The Life of Mt. Hororyuu: The Forefather of all Life and Magic at 4.6 Billion Years Old

Chapter 9

It was a famous discussion in the 21st century, but every year, the Earths continents move a few centimetres at a time. These slight movements accumulate over the course of a few ten thousands to millions of years, leading to dramatic changes in the shape of a continent.

Recently on Earth, several continents have moved and collided, forming a large mountain range reaching an elevation of almost ten thousand metres above sea level. However, the collision of continents did not only create a large mountain range. It also created large mountain ranges not only on the surface, but undergroundin other words, the bedrock was sinking more and more on a grand scale.

This was the cause of Earths largest scale eruption in history.

When you jump into a pool, or throw solid bathwater additives into a bath, it creates a splash of water. The fundamental theory was the same as that.

If you throw some large and heavy into a liquid, it will create a correspondingly large splash. If you drop a mass of rock the size of a large mountain range into the ball of magma that makes up the Earths core, the splash of magma made in reaction to that would be unimaginable.

The dwarf investigation team managed to estimate when the destructive eruption, [Super Bloom] would occur. They evacuated those living in the core region of where the eruption would occur, and prepared for the disaster.

And then, the Super Bloom that was the largest scale disaster in the past several hundred million years came.

The earth rumbled, and from huge crevices that spanned several dozen kilometres, huge magma curtains that were high enough to split the clouds blew up. Though I thought it would just continue spurting out for a whole day before settling, they continued to gush out intermittently over periods spanning from a few days to ten-odd years. Every time the magma curtain erupted, its height gradually decreased. As the lava cooled and hardened, it formed a stratum that was a few kilometres thick.

A considerable quantity of volcanic ash and gases scattered together with the magma. The sky blurred with grey, and the greenhouse gases caused the Earths temperature to rise. The increase in atmospheric temperature led to the methane hydrate on the ocean bottom to dissolve, forming bubbles in the ocean, and the methane gas that was released once again caused the Earths temperature to rise further, which in turn dissolved even more methane hydrate.

The elves, being the newest race, trembled with fear, thinking that it was the end of the world, but the older races that had information passed down since the ancient era were well-informed regarding these events.

All of the rivers and lakes in the world dried up, and the change in the atmospheric composition caused all the living things to gasp from a lack of oxygen. Though all the ice on the North and South Poles melted, it was still only lukewarm, to the point where you could just describe it as an everlasting summer. At most, the average temperature on Earth was about 30~50C.

When the stupidly large meteorites were falling and overturning the bedrock, in the era where rock vapours proliferated and evaporated, the average temperature was around 3000C, you know? To be creating such an uproar over just 1/100th of that temperature is seriously stupid.

After about a thousand years, even the panicking elves calmed down with the passing of two to three generations.

The sudden change in temperature, together with the sudden drop in freshwater and the concentration of oxygen caused about 90% of the flourishing organisms to disappear, but since the five races humbly made by Mt. Dragonends didnt breathe to begin with, they did not suffocate.

The werewolves were troubled by the disappearance of ice, but like before, they were evacuated to the polar regions of the moon.

The elves had a few forests that were luckily able to just barely survive, as well as a greenhouse forest created underground by the dwarves. Though their numbers had decreased compared to their golden age, they were able to survive.

For the dwarves, the rise in temperature made them stop holing up underground, and they started to go out onto the surface. Going out to sightsee the magma curtains and such went into fashion, and they became far more active than before.

The intermittent eruptions completely subsided after about a thousand years, and for a period of time following that, life seemed to be holding its breath.

The organisms that were unable to adapt to the low oxygen, high temperature environment completely died out, and the remaining creatures that somehow managed to survive were doing all they could to continue creating the next generation. It was not a situation in which they could prosper.

On the other hand, I received the blessing brought by the magma sent flying up by the Super Bloom, and my growth was accelerated by absorbing the heat, until I finally broke through the 10,000 metre barrier in elevation. Although it wasnt like I gained any particular special ability by exceeding 10,000 metres, for the time being I gathered the five species.

I sometimes did these sorts of celebrations during turning points, but my sometimes was quite off compared to the sometimes of the five races whose lifespans were only 500 years long. So when I said wed celebrate, its always treated like, Mt. Dragonends is gathering the five races to celebrate!? Seriously!? Ive only heard about that happening in legends!. I saw this sort of exchange happen a hundred thousand years ago as well. I suppose its an established practice now. 

When I was a human, a hundred thousand was seen as an exaggerated number, but after living as a mountain I realized that its unexpectedly quite trivial. It was a long period of time, but from the viewpoint of Earth or a mountain, it wasnt anything at all.

In addition, due to the several kilometre thick stratum formed by the Super Bloom, the dragon crystal vein was sealed off. As such, the creation of weapons and works of art using dragon crystals was just barely continuing.

The Mt. Dragonends group that had become accustomed to sudden changes in the global environment lazily adapted to the changes in environment, but for normal life forms, the changes were tough to handle. Over the course of ten million years, they grew accustomed to the low oxygen and high temperature environment, and gradually started to grow more vigorously. Their shape changed compared to how it was before the Super Bloom.

The most remarkable change was, of course, the rise of the dinosaurs. 

Before the Super Bloom, the large forests and the insects that lived there were the rulers of the earth, while the ocean was ruled by fish (and ammonites!).

After the Super Bloom, things were different. Only animals that had evolved lungs capable of breathing more efficiently could adapt to the low oxygen environment. In other words, the dinosaurs that were derived from reptiles took over the world.

At first, they were all small sized, but as the number of dinosaurs gradually began to increase, the kinds of dinosaurs also increased.

Those that increased in size.

Those that returned to the ocean.

Those who developed wings and soared in the sky.

Those who obtained armour.

Those that were brightly coloured, and those that were plain

There were various kinds.

When I mentioned how, in the 21st century that I was from, they were discovered as fossils, and a portion of insects were sealed in amber and saved like that, the five races caught dinosaurs and created skeletal specimens of them, and sent me things sealed and hardened in resin or glass. While I was happy, no small number of dinosaurs were about to go extinct from such practices, so I had to send out the order that hunting them was prohibited. 

My careless statement could cause an entire species to be destroyed. How frightening. No, even if I didnt do anything, creatures will continue their cycle of going extinct and prospering anyways. So thinking about it that way, the man-made destruction of a few hundred species was a mere miscalculation, looking at it from the perspective of the earths history. 

From the grasslands, wetlands, deserts, forests, and oceans to the skies, dinosaurs evolved. Naturally, their habitat extended even to Mt. Dragonends, or in other words, my region. 

At first, seeing the dinosaurs advance upon the dwarves holy ground as though they owned the place, the dwarves wanted to beat them to death with hammers for being so insolent. However, since I gave the order that hunting them was prohibited, they became unable to do that, and the dinosaurs completely settled down.

Perhaps it was a twist of fate, as the omnivorous medium-sized dinosaur that made Mt. Dragonends into its territory resembled the dragons of the past. We named them the Dragosaurus, and paid special attention to them.

The Dragosaurus was a dinosaur with light green scales that was about the size of a horse. They walked bipedally and ran in a quick-witted manner, taking down weak dinosaurs that strayed from their packs, or jumping up to eat the ripe fruit off of shrubs. Theyd search for carrion, and would also eat the tender sprouts of pteridophytes (fern plants). 

At first the dwarves would drive off the Dragosauruses without killing them by brandishing their hammers, but as the generations passed, they gradually started to treat them as normal animals that had been on Mt. Dragonends since the olden days. Before we knew it, the Dragosaurus had been transformed into the dwarfs mount.

The dwarves were not very tall, and their legs were also short. While they were stout and excelled in physical strength, they were slow on their legs.

What solved that was the Dragosaurus. For the dwarves who had started to go out more frequently due to the high atmospheric temperature that had grown stable, their mobility had been a problem. Thus, the Dragosaurus were just right as legs for them. After all is said and done, it was easier than the harpys air mail, plus they were light and nimble.

As the Dragosaurus was the type of dinosaur to form herds, once they recognized the dwarves as the head of the herd, they became obedient.

Over the course of a few million years, the Dragosauruses were taken care of at my base by the dwarves. Perhaps due to the continuous influence over the course of multiple generations, they adapted to life on the mountain to an almost miraculous extent. As long as there was a mountain, whether it be a high mountain thickly covered in snow, a mountain overgrown with a dense vegetation, or one with volcanic activity that had steam rising up from the ground, they could survive. Of course, since they werent one of Mt. Dragonends astonishing creations, they still needed to breathe and eat.

The Dragosaurus flourished, and the other dinosaurs also flourished. 

In the skies, the Pteranodons and harpies fought for air superiority, while the mermaids worried about the damage to the head of the Mosasaurus that rammed itself against their dwellings at the bottom of the sea. The race that had the most conflicts with dinosaurs were the elves who territory completely overlapped with that of the dinosaurs living in the forest. Only the werewolves who had returned to Earth did not have much conflict or intercourse with the dinosaurs, since they lived in the cold regions that differed far too much from the usual habitat of the poikilothermic dinosaurs. 

The prosperity of the dinosaurs continued for over a hundred million years. However, all good times must come to an end, and there were no living beings (excluding the Mt. Dragonends faction) that could continue to prosper through the trial of the largest mass extinction and environmental change in the Earths history.

The end of the era of dinosaurs would naturally come.

Indeed.

The dinosaurs extinction was signaled by the arrival of that famous gigantic meteorite collision.