Chapter 573: Element 126
The moment he returned to reality, Chen Chen heaved a silent sigh of relief.
That blood cloud that was as ma.s.sive as a mountain created an inexplicable sense of pressure. It felt like he was facing the complete form of the Consciousness Stealer he had seen in a dream.
Still, upon closer comparison, the sense of pressure from the Consciousness Stealer was even greater. That sensation was like standing at the bottom of a mountain, looking up at the entire mountain range, feeling like one’s very soul was suppressed.
Chen Chen casually handed the server where X-112 was located to the Black Knight on the side, then waved with one hand, and the parts that followed him back to reality automatically flew out one by one, neatly arranging themselves on the ground.
Then, Chen Chen began to identify them one by one.
“This is... The coil of a geothermal generator?
“This is an oscillator?
“This is...”
Chen Chen looked around in turn, distinguishing the pieces of equipment he had retrieved. Of all the equipment, he could only recognize a very small percentage. He could not recognize most of it and was not even sure if they existed on Earth.
Chen Chen even saw something similar to text on some of the machinery except that the text did not belong to any language known to mankind. Rather, it had a strange pattern, similar to one on the top of the giant needle.
Little X also stepped forward, pouting and squatting. She looked at a bright orange cloud-like crystal the size of a washbowl and was surprised. “Is this a crystal?”
Chen Chen turned his head and glanced at it, but when his Field scanned the crystal from above, he frowned slightly.
This was because he could feel a compressed p.r.i.c.king sensation in his Field. This sensation was invisible and even human perception could not feel it but with the range of his Field energy that could magnify the subatomic by a thousand times, he could faintly perceive it.
“X, this crystalline material is very radioactive.”
Chen Chen reminded. “Generally, natural crystals are radioactive but only very slightly, to the point where it’s difficult for them to harm people’s bodies or for my Field to detect anything. But this rock is so radioactive that I can sense it. Its radioactivity is probably comparable to the element radium.”
X nodded. She took out a magnifying gla.s.s and a flashlight from one side to observe and then confirmed, “This is zircon!”
“Zircon?”
“That’s right and it’s a bright orange low-type zircon.”
Little X exclaimed, “Most of the zircons with radioactive properties are orange-yellow, so such a bright orange does indicate that the content of radioactive elements in it is very high. By the way, Sir G.o.dfather...”
Little X suddenly turned her head. “Where should this zircon be placed in this piece of equipment?”
Chen Chen smiled. His Field moved instantly and all the parts flew up again quickly and a.s.sembled themselves in mid-air. More than a thousand parts of different sizes and over ten thousand small parts like screws, were pieced together gradually by the manipulation of Chen Chen’s Field.
Finally, the entire piece of equipment was a.s.sembled into an hourgla.s.s-shaped machine installation with wide ends and a narrow center.
Moreover, the orange zircon that was the size of a washbasin was fixed in the center of all the parts, just like an orange crystal eye...
“What a peculiar device.”
Little X had received all the information from X-112 by now and she was puzzled. “Oscillator, geothermal generator, and magnetic field confinement device... Still, this huge zircon is the core of the entire device.”
“Are you able to tell the function of this equipment?”
Chen Chen asked, “I couldn’t use psionic energy at any place on Earth before, but when I destroyed this device, my psionic powers quickly recovered, and it seemed that something was released.”
Little X nodded when she heard this and a.n.a.lyzed. “Zircon is a piezoelectric material and is considered a crystalline material. Such materials have a huge role in the fields of electronic meters, weighing instruments, optical instruments, semiconductors, and communication equipment.
“At the same time, because of the piezoelectricity of the crystal material, it has a magnetic field and there’s even some c.o.c.k-and-bull story that the magnetic field of the crystal can bring health and luck to humans. But now that it’s the core of this device and you said that you can still feel its strong radiation, this becomes very interesting.”
Little X suddenly smiled in delight. “If I’ve guessed correctly, this device should be a radiation diffuser!”
“Radiation diffuser?”
Chen Chen’s eyes lit up upon hearing this and he seemed to understand something.
“Because of this diffusion, the radiation has been diluted and becomes extremely subtle.”
Little X added. “Therefore, some of our instruments are unable to detect it but after this radiation is diffused, it has a special ability, which is to suppress any psionic energy on Earth.
“From the clues you brought, there are a total of twenty giant needles, which means that one such device can inhibit any psionic powers within more than ten million square kilometers, making it impossible for any existence with psychic powers to wield them.”
Hearing this, Chen Chen nodded, “Yes, I understand now. I originally thought that the disappearance of the humans in the dimension of Doom was related to these twenty giant needles, but now it is certain — there’s no relationship between the two.”
“No relationship?”
Little X was immediately stunned.
“Those giant needles aren’t the culprit in the destruction of human civilization.”
Chen Chen nodded and replied, “It’s those things that were pinned by the giant needles.”
Little X immediately understood. “This is indeed the case. At first, humans discovered a giant needle on Mars and then they opened it up as if opening a Pandora’s Box, which triggered the disaster destroying mankind! ”
“This also raises a more important question.”
Chen Chen continued, his expression growing solemn. “That is, in addition to the two forces, humankind and the blood clouds that destroyed humankind, there should be a third party — those who nailed the giant needles on Mars and Earth.
“I’ve discovered that although the pattern on the giant needle on Mars is the same, its outer sh.e.l.l is much older, at least dozens or hundreds of millennia in age whereas the giant needles nailed on Earth are brand new. That is to say, after the destruction of mankind, that third party also nailed those giant needles on Earth and re-nailed or ‘re-sealed’ those existences that had been on Mars...”
At that, Chen Chen shook his head. “This is terrifying. Doesn’t it mean that the humans in the dimension of Doom have been monitored all the time?”
After talking about it, Chen Chen suddenly felt a lot warier. It turned out that the world connected by the USB flash drive was likely to have more than one civilization and there was even a higher civilization monitoring human beings.
This was scary.
After talking about this, half an hour had pa.s.sed but Chen Chen still did not see the Black Knights returning.
“Do you need me to send someone over to check things out?”
Little X also asked a little anxiously.
“There’s no need. Close the portal.”
Chen Chen shook his head decisively, then walked directly to the computer and pulled out the USB flash drive.
The black channel on the computer screen instantly turned into a vortex and was quickly annihilated.
Chen Chen silently breathed a sigh of relief. This time, the rewards of his exploration were significant. Although he still had not figured out what the blood cloud on the opposite side was and how human civilization was destroyed, at least he had figured out why human civilization had perished in that dimension. Not only that, but he also got a special device.
This was a device Chen Chen had never seen.
Following this, the a.n.a.lysis of these mechanisms was handed over to Little X. Little X seemed very interested in the huge zircon in particular.
Was this the fanatical instinct of a female living being toward shiny gems?
Chen Chen pondered silently.
Yes, in his opinion, Little X was already a kind of living being. She had her personality, thoughts, and memories. She also had the thinking logic of a human. It would not be wrong to say that Little X was a person living in an electronic device.
After several days of a.n.a.lysis, Little X did a lot of research and a.n.a.lysis on that zircon and finally sent a report to Chen Chen.
However, after seeing this report, Chen Chen looked astonished.
Sure enough, this zircon chunk was artificially synthesized.
“Zircon, also known as zirconium silicate, is a silicate mineral with the chemical formula ZrSiO?.”
Little X stood beside Chen Chen and explained, “Zircons have many colors and some zircons even contain radioactive elements such as uranium while bright orange zircons represent strong radioactivity. According to my a.n.a.lysis, the interior of this huge zircon contains an element that we humans have never synthesized before!”
“Never synthesized before?”
Chen Chen was abruptly taken aback. In nature, the heaviest non-radioactive element was lead and the most common heaviest element was uranium. Those with higher atomic numbers than uranium were called transuranic elements and most of these elements were artificially synthesized.
The reason it was difficult for humans to find heavier elements was that as the atomic number increased, the stability of the element would worsen and its half-life would become shorter. For instance, the four latest elements synthesized by humans — elements 113, 115, 117, and 118 — had half-lives of only 20 seconds, 2.6 seconds, 0.8 seconds, and 12 milliseconds.
At present, element 118 was the heaviest element that humans could discover (synthesize). Any elements whose atomic number exceeded 118 would open a brand-new eighth period of elements in the periodic table. Currently, no eighth-period element had been synthesized.
Since Little X said that the element in zircon was an element that had never been synthesized by humans, that was to say, its atomic number was greater than 118!
“We found that this radioactive element is composed of 126 neutrons and 126 protons.”
X continued. “Meaning that the arrangement of this element on the periodic table is element 126!”
Chen Chen could not help frowning when he heard these words. “Element 126? So its half-life should be even shorter. How can it be stable inside the zircon?”
Still, in the next second, Chen Chen immediately saw the light and said, “So, it’s the ‘island of stability’!”
The island of stability was a theory that in physics, there was a mysterious “magic number” phenomenon — so far, the magic numbers humans had discovered were 2, 8, 14, 20, 28, 50, 82, 126...
When the number of nucleons of an element matched the above numbers, the stability of the nucleus was relatively high. For example, oxygen-16 was formed by the combination of 8 neutrons and 8 protons, so the nature of the nucleus was very stable. The nucleus of calcium-40 formed by the combination of 20 neutrons and 20 protons was also very stable, and the nuclei of some of the isotopes of nickel, formed with 28 protons, were still very stable...
Therefore, due to the stabilization effect of the elements in the magic number sequence, it was called the island of stability theory. Therefore, element 126, which was composed of 126 neutrons and 126 protons, would also be a stable element.
“But since it’s a stable element, why is there such a huge amount of radioactivity? Is there a mistake?”
Chen Chen found it a little hard to understand. When he used his Feld energy to examine, he did get a very strong p.r.i.c.king sensation. Only extremely intense radioactive elements could induce such a feeling in Chen Chen’s Field energy.
“There’s no mistake.”
Little X was confident. “That element has been determined for sure. This is a special element. It’s a stable element but it still has very strong radioactivity. I can’t understand this phenomenon too. I’m afraid we’ll only be able to solve this mystery when we’re able to synthesize this element, right?
“But now isn’t the time to care about that.”
Little X reminded him again. “I tried to make an outer case for this instrument and at the same time replace the geothermal generator inside with a supercapacitor to provide electricity but I couldn’t restart the instrument.”
“Oh?”
Chen Chen felt his heart clench when he heard these words and immediately walked into the workshop where the equipment was a.s.sembled for a look.
The only thing he had brought back from the dimension of Doom was this device that could suppress psionic energy. If this one was broken, Chen Chen did not know if he had the opportunity to go deep into the dimension of Doom again and bring back other equipment.
As soon as he entered the a.s.sembly workshop, Chen Chen immediately saw a huge cylindrical machine with a diameter of five meters and a height of about 20 meters. The sh.e.l.l made by Little X was made of tungsten alloy and it exuded a dim blue l.u.s.ter.
Its waist had three huge support legs. At the same time, this device was processed by Little X to have a sharp cone shape for its bottom. It was also outfitted with a mechanical system. If one pressed down hard, the three support legs would plunge into the ground and fix the machine in place.
“Why does this shape look a bit like a bacteriophage?”
Chen Chen could not help laughing.
“It’s just a coincidence.”
Little X said helplessly, “My idea was to let it plant itself into the soil, so I put a moving mechanism on it and it turned out like this.”
Chen Chen nodded and stopped nitpicking these details. Instead, he commanded, “Try starting it up again.”
Little X nodded and the Black Knight on the side immediately got into action, trying to make the machine work.
Nonetheless, although this device had a huge amount of electricity, after the initial activation, the device inside stopped working again.
Seeing this, Chen Chen could not help squinting. He directly rose into the air, hovered above the top of the machine, and lifted the lid.
Immediately he saw that all the lights in it, which he had seen before, were all red and none of them were green.
Seeing this, Chen Chen could not help wearing a pensive look. He still remembered that when he broke the outer sh.e.l.l of the giant needle, these mechanisms were not damaged but they stopped working at once. Seeing this, Chen Chen seemed to understand something and turned to Little X, saying, “Try to turn the s.p.a.ce inside into a vacuum state.”
Following Chen Chen’s order, the engineering robots in the workshop quickly started to operate. Under the planning of Little X, an air pump was installed in this device to drain the air inside and seal the machine’s sh.e.l.l.
Then, the machine started again.
“Hum...”
Chen Chen only felt an invisible force spreading from the machine and suddenly, that unusual sensation struck him again!
Chen Chen’s psionic powers had been suppressed!