I-It came out pretty nicely, huh?
In Xeno's words, it's extremely,,,
elegant,
Luna,,,
Was Doctor Xeno a former NASA scientist?
How did you know?!
Doctor Xeno,,,
He got me started on rocket building,
He's my science mentor,
The Two Scientists
All right,
Here we go,
Okay,
What caused that?
Dang it!
I don't get any of it,
You can look up rocket secrets on your computer, huh?
You can read English?!
You're amazing, Senku!
No, not at all,
Nothing beyond "This is a pen,"
What's a "Desuizu"?
Then again, most of the articles are in English,
I have to do the best I can with a dictionary in hand,
Just scouring articles will only get you so far,
You can save time sharing information with colleagues,
That's how science works,
And you're sending that all over the world, huh?
That's right,
I'm practically a spammer,
We got a question from an elementary school student,
"Why is the sky blue when space is black?"
That's adorable,
Give them a good answer,
This one's from an elementary school student in Japan,
Senku-kun, huh?
He must have put in a lot of effort to write it in English,
Let's see,,,
I started off my rocket research modding the hell out of a car turbocharger,
but I'm hitting a stupid number of brick walls trying to decipher papers by brute force,
The first problem was with the oscillating component of the firing pressure,
I managed to get the intermediate frequency oscillatory combustion error
down to 7% by running a computer simulation,
There's no way I'm doing that on my potato PC, though, Not in ten billion years,
So I set up a VPN server on a lab server at the university my dad taught at
and used the supercomputer there to optimize the structure of the fuel injector, and,,,
I'm pretty sure he's confessing to some crimes here,
Nah, there's no way any elementary school kid could be like this,
It must be a prank by some grown-up,
Either way, we can't get involved,
Ignore him,
Nice, Senku!
You got a reply from someone who actually works at NASA!
Pipe down,
I've included the math below,
but long story short, the nozzle will need to be made of niobium alloy,
Doctor Senku, I suspect that you are being led astray by noisy data,
You must be using subpar equipment,
You should get your hands on a resistance thermometer that has a
rhodium-platinum alloy heat sensor,
From Dr, X of NASA,
Here you go, Senku,
Thanks,
So you need to buy this thermometer in the photo, huh?
Think they have it at the 100-yen store?
How much does this thing even cost?
platinum
Platinum-rhodium Alloy Thermometer Sensor
Free Shipping
50,000 Points (10%)
Add to Cart
Senku!
I can't believe you came all the way to the US for me!
You missed me that much, huh?
Yeah, skip the pleasantries and just give me the thing,
The magic card,
S-Sure,,,
The demon's credit card that lets you buy anything science-related for free
when an astronaut enters training in the US!
How do you know about that?
I mean, it's a real thing, but Google won't even tell you much about it,
You're going home already?!
What are you, one of those people who lost on the plane in All-American Ultra Quiz?!
Generation gap, old fart,
I don't get your reference,
When are you coming to the US for real?!
When the credit card expires and I need to renew it,
Aren't you being a bit too cold to your old man?!
Platinum-Rhodium Alloy Resistance Thermometer
Xenon Gas
Phase-Contrast Microscope
Thermal Camera
So much expensive-looking gear!
Not that I know what any of it is,
I could make do without it, but hey,
I'll gladly take anything I can get,
With this mountain of equipment and Doctor X's online classes,,,
I'm going to investigate everything,
I'm going to try everything,
We'll make our way up two million years of human history
not from the ground up, but from atop the shoulders of giants,
Man, Senku,,,
I thought you were trying to build a rocket, though,
Why do you ask him stuff that has nothing to do with that project?
If only we knew which science would be useful for what,
That's like asking why I don't just bet on all the winning horses,
There's so much we don't know,
Science is,,,
New message received,
Science is power,
For example, you don't need me to tell you that your rocket
and a ballistic missile are fundamentally one and the same,
With science,
an intelligent person can guide the foolish masses toward truth and rule over them,
It's an elegant power indeed, Doctor Senku,
Yeah, I'm not interested in that crap,
I'm just stupidly curious about the secrets of the world and the universe,
All of it,
All of it!
Ten billion percent all of it!
Hey, Xeno,,,
What would you do if you were transported back to the Stone Age?
I'd be able to make weapons of science from scratch and become a dictator, wouldn't I?
Would you even want to become a dictator?
What if there are other scientists?
Exactly,
No matter the situation, humanity, ten billion percent,
always produces a greedy bastard who wants to know everything about the world,
Someone like my son,
Then I'd be facing off against this man or woman,
Who will master science in the primitive stone world first?
Doing so, you can keep the temperature in the chamber under 60 degrees Celsius,
In other words, your homemade rocket could be packed with biological and chemical weapons,
I gotta know everything, whether I care for it or not,
So sulfanomides would work against pneumococcus, then,
Where are you headed, Senku?
Africa,
What?!
My son's coming!
You two are real close, huh?
Nah,,,
He's coming for the awful reason that my credit card expired,
We're meeting up outside,
His name's Senku,
Senku,,,
Hey!
Senku!
What is it?
Nothing,
Petrified swallows?!
Swallow populations
Social media posts
Europe South America Japan
The geographical correlation between social media posts
and swallow populations is too strong to be coincidence,
It's safe to assume these are real swallows being turned to stone,
That's an interesting approach,
An old fogy like me can hardly use a smartphone,
let alone come up with such an analysis,
This kind of science is a young person's game,
It wasn't me,
It was a high school student who posted that analysis data,
One from Japan,
CDC (U,S, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)
It even has internal organs,
No one could make such a sculpture,
There's a notable difference in hydrophobicity between the center and the peripheries,
The finer areas repel water more,
What about the X-ray fluorescence analysis?
Mostly iron, Traces of gold, as well as carbon and nitrogen,
Yet it hardly reacts to any chemicals,
Only a slight ion outflow in response to nitric acid,
What about UV radiation?
No embrittlement in response to short wavelength electromagnetism,
Impossible!
It reacts in unrecognizable ways to each frequency,
We have no way to determine its structure,
I've never seen such a mineral,
Really, I'm not even sure "mineral" is the right word,
This is a global-scale—no, universe-scale anomaly,
Doctor Xeno of NASA, we would like your input on this matter,
Yeah, it does sink in water, but it's a bit light to be rock,
Maybe it's a porous rock, like pumice,
Worth a shot, then,
Hiromatsu High School
We're making gasoline out of plastic bottle caps,
Normally you use something porous, like zeolite,
Let's see if this swallow statue's wing works just as well,
Listen up, Senku!
I'm going to confess the feelings I've had for Yuzuriha for the past five years!
Yeah?
Well, that sure does sound interesting,
All right, I got some gasoline,
Throw this on a nuclear magnetic resonance machine, and the carbon distribution might
give me some idea of its properties and the depths of the pores and stuff,
I'm going to investigate everything,
Try everything,
Today's just a DARPA tech demonstration,
Isn't it?
So why are we, special forces, being invited?
It's so fishy, I can feel my asshole puckering,
It's a gathering of America's most talented superheroes,
What is this all about?
This,
A terror attack involving an unknown weapon, or an attack by a foreign nation,,,
Doctor Xeno!
You mustn't show this yet!
Especially not outside!
It doesn't matter,
It's going to be public information after tomorrow's expert briefing, anyway,
We can try a potentiometric analysis using glass wool electrodes doused in nitric acid,
Yeah, okay, that's enough, Xeno,
What's the conclusion?
What's this?
There's a very slight potential difference around the head,
Brain waves,
It's quite elegant, is it not?
This statue is still alive,
Though, with time, their brain waves vanish one by one,
But this swallow, for instance, is still awake right now,
So if you get hit by this new weapon,
you still have a chance if you keep yourself awake,
Miss!
I prepared this, I think it would look great on you,
Please have this ring!
Screw your flashy shit, Carlos, you womanizer!
Miss?
What is,,,
that light?
It's coming!
Retreat!
Get behind cover!
We won't escape petrification, but the real test comes after!
Maintain consciousness, no matter what!
We have to protect Luna even if it kills us, Carlos!
Of course!
Damn it, the ring!
This belongs to her, though,,,
so I don't want to let go of it!
I'm sorry!
I'll wash it later!
Shit,,,
Captain Stanley's orders!
I have to stay awake!
Damn it,,,
I can't move at all,
No way!
I'm a capable woman!
I'm supposed to date a capable man and form a power couple!
I don't wanna die single!
That soldier said to stay awake!
I'm so, so, so, so staying awake!
I'm the cool-headed Luna! The capable woman, Luna!
I'm not leaving her all alone!
I'm the cool-headed Luna! The capable woman, Luna!
Sure,
I'm used to staying awake and still for days on end,
I get plenty of practice sniping,
Pinnacles National Park, where we were, is filled with saltpeter caves,
Which means there must be nitric acid,
I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing,
but it's better than no denaturation at all,
One, two, three, four, five, six,,,
seven, eight, nine,,,
9,157,661,240 seconds,
As long as I stay conscious, I'll have a chance to reawaken,
If I do manage to awaken,
I'll want Yellow Dent corn for both livestock feed and fuel,
There's one location on the West Coast Corn Belt where the corn will have hybridized,,,
Or better yet, it may have been preserved in a dormant state,
If there are any scientists around, they'll gather there,
That wouldn't be fate,
It wouldn't even be coincidence,
It would be necessary,
It would be repeatable,
That is the essence,,,
,,,of science,
Next Episode
This is a work of fiction, but the plants, animals, and production methods described are based on reality, Foraging and making things on your own accord is extremely dangerous and, in some cases, illegal, Please do not imitate without expertise,