10,000 star coins!
Did they grasp what that meant? The hottest-selling T1 Wolf-Louse-class Medium Interstellar Destroyer on the market right now went for just 30,000. This was a single meal eating up a third of a warship.
"You— you swindler…!" Zhou Min raged, her tongue outrunning her sense.
"Like I said — eat it or don't. Woman, if you dare run your mouth one more time, forget eating; I'll toss you straight off the ship. Mind yourself." The cook gave no ground and fired straight back.
Zhou Min was furious to the bone, but didn't dare say another word.
"100 times for her, fine — but why am I 100 times too?" The fair-faced pretty-boy edged deliberately away from Zhou Min, as if the two of them had nothing to do with each other. But the Heaven's Glory students all knew perfectly well: this man and Zhou Min were a couple, and a close one.
"Hurricane Conglomerate — Feng Xiaowei. Our Commander asked me to pass along a message." The cook wore the faint trace of a smile. "You dare use a T3 starship to court my little sister — believe it or not, I'll spend a T3 starship to have you killed."
To Feng Xiaowei, though, that smile carried a thread of mockery. He caught the threat in it plainly: if Zhao Chen truly put a T3 starship up as a black-market bounty, no few people would run the risk to collect on a life worth a whole T3 warship.
"Pfft—" Xue Xiaoxiao, who'd just taken a mouthful of soup, couldn't hold it and sprayed. To spare the food on the table she whipped her head aside in time — the dishes were saved. Zhao Wan'er's face was not.
Zhao Wan'er glared, black-faced, at Xue Xiaoxiao across from her, who was fighting down a fit of laughter.
"Wan'er… your… your brother… he's too much… 'You dare use a T3 starship to court my sister — believe it or not, I'll spend a T3 starship to have you killed!' Hahaha… your big brother wouldn't happen to be a siscon, would he?" Xue Xiaoxiao howled, clutching her belly.
"Too much, am I? I've got something even more too-much right here." Zhao Wan'er snatched up a piece of food beside her — a thing called a baguette — marched over, and jammed it toward Xue Xiaoxiao's mouth.
"Mmph— mmph— it's too big… too big… no— it won't fit— mmph— no— I— I'm dying—" Xue Xiaoxiao thrashed and squirmed.
Only after half the baguette had been driven in did Zhao Wan'er finally let the loose-tongued creature off.
By now the onlookers understood why this particular pair had earned such treatment. Zhou Min and Feng Xiaowei had both, back at Northstar Academy, had "friction" with the Zhao siblings. What they hadn't reckoned on was that Zhao Chen held a grudge this well.
"Hmph… 100 times, and they had it coming. The way Zhou Min used to carry on, more than once I wanted to just haul off and hit her!" Zhao Wan'er watched the pair eat their humiliation, in a thoroughly fine mood, and downed another bowl of rice. She glanced at Xue Xiaoxiao, just recovering beside her, and pointed at the half-gnawed baguette in her hand. "Want one? Not bad, actually."
"No… no thank you…" Xue Xiaoxiao eyed the baguette with open dread. From that day on, she had a food she feared.
After that, Zhou Min and the young master of the Hurricane Conglomerate had no choice but to pare their orders down — and even so, the two of them together ran up a sky-high bill of nearly 5,000 star coins.
Before long the first round of meals was served. The students who hadn't ordered watched the rest eat with such relish that some wavered and chose to order after all. In the end nearly everyone did — some large portions, some small. A few "suckers" who'd paid a fortune only to receive the same food others got for a few dozen coins could only swallow the loss in silence. As for the Northstar teachers and students who'd come out ahead, not one of them felt the pinch now: for under 100 coins they'd enjoyed food others had paid thousands for — food that, in some cases, wasn't even as lavish as theirs. That sense of superiority nudged their impression of Zhao Chen up another notch.
On that account, the Heaven's Glory teacher leading their group even sought out Instructor Qin, hoping she might have a word with that Zhao Chen — even just to win the same treatment as the Northstar cadets. Instructor Qin replied that this was Zhao Chen's ship; how he set the rules was his business, and she, a mere teacher, had no right to interfere.
In truth, on this joint mission of the two academies, Instructor Qin had been fed up with Heaven's Glory for a long time. Before things went wrong, the other side's group leader had strutted and swaggered; after things went wrong, he'd turned into a spineless wretch, and she'd carried the whole ordeal on her own shoulders. Watching them eat their comeuppance now, Instructor Qin was rather pleased herself.
Just then—
"This… this is my food?" Old Professor Jiang's meal was brought over, complete with a mini dining table. On it: three dishes and a soup, meat and vegetables both, a serving of after-meal fruit — and, besides, a simple set of dry-cleaning toiletries and clean clothes. The food couldn't compare with the table Zhao Wan'er and the others shared, but ordered normally at standard rates it would have run to at least 100 star coins.
"Yes. Please, enjoy." The crewwoman set it down and withdrew.
Old Professor Jiang ate, and before he knew it his eyes had gone wet again. Blacklisted at Heaven's Glory, his pay was pitifully low; he lived mostly on synthetic food, and in a whole year could manage only a little very ordinary natural fare. Fruit, natural meat — after that affair, he'd basically never tasted them again. Never in his wildest thoughts had he imagined he'd eat food like this, under circumstances like these.
Among those enjoying the meal, of course, were still some who resented Zhao Chen — Zhou Min and that Feng Xiaowei, for two.
"That bastard actually dares treat us like this!" Feng Xiaowei glared at the food he'd spent 5,000 star coins on, itching with hatred.
Beside him, Zhou Min was wolfing hers down — already through better than half.
Feng Xiaowei called out in a hurry, "Hey! I paid for that — don't eat it all!"
"Xiaowei, I'm really so hungry… couldn't you… buy a little more?" Zhou Min looked at him.
"Buy more? At 100 times the price — you really take me for a sucker! Buy your own!" Feng Xiaowei snatched away what was left, forbidding her to touch another bite.
Zhou Min could only look on, wronged; the little she'd eaten hadn't filled her at all — if anything, she felt hungrier now.
Feng Xiaowei ate the food he'd paid a fortune for and thought darkly: I'll remember this. No one fleeces Young Master Feng.
Meanwhile, in the ship's canteen
Zhao Chen sat watching the video window before him with a wicked grin — the scene inside the hangar — while a steady stream of payment chimes rolled in from his account.
150 star coins received… 5,000 received… 3,000 received… 500 received…
Small as each sum might seem, they added up: the students Zhao Chen had rescued this time numbered nearly 200, and the meal-order income from just this little stretch had already reached a staggering 40 or 50,000 star coins. More lucrative, even, than the arms trade.
Of course, this sort of thing didn't come along often — only under present, special circumstances. Zhao Chen had no intention of making the trip for nothing and then paying out of his own pocket to repair the ship and restock munitions once he got back. And this income was more than enough to patch up the T3 Blizzard-class Light Interstellar Battlecruiser several times over.
"Next up is delivering this pack of suckers home," Zhao Chen muttered. And with that, the smile faded from his face.
The people were saved, yes. But the chain reaction this operation had set off was no small thing — and there was no telling how much trouble lay waiting for him down the road.