The Great Rift Valley divided the vast plains into two parts that were endless in sight. One couldn't see the end of them. Deeper into the Great Rift Valley, the deep and vast yellow rocks appeared blood red under the sun, which made the Great Rift Valley looked even more spectacular.
This rift valley was like a long scar on Yukan continent that resulted from numerous crustal activities.
If the migrating army wanted to reach the opposite plains, it must pass through this Great Rift Valley. Fortunately, this rift valley had been partially interrupted further front. There's a part of the large plain and wasn't cut by it. The migrating army could use this pass to cross the rift valley to the opposite plains.
Pado's group was at the end of the migration army. They could only look at the part of the plains that had not been separated by the Great Rift Valley from a distance. Meanwhile, many of the foremost migration groups had already begun to cross the Great Rift Valley.
The pass that had not been separated by the rift valley was wide enough to accommodate hundreds of dinosaurs crossing at the same time.
The length of the rift valley was only interrupted at this part, as if it's specially reserved for the migrating groups to pass through. On both sides of this vast plains that had not been separated by the rift valley were endless rifts. If the migrating groups didn't pass through here, one wouldn't know how long they needed to walk to reach the other side.
Pado told Gulu that there was no such rift valley when he migrated through here before. It should have been formed during the last two years.
Gulu recalled that when they entered this particularly hot area, they also passed through a rift valley that basically isolated the hot area from other places.
From the presence of these two rift valleys, Gulu speculated that there might have been large and frequent earthquakes one or two years ago that eventually led to their formation.
These large and frequent earthquakes should have killed many dinosaurs, with the surviving ones fleeing to other places to live.
The Amargasaurus and Ouranosaurus should have only settled here recently because they took a fancy to lack of carnivorous dinosaurs nearby. At the same time, carnivorous dinosaurs from other places were prevented from coming to this area due to the two rift valleys (T/N: that acted as giant barriers).
As the only carnivorous dinosaur here, the Troodontids were probably the first carnivorous dinosaurs to have found this treasure land. Troodontids were clever, fast, and sensitive. Because there's no other carnivorous dinosaurs here, Troodontids faced no hunting competition.
The two rift valleys turned this place into a relatively closed "island", so there's only one carnivorous dinosaur type and a few species of local herbivorous dinosaurs.
However, once the crustal activity here stabilized, it would definitely attract more and more carnivorous and herbivorous dinosaurs again to this prosperous land.
Gulu saw more and more migrating groups on the pass where the rift valley was interrupted, which allowed them to cross to the other plains.
However, the rift valleys on both sides of the plains were devoid of any plants and were full of rocks. These rocks didn't have any strong adherence properties.
This showed that it wasn't safe to walk through the rift valley. If another earthquake occurred, these rocks would break apart and collapse.
Even the fern fields near the Great Rift Valley weren't absolutely safe. Once an earthquake happened again, the Great Rift Valley would continue to expand.
Only the forest next to the fern field was safe.
However, as long as they walk through this pass and cross to the opposite plains, they would basically reach the southern continent where they could settle down. They no longer needed to migrate for the next two to three years, at least not until the next dry season.
Therefore, all migrating groups were very excited. They were rushing to cross the rift valley to the opposite plains. Migration journey was difficult and faced endless dangers. Of course, it's better to finish it sooner.
Gulu started to imagine that during the rainy season in the southern continent, the luxuriant ferns would grow 7-8 meters high. After eating up a fern field, within three days, it would become luxuriant again. There would always be endless ferns to eat.
Pado's and Mungo's groups would have fixed territory like before. They could multiply and live on their territory without danger or displacement.
However, in order to ensure absolute safety, Gulu decided to go out of the range of the valley wall to reach the opposite side. Earthquakes happened too frequent these days, which made all surroundings near the rift valley extremely dangerous.
Gulu said to Pado, "Dad, we'll go into the forest and walk through it. We can walk along the forest all the way through the rift valley and to the other side. But this way, it'll take more time. I don't know how long the rift valley is."
Pado was always willing to listen to Gulu, even if it would make the group migration longer. Without hesitation, he immediately led the group into the forest.
Mungo, of course, also took his own group and followed Pado's group into the forest.
Even inside the forest, they could still see the rift valley in the distance. They just walked along the direction of the rift valley to go across it.
Just as Pado's group entered the forest, Gulu saw a large ray of golden light suddenly appearing on the distant horizon, just like the golden light special effects before Buddha appeared on TV, but it's shot toward the sky from the ground, looking very striking.
Although it's still late noon, Gulu was very sure that this was definitely not sunlight.
Then Gulu saw several rays of blue lights hitting the sky in the distant horizon, just like the ground lights of a large concert shooting toward the ceiling, while a strange sky light mixed with turquoise color also appeared in the sky.
Gulu immediately recalled, this was the earth light, also known as earthquake light. It's a sign of an impending earthquake. The color and form of the earthquake light were very rich. This light might have come from interaction of oxygen ions within rocks with the atmospheric molecules or local interruption of the earth magnetic field due to tectonic stress.
Earthquake light usually occurred several seconds before or at the same time as an earthquake.
Only when facing a very large earthquake could one see such a strong earthquake light. An earthquake most likely already occurred in the place where the earthquake light was emitted, but its seismic waves hadn't reached this area.
Gulu immediately shouted, "Get down, everyone, there's earthquake!"
Gulu's voice hardly fell when they heard a loud rumbling noise. The earth began to shake violently. The Triceratopses who didn't have time to get down were directly shaken to the ground.
The ground motion that's visible to the naked eye radiated from the glowing horizon.
Gulu saw the fern field opposite the rift valley rippling violently like a "big wave" rising and falling. Such a huge earthquake directly turned the large plains into a "stormy sea"!
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The rift valley was also surging up and down like a giant snake struggling desperately.
The pass leading to the opposite side where the rift valley was cut off split up almost instantly into smaller plates. The dinosaurs on there ended up standing on lone plates with insurmountable gaps between them.
Dinosaurs who stood on the edge of the plates fell into the abyss one by one. Many smaller plates quickly collapsed. All of the dinosaurs on them, of course, fell down into the rift. Dust storm accompanied by the bitter roars of dinosaurs, rang throughout the valley, together with continuous bang bang bang.
Gulu saw that there was a plate that wasn't separated from the opposite plains. Hundreds of dinosaurs were standing on that plate, which was also the largest number. They ran forward as fast as they could. At the same time, this plate also started disintegrating from behind at a rapid speed. These dinosaurs simply couldn't run faster than the speed of the plate disintegration and fell off one after another.
Only the fastest Camptosaurus reached the opposite plains, but at the same time the opposite plains also started collapsing. Several Camptosaurus ran very fast, then bang. The fern field in front of them collapsed and they fell into the abyss.
The opposite plains was collapsing and sinking at a fast speed. The rift valley was eating the opposite plains to expand its territory. The dinosaurs that already reached the middle of the plains still needed to run fast. However, they couldn't escape the speed of the plains disintegration.
The groups that reached the opposite side were few. They were the groups at the front of the migrating army. Almost all of them fell into the rift and were buried alive.
Most of the migrating groups were still on the fern field here. They ran desperately into the forest. They must run faster than fern field disintegration to avoid getting eaten by the rift.
A large part of the plains on the opposite side had collapsed and the fern field on this side was also continuously collapsing, but not as fast as the one on the opposite side.
Gulu saw that the dinosaur running a little slower on the fern field here also fell into the rift.
Pachi leaned against Gulu in fright and said: "Brother, the rift valley is terrible. It ate a lot of dinosaurs…"
Dudu: "Brother, how many dinosaurs does the rift valley need to eat to be satisfied? It won't eat us too?…"
Mila: "Brother, why does the rift valley eat all kinds of dinosaurs? It also needs ferns and soil? It eats a lot…"
Gulu: "Don't be scare. There're Brother, Dad, Mom, and the group. We won't be eaten, never."
In dinosaurs' minds, whether it's earthquake, fire or flood, dinosaurs could only understand it in terms of relationship between eating and being eaten. Earthquake meant that the ground would eat them. Fire meant that the fire would eat them. Flood meant that the water would eat them.
Gulu knew that the forest was safe, but in order to ensure absolute safety, it's better to run back and stay away from the rift valley where the geological structure was unstable.
Now that the earthquake had become much smaller, Gulu shouted, "Run, run into the forest."
Pado's and Mungo's groups stood up and ran into the forest until the earthquake completely stopped.
All dinosaurs were scared silly. They ran desperately into the forest. Even if the earthquake had stopped, they were still running.
Gulu saw that the rift valley had expanded a lot. More than half of the vast plains on the opposite side was swallowed by it. The fern field on this side wasn't as broad as that on the opposite side. It was completely swallowed by the rift valley that stopped at the edge of the forest.
For a while, all dinosaurs were very frightened. They roared in the forest and didn't dare to take another step outside.
It wasn't until after night fell that the dinosaurs gradually settled down, but each dinosaur group arranged for dinosaurs to keep vigil in turn. If there's an earthquake, they would immediately run deeper into the forest.
———-
T/N: *Cough*, scientifically, grounds can't just collapse in seconds…even during an extremely large earthquakes…
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To be fair, I suppose, its inevitable that you'll run into a scientific impossibility in a story about sentient dinosaurs and transmigration. Is it weird that I'm still hung up over the migration? Just, it's such a long journey that doesn't follow a normal weather pattern (seasonal is not the same as once over a multiple year span) or geographic spatial sense or make sense for a lifespan or anything like that. There is no "we migrate here to breed and back to feed" or "flying south for the winter". Its been distracting me this whole journey. Lol. And what are they gonna do when they can't get back? Regardless of the whole point of continents splitting apparently only taking 5 years or so instead of over many thousands of years. At some point you have to hand wave logic away or it'll drive you nuts!
Thanks for your hard work translating!