A few pieces… that's a hard question to answer. Of course a woman wants more, and she can also use it to gauge the other party's "quality."

But asking for too many is meaningless. An A-level Crystal only goes for a bit over two hundred thousand on the black market; five hundred thousand is really kind of expensive.

Sure, hard currency prices do rise a bit in interstellar space, but she has channels to get Crystals at base price. Buying too many would just make her feel like she's taking a loss.

After a moment of thought, the woman answered, "I don't have many Energy Blocks left. Can I ask where you're heading?"

That was something she hadn't been in a position to ask earlier. The other party had emphasized it was 'on the way'; if she pressed for details, it could come off as doubting him.

Running into each other by chance in interstellar space and actually trusting each other is really not easy. Keeping a sense of proportion is crucial.

"Lanyun Market," Qu Jianlei replied casually. "There's a big fair every ten days there."

"I know Lanyun," the woman answered very straightforwardly. "Can I exchange for Energy Blocks there and pay you then?"

Hearing this, Qu Jianlei sighed inwardly in helplessness again. People with proper, official identities really are different.

And from the sound of it, she's pretty confident about getting enough Energy Blocks, which means the power behind her is probably not small.

Of course, to Qu Jianlei, how big her backing is no longer matters that much.

No matter how big, can it be bigger than the Divine Text Research Association, bigger than the Anomalous Management Division? It probably can't even beat the Cyan Blade Commerce Association, right?

He mulled it over for a moment, then answered in a low voice, "Sure. How many Crystals do you want right now?"

After doing the math, the woman replied, "Let's start with five. If it's not enough, I'll buy more."

Qu Jianlei had only a bit over thirty A-level Crystals on hand—mainly because a few planets still had some buried in them.

Five pieces to him were just drizzle. Ever since he realized he was drifting further and further away from the Superpower System, he hadn't wanted to touch this stuff anymore.

Of course, it was still necessary to keep some for emergencies. "Will five be enough? If not, I can sell you up to ten."

The other side might very well be testing him; he could also use this to flex a bit of strength—and make some money. Why not?

The woman shook her head at that, thinking, Even if I had more money, I wouldn't waste it like that.

"Thanks, five is already enough. The extra two are just for backup anyway."

—Or you could just sell me three. I really wouldn't mind.

The next second, a mechanical arm extended down from the top of the cargo bay, loaded with various medical instruments and medicines, as well as five Crystals.

Qu Jianlei's stance was also crystal clear: you said five, so it's five. Want me to earn less? No way!

The woman didn't fuss about it. She calmly inspected the five Crystals and then took them.

Their little mental back-and-forth never came out in words, but both of them understood it perfectly.

Next, the woman counted her Silver Notes and took out seven million.

Then she said that there were a bit over six million worth of Energy Blocks on her own Starship, and she could only spare three million of that.

"Once we're at Lanyun, I'll hand over these three million, and we can settle the rest all in Energy Blocks then, okay?"

8384 could pull the Energy Blocks from the other Starship right now if they wanted; it wasn't impossible, but it would consume Energy and compressed air.

The woman meant the same thing. Neither side was short of money, so why waste resources?

Mainly, after what just happened, they'd deepened their understanding of each other. The chance of either side reneging had dropped a lot.

Three days later, Lanyun Market.

The weather was uncommonly decent. Wind was only at level five or six, and visibility was relatively good.

A Mecha casually glanced at the sky, then shouted over the intercom channel.

"Holy crap, what am I seeing? A busted-up Starship being towed down by an even more busted Starship."

"I swear on my great-grandma's grave, that back Starship is definitely older than she is!"

There were still two days before the big fair, but plenty of people had already arrived at the market. He was definitely not the only one who liked to gawk.

"Oh? I've never even heard of that class of Starship… shouldn't it be in some antique museum?"

"Damn, it's this Starship. It showed up at a previous big fair. Don't let the junky look fool you—seems to be pretty rich!"

"Am I the only one noticing that the trading ship below is actually a thickened-armor armed firepower platform?"

While the onlookers chattered, the market's administrators had already received the landing request, so they weren't all that surprised.

What puzzled them was, "Wasn't this guy being targeted by the Kitchen Maid? I heard One-Eye even mentioned him twice."

"I wouldn't have remembered if you hadn't said it. Haven't seen the Kitchen Maid around for a while."

"Do you even need to ask? Whenever she pulls off a robbery, she always lays low for a bit afterward… uh, looks like she didn't succeed?"

"I'm afraid it's more than just 'didn't succeed.' She's probably off mining somewhere right now."

"If this guy has that big fellow down there backing him up, the Kitchen Maid probably couldn't beat him, right?"

"If she can't beat him, can't she just run? With that nose of hers, no one's better at running… though, she does like to call in backup too, doesn't she?"

"Hard to say. Anyway, at the very least, we have to re-evaluate this trading ship's combat power."

Under everyone's watchful eyes, the two Starships slowly descended.

There were still two crew members remaining on the heavy-armor Starship; they barely managed to use the batteries to park the ship properly.

Qu Jianlei piloted his own Starship and parked it not far away.

Then the market staff came over to collect the entry fee.

Qu Jianlei still used a mechanical arm to hand over ten thousand silver coins.

The cargo bay door opened and two people walked down into the gale, both wearing spacesuits.

"First get a cold-proof armored vehicle, then you can pay inside the car."

The market management was still quite reasonable in this regard, and immediately called someone to drive over an armored vehicle.

The woman also came down with a helmet on, without any other protection—the helmet was just so she wouldn't be recognized.

After all, having your ride shot up like this, it was hard to save face.

She looked around and couldn't help muttering, "This market really does look pretty bleak."

She didn't deliberately show her Cultivation Level, but the fact she could stand there so casually in minus seventy or eighty degrees was enough to make others respectful. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

Even seasoned B-levels would struggle; she was probably A-level.

A-levels weren't exactly numerous on Lanyun Market, but they weren't rare either. Here, what really spoke was a Starship's firepower.

Most people could also guess these folks were probably crew from that damaged Starship.

However, even if the Starship was damaged, just looking at those ferocious gun ports, you knew how strong it had been before it got wrecked.

In interstellar combat, losing a fight once in a while is perfectly normal. Getting focus-fired or schemed against happens all the time.

The main thing was, just from that loadout, you could tell this wasn't something a small force could own.

The armored vehicle arrived quickly and picked this group up.

Qu Jianlei stopped paying attention to them and stepped onto the trading platform, first listing a materials sheet for power-system modification.

On top of that, he added the materials needed to repair the Starship and Attack Ships.

Then, on the selling side, he listed that he had an Attack Ship for sale—finally, something he could actually offload.

He had no intention of keeping all the Attack Ships. With just him in the fleet, what was he going to do with that many?

Little Lake had timidly objected before, saying Blue Star had this "drone swarm" tactic.

But Qu Jianlei felt that since drone tactics weren't really common in the Imperial sphere, it was better not to stick his head out.

Especially since he had an even stronger reason: "If we don't sell some stuff, who knows what year it'll be before we can afford a large machine."

Not long after Qu Jianlei showed up on the trading platform, someone came to him of their own accord.

It wasn't just anyone; it was people from Sea of Thought Creation, saying they were here to complete the contract for the other computing unit set.

When Qu Jianlei saw them, he felt a bit uncomfortable—Sea of Thought had taken his deposit last time without warning him about the potential threat.

They must have guessed there was risk involved and insisted on that deposit because of it.

That kind of behavior really didn't feel like a business partner. With Sea of Thought's size and connections, were they actually afraid of the Kitchen Maid's group?

But then again, strictly speaking, they had no obligation to warn him.

Same old story: rely on mountains and mountains crumble, rely on people and people run. If you're mixing in society, you still have to rely on your own strength.

Even so, having figured that out didn't mean he was going to be particularly polite to them.

Throughout the whole exchange, his face stayed expressionless.

Once the Sea of Thought people confirmed he'd brought the remaining payment, they didn't say much, just said they'd go fetch the computing unit set now.

Only after they got back did someone say, "The other side's attitude seemed a bit off. Did something happen?"

The Sea of Thought people never felt they were in the wrong for not giving him any warning.

Sea of Thought Creation was powerful, sure, but the Kitchen Maid's bunch were a real pain to deal with too. Why take risks for some company job?

The reason they insisted on taking a deposit was also that, if the other side got screwed, at least they wouldn't take a loss.

After all, temporary assembly of computing units and the shipping back and forth all cost money.

So someone suggested, "Let's settle this order first, then ask if he wants a weapons system."

Turns out they really had contacted relevant Military people and gotten their hands on some cheap second-hand goods.

While they were discussing this, Qu Jianlei piloted an Attack Ship out of the cargo bay and parked it aside as a display.

The main reason was a lack of space. The fifty-million computing unit was already huge, and with its outer packaging, the cargo bay was almost full.

After testing it, Qu Jianlei paid the balance without fuss, planning to use the mechanical arms to repack everything.

After all, on the way back he might run into who-knows-what. Something this valuable could not take a beating.

But then the Sea of Thought Creation people actually asked whether he wanted a weapons system as well. He shook his head and refused without hesitation.

If not for what happened last time, he wouldn't have minded buying some weapons as backup stock.

But their self-preserving behavior had left a really bad taste in his mouth, and Little Lake was also against him buying weapons, so he just wouldn't.

The other side found it a bit strange. "Last time you even gave us a list. It wasn't easy for us to pull strings for this."

Qu Jianlei shot back calmly, "Did I pay you a deposit?"

Intent was still just intent; without a deposit, it naturally didn't count.

The Sea of Thought people were even more surprised. "They're second-hand, yeah, but practically new… and the key thing is, they're cheap."

They'd been thinking about making a big profit, and now the deal was about to fall through. No way they weren't anxious.

When you got down to it, the computing unit set was company business; this new project was their side hustle!

(Updated to here—summoning monthly passes, subscriptions, and recommendation tickets.)