I'll Consider Taking a Few Days Off

The Queen of the Night Bar. Lately, business hours here had been starting earlier and earlier. For lavish VIP clients, it was practically open round-the-clock. However, to the slight disappointment of the patrons, the artworks woven from devil silk seemed to have vanished from the bar, replaced entirely by nylon imitations. Although in a sense this made things more convenient, people still felt something was missing. After all, humans weren't animals; beyond base carnal urges, they still possessed some spiritual pursuits. And artworks woven from tear-proof devil silk happened to elevate otherwise vulgar dance routines into something far less crass. What stoked a man's desire for conquest more than resistance? People grumbled about the material being too sturdy, yet proved all the more eager to throw money at it. Yet regarding the "crackdown on devil silk artworks," Robo, the owner of the Queen of the Night Bar, had acted with unwavering resolve. Even though he had been the first to reap the sweet profits. A spin-off edition of the *Survivor Daily* poking fun at his girls was nothing—neither he nor they cared about face, only chips. But for that bastard to drag inner-city noble lords into the mockery was practically suicidal! He had no desire to get splattered in the blood... At that very moment, inside the most prestigious private booth. A few foppish young masters leaned back against the plush sofas, their arms wrapped around disheveled beauties. From the belts cast carelessly aside, their extraordinary wealth was readily apparent—they were fashioned from deathclaw leather. And from an aged deathclaw at that. Basking in the gentle embrace surrounding him from every side, Jixiu narrowed his eyes in blissful contentment. After a dull, perfunctory shudder, he smacked his lips and grinned. "Boulder City is still the most fun." Over there, he had to take matters into his own hands every single time. Here, he didn't need to lift a finger—a single glance, and they understood everything. And they were incomparably docile and attentive... The young man sitting opposite him asked with curiosity, "Doesn't Ideal City have plenty of androids?" His name was Kumite, the son of Xide. As for Xide, he was an inner-city aristocrat of immense renown. He held shares in both the Weijia Trading Firm and Boulder City Bank; to a figure like him, chips were merely a number. By rights, his father held higher status than Jixiu's old man, and Jixiu ought to have been his lackey. Yet Kumite idolized the fellow before him, willingly humbling himself to let Jixiu take the "big brother" seat. Because this guy was full of endless cunning ideas. Whenever they felt bored, he could always rally the bunch of them to stir up something fresh. Only five years ago, they had taken things a bit too far. The girl had been roughly the same age as his younger sister, and it was quite a feat that Jixiu had even thought up that stunt. After the matter was exposed, that blind old bastard refused their chips, crying his eyes out as he pestered them, demanding they take responsibility... But how could they possibly take responsibility? Were they supposed to draw lots to pick someone to marry her? Their fathers wouldn't just be furious—they would beat them half to death! Left with no choice, they had to make that family disappear. Pity was, the clean-up was botched. The fire accidentally ignited neighboring houses, sending the garrison commander into a furious rage. It was precisely because of that incident that Jixiu's father handed him over to an outbound caravan, sending him all the way to faraway Ideal City to lie low. The rest of them had also been reprimanded by their families, locked in solitary confinement for days to reflect on their actions. Kumite had assumed he would never see his good brother again, never imagining Enterprise would suddenly launch flights to Qingquan City. And his good brother certainly hadn't disappointed him, rushing back to reunite with them at the very first opportunity. Jixiu curled his lip with disdain. "How could androids possibly understand humans better than humans?... Besides, can't you guys show some growth? After all this time, you're still obsessing over that every single day. Utterly vulgar!" Kumite grinned cheekily. "It's not like we have other entertainment. You're the refined one—tell us, what interesting ways to play do they have on the East Coast?" The others chimed in clamorously. "Exactly!" "Tell us already, man!" The circle of fair-weather friends looked expectantly at their buddy who had returned from afar, hoping he would tell them more about the East Coast. Although their fathers were mostly upper-class figures of the inner city, not everyone had the chance to send their children to Ideal City. Three thousand kilometers was simply too far. And the further their power strayed from Boulder City, the less it was worth. Unless it was a merchant caravan that was both deeply trusted and sufficiently formidable, nobody dared entrust their flesh and blood to them. In the wasteland beyond the giant walls, a trivial accident was all it took to end a life. Especially where chips held no currency, human life was thinner than paper. Truth be told, even if they had the opportunity to go to Ideal City, they weren't eager to stay cooped up there for years on end. Still, that didn't stop them from listening to stories from someone who had been there. Besides, a buddy's firsthand experience was far more reliable than tales spun by merchants who might never have set foot there in the first place... Relishing their adoring gazes, Jixiu felt an involuntary trace of superiority creep into his eyes. He drawled lazily, "Ideal City... really isn't as grand as you imagine." Kumite looked at him skeptically. "Still better than Boulder City, right?" "You're overthinking it," Jixiu shook his head. "They have endless rules and restrictions. What you can't do, what you can do—it's all spelled out in black and white, without an inch of room for leeway." In truth, perhaps there was. It was just that his social standing had never reached the level where the Board of Directors would make concessions for him, so he naturally had no clue where flexibility existed. Kumite still wore a skeptical expression as he pressed on, "What about the inner-city nobles there? Surely they live better?" Jixiu replied flatly, "Of course they do, but in my eyes, those people have no vision—you could even call them short-sighted. Perhaps the truly prominent figures are different; I've heard they act more covertly, more conservatively... but beyond that, they aren't much different from us. And that's precisely why life there is so terribly dull. Otherwise, why would they go running outside the city?" To him, that place was another kind of wasteland—a spiritual barren. He could only hole up in a forty-square-meter kennel, strapping on neural interface gear to trade insults across cyberspace with trash on the Endpoint Cloud... That was the cheapest and least bothersome form of entertainment. At least he didn't have to worry about bizarre infractions that would get him locked up and forced to watch educational reels, or tossed out by the guards. The rules there were outrageously convoluted, and one could easily imagine how sluggish the efficiency was—something unimaginable in Boulder City. Soaking in the awe of these provincial bumpkins, Jixiu ate a grape popped into his mouth by a beauty, casually offering an offhand observation about his hometown. "Speaking of which... things have changed quite a bit here too. It used to take at least two days to get from here to the northern suburbs; now it doesn't even take one." Kumite chuckled. "True enough. Those busybodies in the northern suburbs pick fights with marauders every day. The marauders up north have practically all fled south." Another chubby youth chimed in eagerly, "I also heard they've been building like crazy up there recently—even the road beneath the elevated outbound highway was repaved!" A tall fellow's eyes lit up. "I know about that! My father invested a good chunk of money in it!" Jixiu scoffed. "How much can you make selling rebar and cement?... Speaking of which, aren't you guys interested in a venture that actually rakes in real money?" Kumite's eyes instantly gleamed. "You have an angle?" "More than just an angle." Jixiu smiled mysteriously. Glancing at the fervent expressions of his good buddies, he waved them closer. Clearing his throat, he dropped his voice to a whisper. "...I've got a project here that rakes in massive fortune." "The kind where you don't have to do a thing, just lie back and rake it in!" ... A mansion in Dawn City. Sitting in his study, Lister fiddled with the black room card in his hand, glanced at the wall clock, and yawned in utter boredom. He was starting to feel a bit dull. Back then, to obtain this "black card," he had spent no small sum of chips greasing palms, spending at least several million back and forth. Finally, with the help of several nobles and at the cost of a hefty "relocation fee," he had decently escorted a ruined, destitute noble out, taking his place as the inner city's nouveau riche. Over there, aristocratic decency and elegance mattered more than anything, while noble status itself was far less mysterious. As long as one possessed a single room in the Boulder Building, no matter how small, one was counted among the inner-city nobility and enjoyed voting rights on major policy decisions. As for how to obtain one, that came down to navigating interpersonal relations; it was not something openly traded with a fixed price tag on the market. Most nobles didn't actually live inside the Boulder Building. The room number on the keycard was more a symbol of status, prestige, and power. Outside the pre-war Boulder Building stood a ring of later-constructed residential blocks, which were also considered part of the inner city. Living conditions there were considerably better. Furthermore, if a noble lived day in and day out in that tiny cubicle on his keycard, it essentially signaled that he was on the brink of bankruptcy. People would naturally assume he intended to sell off his remaining power for one last good price, and would thoughtfully help him scout prospective buyers. The noble he had replaced was a prime example. That fellow lived on the lowest floor of the building, childless and devoid of marketable skills, kept like a penned pig, hoping day and night to sell his keycard for a good price that "offended neither himself nor his neighbors," so he could take his chips and start over outside. If Boulder City were compared to a massive casino, buying a keycard with one's "gambling winnings" was undeniably equivalent to walking away with the prize. It was precisely for this reason that he had spared no expense to put forward that enormous sum. Not merely because this layer of status meant other inner-city nobles couldn't casually ruin him through extra-legal means, but because he harbored ambitions far beyond ordinary men—he intended to rely on his exceptional business acumen and drive to transform Boulder City and the entire River Valley Province, forging a vast commercial empire! If he could enter Boulder City's core circle of power and befriend like-minded allies, his plans would proceed far more smoothly. Yet shortly after entering that circle, profound disappointment set in. There were no like-minded allies there—not even a single person of moderate competence. Those fellows were like a herd of inbred swine. Not an ounce of human wisdom resided in their brains, or rather, they had expended every drop of their cerebral marrow on internal friction against one another. Even slavelords understood that a shovel dug faster than bare hands, and occasionally bought wood-fired generators and tractors from merchants like him to upgrade their production equipment. Yet those pampered swine insisted on ripping the hoof nails off their draft animals to eat them, smugly boasting of it as an achievement. How did scum like that manage to thrive better than the old town chief of Bett Street or the owner of Brown Farm? Lister had pondered it for many nights without finding an answer. In the end, he could reach only one conclusion— They truly had good fathers. Those survivors who had possessed the courage to stand outside the shelters, braving the radioactive fallout and the perpetual winter, had truly been heroes. They had not only endured the despair of plunging from utopia into the abyss, but had even accomplished in advance what their useless, gluttonous descendants should have done themselves. That was what ought never to have happened. They had built a "fairy-tale paradise" for their children, so much so that in the eyes of the nobles two centuries later, the wasteland had already ended. In truth, such an interpretation wasn't wrong. Had their wasteland not ended long ago?... Just then, a knock sounded outside the study, and his most capable subordinate, Han Long, pushed the door open and stepped inside. "Sir, the Administrator is here." Lister tossed the black card aside and looked at him at once. "Show him in quickly." "Yes." Han Long nodded slightly, his cybernetic eye swiveling left and right, and turned to exit Lister's study. Before long, Chu Guang pushed the door open and walked in with a smile. "Your house really is enormous." He had brought no guards, still wearing that set of powered armor. Lister was long accustomed to this, and had even swapped all the sofas in his house for steel-core ones, fearing he might lack a place to seat his guest. "You should reside somewhere even larger. I happen to have a new residence that's sitting empty for now, why don't—" "The environment inside the shelter is quite fine." "Yet I see your residents thoroughly enjoy building beautiful houses, don't they?" Lister smiled and urged, "The shelter is too cramped after all. Even if you don't mind, you can't shortchange the future Administrator's wife and the Alliance's future heir." Chu Guang smiled faintly. "We've known each other for so long; don't you understand me by now?" Lister fell silent for a moment, let out a soft sigh, and completely abandoned that impractical thought, leaning back into his chair. "To be honest, the longer I know you, the less I understand you... At times, standing before you, I even feel afraid." "Have I done something to make you afraid?" "No." Seeing his silence, Chu Guang vaguely guessed his thoughts and chuckled, speaking with pointed intent. "Old Brown is still running his farm. He accepted our reforms, freed his family's slaves, and disbanded his armed forces. The past was wiped clean, and we allowed him to continue living on his land as an Alliance citizen. And the one who handled that was Luka, the mayor of Dawn City—the very man Brown nearly executed. You see, we can forgive even enemies. You've never done 'anything' against us, so what do you have to worry about?" Lister shook his head. "A mismatch between wealth and status is an inherent sin. In the inner city, I could at least bribe the nobles, or even become one... But here, I have no avenue to become a shelter resident, nor do I understand your operational logic, let alone what you sometimes intend to do. In any case, I only hope that whenever you need money, you give me the chance to offer it up willingly." Chu Guang couldn't help but say, "Why can't you shift your mindset a little? The Alliance is the Alliance; we operate by our own rules. We're different from any survivor settlement... Look at Bucky. He's barely human anymore, yet doesn't he live quite happily here every day?" Lister said helplessly, "He's a citizen of Ideal City. Even if he commits a monumental crime, someone will cover for him... And I can't even see his face." Chu Guang sighed. "I've said it many times: status doesn't matter in the Alliance. Even if someone changes until his own father wouldn't recognize him, so long as he identifies with us, we will unite with him." Lister gave a wry smile. "I hope you remain as true to your word as ever... So, what did you come here hoping I would do for you?" Seeing that Lister had guessed his visit carried an objective, Chu Guang dropped the pretense. Leaning back in his chair, he spoke with animated enthusiasm. "I intend to issue something called bonds." "What are those?" "A financial instrument that can solve our funding issues while simultaneously addressing the investment dilemmas of the inner-city nobles." Lister cleared his throat. "If you're short on money, just say the word and I'll lend it to you." Chu Guang smiled. "It's not me who's short on money, but the Alliance. And it will always be short on money. We need a tremendous amount of chips here. How much could you lend me? A hundred million?" Lister felt his scalp tingle. "That... would indeed be rather difficult." He hadn't anticipated the Administrator possessing such a massive appetite. Chu Guang spread his hands. "Right? This isn't a cake one person can swallow. We need vast sums of chips to purchase Boulder City's goods and expand our market scale. Right now, the inner-city nobles' pockets happen to be stuffed with chips. So why not take the funds they have no immediate use for and put them toward profitable ventures?" Lister stroked his chin with interest, his eyes narrowing slightly. "That does sound intriguing..." Chu Guang smiled, guiding him along step by step. "We can issue five-year and ten-year bonds, with total issuance quotas of one billion and two billion respectively. Purchased with chips, redeemed in chips—entirely fair, and most crucially, secure! The coupon rates will be three percent and four percent respectively. Taking ten-year bonds as an example, a bond of one hundred chips will yield four chips of interest annually, with the one-hundred-chip principal returned in full in the tenth year." Lister's eyes flickered slightly as he keenly grasped the underlying intent. "This is equivalent to splitting debt into tranches... Now, not just banks can invest, but medium-to-large merchant guilds and even private individuals can participate." Chu Guang smiled broadly. "Exactly! We will even provide physical certificates alongside electronic ledger services... Those holding our bonds will be able to trade them freely on our exchange platform. That way, if anyone urgently needs funds, they can liquidate their bonds for cash, paying only a nominal transaction fee." Pity. It seemed Lister hadn't deduced his true underlying motive either, only instinctively suspecting he harbored ulterior designs. "Then why didn't you go to Melvin?" After staring at Chu Guang for a moment, Lister couldn't help asking. "I run a factory; this isn't my line of work." Chu Guang shook his head. "Melvin is an old fox. He wants to extract concessions from me, but he certainly won't permit me to use borrowed funds to repay prior debt. Starting from that two-hundred-million-chip loan, every single loan between us and Boulder City Bank stipulated how the funds must be utilized, and that money must be deposited in accounts at Boulder City Bank under their supervision." Pausing briefly, he continued, "That is why I need two issuance channels to float bonds denominated in chips. However, I guarantee that bonds issued through both channels will carry identical rights. One will simply be issued by the Alliance Central Bank itself, and the other through Boulder City's banks." "I view you as one of our own, so I intend for you to manage the Alliance's issuance channel." Lister stared blankly at Chu Guang, never expecting him to openly disclose something like "using borrowed funds to repay prior debt." Swallowing hard, he asked cautiously, "Do you... truly intend to repay them?" Chu Guang gave him a strange look. "If I didn't intend to repay the money, why would I go to all this trouble?" Lister fell silent for a while before biting the bullet. "I'll give it a try." He had to take the Alliance's counsel seriously. He had no choice. Who told him to make his fortune relying on the Alliance? If not for the Lister Factory, he would never have become an inner-city noble in this lifetime. Never mind asking him to help raise capital—even if he were asked to help commit murder, he would have to find a way. "Go give it your best shot!" Chu Guang rose from the sofa and walked to the study door. Suddenly pausing, he looked back at Lister with an encouraging smile. "Put your best effort into trying. All of the Alliance's business opportunities are written right in the newspapers, and my side will cooperate with you as much as possible. Trust me, if this succeeds, both the Alliance and Boulder City will thank you. If it truly doesn't pan out, that's fine too; I'll just find someone else." Lister said respectfully, "I will certainly do everything in my power." The study door clicked shut. Listening to the receding footsteps, Lister leaned back into his chair, rubbing between his brows with a throbbing headache. Total issuance quotas of one billion and two billion... Any normal person would be scared off by those numbers, wouldn't they? The esteemed Administrator had certainly handed him a monumental challenge. Yet right at that moment, Lister's gaze suddenly landed on the black card on his desk, and a spark of insight flashed through his mind. Picking up the black card again to fiddle with it, the excitement in Lister's eyes grew steadily, and he muttered softly under his breath: "This might not actually be all that difficult..." ... While Lister was instructing his subordinates to pack their belongings for a trip back to Boulder City, an incident of moderate consequence was unfolding within Boulder City itself. The *Survivor Daily*, which had recently taken the entire city by storm and nearly put Mr. House out of a job, had run into trouble after all. At that moment, sealing strips were plastered across the newspaper office's front entrance. Several guards stationed outside shoved back the idle onlookers who had gathered to watch the commotion. "Back off!" "Anyone who doesn't want trouble, get the hell out of here!" Hearing the harsh tone, those unwilling to provoke trouble quickly dispersed. Only one man stayed put, even calling out impulsively, "We're customers waiting for the new issue... not just here to gawk!" He was the owner of the Walnut Tavern located beside the industrial zone; his name was Tang. Usually, workers coming off shift would drop by his tavern to pick up discarded cigarette butts and find someone literate to read the free newspaper aloud. Although he didn't care much for those gloomy poor wretches, they were virtually his only clientele. When they read something delightful, they would often splurge on a mug of beer, or even buy a copy of the paper to take home as a keepsake. If only for the sake of that mug of beer, he felt he ought to speak up on their behalf. Yet upon hearing this, the two guards exchanged a glance, laughed heartily, and kicked the out-of-town bumpkin aside, sneering as he scrambled to his feet. "Get lost!" "There won't be any more of that crap!" Meanwhile, in the upstairs office. Upon hearing the decree handed down by City Hall, Hal felt his vision go dark, nearly fainting dead away. He glared fiercely at the guard reciting the order, wishing he could slaughter the man with his eyes. Yet royal authority meant jack shit here. Boulder City's soldiers didn't give a damn about some desert prince; that status at most spared him a beating. "Suspension of publication?! Why?" Hal roared, spittle flying. The guard looked at him with derision. "City Hall determined you're spreading false information. Who told you to slack off and peddle nonsense all day?" Flushed with rage, Hal gripped the *Playboy* spin-off issue in his hand, his fingers trembling uncontrollably. In the end, only one sentence managed to choke out of him: "But that was just a joke! It wasn't even news!" The joke had gone roughly as follows: a fellow dressed head to toe in deathclaw leather tried to prove his bravery to his drinking buddies, bragging that he had skinned the beast with his own two hands. His friends obviously didn't buy it. To prove his valor, this coward who dared not step beyond the giant walls pounced on a nearby working girl—only for the tear-proof devil silk to expose him as a total idiot... It was originally a joke with two embedded product plugs, even including brand names. Yet perhaps his phrasing had been far too realistic, accidentally offending some noble lord who had actually done something similar. The guard's reply confirmed his suspicions. "Indeed, but a certain inner-city resident didn't find it funny, and felt offended by it. Of course, you and I both know he was definitely not the man in the joke; he simply harbored a well-meaning concern that this is improper." "Then what about the *Workers' Daily*?! We stopped printing news about rich folks on it long ago! It even helped a noble lady find her lost cat!" The guard countered, "Then why didn't you keep printing that kind of thing? You were doing just fine before, helping the lords with errands. But those serialized stories of yours are utterly absurd. How could a barehanded Awakened beat powered armor? And a mercenary buying an inner-city black card is pure nonsense—what do you take the status bestowed by the City Lord for? I've never heard of any mercenary having such capability. If that isn't misleading the public, what is?" Hal tried to argue, "We can cut that content!" "Mr. Dulong's opinion is no." "What about House, then? Isn't he far better at spewing nonsense than me?! If you've ever listened to his broadcasts, you'd know what I write doesn't even qualify as a dry joke!" Hal's face flushed crimson. The person he least wanted to mention was that babbling idiot, yet he was forced to bring him up as an example. When it came to bragging, he wasn't one-ten-thousandth of that fellow; at least he couldn't spin black into white. Yet the guard remained utterly indifferent to his explanations, remarking impatiently, "He holds a permit. By the way, everyone will need such a license going forward. I'm not clear on the specifics; go look into it yourself." Hal looked at him pleadingly. "Then I'll apply right now! Please don't evict me." The guard shrugged callously. "That's your prerogative, but you have to pack your things here first. Tomorrow we will officially seal this place off. Whatever isn't cleared out will be treated as trash and discarded." If this fellow weren't a prince of the Lion Kingdom, the guard wouldn't have bothered wasting so much breath, and would have brought him in line with a rifle butt across the face. Tossing out that parting remark, the guard turned and left with his men, leaving Hal standing dazed on the spot, utterly despondent. He felt like a clown. The Alliance had defeated the invincible Legion, and he had held his head high for days alongside them. Yet on the very eve of the victory celebration, half a year of painstaking effort had been erased with a single sentence. Glancing at his employees who dared not speak, the shattered Hal murmured slowly: "Do you understand... this feeling is like me sticking a fresh flower into cow dung, and they insist on equating themselves with the dung. Is cow dung truly all that remains in their shallow minds?" "In that joke, I merely wrote about a fellow wearing deathclaw hide to entertain everyone, and they insisted it offended an inner-city noble lord. Because humans trim their nails and horses trim their hooves, does that make a human equal to a horse? What kind of bullshit logic is that?" An employee whispered, "...Indeed. Alliance residents wear deathclaw leather too, and they like you far better than Mr. House." Another somewhat younger employee couldn't help asking, "This is clearly a misunderstanding... can we appeal?" A senior editor shook his head. "Doubtful." The room fell into a prolonged silence, everyone dreading what lay ahead. Two reporters exchanged glances and looked toward him. "Boss..." "What should we do?" Hal said irritably, "I don't know, don't ask me! You were all standing by watching the spectacle earlier, not uttering a single word on my behalf, and now you come asking me what to do! How the hell should I know?" He had planned a special feature on the Alliance's celebration and its recent sweeping moves, working overtime to rush out a draft proposal—only for this devastating news to strike out of the blue. Looking at the helpless eyes of his employees, Hal suddenly felt as if all strength had been drained from his body, and let out a long sigh. "...I'll pay you your wages. After this, we'll go our separate ways." Perhaps he truly wasn't cut out for this line of work. The staff wore reluctant expressions. The senior editor spoke up immediately, "Can we be paid in silver coins?" Hal paused slightly. "Silver coins?" The several employees standing beside the senior editor nodded in unison, chiming in quietly one after another: "We used to work for Mr. House... We were fired back then over disagreements, so he certainly won't take us back." "Besides, I wrote articles mocking him..." "We plan to try our luck in the Alliance. Don't they have a *Survivor Daily* too? They should need us." "Exactly! Besides, one chip can currently be exchanged for two silver coins, whereas in Boulder City, one chip can't even buy a piece of bread!" "The Alliance isn't that great either..." "But I heard that over there, zero point nine silver coins can buy a kilogram of corn! Surplus nutrient paste is even fed to pigs!" Listening to his employees chatter back and forth, Hal's crestfallen mood suddenly found immense relief. The wasteland was vast; there were countless places to go. Come to think of it, his original purpose in founding this newspaper office had merely been to find a job to support himself, and to fulfill the trial his royal father had set for him and his brothers—to bring a valuable treasure back from the wasteland. Yet gradually, he had grown attached to this newspaper, so much so that he had completely forgotten his father's charge. In truth, he increasingly felt that contending for that throne didn't matter in the slightest; that thing was a burdensome shackle anyway, whereas drinking and composing poetry were what he truly loved. After he left, who knew how Mr. House would report on the Alliance's celebration? But having cast off everything here, he no longer gave a damn. Whatever. It was merely one settlement. He ought to be a cloud drifting across the sky, writing poetry for those worthy of reading it, singing songs for those worthy of listening. He had proclaimed it: He would spread the *Survivor Daily* across the entire wasteland! If his employees hadn't abandoned this profession, how could he hang his head in defeat at a time like this? "Then let's leave together—there's safety in numbers!" The crowd looked at him in surprise. The senior editor especially asked incredulously, "You plan to leave with us?" "What kind of talk is that? I wasn't a survivor from here to begin with. I've said before, I come from a land bathed in morning twilight... Although giving up so easily has indeed failed the Administrator's expectations, I will offer him a sincere apology." A smile returned to Hal's face. Clearing his throat softly, he continued: "If you like having me as your boss, you can keep following me once we reach the Alliance... The survivors in the desert don't yet have a newspaper of their own. They deserve to know what happens across this wasteland every day. We can start fresh there! Grow bigger, grow stronger, and forge new glory!" "Even if that place is far poorer than here." ... At this moment, Miss Dolly had no idea she was already unemployed. Full of vigor, she dragged Fang Chang scurrying through the streets of Dawn City, gathering material for the now-scrapped celebration feature. Avni from the Honey Badger Kingdom sat by the attic window of the embassy, gazing at the sun dipping toward her homeland with a sigh, trembling with anxiety over whether the gift she was about to present could adequately represent the sentiments of the royal house and the kingdom's people. Mosquito, having been implanted with the Xiao Yu-brand symbiote, found himself stuck inside his homemade tin can once again. As luck would have it, Yaya happened to pass by and snapped a photo, posting it to the forums for merciless ridicule, finally avenging a long-standing grudge. Stop Bullshitting dragged Makabazi and Shangshan Da Laohu to the lakeside for wild fishing. Commander Spring and a squad of Storm Corps brothers were gathered in the lobby of the Highway Town inn, taking turns pouring liquor down the throat of ramen shop owner Zhang Hai, who had bragged about holding his liquor through a thousand cups. Lisa stood by, torn between laughter and tears as she urged them to drink less, wanting to inquire about Pangolin yet feeling too shy to speak up. Kuang Feng and Gu Lang had dashed off to Xizhou City again to fiddle with the reactor, while Ye Shi took his little sister Jiu Jiu to farm split-claw crabs nearby to level up. Lao Bai and the female researcher from the Academy headed to the eastern forest of Qingquan City; she was intensely curious about the psionic interference device there. Elaina had brought back plenty of wondrous ingredients from the desert, and seemed to be brainstorming brand-new dark cuisine with Scrambled Eggs with Tomatoes. Only one final night remained before the triumphal celebration. Dawn City buzzed with bustling life just as it always had. Having just departed Lister's residence, Chu Guang did not return to the shelter. Instead, he made his way to the farmlands east of the city, gazing out across the cleared plots of land, lost in thought. Noticing him staring into the distance for a long time, Lyu Bei, following behind him, asked softly: "My Lord... is there something over there?" Chu Guang said casually, "Nothing." Lyu Bei scratched his head, speaking self-consciously, "I saw you staring that way for so long... I thought there was some issue." "Mm... there is an issue, in fact." Chu Guang pondered for a moment before speaking. "I was thinking that we can't mistreat them." Food security was of paramount importance and could not be entirely outsourced to vassal states. These arable fields were precious assets; perhaps he ought to allocate a portion of tax revenues to subsidize the people laboring in the fields, dispelling their anxieties regarding next year's grain prices. Thinking of this gave Chu Guang another headache. In the past, he hadn't felt much—a wave of his hand was just a string of numbers. Yet as the Alliance's scale expanded, he immediately realized how difficult it was to keep a massive settlement running smoothly. There were simply too many areas demanding expenditure... And a single thought of his no longer decided the livelihoods of a few individuals, but families waiting with bated breath. If he made a mistake, people would starve. Certain measures worked when the population was small, but lost their efficacy once the numbers swelled. Yet where the line lay between too few and too many was terribly hard to grasp. Watching the Administrator sink into deep contemplation, Lyu Bei hesitated for a moment before finally speaking up: "Administrator..." Chu Guang glanced at the young man beside him. "What is it?" Lyu Bei looked at him earnestly. "I think you ought to take an appropriate rest... It's been three days since you returned from the front lines, yet you haven't rested for even a single day." Chu Guang paused briefly, then laughed and patted his shoulder. "No need to worry about me, kid. I know when to rest." "...I just hope you'll take better care of your health," Lyu Bei whispered. "This isn't just my suggestion. I feel... everyone hopes for the same." Looking at the concerned expression in the young man's eyes, Chu Guang smiled and nodded. "I'll consider taking a few days off for myself."