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Olympus Mons was the highest volcano on Mars and the largest known volcano in the solar system.
It was 21,171 meters above the Martian datum plane and over 10,000 meters higher than Mount Everest, the highest mountain on Earth.
It was a veritable behemoth. Even if you stood on Earth and observed the planet with a telescope, you can still see Olympus Mons.
However, unlike Mount Everest, which was steep and difficult to climb, Olympus Mons had a gentle slope, so it was very easy to climb.
Its biggest feature was just being too high and too big. Climbing Olympus Mons was exhausting and time-consuming. But this was not a big problem for Ling Jiu and Niu Ben, as both could fly.
The two climbed to the crater, and a dark sinkhole appeared at the bottom of the crater. It was a passage leading to the inside of Olympus Mons.
With the inner core dying, the geological movement of Mars is almost nonexistent. The largest volcano in the solar system has died out. For hundreds of millions of years, the crater of the volcano has been buried by dust and sand. It was Niu Ben who excavated this passage.
“We can enter the inside of Olympus Mons following this passage.”
Niu Ben pointed to the sinkhole in the crater with delight. “That dimensional passage is at a depth of thirty-thousand meters underground.”
“Let’s get down there.”
Ling Jiu did not hesitate, and Ling Jiu flew down toward the sinkhole without hesitation. Niu Ben quickly followed.
This was not the first time Ling Jiu had entered a sinkhole. But compared with the sinkhole on Pandora, this one was obviously much quieter.
There was no lichen, no fungus, no moisture, only thick volcanic ash and layers of rocks. Mars had been silent for too long.
After descending for half an hour, they finally came to the dimensional passage that emitted a fiery red glow.
Its appearance was almost identical to that of other stable dimensional passages. The only difference was, this one was fiery red, like a magnified ruby with scorching heat waves coming from the dimensional passage.
“I can even feel the heat in the passage. Can you imagine how hot that planet on the other side is?” Niu Ben said.
“Shall we go?” Ling Jiu was an eager beaver now.
“Sure.”
Niu Ben nodded and then entered the dimensional passage with Ling Jiu. In just a moment, they came to the world on the other end of the dimensional passage.
A terrifying heatwave hit them, and they could feel the unbearable heat even with their Venom Suits on.
They felt a pulling force acting on their bodies, and it made movement extremely difficult as if they were 1,000 meters deep undersea.
The sky was orange, while the surface was dry and red.
It was a hot, dead world, completely different from Mars.
“Bro, we won’t be able to stay for too long,” Niu Ben warned. “We will leave after a few minutes, then take a rest and come in again.”
“Understood.” Ling Jiu nodded and even took out an environment reader. “Brother Niu, I will explore while you take the readings.”
“Sure.”
“Holy cow! The temperature here is 470 degrees Celsius. No wonder the Venom Suit can’t last long. I wonder if anything can survive here. But, the greenhouse effect may cause this, since the atmosphere is 96% carbon dioxide, 3% nitrogen, and 1% sulfuric acid.”
“The carbon dioxide content is so high?” Niu Ben was startled as carbon dioxide was the main greenhouse gas.
The carbon dioxide content on this planet was so high that the greenhouse effect was serious. It was as if there was a thick insulation board wrapped around the planet. When the sun shone, the heat would only get in, but not out.
The greenhouse effect was out of control.
“So much carbon dioxide. How nice it would be if we can take some for Mars.”
Ling Jiu couldn’t help sighing. What did Mars lack most?
Mars lacked everything—water, oxygen…
However, Ling Jiu thought that what Mars currently lacked most was heat. It was -5 to -6⁰C during the day, and even as low as -70 or -80⁰C at night.
Where could the heat be coming from?
Carbon dioxide…
If Mars had so much carbon dioxide, it would only take half a day for the sun to heat up Mars and turn it into a hospitable world.
“There is a dimensional passage between this planet and Mars. Perhaps it is possible to transfer some carbon dioxide to Mars!” Ling Jiu exclaimed as he suddenly thought of something.
“That makes sense! You have a point.”
Niu Ben was overjoyed. As a matriculation camp veteran, he knew some inside stories that ordinary rookies did not.
The high-level humans on Earth had thought of many ways to terraform Mars using means such as nuclear bombing and planting Arcana trees.
Unfortunately, they were not very effective.
Now that this planet had a massive amount of carbon dioxide, if they reported this to the higher up, it was going to help in the terraforming effort of Mars, besides getting a handsome reward.
“One more thing, if the carbon dioxide is transferred to Mars, the carbon dioxide content on this planet will decrease, and the temperature here will drop significantly. Then, this planet will become a suitable candidate for terraforming,” Ling Jiu said. “At least, when the temperature drops, we can plant Arcana trees here.”
“Yep, that’s it!” Niu Ben said in excitement. “Meaning, it may be possible to terraform this planet. This way, the reward we get… Wow, bro, you are so smart.”
“Explore! Let’s explore!”
“After we finish exploring, we will see the camp commandant and report the findings. We will share the rewards fifty-fifty.”
“Deal.”
Ling Jiu kept nodding and then continued to explore with the environment reader in hand.
“The atmospheric pressure on the surface of this planet is 90 times higher than that of Earth. This is equivalent to the pressure at a depth of 1,000 meters in the sea.”
“That is terrifying,” Niu Ben said. “If this is the case, then the pressure we feel now should be at atmospheric pressure. The gravity of this planet should be lower than expected.”
“Very likely.”
Just as the two were busy exploring, a terrifying thunder suddenly sounded in the thick orange-yellow clouds.
As they looked up, they saw a thousand-meter-long bolt of lightning dancing in the clouds, running in a rampage for seven or eight minutes before dissipating.
“Holy cow! This lightning lasts really long enough!” Niu Ben exclaimed. “Record this! Record this.”
“One more thing, the wind speed on this planet is very slow, but because the atmosphere is thick, the slow wind contains terrifyingly high energy.”
“Record this.”
Just like that, the two people joined hands to explore this planet. Some time had passed and the Venom Suits overloaded. The two returned to Mars to take a break. When they recovered, they started exploring again.
Three hours passed just like that.
The two came to an enormous lake.
A lake…
This was an important discovery.
When the two of them saw the lake’s true face though, they could not help but shudder.
“This lake is…” Niu Ben swallowed hard. “It will even melt our bones if we fall inside.”
There was indeed a lake ahead, but it was yellow, giving out black smoke and a pungent smell.
Ling Jiu took out a piece of PH test paper and then tested the liquid in the lake. The PH paper turned dark red.
“This is an acid lake.” Ling Jiu was bated breath. “Judging by the 1% sulfuric acid in the atmosphere, it is not difficult to tell that the liquid in this lake is sulfuric acid.”
“Sulfuric acid?” Niu Ben shuddered all over, and couldn’t help taking a few steps back. “Let’s explore other places. It’s too dangerous here.”
“Agree.”
Half an hour later, the two of them came to a river that appeared crimson and bubbled.
No test was needed this time. The two immediately recognized it to be a lava river.
“A sulfuric acid lake just now, and now a lava flow,” Niu Ben said. “What is this planet, really?”
“Don’t you think it looks like Venus, one of the eight planets in the solar system?” Ling Jiu had a thoughtful look on his face.
“Venus?” Niu Ben’s heart skipped a beat.
“Yes, Venus.” Ling Jiu nodded. “All the data we have collected points to the possibility that this planet is Venus.”
“If it is really Venus…”
Just then, the lava suddenly surged. They turned their heads to look and saw two spiral horns, followed by a head, slowly emerged from the lava river.
“This is…” It shocked them to see a head coming out of the lava river. “There is life on this planet?”
In the eyes of the two, life is impossible to exist on a hostile planet like this. Even if there was life, it could only be micro-life such as bacteria and viruses, and it was impossible to breed larger life forms.
Now, however, the creature with two spiral horns in front of their eyes was over ten meters long, and its head was larger than a bus.
Then, there was its body…
Ling Jiu and Niu Ben looked on with bated breath as the creature came out of the lava flow.
It was over 100 meters tall, and its body was covered in fiery red scales. It also had a pair of huge bat-like wings, which were also covered in the same fiery red scales.
On the whole, it looked like an enlarged version of a pterosaur, and a firebird with a terrifying wingspan at the same time.
“What is this monster?” Niu Ben’s voice trembled.
“It looks a bit like the monster, Rodan in the Godzilla 2 movie,” Ling Jiu muttered to himself.
Let’s call it Rodan.
After climbing out of the lava river, Rodan flapped its wings that were over 300 meters. They were so massive that they could almost block out the sky.
It opened its bird’s beak-like monstrous mouth and roared with bursts of sound, the energy of which formed circles of substantial shock waves.
Immediately after, Radon flapped its wings to strike the two of them.
Boom!
A tornado of wind swept at them, sending them flying back backward like two pieces of paper before they landed thousands of meters away.
“That’s powerful!” There was a flash of excitement in Ling Jiu’s eye. He tucked the environment reader away and burst into laughter. “Brother Niu, you take photos while I will play with this beast.”
Taking photos as evidence…
Since there was such a terrifying life form on this hellish planet, taking photos as evidence was absolutely necessary. They could get more details that way.
“What are you going to do?” Niu Ben asked with a trembling voice.
“Kill this beast and take it back for further study.”
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