The wheels of the bus pressed against the asphalt surface, producing a dull grinding sound. The roar of the engine was particularly clear in the silent night.
The players obtained a watch from the unconscious bus driver, and they finally knew the exact time.
It was 1: 44 am, and according to Zhang Heng's calculations, the explosion should have happened 15 to 20 minutes ago.
There was still a long time before dawn. In Pripyat, three kilometers away from the nuclear power plant, most of the residents were still sleeping soundly. They had no idea that the shockwave caused by the explosion had sent part of the nuclear core material into the sky, forming a large mass of highly radioactive aerosol.
The initial gas mass only enveloped the nuclear power plant, but it soon began to expand, spreading in all directions under the influence of the wind.
The first people to notice the explosion in Pripyat were probably a group of night fishing enthusiasts.
The nuclear power plant would discharge the cold water from the steam turbine preheating exchanger into the nearby Pripyaji River. Because the water was very warm, it would also attract schools of fish, making it an excellent fishing spot. Moreover, it happened to be the spring season for fish to spawn, so many fishing enthusiasts had come here. Even at night, there were many people here.
The nearest reactor was less than 300 meters away. When the maintenance crew drove the bus past them, the players saw some of the fishermen looking up at the thick smoke in the reactor's direction. Some of them started to pack up because they were worried, but most of them chose to stay where they were.
They seemed to firmly believe that the fire would not spread here, especially with the arrival of a few fire engines just now. This gave the anglers a lot of confidence that the fire would soon be under control. Some even thought that being able to witness the heroic firefighters fighting the fire at close range was something that they could brag about to their friends in the future, so they all continued to hold their fishing rods and stayed by the river.
Other than that, the crowd also saw a pair of young people sneaking a taste of the forbidden fruit by the river. They ignored the explosion behind them, and they were tightly entwined with each other. Further away, a few workers patrolling the railway bridge also stopped to watch.
"Heh, it seems that we are the only people within a hundred miles who are busy running for their lives," Kratos said in a self-deprecating manner.
"They will pay the price," the doctor said solemnly. "The radiation dust above the nuclear power plant has drifted here, landing on their skin and entering their lungs with every breath they take. When they remember this in the future … if they still have a future, this will be the thing they will regret the most in their lives."
"What are these people thinking in their heads? How could they be indifferent to the explosion in the nuclear power plant when they were around it?" Rat looked incredulous.
"I don't know. I'm just a surgeon, not a psychiatrist." The doctor shrugged.
"Will the radioactive dust drift to the town?" Kratos was concerned about another problem.
"There's no doubt that it's right in front of us."
"So if we stay in the town, we will continue to be exposed to radiation?" the rat asked.
His words made all the players' hearts sink.
Unlike the fishermen and lovey-dovey couples by the river, the players knew that they had no other choice. In order to complete the quest, they had no choice but to stay even though they knew there was radiation in the town.
The bus fell into silence. After a while, Coconut vomited again, but since she had vomited her dinner, she could only retch non-stop. Rat took care of her.
"I'm sorry, I still feel a little carsick," Coconut said.
"I'll try my best to drive steadily, but the road isn't smooth," the maintenance worker said. As he spoke, he saw a few more cars passing by them from the opposite side. There were fire engines that had arrived later, and there were also private cars. One of them even honked at them, as if it wanted them to stop.
However, the maintenance worker wasn't going to listen to him obediently. He turned around and continued to drive forward. He looked at the rearview mirror and saw that the owner of the car had already gotten out of the car. Seeing that the tour bus had gone far away, he seemed a little helpless, but he didn't continue to chase after them.
About five minutes later, the ambulance and the bus drove past the safety zone near the nuclear power plant and finally entered the town one after another.
Everyone's impression of Pripyat was basically inseparable from the word "ghost town". Not long after the Chernobyl incident, the city became barren and uninhabited. Later, Ukraine launched an adventure tourism program, which basically confirmed Pripyat's identity as a ghost town.
The tourists held radiation devices in their hands and walked between the abandoned school and the stadium in their protective suits. Listening to the creaking of the counter, it was as if they could feel the terrible disaster that happened here decades ago. At the same time, they enjoyed the desolation of the ghost town to their heart's content.
However, at this point in time, Pripyat looked no different from other towns. No, to be more precise, Pripyat looked more beautiful than most towns of this era.
The town was built earlier than the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in the east. After the nuclear power plant's plan was approved, the workers' dormitories and management offices were first built here. As the project progressed, the workers' families also moved here. People named the new town after the Pripyat River next to it.
As the number of residents in the town increased, the number of houses here began to increase. Shops, schools, stadiums, and even public transportation and railways appeared. When the nuclear power plant's No. 1 reactor was put into operation, the nuclear power plant staff and their families also lived in the town. After that, the construction of the reactor did not stop. After the No. 4 reactor, the No. 5 and No. 6 reactors were also under intense construction.
There were also more and more residents in the town. So far, there were more than 50,000 people. Unlike the compact and crowded old towns, Pripyat was a typical Brezhnev city. The streets were wide and clean, geometrically distributed, and the houses were well-proportioned. There was also a magnificent children's palace and the 11th cinema in SL.
Whether it was the design or the planning of the city, it was the best in SL, and it also demonstrated SL's ambition for the use of atomic energy. Anyone who had been to Pripyat was fascinated by its charm, and in order to get a residence permit here, people were scrambling to get it.
But now, Pripyat was still asleep. Only a few people noticed the flames of the nuclear power plant in the distance.
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