Chapter 952

Even after landing on the shattered plane, Negrilis couldn’t see any hammer: “You said it looked like an egg, that’s plausible—but where’s the hammer? What looks like a hammer here?”

Everyone landed on the plane; Du Luo kicked at the loose surface soil, and with a clang, a fist-sized chunk of black crystal was kicked out.

“Huh?” Everyone froze. This was black crystal—not just broken rock—how could one kick it out so easily? Was the entire plane made of black crystal deposits?

Everyone realized the same thing at once and began frantically scraping away the surface soil; soon, a layer of loose earth was cleared, revealing vast expanses of black crystal.

Negrilis pried apart some scattered fragments of black crystal and frowned: “Feels like these crystals were smashed—look, there are radial cracks inside, just like a single large block of black crystal was shattered by something, then piled back together.”

Negrilis’s words made Anthony draw a sharp breath: “Smashed? What could smash black crystal?”

“Primordial power,” Negrilis said. “The Abyss Maw and the Dark Primordial can both smash black crystal. What’s so surprising?”

“That’s even scarier!” Anthony rolled his eyes. “It means a Void Primordial exists here. If the Master’s true body doesn’t come, encountering a Primordial means we’re dead.”

Negrilis froze. Because of the Abyss Maw and the Dark Primordial, in its eyes, the Void Primordial wasn’t anything special.

But Anthony was right—if a being like the Abyss Maw or the Dark Primordial existed here, that was far more terrifying. They’d all be dead. Don’t treat Primordials like snacks—they’re the highest-tier entities in the Void.

Only beings like Ang, who shared the same nature as the Void Primordial, had the qualification to stand as their enemies—but the problem was, Ang’s true body wasn’t here.

“It’s all speculation,” Negrilis tried to reassure them. “Void Primordials aren’t fast-growing vegetables—how could they be everywhere? Maybe something else smashed them?”

Anthony rolled his eyes again: “You’re making it scarier by the second. If it was a Void Primordial, fine—but if something else can smash black crystal, isn’t that even worse? Even Your Majesty, after upgrading, must tread carefully—what if one day someone smashes him?”

“Then maybe it wasn’t smashed at all—it cracked naturally,” Negrilis snapped.

Anthony spread his hands: “You’re the one who said it looked smashed.”

While they bickered, Ang made a new discovery—he kicked off hard and shot forward.

Everyone hurried after him, soon arriving before a massive vertical hole piercing the ground.

“This hole is perfectly straight and deep—who dug such a straight shaft here?” Negrilis asked.

The hole’s diameter was about ten meters, plunging vertically downward, uniform in width—clearly not natural. Even with a ruler, it’d be nearly impossible to dig such a perfectly vertical shaft.

Du Luo examined the rim and said: “It doesn’t look like it was pierced either—if something had stabbed in, the interior would show compression marks. There are none here.”

As they analyzed, they entered the hole. The inner walls made Du Luo’s eyes gleam with excitement: “Pressure marks—look, the walls are covered in intact pressure patterns.”

“Pressure marks? Aren’t these carved?” Negrilis also saw the patterns on the walls, but couldn’t tell whether they were pressed or carved.

“No, no, no—not carved. Definitely pressed. There’s no fibrous streaking along the patterns. If carved, the tool’s edge would leave fibrous traces following the lines. These patterns are smooth and even.”

So… what had pressed them? Carrying this question, they descended further, finally entering a regular-shaped chamber.

It was a square chamber. The hole they’d entered through sat at its center; the spaces on either side were nearly identical—perfectly rectangular, with only a sloping ramp where the two faces met.

Negrilis scanned the chamber and said: “Doesn’t this space feel like the inside of a giant hammer mold? Almost like something made with the lost-wax method—look how clear the wall patterns are.”

“Yes! Lost-wax method—first carve a giant hammer out of wax, then coat it, melt and drain the wax away, and you get a space like this. The hole we came through is the hammer handle—and also the wax drainage channel. That’s why the patterns are pressed, not carved.” Du Luo slapped his thigh in excitement.

Anthony was stunned: “A wax mold this big? How much wax would that take? What was this thing built for?”

“It doesn’t have to be wax,” Du Luo’s mind opened up. “Anything that can be poured out without damaging the outer mold works. The Void’s cold—ice blocks work too.” Lost-wax was just a technique name—it didn’t require wax.

Carve a giant hammer shape out of ice, coat it with an outer mold, then melt the ice away—you’d get this perfectly regular inner space.

Ang suddenly shook his head.

Negrilis and the others, still enthusiastically debating the purpose of the giant hammer, felt as if a bucket of ice water had been dumped on their souls: “What? Did we guess wrong?”

Ang said: “Giant hammer strikes. Black crystal body shatters. Devouring force. Giant hammer shrinks.”

Negrilis drew a sharp breath: “You mean there really was a hammer this big, smashed a black crystal body, then released devouring force to compress the shattered fragments into a single mass—and shrank itself, forming this space?”

Ang nodded.

“Impossible! Do you know how big this space is? Who could lift a hammer this huge? And smash a black crystal body? There’s so much black crystal outside—even if you shattered a thousand ancient corpses, you wouldn’t get this much!”

Ang tilted his head: “I can.”

“Pfft…” Negrilis spat out a mouthful of blood. It understood perfectly what “can” meant—Ang was answering its earlier question: “Who could lift it?”

Thinking carefully—if Ang had devoured the Red Giant Sphere, he might indeed swing a hammer this massive. Damn, what kind of monsters are these?

Though Negrilis had protested, it didn’t disbelieve. Ang rarely spoke—but when he did, even Anthony, Du Luo, and even the Sovereign never doubted his words. For Ang, if he wasn’t certain, he wouldn’t speak at all.

Anthony immediately grasped the key point: “The hammer shrank—so where is the hammer? The pirates have no memory of it. Could it still be here?”

No sooner had Anthony spoken than a faint voice echoed from the corner of the chamber: “Talk too much… die…”

As the word “die” rang out, a hammer crashed out from the darkness, accompanied by a muffled thunderclap and tiny streaks of black lightning.