Chapter 152 Drifting from Extreme Heat to Extreme Cold
She stood under the eaves of the front door. The view in front of the raft was empty. There were only a few extremely low islands nearby. Without the walls of the house blocking her view, she could finally see clearly what was the thing that had burst out with dazzling red light from time to time.
That was the mountain island in the distance that looked like a half-opened umbrella that I had seen only yesterday. The originally calm and steep mountain was now like a giant in a rage, spewing out dazzling flames from time to time, accompanied by dull rumbling sounds, and a huge object wrapped in black smoke was ejected from the top of the peak in the flames.
The thing drew a huge arc in the air, passed over the gradually churning water around it, and then slammed down heavily on the water surface closer to her, accompanied by a head-numbing crackling sound. The huge splashes it created made the raft under her feet vibrate again.
This is——a volcanic eruption! ?
Before Shu Fu could finish her thoughts, she heard an even more shocking crash from not far away on the other side. She held onto the pillar under the eaves and looked to the right side of the raft.
The sound of the collision came from a low island not far to the right rear side of the raft. The island looked like it had just been hit by a cannonball, and a downward-facing hole was blown open. The rubble wrapped in lava shattered and fell on the few plants on the island. The plants curled up instantly and were burned into black charcoal by the high temperature before they even burned.
Did the volcanic eruption just now spread so far?
Shu Fu looked again at the volcano in front of him on the left that was roaring and erupting continuously. As if he had thought of something, he immediately walked through the Drifting Island House and climbed up to the second-floor terrace from the stairs at the back.
Here, she could see clearly in four directions at the same time: front, back, left and right. The dim sky before dawn had already been illuminated as bright as day by the bursting red light one after another. Everything near, slightly farther away, and farthest away was clearly reflected in her field of vision.
Sure enough, behind the right side of the raft, there was another slightly shorter island mountain that was also erupting.
Not only that, a little further away, there was a third mountain that seemed to be affected and was also emitting white smoke. After a few breaths, she heard the sound of bang again. Nearby, the fourth island mountain also erupted, and thick orange-red magma spread down from the bare peak and flowed towards the water below.
The Thousand Islands Lake, which was calm and beautiful yesterday, was now like a boiling flaming inferno. The surrounding air was filled with exploding high-temperature mist and spewing lava particles. Some larger eruptions, with long black smoke tails, swept across the sky above the raft at various angles and finally fell heavily into the water.
Shu Fu suddenly realized that the entire area where the raft was anchored was within the crater.
What we saw yesterday obscuring the distant island peaks was not clouds at all, but smoke - one of the precursors to a volcanic eruption.
The reason why no one noticed anything was because the protective shield was always on. She and the others could not smell the sulfur in the outside air, nor could they feel the heat around them.
At this moment, the raft she was on was floating in the center of this purgatory, like a piece of debris in the mouth of a giant beast, which could be swallowed at any time.
Shu Fu knew very well that all the rafts were protected by shields and they should be safe. But this time, facing such a horrific scene, she felt a rare sense of panic.
Her heart was beating so hard that her throat began to tighten and become dry.
This protective shield can withstand tsunamis hundreds of meters high, so it should be able to withstand volcanic eruptions, right?
As she was thinking, she suddenly heard a loud bang nearby. A low island was actually blown up from the inside by extremely hot air, and the raised mountain debris covered the direction of the raft.
It was a huge rock—bigger than her Castaway Island home!
**
A huge shadow completely covered Shu Fu on the balcony, and there was burning lava on the boulder.
Shu Fu moved suddenly. She subconsciously opened the protective shield she was wearing, then quickly ran down the stairs and returned to the house on Drifting Island as soon as possible.
The moment she closed the door, she felt the whole house sink heavily. When she came to her senses, she found that the entire drifting island house, including the four rafts behind it, had been pressed under the water.
She remembered!
When she was in Louyun City, before the tsunami, she had received an urgent task to rush to a certain location within a time limit. Later, she realized that a huge disaster was about to come, and even if the raft had a protective shield, it was not omnipotent.
In some special circumstances, even with a protective shield, she couldn't escape.
That time, it was because the hill where she was was too close to the water-blocking dam. Once the tsunami hit, the dam was destroyed and the broken boulders could trap her and the raft at any time.
The protective shield only has a protective function and no attack capability. Once the drifting island house is trapped under the collapsed boulders and cannot move, there is only one way out, which is death!
A chill rushed to Shu Fu's forehead. She quickly took out the map panel, opened the water map, and set the drifting direction on it.
While she was doing this, several huge pieces of mountain debris fell on the top of the protective shield. They would not break the defense of the protective shield, but because of their large size, coupled with the gravity of the fall, they pressed the raft to sink another ten meters into the water.
This area is not deep sea water, there are mountains underneath! The water depth is limited, once they are pressed to the bottom of the water by the collapsed rocks, all of them will be trapped.
If she was alone, with the help of the protective shield she carried with her, she might be able to swim to the outside of the range of the heavy rock after leaving the Drifting Island House, fold up the raft, and then release the Drifting Island House and leave quickly.
But there are other people on the raft behind. They don’t have protective shields with them. Once they leave the protection area of the raft, they may be drowned, crushed to death by huge rocks, or burned to death by lava that is thousands of degrees hot when they fall into the water!
All kinds of terrible thoughts popped up in Shu Fu's mind, but his hands did not stop moving at all. He quickly found the direction of the deep sea area on the water map, quickly set the destination, pushed the speed to the fastest 100, and equipped the acceleration card on the function screen.
The moment the acceleration card was pressed, the drifting island house, which was originally pressed down by several huge rocks all the way underwater, began to dive faster and faster. Before it completely touched the underwater rocks, it turned quickly and flew over the bottom of a series of huge rocks that were pressing down towards the bottom of the water, and finally left the area covered by many huge rocks.
Outside the range of the huge rocks, new eruptions continued to fall underwater. The drifting island house, with the four rafts behind it, turned and flew through the water at a very high speed.
Such super high speed coupled with constant rapid turns made Shu Fu in the house feel dizzy as if he was spinning and tumbling with the huge waves in a world-destroying tsunami.
She held the door and turned on the voice notification function of the towing raft. She quickly announced the news in concise language, saying that the raft was entering a rapid escape mode, and everyone was asked to find a corner nearby to support their bodies, and it was best to wrap themselves with thick objects to avoid collisions.
The other people on the raft behind also woke up at about the same time as Shu Fu, but not as quickly as Shu Fu. When she made the voice announcement, many people were startled by the sudden sinking of the raft and the rapid turn and flyby a moment later.
Fortunately, there was no one on the raft at the time, and everyone quickly followed the instructions and found a suitable position to stabilize their bodies.
Shu Fu held onto the wall and swayed as she sat down on the cushion next to the floor-to-ceiling window. The view from this position was better than from the back door, and she could observe the situation outside at any time.
The water depth in this area is about 50 meters, and in slightly deeper places, it is estimated to be one or two hundred meters. At this moment, the water outside has been made turbid by the continuous falling objects, and places a little further away cannot be seen clearly at all. Lava continues to fall into the water with terrifying high temperature, and is also heating up the temperature of the surrounding waters little by little.
She saw a small number of fish fleeing in all directions, but they soon began to twitch and tumble due to the rapidly rising water temperature.
The Drifting Island House sometimes floated up and sometimes dived, passing by every fallen object. After all, there were four rafts towing behind it, so the Drifting Island House needed a wider channel at this moment, and the route was more complicated.
She soon saw the shadows of tall buildings in an underwater valley. This area should have been a resort area. Even though these buildings were submerged in water, one could still see that they were beautifully shaped.
But at this moment, these buildings were collapsing, and several volcanoes were erupting at the same time, which eventually caused the entire area to shake, and underwater earthquakes were inevitable.
The speed of 300 kilometers per hour was really fast. When she saw the underwater buildings, the raft was still some distance away from there. But in just a moment, the raft had quickly passed through the collapsed underwater buildings, passing through the large and small cracked building walls, and those small building fragments that could not be avoided were bounced away one by one by the protective shield.
The raft was like a bullet wrapped in a transparent shield, quickly moving away from the danger zone before the taller underwater buildings collapsed.
About ten minutes later, the raft finally left the water volcanic eruption area completely and began to float automatically.
Shu Fu quickly released the acceleration card, allowing the raft to maintain a speed of 50 kilometers per hour, then opened the door and carefully went up the stairs to the second-floor balcony.
At this moment, the raft was heading northwest. The volcanic eruption area was to the southeast of the raft. From this angle, the sky in that area was almost reflected in orange-red. The eruption materials in the sky drew arcs, and the originally gray-white smoke gradually turned into thick black, covering the entire sky.
Several island peaks were surrounded by rushing red magma. From her perspective, everything there was burning. The high temperature caused a large amount of mist to rise from the water. The entire area looked like a planet that had been completely destroyed by a natural disaster.
At the same time, other people on the raft behind were also watching this scene at the window or on the terrace. The red light of the fire was imprinted in their pupils, illuminating their terrified faces. This was a terrible disaster scene that none of them had ever seen.
A moment later, the underwater earthquake triggered roaring waves, and new disasters were superimposed on the surrounding waters. It was no exaggeration to say that it was a collapse of the sky and the earth.
Shu Fu reset the destination, adjusted the raft's speed to 100 again, and quickly left the unstable area.
**
An hour later, the raft returned to the waters of West Kowloon District and continued to move north at a speed of 100.
The Lighthouse Milk Tea Shop was bustling again. Most people were in the shop on the first floor. It was only a little after six o'clock and it was not yet completely light outside, but everyone had just experienced a thrilling escape from death, so how could they sleep?
Shu Fu temporarily placed a fully automatic freshly ground coffee machine on the bar, poured coffee beans into it, and made coffee for everyone.
This is an Italian coffee machine. The concentration and amount of each cup can be adjusted by yourself. She took a glass teapot from the Chen Fa water bar cabinet and made a large pot of Italian coffee directly. Then she took it to the big table in the middle which was made up of several tables. Then she took out the sugar bag, milk and a bucket of ice cubes that had been prepared in an ice bucket and placed them in the middle so that everyone could season it according to their favorite taste.
In addition, she also took out some simple foods such as bread, toast, and sandwiches so that everyone could have breakfast at the same time.
People like Hua Qiong and Chen Yuezhen, who are a little older and don’t drink coffee, just poured milk and drank it.
Even though they were more than 100 kilometers away from the large-scale volcanic eruption area, everyone's souls had not yet fully returned.
The scene was so terrifying, especially when Shu Fu's raft was carrying their raft at super high speed in the water to avoid the eruption. Even though they were in the house, holding each other's hands tightly, the panic in their hearts did not reduce in the slightest.
Especially the raft was going up and down and turning left and right, they felt like they were riding on a roller coaster. However, the fastest roller coaster in the world only reaches a speed of about 240 kilometers per hour, and a speed of just 300 kilometers per hour is simply a challenge to the upper limit of the human body.
People couldn't stand it, their stomachs reacted, and the animals in the breeding house couldn't stand it either, they were so scared that they hid in the corner and trembled. Fortunately, the breeding pens inside were separated by a room, which had better internal stability. In addition, there were not many animals, so there was no large-scale stampede or mutual attack.
However, in many of my friends' rooms, the floor was littered with small items that had not been put away in time. The only lucky thing was that there were not many glass products in everyone's room. After all, we used to travel a lot, and both cups and tableware were mainly made of durable stainless steel. Now, we put them away in the cabinet after use, so this time the impact was not big.
Shu Fu also made herself a cup of iced latte - Italian coffee with milk, sugar and ice cubes. Just as she took the first sip, Zheng Feifei, Zheng's mother, Wu Shaoshan, Yue Dong and Long Sheng all came over after checking the condition of the cubs in several beehives in the breeding house.
"How is it?" Shu Fu gestured for them to sit down and rest first.
"A small number of cubs were frightened and collapsed in a corner. They have now been moved to a separate feeding pen. Some nutrient solution has been added to their drinking water. As long as there are no problems by the afternoon, they should be fine." Wu Shaoshan answered for her and sat next to Zhang Tian. Zhang Tian handed her a cup of coffee with milk and ice cubes. Wu Shaoshan exclaimed in surprise, "Where did it come from?"
"It's Shufu's coffee machine."
Although vending machines sell different vegetables every two or three days, several daily necessities and fast foods are always in stock, and the milk tea shop is also in trial operation, their lives are getting better day by day, but compared with the peacetime era in the past, the variety of supplies is still scarce.
Especially things like coffee ice cream, various snacks, and their favorite spicy hot pot and skewers, which are really hard to find nowadays.
Not only on the raft, but also in Xizhou Province, the large number of westward migrants caused a surge in the town's population, and safe houses were built one after another to accommodate the refugees. Everyone had to solve the problems of food, clothing, housing and transportation first before they would have the energy to produce this kind of leisure food and beverages that could not fill their stomachs.
Shu Fu heard the conversation between the two and turned her head to look at them, just in time to see the white light bar above Wu Shaoshan's head appear again. Compared with the last time, this time the progress bar has taken a big step forward and is just about to be full.
Shu Fu was a little surprised and guessed that this might be related to the water volcanic eruption just now.
Wu Shaoshan herself didn't know that she was only one step away from awakening.
Because Wu Shaoshan and Zhang Tian talked about coffee and coffee machines, Lu Zheng, who was sitting on the other side of the table, thought of something and said that in two days, the hotel would be able to unlock the multi-functional kitchen, and there might be a coffee machine in the kitchen by then.
"But a coffee machine alone isn't very useful, is it?" Jiang Dai said. She also likes to drink coffee. For designers like her, coffee is essential because she often has to work late at night.
"I have some coffee powder here." Chen Fa said. She had bought it when she was looking for ingredients for milk tea, but the quantity was not large.
"Keep your coffee powder for use in your own shop." Shu Haoqi Fu said that she had coffee beans but few coffee machines, so she couldn't give them to them. If the multi-functional kitchen really had its own freshly ground coffee machine or a hand-grinding coffee machine, she would just move a box of coffee beans over.
Lu Zheng subconsciously opened his mouth to refuse, but was interrupted by Yao Ruoyun's cheers: "Wow, can non-hotel guests also go to drink coffee?"
"Ask the innkeeper." Shu Fu gestured.
Yao Ruoyun immediately looked at Lu Zheng eagerly. Lu Zheng originally wanted to refuse Shu Fu's gift. He had been feeling some emotions since that day. He was afraid that she would know about these emotions, but he also wanted her to know them. The most important thing was that he wanted to give her more in return, to make her feel that he was actually reliable and capable, and he didn't want to accept any more gifts from her.
But just as he was about to speak, Xu Tingfeng had already pressed his left shoulder: "Well, take it."
Soon, Yue Dong held down her right shoulder as well: "It's hard to refuse such a kind offer, so just accept it..." Yue Dong was naturally speaking for his wife.
Lu Zheng: ...
He shouldn't have mentioned the multifunctional kitchen...
**
The raft once again returned to its daily routine of floating on the boundless ocean.
Shu Fu still uses the satellite network card for half an hour every day to check the news from Hua State. Although this volcanic eruption is far away from Hua State, there are actually volcanoes in Hua State, especially in the northeastern region of Hua State. There is a volcanic group with more than 600 extinct volcanoes. Although many of them are now submerged under water, there are still many peaks that have not been submerged. Once the earth's crust is unstable, they may also erupt.
In addition, there is also a volcanic zone in the southern sea area of Hua State. Most of the countries there should have been submerged under water, but the mountains with higher altitudes are still there. They were frequently active volcanoes in the past. If the volcanic eruption they experienced in the territory of Eagle State this time was not an accidental event, then that area may also erupt.
Shu Fu thought so and asked Lan Lan to help her again. She uploaded the video and photos of the volcanic eruption that she had taken in the early morning to the website where she uploaded disaster and marine information. She knew that the website was under the full control of the authorities and ordinary people could not see it.
But it doesn’t matter, she just wants the authorities to know.
The videos and photos were very clear. They were taken by Wu Shaoshan and Zhang Tian when they were about to leave the volcanic eruption area. The hotel raft was located at the back, and among all the guests staying in the hotel, only the windows of their room were facing the back.
The two of them were standing by the window at the time, so they took a lot of videos and photos, and the photos were very clear, with close-ups and long shots.
Shu Fu asked Lan Lan to upload this information together with the longitude and latitude of the area where the information was generated to the Internet, and also mentioned the extinct volcanoes in the northeast region and the active volcanoes in the southern sea.
A few days later, when the raft crossed the Arctic Circle, she saw news on the Internet about volcanic eruptions in the northeastern region of Hua State and the sea south of the land.
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