blogombal Chapter 60 Nuclear power, a piece of cake!
Chapter 60 Nuclear power, a piece of cake!
Chapter 60 Nuclear power, a piece of cake!
Deep within the dark rock formations, a small, menacingly shaped tracked drilling rig is roaring to life.
The massive auger, crafted from immersion-engineered special steel, was tearing through the hard granite wall as easily as cutting tofu, sending up clouds of gravel and dust.
Inside the cockpit, Pei Qi leaned comfortably against the leather seat, holding a bottle of chilled fire-resistant potion as a beverage.
He was wearing his signature IC2 nanotech combat suit.
The texture on the surface of this armor gleamed with a cold, eerie luster under the dim light of the instrument panel.
The holographic HUD interface on the mask is constantly updating the surrounding environmental parameters, completely isolating the high temperature that would cook an ordinary person and the lethal amount of dust.
"Alert: Ambient temperature is rising. The nano helmet night vision module is functioning normally. Current battery level: 8"
2%.
Pei Qi glanced at the battery bar and pursed his lips.
"Tsk, the battery drains faster than my hair."
The reason they appear in such a desolate, remote place is ultimately due to that damned "fear of insufficient firepower," or more accurately, "anxiety about insufficient energy."
After resolving the parasite crisis in Tokyo, Pei Qi looked at the rows of machines in the base that were eagerly awaiting their arrival, especially the assembly line used to mass-produce Quinques, and fell into deep thought.
There's not enough electricity.
Why don't we use coal to generate electricity?
Come on, what era are we living in? Come on, it's 2026, who still uses that primitive fuel that puffs out black smoke?
Using coal, a primitive fossil fuel, to power my general-purpose machinery with RF energy storage in the tens of millions?
This is like putting a steam boiler on a Star Destroyer; it's not just a matter of inefficiency, it's an insult to industry! That pitiful calorific value wouldn't even be enough to keep it running for five minutes without stopping.
Although he had a few thermal generators that were barely enough, those things burned coal like water, and their efficiency was so low that it made people want to cry.
As for solar energy? Don't be ridiculous. It's in an underground base. Are you suggesting we dig a tower to the sky and run the cables to the surface to attract lightning strikes?
A real man uses lava! That's powerful! That's exhilarating!
At this point, Pei Qi sighed helplessly and tapped the dial in front of him.
In fact, as a seasoned industrial module player, Pei Qi has countless high-end power generation solutions in his mind.
Nuclear power will be the first to be affected.
This is the romance of the industrial age! Once the reactor is built and the heat sinks and fuel rods are in place, the energy released by those uranium rods is enough to support the extravagance of the entire Asian branch.
Through his "borrowing" and analysis of the GOC database over this period, he had already deduced the entire nuclear facility's recipe in his mind using the [JEI Item Manager].
He was intimately familiar with everything from the most basic breeder reactor to the more efficient MOX fuel rod cycle system, and even the redstone temperature control circuit to prevent the reactor from exploding.
Whether it's IC2's fluid nuclear power or the more complex fusion reactor, Pei Qi has designed everything: centrifuges, canning machines, radiation suits—even blast walls.
He had the design drawings, the theoretical knowledge was unbeatable, and he even had the feng shui for the reactor's placement perfectly arranged.
But reality gave him a resounding slap in the face.
Having blueprints is useless if we don't have the materials!
Even a skilled cook can't cook without rice.
"Even an elementary school student can find the principles of an atomic bomb online, but try asking him to build one in his own backyard? Don't you understand that we're being held back by the core materials?"
"In this tightly regulated modern society, high-purity axial-235 is harder to find than a giant panda."
"I can't exactly raid the strategic nuclear arsenals of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, can I?"
"While it's not that we wouldn't dare, the cost-benefit ratio of starting World War III for a few fuel rods is really not high."
In this damn real world, you can even download a PDF version of the atomic bomb schematics on the dark web, but the key question is, where are you going to get those few kilograms of weapon-grade spherical-235 with an abundance of over 90%?
Although GOC has a stockpile, every gram is under strict monitoring. Even though Pei Qi is the head of Asia, he cannot move enough nuclear fuel to maintain an industrial-grade reactor without alerting the "108 Council" at headquarters.
Not to mention that IC2 nuclear power plants also require a large amount of lead plates for radiation shielding and tempered glass for insulation layers.
We also need iridium ore, which doesn't exist in this world and can only be produced bit by bit using centrifuges.
To synthesize advanced heat sinks.
"No uranium ore, no centrifuges, no iridium—how am I supposed to build a nuclear power plant! Am I supposed to generate electricity with love?"
Pei Qi cursed the author of IC2 a hundred times in his mind at that moment. There was no other way; in order to keep the base running and power that money-devouring Quinque production line, he had to settle for second best.
So he turned his gaze to the ground beneath his feet.
Since nuclear fuel can't be obtained from the sky, there must be magma underground, right? Moreover, according to the Minecraft generation mechanism, magma layers are often accompanied by large amounts of diamonds, redstone, and even gold.
"I'll just dig out a little bit of lava, and by the way—just by the way—see if I can extract some uranium ore."
That's what Pei Qi said to himself.
As we all know, lava is hot, though you can't eat it!
In the logic of the thermal expansion module, as long as there is magma, pouring it into the magma generator will provide a continuous source of RF energy!
Combined with a geothermal generator, this is simply the most cost-effective energy solution in the early to mid-stages.
"Since I can't get uranium, I'll just steal some magma from the Earth's core, okay? This stuff is all-natural, pollution-free, and unlimited. As long as I can get through the mantle, it's an inexhaustible source of milk."
With this extremely pragmatic and frugal mindset, Pei Qi drove the heavily modified drilling vehicle and plunged into the ground.
Of course, this is just the official reason.
But he would never admit that it was actually his "mining addiction" etched into his DNA that triggered it.
In this world full of deceit and monsters, the best cure for adult anxiety is the pure "sense of accumulation" that comes from wielding a pickaxe and watching the minerals in your backpack increase one by one.
Mining really can relieve stress!
However, the ideal is full, and the reality is very skinny.
This pleasant feeling didn't last long.
As they went deeper, Pei Qi gradually discovered something was amiss.
For a Minecraft player who is used to mining while looking at the F3 data panel, the real-world underground mining experience is turning from "decompression" into a "disaster".
In Minecraft, the world is a perfect mathematical model.
No matter how deep you dig, pressing the F3 key will display the X, Y, and Z axis coordinates on the screen as if they were divinely written truths.
The east, west, south, and north are clearly defined, and the bedrock layer is as flat as a sliced cake base. You can accurately calculate that you are on the 11th layer and then start the fishbone mining method.
But what about the real world?
It was a lump of clay that God had carelessly crumpled up after getting drunk.
"Damn it—how thick is this darn granite layer anyway?"
Pei Qi frowned as he looked at the layers of rock in front of him, which were stacked on top of each other and had no apparent pattern.
Based on the various geological data he measured on the surface of Tokyo, this depth should be close to the Mohorovičić discontinuity, the boundary between the Earth's crust and mantle. The rocks there should exhibit a semi-molten plasticity, with temperatures soaring to thousands of degrees.
But now?
The temperature is indeed rising, and the temperature control system of the nanosuit is already running at full power, but the orientation of this rock layer is simply a mess!
The sedimentary rock layers, which should have been distributed horizontally, are twisted into a pretzel shape here, as if by some unseen giant hand.
Faults, folds, diapirs—the underground rocks are like a pot of boiled and then cooled porridge, chaotic and disordered.
Even more problematic is its navigation system.
The map display inside the car, based on the principle of an "ancient compass" module, had its pointer spinning wildly, as if we had entered the Bermuda Triangle.
Is this what they call a realistic physics engine? Terrible, full of bugs.
"