Chapter 243: No Need to Save

It must be said that Anya’s proposal was quite tempting.

New Hope is a giant space station with an excellent location and complete facilities. It would be impossible to say that there wasn’t a bit of ambition for this place; it would be pure pretense.

However, New Hope has a large population, and various companies, organizations, trade caravans, and gangs are intricately intertwined, making the situation dozens or even hundreds of times more complex than Oasis City.

Without the cooperation of “high-prestige locals,” outsiders might be able to conquer it, but managing it well in a short period would be almost impossible!

In contrast, investing was a very good option.

Fewer troublesome matters to worry about, and profits to be gained.

Why not?

In the future, strong and reliable security services would be the capital for Cangyuan to enter the game.

When Lu Yuan realized what he was thinking, he knew that New Hope’s council and official merchant guild were probably doomed.

It wasn't that he had a great feud with them, but simply, he was sorry, they were in the way.

However, despite agreeing with Anya internally, Lu Yuan did not immediately accept.

“This proposal is theoretically acceptable, but before that, we need to fully weigh the subsequent political implications of such a move.”

It's a bit funny to say.

If it weren't for the “reminder” from the envoy from Paradise Island today, he might not have said such words, given the pride brought by two consecutive great victories before.

“For example?”

“For example, the war between Cangyuan and Galan. To be honest, we don’t understand this force very well, so it’s difficult to predict the future direction of the war.”

“Hmm, I can understand your concerns as a leader—”

Anya nodded, zooming in on an area of the star map to show the control range of the Galan Commonwealth.

Star Alliance uniformly defined the midpoint of the line connecting the two giant space stations, New Hope and Paradise Island, as the “Star Alliance Geographical Center.” Then, with the plane where the Milky Way disk is located as the reference plane, the position of the galactic center relative to the Star Alliance Geographical Center was defined as “North,” to facilitate the description of geographical locations.

Under this coordinate system, Li Star is basically located at the easternmost end of the entire Star Alliance space, while the Jialan territory is in the south.

“Galan’s geographical location is very superior,” Anya said, pointing to the star map, “The 44 star systems they control form an independent cluster, with only two star systems having Jump Points facing the outside world. One connects to unexplored interstellar wilderness, and the other connects to one of the Star Alliance’s busiest trade routes.”

“The Jialan have invested heavily in this open star system facing the trade route, building a total of six space fortresses to defend the three Jump Points in the system that lead to the outside world.”

“Each space fortress is equipped with a large number of missiles, carrier-based aircraft, and electromagnetic cannons, with strong firepower, and since the distance between the three Jump Points is not far, the six space fortresses can defend cooperatively.”

“This forms a natural cosmic pass,” Lu Yuan said in a deep voice, “It’s easy to defend, but if the outside wants to break in, it might require several times the military force.”

“Yes, superior geographical conditions are an important reason why Galan can be so arrogant and overbearing.”

Anya said.

“In addition, they are rich in resources, and the number of untouchables, or 5th-level citizens, in their country is very large, with extremely low living standards and labor prices. Therefore, they have gradually formed a general governing policy of selling resources and labor in exchange for advanced weapons and external political support.”

“But these are not the fundamental reasons why Galan is thriving. Galan’s most important advantage lies in the support from the Super Democratic Empire behind them.”

I knew it—

Lu Yuan had actually guessed this point long ago. “With so many forces in the Star Alliance, why does the Super Democratic Empire specifically support Galan?”

He continued to ask.

Anya sighed with a wry smile.

“Executive Officer, what is your evaluation of the Galan Commonwealth?”

Lu Yuan thought and thought, and found it hard to come up with a second evaluation.

“A pile of shit.”

“You are absolutely right! They are a pile of shit! I even think Galan should be classified as a 'negative civilization'. Galan has strong expansionist ambitions, but these ambitions are entirely based on satisfying greedy desires, with no higher pursuit at the civilization level.

The more Galan grows in the Star Alliance, the more the overall strength of the Star Alliance is constrained, and the darker its future becomes. It's a pity that those who support Galan don't seem to recognize this, or they do, but they think they can leave the problems caused by Galan's expansion for future generations to solve.

In short, the Super Democratic Empire hopes to spread this pile of shit further in the Star Alliance by supporting Galan. This is their overall strategy to poison the Star Alliance.”

That's truly disgusting...

Lu Yuan fell into contemplation again.

“Do you think we still have a way to win over or change Galan?”

Anya smiled.

“I advise you to quickly dismiss that idea.”

“Why?”

“Executive Officer, do you understand anything about drug addiction?”

“I understand a little.”

“Hmm, understanding the concept is enough. Currently, we can treat drug addiction symptoms through brain surgery, as long as we don't mind the side effect of intellectual decline. But in ancient times, drug addiction was incurable; once infected, no matter how strong the person's desire to break free from the addiction, or what external treatment they received, that person was ruined.

Getting back to the point, Galan's situation is exactly like this. All of their choices today are actually shaped by their past history, and have long since merged with their national character.”

“History?” Lu Yuan savored the word, “Are you referring to before the Apocalypse?”

Anya: “No! Even earlier, before humanity entered space!”

She picked up her wine glass, moistened her throat, and continued:

“The ancestors of the Jialan came from the legendary human origin planet, Earth. Historically, they were invaded and colonized many times by more powerful civilizations.”

“Of course, according to the research of Scholars, many peoples on Earth were like this, but the Jialan were very ‘unique.’ After continuously experiencing these, they eventually gave up completely and abandoned resistance.”

“The conquered became untouchables, submissive, accepting oppression, no longer engaging in violent resistance, even beautifying cowardice as peace and joy, not being ashamed but proud; the ruling class became high-level citizens, at ease, constantly indulging, constantly escalating, pushing oppressive methods to the extreme—

“Therefore, in Jialan culture, oppressing others and being oppressed by others are very common things, like eating and sleeping, part of daily life. The corresponding national character is greed, shamelessness, a complete lack of responsibility and mission, deep-seated weakness from the soul, and a superficial toughness that covers this weakness.”

“This is the incurable addiction of Galan! It is both their misfortune and their sorrow! During the UEG period, these inferior characteristics in Galan culture were forcibly suppressed and prohibited by the unified government, but with the arrival of the Apocalypse and the demise of the UEG, you know what happened next…”

“In short, while the Super Democratic Empire supports Galan, they also extract huge profits from them. They plunder Galan’s minerals and zero element in large quantities under the guise of development, treating local laborers like slaves.”

“All of this, in our eyes, is no different in essence from colonial rule.”

“Perhaps the Galan government itself realizes this, but they simply don’t care. In the eyes of all Jialan, being colonized does not mean being bullied, nor does it mean eternal damnation; instead, it is a way of investing in a more powerful force, a civilizational ascent and progress.”

Ah, this—

Lu Yuan was hearing such a novel idea for the first time.

You call this investing—I’m impressed, truly impressed!

“In short, in my opinion, the Jialan are completely beyond saving.”

Anya shrugged after her lengthy discourse.

“There were once opponents within their country, especially those against the citizen classification system, but do you know the first thing these opponents did once they gained momentum?”

Lu Yuan shook his head.

“Without exception, they all established new member classification systems within their organizations. Most of the time, these classification systems were even more detailed than the previous 5-level citizen system, sometimes even dividing into a dozen or two dozen levels!”

Impressive!

Lu Yuan was speechless.

It seems that for shit to become shit, it also has to go through a long “digestive” process.

And once it successfully becomes shit, whether in part or in whole, as long as it continues to inherit its country's traditional “feces” culture, it can never return to its original state.

“Therefore, once you understand the national character of Galan, you will realize that when facing a true strong person, no matter how tough they talk, they will absolutely not dare to take the initiative to attack.”

Anya finally said.

“In other words, as long as Cangyuan does not actively expand the war for now, at least in my opinion, Galan will obediently retreat and stay away from the route from New Hope to Li Star, effectively achieving a ceasefire.”

“Later, if you can successfully get Galan to admit defeat, I suggest you secretly negotiate with the Super Democratic Empire beforehand to reach a ceasefire plan acceptable to all three parties, and just have Galan pay a reasonable compensation. Absolutely do not entertain the idea of reforming this giant pile of shit.”

Anya’s words were just her personal opinion, and certainly not to be fully believed.

But it also had to be admitted that the logic was indeed self-contained and had great reference value.

Lu Yuan took a deep breath: “Alright. Assuming Cangyuan doesn’t mind launching offensives against both Galan and Apollo simultaneously, where do you suggest we start?”

“Mr. Sang is currently not in New Hope; he smelled trouble early and ran to Dark Sun headquarters.”

Anya’s lips curled up, showing off her intelligence gathering ability.

“In a few days, as long as you no longer act so aggressively and let the situation cool down a bit, more Apollo high-ranking officials will surely go to follow their boss.”

“As soon as they leave port, I will inform you in time. By then, with Cangyuan’s technical strength, you should be able to track the warp yachts carrying these high-ranking officials without a sound and find Dark Sun’s headquarters.”

The star map provided by Anya marked the secret routes, but lacked the precise coordinates of the Jump Points on these secret routes.

To find the enemy’s true lair, as well as the Ruined Star, this was the only way.