With the perfect sized chunk cut off, Lin Mu immediately stored it away to prevent it from losing any energy.
"That's one down, one more to go." Lin Mu muttered, storing away the main chunk of the Peak Grade Immortal Stone away too.
The first cuboid piece that Lin Mu had cut out was meant for Afternoon Pine. It was a double edged sword and was shorter than Ocean Raker, thus the same size would not work for the second sword.
Lin Mu used his Spatial Perception to get the right dimensions once more before using meld to cut the second cuboid piece. This piece was also fifteen centimeters wide and fifteen centimeters tall but its length was double than the first cuboid.
It was two hundred centimeters long!
This would be enough to accommodate Ocean Raker entirely within it.
With the two cuboid pieces of Peak Grade Immortal Stone cut, Lin Mu was ready for the next part. It was to select the auxiliary components that would help nurture them. Thus was where the two sword nurturing boxes would differ.
Ocean Raker was a sword that was made using Blue Vein Heart Metal and thus nurturing it with a similar kind of metal would be the best option.
Afternoon Pine on the other hand, was made with a mixture of several kinds of metals, which were then imprinted with various runes to give it the Qi skills it had. Thus for Afternoon pine, Lin Mu would have to use a mixture of materials too.
'Let's see… Blue Vein Heart Metal obviously belongs to the metal element, but also has traces of Water element in it.' Lin Mu went through the list of materials he had in his ring, trying to find the right one to complement it.
After looking through hundreds of materials, Lin Mu finally found the right one.
"Bleak Frost Crystal, this'll do well." Lin Mu finally picked one.
The Bleak Frost crystal belonged to that of the ice element and could complement the minor Water element of the Blue Vein Heart metal well. It was a material that Lin Mu had obtained from Lanbao and he had several of them in his storage.
'While I would have preferred to further temper the Ocean Raker since it is a pure refinement type sword, I don't have the required skills for it.' Lin Mu thought to himself.
If he wished to make something like that, Lin Mu would have used a fire elemental material instead. It would continually temper the sword over time and help it get stronger and sharper.
But doing that with the Blue Vein Heart Metal was risky with Lin Mu's current skills. If he didn't make it properly, the Sword Nurturing box might end up making the sword weaker instead as the fire element and the water elements would collide.
The key to using fire elemental material in tempering a sword was to make sure that it only targeted the 'metal' part of the sword and not the water. This would make the metal become denser which could also bring the water elemental parts closer, thereby enhancing them too.
But if the fire element targeted the water element, it would make the metal expand instead, lowering the density and hence weakening the sword.
Actually, something similar would happen if Lin Mu used Bleak Frost Crystal too. The ice element would influence the water element within the Blue Vein Heart metal, making it colder.
If it became too cold, it would expand too, since water would expand when it turned into ice. But the crux of it lay in how much Lin Mu controlled the cooling. If it was targeted towards the metal, it would make it contract too.
Thus, he could balance the two.
The water would expand while the metal would contract, creating a balance between the two!
"Alright, time to get started." Lin Mu said before setting up a small forge using an array.
~SHUA~
Flames lit up on the forge array, and a circle condensed above it.
The circle was meant to be the crucible that would hold the item that was to be forged.
Having set this up, Lin Mu took out the Bleak Frost Crystals. These crystal were about the size of a lime and were pentagonal in shape. If one looked closer, they would even see fine, snowflake like patterns inside its structure.
The crystals themselves were rather dull looking. Having a greyness that was similar to the clouds during a snowstorm.
Lin Mu put all of the Bleak Frost Crystals on the crucible and let the flame heat them up. He carefully controlled the flames, making sure their temperature was low. He didn't need them to be very hot, as that would end up destroying the crystals instead.
He merely needed to 'soften' the crystals enough so that they could be molded according to his needs.
Lin Mu watched the heat for ten minutes and only left it after he was assured that the crystals would be fine.
"Now to get started on the main body of the box…" Lin Mu brought the two meter long cuboid chunk of peak grade immortal stone out.
Lin Mu used meld once more, and cut the cuboid right from the center, splitting it into two equal two meter long halves.
'Now the more sensitive part,' Lin Mu took out his old companion, the double edged short sword.
He held the sword firmly before using it to scrape the inside of the cuboid halves. He was using the short sword since it was sharp enough as well as being small to hold properly.
'I need to get better forging tools later too.' Lin Mu was once again reminded of his lack of specialized equipment.
Bit by bit, Lin Mu carved away parts of the Immortal stone. This resulted in small grains of Peak Grade Immortal stone as well as some dust. Lin Mu kept all of this safe too, as it could be used again for many purposes.
