Chapter 462: Hidden Danger
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
A shadow flew across the dark sky with the speed of light.
Suddenly, it stopped abruptly and hung mid-air.
It was Luo Yuan.
10,000 meters above the air, there were numerous dark clouds rumbling. There were lightning strikes within the dark clouds, which made the sky shift between darkness and light.
He descended from the sky across the dark clouds into the Reconstruction Area – that once used to be a hive of activity. It was now a ruin with three gigantic holes which almost occupied the entire area. Each of the holes was at least 100 kilometers wide from the outside, and its depth was more than 1,000 meters deep – a result of the three anti-material bombs.
Although the weather was cold, apart from one that was completely inactive, there were still smoke coming out of the other two holes.
Due to the explosion, the tectonic plates in the area were weak. The heat from the ground escaped from the cracks that were caused by he volcano eruption, imminent of an impending eruption. It was a major hidden danger for Hope City.
With mankind’s ability, it was impossible to leave this place and build a new residence with such short notice. The terrifying fact of the harsh cold was sufficient to break the anyone’s will to live. The thought of moving into the spacecraft was even less possible.
Luo Yuan was here to see how big this hidden danger was.
Soon, he descended into one of the holes.
The closer he got to the bottom of the hole, the higher the temperature was. The snow around was thinner and more water vapor ascended. The vapor met with the cold up there and was soon frozen into snow that fell back down into the hole again.
The amount of snow was threatening, and snowball that was as big as his fist had hit him from above.
Within seconds, his body was covered in snow.
It was a mini water circulation system in the hole.
When it was 300 meters away from the bottom, as the temperature rose, the snow melted at an instant, showing the virtuous wall that shone with colors.
Luo Yuan could see colorful crystals on the wall, which were minerals created by the cooling of the lava. There were many precious stones seen too. They were valuable before the apocalypse, but now, they were not even worth a penny.
As he descended even further, the temperature increased dramatically. All he could see was steam. When he landed at the bottom, the water vapor had completely evaporated.
Contrary to his expectations, he saw no lava inside, but a boiling lake instead.
The lake was not big – only 100,000 square meters in size. Bubbles were boiling on the surface of the lake; it was humid in there. Luo Yuan was soaking wet with perspiration by just standing there for a short while.
There were 10,000 tons of water flowing from the wall into the lake each second. At the same time, the said amount of water evaporated each second, which caused the lake to remain the same size.
The temperature of the lake was higher than he had expected. If not for the flowing water that refilled the lake, it would be completely evaporated within minutes.
However, the temperature did not affect Luo Yuan at all.
He took off his shirt and jumped into the lake stark naked. There was no water sensation on his skin, and it felt as though the lake was made of bubbles. He felt very light in there.
The unit area of was not even a third of water, and the temperature was already more than 200 degrees Celsius.
But it was just the beginning. As he got closer to the bottom, the density of water in the lake was lower and the temperature was higher. The lake was boiling intensely. If an ordinary person was in there, he would have been cooked or disintegrated by now.
There was a strong recoil that prevented him from going deeper.
He used both his hands and legs to swim another 100 meters against the force.
Suddenly, he went into another world.
With the earth’s gravity, his body descended quickly. He used his Will to float in mid air. He was stunned; there was no water nor bubbles where he was. The humidity in the air was saturated, and apart from the water vapor, there was no other gas in the air.
Even Luo Yuan did not expect the lake to be hollow.
The temperature was 700 degrees Celsius, with all the water evaporating into water vapor. The air pressure there was six times more than normal.
Apart from a slight discomfort, the environment did not affect him at all.
There was a dim red light at the bottom of the hole and the air was filled with a rich smell of Sulphur. It looked like lava in there.
Luo Yuan quickly went towards the bottom of the hole.
As expected, there was lava everywhere. It was boiling like thick porridge, with flames shooting out occasionally, turning the place crimson red.
Looking at the scene had stressed Luo Yuan out. It was not just heat coming from beneath the ground, but more of a soon-to-erupt volcano. To make matters worse, the volcano was located just 150 kilometers from Hope City.
It would be fine if it was just a tiny volcano, which might only cause an earthquake, but if it was a massive eruption, it would adversely affect the entire city.
Since the attack of the anti-material bomb, the earth plates in the area were unstable, where eruption and earthquakes occurred every once in a while. Considering this active volcano and the craters that were boiling the probability of eruption was a strong 90%.
Within 10,000 square kilometers in the Reconstruction Area, there were already three volcanos, of which could possibly even be different ports that came from the same volcano. If a domino effect took place, the consequences would be unimaginable.
Although the fall of the Glassians was over, the disasters happened thereafter had continued to affect the earth. In reality, it was considered bearable in the Reconstruction Area. It was hell for Europe and North America, as volcanos were everywhere and earthquakes struck rather frequently. From above, they were filled with volcanic ashes where the entire Eurasia was engulfed in darkness. Wherever the craters were, eruptions happened all day and all night. Until today, the eruption column that shot 10,000 meters high towards the sky could be seen from space.
It had been half a month, but the nuclear winter had not ended, which was heavily influenced caused by the eruption. However, the impact of any drastic changes in Eurasia could only do little damage to the Reconstruction Area as it was far away.
No matter how powerful he was, there was no way that he could stop the consequences that would befall them, due to the eruption.
However, there was a solution to the volcanos that had yet to erupt.
Luo Yuan was conjuring a plan in his head.
Before the apocalypse, there was a study that came up with a method to reduce the magnitude of the eruption. For instance, through digging holes on the earth’s surface, it releases the pressure underground and therefore delayed any eruption.
Another method would be blasting holes in a specific terrain in the volcano area to allow the lava to flow elsewhere.
Alternatively, they could destroy the lava channel to release its force before the eruption, or use a nuclear bomb to blast specific parts of the earth’s crust to minimize the pressure.
However, such solutions required many geological experts to probe into the ground. But alas, none of them had such expertise.
After all, the Reconstruction Area was small and there was no need for them to set up geological labs everywhere. There was only one department in the Reconstruction Area which was in New Capital City, but it had been destroyed in the disaster.