Entering the City

At the Logistics department, the doors to the corrugated-iron warehouse stood wide open. Lu Zhao marched inside with his men, flashed his pass at the Logistics section chief, and demanded full combat loadouts for every man—rifles, body armor, tactical helmets, and one day's rations. There was no deployment location, no prior notice, and not even an official mission order. Mo Kun felt his scalp prickle. He suspected Lu Zhao was staging a mutiny, but catching sight of the menacing reinforced platoon massed behind him, his tone softened at once. "Staff Officer Lu, this pass is from the General Security Bureau. I need to verify it with my superiors." Lu Zhao nodded. "Much obliged." Mo Kun turned and retreated into his office, but Lu Zhao extended his psychic power inside, catching the man's hushed voice with crystalline clarity. "...Sir, he's demanding combat loadouts. No mission order, no notice. The credentials look legitimate to me; he wouldn't dare forge them. One phone call to verify and he'd end up before a court-martial... What? I can't stall him! You have no idea the kind of sway Lu Zhao has with the soldiers at the border defense station... I'll do my best to stall." Mo Kun stepped back out of the office and said, "Staff Officer Lu, the landline seems to be out of order. Please wait a moment." By then, Lu Zhao had already dialed Lin Zhiyan and switched the call to speakerphone. Lin Zhiyan's voice rang out: "The General Security Bureau has already transmitted written notice regarding this transit pass to every tier of authority in Fangshi. Any delay will be treated as dereliction of duty." "..." Mo Kun was struck speechless. With no choice left, he ordered his personnel to issue the arms. Lu Zhao felt the distinct thrill of having a sword in his grip. Power was not meant to be abused, but to stop others from acting without reason. *** Before long, Lu Zhao and his men left the compound in five military trucks, rolling toward the city in grand style. Along the road, many truck drivers who usually loved honking their horns suddenly turned remarkably well-behaved. The soldiers were just as astonished that Lu Zhao had managed to check out weapons and drive them straight toward the urban district. Behind the wheel, Liu Qiang asked uneasily, "Brother Lu, we aren't... staging a mutiny, are we?" Lu Zhao countered, "With just the few of us?" "Well, no, but riding into the city with all these guns feels a bit too wild." Clutching their rifles, Liu Qiang and the others felt a mix of trepidation and a strange, buzzing excitement. Lu Zhao cautioned, "Remember: no one fires without orders, or things will get very ugly. We are only following the dispatch of the special investigation team." The Federation had no strict gun control. Firearms and ammunition were not stored separately, and magazines were always fully loaded when deploying on missions. Yet that did not mean anyone could run wild. The moment a bullet struck someone, a report had to be filed regardless of whether the target was friend or foe. Hitting an enemy was fine, but mistakenly wounding a citizen meant facing criminal liability. "Yes, sir!" the men answered in unison. Lu Zhao switched on the truck radio, hoping for some music, but caught a news broadcast instead. "...News from this station: The Nanhai Circuit Politics Council is seeking public feedback regarding the deregulation of certain cash crop cultivation..." Hearing the announcement, everyone perked up with interest. The Federation currently operated on a system where rationing took precedence, supplemented by a market economy. Common goods followed the free market, while scarce items like life supplements were strictly rationed. Staples such as rice, flour, grain, cooking oil, tea, electronics, and vehicles were common goods available in shops. Life supplements were controlled substances, and coffee was a low-yield specialty crop. Liu Qiang said, "When will they lift the controls on beef? I only tasted it once when I was a kid, and I've almost forgotten the flavor." A comrade in the back row chimed in, "If you really want some, go look in the Foreign District." "The Foreign District is absurdly expensive. I could never afford it." As the men chatted, doubts crept into Lu Zhao's mind. If they deregulated cash crops, wouldn't staple grain production drop? And if grain prices surged, would the profits reaped from cash crops be used to subsidize staple food prices? Humanity had long lost the ability to expand its frontiers. Regions beyond Shenzhou had either degenerated into Ancient God biospheres unfit for human survival, or were simply abandoned because they were impossible to govern. Take the festering Sanjiang region, for instance: overrun by water beasts, populated by a transient rabble, and choked with rampant gangs, the cost of maintaining public order there was simply unsustainable. Trading life supplements for vast quantities of grain was far more practical. Lin Zhiyan had mentioned in passing that the Federation engaged in trade with external powers. That alone proved no organization in the world could exist entirely detached from the Federation's influence. Many issues were not simple matters of friend versus foe, but entanglements where each side was inextricably bound to the other. This was not just about unbinding cash crops. Someone was trying to dismantle the rationing system. Someone was pushing for systemic reform, and the power struggle had turned white-hot, spilling out into the open. Lu Zhao's sharp mind caught this thread, linking it back to many things Lin Zhiyan had said. Martial Marquis Chen had always advocated weakening the rationing system and allowing the free market to guide society. At the same time, he pushed to ease tensions between the central populace and the border peoples, granting citizenship to outlanders and abolishing the Foreign District. It sounded wonderful on paper, but even an unaligned bystander like Lu Zhao could not help wondering: where would the grain come from? Where would the resources come from? Rice would not multiply out of thin air simply because someone accrued moral merit. The chaos of the current era was never truly an ethnic conflict; it was thirty billion people fighting over finite resources. Since that resource shortage could not be solved, Lu Zhao could only interpret Martial Marquis Chen's motives through the darkest lens. He wanted to reduce everyone to the status of lowborn subjects. Even if someone was branded a member of the surrender faction, they would never wear that label on their sleeve. *** At the expressway toll plaza along the national highway, the five military trucks ground to a halt. Traffic police seemed to have been waiting there for some time. Lu Zhao presented his credentials, but the officer refused to let them through, claiming he had to report to his superiors first. It was the same old stall tactic. Lu Zhao summoned the other drivers, murmured a few brief instructions, and sent everyone back into the vehicles. Right then, Zhang Like called. "Old Lu, City Executive Zhao just phoned me. He said that as long as you're delayed for a bit, he'll personally see to it that you're promoted to field officer by the end of the year." Evidently, the authority behind the transit pass had already trickled down to local departments. Even the Fangshi city executive could not hope to obstruct it legally. He was a city executive, not a feudal chieftain. "Old Zhang, did you mention the smuggling route to him?" "I thought about settling it quietly, but I know you'd never let it slide. Spilling everything wouldn't guarantee me any benefits, and it'd ruin our friendship." "I've waited four years for this day. Right now, the only thing standing in my way is a flimsy barrier gate." Lu Zhao sat in the passenger seat, surrounded by heavily armed comrades. Unlike the invisible, intangible walls of the past, the only thing stopping him now was a flimsy gate arm. The soldiers in the truck had already sensed something was wrong. With a long face, Liu Qiang asked, "Brother Lu, this really isn't a mutiny, is it?" "What if I said it was?" A faint smile touched Lu Zhao's lips. Then came the command: "Ram through." Terror was written all over Liu Qiang's face, but his foot slammed the accelerator without a second's hesitation. *Roar!* With the roar of the diesel engine, the truck smashed straight through the gate arm. The soldiers tightened their grips on their steel rifles. Not a single man raised a question. Since Staff Officer Lu could lead them out of the barracks fully armed through legitimate channels, that meant the procedure was sound. As for the risks and bureaucratic red tape, those were not their concern. They answered only to Lu Zhao and his orders.