Nobody in the B1313 pit had ever imagined that Wuchang would dare raise a hand against the Guard captain. By any sane reckoning, when Ye Tian throws a punch at you, you just take it — what possessed the man to hit back?
Dirty old Lane especially could not make sense of it. Not long ago Pike had radioed them that Wuchang was surrounded by a pack of thugs and couldn't fight back — so how had that same Wuchang just turned into a tiger?
Boss Pan was struck dumb as well. He had a whole bellyful of fine words saved up to smooth things over for Wuchang, and now he couldn't get out a single one. All he could do was curse inwardly:
You stupid boy — you don't even have an identity, and with a crystal like this surfacing, this was your one chance to cozy up to the powerful, and you go and start throwing punches?
As for Coyote Seven, he watched Wuchang's outburst with cold eyes, sneering to himself. His bitterness over losing the crystal had been swept clean away; now he simply stood to one side, waiting for Ye Tian to deal with Wuchang.
Sure enough, the moment Ye Tian locked Wuchang up and pinned him across an ore cart, Seven was the first to jump up. "Well done! Captain Ye, what skill! On all of Huang'e you're the finest fighter, and no one can say otherwise."
Seven's flattery wasn't misplaced. Ye Tian really was the finest fighter on Huang'e — otherwise he could never have become Guard captain, second only to the Governor himself.
"The little brat doesn't know what's good for him. Captain Ye only meant to teach him a lesson, and he dares to hit back — he truly has no idea how high the sky is..." Seven wanted to keep fanning the flames, but Boss Pan beside him would have none of it and hurried to speak.
"Captain Ye, your methods are far above his. A miner, however talented, could never be your match. I beg you, for the sake of that crystal, to let him off this once."
Ye Tian twisted his head and thought it over carefully, then suddenly smiled at Boss Pan. "What did you think I was going to do to him? I only wanted to test his level." With that he let go and shoved, sending Wuchang down onto the ground.
Ye Tian looked around at the several hundred miners, straightened his uniform, cleared his throat, and spoke.
"I'm afraid every one of you has forgotten the law of Huang'e clean. The business from a dozen-odd years ago, you probably don't remember at all. So let me remind you: any rainbow crystal of main-force-warship grade, from the very instant it leaves the rock, is under the protection of the Huang'e Governor's Office."
"Not only the crystal — the miner who extracted it enjoys the same protection. Anyone suspected of damaging a crystal will face the merciless sanctions of the law..." Here Ye Tian glanced at Coyote Seven and said, his voice low,
"I don't care what excuse you have. Anyone who puts a crystal's safety at risk is our enemy."
Ye Tian's icy tone sent a chill down Seven's spine. The Coyote who had been so cocky a moment ago now hung his head and kept his eyes low, like a stray dog that had lost its home.
Wuchang had no idea what case Ye Tian was referring to, nor what outrage from years ago had made Huang'e write such a strange law. One thing was certain, though: Boss Pan and the Guard captain had both brought up main-force interstellar warships again and again, so the warship had to be the key.
Wuchang had guessed right. To any star ring, a main-force interstellar warship was the king of war. A single warship was a city, even an ecosystem. It was not merely the lead actor on the battlefield; it was humanity's last Noah's Ark — several times, in events that destroyed whole civilizations, it had been the main-force warships that carried out the final rescue.
It was precisely because these warships were so extraordinary that every star ring took their number as the sole measure of military strength. Very often, war came down to a simple problem of addition and subtraction.
Ye Tian had no interest in giving these filthy miners a history lesson. He simply repeated, over and over, the importance of the law and its sacred, inviolable standing, and vehemently condemned the despicable robbery Seven had attempted.
"Seven, your actions endangered the crystal's safety. No actual harm was done, but the possibility alone violated the law. As an enforcer of the law, I sentence you to a fine of four thousand gold coins. Do you accept the penalty?"
Coyote Seven was no fool. Ye Tian's question was pure formality; he knew that if he dared say a single word against it, a private cell in the fire prison by the lava river was waiting for him.
Seven turned and whispered a couple of words to Blood Rose, then bowed his head to Ye Tian. "I accept the fine. I absolutely accept it. I was blind, and I broke the law. Whatever sentence the captain hands down, I'll take it..."
Ye Tian nodded in satisfaction, turned to look at Wuchang, frowned in thought for a while, and then suddenly spoke. "Your name is Wuchang? You've handed me a real problem here..."
Wuchang opened his mouth to speak, but dirty old Lane, crouched beside him, yanked furiously at the corner of his clothes. Where the old man found the strength, nobody knew — he actually hauled the big, tall Wuchang down onto the ground and made him squat there with him.
One corner of Ye Tian's mouth lifted. There was no way he failed to see through the old man's little trick, but the lofty Guard captain disdained to stoop to a miner's level. He mused only a short moment before speaking.
"By rights, bringing out a rainbow crystal of such high standard should make your merit enormous. At the very least you deserve a commendation from the Governor — a house of your own in Huang'e City, even. But..."
Ye Tian paused. "But your identity is unclear. Here on Huang'e, stowaways with no identity like you are not welcome — there are plenty of them locked up in the fire prison. Tsk, tsk, tsk. A hard one to handle. Very hard..."
Wuchang sighed inwardly. So I couldn't dodge it after all. The identity landmine has finally gone off. What do I do now? Go quietly and be arrested, or bolt south into the territory they say belongs to cannibals?
Just as he was agonizing over it, dirty old Lane spoke up beside him. "Respected Captain Ye, you are the law enforcer of Huang'e, and your rigor with the law truly commands our respect. We have no objection whatsoever to any judgment of yours."
"But please do consider this, Captain: our Huang'e has not produced a main-force-warship-grade crystal in three years. I imagine the great Emperor in Ten Thousand Steeds Fortress on Three Seas Star has been worrying for three whole years now. The Hunter Star Ring has been circling us the entire time, and we have added not one main-force warship in three years. It is truly heartbreaking."
"In light of this, to ease our great Emperor's worries, I suggest that the captain take into account the inspiration this crystal's discovery will provide, and let the whole of Huang'e City feel the Governor's benevolent rule. I am certain it will set off a great surge in mining."
"Long live the Horsehead Star Ring! Long live our revered Emperor..."
"Long live! Long live! Long live!" The moment the old man mentioned the Emperor on Three Seas Star, Guard captain Ye Tian had snapped to attention and begun straightening his uniform, and the soldiers behind him had all drawn themselves upright in their land vehicles, their faces exceptionally solemn.
Once the cry of "Long live!" went up, this pack of fanatical soldiers shouted along, and they swept several hundred miners around them into cheering with them.
Dirty old Lane's few words had struck Ye Tian exactly on his weak spot. No one dared show the sovereign the slightest disrespect — even here, three space-fold jumps away from the capital star ring.
Looking at the fanatical soldiers, the old man knew his bet had paid off. He had elevated the small matter of Wuchang digging out a crystal into a grand affair bound up with the Emperor's cause, and that had backed Captain Ye into a corner. If he really dared to punish Wuchang, then he had no wish to ease the Emperor's worries — and that made him a traitor.
Sure enough, after four or five rounds of "Long live!", Ye Tian stood gravely before Wuchang and said,
"Although your identity is unknown, you have extracted a rainbow crystal that the Empire urgently needs. Your merit offsets your fault, and I have decided to grant you amnesty. But you will receive no reward from the Governor, and as for that crystal of yours, on behalf of the authorities, I intend to buy it at the price of eighty rainbow coins."
A buzz of discussion swept through the crowd: eighty rainbow coins — a full eight thousand gold coins. Enough to buy a small villa in Huang'e City, or to wash your hands of the pits for good and live out your days comfortably on some easygoing mortal star.
But what the crowd was discussing today was not how much money that was — it was how little. A crystal nineteen centimeters long, for a main-force interstellar warship! On the black market it would fetch at least two hundred rainbow coins, and that was the black market right here on Huang'e. Ship it to another planet and the price would at least double again.
This Ye Tian truly had a black heart, cutting the price straight down to forty percent.
Wuchang heard every word of the crowd's talk, but he had no mind to spare for counting coins. Keep his life and still come away with a hefty sum? He was more than satisfied.
"Thank you for the captain's mercy. I am willing to sell the crystal to the authorities for eighty rainbow coins."
At those words Ye Tian was pleased, and old Lane was pleased too. It wasn't the perfect ending, but it was acceptable. Heaven is big, earth is big, but keeping your life is the biggest thing of all.
Just then Blood Rose came running up from the Ration Center, out of breath, a leather pouch clutched in her hand. Without a word she shoved the bag at Coyote Seven — no need to guess what was in it: the fine.
Four thousand gold coins came to forty rainbow coins, but the bag looked stuffed and bulging — not like it held so little. Sure enough, when Ye Tian opened it and counted, there were fifty rainbow coins inside.
"Damn you — you dare bribe me?" Ye Tian lunged and slapped Seven hard with both hands, left and right, knocking his breathing mask clean off and leaving his mouth full of blood.
"What is the meaning of these ten rainbow coins? Do you think I'm squeezing you for a bribe in disguise? Are you insulting my noble name? You dare bribe a member of the imperial clan?"
He cursed and he struck, and Seven was beaten to his knees, spitting gouts of blood.
"I was wrong, I was wrong! That good-for-nothing woman took the wrong one — I never meant to bribe you, I swear!"
Blood Rose was dumbstruck too. She dropped to her knees and hugged Ye Tian's leg, smiling ingratiatingly. "Captain, calm yourself, it was me, I grabbed the wrong one, my eyes are bad and I didn't look carefully. If you want to punish someone, punish me." And with that she rubbed her ample chest against Ye Tian's leg.
Ye Tian was furious. You dare come on to me in front of all these people? With a face like that, are you deliberately trying to make me sick? He was angry enough to arrest someone on the spot.
But just then a large business land vehicle drove up from the north, and a voice came from its pitch-black cabin.
"Well now, Brother Ye, what's with all this temper? Why waste your anger on these dirty rats?"
Seven burst into tears at the sound. "Supervisor Roda, sir, please put in a word for me! I really did just misread it, I truly had no thought of bribing anyone..."
Over Seven's sobbing, a round, roly-poly fat man stepped out of the land vehicle, wreathed in smiles.
"Brother Ye, in this hellish black-snow weather a man ought to go have a drink, and here you are quarreling with a bunch of dirty rats. Not worth it. Really not worth it..."
"Ah ha ha, so this is the miner called Wuchang? Good lad — his luck is fucking unreal. Here, take it — this is your eighty rainbow coins..."
"Where's my secretary? Get over here and film this for us — next time the Three Seas Post comes out, Huang'e is going to make the front page..."
Smiling Roda the mine supervisor turned the stifling atmosphere light in an instant, and the clouds that had filled the sky scattered all at once.