Whenever Chu Guang went out on a "personal campaign" in the past, in order to give those remaining behind plenty of hope, he would always depart with great fanfare aboard the Heart of Steel, and later return with equal fanfare, laden with victory and glory.
This time, however, was different.
Chu Guang departed quietly. Bringing along only X-16, Lyu Bei, and a few others, he discreetly purchased tickets and reserved an entire train carriage, disturbing no one else.
After all, he was not heading off to war this time; he was merely going to see what had become of the places where he had once fought.
Because he usually appeared in public wearing his azure power armor, once he took off that iconic suit, surprisingly few people could recognize him at a glance.
Paired with holographic imaging equipment capable of subtly altering his facial features, not a single passenger realized they were riding the same train as the Administrator of the Alliance even after the locomotive began to roll.
En route, Chu Guang went to the restroom. Before long, he heard people queuing in the corridor outside talking.
"Where are you heading, buddy?"
"Haiya Province!"
"Haiya Province, huh? Development there really is booming. A lot of immigrants from the west have moved into several settlements, so I'm planning to buy a building there and collect rent."
"Great minds think alike, brother! I heard plenty of folks there are still living in shipping containers. Once those settlements develop and job opportunities open up, the rental market is bound to explode!"
"Are you going there to buy property too?"
"Not quite—heh, I'm going there to build buildings!"
"Oh! A contractor! A pleasure to meet you! Cough... I left my business cards in my bag. Look at my memory."
"No worries, no worries, I left mine in my bag too. Let's exchange numbers and grab a bite when we have time."
Hearing how affluent the Alliance's residents were, Chu Guang could not help wearing a gratified smile.
Around this time two years ago, the Alliance authorities had issued a substantial amount of debt to release liquidity, and now that money had flowed into the wallets of the Alliance's residents through production cycles.
Now, residents of the Alliance were taking this wealth to newly cleared lands to invest, helping immigrants newly admitted into the Alliance build better lives and guiding them to generate even more wealth.
Life was getting better and better.
Before long, however, a discordant voice drifted in through the crack of the door.
"Quit your f*cking bragging. If you two are so rich, why didn't you buy plane tickets?"
Evidently, more than one person was fed up with their boasting; chiming voices arose along the corridor.
"Exactly!"
"You got that cybernetic limb plucked straight from a coal mine, didn't you? The rustproof primer hasn't even worn off. Probably quit your job the second after you got the operation!"
"Thieves stealing taxpayers' money—cut the damn bullsh*t!"
Left utterly speechless by the rebukes, the two men glared fiercely at the instigator in unison and walked away without uttering a single word.
Squatting over the toilet, Chu Guang wore a slightly awkward expression.
Well then.
Even Dawn City had not completely eradicated poverty.
It was still too early to boast; the Alliance had a long road ahead.
Looked at from another perspective, though, ordinary people in the Alliance still harbored dreams of changing their current lives and becoming wealthy, and were willing to take strides to pursue them, rather than treating it as an unattainable daydream or only daring to ponder it while lying flat.
That was actually quite a good thing.
Compared to the residents of Dawn City, those in the South Sea Alliance and Silver Moon Bay were far more restless; some had even caught up with the players, staying ahead of the current game patch.
Being restless was by no means a bad thing; on the contrary, it served as the driving force for social progress.
As for the wealth pursued by ordinary people, it was hardly a terrifying beast; rather, it could serve as a catalyst accelerating societal advancement.
Only when monopolized did it turn into a poison that endangered the entire Alliance.
And preventing such monopolies happened to be one of the tasks Chu Guang was currently working on.
Not occupying the restroom for too long, Chu Guang touched up his appearance slightly using the holographic camouflage system, then vacated the stall for the next person in line.
After returning to his carriage, he passed through security at the door before switching off the holographic camouflage system, then headed straight to the VIP compartment in the middle of the carriage.
X-16 brewed a cup of black tea for him, set it down gently on the table, and then stood aside holding her tray.
Xiao Qi, who was sitting on the table resting her chin in both hands, tilted her head and asked curiously, "Master, isn't there a restroom in our carriage? Why did you go outside to use one?"
Chu Guang smiled and said, "I suddenly felt like seeing how ordinary people live. What's wrong with that?"
Xiao Qi asked in bewilderment, "Can't you see that in Dawn City?"
"I can, but the Alliance isn't just Dawn City. Many people live in places beyond our sight." Taking a gentle sip of black tea, Chu Guang placed the cup onto the jostling tray. "Besides, what we see in the office is definitely different from what we see with our own eyes out in the real world."
Not entirely agreeing with this claim, Xiao Qi pursed her lips lightly. "Mmh... Actually, even if you sit in your office, Xiao Qi can see it for you."
Although current conditions on the wasteland didn't permit launching satellites, the Hummingbird drones controlled by the shelter server could be considered a form of "low-altitude satellite."
Their compact spherical shells barely drew any attention when flying at altitudes above ten meters, while their 360-degree wide-angle cameras could take in the entire area without any blind spots.
A long, long time ago, back when the "players" and "NPCs" were not yet so reliable, it had served as a communication relay for the VMs and as Chu Guang's eyes to observe conditions inside and outside the settlement.
"I'm not doubting your abilities. We're talking about two different things," Chu Guang answered with a chuckle, looking at Xiao Qi's slightly pouting lips before turning his gaze out the window.
The train had departed Qingquan City for quite some time now, and the station they had just passed seemed to be the southernmost station in River Valley Province.
After passing through a tunnel, the rugged mountainous terrain seemed to come to an end, and the slow-moving train gradually accelerated.
Looking at the vaguely familiar scenery, Chu Guang felt a ripple of memories stir within him, and he asked offhandedly, "What's ahead?"
Resting her cheeks in her hands, Xiao Qi answered in a melodious voice, "Past the river ahead is Jinchuan Province. There seems to be a little town there that enshrines a lizard, a rat, and a human."
Chu Guang's heart stirred, and he blurted out, "It's called Dust Town, right?"
Xiao Qi's eyes widened in surprise. "Eh? Master, you still remember?"
Chu Guang laughed out loud. "It's only been a few years. How could I forget so quickly?"
That was where the Jungle Corps had once fought, and that battle had apparently been the combat debut of the bolter rifle.
In that battle, they successfully thwarted the Chi Tribe's sweep through the survivor settlements around Jinhe City and relocated the residents of Dust Town to safety.
Later on, large numbers of Alliance troops deployed from there to the front lines, advancing into Jinchuan Province to fight the Church of the Torch and its mutant vassals.
Then again, in just two or three short years, the changes here were already so vast that he could hardly recognize it.
With a rumbling roar, the train crossed the rolling waves across the river, then crested rolling hills one after another. Soon, an endless plain and gentle slopes came into Chu Guang's view.
Yet the scenery greeting his eyes now was even more breathtaking than before.
The land, which in his memory had been barren and deserted, was now carpeted with dazzling golden paddy fields.
Heavy ears of rice weighed down the stalks, creating golden waves with every gust of the gentle breeze.
September was harvest season, and Dust Town had entered the busiest time of year.
Massive machines pushing rotary drums rolled back and forth across the fields. Where their treads and rollers passed, the ground resembled hair freshly trimmed by a barber, leaving behind only a stubbly fuzz.
Those were the chopped stalks of rice straw.
Machines trailing closely behind would mix them into the soil with nitrogen fertilizer to prepare for the next planting cycle.
Beyond the paddy fields, orchards planted with Kamu trees and other species stretched into the distance, all managed by gardening robots manufactured in Boulder City.
Although Dust Town was home to only a hundred-odd households, relying on this mechanized farming technology, the area under cultivation exceeded what over ten thousand men of the Xilan Expeditionary Army had cleared.
Watching the distant townsfolk bagging threshed grain into burlap sacks, Chu Guang murmured with genuine emotion, "I didn't expect Jinchuan Province to adopt mechanized farming systems as well."
He recalled that when the Alliance first arrived, the laborers here had still been serfs, and their tools had merely been hoes.
The local farm owners had preferred buying a few more propeller planes phased out by the Alliance over switching to more efficient tractors. Later, in the turmoil stirred up by the Torch, they and their serfs had nearly been wiped out in one fell swoop.
Of course, Dust Town's situation was somewhat different from other local settlements.
Because Scavenger and his two buddies had dipped into their own pockets to buy equipment for the locals, and later helped them sell their harvested grain to Boulder City, this place was probably the earliest in all of Jinchuan Province to implement mechanized agriculture.
In other settlements, such as Mafu Town, the changes were likely not quite so dramatic.
Seeing Chu Guang's keen interest in the farming machines, X-16, standing aside with her tray, introduced them like a tour guide: "That is a combine harvesting system designed by Boulder Heavy Industries."
Chu Guang was slightly surprised. "Boulder Heavy Industries?"
X-16 nodded and continued, "In June of this year, Mr. Ibers spun off the production of heavy mining equipment, agricultural machinery, and rail transport vehicles from Boulder Military Industries' production lines, establishing an independent new enterprise operated by a human CEO. Currently, this subsidiary has become a new profit driver for Boulder Military Industries, with plans to go public on the Dawn City Stock Exchange."
Lister's Lister Group was not the only one to step beyond the Great Wall; Boulder Military Industries, the colossus of the past, was also finding its own way out of those soaring walls.
Chu Guang, however, had never paid much attention to Boulder Military Industries' non-military operations.
The last time he met with Ibers had been when he represented the Alliance authorities to spearhead talks on cooperative business with North Island Heavy Industries.
Of course, it was entirely possible that the cooperation with North Island Heavy Industries had provided Ibers with fresh inspiration.
Ever since acquiring a new master, that bionic android past its service life seemed to be slowly returning to normal.
Chu Guang chuckled and said, "That's great. Though I didn't expect that guy to take an interest in anything other than weapons."
Her pitch-black visor flickered slightly as X-16 continued in a tone devoid of ups and downs, "Father said that only by squeezing the value of land to the extreme will people fight and slaughter one another for it once more... Suppressing food prices and increasing the birth rate is also a long-term strategy to expand the market for Boulder Military Industries' weapons."
Chu Guang choked on the black tea at his lips and coughed. "Cough... Food prices aren't the only factor affecting birth rates. I think he's overthinking it."
X-16 nodded, sounding pensive. "I see... So that is how it is."
Chu Guang doubted she truly understood what he meant, but he did not mind much.
Ibers' penchant for wanting to watch the world burn was nothing new; it had been like that long before Chu Guang ever met him.
The train traveled until it neared Dust Town, pulling up beside a rustic station.
Two travelers chose to disembark here; judging by their appearance, they seemed to be backpackers from Ideal City.
As Chu Guang looked out the window, his eyes caught the perimeter wall outside the station.
The low wall, once haphazardly cobbled together from granite and cement, had been replaced by a neat, attractive, and much sturdier concrete wall.
The locals had indeed fulfilled their former wish, erecting a larger, more beautiful settlement atop the ruins.
Engraved upon the main gate of that high wall was a relief carving depicting an enormous deathclaw, a plump rat, and a cloaked man.
They were revered by the town's residents as guardian deities and also served as a landmark where travelers from Ideal City snapped photos to commemorate their visit.
It was worth noting that although the mutant tribes in the vicinity had been wiped out by players, exotic creatures still wandered over from time to time.
Although the Alliance's psychic interference devices could repel exotic beasts, due to past events, the locals trusted the shotguns in their hands and the walls built by their own sweat far more than psychic interference devices. Consequently, they maintained their longstanding tradition of constructing watchtowers.
With few passengers getting off, the train stopped for only three minutes before setting out again, continuing toward Singularity City.
That place had once been the logistics transit hub for the Alliance's southbound forces in Jinchuan Province, but it had now grown into the Alliance's most populous settlement in the province—boasting even more people than Weifu City at the southern tip.
Truth be told, this had exceeded Chu Guang's expectations.
In his original vision, Singularity City, where an AI governed everything, was supposed to serve as a massive rehabilitation center for the Alliance. While weaning the locals off their dependency on Na fruit, it was also meant to help cure them of their "giant infant" syndrome.
They could not always rely on someone to take care of them; they needed to figure out how to live like real human beings on their own.
Yet contrary to Chu Guang's expectations, the population here experienced explosive growth, expanding from tens of thousands initially to a staggering two hundred thousand.
Unlike other settlements, Frost turned no one away who chose to stay.
Although the Alliance did not issue ID cards here and labor earned no silver coins, the advantage was that one never had to worry about survival or what to wear each day. Residents could stay for as long as they pleased, even for a lifetime.
The sole requirement was that once you left, you could never return.
Moreover, apart from the luggage checked in upon arrival and a small amount of silver coins converted from points, nothing could be taken away.
As for visitors, they could rest in the hotel near the station or tour the farms, but their stay was limited to a single day, and they rarely had any contact with the locals.
In fact, to guarantee a certain sense of fairness, even the staff at the station hotel were bionic androids imported specifically from Ideal City.
The train stopped here for longer. The flow of passengers embarking and disembarking was far denser than at previous stations, with hurried footsteps pacing back and forth across the tiled platform.
Unlike the stations in southern River Valley Province, however, most travelers getting off here were backpackers from Ideal City, with scarcely any immigrants intending to settle permanently.
The backpackers from Ideal City in particular.
They seemed extraordinarily intrigued by this settlement with its unique rules and special ties to Kangmao Group, their faces painted with excitement and even fanaticism.
Chu Guang had only learned from Brother Mole's posts later that the netizen "cloud-dwellers" on Ideal City's Endpoint Cloud treated this place as some sort of sociological testing ground.
Not only did they praise it to high heaven, they even viewed it as the ultimate form of human societal development—
that is, a perfect utopia governed and managed entirely by AI, free from man's exploitation of man.
The equality here went a step further than that of the Alliance.
The local populace had achieved absolute equality, striking an uncanny balance between production and consumption.
If Chu Guang had a say, though, the citizens of Ideal City simply had too much free time on their hands.
Countless people across the wasteland envied their lifestyle, and even players from a peaceful world marveled at their prosperity, yet they looked upon an impoverished wasteland backwater as their spiritual homeland.
Of course, that was their prerogative.
The Alliance had raked in a substantial amount of Ideal City's Cr through tourism revenue, giving him no reason to complain.
Intending to stay overnight and catch up with old friends he hadn't seen in a while, Chu Guang discreetly disembarked from the train with X-16, Lyu Bei, and the others, heading straight for the official passage.
To be frank, the changes here were considerable as well, just not as staggering as in Dust Town.
After all, expansive fields and orchards had already existed here before; today, those farms and orchards retained their original look, only having expanded considerably in acreage.
Aside from that, the greatest changes lay in the settlement's infrastructure and residential housing.
A wide road led straight from the settlement's entrance to the manor nestled deep within the farms, flanked on both sides by uniform streetlights, green belts, and prefabricated concrete buildings.
These buildings were organized into block-shaped neighborhoods, complete with landscaped parks for leisure, boiler rooms supplying hot water, and centralized cafeterias.
Between several larger neighborhoods sat even larger public amenities such as schools, libraries, and hospitals.
Chu Guang was naturally no stranger to those buildings pieced together from prefabricated concrete slabs, as they had been the makeshift solution he concocted back then to resolve the housing shortage for wastelanders.
Nowadays, prefabricated concrete buildings were one of Boulder City's pillar industries, having been sold as far as Port Kingalon and even Tiandu in Brahma Province.
Curiously enough, Boulder City, which had pulled itself out of crisis and struck it rich through this very business, had long ceased constructing them within its own walls and was even contemplating exporting this outdated production line to Brahma Province, where demand remained high.
Yet Boulder City's residents likely never imagined that, driven by Singularity City's surging housing demand, an obsolete production line that ought to have been phased out had actually been preserved.
The moment Chu Guang set foot in Singularity City, Frost, who was working in the manor, noticed him immediately and rushed to the manor entrance with Eclipse in pleasant surprise.
"Respected Administrator, what good wind blows you here?"
"Long time no see. I came to visit you."
Looking at Frost and Eclipse in their maid outfits, Chu Guang nodded with a smile and continued, "The changes here are so enormous that when I first stepped in, I thought I'd missed my stop... until I saw you two. Speaking of which, you haven't changed a bit—just as you were before."
"Of course. My pursuit of art is eternal, and the artists of the Alliance never fail to surprise me in new ways."
Pinching her skirt hem and twirling gracefully, Frost wore a confident smile that soon gave way to a trace of melancholy.
"If only the survivors in Singularity City could be like everyone else in the Alliance. I've tried teaching them art, and while they attempt to embrace it... they rarely give me that... Apologies, I don't know how to describe that feeling."
Perched on Chu Guang's shoulder, Xiao Qi chimed in, "...Sapience plugin on fire?"
Frost's eyes lit up, and she babbled on: "Exactly, that sensation of a sapience plugin catching fire! Of course, it's not that I'm weary of my current duties, but their creativity consists solely of uniformly enlarging or shrinking the elements I provide them. It always feels like it's missing originality."
Hearing this, Chu Guang gave a soft cough and said, "You can't have your cake and eat it too. Certain buffs... I mean traits, are inherently contradictory. You can only choose one."
"Contradictory?" Frost paused, lowering her head in thought. "Are they contradictory? But logically... they don't seem to contradict each other."
Chu Guang fell silent for a moment before offering an answer he wasn't entirely certain of himself. "Perhaps that's the biggest difference between humans and machines. Humans aren't creatures governed strictly by logic or mathematical rules."
"Then what do they follow?"
Chu Guang thought for a bit and said, "Perhaps intuition, or perhaps instinct."
Unlike machines engineered for a specific purpose, humans do not come into this world preprogrammed with one.
Or rather, the meaning of a person's existence is discovered through the process of living, not preset from the start.
Yet the subject was far too philosophical; he was not sure whether the bionic android before him could truly grasp it.
Just then, a soft, delicate voice drifted over from behind Frost.
"It's not really that hard to understand... Father's farm used to be like this. I don't think it's changed that much."
"Yinyin?"
Seeing the little girl stepping out from behind Frost, Chu Guang wore a surprised look.
He was about to jokingly offer the polite greeting, "You've grown taller," but immediately remembered that she would never grow again, so he swallowed the words on the tip of his tongue and changed them: "How are you feeling? With the new body."
Yinyin nodded gently and murmured in a low voice, "I've gotten used to it... but it always feels like after becoming a robot, every day has lost its meaning."
Hearing her answer, the expressionless Eclipse chimed in to correct her: "A bionic android. We are not the same as robots."
Yinyin pulled a helpless expression, as if to say, "Whatever you say."
Her mature, sensible demeanor tugged at the heartstrings.
Having endured such a colossal upheaval in her life, she had grown precocious, just like Xiao Yang.
Looking at the resigned Yinyin, Chu Guang pondered for a moment before speaking in a gentle tone: "Meaning is something you have to find for yourself. That's the one thing we can't help you with... But I believe you will find it, just like Frost beside you."
Though unsure whether she could still be considered a child, he hoped she would not slide into the abyss of nihilism.
Yinyin nodded softly, though whether she truly took his kindness to heart was anyone's guess, and said in her melodious voice, "Mm, I know, Mr. Administrator, even if I don't envy Sister Frost's bizarre hobbies one bit... By the way, respected Administrator, how is Xiao Yang doing?"
Chu Guang stroked her head and said with a smile, "I wouldn't know about that. I only heard that she's reunited with her father and gone to school just like the other children in Dawn City. If you miss her, I suggest you go see her in person."
Yinyin's expression grew nervous all of a sudden. "...I will."
Chu Guang could roughly guess the trouble weighing on her mind, but that was her own affair.
Straightening up, he turned his gaze back to Frost and said politely, "I'm sorry for not booking in advance. My trip south isn't an official visit... Could you prepare some rooms for us? I plan to stay here for a night."
A radiant smile spread across Frost's face, and she answered warmly, "No problem at all! Usually only Yinyin, Eclipse, and I live in this manor, so empty rooms are the last thing we lack... Please follow me, respected Administrator."
Chu Guang nodded, then followed Frost into the manor where the Burning Corps had once fought.
From the moment they stepped into the manor, Chu Guang noticed that Lyu Bei kept his hand resting on his waist, scanning the surroundings nervously as if people were lurking in the grass.
Especially when they walked in front of the Annex building, his expression pulled taut like a bowstring.
Alliance aircraft had once touched down here, and bullet holes could still be seen on the nearby wall.
Seeing the young man's behavior, Chu Guang couldn't help smiling and asked, "Did you find something?"
Not expecting Chu Guang to notice his little movements, Lyu Bei blushed in embarrassment and scratched the back of his head. "I..."
"It's already the year 214. The battle here ended a long time ago."
Chu Guang reached out, patted him gently on the shoulder, and said in a mild tone, "I told you before we set out: this time, we're just here to take a look, not to fight a war."
Chapter 901