After seeing the astronaut off, Xi Yujin stared at the black and gold invitation on the table and fell into silence.
Ganuo confirmed that there were no suspicious objects around the Chaoping and thought that there was something wrong with the invitation letter. When he was about to ask, he saw Xi Yujin's hair was trembling slightly.
Then the Tide Flat roared with the last embers' cheer:
"Great! It's the black market! Haha! What's the point of coming to the universe without going to the black market once!"
Gano: Okay.
"Gano, let's go." Xi Yujin regained his rationality after being excited. "No, we should change our disguise. Should I dye my hair green? I should have a personality with green hair..." He pondered for a moment and looked through the invitation letter carefully. It said "Representatives of Blue Star Civilization". So this black market was not the mysterious market as he thought, but a gathering of a small circle. He would not be looked down upon if he went there with an official identity.
Xi Yujin improved his disguise, picked up the invitation letter, and took Ganuo with him out of habit. Not only for translation, but also because he wanted to go on a space adventure with his partner. Ganuo didn't feel like he was working, but that he was encountering different things with Yujinnuo. These things he would never know in the Zerg. Looking at Xi Yujin's happy profile, he suddenly realized that the feeling in his heart was called expectation... looking forward to meeting a different future with Yujinnuo.
According to the invitation letter, each pilot ship had been jumping between various galaxies before it collapsed, so it did not obey the rules of any galaxy and was a well-known no-man's land.
In order to maintain the operation of the leading ship, a "black market" for trading unethical goods came into being. The "black market" is also divided into levels, and you need to spend a certain amount of money and pass the civilization assessment of the ship staff to enter the special part of the "black market".
This time, the crew of the ship was probably frightened. It was unheard of to develop advanced text derivatives during the journey, so they quickly made up for it and let Blue Star come in directly through the special channel. This was a compensation and also an observation.
Xi Yujin and Ganuo went through the gravity channel together and arrived at the group of spaceships where the black market was located.
These large spaceships were grey and inconspicuous, blending in with the various alien spacecrafts. Each spaceship seemed to have a different function in the black market. Xi Yujin observed carefully and entered from an entrance with a larger flow of traffic.
He showed the invitation letter and the tall guard opened a door.
Walking in, there is a disinfectant spray channel, and then a heavy lead-gray mechanical round door opens up, and suddenly it is a gymnasium-sized hall with gradient blue spotlights standing on the edge. Colorful goods float in the green magnetic device, with rose-red price tags hanging below. Bright and plump alien creatures come and go, speaking a rustling language, and the hall seems to be buzzing with mosquitoes.
"Capturing waveforms..." Ganuo's King of Ers also followed in disguise. He was an assassination expert, so collecting information was a piece of cake. "13 creatures were found mentioning 'Blue Star'. Maintain level 3 alert. Please don't stay too far away from me, Emberno."
Xi Yujin has always cherished his life and listened to the advice very much: "I absolutely won't do that!"
Nothing can separate them!
Some seeds of association in Gano broke through the ground, and for some reason he didn't dare to look at the ashes.
The two walked forward along the bright yellow sign on the ground in the hall, with rows of green magnetic devices on both sides. From the aliens' language, it can be understood that this is a primary black market, where the rules are that sellers and buyers complete transactions face to face, and there is no after-sales service. If you want to find more advanced products or conduct contactless transactions, you can go to a more advanced black market.
Ganuo asked them if they wanted to go to the high-end black market, and Xi Yujin quickly refused.
The essence of shopping in the black market is to shop at street stalls and auctions!
Xi Yujin stopped at every stall to take a look. The sellers came forward to introduce their products to him.
"Hello, distinguished guest. This is a portable weapon from the old days, the SW7001 lightsaber. It has been discontinued, but look at its appearance. The shell is made of high-quality basalt from the Suye galaxy. The ancient patterns on the hilt are clearly visible, and the year identification is clear. It is very collectible. It only costs 200,000 dust sands or 2 ship coins."
Lightsaber!
Xi Yujin's eyes lit up.
"Hello, distinguished guest. If you want to try the fun of being a star pirate, why not buy this set of star-capturing gravitational energy particle generator core? It uses the classic technology of the Rush Galaxy, which is smaller and more powerful!"
Uh... Pirate suit?
"Hello, distinguished guest. This is a physical book from our galaxy. It is not authorized to be sold anywhere else and is the only copy in any galaxy. The dust and sand in this physical book set are of high quality and the decorative art is excellent. Would you like to take a look? It is restricted to adult creatures!"
Ah...ah?
Xi Yujin also saw a set of 12-meter cool exoskeleton, equipped with cold weapons and suspended satellite hand cannons, and the exoskeleton can be adjusted according to the size of the user. His heartbeat accelerated and he fell in love at first sight, but when he saw the price, his heart sank. It actually cost six million dust sands!
He made a fortune in the Pangshi Galaxy, but his assets today are barely over a million.
"But... only 10 ship coins?"
Xi Yujin noticed that there was another currency circulating in the black market, Ship Coin. This was made by the giant ship to facilitate bartering, and it was even rarer and not interchangeable with Dust Sand. The seller's price was entirely up to his own will. The price of the product might be hundreds of millions of Dust Sand, but he would sell it for 600 Ship Coins.
They spent quite a while browsing the primary black market. Xi Yujin completely gave up the idea of buying street goods, because he wanted to buy every item, and every item looked like a bargain waiting for him to find it. In the end, he only bought a high-tech cooking set. He missed the dishes on Earth a little bit, so he would write a food travel journal when he returned.
"But can I make my own physical books and sell them here?"
Xi Yujin thought carefully and still hadn't given up on the exoskeleton suit that cost 10 ship coins.
"Is this considered stealing from the company? But I still have the copyright..."
With Xi Yujin talking all the way, the two came to the intermediate black market. It was quieter here, and the goods were more widely distributed. There were strange prismatic rune tablets, which were said to be the cultural product of a race with extremely developed spiritual power. There were cryogenic flight cabins, whose power source was the magnetotrophic creatures in the energy tank, which could perform abnormal navigation. There was a broken dynamic model of a certain star field, but I didn't know what it was used for.
Xi Yujin continued to read the introduction of each product and figured out some patterns:
The goods sold in the intermediate black market are closer to the "core of the race's civilization", such as core technology and core military maps. Basically, only creatures of this race are capable of selling them.
What are the consequences of selling the race core, and what mood those creatures were in when they sold it, is unknown...
The dust and sand prices of the goods here were ridiculously expensive, so Xi Yujin and Ganuo did not stay for too long and went to the next spaceship exhibition hall. The guard looked at their invitation letter and let them pass.
The lighting in the next spaceship exhibition hall was even darker, as if it was deliberately creating a gloomy atmosphere. There were no longer product display tables here, but private small rooms, which were private places for negotiating transactions. There were two doors at the end of the exhibition hall. One led to the "game venue", and the cheers and screams inside were almost unbearable. Xi Yujin thought of some of the bad cultures on Earth and didn't want to go in. The other door led to the "auction".
A creature with six eyes hung down from the top of the door frame and said in a sweet voice, "You are most welcome, our special guest! You have been hanging around in the black market, and you have really kept us waiting."
Ganuo looked at Xi Yujin. Xi Yujin was not at all disappointed, and asked back: "Can't you wait even a little longer?"
The six-eyed creature sneered and welcomed Xi Yujin and Ganuo in.
The auction hall was smaller than the other exhibition halls, and was surrounded by a circle of wide stairs without escalators. Groups of creatures walked or stood on the stairs, looking at the huge merchandise in the center. Their camps were clearly divided, and only creatures with the same characteristics stood together. Everyone seemed to not care about the privacy of the transactions, but felt that it was an honor for their race to show up here. Many creatures saw Xi Yujin and Ganuo passing by, and even if they didn't know them, they would nod and say hello, thinking that it was a respect for the same level of civilization.
Xi Yujin also recognized several diplomats he had seen in the Peace Hall. The business here was too big, and the official team of the race had to come forward. It was rare for two people like Lan Xing to travel together.
Xi Yujin walked up the stairs, pretending to look casually at the goods in the center of the auction, curious about what was worth all the effort. After seeing what it was, he was obviously stunned.
The 20-meter-long cube container is filled with an off-white suspension, bubbling. Several bright white eggs are leaning against the edge of the glass, shaking occasionally, as if responding to the outside world. One of the eggs has cute spots on it, like a round heart.
The staff's voices were transmitted to every corner through the loudspeakers.
“Introducing once again the highlight of our auction… the unnamed race from the unnamed 3532ER star system.
There are eight families here, and the surviving members of each family have unique gene sequences, which is convenient for subsequent breeding... and the gene sequences are 0.1% similar to the Zerg, proving that they can accommodate a very wide range of mutations. Each civilization can add different genes according to its needs...
In terms of technology, they can use tools other than their own to build large residential cities, public welfare hospitals, collective schools, and light leisure places... In terms of intelligence, they can talk and make three syllables: "Alas", "Eh", and "Hush". They have formed three levels of intelligence based on the length and order of the syllables. Their vocabulary is about 5,000 and they have abstract thinking. In terms of art, they have the art of shell placement and also have a tendency to go to the light... In terms of morality, they pay attention to family members and usually travel as a family unit. Please be careful not to separate them when raising them...
When our seller found them, a terrible magma was engulfing their world. But for us, everything is so easy to solve. Is there any advanced civilization willing to raise this new civilization now? "
The advanced alien civilizations whispered to each other and seemed to think that this new civilization was not very valuable.
The auctioneers then displayed the art of the civilization they found. This unnamed species is an amphibious creature that holds calcium carbonate compounds in its mouth and arranges them into different shapes on the beach. Because this behavior is judged to be not beneficial to reproduction and is only for the pleasure of the individual, it is considered an artistic expression.
The auctioneer tried to prove that this was a civilization worth saving, and then shouted: "We want to display the morality of advanced civilization!"
"But it's too weak and can't dig holes. We hope to have some help in mining..."
"Advanced civilization is immoral."
"The civilization level of this species is still too low. It will take a long time to cultivate. It's easy to shoot itself in the foot."
The races on the stairs responded one after another.
Xi Yujin walked to an open space, leaned against the wall, and looked at this unnamed race that was urgently waiting to be sold, and was speechless for a moment.
It turns out that the core transaction in the black market is the buying and selling of civilization.
There is no distinction between superior and inferior civilizations until two different civilizations come into contact across the vast universe, and from then on the two ends of the scale are determined.
The lower civilizations cannot refuse whether the higher civilizations rob, invade, transform, assist, educate, or just pass by.
When two advanced civilizations meet, how do they judge the strength of each other?
Advanced civilizations have invented an efficient competition method, comparing the number and level of civilizations nurtured by both sides, thereby distinguishing the more advanced civilizations. This method spreads like wildfire in the universe.
At that time, it was difficult for civilizations to meet each other. They could only understand each other's information through electromagnetic waves. Everything was dark. In order to quickly stand on the top at the moment of meeting, and to stand on the top again in the next meeting, civilizations started an arms race in the air, lowering the moral bottom line towards different species again and again.
This was the period of "violent colonization" of the universe.
On the wide staircase, Xi Yujin watched the egg tremble and couldn't help but shudder. From the perspective of this unnamed race, what role do these advanced civilizations play today? Does it know that its race is being sold at a marked price in the auction hall?
Xi Yujin thought of Ketuerte. They were still worried about their official novelist and couldn't even get an invitation to this auction hall. Would they know that the same thing happened in this auction hall as in their history? Maybe they knew, but they just pretended not to know.
"Ember Nuo..."
Ganuo has been standing beside Xi Yujin.
Xi Yujin adjusted his expression. He guessed that as a member of an advanced civilization, it was strange for him to sympathize with commodities, and Ganuo might find it difficult to understand.
But unexpectedly, Ganuo asked directly: "Are you sad for them?"
Xi Yujin looked at him. They had similar faces and seemed to be the same kind in the cold universe. Xi Yujin quietly released a little of his soul that did not belong to this universe. He said, "Books are the ladder of human progress. We have read so many books, so of course we will feel pain for a civilization that has lost its freedom."
Gano thought for a moment and replied, "I think Emberno is right."
Xi Yujin felt relieved to have found a kindred spirit. In the beginning, Ganuo was willing to save a planet that he had never seen before, perhaps implying that some of their ideas were compatible.
Although one thinks imprisonment is normal, the other is addicted to schizophrenia.
But in this auction hall surrounded by stairs, their unnoticed corner is a camp.
Xi Yujin thought of the history after "violent colonization".
——As lower-level civilizations enslave lower-level civilizations and higher-level civilizations incarnate into higher-level civilizations, the civilization hierarchy of the universe seems to have been finalized, but this pyramid hierarchy is as precarious as a Ponzi scheme. At a certain point in time, the civilization that considered itself the most advanced discovered two alien species in the universe, the intelligent machine race and the insect race. These two races stepped onto the stage of the universe, and the most advanced civilization was instantly extinct.
It was also from here that mental confusion became increasingly serious, countless advanced civilizations spontaneously collapsed, and novelists became a cure, but were also tragically wiped out.
In the chaos, cosmic creatures for the first time figured out a relatively correct model of the universe - dunes.
The creatures ushered in a false peace because of their common fear of the vast universe.
At this point, the remaining civilization entered the "Dune Universe" period, and the cosmic creatures began a journey from which there would be no return...
…
Compared to today, the morality of the universe is actually slowly rising. At least the behavior of raising civilizations can only be seen in the black market now, and the advanced civilizations who are proud of raising low-level races can only show their darkness on the huge ship that cannot be governed, in this auction hall that is smaller than the Tide Level.
“Perhaps I can do more than just live well…” Xi Yujin thought, “Perhaps the Blue Star civilization has other meanings for its existence…”
"Gano, let's go back."
Xi Yujin didn't want to stay in this black market. He felt helpless and urgent. He had to go back to improve the power of Blue Star. Both the official novelists and freelance novelists of Blue Star had to be well organized. The truth was within the range of the literary cannon.
But a loud voice called him:
"Hello, are you the Blue Star diplomats? There are only two of us?"
Xi Yujin felt several scrutinizing gazes coming from all directions, as if trying to look down on him from the other end of the scale.
The fact that they came to this auction made it clear what they were thinking. The ship that sent out the invitation was also not clean.
An alien creature walked out of the queue and said, "I heard that you are also an advanced civilization, but after chatting for a while, it seems that we have not heard much about the deeds of Blue Star. The races here can almost be traced back to the period of contact with civilization. The low-level races we raised at the beginning have become independent civilizations with our help, and many of them still have a deep friendship with us.
And Blue Star... is really mysterious."
Xi Yujin stopped Ganuo and said, "We rarely communicate with foreign civilizations."
More eyes were shining on Xi Yujin like searchlights, making him more conspicuous than the goods in the exhibition hall. The alien creature pressed on: "Is there anything on Blue Star that needs to be auctioned? Since we are here at the auction house, why not let us see it for ourselves?"
"We don't need to auction our civilization core, but we don't mind everyone paying a high price to grab the right to browse our ancient books." Xi Yujin continued, "After all, our Blue Star has been a civilization that has never been cut off since the 'isolated planet' period."
As soon as these words were spoken, all the creatures were in an uproar.
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