676: Efficiency and Natural Laws, Can Both Be Achieved?
Locke Augustine ended his voice call with Wizard Salvador, found Witch Mason, and informed them that he was leaving the Group 2 Research Institute to head into the depths of the Dune Plane.
Then, under the surprised gazes of Witch Mason and the others, he left the ecological membrane alone and entered the desert region.
Looking at the yellow sand in the distance, Locke thought, "To close the project for the True Knowledge Institute's first-class project fund, I just need to use the special energy-locking structure of the ancient flower root and perform the corresponding analysis. The hardest step is finding the ancient flower."
"Therefore, there is no need for me to worry too much. But there is one thing I am truly concerned about: why do advanced life forms still survive on the Dune Plane?"
Locke looked up at the sky shrouded in heavy element particles, and the hundreds of conversion plants that were driven into this yellow sandy land like steel nails.
"How should one balance efficiency and long-term benefits when transforming nature, to avoid short-term ecological prosperity?"
Locke walked into the sandstorm, and immediately the sky-filling yellow sand howled towards him, but the next moment, Mist's Power manifested as a natural force field, like a terrifying forest from beyond the realm, and the entire sandstorm dissipated in an instant.
Locke walked for about half an hour, looking at the boundless yellow sand, and frowned slightly.
"Searching with the naked eye is too slow."
"Thinking carefully, where the Dune People live, this Dune Plane likely still has some rudimentary ecosystems barely existing. If I find plants, I should be able to find those remaining Dune People."
Locke waved his right hand, and suddenly a full moon descended into the sky, appearing behind him like a star suspended from beyond the heavens.
He himself transformed into a dark sun, using the special operating logic of the Sun and Moon Dual Movement to superimpose the gravity of the dark sun and the full moon, increasing the lunar gravity by two times out of thin air.
At the same time, the full moon hung in the sky of this Plane; because the world force of this Plane was already extremely weak and broken, this prototype of Locke's Great Magic became a terrifying spell hanging on the horizon.
It illuminated the entire Plane without being hindered by the world force, nor did it suffer the losses that would typically be caused by the world force suppressing magic cast from other Planes.
Locke even sensed the world welcoming him.
"Found it."
Relying on the full moon's gravity, Locke locked onto the Magic Plant communities hidden beneath the desert, and then used the Great Green Leaf Dragon Finch to fly into an underground river entrance.
Moonlight continued to shine into the underground along the river and the crevices of the rocks.
Locke emerged from the underground river and looked at the interior of the underground river channel, which was overgrown with a large number of low-level Magic Plants, mainly ferns and mosses.
"There are actually so many Magic Plants here? The temperature... is quite low, about 30 degrees Celsius."
Locke looked at a huge block of ice next to the underground river.
"So that's it, there is a large amount of underground ice in this area. The surface of this region was likely an ice sheet in the past; while the ice on the ground has now melted and the soil has turned into yellow sand, some of the ice underground has not yet completely melted."
"Therefore, there is still a water source here. Consequently, there are still some simple Magic Plant communities here. Low-level Magic Plants like ferns also have the lowest requirements for their survival environment."
In essence, trees and grass-type Magic Plants do not necessarily surpass ferns in vitality, nor do they completely surpass ferns in reproductive ability.
Even in the Wizard World, in some areas with high humidity, ferns still outperform those grasses and trees.
Ferns are only outcompeted by more advanced grass and tree Magic Plants when natural resources are extremely abundant, due to a lack of sufficient specialization and complexity.
Therefore, in environments with insufficient resources or extreme conditions, ferns become survivors due to being 'low-consumption and high-efficiency.'
Ferns are like a natural backup system; when grasses and trees collapse, ferns will suddenly emerge from the crevices of rocks to attempt to restart the world.
"This is..."
Locke observed these special ferns, "These ferns have undergone special evolution to cope with high temperatures; their leaves have shrunk, and they have developed multi-jointed water-storage structures. These are very common energy-locking structures produced due to drought resistance."
"I have also read many such things in the research materials of Group 2."
"However..."
Locke looked at an unfamiliar fern Magic Plant in front of him, feeling it looked very similar to the lava fern of the Wizard World. He snapped his fingers, and a flame appeared above the lava fern-like plant. Suddenly, the leaf stomata on the surface of the special rock fern were rapidly absorbing the high temperature to extinguish the flame.
Seeing this miracle of life with his own eyes, Locke couldn't help but exclaim, "This special type of fern has undergone evolution similar to the lava fern. Even though the two should have no relation, did they evolve in this direction in order to combat high temperatures?"
Locke carefully used an ordinary grafting knife to dig out one of these special rock ferns, soil and roots included, "It must have evolved leaves with energy-locking structures similar to those of the lava fern, [High-Temperature Breath Leaves]."
"Ferns are always the easiest to adapt to the environment. With this kind of lava fern, one can utilize the high temperature and flames in the air, while also trying to make it difficult for flames to occur."
"It should be a plant that this ecological community spontaneously evolved."
Locke remembered an article on ecology he had read before, which proposed a hypothesis—the Spontaneous Niche Filling Evolution Hypothesis.
That is, in order to maintain the existence of the ecosystem and cope with external dangers that threaten to destroy it, specific species will appear within the ecosystem, spontaneously filling a certain niche required to maintain the ecosystem.
Life will spontaneously evolve toward this niche.
This hypothesis may not be correct, but it is just one perspective to look at things.
In this hypothesis, it is believed that the root of biological evolution lies in the supplementation of niches and the maintenance of the ecosystem's existence.
Locke said, "The magic tide here is still rich, likely due to the existence of the Magic Plant community. The magic tide is related to various elements and is very complex; I cannot fully understand it either."
"But at least it has a direct relationship with the strength of the Plane's power and the total biomass."
"The total biomass here is still preserved to a certain extent, so the magic tide still exists."
Locke said, "These Magic Plants are working hard to adapt to environmental changes."
Locke frowned and said, "It's just that the Dune Plane was almost pulled into the Sun primal force Plane before, and the entire environment of the Plane changed suddenly. The speed of this change was simply too fast, leaving no time for the ecology here to react."
"The intervention of the Wizard Civilization stabilized the current situation of the Dune Plane, and the ecology here has undergone corresponding changes according to the current circumstances."
"This may also be one of the reasons why the Dune People can still exist within this Plane."
On these simple ferns, Locke saw many of the energy-locking structures that Group 2 was studying, and even saw some sea buckthorn-type Magic Plants, which also clearly had some special abilities.
For example, they could collect moisture from the air, increasing the environmental humidity here.
Clearly, the evolution of Magic Plants might in itself be sufficient to solve the problems of the Dune Plane.
But the problem is that the evolution of Magic Plants is simply too slow.
If the Wizard Civilization had not participated, they would not even have the chance they have now.
Locke looked at the underground dark river and smelled a pungent odor; it occurred to him that the wastewater discharged from those conversion plants had already polluted this place.
Those heavy element particles are things that are difficult to disappear even after ten thousand years.
Locke frowned, "That's not right. Didn't Wizard Zalan Bailey hire an environmental company to help him treat exhaust gas and wastewater? Why is the pollution still so severe?"
"Could it be that they are discharging wastewater directly into the desert, and then the wastewater is flowing out from the crevices in the sand, polluting the entire desert?"
Hearing footsteps, Locke immediately stood up from the ground.
Inside the Group 2 Research Institute, Wizard Zalan Bailey arrived at the public laboratory with a smile on his face, "Is Wizard Locke Augustine here?"
Witch Mason hurriedly stood up, bowed to him, and then said, "Lord Zalan Bailey, what a coincidence. Although Lord Locke is on the Dune Plane, he has left the research base and headed into the depths of the Dune Plane."
Wizard Zalan Bailey's brows locked together, and he said with slight dissatisfaction, "Did I miss him again? What is he doing in the depths of the desert?"
Witch Mason explained, "This... I am not too sure. The Group Leader seems curious about the Dune People that still exist."
Zalan Bailey said with his hands behind his back, "They are just lingering on in a desperate struggle. Their civilization is lost, and their living conditions are no different from cave-dwelling primitive people. Group 2 finished the investigation long ago; they are only temporarily surviving by relying on some special areas with glaciers beneath the Dune Plane."
"Has he not read the relevant investigation report?"
Witch Mason did not like the other party's preaching tone, but since he was a Second Ring Wizard, she naturally had to swallow her anger, "I don't know either. Perhaps the Group Leader has his own ideas."
Wizard Zalan Bailey turned around, "When Locke returns, let me know. I haven't been able to meet with him all this time."
Witch Mason watched his departing back and frowned slightly.
"Troublesome."
"Because he is a Second Ring Wizard, it's not easy to refuse him outright."
Witch Freya said, "Why do you bother with him? When he comes over, we'll just pretend we are very busy working. He can't very well interrupt our work, or Group Leader Siss will speak to him."
"Then if he asks, we'll answer, just answer simply. That's enough to save face. However, why does he always want to find the Group Leader? He seems very active lately."
Witch Freya said, "Supposedly, he seems to think that our group is a competitor to his group. It's strange to be getting so close."
Witch Mason shrugged her shoulders, "Who knows."
Beneath the Dune Plane, Locke saw two Dune People. He saw that the two were only wearing simple clothes, and their overall civilization seemed to have severely regressed, having lost the ability to speak.
The two of them seemed very hungry and physically weak.
But they could still conduct telepathic communication by relying on their innate psionic energy.
Locke frowned.
He attempted to use his virtual psionic organ to connect directly into the psionic resonance between the two. After immediately designing a simple apprentice-level Spell Model, Locke used the virtual psionic organ behind his brain to forcibly enter the communication between the two Dune People.
"This race indeed possesses very powerful magical potential for the Mind School innately."
"Can they form special psionic waves around themselves using their physical bodies to generate telepathic communication?"
"Although it is only a very rudimentary application method of the Mind School. This kind of thing is very primitive, but it is a common talent of this race."
Relying on his attainments in magic, Locke, from a high vantage point, forcibly understood the simple conversation between the two Dune People.
Locke discovered that these people should not have lost the ability to speak; after all, human thinking relies on the structure of language.
These two Dune People were still communicating with each other.
"Life is getting harder and harder... the fish in the river have all died..."
"Can we make it through this year?"
"Cough, cough, cough... After I ate that fish yesterday, it felt like my stomach was very uncomfortable... I heard that in the past, we lived on the surface, and we had delicious cake to eat."
"Cake? What is that?"
"I don't know... I heard it from my father; he told me in telepathy."
Locke looked at the polluted river and immediately understood that it was Wizard Zalan Bailey's plan that had caused the underground dark river of the Dune Plane to be severely polluted.
Low-level plant communities could not support the activities of advanced organisms, so these Dune People could only barely survive by relying on the cold fish still alive in the underground river.
It was just that Wizard Zalan Bailey's radical transformation plan had destroyed this fragile and temporary ecological balance, like the final straw that breaks a person, causing this Dune People tribe before him to face a severe food shortage.
At this moment, one of the Dune People suddenly clutched his stomach, foaming at the mouth, and fell to the ground in pain. His face was flushed red; it seemed that eating fish containing heavy element particle pollution had caused him to suffer from multi-organ disease.
As a Potion Master, Locke recognized the problem with this person at a glance.
The Dune companion was extremely terrified, constantly pushing his body, trying to confirm that his companion was still alive, but to be honest, this was of no use.
Locke frowned and subconsciously wanted to step out, but he immediately thought of his principle of minimal intervention.
"I am here to observe these remaining Dune People, why they can still survive, and to observe their ecology. If I intervene now, I can certainly solve their problem easily. But is that really appropriate?"
"From my perspective, I would be unable to see the ecology of the Dune People clearly. And from the perspective of the Dune People, what kind of state is my existence to them? They have survived so tenaciously for so long; perhaps this state itself is extremely precious."
"I cannot break this state at will."
"Let's observe in other ways first."
Locke looked at a ray of moonlight shining into the underground space, opened a bottle of Holy Spring Nectar Potion, put a wisp of the potion into it, and then used that moonlight to infuse it into the Dune person's body, alleviating his symptoms.
"First, I must believe in the resilience of the ecosystem that the Dune People have managed to preserve. If I intervene arbitrarily, I would be just like Wizard Zalan Bailey, carrying out arbitrary transformations on this Plane."
Locke said, "That efficiency is the highest, but the observation itself would have lost its meaning."
"Efficiency and natural laws, can both be achieved?"