyed, nothing would happen to Lanbao. And being a Peak Grade Immortal weapon, even damaging her was a huge task on its own.
Lin Mu's cycle of absorption and condensation had now reached the fifteenth attempt.
'It's taking a lot longer to fill up too…' Lin Mu realized.
By now, he was satisfied by his work and was simply wondering how far he could take this. The Spatial Dao Traces within his Dao shell had already turned into the form of a cloud.
If an average cultivator looked at it, they might think that it was simply a harmless mass of water vapor. But if anyone touched it they wouldn't even have a chance to realize that they had died.
Normally Spatial Dao Traces wouldn't do anything to any creature. They were inert in nature as they were naturally present everywhere. Mortals would come into contact with them and never know about it.
But with the heavy compression that Lin Mu had done, they had revealed their dangerous characteristic.
One could even compare it to basic water too. At its normal state it was harmless and wouldn't do much. Turn it into vapor and it would still be relatively harmless. But then change that to steam and it would become dangerous.
Compress the hot steam and it would turn deadly!
The effect that the Spatial Dao Traces brought about after being compressed and condensed like this was similar to this. If anyone that was not versed in the Spatial element was to come close to this cloud, they would be ripped apart by it.
Lin Mu felt like he could take it further so he continued his cycle of compression.
And finally, by the 20th try the Dao Traces had reached an absolute limit. The cloud now accommodated the entirety of the Dao Shell and no matter how much Lin Mu tried, he couldn't press it.
'Meld has reached its limit… No, it's actually me who has reached the limit of my understanding of Space.' Lin Mu realized.
His face was calm and he looked at the Dao Shell contently. He was pleased with his work and the new discovery hew had made would bring forth more gains to him.
"This will be my key to furthering my understanding…" Lin Mu muttered while gazing at the cloud of the Dao Traces.
~huu~
Lin Mu let out a breath he didn't even realize he was holding back and released his control over the Dao Shell.
~HONG~
As soon as he did that though, the Spatial Dao Traces didn't expand. Instead the condensed further!
"Huh? How's this happening?" Lin Mu was confused.
"Seems like you reached the point of sublimation." Xukong finally spoke.
He had observed Lin Mu's research and work, feeling greatly impressed.
"Point of Sublimation?" Lin Mu raised a brow.
"You'll know soon enough." Xukong replied. "Just let go of all inhibitions, and let your heart guide you." He suggested.
Lin Mu narrowed his brows but then nodded his head.
"Alright…" Lin Mu fully let go, causing the Dao Shell to crack a little.
Without his will power holding it together, the Dao Shell was bound to crack. But much to the surprise of all, the Dao Shell didn't continue to crack. Instead, it healed automatically while the Spatial Dao Traces started pulling into itself.
~RAM~RAM~RAM~
A strange moving sound was heard which soon turned into explosions!
"They Spatial Dao Traces… they're cracking the space?" Lin Mu noticed.
But before he could be anymore worried he saw a shining white dot appear in the cloud of Spatial Dao Traces.
"A star?" Lin Mu muttered in surprise.
This was merely the start though as the sound of explosion happened again, this time another star appearing.
"What is the meaning of this?" Lin Mu felt like Xukong had hinted at something.
~BOOM~BOOM~BOOM
More booming sounds were heard as several stars appeared in the clouds one by one. At the same time, the clouds were turning darker in color. About five minutes later, it had turned into an black purple shade.
The stars glowed within the black purple mass of clouds and released a pure energy waves. It was like the energy was directly compelled to reach Lin Mu as he didn't have time to dodge.
The Dao Shell dived into his body before coming to his Dantian.
"Wait a second this feeling… A Dao Embryo is about to be formed." Lin Mu said in excitement.
And as if it had been waiting for him to acknowledge it, the cloud transformed!
