Only a month after the events of "Center", Yegor Koshkin and his friends decided to get back to the Patomski Crater - just north-east of the Lake Baikal, on the border between the main Russian gold mining region and the diamond fields of Yakutia. They wanted to perform scientific research and measure the influence the crater on moral judgment and creative potential of people. Meanwhile, some other characters we met in the previous books of the series decided to attend the same area too, attracted by the presence of diamond fields there. Two concurrent activity got entangled in an unexpected way that created seemingly insurmountable problems for Yegor and his friends. In addition, another group of Americans appeared in the same general area persuading their own scientific and not so scientific interests. It has complicated already complex situation but eventually led to an unexpected turn of events.