The building's windows couldn't withstand the hailstorm and were already showing signs of cracking.
"Quick, let's find another place!"
Old Morgan was the first to stand up. His large movement stirred up the surrounding air, as if two blocks of ice had been stuffed into his bones, causing him to gasp involuntarily.
The family members and several drivers and employees next to them also got up to pack their things, wrapped in blankets and various warm items, all of which were high-end brands, with prices that ordinary people could only look up to in the past.
Aside from not being very warm, these high-end brands have almost no other drawbacks.
Just as everyone stood up, the glass that had already made a sound let out a final shout.
With a loud crash, shards of metal scattered all over the ground.
Hailstones, now the size of fists, began to rain down one after another, like meteorites, pounding into the house through the crack in the window, fragments flying to everyone's feet.
Moreover, it wasn't just one window; other windows in the building also shattered, and within half a minute, the building was drafty from all sides.
An unprecedented chill swept through Old Morgan's body, as if trying to freeze his internal organs into ice crystals.
He could feel a dull, stinging pain in his lungs just from breathing, as if he had stuffed two mints inside.
Others weren't much better off than Old Morgan.
The Morgan family has always lived a life of luxury, never leaving the embrace of air conditioning and heating from birth, and never getting cold or hot even outdoors.
What's more, they are now facing a superstorm that is much stronger than a normal cold wave.
Even across all time and space, very few people have ever encountered such a scene, let alone those of them who have never experienced the cold.
After the window shattered and a cold draft rushed in, Old Morgan's grandson couldn't take it anymore and had to be held by several loyal drivers.
The group wandered aimlessly through the building like headless flies in the cold wind, finally finding their way down the stairs to a basement.
There are no windows here, but there is a door that can block out the cold wind raging in the building.
Even after the drivers closed the door, Old Morgan still felt a constant stream of cold air blowing in from outside...
The group could only huddle together, like penguins hibernating, clinging to each other for warmth.
However, opinions on the effectiveness of this approach vary...
After a while, Morgan, who was getting too cold, asked for everyone's opinions, hoping that anyone knew any tips for keeping warm.
The result greatly disappointed him.
Aside from starting a fire, no one offered any answers.
One brave veteran employee suggested that he could risk rushing out, draining the gasoline from the car, and bringing it back to use for heating.
The other drivers all said that his behavior was very kind.
Yes, enthusiasm in a physical sense.
Gasoline evaporates to produce vapors, which can ignite when they reach a certain concentration due to static electricity.
Playing this in a sealed basement, you're probably planning a barbecue in LeMay...
Morgan persisted, urging everyone to brainstorm more ways to keep warm. The only suggestion he received was for everyone to huddle together closer and rely on love for warmth.
Only then did Old Morgan, shivering from the cold, give up.
What clever ways can these people, who have never been cold since birth, come up with to keep warm?
They don't need to know many things that are common sense for ordinary people...
The cold wind howled outside, and even though the basement provided some protection, the temperature continued to drop.
Occasionally, a driver would light a piece of paper in the basement to briefly raise the temperature, but before everyone could feel truly warm, the fire had to be extinguished due to lack of oxygen.
Gradually, the atmosphere in the basement became increasingly oppressive.
Apart from the sound of the wind outside, no one else could be heard speaking.
Held in the middle of the crowd, Old Morgan shivered like a pitiful mouse in the cold, his muscles twitching involuntarily.
Even my vision started to blur.
This was the first time he had ever felt such a bone-chilling cold.
Every second he spent there felt like an eternity.
At that moment, he missed that enclosed but warm bunker terribly.
He regretted leaving there, and in his dazed state, he recalled the day CW-7 was released...
If only he could stop the plan on that day.
Now he doesn't have to freeze here anymore, right?
"Can we get back to the bunker?" the teenage grandson asked, his jaw clenching uncontrollably.
"That Mutual Aid Society said they could relocate us to a parallel universe, didn't they? There wouldn't be this harsh cold there, and we wouldn't have to endure this suffering anymore. I feel like I'm about to die..."
The grandson was speaking with his last breath.
His father heard this and simply hugged him even tighter.
Old Morgan was pulled back to reality from his reverie by the sound.
Although he desperately wanted to return to the bunker, he didn't care if he were caught because of it...
But Old Morgan knew very well.
"There's no going back, neither the bunker nor that day."
"What we need to do now is to bear the consequences..."
Old Morgan, unusually, went on and on with a long, rambling explanation of principles.
No matter how much he said, no one responded to him...
Old Morgan didn't care and just kept talking quietly.
breathe...
Heartbeat...
Everything is slowly coming to a stop.
At this moment, it was not just Old Morgan's family who were enduring the torment of the bitter cold.
The area affected by this superstorm spanned hundreds of thousands of square kilometers, with almost the entirety of North Dakota and Minnesota within its reach.
In addition, parts of other surrounding states have also been affected to varying degrees.
Winter temperatures in these three states typically drop to around -10 degrees Celsius, but due to the storm, temperatures have plummeted to below -20 degrees Celsius.
This temperature, occurring in the summer, caught everyone off guard.
Within an hour of the storm's arrival, a flood of requests for help arrived, far too many to handle.
In addition, there were numerous death reports...
Even with some prior preparation, everything was still in complete chaos, barely managing to stay afloat.
In this situation, even if Matthew personally supervises online, it won't make any difference.
He can't just send people to the disaster area out of thin air!
The guards he just mobilized from various regions have only just set off, and it's still unknown when they will arrive.
Matthew, caught off guard by this unexpected situation, was completely overwhelmed and kept asking his secretary if there was anything else he could do.
The secretary frantically reported the situation, "We've already dispatched a support team of 80,000 people, but the earliest one is expected to arrive in three hours..."
Matthew suddenly thought, "What about the Mutual Aid Society's plasma jets?"
"I received their notification that the superheated jets have been launched to the storm's epicenter through the Spacetime Tunnel."
"Then why isn't it working?"
"They had previously warned that plasma jets would have little effect on such a large-scale cryogenic storm."
"So how many death reports have we received so far?" Matthew asked again.
The secretary replied, "A total of...305 cases across the three states!"
Upon hearing this, Matthew nearly fainted.
Less than an hour after the storm hit, we've already received 300 reports of deaths.
And this is just from receiving the message.
There are still many cases that haven't been reported in time or that weren't possible to report.
Those are the real big winners.
At this moment, the secretary, her voice trembling, said, "According to estimates from relevant departments, the actual death toll is now at least over a thousand."
Matthew put his hands on his hair, resisting the urge to mess it up. He remembered a case that Cheng Wanli had sent him not long ago when he first took office.
It is said that it was a real event that occurred in a certain timeline within the Mutual Aid Society.
That timeline was also struck by a cryogenic storm, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of millions of people.
I heard they still haven't finished collecting the bodies.
Furthermore, a new shooting game instance was added to North America in that timeline, resulting in even more corpses...
He was initially skeptical about this case.
So while discussing relocation plans with Cheng Wanli and requesting more lenient conditions, they also had people analyze the accuracy of various meteorological data in the case studies, and incidentally, proactively arranged for various regions to make some disaster preparedness measures...
Unexpectedly, the veracity of the cryogenic storm has yet to be confirmed.
It has already appeared in reality!
"Let's check the situation on site."
Matthew's secretary accessed real-time satellite imagery.
The massive eye of the storm appears from space as a large, newly grown spot on Earth.
Near the center of this large spot, dozens of straight, fine blue beams can be seen shooting out intermittently, frantically stirring up the vortex-shaped storm cloud.
However, in the face of a massive storm cloud with an impact area of hundreds of thousands of square kilometers, these few beams of blue light were like toothpicks stirring a water tank; they weren't completely ineffective, but they were certainly negligible.
"That's the Mutual Aid Society's plasma jet," the secretary said, holding a tablet connected to a large screen, looking at her boss and shaking her head slightly. "Just like they said, the effect is weak."
If viewed from the ground, the plasma beams ejected by the Planetary Engine would resemble colossal pillars in a temple, or lightsabers piercing the heavens and earth—no amount of awe-inspiring adjectives can adequately describe their power.
Its magnificence...
But compared to the storm that's currently unfolding, it's at best a taut steel wire.
No matter how many steel wires you have, you can't break up a storm that has already formed.
Natural disaster!
This is the power of natural disasters!
This storm killed hundreds of millions of people in another time and space!
Matthew is now completely convinced that if they don't hurry up and evacuate, these storms will only become more and more frequent.
The plasma jets that had previously astonished them were almost completely ineffective in the face of such a natural disaster.
Such power is beyond what humans can withstand.
Even if...
It may have been created by humans.
Matthew suddenly remembered the information that Cheng Wanli had sent him.
Morgan!
Matthew gritted his teeth; he had never hated an old man so much in his life.
"All 24 steering engines are running at full power!"
"In addition, we have started testing thirty propulsion engines, but the activation of these engines was unplanned and will have a significant impact on the underground city and the surrounding area. We can only keep them running for one hour..."
Messages from the spacetime communication system came from the Wandering Spacetime.
Looking at the large screen in front of him, Zhang Tianyuan simply replied, "Thank you for your hard work."
I hung up the phone and looked to the side.
Liu Chunshi and Jack were still discussing while waiting for the supercomputer's weather simulation results.
Before them were detailed data on the current superstorm in North America.
With all 24 Planetary Engine firing at full power, the impact is minimal, only raising the overall temperature in some areas by 1.3 degrees Celsius.
For the ground surface, which is already close to minus thirty degrees Celsius, this mere 1-2 degree Celsius temperature increase is practically negligible.
Many people still freeze to death.
No one can save them.
Jack Hall seemed to be recalling events from his own timeline, his expression remaining grim.
Taking advantage of a break, Liu Chunshi offered him a few words of comfort.
"This storm formed so suddenly, they've done a very good job."
Jack opened his mouth, hesitated, and finally just sighed.
He also knew that North America in this timeline had truly done its best.
The storm took less than an hour from its first signs to its complete formation—a process faster than their computers could calculate!
This situation did not occur even in the Day After Tomorrow Spacetime.
Zhang Tianyuan remained silent.
And there's not much to say right now.
Although some success has been achieved in the Day After Tomorrow Spacetime, nature is still showing all of humanity, in its own way, just how terrifying its power truly is.
Spacetime Tunnel and Mutual Aid Society are not always a panacea.
The Planetary Engine, temporarily increased to 54, unleashed a torrent of fire at the eye of the storm.
Furthermore, in order to increase the warming effect on the ground, Zhang Tianyuan lowered the height of the plasma jet at Liu Chunshi's suggestion.
Hundreds of kilometers of high-temperature plasma streaked across the low atmosphere, rubbing against the air and producing terrifying roars. Intense blue-white light flashed in the storm, as if the end of the world had arrived.
The storm and plasma are constantly vying for dominance.
Ice and fire, white and blue, intertwine and blend in the sky.
Ultimately, as expected, the storm prevailed.
After leaving behind a trail of destruction, the massive storm cloud packed up and headed south.
Zhang Tianyuan manipulated the Spacetime Tunnel to continue the pursuit.
However, plasma jets weren't entirely without their downfall.
Because it is closer to the ground, its warming effect on the ground is quite significant, and the warming effect is expected to reach 5.
The difference between -30 and -25 can still save some people.
In the disaster-stricken area.
Soon after the storm moved south, all rescue teams were mobilized, and rescue teams that Matthew had previously dispatched from all over the country also arrived one after another.
Rescue operations have officially begun.
Is anyone there?
When Old Morgan regained consciousness, he heard an unknown loud noise, a creaking sound, and then a bright light was shone into his eyes.
He wanted to respond.
But his whole body wouldn't obey his commands anymore...
"Hurry, there's one alive here, take him away immediately!"
The man shining a flashlight into his eyes was excited, and then a group of people came up.
Morgan could only see many blurry shadows, barely able to make out that the ones in front of him were humanoid creatures; the rest were completely indistinct...
He remained there, like a rag doll, at the mercy of the rescue team. He had lost all sense of touch, his consciousness was hazy, as if he were in a dream, and the world seemed both near and far to him.
Thump!
Suddenly something fell to the ground, making a sound like a hard object colliding.
Damn it!
His arms and legs are broken!
The man with the flashlight sounded terrified...