4.6 Billion Year Symphony of Evolution

Book 2: Chapter 48 “Count-down To Doom”

Under the dark starlight, Leviathan came closer and closer to the land. But, a rock cliff dozens of meters tall separated Lin from the land, preventing Lin to see what land looked like under the giant sharp spikes.

Was it rock? But there were some small forks on the spikes. Rocks should not have such structures.

Could it be.an organism?

Lin was interested but Leviathan could not climb on to such steep cliffs.

Never mind, when the time came, it should be able to swim around the cliff to find land.

Lin did not care. It had the Leviathan put down the base seed. If there were problems with this piece of land, then it could only face the disaster face on.

Lin did not have great hopes. Yet when Lins base seed touched the rock, there was nothing unusual

This landdid not have an abnormal reaction?

So this was why. No wonder it had a feeling that the north was safe

While Lin did not know what this feeling was, it seemed to be of great help. Now it must have the transporters quickly swim here.

Lin did not know if there was enough time. Leviathan took more than a hundred days to come here, and the transporters were not as fast as Leviathan. But they were now in the ocean, and shouldnt be affected by the disaster on land.

Lin had Leviathan stop under the cliff and focused on directing the large swarm of transporters.

At the same time, Lin noticed that the observation eyes from its original bases over on the west land and east land now saw signs that disaster was coming.

In the thirty days before the disaster, many organisms were starting to leave. First were the fish like the sharks with a good sense of smell, then the helmet fish. At nearly nine days, even the jellyfish were starting to leave. What remained were the sessile organisms like the corals and grasses

Of course, they did not just sit by. The corals released large amounts of eggs even though this was not the time for breeding and let the eggs float away with the water current.

Each organism had some ability to sense the ripples deep underground. Their senses had continued to evolve through competition, hunting and countless disasters.

Lin was interested to see where they would swim. While Lin itself predicted earlier, it had no clue about escape paths. But other organisms were always able to swim to safe places.

While Lin now had a target, it still had many eyeballs follow the fleeing organisms.

Lin also had many organisms swim in the direction that it had swam in. For example, the helmet fish were mostly mixed up in Lins transporter army. There were tens of thousand of them. There were also many other lobe-finned fish. They had chosen the same direction as Lin, but many other organisms swam in different directions.

Lin had over two thousand transporters. The transporters were shaped like sharks, and relied on their water spout tentacles to swim and steer. Right now, this enormous troop was underneath the dark cold ice layer and swam north without hesitation.

Over 90% of a transporters body was stuffed full of nutrients from the green carpet and they could not swim fast. Adding on the group of helmet fish, this attracted many predators. They swam around the troop and prepared to attack at any time.

Most of them were sharks. There were about a hundred of them that followed the troop on both sides. They would sometimes charge up, bite a helmet fish and then retreat.

Lins transporters had many guards and it was easier to deal with the sharks. If they only attacked the helmet fish, Lin would ignore them but there were some troublesome organisms following as well.

The Dunkleosteus. These giant fish rarely appeared with more than two but there were dozens now following behind Lins transporters. They did not wait for a chance to attack like the sharks, but calmly swam behind.

They may have grown more docile because this was the prelude to the disasterwhile Lin thought so, it still kept an eye on them. This group of large fish would be very troublesome.

Lin called the north the fish path. Almost all the fish species had followed this way while other organisms swam mostly towards the southwest and northeast.

Now, there were only eight nights left. Would they get there in timebut, no matter what, this location should not be greatly affected.

After the night passed, Lins troops still moved at their fastest speed but Lin felt something strange.

There was a layer of ice above the troop. Large amounts of ice started to fall. They did not affect Lin and the other fish but were very strange.

This must be a warning sign of the disaster. Would the change affect this place as well?

While strange, Lin did not stop.

Another night passed. There were only seven nights left. Large cracks appeared on the ice layer. This time, there were obvious changes. The sharks grew quiet. They did not seem interested in eating and sped up swimming.

There were only six nights left. Lin could sense that the water temperature was much higher. All of the fish were not swimming so high up, and did not day so close to the ice surface.

Lin also moved down with them. In terms of choosing the path, Lin trusted other organisms more.

There were only five nights left. Big cracks had formed between the ice pieces. The sunlight shown through the cracks into the dark waters. If the ice melted, Lin could create the green carpet here. But looking at the urgently swimming fish, Lin did not follow the thought.

Then as night and day changed, the changes in the ice layer grew more obvious. From the thick ice dozens of meters thick to the few pieces on the water surface now.

The water temperature changed rapidly, and the icy ocean water turned to a hot spring. While Lin did not know what a hot spring was, from the term, it was easy to understand the meaning.

Now, there were only two nights left

The fish swarm was now swimming along the seabed. Lin found that the fish were not the only ones moving north, there were also many segmented limb organisms, like the trilobites, the Brontoscorpio. They were also moving on the bottom of the ocean north wards.

There were many fish that werent able to endure the heat and died along the way. When their corpses fell to the bottom, no organism went to eat them. Every organism was hurrying, of no mind to do anything also. Even those that were predator and prey were close together as they traveled.

In the face of the disaster, every was different

Lins troop was not completely unharmed. Because the change from cold to hot had been so fast, some transporters had died, unable to adjust. But the remainder quickly adjusted.

Lin had not had to endure heat for a long time, but the cell memories of enduring heat a long time ago were stored. Lin just had to produce them.

But, if the water continued to heat up, there likely would be more danger.

Now, there was only one night left

Lin observed the surrounding organisms. There were only half of the helmet fish left. The remainder were large ones with great resistance. The sharks were not well off. But the Dunkleosteus did not seem to be afraid of the heat and only a few of them had been lost.

As to the arthropods, they seemed much better than the fish. Lin saw few fatalities.

Lin had kept some eyeballs observing on the water surface. There were almost no ice pieces left. It was so hot. But the eyeballs were simple in construction, could easily change itself and increased its ability to resist heat.

All this time, Lins eyeball observed the change of the ice layer, but now on the ice free surface, they saw something else.

Right now, it was night and the stars shone brightly. The temperature was much lower than during the daytime. Lin had the eyeballs float to the water surface to sense the air temperature. Immediately, Lins eyeballs felt the surrounding temperature increase. The stars on the sky seemed to grow bigger, and they were flying towards the sea!

What was that?

Stars? Didnt seem like it

These things were spheres, around ten meters across, and were completely wrapped in a red and flickering light.

A new term appeared in Lins thoughtsfire

Fire? What was that?

During Lins confusion, the fireballs crashed into the distant sea.

Translator Ramblings: This is a really cool documentary with amazing graphics about space and life, especially chapter 2.