On the cold stone table rested the Bookworm retrieved from the Black Bone King's will, alongside a Rank 1 Earth Tremor Gu radiating a faint ochre glow.
Beside them lay the primary material Lin Mu had gone to such lengths to obtain — the Blood Trace Gu.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
Lin Mu sat cross-legged, eyes closed, settling his breathing into a long, even rhythm.
In his mind, he ran through the refinement steps for the Blood Attraction Gu recorded within the Bookworm — like slides projected one after another — dozens of times over, until not a single stray thought remained.
Then his eyes snapped open. In the dim chamber, two sharp points of light ignited within his dark pupils.
"Rise."
With a single mental command, the pure Rank 2 Primeval Essence within his Aperture surged outward, lifting both the Blood Trace Gu and the Earth Tremor Gu from the table and suspending them in midair simultaneously.
After the grueling refinement work he had put in over the past months, Lin Mu considered his technique — if not that of a Refinement Path master — at least thoroughly practiced and reliably steady.
Hum.
A blazing white orb of light erupted in the air, churning violently.
"Going smoothly. Next — neutralize the wills, inject the Primeval Stones."
A flicker of confidence crossed Lin Mu's eyes.
He freed his left hand, grabbed the Primeval Stones he had prepared nearby, and fed them into the churning white light one by one, in measured succession.
Each stone that entered the orb was drained of its natural primeval energy in an instant, crumbling into grey-white powder that sifted downward.
Everything proceeded according to plan.
After consuming dozens of Primeval Stones, the orb began to slowly contract and condense inward, exactly as the Bookworm's records described.
But then.
Just as the orb shrank to the size of a large bowl — just as the two types of Dao Marks were on the verge of fully merging —
Without any warning.
The white light, which had been trending toward stability, suddenly erupted from within with a violent, razor-sharp force of rejection.
"What?!"
Lin Mu's pupils contracted sharply. There was no time to make any corrective adjustment.
CRACK.
A piercing, sharp explosion rang out through the sealed chamber.
The white orb shattered like glass struck by a hammer, scattering and dissolving in an instant.
The backlash of Primeval Essence hit Lin Mu like a shockwave — a dull impact in his chest — and forced him back half a step.
Tap.
Flecks of black ash and residue rained down onto the stone table.
The first attempt had ended in catastrophic failure — for no discernible reason.
The Rank 1 Blood Trace Gu — the primary material Lin Mu had paid a fortune to acquire — had been reduced to dead ash on the spot.
"How..."
Lin Mu stared at the pinch of lifeless powder in his palm, his face a mask of shock and disbelief.
He stood motionless, eyes fixed on the Bookworm bearing the formula.
He had followed the Black Bone King's instructions precisely. His Primeval Essence output had been perfectly smooth — not a single deviation.
So why had it collapsed so completely at the final moment?
Lin Mu's gaze drifted slowly to the edge of the stone table.
There, his last remaining Blood Trace Gu sat waiting.
It hung over him like the sword of Damocles.
Only a few days remained before the Jia Clan Caravan broke camp and departed — before the so-called "Friendship Match" between the two stockades began.
If Li Mang, Patriarch of White Bone Stockade, led his people through the gates of Black Blood Stockade before Lin Mu had obtained the key to the inheritance's first layer...
Before he held a trump card sufficient to protect himself or break out of a crisis...
Then when the sweeping inspection came, he would have no chance of survival whatsoever.
"No recklessness. Absolutely no more brute-force attempts."
Lin Mu forced himself to draw several slow, cold breaths, crushing down the suffocating panic and agitation threatening to overwhelm him.
He sat back down cross-legged, closed his eyes, and began dissecting the Blood Attraction Gu's formula in his mind — over and over again.
"The Black Bone King was an exceptionally rare dual cultivator of both Earth and Blood Path. This formula is, at its core, Blood Path layered upon Earth Path."
"These two types of Dao Marks are naturally antagonistic. Is my foundational understanding of Blood Path and Earth Path insufficient?"
"Or is this formula actually intended for a Rank 3 or Rank 4 cultivator — requiring higher-grade Primeval Essence to forcibly suppress and fuse the two?"
If it truly required higher-grade Primeval Essence to brute-force the fusion, then at Rank 2 initial stage, he was simply waiting to die.
"No... there has to be another way out. Where exactly is the problem?"
Lin Mu's mind churned like an overloaded set of gears, running through every possibility at a frantic pace.
In the dead silence of that long night, as he sat in deep, grinding contemplation — a bolt of lightning tore through his mind without warning.
He remembered.
He remembered a specific, classic detail from his memories — Fang Yuan refining Gu worms on Qing Mao Mountain.
"The White Jade Gu."
Lin Mu's eyes flew open. He murmured into the darkness.
In the original story, combining the White Boar Gu with the Jade Skin Gu to produce the Rank 2 White Jade Gu was a widely known formula that had been passed down for a thousand years.
Yet even Refinement Path masters following that formula achieved a success rate that was laughably low.
It was not until a hundred and fifty years later that a gifted Refinement Path prodigy stumbled upon a discovery.
Adding a single "Snow Tusk of a Wild Boar King" during the refinement process triggered something akin to a perfect chemical reaction — dramatically elevating the otherwise dismal success rate.
Fang Yuan had exploited that information gap to refine the White Jade Gu with ease.
"Draw the parallel..."
Lin Mu's eyes sharpened with sudden, brilliant clarity — like a man in freefall catching hold of the sturdiest lifeline imaginable.
"The old formula is a classic, but formulas are never absolute."
"The conflict between Blood Path and Earth Path erupted at the final moment because something was missing — a stabilizing agent capable of harmonizing the two and allowing them to fuse cleanly."
"If it wasn't written into the formula, then why not find my own path? Find an auxiliary material that can serve as the bridge."
Once the line of thinking opened up, everything else followed.
A material that could flow naturally between Blood Path and Earth Path — bearing the weight of earth while accommodating the rawness of blood...
His thoughts locked onto the answer almost instantaneously — a Gu worm that had accompanied him from the very beginning, residing within his Aperture.
The Red Mud Gu.
A fierce gleam of excitement flashed through Lin Mu's eyes. "It's an Earth Path Gu worm that carries both earth and blood characteristics. It just might work."
But.
He looked at the last remaining Blood Trace Gu on the table. His heartbeat quickened despite himself.
Gamble, or not?
If he introduced the red mud at the critical final stage of refinement, and this unauthorized deviation from the formula triggered an even more violent backlash — that last Blood Trace Gu would be reduced to ash as well.
The cost was too steep.
But the hesitation lasted only an instant before a cold, iron-hard resolve swept it away entirely.
"What is there to be afraid of gambling on?!"
Lin Mu's Dao heart had never been clearer than in this moment.
"Cultivation is defiance — seizing life from heaven itself. If I shrink back now out of fear of failure, when Li Mang's blade is at my throat, he will not grant me a single moment's mercy to try again."
Better to fight to the death than wait for it.
"Do it."
Lin Mu drew a deep breath. Red Iron Primeval Essence surged.
Within his Aperture, the Red Mud Gu trembled faintly and, with complete compliance, secreted a large mass of dark-red mud — thick with the smell of blood and heavy earth — which Lin Mu carefully set within reach.
Then he steadied his mind, extended both hands, and without hesitation initiated the second refinement.
The orb of light reappeared.
With the first attempt behind him, Lin Mu moved through the opening steps with far greater fluency.
He held the churning white orb in place with the full force of his concentration, while his other hand moved like lightning — drawing Primeval Stones from his pouch and casting them in one after another.
Hiss. Hiss. Hiss.
The orb devoured each stone like a bottomless maw. Grey-white powder rained down onto the cold stone bed.
With every stone consumed, the orb's boundary expanded slightly — and the rejection force building within grew more savage and unstable, as though it might collapse entirely at any moment, just as before.
A race against destruction. The edge of catastrophe, one breath away.
Just as the orb contracted sharply and hurtled toward that lethal threshold — just as it was on the verge of tearing itself apart —
"Now."
Lin Mu's eyes flew wide open. His hand moved before the thought had finished forming.
He seized the prepared mass of dark-red mud and hurled it into the raging white orb.
What happened next was extraordinary.
The moment the red mud entered the orb, it was as though the perfect solvent had been dropped between two irreconcilable extremes.
The violent, blazing orb — which had been radiating outward in wild, uncontrolled bursts on the verge of detonation — made contact with the red mud.
In that instant, it was as if a wild beast had been soothed. The light softened. The turbulence stilled.
"It's working."
Under Lin Mu's breathless, unblinking watch — not daring to exhale —
The gentle luminescence began to slowly contract inward, condensing and solidifying. Ten breaths later, the light faded entirely.
Hovering in midair, perfectly still, was a new Gu worm.
Its body was a deep, rich crimson throughout. Across its carapace ran intricate patterns — like naturally occurring veins, profound and arcane.
Its shape resembled an exquisitely crafted miniature compass wrought from blood, and it radiated a faint, heart-stirring pull.
Rank 2 — Blood Attraction Gu.
Success.