Chapter 216, This Mom Still Needs It
Gu Hang's visit to Nuxiaoxing really put her in a passive position.
I was originally planning to seize the position of the family head, but in the end the intended family head himself was gone.
But his performance on the Angry Owl Star brought a turning point in the situation.
Gu Hang's outstanding performance on Angry Owl Star not only saved Wang Qi several million dollars needed to fill the gap in imperial taxes, but more importantly, it enabled Gu Hang to establish his own industry.
Does the Gu family not want to own their own planet? Of course not. But it is very difficult to get a planet of your own, especially a world with positive assets.
But they don't want a wasteland world like the Wrathful Owl Star. The initial construction cost is too high, the cost recovery period is quite long, and there may be many risks in the process.
For example, Gu Hang had encountered the greenskin disaster and the demon cult invasion in the past year and a half. Any of these two risk points, if encountered by the people who were normally redeveloping the Angry Owl Star, would be a disaster, and the high investment would be wasted.
Moreover, the biggest problem in seeking an unreliable planetary governor is that you cannot easily admit your losses and leave. If other investments fail, you just lose them; but if you fail in investing in a planet, the Imperial Tax Department will not care so much. You must pay the Imperial taxes you are supposed to pay, not a penny less, and you must continue to pay them in the future.
It is precisely because of this that Gu Hang’s performance over the past year has been so surprising.
Although not many people knew about it because the Angry Owl Star was too secluded and the information was not well circulated, the upper class of the Flying Wing Star still regarded Gu Hang's appointment as the planetary governor as a joke. However, some people with ulterior motives saw it clearly.
The people of the Gu family are, of course, such people with a good heart.
Because of Gu Hang's nonsense, Wang Qi's allies began to strongly question her plan. The most serious ones were a little out of Wang Qi's control. Even if Wang Qi had some remedial measures, they would still worry whether supporting such a family head could actually increase everyone's interests.
But Gu Hang's performance calmed down their concerns, anger, and indecision.
In the past, he was considered a loser who was a small waste and a burden to his mother, but now he has transformed himself into a planetary governor. Moreover, he has made his career on that wasteland planet very successful without any support from his family.
Not only do we no longer need external subsidies, we can pay the taxes on our own and also generate considerable additional output value.
At present, this output value may reach the planet of a family caravan by next year. Who dares to underestimate it?
Industry and business are two different things!
What's more, this is still a current comparison; as a planet develops better and better in the future, its population grows larger, and its industrial structure becomes more perfect, there is still a lot of room for improvement in the potential of everything.
Can this potential be realized?
At least looking at Gu Hang's performance over the past year and a half, that is quite possible.
To be honest, many people couldn't believe this was true, and some even thought it was a rumor made up by Wang Qi in order to maintain the support of his old brothers.
How else is it possible?
How can it be so easy to deal with the Angry Owl Star, which has caused Chief Pedesi to worry for a long time and has made the star district government bear a burden for so many years?
Turning waste into treasure in just one and a half years?
Could it be that the guy who used to be known as a waste was actually a chosen one of the Emperors? Blessed by the Emperor?
However, as more and more information is disclosed, you have to believe it even if you don’t.
It was for this reason that before Wang Qi had time to launch some of her additional arrangements, her situation began to improve again.
She probably won't need to take any special risks anymore, just follow her past plans and move forward slowly.
She was not afraid that the current head of the family would know her thoughts.
This thing can't be hidden and it's out in the open.
Everyone can just set up their chariots, horses and cannons and play against each other. The winner and loser will be revealed at the next family meeting, depending on the votes of the fourteen family caravans.
However, an accident happened.
The current head of the family, Gu Ming, convened the Gu family meeting ahead of schedule.
The meeting place is on Black Arrow Star.
Among the nine planets in the Pegasus star region, apart from the wasteland world of Angry Owl, the worst one is Black Arrow.
It was a feudal world. The overall technological level was such that, except for a small number of powerful people who could enjoy some technological conveniences of the interstellar age, in most parts of the planet, the production relations were probably not much better than those in the Middle Ages.
It’s not that there is no technology, but the entire social production relationship is wrong: serfs driving advanced agricultural machines pay tribute to the knight masters;
Knights were granted titles by lords from various places, and drove their mechs to fight for them.
The lords were granted titles by the kings and helped them collect taxes;
The highest ruling body of the planet is the King's Alliance. The governor of the planet has always been taken turns by the world's largest kings. They are responsible for ensuring that each kingdom can pay taxes in full. Once there are signs of failure to pay taxes in full, the King's Alliance will launch a punitive war against the country with insufficient taxes and make up the taxes through plunder...
Gu Hang was quite speechless about this backward mechanism, but this was the overall policy of the empire: as long as you pay taxes, I don’t care about anything else.
As long as the taxes were paid normally and there were no other major events, the Empire really didn't care what the planets were like. Gu Hang even suspected that after the Empire had recovered some worlds, it seemed to be intentionally letting these worlds maintain their original appearance.
We don’t know what the high lords of the empire are thinking, but the current situation is like this.
Black Arrow Star has a population of 400 million - the feudal production relations really cannot support too many people. What's more, not only are their production relations backward, but their industrial capacity is also almost non-existent.
However, this planet has a very good relationship with the Gu family.
Those kings who want to enfeoff more lords and more knights need a hard indicator: knight mecha.
Obviously, the Black Arrow Star natives couldn't even make agricultural machinery, let alone mechas. The mechas they used to confer knights were obviously all imported.
Then it is normal to have a good relationship with the Gu family.
The Gu family held the past six family meetings on Black Arrow Star.
This time is no exception.
Wang Qi believed that Gu Ming did this because Gu Hang's career and reputation were not big enough. And when Angry Owl Star paid taxes for the first time seven months later and proved his ability, it would be too difficult to save the situation.
He wanted to start a family meeting before that, and make plans for the next six years while the trouble caused by Gu Hang has not been completely settled, while Wang Qi's allies are seriously shaken, and while Wang Qi has not been able to win more votes.
This is certainly a smart move, but Wang Qi also said that she is not worried.
She now controls at least eight votes, and Gu Ming cannot turn the tables.
"If nothing goes wrong, you will be the head of the Gu family in four months." This is what Wang Qi said to Gu Hang.
Gu Hang smiled.
He has always felt that the current business structure of the Gu family is very unstable. It is a pure merchant fleet with all the assets on those fleets, which is too empty.
Although the current value of the Angry Owl Star is not enough, it will at most be worth a caravan by next year; and the Gu family has fourteen caravans.
But he would not trade his own inheritance for that of the head of the Gu family.
With further development, we will have a real planet, countless people, a huge army, and real industrial and agricultural output. Isn't this more real than traveling for business?
Of course, being the head of this family would not prevent him from continuing to be the governor of Angry Owl Star.
If this is really possible, it is not a bad thing. The Gu family has nothing else but a lot of money. They even want to win over the heads of the star regions, which shows their strength.
If he could really mobilize the power of the entire family, the future development of Angry Owl Star would soar.
Even if the person who actually makes the decision for the Gu family is not him but his mother, it won't be a big problem.
But people, when planning things, you can't just look at the positive side.
"Are you so sure?" he asked.
"Yes." Wang Qi showed confidence.
"What if... Uncle Ming flips the table?"
"Huh?" Wang Qi was stunned. "Overturn the table? ... What do you mean?"
Gu Hang said it even more bluntly: "Did you arrange the security for the family meeting?"
"...No." Wang Qi said, "Do you think he would kill someone at that time?"
"Why not?"
"Impossible, this has never happened in our family." Wang Qi's first reaction was to refute, "The Gu family tradition has been maintained for so many years, and there has never been any internal slaughter. We have always been united..."
Before she could finish her words, she was interrupted by Gu Hang: "Everything has a first time, and conventions are meant to be broken. Does that mean we don't need to consider extreme situations?"
Wang Qi was silent for a moment. "I actually thought that he would do something desperate. I brought enough guards. Besides, the current planetary governor of Black Arrow, King Muir, has a good relationship with me and is my supporter."
"Don't put your own safety in the hands of others. Is King Muir really reliable? Even if he is reliable, did he arrange the security of the venue?"
These questions stumped Wang Qi again.
Gu Hang paused and continued, "As for the guards around you... Ha, I roughly know who they are. They are the ones who came to arrest me and locked me up when I did something naughty in the past. It's not that I look down on them, but... they are really no good."
"Do you have a better candidate?"
"Of course. To be honest, their level is the average level of the soldiers under my command. I can always find a team with a much larger number and better level than the guards around you."
"Xiao Hang, you've really made great progress." Wang Qi didn't know whether she believed it or not, so it was hard to tell whether the words were irony or admiration.
Maybe both.
Gu Hang didn't dwell on it. He continued, "What's more, what you need is not only a guard team, but..."
"An army."
…
After hanging up the phone, Ms. Wang Qi sat there, lost in thought for a long time.
Until there was a knock on the door of the office on the starship.
"Come in."
"Aunt." The person who came was Wang Jiarong.
After the beautiful girls' caravan returned, all the boats needed to be repaired before they could set sail again. So she returned to her aunt and worked as a secretary to help out - that was what she did before, but she was only released in the last one or two years to lead a caravan that was completely controlled by Wang Qi.
She asked cautiously, "Is your call with your cousin...over?"
"Um."
"It's good. It's been a while since you and your cousin have talked for such a long time at one time."
"It's all about serious matters."
"What exactly is it?" Wang Jiarong seemed very curious.
Wang Qi smiled and said, "Your cousin...is worried that your aunt is being cheated."
Wang Jiarong was delighted. It seemed that they had a good chat. "Of course he would be worried. After all, you are his mother."
At this point, Wang Qi sighed: "He has changed a lot. His voice, appearance and voice are still the same, but his demeanor is completely different."
"Isn't that a good thing? Isn't it your long-cherished wish that my cousin can become a better person?"
"Yeah, that's great..." Wang Qi said with a smile, "But we have to change our route. We have to go to the Wrathful Owl Galaxy first."
"What are you going to do?"
"Bring an army."
…
It makes practical sense to send an army to my mother, escort her to Black Arrow Star, and protect her safety there.
In addition to the fact that she was the biological mother of this body, Gu Hang had at least two other important reasons:
The position of the head of the Gu family fell into his hands, which was very important. The patriarch of the richest merchant family in the Tianma Star Region, with 14 fleets capable of interstellar navigation, ranging from armed merchant ships to transport merchant ships, was a huge fortune.
Even though this wealth would not belong to him all at once, or even to his powerful mother, after all, those caravans were "franchisees". But the power to mobilize this force and wealth was already huge enough.
This is of great significance to the development of Angry Owl Star and is a major impetus for Angry Owl Star to move towards an interstellar society.
The second reason is actually based on the first point: he needs to find a stage to show his strength.
Keeping a low profile and building a reputation are not completely contradictory. Some of the things in Gu Hang's hands need to be kept under a low profile and hidden away. But the strength of Angry Owl Star is gradually increasing, it is rich, and it has enough potential... This information should be made public.
The more people know, the better.
This will bring attention.
And attention is money, and money is the driving force for development.
All in all, whether from a personal emotional perspective or from a practical perspective, this mother is still necessary.
I can't live without a mother.
(End of this chapter)
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