Terraforming

"Terraforming"
Japanese	TERRAFORMING (テラフォーミング)
Rōmaji	Terafōmingu
Chapter Details
Volume	Volume 27
Pages	51
Release Date	July 3, 2022
WSJ Issue	2022 (#31)
Chapter Guide
Previous	← Chapter 232
Next	4D Science: Chapter 1 →

Terraforming (TERRAFORMING (テラフォーミング) , Terafōmingu) is a special one-shot chapter set shortly after the end of the Dr. Stone manga.

Summary

Senku wakes up alone and isolated in the middle of an ocean, with no land or ship in sight, and no memory of how he wound up in that situation. He quickly realizes he'd previously covered his body in oil, which acts as a primitive thermal insulator, giving him more time before hypothermia sets in. Senku thus begins checking himself for clues as well as resources on his person, finding he has revival fluid and a DIY earpiece similar to the crystal radio made years ago on Treasure Island.

Putting the earpiece in his ear, he hears a buzzing sound and follows it to find Kohaku, curled into a ball, petrified, with the sound coming from her life jacket's beacon. This then causes Senku to remember what had happened: their airplane had crashed on the way back from Taiju and Yuzuriha's honeymoon in Norway. During their free fall, Taiju uses the Petrification Weapon to petrify them all in order to protect them. Senku was then revived by one of his own bottles of revival fluid shattering against him, only to be hit in the head by a coconut tree.

Senku revives Kohaku, happy to have a friend, but the reunion is cut short by Kohaku spotting debris to begin building a raft. Senku establishes they must have splashed down in the Sargasso sea, where the Bermuda Triangle is, which is why there's so much flotsam gathering.

After recovering Suika and Chrome, the group fishes so proficiently that they obtain a vast supply of food, fish oil, and thus drinking water. They begin fermenting coconut sugar to create alcohol in order to make more revival fluid. Ukyo is then found, but cannot be brought back until they find a source of nitric acid.

Suika then recalls that there's an electrical arc method to make nitric acid. She wishes the frequent thunderstorms, such as the one they are currently facing, could be used as their source of electricity. Chrome mentions that he saw blue fire before the plane went down, making Senku realize that they could harness the storm's power using a palm tree and Ginro's spear as a lightning rod.

They start build up the apparatus to make nitric acid, collecting glass jars from the ocean floor and finding an artifact from their own accident: a shiny can of Senku's corned beef.

They used the metal can to make a new cotton candy machine, running molten glass through it to create glass wool. With all these materials, their system manages to produce nitric acid, allowing them to revive not only Ukyo, but also Tsukasa, Chelsea, Sai, Ryusui, Gen, Taiju, Yuzuriha, Kinro and Ginro. Everyone then works together to craft sails from fish skins to escape the currents that have kept them trapped in the ocean.

The rescue teams are beginning to lose hope of finding any survivors, however they are eventually found and guided back to shore by Stanley's plane.

As they make landfall, Luna and Xeno greet them while Senku delivers the treasure they had been out to find in the first place: ultra-high-purity silicon metal, used to make semiconductors.

Senku then explains that he plans to advance civilization further than ever with rare resources from alien worlds via terraforming. Everyone is amazed at the prospect, and Senku tells them to get excited.

Characters in Order of Appearance

• Senku Ishigami
• Taiju Oki
• Kohaku
• Yuzuriha Ogawa
• Chrome
• Suika
• Kinro
• Ginro
• Sai Nanami
• Gen Asagiri
• Chelsea Childe
• Francois
• The last Petrification Weapon
• Ryusui Nanami
• Xeno Houston Wingfield
• Ukyo Saionji
• Tsukasa Shishio
• Stanley Snyder
• Luna Wright

Chapter Notes

• A plane carrying Taiju and Yuzuriha's honeymoon party crashes in the Sargasso sea.
  • All the passengers are petrified in order to land safely.
• Revived by an errant bottle of revival fluid, Senku begins making preparations to survive at sea.
• Kohaku is found and revived to help fish and build the raft.
• Chrome and Suika are found and revived, then help to make more revival fluid to revive the rest of the party.
• Once everyone is found and revived, they build a large raft and sail back to shore, guided by Stanley.
• Ultra-high-purity silicon metal from Norway is acquired to make semiconductors.
• Senku unveils an ambitious plan to terraform alien planets in order to advance science with materials not available on Earth.

Trivia

• Francois was in the plane but was never shown to be rescued.
• The process Suika brought up to produce nitric acid using electricity is the Birkeland-Eyde process. This however cannot be carried out using St. Elmo's fire, as the low temperature electric discharge does not pyrolize the nitrogen molecules in the air, in order to form nitrogen dioxide. To function, the reaction requires a hot electric arc, of several thousand degrees.
• The material that the Kingdom of Science aimed to obtain from Norway is elemental silicon, intended for the production of electronic parts such as transistors and microchips. The chapter includes a few misconceptions about this material:
  • Pure silicon is not a naturally occurring resource, as it readily reacts with oxygen.
  • Contrary to a statement by Xeno, pure silicon can be produced from other natural resources, and this is in fact, the only way to obtain it.
  • The raw materials to produce it are not uncommon, as it's often produced from quartzite or silica sand, similar to glass, however, the process to refine it is not simple, especially considering that the level of purity needed in semiconductor materials can be as high as one part in ten billion (1 in 10¹⁰) or higher.
  • Norway is a big producer of silicon based materials, but the high purity elemental silicon for electronics is not one of the materials they produce in notably large amounts, instead being one of the main producers of ferrosilicon, an alloy of silicon and iron used in steel production and other industries.