In King Kong Canyon!
Hawk's figure appeared silently at the edge of the underground passage entrance, still emitting ochre smoke into the canyon.
This ochre smoke didn't seem to be released actively; rather, it resembled a kind of natural overflow.
Perhaps when the Uighurs came up from below, they didn't seal the entrance properly, allowing skull crawlers to continually emerge from inside.
Yet...
Why are the ones coming up not the Mutant Race, but skull crawlers whose form and abilities are inferior by comparison?
Is it because they don't want to, or can't?
Hawk leaned towards the possibility of the latter.
The Mutant Race doesn't refrain from coming up; they simply can't. The reason why can only be understood by venturing below.
With this thought in mind.
Hawk didn't hesitate and took a step forward; instantly, he disappeared from the ground of King Kong Canyon.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!
Freely falling towards the bottom of the passage under gravity, Hawk felt the wind whistling past his ears and looked upwards.
The entrance to King Kong Canyon had almost shrunk to the size of a grain.
Hawk lowered his gaze.
The passage, filled with ochre smoke, remained bottomless, obscuring his vision from seeing the true situation below.
Next moment.
Hawk's Little Cosmos ignited; instantly, his falling speed accelerated, while Phoenix Fire spread across his feet, ensuring that should any danger arise, his kick could pulverize anything trying to block him.
Unknown how long had passed.
His vision cleared as a Lost World appeared before his eyes.
Boom!
Hawk's figure instantly halted, stopping forcibly in mid-air as a sonic boom echoed beneath him, blasting a doughnut shape in the ochre clouds below.
This sonic boom reverberated loudly and endlessly through the Lost World.
Hawk looked up once more.
Before him.
A thick layer of moss emitting faint phosphorescence covered the dome, with countless massive, sharp crystals hanging from it.
The thick ochre clouds pervaded the sky; upon closer look, one would discover the ochre clouds flowing upwards through a passage in the dome.
As for beneath the dome...
Hawk gazed downward at the colossal, jagged mountains seemingly held aloft by invisible forces, eerily floating in the sky.
The mountain surfaces were similarly covered with moss emitting faint phosphorescence like that on the dome.
The mountains were connected by vast, translucent, crystal-like natural stone bridges or thick glowing vines.
Beneath the mountains lay the cracked ground; through the ground's gaps, one could see additional space below, not an abyss but a flowing, golden-hot energy resembling magma, continuously circulating beneath every piece of ground.
On the ground lay forests and rivers; whatever exists outside, the same exists here.
Moreover, there are creatures other than skull crawlers here.
Accompanied by a sharp screech, a peculiar creature with a body length of 130 meters, resembling a red snake with a pair of red wings, suddenly unfurled from coiled mountains, opening its sharp maw as it swooped towards Hawk in the sky.
Hawk snapped back to reality, focused, as his form descended toward this bizarre creature, enveloping his right leg once more with Phoenix Fire.
"Phoenix Flying Kick!"
"Boom!"
The creature's head shattered from Hawk's kick, spraying fiery red liquid while its massive body plummeted toward the ground swift.
Yet, before this strange creature hit the ground, a cacophony of screams erupted.
Hawk looked toward the sound's direction.
Before him.
Peculiar, large-bodied flying creatures like a combination of owl heads and bat wings swooped to the snake-winged creature's corpse, beginning a struggle for the God-given meal in mid-air.
Disinterestedly glancing at them, Hawk followed along and flew towards a direction led by instinct.
Soon.
He arrived in a canyon formed by two enormous floating mountains.
The canyon is high and deep, covered in forests.
Yet there were no traces of any peculiar creature activities here; even those owl-headed and bat-winged creatures hastily turned and flew away upon seeing Hawk reach this canyon.
All creatures possess an instinct to avoid danger.
Clearly.
For the peculiar creatures here, this high-deep canyon holds a terror, preventing them to even approach near.
However...
Hawk felt no fear in this high-deep canyon.
His gaze fell upon the sanctuary across, seemingly melded into the mountain.
Indeed.
It's identical to the sanctuary in the Uighur Village; however, compared to the sanctuary on Skull Island, the sanctuary here is covered with moss emitting faint phosphorescence, blending seamlessly into the rear mountain from afar.
As Hawk lifted his foot, he found himself in the abandoned Holy Hall before him, not knowing how long it had been deserted.
The Holy Hall shone brightly.
The beams, the tops of the walls, were inlaid with mystical crystals emitting white light, illuminating the entire Holy Hall as if it were daylight.
The first thing that caught the eye were ten statues in the Holy Hall, each carved out of the same mystical crystal, each with a different expression.
Ten giant statues, like titans, were arranged in a row.
There were gentle-faced females and tall males; also, there were males with ostentatious expressions and females with a cold and aloof demeanor...
"Are these the ten members of the Eternal Race?"
As Hawk's gaze swept over the faces of these ten giant statues, he thought silently, then fixed his eyes on the murals on the walls on either side of the Holy Hall.
If the murals in the Uighur Village's Holy Hall were the chronicles of the Uighur after they arrived on Skull Island, then the murals on either side of this Holy Hall were the origin of the Uighur.
When the last of the Mutant Race was eliminated, the solemn and sacred leader stood alone at the seaside, while the nine members behind him each walked in different directions.
The gentle-faced female and the tall male walked together and settled down in this Lost World.
The first Uighur member was born.
They settled in this valley, and with the birth of dozens of the second batch of Uighur members, this Holy Hall was also born.
Afterward...
The tall male flew away without a word.
The gentle female hurried after him, and from then on, neither the man nor the woman ever returned.
The first male Uighur was appointed as the patriarch, and as time evolved, the Uighur grew more potent, clearly showing that in the face of the extraordinary, the possibility of mutations due to inbreeding seemed somewhat laughable.
And that initial Uighur became the High Priest.
Countless Uighur lived in this canyon, living in comfort and harmony, with extraordinary power and abilities as their backing.
Then, a change occurred.
The Mutant Race appeared, bringing an unprecedented disaster to the Uighur, who had never encountered any danger since their inception and didn't even know what danger meant.
Over time, the Mutant Race, which could evolve through battle and gain abilities after killing them, quickly gained the upper hand in this war.
Finally—
There was no end.
The final mural stopped abruptly at a passageway exposed on the dome of the Lost World.
Hawk withdrew his gaze, fixing his eyes on a skeleton sitting on the steps, head bowed, holding a metal scepter under the ten giant statues.
According to the mural on the wall, the skeleton before him should be that first Uighur.
But—
This skeleton didn't seem to be killed by the Mutant Race.
Hawk's gaze fell on the skeleton's chest, which had been pierced through the ribs, leaving an empty cavity.
The skeleton seemed to have died from some powerful energy that penetrated its chest, causing its death.
Hawk thought in his heart.
The next second.
His gaze turned to the sides of the ten giant statues, and he saw skeleton insects crawling silently from the dark, baring their teeth with fierce light. As they appeared, they immediately leaped towards him without hesitation.
Hawk raised an eyebrow.
In an instant!
The sound of Hawk's fist.
The hissing of the skeleton insects.
And the sound of flesh being pierced by a fist resonated continuously in the Holy Hall.
But the commotion came quickly and went just as fast.
After Hawk dealt with the last skeleton insect, the Holy Hall once again returned to its silent stillness.
Then—
The sound of angry roars, accompanied by the clinking of chains, came from behind the statues.
Ignoring the various corpses of the skeletal insects at his feet and before him, Hawk flickered and appeared behind the ten statues arranged in a row.
In sight.
In front of him was a vast white light shadow, and it was under this light that the ten giant statues appeared like white jade.
The roar came from behind this white light shadow.
Hawk raised an eyebrow, looking at the white light shadow before him. He lifted his right hand to touch the shadow, ripples undulating on it, as his right hand submerged into the shadow without obstruction.
It seemed that there was another space beyond this light shadow.
Hawk did not hesitate, stepping out in an instant, placing himself within the white light shadow, and as he took another step forward, the white light shadow dissipated. Another vast dark cave, which once seemed like it should have been full of flowers and plants resembling Heaven, but now filled with various skeleton insect remnants, appeared in view, exuding a hell-like atmosphere beyond words.
The sound of chains clinked.
The roar was incessant.
Hawk looked in the direction where the sound came from.
In sight!
The Mutant Race!
...