The Out-of-Control Artificial Sun

Was this heaven's way of giving them a test because everything had gone too smoothly? It was like attaining enlightenment and ascending in classical immortal tales—there would always be a heavenly tribulation blocking the way. But watching Dr. Otto Octavius, who had originally been handling everything with ease, begin to fumble with his four mechanical tentacles, Henry felt that things were going badly.

More dangerous than any problem with the equipment was the Artificial Sun starting to act up!

As it repeatedly broke through the protective perimeter maintained by Dr. Octavius's mechanical tentacles, the magnetic field generator inside the Artificial Sun apparatus was the first to malfunction.

All the unsecured metal objects were sucked into the Artificial Sun, and their fate went without saying. Then the surrounding sheet metal and equipment cabinets began to shake as well, about to tear free from their original positions and plunge into the Artificial Sun.

Fortunately, Dr. Octavius's metal mechanical tentacles had been demagnetized and were unaffected by the magnetic field. That was the only reason he could barely maintain the situation and desperately keep the Artificial Sun stable.

Then something unexpected happened. When the mass of the tritium particles colliding under laser pressure at the same time exceeded 21.77 micrograms—the Planck mass—a singularity formed.

This was a so-called microscopic black hole. It existed for only 0.1 yoctoseconds (ys, or 10^-24 seconds) before evaporating. Yet in that fleeting instant, it formed a gravitational field unrelated to mass, drawing in all objects within its range.

It was not only nonmagnetic objects that began to be pulled from their original positions. The tritium particles themselves continued colliding under the force of gravity, triggering nuclear fusion reactions.

But once the colliding particles reached the Planck mass, another microscopic black hole formed and created another gravitational field. This