Li Dong stood in his Memory Palace, staring blankly at the book that had materialized. A chill ran down his spine, as if he’d been plunged into an ice cave.
’A Miyake Level extreme solar particle event... is about to happen?’
The Wukong Satellite’s curve scraping the edge of the anchor interval, the email from Yangbajing, and those dozen or so similar data points that had been dismissed as "Illusion Peaks."
Taken individually, each piece was inconclusive. But strung together... damn, this was scarier than any chart in a top-tier journal!
Wait.
Li Dong suddenly realized something.
’No, that’s not right. This guess is a bit too presumptuous.’
These precursors only proved that "such a thing does exist," and maybe even that "Earth is currently being knocked on by some special kind of particle."
But that was still a world away from a Miyake Level extreme solar particle event being imminent!
Scientific research isn’t something where you can jump to conclusions based on feelings and guesses.
’First, I need to find Teacher Zheng and get all the old event packages that were dismissed as Illusion Peaks. I’ll run them through the Li Criterion to see if they’re real before I do anything else.’
Thinking of this, Li Dong decisively exited the Memory Palace.
Outside the window, the Jinling night was deep.
The screen of the phone on his desk was lit, displaying the time: [22:03].
At this hour, there would definitely still be someone in the duty room at the Zijin Mountain Observatory.
Just as Li Dong was about to head out, the phone on his desk suddenly vibrated.
He opened WeChat. Someone in the Cyan Dragon Study Group was tagging him.
[George Gamov]: @In University Research, are you there, Your Excellency?
Li Dong’s mouth twitched.
’This cantankerous old man, who had previously argued Mendeleev and Madam Curie into a corner, was being so polite today? Did he take the wrong medicine or something?’
[In University Research]: Your Excellency Gamov, I’m here. How can I help you?
[George Gamov]: Mr. Bohr mentioned to me a few days ago that you are a Wise Man. Therefore, I have a problem I’ve been mulling over for a while and would like to ask for your guidance.
Li Dong was amused.
’So Bohr is in the group. That explains why the old rascal doesn’t dare act up. After all, my persona is that of a Wise Man, as designated by Bohr.’
[In University Research]: Mr. Gamov, please go ahead.
[George Gamov]: I’ve recently been studying the alpha particle energy spectrum. The low-energy section is completely normal, but on the high-energy tail, a few small, isolated spikes occasionally appear. Their amplitude isn’t large, but they are definitely there.
[George Gamov]: So I have two hypotheses. One, they’re real, corresponding to some resonant state within the nucleus. Two, they’re false—simply Illusion Peaks created by statistical fluctuations in the detector. I’ve thought of several methods of discernment, but the conclusions are inconsistent. Does Your Excellency have a different approach?
Reading this, Li Dong wore a strange expression.
’This sounds way too familiar! If you swapped "alpha energy spectrum" with "Wukong Satellite’s high-energy arm spectrum," it would be exactly the same!’
But on second thought, it made sense.
Distinguishing real signals from noise-induced Illusion Peaks was a classic, universal problem in physics.
It was perfectly normal for physicists across time and space to run into the same wall in different fields.
Thinking of this, Li Dong relaxed and sent his idea over.
[In University Research]: I happen to have a rather meticulous method on hand, an idea provided by His Excellency Gikhmanov. Instead of tackling the spikes head-on, it goes around to the inverse operator side to make a judgment.
Li Dong summarized the core framework of the "Li Criterion" and sent it.
The criterion coefficient climbs along the energy segment, marking forbidden zones. What’s left is then extracted with conventional tools.
[George Gamov]: ...Brilliant!
[George Gamov]: Your Excellency is truly a Wise Man. Shifting the debate of true versus false from the spectrum’s tail to the operator’s source... I am enlightened!
’As expected of a master, he gets it instantly.’
Just as Li Dong was about to offer a few polite words, Gamov sent another message.
[George Gamov]: But I have an even more difficult problem. I recently spent several months continuously measuring the energy spectrum of a radioactive sample. Using your method, I’ve confirmed those spikes are real.
Furthermore, their amplitudes are slowly climbing, and each one is appearing earlier than the last.
[George Gamov]: Do you think this means that an alpha particle is about to escape from the nucleus?
"Of course!" Li Dong subconsciously started to type a reply, but his fingers froze after just two keystrokes.
’Wait, no!’
’The essence of alpha decay is quantum tunneling! The alpha particle repeatedly hits the potential barrier inside the nucleus’s potential well, with a small probability of tunneling through each time.’
’The decay constant that Gamov calculated is an average value.’
’Increasing precursor amplitudes only indicate that the channel under this potential barrier is opening.’
’It can tell you the path is clear, but it absolutely cannot give you the exact time when a particle will actually escape!’
’It could be a year, or it could be a hundred years!’
So, Li Dong deleted what he had typed and wrote instead...
[In University Research]: Mr. Gamov, I think you might be mistaken about one thing.
[In University Research]: A gradually climbing precursor spectrum only represents the channel opening. It cannot give a specific time for ’when it will erupt.’ Between the precursor and ’about to emerge,’ there is still a separate judgment to be made: the decay constant of the tunneling process itself.
After sending this message, before Gamov could even reply, Li Dong himself froze.
Just now in the Memory Palace, when he saw the dozen or so increasing "precursors" from the Wukong Satellite, wasn’t his first reaction also that the main Miyake Level extreme solar particle event was imminent?
’The precursor and the main peak are two completely different things!’
Li Dong suppressed the tremor in his heart and looked back at his phone screen.
[George Gamov]: ...Your Excellency, that statement of yours has just cleared up the blockage in my mind. I am enlightened. I’m going to calculate my spectrum now. Farewell.
The group chat fell silent.
Only then did Li Dong shove his phone into his pocket and grab his backpack.
’First, to Zijin Mountain! I’ll get that data and then figure out the rest!’
At this moment, he was completely unaware of why Gamov had already confirmed the spikes were real just moments after he had provided the Li Criterion.
「Zijin Mountain, Dark Matter Particle Detection Collaborative Innovation Center.」
At eleven o’clock at night, the only light left on in the entire building was in the third-floor duty room.
Researcher Zheng was holding a cup of instant coffee, watching the stable data curve on the screen with Lu Bohou.
BANG! The door was pushed open.
"East... East God?" Lu Bohou’s hand trembled, nearly spilling his coffee.
"Li Dong? What are you doing up the mountain so late?" Researcher Zheng was also stunned.
Li Dong walked over and, without beating around the bush, got straight to the point.
"Teacher Zheng, can you give me a copy of the similar event packages you all treated as Illusion Peaks over the past two years?"
Old Zheng saw the serious expression on Li Dong’s face. He swallowed the question he was about to ask—"Did you discover something?"—and turned to Lu Bohou instead.
"Xiaolong, go copy all the suspected high-energy event packages from the ’awaiting review’ folder from the past two years onto a USB drive for Li Dong."
Ten minutes later, Li Dong had the USB drive containing thirty-seven event packages. He said a word of thanks, turned, and left, leaving Old Zheng staring at his coffee, unable to taste a thing for a long time.
「Past midnight, in the apartment.」
Li Dong didn’t even turn on his desk lamp. Using only the light from his laptop screen, he ran all thirty-seven data entries from the USB drive through the framework of the Li Criterion.
Two hours later, the results were in.
Real signals: Eleven.
Illusion Peaks: Twenty-six.
He laid out these eleven real signals in a time series. An unevenly rising curve appeared on the screen. In the most recent six months, the slope had steepened dramatically!
’This is the frequency behind what Gamov called the ’decay constant.’’
Li Dong pulled out a piece of scratch paper and grabbed a pen.
He was going to use these eleven real signals to retroactively calculate the rhythm of the main event!
The pen touched the paper, and a SCRATCHING sound filled the air.
In the unseen world, it was as if an invisible hand was guiding Li Dong’s thoughts.
[Passive Skill Triggered: Orbital Calculation (Basic)]
[Gift from the "Discoverer at the Tip of a Pen": The insight of Levay has been bestowed.]
In 1846, Levay calculated the existence of Neptune with the tip of his pen.
In 2023, Li Dong would use the tip of his pen to calculate, from eleven abnormal data points, the world-destroying energy the Sun was about to unleash!
"First, the exponential growth rate of the monotonic amplitude..."
"Second, the statistical autocorrelation of the event intervals..."
The pile of scratch paper grew higher and higher. The first part of the results soon emerged.
The exponential growth of the amplitude of these eleven real signals pointed to a total energy release window... on a century-long scale.
The Miyake Level main peak was indeed on its way, but it was still a long way off!
The weight in Li Dong’s heart had just begun to lift, but the result of the second derivation made it leap back into his throat.
’There’s a shorter period hidden within the time intervals of the real signals!’
He isolated this window, plugged it into the decay constant model, and extrapolated three consecutive times.
On the screen, a set of numbers appeared that made his scalp tingle.
[Main Peak Estimated Arrival Window: Approximately 18 months from now.]
[Main Peak Estimated Magnitude: Carrington Level.]
Li Dong sucked in a sharp breath of Carrington.
A Carrington Level extreme solar particle event! While it wouldn’t be enough to send Earth back to the Stone Age, it was more than capable of knocking out most of the world’s low-orbit satellites, burning through submarine cable repeater stations, and paralyzing the power grids and communications of half the planet for hours!
This was a wake-up call for modern civilization!
Li Dong put down his pen, staring intently at the scratch paper.
’Thirty-seven data points are still too few. The uncertainty is too high. To pin down this number accurately, I must get all the full data from the Wukong Satellite’s eight years in orbit!’
He didn’t have that level of clearance, and neither did Researcher Zheng.
「Two in the morning.」
Li Dong took out his phone and scrolled through his contacts to the name "Shen Che."
He took a deep breath and pressed the call button.

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