A rough black keratinous shell covered the entire body, filled with cracks and ravines.
From the cracks and ravines, dark gold light emanated, as if magma flowed within, with asymmetrical limbs, some bearing multiple arms, others bearing numerous tentacles...
When Hawk saw these two members of the Mutant Race before him, he recalled Felicia's previous description of the Mutant Race.
Not just similar, but exactly the same.
However...
These two were striking a battle stance, facing him with roars, yet did not immediately launch an attack.
Do they not want to?
No.
They cannot, because these two mutants had been captured and kept.
Indeed.
Captivity.
Hawk immediately noticed the chains wrapped around the bodies of these two mutants.
Two thick chains emitting a silver sheen, resembling Adamantium, tightly bound around the waists of the mutants, with the other end firmly connected to the mountain behind them.
No matter how fiercely these two mutants struggled, the chain connected to the mountain remained taut, showing no sign of breaking.
"Hiss!"
"Mutants, kept in captivity."
"What a thing!"
After realizing this, Hawk couldn't help but gasp, his inner voice exclaimed multiple times.
But that's not the point.
The point is, as the two mutants struggled angrily upon seeing Hawk, under the constantly clanking chains, the fluorescent moss covering the mountain peeled away, exposing the true form of the mountain.
Hawk, seeing the silver glow revealed from the mountain's surface after the moss peeled away, first froze, then walked to the mountain's side, placing his right hand on it, activating his Sixth Sense fully.
Then—
He was stunned.
What a discovery.
The entire mountain was Adamantium?
This exaggerated?
Hawk's mind flashed images of the countless mountains suspended in the Lost World as he gazed below, and once again, he was greatly shocked.
To be honest, Hawk descended earlier with the hope of finding Adamantium, thinking it would be just like Vibranium, requiring him to play miner and extract it.
But it turns out, he didn't need to dig; these floating mountains in the Lost World's sky, varied in size, were completely composed of Adamantium, merely petrified over endless ages, shaping into their current form.
In the next moment.
Hawk's heart instantly burned with eagerness, decisively turned away, ignoring the two captive mutants before him.
Though he didn't understand what had occurred here.
Yet...
Don't meddle in other people's affairs!
He came here solely for Adamantium, uninterested in the events or reasons behind them.
I'll take the Adamantium and leave.
With this thought, Hawk stepped directly through the white light before him, returning to the Holy Hall.
Boom!
Two golden beams of energy suddenly hit, striking Hawk's chest. Caught off guard, Hawk flew backwards like a meteor, once again returning to the high valley where the two mutant creatures had been kept, his entire back colliding with the mountain composed of Adamantium.
The mountain behind him shook instantly, with countless moss and surface layers peeling off, revealing more of the unique silver glow of Adamantium.
Simultaneously.
The two mutants, seeing Hawk suddenly appear within their attack range, wasted no hesitation, they growled as if they were chained dogs lunging at Hawk.
Hawk's Little Cosmos ignited in an instant, delivering a punch that perforated one mutant's body, casually performing a fancy leg sweep in mid-air, driving the other lunging mutant into the ground.
Under powerful impact, the second mutant's head intimately hit the ground, also revealing that the lower surface was composed of Adamantium.
Which is harder—mutant's head or Adamantium?
The answer is obvious.
With a watermelon-burst sound, the two captive mutants were reduced to corpses, one with a pierced stomach, the other with a shattered head.
The mutant with a pierced stomach also revealed a fragmented skeleton crawler in its abdomen.
Clearly.
The skeleton crawlers outside and those rushing Skull Island originated from mutant offspring born through these two captive mutants' mating.
While Hawk's thoughts raced, he withdrew his gaze from the dead mutant's body and fixed it on the white light in front.
Soon.
Accompanied by footsteps, a rugged-faced man with black hair and blue eyes, strong build, wearing a blue-golden interlaced uniform appeared before him.
The man's gaze first fell on the dead bodies of the two Mutants at Hawk's feet.
In the next moment.
Revisiting Hawk, the man's blue eyes instantly flooded with golden power, followed by two golden beams, resembling Superman's thermographic vision, striking towards Hawk.
"The same trick doesn't work on Saint Warriors."
"Boom!"
Witnessing this, Hawk threw a punch at the man while his form flickered in place. Upon reappearing, accompanied by the sound of the Phoenix Holy Armor manifesting and aligning with his body, Hawk punched the man's chest in front of him.
It is impolite not to return what you receive!
The man with a resilient face showed a hint of incredulity, followed by flying backward just like how he had just knocked Hawk away.
Boom!
The man flew out from the white light and crashed straight onto a huge statue.
The surface of the massive statue cracked and fell off with the vibration, revealing its silver glowing essence.
Goodness gracious.
Is this statue also made of Adamantium metal?
Hawk, who flashed out right after, watched the statue fall to the ground with a bang, and exclaimed in shock, then he flashed again, appearing before the man who had steadied himself in mid-air.
A punch!
"Boom!"
"You're courting death!"
The golden energy in the eyes of the man who had steadied himself flowed once more, releasing a scorching golden energy that collided with Hawk's punch in mid-air.
The violent energy surged within the Holy Hall instantly, causing the entire place to tremble at this moment.
On the beams, on the walls, even on the ground, the stone and moss covering them peeled off completely, exposing the original construction material of the Holy Hall.
Adamantium metal.
Still Adamantium metal.
Stronger and rarer than Vibranium, it's said to be utterly indestructible once fixed, yet here it seems as common as street garbage.
With a loud bang!
Following the shockwave from the clash of fists and thermographic vision, Hawk and the man flew backward.
Soon.
The two stabilized themselves again, one by the entrance of the Holy Hall, the other at the entrance of the white light, hovering above the spacious Holy Hall, staring at each other.
Hawk's Little Cosmos kept burning, looking at the resolute-faced black-haired man staring back at him from afar, and a name flashed through his mind.
"Icarus!"
"..."
Icarus paused the golden energy flowing through his eyes upon hearing Hawk shout his name.
Yet his eyes remained fiercely trained on Hawk, his voice deep.
"Who are you?"
"It really is you."
Hawk, upon hearing this, confirmed his guess, while his gaze swept over the ten statues inside the Holy Hall and the murals on the walls, finally landing on the skeleton that had just collapsed due to the tremor, its chest pierced.
"The two figures depicted on the murals here, they should be you and Sesi, right?"
"The Uighur tribe living here, they should be descendants of you and Sesi."
"Am I right?"
While speaking, Hawk once again looked towards Icarus from afar.
Icarus's gaze turned icy.
His answer remained the same as before.
"Who the hell are you!"
"Hawk, just a passerby."
"Passerby?"
Icarus's gaze lowered slightly, then he looked back at Hawk: "People from this planet don't possess energy as powerful as yours."
Hawk chuckled: "I have my own fortunes."
See.
Before obtaining the Reality Gemstone, Mephisto determined right away that his energy originates from the Outer Cosmos.
But after he obtained the Reality Gemstone and materialized his own energy, Icarus before him could no longer discern the origin of his energy.
Hawk now fully grasped what had transpired here.
Years ago, the leader of the Eternal Race, Ajak, led its members to exterminate the last Mutant Race before dispersing them across the world, waiting for the Divine Appearance.
Icarus and another member of the Eternal Race, Sesi, accidentally discovered this Lost World, then settled here, establishing the Uighur tribe.
However, due to certain circumstances, Icarus and Sesi left, leaving the Uighur tribe here to fend for themselves.
Afterward, who knows how long passed, Icarus returned quietly, bringing back two Mutant Races.
The Uighur tribe was forced to leave and survive on Skull Island above, gradually degenerating into its native inhabitants due to the effect of time flow, with only generations of High Priests knowing the truth about the Mutant Race.
As for why Icarus did this.
Who knows, but one thing's for certain, it's guaranteed Icarus brought back the Mutant Race thought to be exterminated.
Because in the plot of the Eternal Race, when the truth that Icarus killed Ajak using Mutant Race was exposed, Sesi once questioned Icarus: "Was it you who brought back the Mutant Race?"
Facing Sesi's question, Icarus's answer at that time was silence.
And silence already served as a very good answer.
Just like now.
Icarus, listening to Hawk's "I have my fortunes" answer, sneered coldly, once again his eyes surged with golden energy.
"It doesn't matter who you are, since you've already known, then stay here."
"Boom!"
"..."