Today was the day the military academy went on break.
To celebrate the Hoffmann royal family founding the empire a thousand years ago, the entire capital planet took ti off during the anniversary period—and the military academy was no exception.
Xi Heyan packed up everything in the dorm, refused Zhuo Haoyu’s invitation, and left the school with nothing but a backpack.
As soon as he stepped out of the campus gates, the streets were overflowing with festivity.
On a giant electronic screen, a female host with golden, wavy curls smiled as she read the day’s news.
“This morning, the royal family issued their anniversary greetings as a group. And in a pleasant surprise, His Majesty Bernard has clearly stated he will attend this year’s celebration ceremony...”
“Great Hoffmann! Great His Majesty Bernard!”
Under a wall, a line of street perforrs—faces thick with makeup and dressed in flashy outfits—shouted in unison.
Nearby, a few young people passed by, laughing as they talked about where to go for the holiday.
“Let’s go to Haiwei Star. It’s the best for vacation—sun, beaches, and there’s even rmaid shows. Don’t you want to see rmaids at least once?”
“Wait, what? It’s the anniversary—aren’t we staying to watch the ceremony?”
“Ugh... watching the ceremony is so la.”
“But His Majesty Bernard will be there this year. Ever since the empress passed away, His Majesty hasn’t shown up in public for a long ti.”
“Still sounds boring...”
All those street-corner scenes wove together like the opening montage of a movie about to begin. Xi Heyan walked past without slowing at all—only when he heard the words “the empress” did his figure pause, just slightly.
But he didn’t turn back. He didn’t stop. He just shifted his backpack and slipped into the station, avoiding the flow of people.
The place he was going was a bit far. Xi Heyan transferred several tis along the way. Only when the car had emptied out did he get off at the very last stop.
And what awaited him there was a world completely different from the lively streets he’d just left.
Crowded houses. Narrow streets. Mountains of stinking garbage piled high to one side. Even the river pressed up against them had been polluted black.
Facing that kind of environnt, Xi Heyan didn’t so much as wrinkle his brow.
The deeper he went, the tighter the roads beca, and the more broken-down the buildings looked.
If you hadn’t seen it with your own eyes, it would be hard to believe a filthy, chaotic place like this could exist inside the glittering, glamorous capital planet.
But it did—solidly, undeniably.
A place like this... even soone like Zhuo Haoyu, who claid to be a commoner, probably had never been here.
While the wealthy, prosperous capital planet drew countless people’s longing, it also cruelly carved everyone into levels.
Zhuo Haoyu’s family background only counted as “lower-tier” within the military academy. But beneath the lower-tier, there was an even more despised layer—
“trash-class.”
They were people from other, remote planets. They ca to the capital planet to make a living, but were always pushed out and excluded, forced to huddle in fringe corners. The places they lived were jokingly called “the garbage station.”
Because in the eyes of capital-planet residents, people from remote planets were garbage, too.
It was already close to dark, but there wasn’t a single streetlight. The outlines of the buildings blurred in the dimness, turning into looming black shadows.
Xi Heyan walked into a place that looked like a bar.
Soone handed him a card. Using it, he opened a hidden passage deep inside the bar.
It was a staircase leading underground.
He didn’t know how long he walked. Then his view suddenly opened up.
Under dim lights, heavy tal music was loud enough to rattle the eardrums. What ca into view were tangled, interlocking streets—so many twisting turns that a first-tir might get dizzy just looking.
But Xi Heyan seed extrely familiar with this place.
“Hey, wanna grab a drink?”
“Fresh stock just ca in—don’t you want to take a look?”
Shouts and hawking calls hit his ears from all sides. If you ignored the surroundings, it looked like a massive underground market.
Only here, what could be sold ca in every variety, outside the law. All kinds of contraband that was banned on the surface was everywhere.
Sotis, staying out of sight was the best camouflage of all. The capital planet’s largest black market had been built right beneath the garbage station.
But Xi Heyan hadn’t co to buy illegal goods.
He’d co to make money.
Inside a rundown hall, countless electronic screens played one bounty after another—assassinating so noble, taking revenge on an enemy, stealing rare valuables, and all sorts of others.
As long as the price was right, any kind of job could be posted.
And there were plenty of desperate people here willing to risk everything for money.
Xi Heyan usually only took exploration-type jobs. Those didn’t require dealing with people, the payouts were higher, and most importantly, he didn’t like partnering up. Exploration work could be completed alone.
But while scanning jobs, Xi Heyan still noticed the largest screen.
On it—
was an egg.
The amount [N O V E L I G H T] beneath it was already a dense, eye-hurting string of astronomical digits, marked in a bright red font. And when Xi Heyan looked over, that bounty price was still climbing.
Because of that outrageous number, the hall—
“...People have lost their minds, huh?!”
“You don’t get it. Rich nobles love collecting pretty, rare stuff like this. The more the price gets inflated, the more they want it. If that egg weren’t in the Saint Clan’s hands, soone would’ve taken the job already.”
With a bounty that high, pulling off this one job would an never worrying for the rest of your life.
Then, suddenly, the bounty number jumped again.
This ti, it doubled outright.
The hall went dead silent.
Everyone stared at the digits with fever-bright eyes, like the numbers themselves were casting a spell.
Xi Heyan stood among them, expression still calm.
He didn’t stay in the hall long. After taking the job he’d picked, he went against the flow and headed out.
But at the mont he was about to leave, he glanced back at the party offering the bounty.
Under “Na,” it clearly read—
Polaris Life Research Institute.
......
Catching the last train, Xi Heyan returned to the lively city district.
Compared to the garbage station, this place was practically paradise.
Passing a shop, Xi Heyan stopped.
It was a small store selling handmade goods, and what caught his attention was a fluffy little keychain hanging up by the owner.
“Excuse —are you buying Little Baby?”
The shop owner was a woman. Seeing Xi Heyan standing by the display, she hurried over to ask.
“Little Baby?”
Xi Heyan spoke, confused.
The owner explained, “Yeah. The one you’re looking at. We don’t know its real na, so online everyone calls it Little Baby. Because it’s cute, isn’t it?”
...Cute?
Xi Heyan stared at the keychain for a while.
Maybe... it really did count as cute.
But the reason Xi Heyan had stopped wasn’t because it was cute.
It was because he’d just seen it at the black market.
The original model for this fluffy keychain—at the exact mont he’d left—had beco the most expensive bounty in the black market’s history.
Without even thinking, he knew the people down there were probably going completely insane over it.
Xi Heyan didn’t want any part of that ss. He’d left early precisely to avoid trouble.
And while he was thinking, the owner kept pushing, working hard to sell it. “This is our best-selling design. And what you’re looking at is the very last one.”
“And it’s weird—before, you could still find Little Baby’s photos online, but now they’ve all been taken down. Good thing I have a great mory...”
Xi Heyan snapped back to himself. The owner was still chattering, but he cut in directly.
“What did you just say?”
“...That my mory is great?”
“The sentence before that.”
“This is the last one.”
“Mm. Ring it up.”
“.........”
When Xi Heyan walked back out of the shop, he was now holding a fluffy keychain that didn’t match his style at all.
A snow-white baby egg—milky-soft, chubby, and round.
Xi Heyan didn’t even know why he’d bought it. He’d never been interested in plush things.
But...
The image of that silver-haired boy flickered through his mind.
...That person would probably like sothing like this, wouldn’t he?
Xi Heyan thought, distracted.
And as he was thinking that, a long-unheard light-brain notification sound chid again.
The mont he heard it, Xi Heyan almost thought he’d imagined it.
After all, the other person seed to have been offline for a long ti. There had been no new ssages in the chat window.
But seeing that sudden red dot, Xi Heyan realized it wasn’t his imagination.
That long-lost online friend really had co back online.
On the other side, Wen Yuzhi typed for a long ti, roughly explaining that sothing had happened recently, and on top of that his light-brain had suddenly broken and had to be repaired, so he hadn’t been able to reply in ti.
At the end, Wen Yuzhi sent a cat “sorry” sticker.
Xi Heyan looked at the little cat with its paws pressed together, but his eyes snagged on the words: light-brain broke.
His brow furrowed.
As the most important communication tool in the galaxy, light-brains didn’t break easily. And situations that could break one were even rarer.
Unable to help himself, he asked:
[Did sothing happen?]
After sending it, Xi Heyan suddenly realized it might make the other person feel like he was prying into private matters.
So he quickly added:
[If it’s not convenient to say, you don’t have to.]
Wen Yuzhi didn’t think it was inconvenient at all.
He summarized what had happened that night in the council hall in his own words, deliberately blurring the tis, places, and people involved.
So to Xi Heyan, it sounded like: bad guys had broken into their ho, the young master had been rescued by the household staff, but then even more bad guys broke in—and they’d even tried to hurt the young master’s rich dad.
“......”
What kind of bizarre, over-the-top rich-family kidnapping drama was this?
Xi Heyan’s brow knit even tighter.
Wen Yuzhi was utterly calm:
[Don’t worry. My family is really good at fighting.]
Given the Saint Clan’s combat power, saying “really good at fighting” seed fair enough.
Xi Heyan knew that on the black market, bounties targeting rich people were practically endless. A large-scale ho invasion like that was very likely preditated.
He warned:
[Be more careful.]
Wen Yuzhi replied:
[I will. My dad... they got bodyguards.]
Personal guards were basically bodyguards.
That checked out.
And the mont Xi Heyan saw the word “bodyguards,” he thought: so he really is so rich family’s young master.
It looked like that new family treated him pretty well, too. After sothing happened, they were at least willing to assign protection.
On the other side, Wen Yuzhi hesitated. Even though Mansendis and Mond didn’t want him thinking about anything related to ntal energy, he still couldn’t help venting so of the heaviness in his chest to this online friend.
[Do you know about ntal sea collapse?]
When Xi Heyan saw that line, his lips pressed slightly together.
[I do.]
Wen Yuzhi had been trying to figure out who to talk to about this. Seeing Xi Heyan’s reply, he imdiately followed up:
[Then have you seen soone with ntal sea collapse?]
Xi Heyan lowered his gaze and typed two words.
[I’ve seen it.]
Not only had he seen it—he’d watched soone die right in front of him.
[Is there really no saving soone once their ntal sea collapses?]
Wen Yuzhi didn’t know what other races were like. He still held onto a faint hope—maybe other races had a way to treat ntal seas.
But reality was cruel.
Xi Heyan told him:
[Right now, there’s still no way anywhere in the galaxy to treat the ntal sea.]
If there were, Bernard would’ve had himself treated long ago—rather than lying sickly in the palace, unable even to make public appearances.
This rare attendance at the celebration ceremony was probably because if he didn’t show up soon, suspicion would start to rise.
After all, as the empire’s emperor, Bernard could fall ill—but he couldn’t stay ill forever. Otherwise, the nobles eyeing the throne would swarm like hyenas scenting blood, tearing the Hoffmann royal house apart until nothing remained.
A cold glint passed through Xi Heyan’s eyes.
But while chatting with Wen Yuzhi, he didn’t show even the slightest trace of it. He only asked:
[Why are you suddenly curious about this?]
In Xi Heyan’s view, a young master like him should be carefree. Why would he be thinking about ntal sea collapse?
And besides, he’d never brought up anything about ntal energy before.
So... did soone in that new family have a ntal sea problem?
That thought had only just risen in Xi Heyan’s mind when the next ssage arrived:
[My family has symptoms of ntal-energy disorder, so I wanted to understand this stuff.]
Seeing that, Xi Heyan first sent:
[Sorry.]
In any race, symptoms of ntal-energy disorder were serious. It just wasn’t like the Saint Clan, where everyone basically had it. In most races, ntal-sea problems were rare—so Xi Heyan said sorry.
His wording really had been thoughtless.
Thinking that through, Xi Heyan said:
[If you want to learn about ntal energy, I have so materials here. They ntion certain ntal-energy disorder situations. Maybe you can take a look.]
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