Lin Mu controlled the runes that would act on the blood and made sure that they worked according to the proper institutions.
The three ribbons of blood completely wrapped the corpse of the trunk faced cow, turning into a red mass and then the beast core melted before merging into the red mass. This red mass floated up and twisted and turned, letting out more noises.
The trunk faced cow's grunts and cries could be heard in the room. Lin Mu was profusely sweating, but he did not dare to lose focus for even one second and continued operating the formations. An hour passed by after which the red mass had shrunk by half and continued to do so.
"How long do I need to keep this up, senior?" Lin Mu asked with difficulty.
"Until it has been reduced to the size of a small pill." Xukong answered.
~Sigh~
Lin Mu let out a sigh and then focused back on the task at hand. Another hour passed and now the red mass was reduced to ten percent of its original size. But it was still far from the size it needed to be. One more hour for a total of three hours passed and now the red mass had reached the size of a fist.
Lin Mu's eyes were blood shot at this point and veins had popped up on his face due to how much he had been straining himself.
Suddenly a new change happened and all the formations runes that had been floating in the air started to fall towards the fist sized mass and hammered on it. With each formation rune that imprinted on it, the size of the red mass shrank by a little bit.
Grasping what he now needed to do now, Lin Mu started to control the runes to hammer onto the red mass. With each rune, he increased his speed and continued to do so until finally all of the runes had disappeared and the red mass had shrunk to the size of a small pill.
"MOOOOO"
An unyielding cry came from the pill, and it almost escaped Lin Mu's control. The pill was trying to run away!
"NO, YOU WON'T!" Lin Mu uttered with determination.
In that moment, the aura of the sword path unconsciously leaked out of his body and touched upon the small red pill. As soon as it did, a suppressed grunt came out of the pill as if it were submitting to Lin Mu.
Finally, the small red pill glowed brightly, and when the light faded away Lin Mu saw it. There was now a translucent red bead floating in his hand. The bead had the figure of the trunk faced cow in it, but unlike before, it was fixed and did not move.
~Phew~
Lin Mu let out a breath of relief and held onto the small bead.
"Now that is a proper bloodline crystal. Excellent job!" Xukong praised.
"Thank you senior," Lin Mu said before he collapsed onto the ground in exhaustion and then falling into a deep slumber.
Xukong chuckled upon seeing this but knew that it was a well deserved rest.
'He actually refined the entire thing in his first try, that is simply stunning.' Xukong praised in his heart.
"If he can do it with this method, then the one that he will use for the great slumber bear will be even easier. Seems like my decision of getting him to practice with the more complex method was correct, after all I also got to test out his natural skill in formations and refinement too." Xukong muttered to himself.
An unknown amount of time passed before Lin Mu woke up. After waking up, he looked around and saw that he was in his room with all the barrels lying around him. Thankfully, all of the blood had been used up to refine the bloodline crystal, so there was no mess in the room.
He would not even have to wash the barrels as every single drop of blood was utilized. Lin Mu laid as he was on the ground and lifted his hand to look at the bloodline crystal in his hand. He looked at it closely and saw it faintly glimmer before the ray of sunlight that leaked in from the corner of a window.
Lin Mu curiously probed it with his spirit sense and saw that he couldn't do it. The bloodline crystal was even more dense than the beast core and he could faintly sense the massive amount of raw spirit qi contained within it.
But while doing this, Lin Mu also felt something strange with his spirit sense.
"Huh, it increased in size?" Lin Mu muttered with surprise.
He extended it as much as he could and realized that it had now reached a maximum length of a hundred meters.
"But how?" Lin Mu wondered.
"You extensively used your spirit sense to the limit. This stimulated it and caused it to grow while you were sleeping. This has happened before, remember?" Xukong suddenly spoke.
Lin Mu then remembered when he had killed the Alpha steel back wolf, how the short sword had heeded his command and acted according to his will. He had exhausted himself quite a lot back then too and had stressed his spirit sense, which led to it greatly growing.
The same thing occurred now too, except it was not as much as before. This time it only grew in maximum length by about twenty meters, which was still quite a lot. According to what Lin Mu knew, the range of spirit sense was usually only achievable when a cultivator reached the core condensation realm.
Yet, Lin Mu had done it while he was half way through the peak stage of the qi refining realm. Lin Mu checked his dantian and saw that it was a little more than eighteen hundred drops of spirit qi, while the rest of the space was filled with spirit qi wisps.
"Now I've only got to ensure that I've reached a sufficient level of proficiency with the nameless technique of the lost immortal." Lin Mu muttered to himself.