The Great Flare (Saturn Ring 1)

65 million years ago, Venus

Returning to his residence, a weary Nikola Tesla washed up and climbed into bed, soon falling asleep.

These days, he had been shuttling back and forth between Earth, Venus, and Mars, and was truly exhausted. Fortunately, he finally had a preliminary plan to deal with the Venusian crisis, awaiting only the Alliance's approval.

A knock on the door startled Nikola Tesla awake. He groggily opened his eyes and waved to turn on the lights, but nothing happened. The room remained dark. Had the power gone out?

He fumbled to open the door, and Abbott outside anxiously called out:

"Nikola, hurry and get dressed, come with me. Something big has happened around Saturn."

The hallway was pitch black, as was the road leading to the Academy of Sciences building. The power was truly out, a widespread outage.

For over 80 years, while Nikola Tesla was in a coma, Abbott had been studying his Superluminal Wave Theory. To convince the skeptical mainstream scientists, Abbott planned to erect a 180,000-kilometer-tall device on Tower Island in Venus.

If Tesla's theory was correct, this device would be able to fully receive the wavelength of superluminal waves, thus becoming an inexhaustible clean energy source, the so-called Superlight Wave Power Station.

Abbott's plan not only met with unanimous opposition from his peers, but even he himself was unsure about the side effects of the Superlight Wave Power Station, as Venusians knew too little about the nature of superluminal waves.

Thus, the experimental Saturn Power Station plan came into being. Saturn was very far from Venus, with Earth, Mars, and Jupiter in between. Even if the Saturn Superlight Wave Power Station had any side effects, it would not affect Venus.

In the Solar System, Jupiter was the largest planet with the most moons. Saturn, on the other hand, had only a few moons, the largest of which had a diameter of over ten thousand kilometers, larger than Mars. Venusians named it Sedna.

The moon Sedna had a semi-major axis of 380,000 kilometers, comparable to the distance between Earth and the Moon.

Abbott's team received the support of the Venus Alliance and spent over a decade building a 380,000-kilometer-long flexible structure of Carbon Fiber Tubes at Sedna's equator, always facing Saturn.

For structural stability, a massive metal space station was built at the midpoint, about 190,000 kilometers in, for personnel to live, maintain, and monitor.

The end of the structure was a giant metal sphere suspended a few hundred kilometers above Saturn. Saturn's powerful gravity pulled the entire structure taut.

As superluminal waves entered, the workstations located on Sedna's surface and at the center converted thermal energy into electrical energy, and Venusians' first Superlight Wave Power Station in the Solar System was successfully completed.

Because the Sedna power station was experimental and limited by transportation capacity and construction costs, its power output was much smaller than the Venus Tower Island Power Station built later, only on the order of one in a million.

The thermal-to-electric conversion rate of the Superlight Wave Power Station could not reach one hundred percent, causing overheating within Venus. After the crisis occurred, the Venus Academy of Sciences evaluated and shut down several Venusian Superlight Wave Power Stations.

However, because the Sedna power station was located far away and its power output was extremely small, it was preserved for better research into the nature of superluminal waves.

A few hours ago, the residual superluminal wave heat energy accumulated inside Sedna, Saturn's largest moon, finally erupted, and the giant ice moon exploded.

Debris spread around Saturn's equator, chaotic ice blocks and rocks colliding with each other, rotating at high speed, stretching for nearly a million kilometers. Saturn became blurry, shrouded in a massive cluster of ice blocks and rubble.

Taking the Sun as an example, superluminal waves came from all directions. Because their wavelength was smaller than the Sun's diameter, immense energy was uniformly injected, causing the star to undergo nuclear reactions, shining and emitting heat as if ignited.

Since Saturn's diameter was smaller than the wavelength of superluminal waves, the superluminal waves from Saturn's direction on the Sun's surface diffracted. After being blocked by Saturn, the surface temperature of the corresponding area of the Sun decreased.

If other blocking relationships were added, causing the surface temperature of this area to further decrease, sunspots would form, leading to explosions in the high-temperature regions at the edges of the sunspots, called solar flares.

Sedna's explosion broke the original balance. Saturn, carrying the debris cluster spanning a million kilometers, blocked the superluminal waves over a larger area.

The corresponding sunspots dramatically enlarged, and the resulting solar flares caused a significant increase in the Sun's extremely low-frequency radiation power. This resonated with the Venusian power grid at low frequencies, causing widespread power outages on Venus.

Nikola Tesla followed Abbott to the emergency command center of the Venus Academy of Sciences building. Backup generators had begun to operate, and several sky-survey telescopes were focused on Saturn. Abbott pointed to the large cluster of ice debris on the screen and said:

"Nikola, repairing and restoring power is not our job. What we need to do is to quickly assess the impact of Sedna's explosion on solar activity and even the entire Solar System."

Faced with the sudden turn of events, Nikola Tesla didn't know where to start. He organized his thoughts and said:

"The most significant impact I can think of, of course, is sunspots and flares. This chaotic structure spanning a million kilometers is clearly unstable. Once it dissipates and stabilizes in some form, solar activity may return to normal."

"Slowly dissipate? How long will that take? During that time, we Venusians will suffer from off-the-charts solar flares and solar winds," Abbott said, pushing Tesla into a special chair. "I've already uploaded Sedna's data to your external brain. Connect it to the Lightning Ball and think deeply."

The answer Nikola Tesla received from his external brain, connected via the Lightning Ball, initially startled him. Then, he switched off the connection and slumped back in the chair. Under Abbott's anxious questioning, Tesla slowly said:

"The external brain is a computer; it's different from us humans. Its answers are cold and represent the worst-case scenario. Whenever Jupiter and Saturn align, it triggers stronger solar activity. What will happen now that Jupiter and this giant ice ball of Saturn are aligning, Abbott?"

Abbott's spine instantly chilled. He grabbed a tablet, found the planetary conjunction cycle table, and desperately muttered to himself:

"Saturn and Jupiter have a conjunction cycle of about 20 years. We're too unlucky; the next one is in three years."

Tesla's addition was like adding insult to injury. He said:

"Even more unfortunate is that in three years, the conjunction point of Saturn and Jupiter will be exactly on the line between the Sun and Regulus, triggering the most intense sunspots and flares in history."

"Three years. By then, can we Venusians still survive? Nikola, quickly think of a solution," Abbott said despairingly.

"If it were just this, I believe that even with widespread power outages and abnormal high temperatures every 20 years, it wouldn't lead to the extinction of Venusians. We are tenacious, after all," Tesla said firmly, as if comforting Abbott, and added:

"The good news is that when Sedna exploded, the power station structure was on the outer side of the Sun. It broke into two sections, intertwined, and is now flying out of the Solar System while rotating. It didn't come towards us. And that chaotic giant ice cluster will form beautiful rings under Saturn's gravitational pull."

Abbott couldn't help but ask, "Then what's the bad news? I'm not in the mood to care about the beautiful Saturn rings that will form in the future."

Seeing the anxious Abbott, Tesla hesitated. He stood up, clenched his fist, and said to Abbott:

"Stop waiting for the Alliance's approval process. Prepare a spaceship for me. I need to go to Earth immediately and conduct the lunar mass tumor experiment with space debris."

Abbott was full of doubt and a sense of foreboding. He asked, "With the Saturn crisis being so urgent, why are you still thinking about that lunar mass tumor gravity experiment?"

Nikola Tesla looked at Abbott with heartache. He didn't know whether to tell his poor old friend that he said regretfully:

"Abbott, I truly hate myself for coming up with this so-called Superluminal Wave Theory. You could say that the crisis facing Venusians was caused by me, this scientific fanatic."

Abbott grabbed Tesla's arm and said:

"This is not your fault, nor is it a question of who is right or wrong. We must never give up hope and effort at any time. Are you going to Earth to conduct an experiment because you've thought of a way to solve the crisis?"

Tesla could no longer hold back and answered with difficulty:

"It's not that I thought of a good idea, I'm afraid my gravitational theory is also correct, and if that's the case, we'll face an even bigger crisis."

Abbott was startled again and asked:

"Are you saying the Venusians will be destroyed?"

Nikola Tesla, hating the answer given by the external brain connected by the Lightning Ball, couldn't suppress his rage and roared:

"Not just the Venusians, the entire Solar System will be destroyed!"

&

Poem for Chapter Compilation:

Vast wilderness, cold stars touch the ground so much, Ming, Zhang Xuan

Lingering waves still ripple on the solid ice. Qing, Huang Ren

Xuanyuan doesn't value unknown guests, Tang, Dai Shulun

Even with a long rope, what can be done about the sun? Song, Lin Yong