Many corporations are mining resources in the Asteroid Belt, so it's not surprising to see starships here.

Especially crucial is that many starships are armed merchant ships—they need force to protect mining operations, and transport ships must be safe from looting.

Is it rare? It's really not rare at all; resources turn into money quickly and are hard to trace, making them the favorite of most capitalists.

Even now, in the Asteroid Belt of Celestial Blade Star, fighting and killing are not uncommon.

However, small powers generally don't dare to easily involve themselves in the conflicts anymore, only the giants dare to delve in.

The most a small force can do is contract a vein and earn some hard cash.

Since arriving at Celestial Hook, Qu Jianlei has intentionally gathered intelligence here, and with Xiao Hu's help, he knows quite a bit.

He was quite surprised that the Star Thieves chose this place as their base.

Given the current strength the Star Thieves have demonstrated, he feels it's not hard for some large power's protective warships to wipe them out.

So, is this the darkness under the lamp? Qu Jianlei isn't sure if his thoughts are correct.

But he can be certain of one thing, the Star Thieves' jump points are... unusually close to the Asteroid Belt.

Normally, a starship jump is best done away from star bodies, otherwise it may bring uncontrollable risks.

In his many interstellar travels, the starships he rode needed to travel for at least a day and a half before considering jumping.

Likewise, the endpoint of a starship jump should have absolutely no nearby star bodies... maintaining at least a day and a half's travel distance.

But their current jump endpoint is only half a day's journey from the Asteroid Belt.

This means the Star Thieves might have mastered a more advanced or accurate jumping technology.

Realizing this, Qu Jianlei was indeed shocked, could the Star Thieves' technological level surpass the Imperial?

But technology is really hard to pin down; accumulation is the foundation, yet occasionally mutations are permitted.

Half a day later, three starships landed on an asteroid.

This asteroid isn't small, with a diameter exceeding five hundred kilometers.

The planetary phenomena around the asteroid are exceptionally complex, with many unknown sources of radiation that can cause cognitive chaos in ordinary people. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

Qu Jianlei analyzed and concluded that such an environment can be considered to possess hallucinatory capabilities.

After the starship passed through the complex phenomena and entered the asteroid, it was confirmed that the natural environment on the asteroid was terrible.

The weather is freezing with cosmic radiation rampant, especially crucial is that the asteroid doesn't even have an atmosphere.

"Minus over two hundred degrees, doesn't seem that cold," Qu Jianlei released his perception.

"That's because you're powerful," Xiao Hu replied leisurely, "In minus over two hundred degrees, I would need to preheat before starting."

But to be honest, the asteroid chosen by the Star Thieves has its merits.

The rocks of the planet have a high oxygen content, which is sufficient, and due to complex phenomena, there aren't many minerals, so no one cares about it.

The asteroid lacks water, but that's no matter; there are many Awakened with Water Attributes among the Star Thieves.

Certainly, relative to the number of Star Thieves, Awakened with Water Attributes are still few, but... can't they be recycled?

The three warships descended onto a wide crevice, and a large door on the crevice's stone wall rose slowly.

This door was over a hundred meters tall and more than three hundred meters wide, rising at a decently fast speed.

Seeing the large hydraulic columns on either side of the door and the slanting traction cables, Qu Jianlei couldn't help but nod secretly.

Such magnificent engineering isn't much in the Imperial, but for the Star Thieves to create this, it's clearly not a shadowy settlement.

After entering the gate, the inside had its own hidden charm, quite spacious, with a bit of the Celestial Blade Star Underground City's feel.

Qu Jianlei leaned on the alloy walking stick as he walked down the gangway, looking around for quite a while before a C-level Warrior, with two others, approached him.

"Are you Tesla? Follow me!"

Unusually, the Star Thieves also had security checkpoints; even Qu Jianlei's alloy walking stick was thoroughly inspected.

But Xiao Hu had already infiltrated the opponent's network, and the void in the walking stick went unnoticed.

Qu Jianlei's Spiritual Power can influence the Star Thieves, but the two were concerned that some judgments might be completed automatically by the control system.

So they directly let Xiao Hu intervene, saving labor and worry.

After passing the security checkpoint, the C-level Warrior handed Qu Jianlei over to a scar-faced man and turned away.

The scar-faced man was a Modified Warrior, covered in pits and bumps, looking quite intimidating.

This person's aura carried deep hostility, didn't speak much, and drove an electric scooter to take Qu Jianlei away.

After a while, Qu Jianlei found he indeed overestimated the Star Thieves; the road became increasingly narrow.

However, being able to walk two to three kilometers suggests there are quite a few residents, so he asked, "How many people are here?"

The scar-face answered sullenly, "About eighty thousand."

Qu Jianlei clicked his tongue secretly, the Star Thieves aren't small in scale.

The key is their capability; they've dug out such a large Underground City and have sufficient power for lighting.

Before long, the scar-face brought him to a large courtyard—a skyless courtyard.

This is the maintenance department of the Star Thieves, and the scar-face gave him an access card, indicating from now on, you'd tag along with me.

Qu Jianlei was assigned to a four-person room, but at least it had an independent bathroom.

There were originally two people in the room for four, an old man and a middle-aged man, both ordinary people.

The middle-aged man was cold and didn't like to talk, while the old man was relatively more enthusiastic, especially after he found out Tesla was a Modified Warrior.

What's the big deal with a lame leg? The strength of a Modified Warrior is still greater than that of ordinary people.

Qu Jianlei was also not as indifferent as he was on the Starship, and made some small talk with the old man.

After all, he was more interested in the situation with the Star Thieves, but he didn't want to waste too much time.

When the old man learned that the other party was brought from the Starship, he actually took the initiative to offer comfort, because he was also a Maintenance Master who was captured.

However, he had a very poor opinion of the Imperial, muttering a lot of bad things, and found the Star Thieves to be relatively more human.

Qu Jianlei couldn't listen any longer, "I just came, why don't you introduce the situation here to me?"

The old man was quite enthusiastic and very willing to explain to the new colleague.

The number of Star Thieves was slightly less than eighty thousand, but nearly half of them were Star Thief family members.

In other words, the number of Star Thieves was about fifty thousand.

On Blue Star, such a force would be enough to overthrow the government of a small to medium-sized country.

But the old man didn't think this group of Star Thieves was very strong, mainly because the Imperial was just too large.

Qu Jianlei thought about it and realized it made sense.

For example, the Wagner Group on Blue Star had a large number of people, all of whom were desperados, but what could they amount to in the frictions of a major country?

So this group of Star Thieves' scale was at best middling, neither too strong nor too weak.

Then the old man mentioned that this Star Thief group had at least four A-levels and more than a dozen B-levels.

If you calculate it like this, are the probabilities of an A-level and B-level in the Star Thief group far higher than in the Imperial?

Statistically, yes. Without ten thousand people, it's almost impossible to produce an A-level.

But Qu Jianlei didn't think so. What are Star Thieves? A group of vicious bandits!

To be a successful thug is not easy. You have to be ruthless, not too stupid, and have a bit of luck.

There's a saying in the Divine Land that most criminals in prison are smarter than ordinary people.

If they weren't so smart, they generally wouldn't commit serious crimes.

As for luck, that's even more important; there's a strong survivor bias in being a Star Thief.

Star Thieves without enough strength or bad luck are long dead and buried by the roadside.

So he asked, "With such a large scale, isn't there a Supreme to protect them?"

"Of course there's a Supreme," the old man answered matter-of-factly, "Otherwise, how could they sustain such a large operation?"

At this moment, the middle-aged man spoke coldly, "If you don't want to die, stop discussing this topic."

Qu Jianlei sneered, "I need to figure these things out to cultivate a sense of belonging, right?"

His time was too valuable to waste chit-chatting with these people.

"A sense of belonging..." the middle-aged man glanced at him indifferently and said no more.

The old man, however, shook his head, "Forget it, let's not talk about it... This one voluntarily defected, has a good relationship with those above."

Voluntarily defected to the Star Thieves? Qu Jianlei looked at the middle-aged man strangely, a plant for the Star Thieves in the maintenance department?

In that case, some things couldn't be inquired about, "I'm new. Can I leave the yard for a walk?"

The old man nodded, "You can walk, but with your leg... never mind, I'll accompany you for a stroll."

This place was essentially an isolated outpost in space, and even if the Star Thieves didn't trust newcomers, they weren't worried about them escaping.

The maintenance department was still very busy. The next day, Qu Jianlei was sent to check the ventilation system.

His work efficiency was recognized by the Star Thieves, and when he returned to the yard, even the scar-faced man's attitude was a bit friendlier.

In the blink of an eye, Qu Jianlei had been in the Star Thief Nest for five days, and because of his dedication, no one usually paid attention to his in and out.

Through careful Perception and the cooperation of the small lake, he roughly figured out the situation here.

Indeed, there was a Supreme among the Star Thieves, but he wasn't sure of the name, and this person was currently not in the nest.

Qu Jianlei originally wanted to act after this person returned, thinking that a Supreme would have more valuable items.

Nonetheless, on the sixth day, while repairing a mining vehicle, he received a temporary notification to fix a circulating water pump.

This water pump was very close to the power center, specially for cooling it.

This was the opportunity! Perfect for him to vanish quietly in this identity.

With such a large nest, the power center wouldn't be small, heavily guarded, and was even two systems.

But that was not a problem for the small lake. While Qu Jianlei was repairing the water pump, it issued a series of erroneous commands.

"The tide has started and is projected to detonate violently in twenty seconds."

In the control room of the power center, piercing alarms rang incessantly.

The faces of the three on-duty Star Thieves were ashen as they hurriedly inputted various commands, "Damn, the equipment is reacting too slowly!"

(To be continued, requesting monthly tickets, subscription, and recommendation tickets.)