81: Chapter 81 World Wonders

The moment the screen in the live stream was engulfed by white light, all comments stopped.

It wasn't that no one was posting, but rather that everyone had forgotten to.

The faces in front of the screens froze, one by one.

White-collar workers in offices stopped typing on their keyboards.

Students in school dormitories sat with their mouths agape, forgetting to close them.

A middle-aged man holding his phone in a subway car had his finger frozen above the screen.

That scene—that white light falling from the sky and then engulfing the entire screen—no one could look away.

Then, the mushroom cloud rose.

A gray-black column of clouds surged up from the ground, spreading out a ring-shaped cloud cap thousands of meters in the air.

The ripples of the shockwave continued to spread outward, pushing away the broken clouds in the high altitude in concentric circles.

The live stream footage was shaking violently.

The comments began to scroll again, but they were no longer the arguments and teasing from before.

"...Is this a nuclear bomb?"

"It's too terrifying."

"So this is a real God of the Human World."

"I'm sorry. I previously said you were just a flying monster. I was wrong, I'm sorry."

"An entire complex is gone?"

"Just like that?"

People in front of their screens were stunned.

They had thought the power of that ball of light might be great.

After all, being able to condense something that looked like a second sun at an altitude of five thousand meters didn't look like an ordinary attack.

But they had never imagined it would be this big.

A nuclear bomb.

It was synonymous with humanity's ultimate weapon.

It was the ultimate deterrent that human civilization had created only after decades of repeatedly testing the edge of self-destruction.

It was the Sword of Damocles hanging over the head of every nation.

And now, one person, with his bare hands, had done it.

People began to recall the two previous scenes they had seen: lifting a plane at the airport and flying at supersonic speeds through the clouds.

At that time, although they felt it was incredible, it was still within the range of what they could accept.

Being able to lift a plane meant his strength was great.

Being able to fly at Mach 12 meant his speed was fast.

But how strong was his strength?

How fast was his speed?

There was no intuitive concept.

Now there was.

An attack comparable to a nuclear bomb, erasing two square kilometers directly from the map, a shockwave leveling all buildings within ten kilometers, and even shattering glass twenty kilometers away.

This wasn't just being strong.

This was terror.

The trending lists on major social media platforms were completely refreshed within minutes.

#God of the Human World Nuclear Explosion#, #Africa Mushroom Cloud#, #Attack Comparable to a Nuclear Bomb#, #Is it a God or a Nuclear Weapon#.

All topics revolved around the same scene: that white sun falling from the sky and the subsequent gray-black mushroom cloud.

No platform dared to ban the live stream.

It wasn't because of technical difficulties, but because they didn't dare.

The power of that entity had already been seen by the whole world.

Ban news about him?

Delete the footage?

Who knew what he would think?

No one was willing to use their own head to test the temper of a god.

Moreover, the higher-ups also had their own considerations.

Letting people know the truth, knowing the consequences of provoking that entity.

Perhaps it was a good thing after all.

At least no one would be stupid enough to provoke him again.

Analysis videos sprang up like bamboo shoots after a rain.

Military bloggers, physics bloggers, retired artillery commanders, and meteorology experts—everyone was using their professional knowledge to try to explain what had just happened.

A military analysis blogger with two million followers included frame-by-frame footage in his video, comparing it with public nuclear test archives.

He used a cursor to circle the top height of the mushroom cloud, the speed of the shockwave's spread, and the ring-shaped cloud forming at the center of the explosion.

"I have compared data from multiple nuclear tests from the last century and this century,"

His voice was very low, as if he were stating a fact he himself was unwilling to believe.

"The shockwave propagation speed of this explosion, the rising height and shape of the mushroom cloud, the temperature at the blast center—all parameters point to the same conclusion."

He paused for a moment.

"This is an explosion of at least a megaton TNT equivalent. It is equivalent to a standard strategic nuclear warhead carried on an intercontinental missile."

He took a deep breath.

"And this was released by one person with his bare hands."

The video was forwarded all over the internet.

Military institutions and intelligence agencies of various countries were also analyzing it simultaneously.

More detailed and accurate data was constantly being extracted and placed on the desks of the top decision-makers of various countries.

The conclusion was unanimous.

"Megaton-level attack, released by a single person."

"No radiation residue, no pollution spread, purely physical energy explosion."

"Theoretically, it can be released continuously, unrestricted by charge capacity."

"Repeat strike interval unknown."

"Analysis of interception methods: None. Currently, no active anti-missile System is effective against such attacks."

There was dead silence in the conference room.

What they had originally worried about was only the individual destructive power of this entity.

After all, no matter how strong a person was, the destruction they could cause was always limited.

He would always have to punch punch by punch, kick kick by kick.

But now it was different.

Now they knew he could destroy an entire city in one blow.

No army needed, no equipment needed, no logistics needed.

One person, standing there, waving a hand, and a city was gone.

And he could also turn invisible, and fly to any corner of the world.

He could appear above your head without any of your detection equipment reacting.

"This assessment report"

The United States Secretary of Defense was silent for a moment before speaking, then changed his wording, "This entity is not a military threat in the conventional sense."

No one replied.

Because everyone knew what he wanted to say.

This wasn't a military threat; this was an existential threat.

It was no longer a question of "how much force a country needs to mobilize to deal with him."

It was just one person, but whatever you did was useless.

In the Xia Kingdom, at the training base.

Cheng Jian's phone screen was still lit, the live stream footage frozen on that rising mushroom cloud.

Since the airplane incident, he had started paying attention to related news.

He barely slept that night, repeatedly rewatching that sonic boom video, trying to find clues in the footage.

He wanted to confirm if it was that person.

But today.

He saw that ball of light fall, saw the mushroom cloud rise, and saw several square kilometers razed to the ground.

A nuclear-level attack.

Cheng Jian slowly leaned back in his chair.

If the airport incident had caused him strong shock and associations, then this time, he found it somewhat difficult to imagine.

Chen Mo stood thousands of meters in the air, glanced at the ruins below, and withdrew his gaze.

Smoke and dust had completely obscured the earth.

The gray-black cloud of dust surged and spread.

Shrouding all areas beneath the explosion center in a state of Chaos.

He already knew the destructive power of his full-force eruption.

A megaton equivalent.

It was enough.

This time, he had also completely announced his strength to the world.

There was no need for any more probing, no need for any more provocation.

Chen Mo turned around and flew away silently.

As he flew, he absorbed spirit energy particles, and his Source Power replenished in his meridians.

The dried-up energy in his cells was once again filled by Source Power.

In half an hour, his state had recovered.

Continue training.

Continue becoming stronger.

And at the same time, continue looking at this planet.

Hours later.

The sky began to pour with heavy rain.

The rain poured down, each drop the size of a soybean, splashing white water upon hitting the ground.

In the sky were layers upon layers of dark clouds, hanging so low they seemed about to press down onto the ground.

Lightning cracked through the clouds, illuminating the ruins below.

Thunder rolled in, shaking the ground.

It rained for a whole day.

As if it wanted to wash all the dust kicked up by the explosion back into the earth.

Plants were recovering at an accelerated rate.

On the periphery of the explosion zone, new shoots had already emerged from the roots of trees that had been overturned by the shockwave.

After the ash-covered soil was washed by the rain, it revealed moist earth, and moss and ferns began to spread patches of green on the ground.

A day later, the sky cleared up.

People could finally set off for the center of the explosion.

Observation teams from various countries set off simultaneously.

The Xia Kingdom, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Russia.

All countries with the capability to dispatch to Africa had sent teams.

This explosion had no radiation residue, so there was no need to wait for nuclear dust to settle before entering the core area directly.

This was a once-in-a-thousand-years opportunity for field observation.

The convoy struggled forward on the muddy road.

The terrain after the explosion had completely changed.

The original roads had been overturned by the shockwave.

Trees lay scattered across the road.

Accumulated water formed muddy pools in the low-lying areas.

The convoy had to stop and go.

From afar, someone shouted.

Everyone looked up.

In the distance, there was a lake.

No, that was not a natural lake.

Its edges were too round, almost a perfect circle.

The lake surface was as calm as a mirror, reflecting the sky that had cleared after the rain.

The sunlight hit the water surface at an angle, reflecting a luster like broken gold.

Several kilometers in size.

"Is that the center of the explosion?" someone asked.

No one answered.

They continued to approach.

The captain of the Xia Kingdom survey team stood by the lake, holding a laser rangefinder in his hand, stunned for a long time.

The size of this lake reminded him of a reference object: the West Lake.

One lake, one landscape, formed over a thousand years.

And here, it was just one blow.

The measurement work lasted for several hours.

The data was gradually summarized.

Diameter: 2.4 kilometers.

Lake shore shape: nearly a perfect circle, with edge deviations of no more than ten meters.

Average water depth: nearly 50 meters.

Deepest point: 60 meters.

Directly below the center position, the rock layers deposited at the bottom of the lake had obvious signs of liquefaction.

Under high temperature and high pressure, the rocks turned into fluid, and after cooling, formed a smooth, glassy surface.

And the complex that was originally here—the walls, barracks, warehouses, villas, and those weapons.

All disappeared.

No residue.

No ruins.

No fragments.

It was as if they had never existed.

"One blow," someone muttered, repeating, "This one blow melted through the ground by sixty meters."

"The complex only occupied a few square kilometers."

"It drew a perfect lake."

The news was transmitted back home.

Transmitted to the world.

Before the media could think of a suitable headline, someone had already posted photos online.

Viewed from a satellite perspective, that lake was a nearly perfect circle, like a blue eyeball embedded in the brownish-yellow land of Africa.

No one was joking, no one was making fun of it.

Even the comments seemed exceptionally silent.

"Is this crater really made by a human?"

"It's not a crater, it's a lake."

"A lake as big as the West Lake."

"One blow."

A few days later, this lake was designated as a protected area by the newly formed local temporary management agency.

The roads leading to the lake were blocked, and only sporadic tourists and researchers were allowed to enter.

It became a new world wonder.

Not a temple, not a tomb, not a wonder weathered by a thousand years.

It was the mark left by power.