Exploring Technology in a Wizard World-Chapter 621 - 619: Earth’s Fart: Lake Flipping

Natural disasters, also known as acts of God, calamities, and famines, refer to abnormal phenomena that occur in nature, which cause severe disasters to surrounding lifeforms and human society.

This is humanity’s definition of a natural disaster.

Discarding the flowery explanations, from the very beginning of human existence, we have been battling various natural disasters and paying a hefty price.

In winter, snowstorms can kill.

In summer, droughts can kill.

On highlands, avalanches can kill.

By the coast, tsunamis can kill.

Normally, typhoons, floods, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and meteorite impacts still result in deaths.

Natural disasters often erupt suddenly, making them unpredictable, and thus, the losses are severe. Of course, over the years, humanity has amassed a lot of experience, learned to detect natural disasters, and devised various ways to prevent them.

For instance, in snowy mountains, one must absolutely not make loud sounds or cause strong vibrations to prevent avalanches. On large rivers, many dams and reservoirs are built to regulate the flow of water to prevent flooding. Additionally, artificial rain is used to mitigate droughts, and meteorological satellites provide early warnings and aid in the evacuation of populations to minimize losses from typhoons, and so on.

However, under the terrifying power of nature, human strength is indeed too insignificant; we can only prevent, avoid, and reduce losses, but it is very difficult to resist.

Take typhoons as an example.

Typhoons are among the most common natural disasters, occurring frequently, with great power, widespread impact, and causing significant damage.

Someone proposed whether, with the technological advancements of modern Earth, it could be possible to eliminate a typhoon. For example, by detonating a high-yield nuclear bomb at the center of a typhoon to disrupt it and ultimately dissipate it.

In reality, this is not possible.

The heat released by a mature typhoon is roughly equivalent to detonating a 10-million-ton nuclear bomb every 20 minutes, and the heat released hourly is thousands of times that of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Detonating a few ordinary nuclear bombs at the center of a typhoon would hardly be effective.

In a nutshell: nature is the ruler of the planet, and humans are merely parasites on the surface of the Earth.

Sixty-five million years ago, an asteroid about eleven kilometers in diameter struck the Gulf of Mexico, causing the Cretaceous mass extinction, which wiped out about 75% of life on Earth, including dinosaurs; the Earth was unaffected.

The Earth has existed for nearly 4.6 billion years and will likely continue to exist for several more billions of years.

Humans, with only thousands of years of civilization and millions of years of evolutionary history, are truly of no consequence to the Earth, at least for now.

In dealing with natural disasters on Earth, humans can only attempt to avoid and prevent them, but cannot resist.

Another troubling matter is that some common natural disasters have obvious signs and can be detected in advance, allowing sufficient time for prevention.

However, other less common natural disasters show no abnormalities before they strike and, once they occur, swiftly claim a large number of lives, catching people off guard and leaving them only to seek the protection of the Luck Goddess. One such infamous disaster is known as... lake flipping.

Recorded instances of lake flipping disasters are exceedingly rare, with only two known cases, but each has caused considerable casualties.

The first case, Monaune Lake.

Monaune Lake, located in the central-western African country of Cameroon, experienced this disaster on August 15, 1984.

At the time of the disaster, there were no signs, and it occurred incredibly swiftly, like a Death God swinging a scythe, precisely snatching lives one by one, then hiding in the darkness.

Those affected by the disaster had absolutely no ability to resist or convey messages for help to the outside world; they all died within a very short time. The situation remained unknown until unrelated individuals entered the scene after the disaster had occurred and realized something was amiss.

The first person to discover the scene was named Ahaji Abdu. While traveling, he saw corpses scattered along the road and cars crashed off the road, with not a single survivor.

Afterwards, a total of 37 deaths were confirmed from this disaster.

This number might not seem significant, but the most crucial point is that the deceased showed no signs of struggle, as if they had suddenly died from some acute infectious disease, causing widespread panic until the investigations were completed.

The second case, Ni Os Lake.

Ni Os Lake, also located in Cameroon, experienced this disaster in the early hours of August 21, 1986—two years after the first incident.

The disaster struck in the dead of night, in a densely populated area, swiftly claiming the lives of many people who were still asleep.

Eyewitnesses who later entered the area described seeing no one alive; everyone was dead.

Because they were on the periphery of the area, a few extremely fortunate survivors recounted standing amid a mass of dead bodies, with dead family members and livestock everywhere. Out of a family of 56, 53 were breathless.

After the disaster, it was estimated that over 1700 people had died, and the number of deceased livestock was countless!

This clearly caused a great deal of panic, especially since it happened just two years after the first case.

Consequently, scientists from all quarters rushed in, conducting rigorous investigations and studies, concluding that the incidents at Ni Os Lake and Monaune Lake were both caused by lake flipping.

What is lake flipping?

It turned out that Ni Os Lake and Monaune Lake were not ordinary lakes; beneath them lay a magma belt. The presence of this magma belt continuously leaked carbon dioxide (CO2) into the water, which accumulated at the bottom of the lakes where the water moved slowly and the pressure was extremely high.

When the accumulation of carbon dioxide reached its limit, it would erupt, and at that time, hundreds of thousands of tons of carbon dioxide would rapidly burst out of the lake surface, spreading all around.

Because the density of carbon dioxide is 1.5 times that of air, the abundant carbon dioxide acted like a thick carpet over the ground, driving away almost all the air—first creating a high concentration zone of carbon dioxide, followed by a pure carbon dioxide zone, which would take a long time to dissipate.

As a part of the air, carbon dioxide, when in low concentrations such as 0.04%, is harmless.

But when the concentration rose to 1%, it could cause suffocation, dizziness, and palpitations.

At 5%, it caused wheezing, headaches, and dizziness.

At 10%, human bodily functions became severely disrupted, leading to unconsciousness, mental confusion, respiratory arrest, and death.

At higher concentrations, reaching the level of pure carbon dioxide, not only humans but any plant, animal, or microorganism that depends on oxygen for aerobic respiration cannot survive.

That is lake flipping!

Somebody aptly nicknamed this natural disaster "Earth’s Fart."

Yes, Earth’s Fart.

The Earth let out a fart, then took away the lives of hundreds, even thousands of people.

And this is the power of natural disasters.

...

Taklamakan Lake was a lake known to periodically experience "lake flipping."

However, when Richard initially became interested in Taklamakan Lake, he did not know this. His interest was solely because of the name.

After all, not every desert is called Taklamakan. To have the name of a desert in the current world as a lake on Earth made Richard very curious.

Later, after hearing about the legend of the Taklamakan Lake Death God from Wizard Teddy, Richard became even more eager to uncover the secrets of the lake.

Many speculations were developed, and later during the exploration of Yadisi Village, more discoveries were made. Eventually, after investigating inside the lake, it was confirmed that Taklamakan Lake was indeed a lake that could undergo natural disasters termed "lake flipping."

Everything then made sense.

In the legends of Taklamakan Lake, the so-called Death God was merely tens of thousands of tons of carbon dioxide gas accumulated at the lake’s bottom. That the Death God woke only once every several hundred years and took every life it saw was due to the fact that each time the carbon dioxide erupted, a long time was needed to reaccumulate. Several hundred years was the accumulation period.

Understanding these facts, Richard grew more cautious about Taklamakan Lake, warning Nancy, Gro, and others to stay away from the lake as much as possible.

Although he saw that the accumulation of carbon dioxide at the lake bottom was nowhere near the limit and unlikely to erupt outside for decades, many things were not absolute.

A small earthquake or a giant stone falling into the water could easily disrupt the delicate balance between the carbon dioxide and the lake water, causing the carbon dioxide to release prematurely. At that time, the potential lethality and range might be somewhat reduced, but for those in the core area without sufficient preparation, death was certain.

After understanding these points, the matter seemed to come to a conclusion. As the conference convened, Richard set aside Taklamakan Lake. After all, his main goals were the treasure of the Black Spirit King and the ultimate secrets of the Black Spirit Empire, not a geographic expedition.

He only planned to find a way to stay and continue excavating and looking for Yadisi Village after the conference, not investing too much effort in one rare lake, even though only three such lakes have been identified on Earth so far.

But unexpectedly, the conference turned out to be a massive trap, as Deep Blue Castle had colluded with the Mysterious Organization to kill all the attending wizards.

Faced with such traps and conspiracies, Richard wasn’t much concerned, planning not to get involved and to help Gro, Nancy, and others break free and then leave.

He was more concerned about one thing: with the uproar caused by Deep Blue Castle, the entire East Coast was in chaos, and the area around Deep Blue Castle became highly dangerous. Continuing to excavate and search for Yadisi Village would be difficult; he would have to devise another plan.

While contemplating these strategies, a new compulsion arose. For some unknown reason, the Black Robed Wizards of the Mysterious Organization had marked him as a necessary target, mobilizing a massive force to surround and ambush him, making escape nearly impossible.

In a critical moment, he remembered the perilous existence of Taklamakan Lake. He simply fled to Taklamakan Lake, and taking advantage of the enemy’s lack of suspicion, prematurely released the massive amount of carbon dioxide from the lake bottom, solving all his problems.

For such opportunistic actions, he felt no misgivings nor thought it was an unfair victory.

Regardless, by this method, he completely eliminated the need to exert effort in killing or continuing to run; now, he just needed to collect the spoils from the many bodies.

Yes, collecting the spoils.

...

Foll𝑜w current novℯls on fre𝒆web(n)ovel.co(m)