Golden Plastic Sisters Translation Group

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8

While Headmaster Lu’s opening ceremony, which was newly added to B4’s schedule by Zhanlu, was yet to start, he had encountered a bit of a problem.

The opening ceremony was arranged in the morning, and before that was the faculty and staff meeting.

The newly established Star Sea Academy had three departments: Mech and Mechanical Engineering, Mech Operation, and Information Science. All the course materials were headmaster compilations…plus some other pieces gleaned from god-knows-where.

According to Headmaster Lu’s great conceptions of the future, Star Academy is to become the greatest hall of human wisdom, having the most advanced laboratories and synesthetic libraries, and the most authoritative publishing press in the universe. It would become the constellation of the best of the humanity with research centers across all eight galaxies. Echoing with the Black Orchid Academy as mind and muscle, it would leave a mark on all the brilliances of human history.

Bixing Lu might be poor in worldly possessions, but he was definitely rich in transcendent aspirations.

Without the accumulation of tiny steps, you cannot walk thousands of miles--- and Headmaster Lu strongly believed that the three scorned departments he had was the first tiny step of his great career.

But just as the opening ceremony was ready to start, the three “tiny steps”—the deans of the three departments, grimaced together at Headmaster Lu, and showed him the harsh reality.

The cranky dean of Mech Operation spoke before Headmaster Lu could finish his wonderful expectations for the new semester.

“I can’t teach these students anymore, Headmaster Lu! Last semester, the failure rate was higher than ninety percent, and I had already adjusted their scores by multiplying the root number by ten. What else can I do, Headmaster?”

The dean of Mech and Mechanical Engineering added with a rather offish face, “My failure rate was a hundred percent.”

Lu, having heard these appalling numbers, still managed to remain considerate, “Engineering majors have higher requirements for basic education. That’s okay---we can extend the school year if we need to, and maybe you can be a little more lax on their first year, and give the ones close to passing a few more points to let them pass.”

“Won’t work,” said the dean of Mech and Mechanical Engineering with a tragic expression, “If I use the hundred mark system, I would only have one student who has an average that actually reaches double digits.”

Bixing Lu: “……”

“I won’t talk about my department, as we don’t even have data,” the dean of the Information Science was a thin, white-haired old man who spoke slowly, “I don’t know how you advertised our school, Headmaster, as most of the students who enrolled in my department are simply here to learn how to tap into people’s secrets. I explained to them that my course isn’t a course on spying or espionage, and guess what ---of the forty nine students who registered, fifty of them dropped out.”

Lu ran the old dean’s words through his mind again, speaking confusedly, “……How come there were more students who dropped out than those who registered?”

“A student found out that a group of gangsters who were his enemies were also at the school, and as he didn’t want any trouble, he dropped out halfway through registering,” spoke the old dean.

The teachers at the school were all scholastic pedants whom Lu discovered from all the corners of the Eighth Galaxy, as they were an endangered species here.

Upon arrival, they were expecting to teach a group of elites, and guide them onto the glorious path towards truth and knowledge. Unfortunately, as they settled down, all their work was those of a zookeeper’s, which was a complete disgrace to them.

The three deans sat together in a circle, three pairs of eyes accusing the headmaster of deceiving them.

Lu was unfazed, “That may be the inappropriate course materials and curriculum. I’ve only taught a few students in private before, and this is my first year to actually run a school, which means I have absolutely zero experience. If we come across a problem like this again, we can have a meeting more early on, and fix it in time.”

“Headmaster Lu,” said the dean of Mech Operation, “do you know how much you need for a primary degree?”

The education system of the Eighth Galaxy was simpler and much different than other places, which had only two levels: primary and senior. A primary degree meant basic education, which was possible by studying at a public school for fifteen years, or studying on your own and passing an exam at an appointed location. After you have received a primary degree, you can choose to enroll into vocational training and then start working, or choose the higher level for further education.

Needless to say, higher education wasn’t affordable for everyone. In the Eighth Galaxy, there were eighteen planets with residents, but only eleven schools---and six of them were already closed, with only the empty buildings and a few security guards to keep the homeless and criminals from making it a place of their own.

Most people wouldn’t know what a college looked like.

Schooling is useless---that was common sense in the Eighth Galaxy.

Under these conditions, it was a miracle that Star Sea Academy could enroll more than a hundred students, receive more than three hundred application forms on the second year, and even have an actual enrollment rate. This miracle was not because of Headmaster Lu’s attractiveness and charm-it was said that B4’s the sponsor of the school.

This is the generation when even colleges needed the support of rogues, after all.

"Thirty dollars for a fake degree with complete assurance for quality, and with another hundred and eight, you can even have the full application materials, also with a full guarantee for passing,” said the dean of Informational Science, “All done by the people who dropped out of my department.”

Bixing Lu: “……”

The dean of Engineering had a pair of naturally downturned eyebrows, and now they were more drooped than usual, making him look particularly distressed, “Headmaster Lu , most of the students you recruited are here to get a peek at that mister. We may work hard like devoted gardeners, but planting a whole garden of mice is too much for us.”

Lu quickly calculated how much cash he could receive by selling himself, and smiled, speaking in a mysterious way, “You shouldn’t say it in a way like that---every road to greatness is covered with thorns, and every wise man’s doing have once been viewed as the legendary Yugong who tried to move the mountain. There is the saying that ‘only the road to hell is filled with good-willed flowers’, and isn’t hardship the undoubted road to one’s dreams?”

The three deans lowered their heads together like three withered eggplants as Headmaster’s “chicken soup for the soul” was a little too rancid to consume.

“I know that all of you work extremely hard, so we’re going to raise the salaries for all faculty members by twenty percent this year.” Said Lu.

The eggplants silently grew out new sprouts, and regained a bit of liveliness.

Bixing Lu separated himself into two characters, and switched into the unpleasant one with a cold face, “According to known statistics, the dropout rate of the Eight Galaxy is as high as ninety percent, and most of the people with full application materials haven’t actually finished primary education, having used fake degrees to apply. I’m aware. But who knows if there are students who was grabbing a last hold of hope and did not drop out of school voluntarily? Do you know, my fellow coworkers, that in the same world as ours, primary education is not even needed in the other galaxies that are not even far away from us?”

Someone murmured, “Eden…”

“Eden,” Lu stood up with his hands behind his back, speaking with fervor, “The children in Eden are instilled with primary education through mental network before they are ten---they call it “painless learning” ---they just lie in a nutrition cabin for a month, and then automatically understand the knowledge naturally, as if they were magically enlightened.”

“Can you imagine that? They don’t have to go through the process of memorizing and forgetting over and over again, or explore down the wrong path with no one to help them work out the problems in their minds. You dislike the student’s weak basics, but on this notion, all of us here had weak basics. We might have lost at the starting line, but so what? We can adjust the course materials, teach them bit by bit slowly, and help them learn slowly.”

“If you give up on them just like that, can you face your conscience, and face the confused, helpless person you once have been in the past?”

Complete silence spread through the conference room, unclear if it was caused by Headmaster Lu’s worries or the salary raise.

Lu glanced around, feeling that he had successfully persuaded everyone by logic, and ended the conference, with the lamenting tone, ready for the opening ceremony to start. He found a corner with on one around. and checked his appearance in the glass: wide shoulders leading to a slim waist, formal wear unruffled, hair slicked back perfectly, a forehead that could enter the Intergalactic Forehead Beauty Contest, and dignified features.

The real-life epitome of Apollo.

Then the gorgeous man tried to smile at the glass, testing first the way of lifting the corners of his lips but not showing his teeth, then the standard way of showing eight teeth, and lastly a combination of the first two---a reserved way showing only half a side of teeth.

All three kinds had their merits, and were all perfect. Mr. Metrosexual Lu had a choosing disorder, and after a series of rigorous comparison, he chose option three due to his identity as headmaster---even though he really, really wanted to show his beautiful, white teeth.

After everything was set, he changed into his most careless posture, walked round the tutor building, and strode towards the auditorium.

Stepping on the threshold of the auditorium, Lu shoved his hands into his pockets, and nodded back to everyone who greeted him.

On this beautiful planet full of walking bumpkins, Lu was probably the only one who had the ability to sense that Zhanlu was not human. As the local AIs had an average IQ lower than eighty, it was indeed difficult to think of Zhanlu as the same species as them.

Lu also knew that Lin wasn’t from the Eighth Galaxy, or one of the extraterritorial interstellar pirates---Lu had grown up under the guidance of Monoeye Hawk, and had seen many interstellar pirates before. Lin wasn’t like them---they were malevolent, harsh, like wandering vultures.

When they first talked about Eden, Zhanlu tried to correct his imaginations about the First Galaxy twice. However, it was interrupted by Lin both times. Bixing Lu pretended that he hadn’t noticed that--- and keeping that unspoken boundary was how he could become friends with Lin.

Lu met Lin when he ran away from home. Lu had drifted close to Beijing-β, and before he decided whether to land or not, he encountered a drift bottle… or rather, an unknown eco-pod.

It had no identification, and was orbiting Beijing-β outside its unanimated artificial atmosphere, exquisite like a celestial visitor from another dimension, with a minimalist styled shell gorgeous enough to turn any researcher into a stalker. Lu, mouth drooling, followed the unidentified eco-pod around Beijing-β thrice, and intercepted the eco-pod, even though he knew that picking up unknown items in space was pretty much committing suicide.

The whole interception process took almost three hours, and after it was completed, Lu found out that the eco-pod had a tough encryption system, and would self-destruct if forcibly opened.

The contents of the delicate eco-pod could be a huge secret, or some deadly virus. Either way, it could be extremely dangerous, and with normal thinking, one would return this thing to where it was, and get as far away as possible from it.

But our young Mr. Lu was clearly not normal.

As a scientist who couldn’t control himself from fiddling with the eco-pod, Lu was actually not curious about what was in the eco-pod. But he fell in love with the almost provocative encryption system at first sight, forgetting all the things he was supposed to do, and after two months of trying, he finally cracked the “sphinx” open.

In extreme rapture, Lu wrote a fluent and voluminous interstellar travel journal with two bottles of whiskey, recording his great feats. He finished the journal, got himself tipsy in the process--then he kicked the pod door open accidentally.

Pandora’s box opened, and the alcohol in Lu’s body evaporated along with his guts.

He rubbed his eyes once, then twice, over and over again, and sat down on the floor to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating---

There was a living human inside the pod.

Lu took a handful of antialcohol drugs, examined the person inside the eco-pod, found out that his vital sign was dangerously low, and had a mechanical arm clasped to his arm like an accoutrement. It was probably an AI of some sort that was unable to turn on due to lack of energy.

Low vital signs may be able to preserve one’s life in extreme conditions, but could also cause irreversible damage if maintained too long. Lu didn’t know how long this “sleeping handsome” had slept, and took out all of his medical equipment, afraid that he would die in his sleep. But this “celestial visitor” had not used common drugs to lower his vital signs---not the ones the medical equipment could identify. As Lu wasn’t a doctor, he was afraid of using waking drugs he didn’t knew, so he only injected him with nutritive medium and used microcurrents to try to wake him up.

On the third day, Sleeping Handsome’s eyelids lightly fluttered once. Lu tried to get a response from him after that, but failed.

Out of boredom, Lu took a dozen books, and started to read beside Sleeping Handsome’s ears, the books ranging from Advanced Mechincal Engineering to History of Earth. At last, he read a vulgar piece of erotica involving a lot of alluring fairies--and his audience finally opened his eyes, unable to endure it anymore.

As it was dry in mech cabins, and Lu was getting to the intense part of the story, Lin saw two lines of bright red streaming down under Lu’s nose just as he opened his eyes.

Lin’s waking drugs were kept by Zhanlu, and as Zhanlu couldn’t start up due to low energy, Lu did not wake up Lin in the normal way, and therefore the waking process became severely painful.

At first, Lin was like a mummy, with only his eyes able to move, and had to soak in nutrition fluid for months to regain physical mobility. Mr. Lu then realized how much trouble he had caused, and had to start acting as Lin’s nurse voluntarily.

7

Silver Fortress, the First Galaxy.

The suspension door slid to both sides. Admiral Wolf and Secretary General Golden got off the car one after another. Golden politely let Admiral Wolf go first whilehe held the door gracefully, bending down and reaching inside, giving hand to Mrs. Goldon who was still in the car. He leaned towards her and gently whispered: “Do you still feel bad?”

Jingshu Lin nodded with a pale face. Space transferring is requisite if you do not want to spend thirteen days on the way from the capital planet to the Silver Fortress like Commodore Lin. People had been troubled by carsickness, seasickness and airsickness since ancient times, it was not a big deal that Jingshu had a spacesickness now.

Golden said: Authorize Eden please, let it help you by adjusting the balancer.”

Jingshu Lin shook her head silently.

After her brother, Commodore Lin’s death, Jingshu had shielded most functions of Eden.

The network of Eden was not accomplished in a short time. In the beginning, it was simply used in a very limited area including helping people controlling domestic appliance and playing holographic games. The technology developed in hundreds of years, providing more and more convenience in the daily life. As a result, people constantly gave authorization to Eden in the same way as the ancients installing applications in their cellphones.

The Spiritual Network Protection Law stipulated that Eden must fully inform citizens of the possibility of the disclosure of their privacy; only after being given the authorization can the application be connected. However, people seldom read those terms and conditions which were detailed in millions of words. Anyhow the legislation and supervision were quite strict since the establishment of Eden so that no one had heard of any scandals about privacy disclosure.

Nowadays, openness, tolerance, frankness and the freedom of expression were unquestionable political correctness. Except for a few religious who believed that penances is the way of cultivating themselves, only Jingheng and his Ten Squadrons shielded Eden. It was once a crime of Commodore Lin before his death – an unequivocal witness of his dishonesty and conspiracy, but now it became a merit in his posthumous praise by the government of the Interstellar Union, saying that he was “the first to embrace the pain for the purpose of sharpening himself and his army”.

Jingshu memorized her dead brother like an ascetic vegetarian in this way, about which Golden had no objection . He lent her his arm considerately so she could have a rest. His gentleness was a show in the Silver Fortress in some sort, but it is sincere as well----no matter what conflicts he had with Commodore Lin privately in the past, he was still very affectionate with Jingshu Lin.

After all, as such a beauty, she had the privilege to be loved even if she was like a piece of furniture placed coldly at home.

Commodore Li, the new commodore of the Silver Fortress, had been waiting for Admiral Wolf and the Secretary General as well as his wife for a long time. Two rows of guards stood behind him in a solemn and neat way, young and handsome with slender legs and thin waist. if looking more carefully, however, there were some strange details which could not be ignored. If ignoring the numbers on their military uniforms, they were so uniformly handsome that they seemed to be hatched from the same egg. They could almost arouse a feeling of trypophobia.

Admiral Wolf is aveteran who belongs to the established powers in the army. He frowned when he saw these honor guards. Commodore Li explained in a whisper: There are few Ten Squadrons left now, and the others......the others are all unruly dignitaries as well as rebels, very difficult to control. Therefore we have to transfer a group of artificial humans for the safety of the Silver Fortress. What do you think of......”

Commodore Wolf interrupted him in a voice dripping with sarcasm: Excellent idea. I will write a letter to the IU parliament and advise them to send an artificial intelligence to govern the Silver Fortress. From then on, robots will command themselves to fight the battles. How civilized and convenient! They don’t even need to intrigue against each other.”

Commodore Li was planning to take the robot model honor guards to welcome them, so as to show off his flexibility and open-mindedness. Being satirized by Admiral Wolf, he was not dare to say anything more, and led the way listlessly.

They went into the Silver Fortress, walking straight into the ground and entered the deepest underground. Admiral Wolf opened seven sealed doors with the supreme authority of the IU Armed Force. As the last heavy metal door slowly lifted, a huge mech fell into their eyes.

Near glorious perfection, its icy body shining resplendency; it looked like a sleeping dragon.

Secretary General raised his head, sighing in admiration: This is Zhanlu.”

“Yes.” It seemed that Commodore Li was afraid of waking up something, so he lowered his voice unconsciously, After Jingheng’s… no one can awake Zhanlu again. It rejected any spiritual connection, including Eden. Zhanlu is a treasure to all the human beings, and the oriflamme of the Silver Fortress. We don’t want to force it to connect, you know, avoiding potential damage by doing that. Butthe star pirates are growing rampant, the IU really needs it. There is no other way so that we have to bother Mrs. Golden.”

Commodore Li said to Jingshu, bowing to her slightly: You are the only blood relative of Jingheng and shares the same excellent genes with him. Maybe you can impress Zhanlu.”

Jingshu Lin stepped back to refuse the formality and gave him an appropriate smile.

Admiral Wolf walked forward and touched the hull of Zhanlu, pressing his hand on the cabin door and tried: Request connection.”

He felt something extremely powerful crushed over him. The underground space shook with a buzz while the sound frequency went beyond the resolution of human ears, like a silent roar, resounding like waves. The sleeping mech was like a trapped beast, and it was ready to bite once it opened eyes.

Admiral Wolf was shocked and let go immediately, holding himself after stumbling back a few steps.

“ADMIRAL!”

Admiral Wolf waved his hand and blocked the flattering hands of Commodore Li, starring at him with his cloudy eyes, said at a measured and slow pace:In 260, Jingheng Lin was commanded to fight battles against the combination of the interstellar terrorism and the star pirates. In the most famous battle, he single-handedly invaded fifteen enemy armies and took over their authorities AT THE SAME TIME.”

Commodore Li blushed and turned pale at the same time.

“Jingheng Lin did not command the Silver Fortress by a mech. It is logical for Zhanlu to reject any connections. Linking to you rubbish is a shame on itself. If the spiritual threshold cannot be reached, then use blood and gene to compensate? Preposterous! ” Admiral Wolf said coldly, and then turned to Jingshu politely and aloofly, “There is no need to bother Mrs. Golden. You are not in a good health and have not been military trained, way too easy to be injured by Zhanlu. It will be a colossal loss to the capital planet to hurt such a beautiful lady. I apologize for bothering you to have this trip. Please.”

The Secretary General was just here for a show but not really ready to offer a help, so he was gloating to see the military upset. Following Admiral Wolfs stride he held Jingshu’s hand and led her leaving the Silver Fortress without saying a word.

He did not notice that her weak and soft wife turned around and cast a look at Zhanlu. Her feather-liked eyelashes drooped, hiding her quirky smile.

At the same universal time, in the Beijing-ß planet, the Eighth Galaxy,.

It was just dawning. B4 washed his hand carefully for three times, and decided to clean his face as well.

The robot hand on the wall was still sleeping. B4 shaved and dressed himself; then opened the windows and doors of the Speakeasy.

Chill feeling and the sound of wind passed through this house. The Beijing-ß planet had woken up from the shivering cold night.

B4 poured a cup of overnight coffee for himself, and found a lump of sandwich that was a kind of specialty of the Eighth Galaxy from a fresh-keeping cabinet. B4 had a look at it and failed to find out what was in it, but he did not care about it. He started eating in the cold wind with all doors open, and casually fed the lizard some mealworm.

The noises outside were rising. There were sounds of hurried footsteps, loud complaints of housewives, swearing naughty children, mixed with the whistles of the gay sportevery five minutes. It was the vitality that only could be found in the Eighth Galaxy.

The Speakeasy was clean and fresh. Spider had disappeared already.

B4 was neither brisk when he was energetic nor listless when he stayed up all night like this time. He was just like a pine which always kept an unchanged look no matter in winter blizzard or in spring sunshine.

As firm as iron, he seemed to have no feelings.

“You had better not to have breakfast in the cold wind, for it will cause gastrointestinal problems.” Three hours later, Zhanlu on the wall transferred into the handsome man in time.

B4 seemed to be attracted by something out of the window and he gazed at it without looking back, “No.”

He had not finished his words when the doors and windows closed. The temperature indoor rose rapidly, shielding the cold morning of the Beijing-ß planet from the house like a fortress.

Zhanlu said seriously: Yes, it will. There is a significant positive correlation between having cold food in the wind and gastrointestinal problems.”

B4: ......”

Zhanlu took away his extremely simple breakfast and discarded the overnight coffee.He made a cup of hot coffee, and heated the sandwich, “You interrogated Spider.”

B4 did not need to speak to Zhanlu euphemistically: I did. The Toxic Nest ran into a gang of dubious people on the periphery of the Eighth Galaxy three months ago, and they claimed that they had one hundred mechs and two armed starships, hoping to have a munition deal with them. It was those people who brought the chips. Implanted in the heartand humans and artificial intelligence in a 200-meter radius will be affected expediently. Besides, they can also strengthen the implanted humans, turning them into invulnerable supermen. As far as I know, even Eden cannot do this.”

What does “one hundred mechs” mean?

Five years ago, the IU government only sent five hundred mechs to siege the Silver Fortress in secret.

Zhanlu said: They are not the local gangs of the Eighth Galaxy.”

“I suppose not.” B4 said，”They offer a quite low price. The first batch of munitions are nearly free. What they required the Toxic Nest to do is to help looking for children between two and four, one hundred children per batch, and they have already had two batches. I speculate that they are doing human experiments. The mysterious people do not suggest them to steal children in the same area to avoid being discovered, or perhaps they are testing biochips on those Toxic Nest fools who are rushed everywhere in the Eighth Galaxy.”

Zhanlu waited for B4’s conclusion quietly.

B4 finished the processed breakfast absentmindedly, and then said: No need to hurry. It is only an attempt of the Toxic Nest if extraterritorial pirates really want to do something, they will find us soon or later. Before that, we’d better to find out what the biochips are.”

“I will spare no effort to help Headmaster Lu.” Zhanlu paused for a while, Well, will you accept Headmaster Lu’s invitation to attend the opening ceremony?”

“Do I look like have nothing else to do?” B4 drank up the coffee.

Zhanlu: But I notice that you have got in suit.”

B4 said casually: I threw away that one. It had been stained with blood.”

Zhanlu answerd “I see” and took away the empty cup and tableware. I will cancel this plan from your schedule later.”

6

Five minutes later, lazy, zombie-like jazz music was played again in Speakeasy. The deeply unconscious “spider” was bound to a table leg with an electrocuting metal string, and the headmaster who was supposed to go back to his beauty sleep was seated again at the bar counter.

The green lizard crouched lazily on Zhanlu’s shoulder like a plastic ornament, unmoving.

Bixing Lu’s hands ran uncontrollably over the lizard’s spine, and the texture scared him even though the lizard wasn’t even bothered in the slightest.“Is there anyone that can explain to me about the entertainment of keeping this stupid thing?” Lu askd with chills running down his spine.

“Reptiles have a long history, Sir.” Zhanlu answered him with immaculate reasoning, “And as they are ancient and mysterious, they have been the blueprints of imagination-oriented gods and demons that can be dated back to the Earth Era. As you can see, it's notably quiet, and it has a gorgeous, ever-changing temperature and also a cycling life magnetic field---it is a conflicting yet bizarre organism, yet as alluring as an antique came to life.”

The artificial intelligence’s romantic heart flabbergasted Lu.

“He means that this thing is more suitable for background decorations.” B4 added perfunctorily.

Epiphany dawned on Lu, who immediately accepted the reasoning, and understood the adorableness of reptiles at lightspeed.

B4’s fingers lightly clicked on the counter twice, getting Lu’s attention, “How much do you understand about the Eden you mentioned just now?”

“If I had enough resources, I could even build one on the Eighth Galaxy!” Lu replied boldly.

B4 listened to his almost foolish confidence with great patience, and felt that even the whole Beijing-ß couldn’t contain young sir Lu’s nerve.

“The Eden is the first class in IT department. The popular science books were edited by myself.” Lu said, gulping down a glass of soft drink to wet his whistle, readying himself for a long speech, “Now, you two, do you know the event that separates OSC and NSC?”

B4 didn’t even bother to give him a reply.

Though Zhanlu answered him enthusiastically: “If we speak about it politically, it would be the establishment of the Union. But speaking technically, it would be the construction of the Eden.”

“Bingo,” said Lu, lowering his voice, “Now, students, please close your eyes and let your imagination loose. Come with me to the capital planet of our Union---imagine that you’re a normal citizen living on Wotto, having a living condition similar to the one you have now on the Beijing-ß planet, living in a tube-shaped apartment with only one room.

Zhanlu couldn’t stop itself from speaking: “But, Sir... ...”

There is no such living condition on Wotto.

“Shh—” Lu said in a mystifying voice, “Don’t interrupt me.”

“Under the effects of Eden, your home should be like this: you wake up in the morning and find yourself lying on a soft meadow with forest smells surrounding you. Your favorite animals running around you. Of course, they are unrealistically clean and cute and has no excrement at all. Maybe you like the sea more, then your home will look like the seabed with colorful fish and coral surrounding you. You can feel the sea gently rocking you like a crib, but you won’t even feel hard to breathe or contricted by the pressure as a mammal,” Lu’s voice was perfect for spreading evil beliefs with its attraction. He said and smiled, “And that is just the tiniest speck of what Eden can do.”

Zhanlu was still stuck in his problem. “But, Sir, there are no such buildings in the First Galaxy like that... ...”

“Enough,” B4 interrupted, “Just shut up and cut to the point.”

B4’s words poured down Lu’s passionate midnight class. “Oh, okay. Actually, the Eden is a large mental network made up of both humans and machines that also covers most aspects of daily life, and can serve humans to the largest extent possible.” said Lu dryly.

“I also did not mean for you to speak like a textbook.” said B4, unsatisfied by the answer Lu gave.

Bixing Lu, experienced with this kind of behavior with his troublesome students, changed his words in no time as Jingheng asked. “It means that under the service area of Eden, your brain can connect with any AI anytime you want. For example—you’re sitting at the bar counter now, right? So, if you connect to Eden, when the thought of a drink flashes across your mind, the bar will immediately make a drink for you. And as Eden is connected to the human brain, it can also control human senses—let’s use drinks as an example again—if someone wants milkshake, but is also on a diet, then the bar will give him a glass of cold water and make Eden stimulate his senses, letting him ‘drink’ the milkshake he wanted without any calories.”

“So you’ve seen the Eden before?” B4 quickly asked.

“If I had the chance,”Lu shrugged, “I would like to have an interstellar trip, but unfortunately my dad has my passport. I’ve heard that every infant born in the Seven Galaxies, after being registered, would be under the protection of Eden. For his whole life, he would have the most detailed care, and in reality, the infinite mental network would take care of every emotion, such as loneliness, depression, anxiety, etc. All of those would be removed, since the Eden takes care of your emotions right away with the slightest wavering of your mental state, adjusting your senses and hormones to erase the negative feelings. Back in Earth times, this was a concept a lot of religions had---a land without worries and sadness, which they called 'Paradise', 'Heaven' or 'Eden'. In myths, God expulsed man from Eden, and now humans have created one of its own. Of course, that ‘Eden’ has nothing to do with the Eighth Galaxy, as there must be someone who goes to hell on behalf of everyone."

“Why do you think the tools the trafficker used has something to do with Eden?” B4 ignored Lu's opinions about the Eighth Galaxy, and went back to the topic he wanted to focus on.

“It's the hallucinations it causes, Lin. The only thing I can think of that can affect both humans and artificial intelligence is Eden.” Lu pressed on his temples, “Everything is two-sided, and the thing that makes you happy can also make you lose control of your mind. Back then, for Eden to be set up, the Seven Galaxies created a series of regulations to make sure that the Eden couldn't influence normal cognition and free thought. But technology itself is a double-edged sword, and if it can serve people, it can harm them too---and I also think that that student of mine has empty-brain syndrome.”

About one percent of humans have empty-brain syndrome. Caused by gene defects, it means that people with it have naturally low mental strength, and is unable to adapt to the Eden system, which basically means that their brains have poor connections with technology in general.

If forced to come in contact with Eden, people with vacucerebral syndrome exposed long enough to it could receive mental harm and even death risks.

In the first few decades of NSC, when Eden wasn’t fully developed yet, these people could still scrape by, but as Eden’s involvement with the daily life increased, these “imperfections” were marginalized.

Vacucereral syndrome has to do with heredity, and passes down in the family.

Back when General Lu regained the Eighth Galaxy, heavily discriminated people with vacuceraral syndrome moved with their entire families to this barren place, living with the grimy natives in the ‘wilderness’ and making the vote for the Eden to be set up in the Eighth Galaxy impossible to pass. But that doesn’t matter—even if the vote was able to pass, no one would give the Eighth Galaxy’s gorillas any disbursement to set up Eden.

B4 raised his head to glance at Zhanlu.

Zhanlu understood him immediately, and showed Lu the biological chip he removed from Spider in his palm.

“This should be the double-edged sword that you were talking about, Headmaster Lu. I am very surprised to learn that you are also expertised in the field of informational technology.” said Zhanlu.

“What do you mean?” Lu said with shock, trying to keep himself reserved and not blatantly staring at the chip. “Do you want me to work as a researcher for you guys? That’s pretty hard, for I don’t have a lab on my hands.”

“You’re using my name to keep this mess of a school together, and you don’t even have a lab?” B4 raised his eyebrows, scowling.

Lu sighed. “Rome wasn’t built in a day, and it is the same for Stars Academy. Stars Academy is still young, and needs slow and gradual improvement.”

“Cut out the crap.” said B4.

“......” Lu lowered his head. “We might have a bit of a funding problem.”

Stars Academy wasn’t actually how most people thought it was—not one of the second-generation rich wasting his father’s wealth. No father sponsors his son to run away from home. When Lu was driving his mech everywhere he could visit, Monoeye Hawk had already froze all of his accounts.

Lu had to use deception to trick someone into buying his modified mech in order to fund the school he wanted.

Stars Academy was still new, and needs money for everything—the facilities needed to be maintained, the teachers that he tricked into working here needed salaries, and the tuition the students paid was far from enough, as most of them were impoverished, and needed ‘scholarships’.

Although Headmaster Lu looked sharp and outstanding, he was close to selling his body.

However B4 did not care about his towering stress, and lighted a cigarette, gesturing for Lu to leave: “I understand. Just ask Zhanlu and he’ll transfer the money over to your account.”

Lu barely held back his desire to kneel down in front of B4 to thank him, keeping his posture with extreme self-control and nodding. “Thank you, sir, for your contribution to education, and I represent the school board to give you an honorary PhD with extreme gratitude.”

B4 took his words as bullshit, pointed at the door with his chin, and indicated for Lu to get out.

Lu still refused to leave, and shook Lin’s hands forcibly: “As our school’s biggest sponsor, I have a surprise for you—tomorrow is the opening ceremony for the new academic year, our second one, and I have prepared a VIP seat for you, Dr. Lin.”

“Just get the fuck out.” the newly made Dr. Lin answered.

Bixing Lu picked up the chip from Zhanlu’s hand, gave it a brief kiss without feeling dirty or disgusted to the blood on it, and left the room.

The wind chimes on the front door tinkled as he left. After Lu was out of sight, B4 finally showed a hint of a smile, and spoke to Zhanlu: “Pour me a glass of wine.”

“Sir, you are very fond of Headmaster Lu.” Zhanlu acted like the Eden described by Lu, pouring Lin a glass completely fitted to his tastes, adding two ice cubes.

B4’s gaze skimmed over the brink of his glass and landed on him.

“You are very patient with him, and I rarely see you so patient with other people.” Zhanlu put the green lizard back in the glass tank, and started to clean the counter neatly.

B4 did not express his opinion on Zhanlu’s words: “Have I always been so impatient in your eyes? Back then, all those researchers who surrounded me were also as talkative as him, and I didn’t object any of them, did I?”

Data analysis charts ran in Zhanlu’s eyes that looked like a calm, emerald green lake, as he tried to express his opinions with immense data.

Whereas B4 did not give him the chance.

Lin finished his drink, and his relaxed expression disappeared, commanding: “Zhanlu, go to sleep.”

Zhanlu was confused. “Sir, do you want me to completely go asleep, or just make the host go to sleep and keep the basic monitoring on?”

“Be asleep for three hours, then wake up when the sun rises.” said B4.

“Yes, ready to sleep in one minute, full sleep mode—” Zhanlu repeated his command one word after another, until his body melted, mixing with the counter and remaining only a mechanical hand draped near the wine cooler.

The hand spoke abruptly: “Sir, I serve for you, and I will complete any of your commands except for ones that harm your life. It doesn’t matter to me if you are noble or despicable—I do not have the feature of evaluating my owner written in my code.”

B4 stared quietly at the melting ice cubes as if he hadn’t heard anything.

A minute later, the mechanical hand hanged down, and went quiet.

5

Zhanlu said: “A great association was evident between the Toxic Nest and the star pirate group, according to the eavesdropped conversation.”

B4 crossed his legs, looking out of the car windows. The twisted space field outside was very dizzy, which could make you puke if you just stare at it for a few seconds, whereas B4 was very used to it. He did not say a word after Zhanlu finished his words.

Zhanlu realized something immediately in the silence, and then corrected himself: “Sorry, Sir. This part of the common lexicon has not been updated yet.”

According to the clause of the IU Anti-pirate Law, any unauthorized military is a star pirate. Of course, the Blackhole was one of them.

“Chuck your pathetic lizard away when we come back. Get a parrot instead.” B4 said, “It will be a great help when you fit in your pirate identification.”

Zhanlu finished searching in his huge database in no time, finding a cartoon picture from the Ancient Earth Era----a corsair captain with a ferocious face and a parrot, with a ferocious face too, standing on his shoulder.

After digging into the picture for some time, he realized. “Oh, you are kidding.”

B4 kneaded his eyebrows, in a worried way.

Zhanlu let out a goose-bumping and mechanical laughter. “Ha-ha-ha.”

To avoid Zhanlu telling another cold joke in return, B4 started another topic. “Penny is a local gangster in Beijing planet, capable, indeed. It is not that easy to get rid of her. Did you find out the reason?”

“Yes, Sir. I find it under his skin.” Zhanlu said, a bloody biological chip raised up, “I am unable to figure out what it is in such a short time. If the chip is implanted in his heart, there will be a small-size collective illusion among both human and artificial intelligence when it is open.”

B4’s eyes became keen immediately, as an icy blade.

“He was aware of being spied this afternoon. To get rid of Penny, he disguised the boy and himself as two beggars, and he succeeded. He got on a city shuttle, trying to escape through the harbour V. There were other 13 passengers but no one had aware of it. Collective illusion woke up the forbidden fruit system in my body, therefore I was not affected by the illusion. I did some tests on the way, tried to release some disturbance. However, only one girl escaped from it. She happened to have vacucerebral syndrome. To ensure the safety of the innocents, I hacked into the city transport system, forcing it to stop at the Speakeasy and sending a message to Miss Penny.” Zhanlu answered in a smooth tune, “Sir, I assume that the chip shares a same theory with Eden, but much simpler.”

B4 frowned. “I can’t get you a research group here in such a short time.”

“I know, Sir. I will figure it out by myself.” He paused for a second, and asked again, “May I ask, do you still want to look for......Yessss.”

“Don’t tell me the probability. I know your algorithm.” B4 interrupted him. He tensioned his jaw for a second, then tapped the car gently, “We are about to go after some time. It is okay to give up if we can’t find him anyway. There were too many children died young. Probably the kid died as well.”

“Sir......”

“It is okay to die sometimes.”B4 did not express too much emotions, “It can be lucky to die in troubled times. Are we arrived?”

The car had already passed the space field and landed at the backdoor of the Speakeasy exactly in such a short conversation. It was almost silent when tires faced the ground, nothing but some small snowflakes moved away a little bit. The high-speed motors parked there were not there now, which suggested that the traffic lights group and Penny had gone.

Spider used the space field as well when he tried to escape. However, he was all alone, meaning that he would make great noise when he started the space field. The location error seemed to be great, too----otherwise he did not need to pretend that he was a beggar, hiking to the harbour V in cold and hunger.

On the contrary, Zhanlu could control a heavy vehicle to pass the space field, locating at the narrow alley out of the Speakeasy’s backdoor. That required errors within 50 centimetres, or else, there would be a vehicle-on-the-wall scene when landing, for sure.

The two space fields seemed to be similar, whereas any expert could tell that they were different as heaven and hell----like “gay sports” and an interstellar mech.

It was a pity that there were illiteracy everywhere in the “uncivilized” Eighth Galaxy and only a few people would appreciate the beauty of technology.

It was not all true though, you can still meet confidants rarely. However......

The humanlike Zhanlu separated himself from the car, carrying Spider in the trunk. His green eyes saw through the backdoor and scanned the room inside before he opened the door.

“Sir.” He paused, “You have a guest.”

B4’s canthus twitched. It was said that the bad-ass boss did not have more expressions than an artificial intelligence. However, right now, his expression was really hard to describe.

The warm air inside the pub hit them while the door was opened. The lights on the wall were all off even the Speakeasy was dark at the first place. Just the one above the bar counter was still on, adding a soft light filter to the man under it.

In the stunning atmosphere was a young man whose clothes on his body loosely and jacket on his shoulder. Hair in a mess, he leaned on the bar counter casually. At the first sight, he must be the one, who had just got up, too lazy to take care of himself, meeting people in a fairly casual way. It was not like anyone else being casual. It was as insubstantial as though a fairy had poised itself there for a minute.

However, his “casual” look had no inappropriate gather at all, neither in and out. Besides, his hairstyle was messy, at the same time, fluffy. It absolutely had nothing to do with pillows. It was obvious that his casual look had nothing to do with being casual.

“I say,” He noticed the man on Zhanlu’s shoulder unexpectedly, “You guys have a triumph of robbing？ Did I see something I shouldn’t know? Will I get cleaned?”

Zhanlu threw Spider on the floor. The crash between body and floor made some slight but thick voice. He greeted the man politely: “Good evening, headmaster Lu.”

The name of Headmaster Lu was Bixing. He was famous as a black sheep, a freak and a big hoodie in the Eighth Galaxy. He was both the chief man of the school board and the headmaster of the Starry Sea College----not because he was noble, of course, but because that it was he that contributed the college.

Headmaster Lu was very young. The reason why he could devote himself into the education career was not only because that he had passion and high ideal dreams, but also because that his father was a very famous munitions merchant in the Eighth Galaxy.

His father’s nickname was the Monoeye Hawk, who occupied the Cayley planet which is the capital planet of the Eighth Galaxy. He offered more than eighty percent of the weapons in the fights and wars in the Eighth Galaxy. He was THE troublemaker causing blood bleeding.

Bixing grew up with weapons of mass destruction, becoming an expert in the field of mechs very naturally since he grew up in such a family. He has the potential to be a Frankstein. Unfortunately, Monoeye Hawk found his son had an absurd dream before he could be happy for having a perfect inheritor——his son dreamed of being an educator even if he had grew in such a bloody family.

Why would the son of a munitions merchant would have such a humanistic dream? Bixing Lu had never told others the reason. That was why people all regarded him as a nutter.

Everything absurd in Eighty Galaxy , which cannot be explained properly, have the final answer simply as one word——insanity.

Monoeye Hawk finished his feast earlier on his son’s twentieth birthday. He asked his son about his wishes. He was too drunk to stay sober, promising he would make every wish come true even if his wish was to burn the Wotto down.

Little Lu believed it. He said his wish to his father, faithfully. “I want to publish a book.”

The Monoeye Hawk awoke immediately. He read his son’s masterpiece under the title “Space Mech Introductory Theory”. The munitions merchant was a bit confused. He could not recall where the argot of Space Mech Introductory Theory belongs to. Therefore, he asked, without feeling awkward: “What is this?”

Lu Jr. answered: “A basic textbook introducing space mech technology.”

The Monoeye Hawk thought there was something wrong with his ears. “Te...... what book?”

“Textbook.” Lu Jr. said, “I’ve read the textbooks accepted by several kind of normal colleges in the Eighth Galaxy. They were all disasters. Therefore, I write one by myself. Father, you are very welcomed to correct me.”

His father didn’t say anything for a while. “What do you wanna do?”

Lu Jr. was nuts absolutely. “I am willing to contribute a serious school, serious enough to lit the technological fame of the Eighth Galaxy.”

Now his father was wide awake now. He left without a single word, deciding to find a doctor to cure his son.

Since that, Bixing Lu and his father had started their long-time fighting. His mech abilities improved a lot in the process. When he was grounded in the Cayley planet, he spent 3 years turning his wandering vehicle into a pathetic-looking interstellar mech. Escaping by driving it, he wandered a lot of places until he met someone by the Beijing-ß, and then started a bad romance.

“Where is your student?” B4 turned on the lights on the wall the second he walked in, destroying the atmosphere Bixing Lu created on purpose.

“The secretary took her away.” Bixing Lu had prepared for the moment for so long, but now his only audience broke his stage without a glance. He sighed and had to leave his bar stool, circling around Spider. “What? You get the human trafficker back? Is that him?”

B4 looked at him for a second.

“I don’t have to ask, do I?” He rolled over the man on the floor with his foot, winking to Zhanlu, “No one can escape from Zhanlu’s chasing space field in the Eighth Galaxy, can they, babe?

Zhanlu showed no expression. “Thanks for your appreciation.”

B4 showed no expression as well. “Then why are you still here?”

Bixing was helpless when facing two pokerfaces. “I say, which one of you is the original edition?”

Then he kneeled, pressing on the Spider’s neck. Figuring out the man was still alive, he became more serious. “I have no intention to know who he is or what he is doing here. I will ask just one question and I will leave here immediately after finishing it. Will my student be in danger because of all of this?”

“Do not worry.” Zhanlu answered, “I have blocked the ID information of Miss Huang. Spider’s partner did not get anything.”

Bixing did not say a word then. He stood up, taking a bottle of wine behind the bar counter without asking for it.

“I am leaving then.” He checked his look in front of the glass door, turning around to say, “Well, the girl told me what happened roughly. I suppose the man has something similar to Eden. Be careful——bye.”

4

1300 UT*

It was late night in Venus Harbour, Beijing-ß.

Venus harbour was a galaxy harbour about to be abandoned. Only a few workers were left working here, living on low wages paid by the government.

It was a cold night. There was no one at the Venus Harbour. Large tracts of wasteland were covered with weeds higher than an adult, which were dying, rustling, waving in the howling gale. It was like a ghost town, run-down and sombre. The obsolete buildings and launchers in Venus Harbour were standing in the desolation, reminding you of those ugly scenes in ancient sci-fictions, more than words could describe.

There was a narrow path between the pale green weeds for the workers to in and out. The homeless were marching toward to the Venus through the path. Workers would drive them away during the daytime, however they could still take here as a refuge at night.

One of them was an old man, on his back was a child wearing shabby clothes exactly like himself. Suddenly he fell to the ground, and the child fell as well like a senseless ball. The kid rolled over stiffly, showing his cyanosed face——he had been already dead for some time.

A trashcan detected a corpse of carbon-based life form, and then the cleaning programme worked automatically. It moved closer, reaching out a cold robot arm with a shovel to take the corpse away. The old man covered the kid’s body by himself right at the moment, as if he could share his vitality with his boy.

It was a pity that the trashcan wasn’t so that dumb. It kept spading, engaging a cruel fight against the elder in the small space.

There was no doubt that the trashcan won.

Hit by the rude trashcan, the poor old kneeled down, crying out loud for all he had suffered. His companions kept going on without giving a glance. They did not give a shit. After all, taking a corpse as rubbish was not so rare here.

The homeless men walked away. Then a pair of boots showed up in the pale weeds, going straight to the trashcan after hesitating for a few seconds.

That was a tall man who has flaxen hair and pale skin. He seemed to be kind of stiff because his face was way too perfect. Every step he walked was of exactly the same length, which made him look like a soldier even though he dressed casually.

He entered the trashcan’s background program in silence. After what he had done then, the trashcan reached out the shovel and gave out the little corpse.

The man did not mind about his dirty. He gave the body to the old man, who was still sitting on the ground. “Sorry about your loss.”

The old man looked at him in shock. The man then pointed a direction. “At 3 ’o clock, about 200 meters from here, the soil texture is most soft there at which you can bury your child. I’m genuinely sorry about your loss.”

Not only his steps, but also his tunes were exactly the same, like a machine. After talking like reciting, he stroke heels and bowed, ready to leave.

The old homeless could not help asking. “You are……”

He regretted the moment he had asked. The man dressed so well, showing the smell of richness from head to toe, like a upper class. According to his life experience, he had better leave the upper class as far as he can, or he would be the one who suffer the most.

But the man stopped, and answered seriously. “My identification is confidential. No access. My name is Zhanlu.”

The old was even more panic now.

The man who called himself Zhanlu asked. “Do you have any more questions?”

The nervous old man shook his head, blowing his nose. The man then left with his long legs, following the other homeless men.

There was a heating system in Harbour V. The homeless dropped their coats, trying to win some warmness for themselves. They took every second to sleep as long as they could.

The snore was loud within half an hour.

A sneaking small guy stood up at the corner, walking into the harbour without others’ attention.

If Jingshu Huang the bad girl had been here, she could recognize the man at the first sight. That was the trader monster in disguise, who had been forced to run away from the shabby speakeasy. Then he landed near the Harbour V through small-size space field, pretending to be one of the homeless and trying to leave Beijing-ß.

The safety passageway between the terminal and the launcher was locked. The fake homeless man took out a chip and covered it on the lock. The locked program opened silently in three seconds while the heavy door opened as well. He sneaked in cautiously and quickly.

“It’s me, Spider.” There was no other man in the safety passageway. The thin and short beggar threw away his shabby coat. His bones cracked to widen, turning into the shape he really was. He talked to his companion in low voice. “Did I gain anything? I gained a piece of shit! I was spied on. Almost being trapped there!”

The passage was long and narrow, which volumed up the voice. Although knowing the surveillance centre was shielded, he was still nervous about the echo. He complained: “Son of bitch, the only thing they know is asking for more people and more stuffs. But they can’t even copy the hella soundless phone. It is almost popularized among the IU jackals. Fucking the IU by doing like this? Is it fun to make yourself a fucking daydream……I dunno, a woman——How could I know who the fuck is she?”

The Spider pressed on his wrist while talking. Jingshu Huang’s photos rose on his wrist.

Then the photos became detail information including identification, address and so on. The man glared at the girl with his bloody eyes. “Got her details, don’t know true or fake. But I don’t think she was some government guy……ew, it could be simply coincidence, you know, vacucerebral blockheads are everywhere in the fucking eighth galaxy……”

He walked to the end of the passageway. There were just a few security robots in the empty platform. The Spider estimated the number of the robots, then he pressed the disturbing apparatus on his hand.

The security robots and the monitoring program stopped at the same time. The Spider walked by the freezing robots to the outline of the railway. Taking out a tiny mech in the space field, he saw the mech landed on the launchers and opened the door.

The Spider walked into the mech. In the light of the launcher, it seemed like his face had wore a metal mask. “No matter who she really is, whether coincidence or not, for safety, anyway we should kill——”

The alarm rang before he finished his words. His phone call was cut off. He headed up in a rush, only to find the mech on the launcher shivered like it had been alive. The spirit net of the mech was not connect to the owner yet. Shivers became earthquake-like tremble, which made the Spider fell back. The spirit net was full of sparks and the smell of ozone——as the result of serious mech disturbing!

Nonetheless in fact most people in the eighth galaxy would never see a real mech in their whole lives. Where in the hell could those poorly poor find a disturbing technology like this?

The Spider’s skin was full of goose bumps.

No one can survive in such messy spirit net condition, not mention to him. Therefore he crushed the emergency safety valve without thinking twice and transferred into manual operation, opening the cabin door already heating up, then rolled out with screaming.

Smoke coverd the mech behind him, while the security robots back to life for no reason. Seven or eight laser guns were pointed at his head. No one else was in the platform.

He failed to get rid of these flies!

The Spider put a hand on his left chest——there was an insert chip which was his Sunday punch.

The robots approached him——

“Trespassing! Trespassing!”

“Fail to identify the trespasser!”

“Warning! Put your hands up!”

Then, an invisible field, which centred him, spread out. The locaters lost targets, while the scan results were all that no one was on the platform. The security robots wandered around with laser guns for some time, but found nothing. They had to go back to where they were before.

The Spider rested in relief, smiling cock-a-hoop. “Those bitches are useful in some way after all.”

With the “secret weapon”, he could control the sense of any people or robots whenever he wanted, like what he did on the “gay sport”. It could work for vacant brain bitches for some time even.

“Come and get me!” The Spider shouted and whistled, bursting out laughter and putting middle fingers to the sky. He was ready for entering the mech again.

A thin beam red light shoot out of the wall straight through his neck, right at the moment he turned around. He fell to the ground without making any noise, while his mouth was still laughing.

A flaxen-short-hair man came out of the wall magically. It was the man who called himself Zhanlu.

He reached out his right hand. The pale hand turned into a robot hand exactly the same as the one in the speakeasy.

The robot hand scanned the insensible Spider from head to toe, and found a strong energy field inside his heart.

Zhanlu’s head was slightly aside. A threadlike probe reached out of his hand while five finger pulps sprinkled foggy disinfector. A temporary small sterilized space was created. The probe stabbed into Spider’ chest quickly. The little operation finished in five minutes——Zhanlu took a biology chip out of the Spider’s heart.

At the moment the chip was taken away, Spider’s metal-like skin subsided. His temperature, heart rate and metabolism decreased suddenly. He seemed older for decades in a second.

The robot hand sounded like Zhanlu himself. “Found unknown energy field——”

“Failed to recognize.”

“Failed again——failed to recognize——warning——”

“Block it.” Zhanlu ordered.

Zhanlu collected it cautiously. The robot hand turned into the human one, taking every electronic equipment from Spider. He bent to shoulder Spider and then destroyed the encryption system of the mech and taking the mech as well. Zhanlu left the Venus Harbour.

He planned to go back through the way he had come here at first, however he stopped near the terminal. Heading up and eyes closed, he changed his direction like he was called, going straight into the thick pale-green weeds.

There was a car in the deep of the weeds. B4 leaned against the car, two arms crossed before his chest, seemed to have been waiting for some time.

Zhanlu bowed. “Sir.”

B4 raised his jaw, suggesting him to get on the car. Zhanlu put Spider into the trunk and put a hand on the car. His hand melted unexpectedly, then his body, his head……He disappeared, or to say he mixed with the car. At the same time, the dormant car restarted automatically.

The tall handsome man named Zhanlu was an artificial intelligence.

Zhanlu said: “Where will we go, sir?”

“Back to the speakeasy.” B4 answered, “Can you tell where he belongs to?”

“Prepare to start the space filed. Location: the speakeasy——He is supposed to be one of the Toxic Nest according to the mech type.”

The Toxic Nest was an organization at the edge of the eighth galaxy, at where it would be hard to survive if going more further. The Toxic Nest seldom contacted with the other gangsters in the galaxy. It was more like a heresy than a gangster. There were tons of heresies among those ambitious brothers and sisters in the eighth galaxy, but generally they worshiped some gods in ancient myths, or some animals, mammals at least——it was really rare, and odd enough to worship bugs like the Toxic Nest did.

B4 was a bit of surprised. “What are they doing on the Beijing planet?”

Note:

3

Out of the high-speed motors came three men and a woman.

The three men could probably debut as a group, for their hair were red, green and yellow, which made them signal lights when they stood together. The woman dressed exactly like the girl, a jacket and an underwear. This clothing match must be quite popular among local hoodie gals.

They all came out of the sky, like some tough guys. However now standing in line behind the speakeasy, none of them dared to say a word.

Having struggled for some time, the “traffic lights group” sent the woman out of the line.

The motor gal was not afraid of the coldness, but defeated by the poker face of the man standing in front of the backdoor. Trembling, she said hesitantly: “That man owned a strange shield machine, we lost his track……”

The man looked at her in silence. As the result, the motor gal almost sneezed her lungs out.

The boy who just stopped crying was scared by her fierce sneeze, crying out loud again on the ground.

However, after having an eye contact with the man holding a cigarette, the boy stopped crying because he was genuinely panic now.

“Call for the cops. Stop standing here and embarrassing me. Come on in.” The man who had stopped a little boy from crying by a simple eye contact held the boy with one arm, and spoke when he saw the uncollected girl in the corner. “You, too.”

The motor guys followed him one by one as if they had been pardoned after committing a crime.

The girl stood up and hesitated for a second. Nonetheless the warmness in the speakeasy soon convinced her. She touched the wound on the back of her hand, following with her luggage.

The atmosphere here was fairly retro, even the feeling of decay was quite special. The sweet smell of rum fulfilled the air, while the jazz music enlighten the whole room. It must be close for now, because waiters and bartenders were not here. Only the man who opened the door just now was here. Maybe he was the boss.

“A boss of a damn small pub. Cocky like this?” the girl thought to herself, very confused. She found something moving on the shelf besides the table but simply regarded it as a beam of light. A cold eye met with hers, which made her jump. Now she realized that it was a dark green lizard.

“Don’t be. It is too lazy to bite anyone.” The boss placed the boy on a highchair opposite to the girl. “What do you want to drink?”

The girl answered. “Beer.”

The boss gave her a glance. “How old are you?”

Now she eventually figured out the man’s face——despite of the deep outline of his face, the man looked quite eastern with his black hair. His cuffs were at his elbows. His shirt was open, showing his sinewy chest and chiseled underbelly. Not until he noticed the girl was looking at him did he do his under buttons in a casual way.

On his neck was an old scar. Extended from his Adam’s apple to his shoulder, it was then concealed by his shirt, which made him even more stern and dangerous. He squinted behind cigarette smoke with his jaw shaved not very well. He was so slovenly, but not skittish at all, for his dark grey eyes, maybe.

Those eyes were quite special, like a valley in summer haze, deep and gloomy.

The girl did not dare to look straight into his eyes. She answered briefly. “Fifty.”

The man gave her a glance. “No jokes here.”

She was a little hoodie about whom no one cared and she never feared anyone or anything. Somehow she was panic, like really panic now, about the boss of this tatty speakeasy. Those hazy eyes made her nervous——not that kind of nervous women felt when they met handsome men, but that kind of nervous naughty kids felt when they were caught by teachers or late newbies felt when they looked at their boss.

That was why she headed down, and gave another answer. “Twenty-five.”

Suddenly a white light swept her before she realized what had happened and covered her face with hands. “The heck are you doing?”

The personal terminal showed above the man’s wrist, then an identification file floated in the mid-air. He let the smoke out by his nose, spoke out the girl’s name. “Jingshu……Huang?”

Anger fulfilled the girl. “Who are you to check my ID without my ‘yes’?”

The boss did not give a shit. He just smiled. “Jingshu, huh? Nice name, same as the wife of the IU secretary-general.”

“The wife of the IU secretary-general” was exactly like “the scientist named outer space blackhole as the small intestine of the son of dragon” to a hoodie girl——never heard and irrelevant.

In spite of this, she still knew that only some special ones can check others’ ID. Therefore, the girl looked at the man with her alarm on. “Did I fall into some cop things?”

He did not piss off for her rudeness. “Born in August, 259. Cat, you are sixteen, huh?”

The girl lost all her temper in front of him for no reason.

He wiped away the information showed on his personal terminal. The robot hand belonged to him grabbed a bottle of milk out and poured it into two glasses, placing them before Jingshu Huang and the boy opposite to her and even stroking the lizard in a very human way. Unfortunately the lizard was poikilotherm itself, so it was not fond of another cold paw. Mr. Lizard shrank back and climbed away slowly.

“As an underage, why did you poke your little nose into others’ business?” The boss said, “Hang around at late night with makeup as messy as hell. Where are your parents? Did they abandon you?”

“What’s wrong about being damn god sixteen? Mind your own fucking business! I am a Blackhole.” She pounded the table, “Shut the fuck up and give me some beer! I will pay for it, okay?!”

Even the music stopped for a second intelligently when she finished her words. Everyone was staring at her. The red hair motor guy from the “Traffic Lights Group” coughed his beer out, while the green hair cleaned his face with sleeve. “What are you?”

As everyone knew, the government of the eighth galaxy was like a disposable lunchbox. By parity of reasoning, the government of each planet here was nothing more than waste papers. The police stations were similar to guideposts, as no one would take them seriously. However, there has to be someone in charge if the government do not, so there were lots of gangsters to take charge of their own areas. These gangsters were the exactly invisible government in every planet.

The invisible government in Beijing-ß was called Blackhole. Their financial income was from protection fee, if it was called so. Sometimes they did rob or slaughter, too.

The mysterious “father” of Blackhole named Lin. It could not be sure if it was Lin or Lynn, so they call him B4 anyway. There were plenty of stories about his origin. Some said he was a wanted, some said he was a star pirate, and so much more. After all, he was popular among the Blackhole, becoming the favourite of the previous “father”, and then the present “father” himself.

How did he get to the top? There were plenty of stories, too. Full of tricks and blood, not sure to be true or not but were quite popular among the eighth galaxy.

All the hoodie girls or boys were dreaming of being the next B4. What they were imagining about the Blackhole was exactly like what Wotto children about the Black Orchid College.

Jingshu Huang said normally. “The Blackhole. You are in Beijing-ß. You must have heard of it, haven’t you?”

The motor gal could not help laughing. “Was B4 that poor? To use some kids?”

The girl, frowned, was about to say something really rude. However, before she could say a word, the man wiped his hands and gave an order to the robot hand. “Call Bixing Lu.”

The robot hand showed an “OK” gesture, talking in plain voice. “Calling Headmaster Lu.”

The girl was shocked. “How……”

“How could I know your school?” The boss answered the question himself, “All the kids passing themselves as one of the Blackhole, were students of that jerk.”

The robot hand trembled after his words. “That jerk” ’s phone was just on.

The plain voice of the android became a man voice, low and gentle. “How rare. What makes you call me?”

The boss answered in brief. “Come here. Lost and found.”

“Oh?” The headmaster Lu said with a smile, “What did I loss?”

He spoke like singing, drowsily, but every word he spoke was crystal clear. He spoke the last syllable nasally, which made him genuinely affectionate. In a word, he did not sound like some serious headmaster.

“A kid named Jingshu Huang. Check if she was one of your students.”

The robot hand paused, then, the voice became much more serious, not like a midnight DJ anymore, but a news reporter. “What? What happened? Where are you?”

A silver sword happened to show above the man’s wrist before he answered. Putting on his jacket, he stood up and said to the hand: “In the speakeasy. Stop talking nonsense, just come and take the girl away.”

Then he hung up, reaching out his arm. The robot hand fell from the pedestal and minimized on his arm like an armband——exactly like a well-trained parrot!

Jingshu Huang was stunned since she had never seen anything like this in the hick galaxy before.

The boss left through the backdoor saying “Penny, watch over”.

A middle-aged man, in cop suit, came right after he left. He smiled at the strange motor guys with great politeness. “What happened? I heard that something needs me to deal with.”

“That one.” The Penny gal pointed at the boy. “Lost kid. Just take him away.”

“Okay, okay, of course. You can trust me, Miss Penny.” The heeler-cop took the boy, comforted him like he had done this thousands times. Then he looked around, with even more politeness. “Well……Was B4 here just now?”

The girl Jingshu was almost shock to death.

Penny looked at her, feeling funny.

2

Five years later.

NSC 257, the eighth galaxy, Beijing-ß planet.

Beijing-ß was a stereotyped name for a planet. There were dozens of Beijing planet, London planet or Zimbabwe planet in each galaxy. They were quite similar to the Beijing Road or the Nanjing Street in a country called China in the Ancient Earth Era.

Beijing-ß really had an eastern atmosphere: Lots of citizens had the blood of ancient Chinese, probably because of its name——nevertheless, you couldn’t live a comfortable life in the eighth galaxy even if you had the blood of ancient dragons.

It was said that one tenth of the news in other galaxies was talking about their miserable lives.

The eighth galaxy gained itself a nickname: the Wilderness.

The Interstellar Union consisted of eight galaxies. The capital planet Wotto in the first galaxy was absolutely at the top of the pyramid. Further from Wotto, more undeveloped the planet was——the eighth galaxy was already the sewer of the pyramid.

The eighth galaxy became the wilderness for both natural and historical reasons. Lack of resources and inconvenience in transportation were reasons for sure. However when it came to history , it was really a long story to tell——

In the old era, which dated back more than two hundred years ago, the IU was in the abyss of the star pirates——most of the pirates was descendants of the Ancient Earth Man as well, not alien monsters. Besides, they didn’t call themselves “star pirates” such a foolish name and they were not in an entirety. It was after the IU got most political powers in its control that it named all the organizations which didn’t obey the IU as star pirates for convenience.

The eighth galaxy was alone all the time. It was like a pitiful islet apart from other seven galaxies. The anti-govern organizations settled in the eighth galaxy to fight against the powerful IU in the past. In the beginning of the New Sidereal Era, the eighth galaxy was still under the control of star pirates. Until NSC 136, it was took up by Commodore Lu——Xin Lu was an excellent commander of the IU——and finally recovered communication with the other galaxies.

The IU developed at full speed under the light of science and civilization in the past 136 years. Instead the eighth galaxy was in endless civil wars against pirates. The longer the time past, the wider the gap between the IU and the eighth galaxy was. Compared with the IU, the eighth galaxy was more like a monkey to a human.

The IU was once evaluated the eighth galaxy after it was took up by Xin Lu, but only to find it not valuable at all. Therefore the IU set a self-government here, which was a polite way to say “go fuck yourselves”.

All the chief officers had their name cards in important occasions of the IU, except those of the eighth galaxy. It was just “The eighth galaxy” on the card instead of an exact name, not for area discrimination though, for the eight galaxy altered their chief officer all the time that others were unable to remember the name of the chief officer himself or herself. That was the reason why the name card was replaced by the area one.

People tried every means to get away from the eighth galaxy. The rest were all poor guys left behind by the time, suffering in the wilderness.

Beijing-ß was quite good in this galaxy, which had the largest population. It was messy and poverty-stricken for sure, but after all there were still some routes and industries, enough to simply keep its citizens alive.

In the evening in Beijing-ß, an old shuttle ran slowly along the road with sleepy passengers inside. The words “Galaxy Transports” on its surface faded into “Gay sports” over the course of time. The artificial intelligence was already artificial idiot now. The damage rate reached up to 95%. Thus only the “super-safe mode” was still working, in which the bus bell rang every 5 minutes. Such a shabby shuttle drove at such a low speed, into a night more sombre than night itself.

None of the windows was intact——all broke by the citizens who had been woken up by the bloody tinkle.

The shuttle, in which dust swirled in the air, was unable to shelter anything from wind. Nonetheless nobody would maintain it, because the Galaxy Transportations Company had been bankrupt for 200 years. The only thing left was an urban public transport system, automatic and moribund.

It was in deep winter here. What is more, winter in Beijing-ß’ was pretty long according to the revolution routine of planets. The winter here lasted 3 years long in NSC whereas the temperature regulation system stopped running long time ago because of its poverty. The freezing wind, hollowing, crying, blowing, attacked the unprepared city. All of the poor passengers held their clothes tight, like quails hid their heads under their wings.

It was the poorly poor who used this kind of free transportation. Lots of them are beggars who were too dirty to be identified their sex or age. Thanks to the sealing carriage, the smell of the passengers would not kill themselves.

A drunk girl, whose face could not be recognized since her make-up was messed up, sat in the back corner of the “Gay sports”. She was not afraid of the coldness, letting her jacket open and showing the strange bra and the skull tattoo on her waist—— a tough hoodie, obviously.

A backpack more than one meter high was placed beside her feet. She was wearing a headset, closing her eyes to get some rest. She looked a little bit of grumpy, for drunk and noisy crying of a damn child. The crying was so loud that the music playing in the headset could not drown it out.

She tried to bear it for a few minutes, but she failed. She took her headset off, ready to make some more noise.

The strange thing was that the annoying crying disappeared when she took out her headset.

She looked around in mad, finding no one but sorehead adults preventing themselves from the fierce wind. There was no child. She hiccupped in drunk, doubting if she had an acousma. Wearing the headset again, she closed her eyes again tiredly.

When she was about to fall asleep, a poignant crying woke her up like a needle stabbing her eardrum. “ Mommy!”

She opened her eyes, thrilling. The “Gay sports” stopped.

Turning off the music, she heard the miserable crying not far clearly this time.

But……where the hell is the child?

The station board was stolen years ago and the street lamps were all broken, too. There was just darkness. Some paths crossed, forming into a nasty block, which looked like an eye of darkness peeping at people. The artificial idiot driver had something wrong again, beeping “the final station” earlier, and then went to sleep before the passengers say no. They had to get off the shuttle, cursing and swearing.

The girl frowned, grabbing her luggage and getting off after some exhausted passengers. A small man in thick clothes in front of her was holding a skinny geezer. The geezer was pulled by him, smashing into her by accident.

The hoodie girl didn’t have a chance to seethe. Instead, she was dizzy for a second. She rubbed her smoky eyes plastered by mascara, but only to see the geezer turning into a little boy.

“Am I too drunk? Fake alcohol maybe?” She tried to be a little more sober.

Eventually she ensured it to be a child who was about 3 years old, hardly to walk by himself for now. Although he was in a shabby jacket, the clothes underneath referred that he was born in a wealthy family.

The “beggar” was holding the boy by his neck and wrist. The boy was struggling and crying all the time but no one paid attention to him. Even no one reacted like there had been anything wrong——it seemed like they saw merely a crazy geezer like she had just now.

It was a collective illusion!

Her pupils shrank. she doubted the “beggar” was a human trader. That was the reason why she followed them.

The “beggar” did not pay attention to the girl, going straight to a narrow path between shabby buildings.

In the darkest corner was a speakeasy, of which the backdoor’s lamp lightened the path. The crying reverberated in the path. But no one cared.

It must not be psychedelic——either in bus or in the path, the wind would blow away any chemical absolutely.

The girl adjusted her post, putting up her hood, and then stopped the beggar. “Hey, you, stop there.”

The beggar paused, tightening his hand on the boy’s neck. On the contrary, he smiled like a coward and shrugged his shoulders, suggesting that he did not want to get into any trouble. He stammered: “Me……me?”

The girl squinted warily and rose her jaw. She pointed at the boy. “Is this your child?”

The “beggar” changed his face, blinking and smiling grudgingly. “Wha......What? You......You——You must misunderstand something. What child? This, this old thing, look like......an old monkey. He is small, but not a kid, look at him. “

He pushed the guy in his hand toward the girl. At that moment, she saw something like a faulted screen. The crying-to-choking boy went tall and short, changing between a gross old homeless and a crying boy. The picture on the screen altered from time to time.

She frowned, stepping closer. “That’s weird. “

The “beggar” smiled when she was confused. “Look, what, what did I——I

say......”

He was hit by a beer bottle before finishing his words. The girl’s action was as sudden as lightning . The bottle fell into pieces immediately when it met the beggar’s forehead. The unpleasant smell of alcohol spread everywhere. The hoodie girl held the rest “corpse” of the bottle, wiping off her faded lipstick. “You son of bitch. How dare you to fool ME, huh?”

The alcohol blurred the beggar’s face. He stopped smiling and let his coldness show. Setting the boy aside, he became a nearly-2-meter-tall muscular man with his bones cracking!

The tough girl was really confused this time, shrinking back for a few steps. “You......”

The “beggar” smiled with his bloody big mouth. “I see. A vacucerebral bitch.“

The confusion altered into anger after the b-word. She attacked his pubic area and grabbed his hair when he try to elude. The sharp bottle piece was supposed to made his face bleed again——her acts were perfect. An experienced hoodie for sure.

Nonetheless the bottle did not hurt him at all. The man’s face was firm and pale, like some kind of metal.

He rotated his neck left and right and back again, holding the girl as if she were a kitten.

The bottle fell to the ground and the girl struggled in mid-air . She looked at the reflective face, astonished . “You......you are not a man. “

The “beggar” smiled weirdly. His giant hand on her head squeezed——

A strong light swept through. Three or four high-speed motors followed after, obviously disobeying the ban of “no high-speed motor 100 meters near ground”. The light was much faster than the loud sound. Then a strong wind swirled on the ground.

The “beggar” realized something and decided to run away immediately.

The wind knocked down the girl. She fell down with her luggage, trying to stand up with her arms and legs.

The boy, who was screaming, floated on the air right away.

The monster-like “beggar” ran as fast as a beast could. He disappeared in the darkness with a ray.

The boy, moving his limbs helplessly in the mid-air, smashed to the speakeasy.

The backdoor opened just on time. A man stepped out and got the boy by the neck.

The motors muted after they had landed. The girl looked out through her messed hair and saw a tall man standing in the shadow, whose face was sheltered from the light.

He bent over, leaving the boy alone. The other hand was flicking a cigarette.

Volume1 The Star of Wilderness

Chapter1     Prologue

NSC*  March 6th , 270

The Interstellar Union announced an emergency command, calling Jingheng Lin, the commodore of the Silver Fortress, back to the capital planet Wotto to be interrogated immediately.

Jingheng Lin violated the command sturdily.

The next day, the headline of Wotto Daily was a furious line——“Are you revolting against the IU, Jingheng Lin?”

At the end of March, the Silver Fortress was fully blockaded. About five hundred super-space massive mechs parked out of the artificial atmosphere. The elites of the Silver Fortress were ready to kill their colleagues. Both sides refused to compromise. The deadlock had lasted for almost 48 hours till the evening of 26th.

The General Knight placed the rum and the ice cubes on the table quietly, standing at attention.

The commodore standing at the window snapped, suggesting him to stay.

Commodore Lin, who was famous as a tyrant in all eight galaxies, was fairly tall. The preciseness and appropriateness reflected from hair to feet made him to be seemingly cold-blooded. He added few ice cubes into the whisky cup causally. A virtual image embraced his left ear——his communication was on , which indicated that he was talking to someone right now.

Thanks to advanced communication technology, phones were connected with the personal terminal so that people didn’t have to “say” , instead, they just simply “think”, for the signal from brain would arrive the opposite receiver straight. In this way, the secrecy could be well ensured. The only way to judge whether the call meant greeting or wrangling was to observe the expression of the speaker.

However, Knight Lorde who was standing there silently couldn’t figure out anything from the Commodore’s face.

The modern society encouraged bluffness, openness and outspokenness. Therefore the old-fashioned conservativeness and alienation of Lin didn’t suit the times greatly. The press and his political opponents grasped these personalities to attack him, criticizing him as a scheming and arrogant person.

The “scheming” commodore ended the conversation. Feeling the taste of rum in his mouth, he spoke to Lorde as if nothing had happened: “The Admiral of the fleets asked me to make a strategic compromise―― go back to Wotto anyway.”

Lorde was confused for a moment.

“Strategic compromise.” Commodore Lin repeated the phrase ironically with a sneer and watched the current news.

The press in Wotto were all focusing on the situation of the Silver Fortress.

The new secretary-general were standing in front of the parliament of the capital planet, addressing briefly to the press. “For me, Commodore Lin is my schoolmate, my friend and most of all, my family. I swear, with my career, my dignity and my everything, that Commodore Lin is loyal to Wotto. He will never betray Wotto, meanwhile, he will never betray the Interstellar Union for sure. The queries to his loyalty are all slanderous!”

Commodore Lin was chewing an ice cube while listening to the passionate speech.

“Jingheng, please, please give me a minute if you are watching.” The secretary-general looked into the person behind the camera deeply, “Do not let the false accusation disturb you. Do not let the misunderstanding become a conflict which will definitely hurt your beloved and please your enemy. Please, come back!  Jingshu and I are both waiting for you in Wotto. You still have families in Wotto, Jingheng!”

Then a woman beside Golden was seen on the screen. She, in black, didn’t wear any make up and looked extremely pale. The only color on her face came from her black eyes and eyebrows. However nothing could decrease her amazing beauty for even a little bit.

Jingshu Lin was Commodore Lin’s little sister in blood. She married to Golden, who had the greatest future in all seven galaxies in the IU, a year ago.

Mrs. Golden surrounded by knights didn’t say a word but looked into the air, fairly like a delicate doll.

Commodore Lin was not touched at all. He turned to ask his knight: “What do you think of the secretary-general?”

Lorde answered prudently. “He is really something.”

“Yeah, he is something, indeed. He is fairly perfect in every way but the mood he showed. I bet those not in the know would guess that I have an affair with my brother-in-law.” Jingheng laughed and turned off the screen, tossing off the liquor in his glass, “ Far too cheesy.”

Lorde took over the empty glass, speaking in low voice. “Commodore, you don’t have to pay attention to those annoying things. The Ten Squadrons are ready to fight right now. You can give the order whenever you want to.”

“To what? Rebelling?” Looking at him, Jingheng suddenly asked, “Did you graduate from the first military school?”

“Yes, Sir! I was the 260th graduates from the Black Orchid College in proud!”

“How is your family? Do you have any sisters or brothers?”

Lorde was confused, didn’t understand why his Commodore asked him these questions in such intense time. Despite of this, he answered the question seriously: “My father is in charge of an medical institution. My mother is a teacher in Black Orchid College. I have an elder brother and a little sister.”

Jingheng smiled bitterly.

Ready to fight right now……

The young boy took it so easy——fight against whom?

Your families who are proud of you?

The Black Orchid College was the nickname of the first military school. Though the BOC was known as the cradle of high-ranks, few of the graduates were able to be one of the Sliver Fortress.

Apart from excellent grades were required. The graduates’ futures were associated with their hometown as the result of superior political game. They took “humanitarianism” into consideration so that the soldiers should be near their home. As a fortress of the first galaxy, the Silver Fortress only accepted graduates from the first galaxy. What was more, most of them came from upper class, including families of merchants, high-level intellectuals, celebrities and even politicians.

Therefore, the political environment was super complicated. There were generally two factions——

One was the Ten Squadrons, Lin’s own inner circle which had hunt down star pirates with him. The number of them was about one tenth of the whole fortress. The Ten Squadrons shared the bad reputation with its Commodore, famous as universal hoodie. Scandals about them were reported everyday, becoming the entertainment of folks. As everyone known, it was totally combating poison with poison when they fought against star pirates in the past.

The rest were all childes from the BOC. Complicated families and bonds behind them weaved a giant net to bind their loyalty, ensuring the Silver Fortress is stable and still and all.

Jingheng waved to his General Knight and gave an order. “Give me a suite. Send messages to customs on our way, claiming our route. I will start my journey back to Wotto tomorrow.”

Lorde was shocked. “Commodore……”

“The Admiral of fleets told me to make a strategic compromise, what else do you want? All of the Silver Fortress——” Lin paused, looking at the view out of the window. Thousands of starships were ready to fight against the unwelcome guests out of the artificial atmosphere. They shone coldly, reminding people of the silver fish in the sea. The sea was reflected in Commodore’s grey eyes.

He took off the gloves and then tossed them away. “Unarmed.”

The following day, the Jingyuan Starship flew away the Silver Fortress like a tiny boat in the sea.

The covetous and offensive machinery army out of the artificial atmosphere stepped aside and made a narrow path for the military dictator, watching his back in silence.

Unarmed starships were not allowed with transfer valves. According to normal process, the Jingyuan Starship would spend 13 days from the Silver Fortress to the capital planet Wotto via 6 customs.

The fourth day, the Jingyuan Starship passed by the Sima planet, encountering an  asteroid stream. The Jingyuan intended to avoid it. On the contrary, the fourth squadron of the capital regarded Jingheng Lin as the most dangerous person. It was terrified that the Jingyuan didn’t arrive on time. As a result, it announced twelve level 1 alerts in just one day to stop the transient stay of the Jingyuan.

The Jingyuan were forced to detour via the Heart of the Rose——the only forbidden zone in the first galaxy which had never been explored by mankind.

On April 6th in NSC, the Jingyuan Starship were attacked by star pirates hidden in the periphery of the Heart of the Rose. The Jingyuan was destroyed while Jingheng Lin was killed.

In the capital planet, various public opinions arose from the shocking news. The Ten Squadrons rebelled. The Silver Fortress stopped working. Admiral Wolf resigned furiously to the IU Council, for he lost his favorite subordinate. At the same time, more horrible incidents happened. The pirates, who were driven out of the eight galaxies by Commodore Lin ten years ago, came back again, attacking a civil route in the sixth galaxy. The messy Military Committee’s hysteretic reactions caused great injuries and deaths.

The series of events is historically called the Silver Catastrophe.

Large demonstrations spread like a plague, from the sixth galaxy to the first through transfer points.

Wotto altered their attitude under pressure. They pacified the Military Committee first, then shut their mouth about forcing Lin to come back. Mouthpieces of government praised Commodore Lin as much as they once had criticized him, as if they had lost their memory overnight.

The “scheming” commodore became the gift for human, the greatest man in history.

The funeral was held in Wotto. A suite Lin never wore stood for him, getting into the Martyrs Cemetery of Wotto. The ticket price was unbelievably high and Commodore Lin was in Guinness World Records for died so expensively. Jingheng Lin, of obituary fame.

Jingshu Lin was in black voile on that day, presenting back the compliments from every celebrities showed on the funeral. She was genuinely demure and extremely elegant in such an occasion.

She was so beautiful——you would praise her beauty for sure if you had seen her——and coldhearted as well.

Golden the secretary-general stepped closer. Jingshu, as fragile as a dodder, winded his arm, accepting his care compliantly, letting him help her put on her hat. Then she sat in silence, looked at him with worship and dependency, listening to his performance full of sorrow, and wiped her crocodile tears with handkerchief time and time again.

Reporters photographed her for a while then scattered in dull. Mrs. Golden was exactly the same as she acted at a fancy fair in opposition to throwing pets’ bodies into outer space. She was so banally stylish that the press could use the same photos from other activities as well.

Jingshu was still, although the press all scattered.

She was like the most beautiful flower blooming lonesomely in the wind—— whether there was anyone watching or not, she just simply appreciated herself.

Now the beautiful flower smiled in tears. So stunning was she that the light of humanity seemed to be shining upon her comely features. She watched Golden choking with sobs on the stage elegantly. She thought: “A life for a life, I want you to die.”

It had been for more than 200 years since human lived in peace after the start of the new sidereal era. But for now, a grisly crack appeared on the tender surface of the peace——

Notes:

Description:

Who will bury mankind, Orwell or Huxley? No need to give your answer so quick. Let's read a story first.

When Bixing Lu, a hoodie from the Eighth Galaxy, fell in love with a gangster called B4, he didn't know that his muffin was Commodore Jingheng Lin, the commander of the Silver Fortress. As they knew each other further, the world changed dramatically: Star Pirates invaded the Interstellar Union. The nasty secrets about the Eden emerged in front of them. Lu's pedigree was found to be unbelievably mysterious. Anyway, all they wanted is each other, no matter how peculiar the world was.

In a word, it's a story about conspiracies and murders, gentlemen and villains, love and hatred.

Go back to the question, the answer is:「People born from belief, die of belief and reborn from the ashes of belief. 」

Chapter 0

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. —— Dickens《A Tale of Two Cities》

I made myself a ghost back to life from death, with hatred in my bones and conspiracy brewed for years, sinking into the marsh, into the abyss. All I want is to bury the rotten roots, growing thistles and thorns which can kill like upas, to stab into the hypocritical civilization.