Gold is one of the most chemically stable elements and does not react with other substances in most cases. This results in gold existing in the free elemental form in most cases. Even in gold mines on the earth, gold is usually mixed with other materials, such as sand, and gold can usually be obtained by sifting.
There are even large pieces of natural high-purity gold on the earth, which are commonly known as gold nuggets. The piece in Zhao Changxing's hand at this moment is obviously a piece of nugget gold.
It must have just fallen to the ground. Because this place is near human buildings, I don’t know how many people have been active here in the past. If there were people before, they would have been discovered long ago. And it also has such obvious impact marks, which further proves that it was originally part of the asteroid.
And... there is even gold nugget, which seems to mean that there is a high probability that there is more gold on that asteroid.
Zhao Changxing's heart was beating loudly.
He never imagined that the asteroid that originally meant a huge disaster would suddenly change its identity at this moment.
"Dad, let's move the equipment back quickly... Ouch! What is this? Gold?! Where did it come from?!"
Qian Yue's words interrupted Zhao Changxing's contemplation. After seeing the gold in Zhao Changxing's hand, Zhao Changxing clearly saw Qian Yue's mouth wide open in shock through the mask of his spacesuit.
Zhao Changxing raised his head and pointed at the shining star - it was only a few hundred kilometers away from the surface of Sedna at this moment, and could be clearly seen with the naked eye: "If I guessed correctly, it should be from It fell off."
"This doesn't mean, doesn't mean..."
Qian Yue was so shocked by the huge surprise that he couldn't even finish his words.
The conversation between the two quickly attracted the attention of the others. People quickly gathered around, looking at the gold in Zhao Changxing's hand, and each of them exclaimed.
"Such a large piece of gold must be at least five kilograms, right?"
"I think it's six kilograms."
"With so much, even if there is nothing else, it will be enough for us to finish building the second base, right?"
"Absolutely enough, there is still some left."
"I'll go look for it on the asteroid!"
At this moment, people became concerned about the asteroid again. However, at this moment, we are not worried that it will hit Sedna Star, but that under the continuous jet of gas, it will gain the speed to break away from Sedna Star, and then move away from it and step into the universe again. Not coming back either.
People don't know exactly how much gas is inside this asteroid, how long it can be ejected, and how much force it can provide. Before, people just hoped for more, but now people are praying for less.
"Don't go now, it's too dangerous." Zhao Changxing stopped the excited people: "The gas injection is still continuing, and it is easy to have accidents when landing now. Just wait."
With such a huge and rapid gas injection, the gas inside it should be exhausted very quickly. It's just that no one can be sure whether it will be given enough force before the gas is exhausted.
"Otherwise, we can find a way to make the gas channel bigger, so that we don't have to worry about it breaking away from the gravitational field of Sedna."
The gas channel increases, the gas flow rate slows down, and the reaction force decreases.
Zhao Changxing shook his head: "We don't have enough explosives. It's too late to make them now."
I'm afraid it will take several months before people can make enough explosives again - the current chemical plant has had all the key equipment removed, and it will take time to transport the key equipment from the Spark spacecraft, install and debug it. By then, if the asteroid was going to fly away, it would have flown away long ago.
"All right."
"Now, let's move the supplies back and restore the operation of several bases first." Zhao Changxing gave the order: "If this asteroid is going to fly away in the end, it's because we don't have such luck."
After the disaster subsided, people once again began the work of moving supplies back. Different from the previous relocation work, everyone at this moment is in high spirits, relaxed and happy.
This time, people have another concern at work. Almost every day, people check the asteroid's gas ejection process, measure its orbit, calculate how close it is to breaking away from Sedna's gravitational field, and pray that it will stop ejecting quickly and stabilize. .
Today, people have even given up hope of finding gold mines on Sedna, or even if they still have hope, they subconsciously think that it will be very difficult. Now, there's a replacement that could potentially hold a lot of gold, and everyone is hoping to get their hands on it.
Among the relocation tasks, Zhao Changxing designated the No. 2 planting base as the highest priority relocation task. In any case, the No. 2 Planting Base must resume production as quickly as possible. For this reason, Zhao Changxing would rather people squeeze in the crowded and cramped Fire Spaceship for a while longer.
In less than a month, the equipment that had been dismantled and moved was reinstalled in the No. 2 planting base, and crop planting began immediately. A large number of corn, wheat, rice, soybeans and other crops began to grow again, and Zhao Changxing's heart, which had always been worried about famine, finally calmed down.
After that, it was the turn of the recovery work of the No. 1 Comprehensive Base. On the third day after this work was carried out, people were surprised to find that the long-lasting gas injection on the asteroid showed a weakening trend, and it seemed that the internal pressure had been reduced.
When Comprehensive Base No. 1 has been restored, and adults can finally move back to live in comfortable and spacious double rooms compared to those in the Spark spacecraft, the rate of gas ejection from the asteroid is much lower than in its heyday. It has dropped by more than 90% and is still continuing to drop.
This means that landing on this asteroid has become possible. So after a period of preparation and planning, Zhao Changxing led a few people and brought relevant prospecting equipment to the asteroid again.
At this moment, the asteroid's mass has dropped by more than 30 million tons compared to its initial mass. Even excluding the rubble thrown out by the explosion and orbit change, the mass of the ejected gas is as high as more than 20 million tons. This makes people have to lament the richness of gas material reserves on this asteroid.
At this moment, its orbit is at an average distance of more than two thousand kilometers from the star Sedna. Based on this distance, its current orbit data and the reaction force of the gas jet, it can no longer escape the gravitational field of the Sedna star. This also means that people have almost permanent access to this asteroid. Of course, it would be of little use if there were no precious minerals such as gold on it.
Wearing spacesuits, Zhao Changxing and a few others flew around on its surface like supermen, touching here and looking there. After being busy for more than half an hour, Chen Feng suddenly shouted excitedly: "Dad, come and take a look!"
Zhao Changxing's heart skipped a beat, and he and a few other people immediately flew in space suits to where Chen Feng was.
The place where Chen Feng is located is a "peak" more than fifty meters high. Flying directly over, people saw Chen Feng holding a fist-sized black-gray stone in his hand. Shining his space suit's headlight on it and observing carefully, Zhao Changxing saw something as big as a small piece of sand, glowing with golden light, just above the stone, among the sharp edges.
"Gold sand? Take it to the spaceship to see."
Several people hurriedly flew back to the Falcon 1 spacecraft, which was parked nearby and orbited the Sedna star along with the asteroid. They carefully used hammers to smash the stone into pieces, and then found more than a dozen golden grains. The gravel is gathered together and placed under the instrument for testing.
The test results came back quickly and there was no doubt it was gold. It's just that some silver is mixed in, and the whole thing is in the state of amber gold.
This was another unexpected surprise. You know, not only gold, but silver is also relatively scarce on Sedna. Although there is no shortage at this stage, in the long run, if silver mines are not found, the silver will obviously not be enough.
Now, two rare mineral deposits have been found from an asteroid.
At this moment, it is almost certain that there is a vein of gold and silver ore with considerable reserves on this asteroid. The natural chasm that stood in front of human beings disappeared in an instant.
"I don't know which supernova explosion created these golds. I don't know how long they wandered in the vast universe and what they encountered before they finally entered the solar system and were discovered by us. But it doesn't actually matter. What's important is Yes, now, these gold and silver are all ours!"
Zhao Changxing's heart was filled with excitement.
"When our population increases, it will be necessary to build a gold refinery directly here."
It would be too troublesome to directly bring the ore back for refining. It would be more time-consuming and labor-saving to build a gold refinery here to refine the gold and then transport it back.
This trip has come to a successful conclusion. People once again left the Falcon 1 spacecraft, manipulated the instruments to mine about a dozen tons of gold ore for initial testing, and then successfully returned to Sedna.
With the addition of the natural nugget gold, there is no obstacle to building the No. 2 comprehensive base. At this moment, people are seizing the time to repair the industrial area and build the No. 2 comprehensive base. When the second comprehensive base is completed, the 60 third-generation people can actually move to Sedna.
Time flies by, and this day has arrived soon. At this moment, the number of adults under Zhao Changxing who can be assigned work has reached an unprecedented 100.
With enough manpower, many subsequent tasks can be put on the agenda.
