Foreign Land Reclamation By a Vegetable-growing Skeleton Chapter 1428

Chapter 1428: Chapter 989: Deciphering the Pattern Imprint

The Universal Pull Divine Hammer let out an enraged roar: “Talkative… Die! Die! Die! Die…”

This roar was not a sound but a soul scream, blasting outward like a shockwave.

In Arcane Magic, there is a type of voice magic that can release sound waves at special frequencies to attack the enemy. The scream from this hammer was just like that magic, assaulting everyone's souls.

Ange didn't care, but it was unbearable for the others, especially Negris, who subconsciously covered his ears. But since it wasn't sound, covering the ears was useless; if anything, they should be shielding their souls.

Durken suddenly jumped in front of Negris, his cloak swirling around him, enveloping both himself and Negris.

Anthony stepped forward, his wand pounded the ground once, dong–then again, dong–

Rings of holy auras expanded outwards, countering the soul screams. By the time the impact reached everyone, it no longer caused much harm.

It was still very uncomfortable, like having an amplified magic right beside the ear. Anthony's face was wrinkled enough to trap mosquitoes.

This continued for four seconds, then the soul scream abruptly stopped, and the hammer the size of a human head whooshed down to the size of a fingertip, which Ange pinched in his hand.

“What happened? What did you do to it? How did it… become thinner?” Negris peeked out from behind the cloak, seeing that the fight seemed over, and hesitantly asked.

Ange said: “Lock… seal.”

“Seal? Did you seal it to make it this small, or did it become small because you sealed it?” Negris asked.

There's a difference between the two: if it's the former, it means Ange has mastered a sealing enchantment capable of shrinking matter; if it's the latter, it means the hammer is only that small.

Ange tilted his head, troubled, and said: “I used, its power, to seal it, became small.”

Anthony and Durken looked at each other, clearly not understanding, but Negris did understand: “You can do that? You used its Power of Devour to seal it this small? So, the seal is your power, but the diminishment is its power?”

Ange breathed a sigh of relief and nodded vigorously.

“That's too clever! So, you're saying if you don't remove the seal, it will remain this small forever?” Negris asked.

Ange nodded again.

“Can it still answer questions now?” Negris inquired.

Ange handed over the tiny hammer.

Negris addressed the tiny hammer: “Who are you? How did you end up here?”

The tiny hammer let out an enraged bellow: “Talkative… die.”

Negris repeated the question several times, but the tiny hammer always responded with the same bellow, nowhere close to seeming like it had normal consciousness.

“It's screwed, it's a fool. Why does it keep muttering that one phrase? Did someone who talks too much pee on it or something?” Durken said, somewhat perplexed.

“So it smashed me because I was talking? Am I too talkative? It's sick, right?” Negris angrily said.

Anthony nodded: “It doesn't even have a complete consciousness, definitely sick, mentally ill.”

The inquiry couldn't proceed any further. The small hammer had no complete consciousness and only kept repeating that one sentence.

Everyone anxiously examined the space. A hammer that could grow so large, possessed powerful devouring power, and even smashed a Body of Mourning–what was the origin of this hammer? Whose Body of Mourning was it? Why was such a powerful creation here? Were there other things nearby?

One question after another filled the minds of Anthony and the others. With these questions in mind, they began searching the entire space.

Ange did not wander aimlessly but planted a World Tree Seedling as soon as he could, laid down a substrate around it, sprinkled the seeds of the Tree of the Dead, and then stepped on the footprint.

The Tree of the Dead did not require light to grow and was one of the few crops that could thrive in the absence of light. Ange found the breath of death in this place to be very dense, making it an excellent spot for planting Deadman's Fruit.

With the Instant Death Halo activated, the seeds of the Tree of the Dead germinated and grew rapidly, producing surging life force, spurring the World Tree Seedling to also grow rapidly.

The World Tree is a magical plant. It not only transforms the environment but also adapts to it. It is the greatest protector of life.

In a place where Black Crystal was everywhere and soil was scarce, the World Tree Seedling gave up the previous growth pattern of deeply rooting and becoming a giant tree. Instead, it began spreading along the ground, extending through the gaps between Black Crystals, expanding like a net.

“Hold on, hold on, I haven't finished looking at it yet. These lines seem to have a pattern, likely to be some kind of script. I'm summarizing the pattern, don't cover it up,” Nagri was attentively observing and just as he made a discovery, he turned his head to see Ange starting to plant the tree.

Ange ran over and handed the Universal Pull Divine Hammer to him.

“Fair point. I'll just look at the hammer directly. Staring like an idiot, Durken, give me a magnifying glass,” Nagri grumbled annoyance.

Of course, things like a magnifying glass were merely words of embarrassment from Nagri. Its telepathy was better than any magnifying glass. No matter how small the pattern, it could 'see' clearly. Looking for patterns on the hammer spared it the trouble of moving around the space.

Soon, Nagri summarized the pattern of the lines, exclaiming, “I have figured out the pattern now. There's a problem–I need a few references to infer what these patterns represent.”

Decoding a completely unfamiliar pattern is very difficult without references because one would not know if it represented text, sound, or something abstract. If it's simply three horizontal lines, one might think it represents 'three,' but it could actually mean 'river.' How to translate that?

At this time, some references are needed. For example, if one line means one, two lines mean two, three lines mean three, then by that logic, four lines would certainly mean four.

Once the meaning of four lines is understood, one can look at the context and find the pattern of its occurrence, then make comparisons and guess the meaning of the next imprint. Once the next character is hypothesized, one can compare it with the context and summarize the pattern of the second character, then guess the third.

As more characters are hypothesized, one can go back and cross-verify to see if the earlier guesses are correct, repeating until everything is decoded.

However, this method presupposes having references. The more references there are, the faster the decoding will go.

“When people using different languages come together, one points to the Sun and says 'day,' while another points and says 'fire basin,' then one knows that in the other's language, 'fire basin' represents the Sun. That's a reference,” Nagri explained what a reference is.

Ange thought for a moment, conjured a water orb, and soaked the small hammer in it, eliciting no response from the hammer.

Ange then conjured a Fireball and put the small hammer into it to burn. Surprisingly, one of the imprints on the hammer reacted.

“There's a reaction, there's a reaction! Then this imprint might represent flame, heat, or the Fire Element,” Nagri quickly noted down.

Ange subjected the hammer to all the Natural Elements one by one. It reacted to fire, lightning, and Dark Element. However, it was always the same imprint that reacted.

“Eh, it reacts to fire, earth, and Dark Element. Then it shouldn't represent the Fire Element but perhaps energy? Source? Transformation?” Nagri hastily amended his notes.

Then Ange swung the small hammer, threw it out, banged it against things, or hit it with Soul Impact, soaked it in Breath of Death, or shouted loudly at it–in short, he tried everything he could think of to affect it and found nine imprints that reacted.

“Great, with nine references, let's see if I can decode them. This one is fire, this one is magnetism; fire magnetism? No, that's not right. It should be energy, magnetism, electricity, weak, strong–with the forces of magnetism, electricity, weak and strong? The core, what about the core? Contraction or fusion? Ange, try fusion. Yes, it's fusion. With the power of weak, strong, electric, and magnetic forces, fusion of something something, the Universal Pull Divine Hammer…”

As Nagri was decoding and muttering, the Universal Pull Divine Hammer, which had shrunk to the size of a fingertip, suddenly began to tremble violently, as if trying to break free from Ange's seal.

Chapter end

Report