A Supreme Effect

The Forging room was quiet.

The furnace fire had been banked, leaving only a layer of warm red embers flickering deep within its mouth. Their glow cast shifting shades over the dull metallic sheen accumulated through the years on the walls and iron racks. The Blood Sacrifice seemed to have left few traces. Only the shallow cut in Tang Wulin's palm and the distinctly altered Star-Sinking Hammer within him proved that a piece of Thousand-Refined Heavy Silver had truly been fed into this Martial Soul.

"Bring it out," Mang Tian suddenly said.

Tang Wulin paused briefly, then nodded.

Silver light flashed.

The Star-Sinking Hammer settled silently into his palm.

It still looked the same—short, blunt, heavy, and black all over. Rather than an imposing, powerful Tool Martial Soul, it resembled an ancient hammer worn by the years. But a closer, more careful look revealed that it was already utterly different from what it had been before yesterday.

Deep within the hammer, a faint layer of silver-gray tidal patterns now lay between the barely visible dark gold markings.

Those patterns neither shone nor rose to the surface. They seemed to have been washed into the iron by the tides, sinking deep inside. Only when the furnace light wavered did an occasional glimmer reveal a hint of quiet, profound chill. They had not made the Star-Sinking Hammer more splendid. Instead, they made it look older, heavier, more like something that had lain beneath the sea for many years.

As Tang Wulin held it, his first impression was not, How much heavier is it?

It was, It feels more complete.

That feeling was difficult to describe.

It was as though he had previously held nothing more than a hammer that was naturally heavy. Now, the hammer possessed another layer of bone and grain that truly belonged to it. Like something that should always have grown into this form, it had finally filled in its missing piece in his hands.

"Take out a piece of metal," Mang Tian said.

Tang Wulin immediately complied, taking a piece of Red Iron Essence from the nearby Material Rack. It had already been heated and kept ready. It was only a modest-sized test piece, at just the right temperature, its surface glowing a dull, hot red.

He set it firmly on the Forging Platform and was about to swing when Mang Tian raised a hand to stop him.

"Don't rush into a heavy strike." He stared at the Star-Sinking Hammer, his gaze deep and grave. "Listen first."

Tang Wulin nodded.

He raised the Star-Sinking Hammer and lightly tapped the Red Iron Essence, just as he ordinarily did when testing a hammer.

Clink—

The sound was crisp, carrying the slight tremor peculiar to heated metal.

But before that first note had faded, a second and a third followed, stacking up from the very same point.

Clink, clink, clink.

Three linked notes, extremely swift and light, yet distinctly separate.

Tang Wulin's hand froze for a moment.

He had not struck twice more.

He was certain he had brought the hammer down only once.

The silence in the Forging room suddenly deepened.

Even Tang Ziran heard something amiss and instinctively took half a step forward.

"Try again." Mang Tian's voice was lower than before, but a new gleam had unmistakably appeared in his eyes.

Tang Wulin drew a breath, suppressing the strange feeling that had abruptly risen within him. He raised the hammer again and gave another light tap.

Clink, clink, clink.

Three notes again.

Again, the same position, the same point of impact, with second and third reverberations naturally emerging after a single test strike.

Tang Wulin finally looked up.

"Teacher..."

This time, before he could finish, Mang Tian spoke in a low voice:

"A heavy strike."

Tang Wulin's gaze sharpened.

In the next instant, all the gentleness of his test strikes vanished. The Star-Sinking Hammer turned in his wrist, then swung fiercely upward with the strength of his shoulders, back, waist, and legs before crashing down!

Clang—!

The first thunderous ring burst out.

Then, behind the hammer's moving silhouette, two fainter, faster afterimages actually trailed into existence.

They did not look like illusions. It was more as though, after the first strike fell, something had forcibly dragged two more downward swings from its lingering momentum.

Clang! Clang!

The next two reports burst almost on top of the first, separated by only the slimmest interval, yet their force landed solidly in the Red Iron Essence.

Three sounds as one.

Three strikes on the same point.

A spot that should have received only one hammer mark sank through three layers in the blink of an eye. The metal's surface rippled rapidly like water, then gave a short, muffled groan.

Even Tang Wulin himself was stunned.

He looked down at the Star-Sinking Hammer in his palm, then at the test piece compressed by three layers of hammer force in a single breath. His palm felt slightly numb. Yet within that numbness lay an indescribable sense of clarity—as though the hammer had finally grown the edge it was always meant to have.

"This is..." He opened his mouth.

But Mang Tian had already supplied the rest.

"The stacked hammer effect."

His tone was neither emphatic nor excited; it was almost flat. Yet anyone listening carefully could hear a rare tremor held beneath that calm.

Tang Wulin stared blankly at him.

"Stacked Hammers?"

Mang Tian did not explain immediately. Instead, he stepped forward and pressed his fingers against the triple hammer mark on the test piece. Its heat had yet to dissipate, but its surface had already been driven deep, its edges compressed tightly, without the slightest sign of dispersed force.

He withdrew his hand and looked up at Tang Wulin.

"Stacked Hammers means that when a strike falls, its momentum does not end. The metal itself completes a resonance and rebound in an instant, carrying the residual momentum of your original strike into two more layers."

"They aren't phantoms or feints. They're two layers of hammer force that truly land."

"The second carries roughly seventy percent of the first strike's force. The third takes another fifty percent. With three strikes stacked on one point, good control will make the effect of a single hammer blow far surpass what an ordinary person can achieve."

Here, Mang Tian paused. His gaze returned to the Star-Sinking Hammer, and a faint but profound envy finally surfaced in his eyes.

"This is a supreme effect."

"And it's the supreme effect best suited to a hammer."

Tang Wulin's fingers unconsciously tightened around the Star-Sinking Hammer.

Of course he knew the word "supreme" carried weight, but he still did not fully understand just how heavy that weight was.

Mang Tian glanced at him, as though seeing through his bewilderment, and gave a cold snort.

"Never mind you," he said. "Even I have never forged a thousand-refined hammer with the Stacked Hammers effect."

Listening nearby, Tang Ziran froze briefly and instinctively looked toward his old friend.

He knew better than anyone what sort of man Mang Tian was. His standards towered above the clouds, and his tongue was sharp. Ordinarily, even hearing him say "not bad" was rare. Now, he had actually said, "Even I have never forged one." This went beyond any ordinary praise.

And once Tang Wulin heard his teacher's words clearly, he felt as though something had gently struck him.

So... it was already that good?

But Mang Tian was not finished.

"The reason an ordinary Blacksmith must perform a Blood Sacrifice on his first work of Thousand Refinement is that the first piece is the most likely to develop an effect closest to him and most rooted in his essence. After the Blood Sacrifice, it becomes linked to the Blacksmith's bloodline, and that effect is pushed to its utmost."

"That's why the most important thousand-refined piece in most Blacksmiths' lives is often their first. It's also why they usually shape that piece into their own Forging hammer, to accompany them for a lifetime."

As he spoke, his gaze settled on the Star-Sinking Hammer in Tang Wulin's hand, and his tone softened a little.

"You're different. You didn't turn your first thousand-refined piece into an external hammer. You fed it straight into your Martial Soul."

"In other words, this stacked hammer effect isn't attached to some external object now. It has grown into your Martial Soul itself."

"No one can take it from you, even if they try."

Warmth suddenly flared in Tang Wulin's chest.

He looked down at the hammer in his hand, as though only now truly understanding what he had just gained.

Not a pair of forging hammers, not a piece of material.

But an ability that would accompany him all the way forward.

"Teacher..." he asked softly. "Does that mean every time I Forging from now on, I can use one strike as three?"

Mang Tian glanced at him, looking as though he wanted to smile, only to forcibly suppress it.

"In your dreams."

"You have the effect, but your control is still a long way off. You've only just begun. The two additional layers emerge naturally after your hammer falls because the metal and your Martial Soul are carrying the momentum themselves. Only when you can release and rein in those three layers freely—one when you want one, three when you want three, and even deliberately shift the landing points of the second and third—will you truly know how to use it."

Having said that, he added:

"Still, even as it is now, it's enough to put you far ahead of others."

At those words, Tang Wulin could no longer suppress the light in his eyes.

He looked at the test piece on the Forging Platform, then down at his hammer. It felt as though a fire burned in his chest, something stoking it brighter and brighter.

He suddenly recalled the path he had traveled.

The inconspicuous little black hammer from his Martial Soul Awakening, the days when his first swings in the workshop had left both arms aching, all those ordinary pieces of metal beneath his hammer, the silver light that had broken through the furnace flames last night, and tonight's triple hammer notes that even he had never expected.

It seemed that all those unremarkable things had, in the end, been giving him his answer little by little.

It was not that he had no path.

The path he walked had simply never been anyone else's.

"Try again," Mang Tian suddenly said.

Tang Wulin paused.

"Stop daydreaming." Mang Tian's voice turned cold. "Your supreme effect won't settle into place on its own just because you spend a little longer being happy. Practice while it's hot."

"Yes!"

Tang Wulin answered at once.

This time, he was no longer testing it. With the straightforward excitement only a boy could possess, he raised the hammer again.

The first blow still produced three stacked strikes.

The second did the same.

By the third, he had begun instinctively trying to catch the timing of those two afterimages.

Not by looking, but by feeling.

Feeling how, after the hammer fell, its lingering momentum was "carried" by the layer of tidal patterns deep within the hammer, then pressed back onto the same point in an exceedingly brief instant.

Stacked Hammers was not merely an echo.

It was more like a tide.

One wave pressing upon another, one layer stacking over the next.

At that thought, Tang Wulin suddenly paused.

Tide.

That was it.

The sublimated property of Thousand-Refined Heavy Silver had been Tide from the start, and now it had been fed into the Star-Sinking Hammer. Those silver-gray tidal patterns did more than make the hammer heavier and steadier. They had also invisibly brought the essence of "stacking" into it.

Once a strike fell, its momentum did not end, like two hidden waves rolling back in swift succession after the tide struck the shore.

No wonder it was Stacked Hammers.

No wonder this effect had grown on this particular hammer.

In that instant, the light in Tang Wulin's eyes grew utterly steady.

He finally understood a little.

This was not simply a matter of being "lucky" enough to forge a supreme effect. This piece of Thousand-Refined Heavy Silver, this Star-Sinking Hammer, his Blood Sacrifice, and his Martial Soul had all happened to travel along the same line, ultimately giving rise to this result.

Mang Tian stood nearby, watching the boy bring his hammer down again and again, watching the triple hammer notes gradually become smoother after their initial unexpected appearance. The emotion he had held deep within his eyes finally settled, little by little.

He knew that from this moment onward, this child's path in Forging was already different from anyone else's.