Mother

Gradually, a colossal humanoid figure appeared above the island.

At first, the figure was blurry. Its bones and internal organs could be seen assembling themselves, but little by little, it became solid, as though a phantom had transformed into a creation that truly existed.

After Hawkins completed the rough framework, his Curse Power was completely exhausted. He rested for several hours before continuing to adjust the body.

"No, this body doesn't need to maintain a human shape. Besides, a human brain is far too small for me. Its brain capacity has to be increased, and it doesn't need such strong mobility either. Forget it, I'll use the old body template!"

Hawkins had originally planned to directly create a giant clone, but after thinking it over carefully, he realized there was no need for it to be humanoid. It could take another form entirely.

Although the human form suited his aesthetic tastes, it had many unreasonable aspects. Once it reached a certain size, the human body would develop countless flaws and defects.

A day later, a gigantic, bizarre, metallic, indescribable golden creature floated above Yazhong Island.

The creature had countless eyes, mouths, arms, and tentacles. Blazing light shone through the gaps between every cell. Its very existence seemed to twist space and time, directly carving out a portion of Eternal Space. Even without consciousness residing within it, it emanated a terrifying aura.

Hawkins looked at the creation before him with a trace of nostalgia. This was one of the bodies he had once used while drifting through the universe.

This body combined countless outstanding genes and advanced organs. Alien lifeforms had once bestowed upon it the name of a god, while Hawkins had called it "Mother," because this body carried the wisdom of countless civilizations, and every cell contained unimaginable genetic information.

"Alright. I hope my guess is correct."

Feeling slightly sentimental, Hawkins slowly walked toward Mother.

One of Mother's abilities was to accept other living beings and assimilate them into itself.

When Hawkins approached Mother, his body transformed into countless cells and was completely absorbed by Mother. At the same time, his consciousness swiftly transferred into Mother.

Mother's previously closed eyes opened one after another, and its bodily functions began operating.

Although he had not used this body for tens of billions of years, Hawkins still skillfully controlled the operation of every organ. He extended an arm and struck the air. The minute amount of hydrogen in the atmosphere was instantly pulled together, then triggered into a nuclear fusion explosion.

Looks like I haven't gotten rusty. Unfortunately, ninety-nine percent of this body's cells are made of elements from Eternal Space, so it can't leave Eternal Space. Hawkins looked at the massive crater blasted into the ground and thought to himself.

However, this proved that the curse on him had indeed been offset.

In Mother's state, his thinking ability was trillions of times greater than in his human state. Problems that originally required long periods of thought could now be answered in the blink of an eye.

He realized that the reason the curse had weakened was that its calculations were based on the number of cells, with the curse's effects spread among them.

Therefore, the larger the body, the weaker the curse.

The Great Way was simple at its core.

In truth, the principle behind the curse was extremely simple. It was merely that no one in this world had devoted themselves to studying it.

Hawkins adapted to Mother exceptionally well. After all, he had personally designed this body. For tens of billions of years in the past, he had wandered the universe using it, and the experience had long been etched deep into his consciousness.

After confirming that there were no problems with the body, he directly activated his ability, Splitting and Proliferation!

Inside the enormous body, the atoms that had broken down from Hawkins rapidly reassembled, eventually returning to Hawkins's form. He was spat out by Mother, and in the blink of an eye, he had recovered.

The same atoms, the same molecules, the same cells—but Hawkins had actually been completely reassembled. He was no longer Pirate Hawkins, but Mother Hawkins.

Mother's thinking ability was trillions of times that of a human. Let alone dividing his attention between two tasks, he had countless eyes, countless arms, and countless mouths. He could process all kinds of tasks on multiple fronts at once; even dividing his attention ten thousand ways was child's play.

Hawkins glanced back at Mother, then carefully sensed the changes in his body and confirmed that all bodily functions were operating normally.

Although Mother possessed all manner of powerful and wondrous abilities, Hawkins's body had not grown stronger. His ability values were completely unchanged from before, and even his genes had not changed in the slightest.

The only difference was that even if Hawkins were killed, his consciousness would not die.

After all, his primary consciousness was now within Mother, not within Hawkins himself.

Of course, every blessing had its bane.

Although Mother's existence guaranteed Hawkins's life, it also weakened his combat power.

Originally, Hawkins could cover his body with Curse Power at any moment. Now, he needed 0.01 seconds to react, which was equivalent to having a tiny opening. If an enemy was strong enough and could seize that opening, then Hawkins's body might be destroyed.

With a thought, Hawkins returned to his laboratory and picked up the blowpipe.

This time, he did not use Curse Power to cover his hand, so the instant he picked up the blowpipe, his body gained another curse.

The blowpipe's curse had never been a particularly powerful type. Now that Mother was sharing the curse, Hawkins found that the curse on his body was utterly insignificant. Even if suffocation struck, it could last at most 0.001 seconds.

In other words, he was effectively immune to the blowpipe's curse. After all, not breathing for 0.001 seconds could not possibly cause harm unless the timing was calculated with exquisite precision.

"Mother still needs to become larger. Only by becoming larger can it bear more curses!"

Hawkins tried breathing. In an instant, the air was compressed inside his mouth. Then he gave a light puff, and a huge crater was immediately smashed into the wall before him.

However, using it this way was truly like using a priceless treasure to crack a walnut.

Curse Power flowed into the blowpipe, and a small bubble appeared at its tip. Hawkins tried compressing the air within the bubble, gradually compressing it into liquid. He continued outputting Curse Power and compressed it further, until the liquid air was gradually compressed into solid form.

Yet even then, he continued pouring out Curse Power.

As long as there was enough Curse Power, the blowpipe could continue compressing air forever. This ability was simply terrifying.

Under Hawkins's persistence, the small bubble began to tremble, and the surrounding matter was affected. However, Mother released sufficient Curse Power to smooth away the disturbance.

When the air was compressed to its absolute limit, all matter in the laboratory was instantly torn apart by immense gravity. Hawkins's body was also destroyed in the blink of an eye, and even light was sucked into the bubble.

However, at the instant the black hole formed, Mother released Curse Power and stopped the process. Then, as though time had flowed backward, all matter returned to its original place, and Hawkins's body rapidly reassembled.

Since air could be compressed to the limit and turned into a black hole, atoms could naturally also be compressed into fusion, thereby triggering a nuclear explosion.

Hawkins summoned the Eternal Sea Chart and tossed the blowpipe into it. Closing his eyes, he sent a stream of Curse Power spreading from his arm. When he whipped the air, he instantly compressed the hydrogen in it to the absolute limit and triggered nuclear fusion, using the exact same method as Mother.

In an instant, dazzling light covered the entire island, and his laboratory was directly reduced to ashes.

He had actually thought of this method long ago. Without Mother, however, he would not have casually courted death, because he could not be sure whether dying in Eternal Space meant truly dying.

But now that Mother guaranteed his safety, he could freely experiment with every possible outcome.

Just as the explosion was about to spread to the sea, Mother directly stopped the nuclear reaction. In the blink of an eye, it was as though time had reversed—the mushroom cloud rapidly shrank, and everything eventually returned to normal.

This kind of attack did not hold much meaning. He had never intended to use nuclear weapons against the Seven Seas.

He merely wanted to know how miraculous Cursed Relics truly were. A Fine-grade Relic possessed an ability that sounded unimpressive—Air Compression—yet when supplemented by knowledge, it could gain the power to destroy the world.

If the abilities of other Cursed Relics were developed further, would even more wondrous powers emerge?

The newly revived Hawkins's mind was filled with plans to court death...

Eternal Space—House Town.

Because the land was vast and the population sparse, everyone owned a house of their own.

At that moment, Mark was squatting before the toilet in his home, carefully scrubbing it. He could not wash other people's toilets, but at least no one would fight him for his own.

To earn more exchange points, Mark now split every bowel movement into three sessions. That way, he could wash the toilet three times and earn three exchange points.

From initially being deeply resistant to cleaning toilets to now being accustomed to it, he felt that he had matured greatly.

"I wonder whether little sister Jennie has taken a dump yet?" Mark stopped what he was doing, raised his head to look at the glowing toilet, and could not help muttering to himself.

Thinking about the girl he liked doing the same thing as him, he became brimming with motivation again and continued wiping the edge of the toilet.

At that moment, someone suddenly @'d him in the Chat Group. He opened it and saw that Hawkins had told him to prepare. Next came a full-scale assault on Black Market Island.

There are quite a few pirates on Black Market Island. Maybe I can do some missions too. Mark stopped what he was doing, submitted the toilet-cleaning mission, and thought to himself.

But then his expression changed. Oh no—he had not finished taking a dump yet.

Just now, in order to do the toilet-cleaning mission one more time, he had forcibly pinched off his poop, but there were still two-thirds left to come out!

He hurriedly pulled down his pants, sat on the toilet, and wore an expression filled with bitter hatred and deep enmity.