"The goods on the order have all been delivered." The woman liaison looked to Zhao Chen.
"Good; thank you."
After Lilith saw the woman liaison off, she came back to Zhao Chen's side, looking at the shut door behind them — from beyond which one could even, faintly, hear the sound of someone kicking it, along with the grumbling and the vibration.
"Um… will you truly not have some dealings with this Miss Chu?" Lilith asked. "Her standing is no ordinary thing."
"You know her standing?" Zhao Chen looked at Lilith.
Lilith raised a hand and holographically projected that golden-character "Chu" crest from before.
"After I became your secretary, I made a general study of the various intelligence on the Starlight Empire. Among it was some concerning this Miss Chu. There's no imagery of Miss Chu on the networks, but from the various fine threads of detail, one can basically pin down her identity," Lilith said.
Zhao Chen, who'd been walking toward the T2 Iron-Hammer-class Heavy Interstellar Industrial Ship, slowed his steps, and motioned for Lilith to go on.
"The Arctic Fox star system where we are falls under the North Wind Star Region, and the Governor of the North Wind Star Region is Miss Chu Xuan's maternal grandfather, holding the rank of imperial duke. And the Governor of the Chu River Star Region — one of the Starlight Empire's eight great star regions — is Miss Chu's paternal grandfather, holding the rank of imperial duke, and serving besides as an Imperial Five-Star Marshal! Most important of all, this Miss Chu Xuan is the Chu River Duke's only granddaughter, doted on always. The North Wind Governor loves this granddaughter of his daughter's more even than his own grandsons. She may fairly be called the cherished pearl of two star-region governors." Lilith's expression was grave.
Two star-region governors — one this girl's paternal grandfather, the other her maternal grandfather.
Enough to show how terrifying Chu Xuan's background was; small wonder even the Black Fox Society dared not act rashly, dared to shout for the Arctic Fox star system's lord to come find her himself if he had the nerve.
"You think I ought to strike up a friendship with her, is that it?" Zhao Chen said.
Lilith looked at the captain in puzzlement, not taking his meaning; wasn't it the plainest of things?
"The more illustrious her standing, the farther from her we'd best keep. What we must do right now is turtle up and grow quietly. Two ships that stand foremost in the T2 tier we may have — but faced with a true enemy, we're still very fragile," Zhao Chen said mildly.
There was, in fact, one more reason: Zhao Chen didn't believe a duke's granddaughter would, out of nowhere, be so warm to him. Where a thing runs against the natural course, there's a demon behind it.
The more so as the secrets on him grew by the day; get too close to a person like that, and who knew what might come of it.
Naturally, the farther the better.
"Understood," Lilith answered.
"The raw materials I ordered are all here; the next task is to build the T2 Black-Rhino-class Interstellar Heavy-Assault Frigate before year's end," Zhao Chen said, a bright light in his eyes.
Were the Chu Xuan shut outside the door to know that her charms ranked below a T2 interstellar frigate, she'd likely be furious enough to have it out with Zhao Chen head to head.
"What's with this fellow — can he truly not see my standing! I, this young lady, invite him to a meal, and he actually won't give me the face?" Chu Xuan stood, hands on hips, all the grave dignity of the woman officer of before quite gone, looking rather to have lost her composure.
The female adjutant covered her mouth and laughed softly. "My lady, you couldn't have gone and taken a fancy to this gentleman, could you?"
"Bah, bah, bah — how many times have we even met? How could I possibly fancy him — and a steel-straight man, at that. Me, fancy him? Not unless I walk out my door and get my head knocked in by a starship!" Chu Xuan rolled her eyes, seething.
"Then why come all this way to Arctic Fox Starport — truly just to buy him a meal? To get acquainted?" the female adjutant asked doubtfully.
Chu Xuan calmed her feelings and looked at the door, as though she could see through it to Zhao Chen's figure within.
"I had someone look into that ship called Blizzard Zero. There's no record of it anywhere. Nor of the other carrier starship. I even widened the search beyond the Starlight Empire — still no matching class."
Chu Xuan narrowed her eyes and said gravely, "Which leaves only two possibilities. One, he has a very secret channel for buying ships. Two, these two ships weren't bought by him — he designed and built them himself!"
"Designed and built them himself? How could that be? T2 ships may only be half-military-grade vessels, but they're hardly something just anyone can design and build." The female adjutant doubted the answer.
"I don't believe it either, which is why I mean to get to the bottom of it. If it's the former, we'll use that channel to purchase a batch of these ships of astonishing combat power. If it's the latter, then here's a talent — and if won over to the service of our Chu family, it would surely raise the Chu family's strength. The Starlight Empire's situation now is a tangled one; we must seize any sliver of a chance to grow our Chu family stronger."
Having said all this, Chu Xuan tossed the female adjutant a sidelong look. "You didn't truly think I was some big-chested, empty-headed girl gone soft over a man, throwing myself at him, did you?"
"I never thought so at all." The female adjutant shook her head again and again — though the look in her eyes wasn't quite so firm; then she cut a glance at a certain spot and muttered, "And besides, it's not exactly big-chested and empty-headed."
Chu Xuan's mouth twitched. "You wretched girl — you dare tease me!"
"Reporting, my lady — there are comm requests from the two dukes." Xiao Song came over just then and holographically projected the links of two comm requests.
"Hey — don't take them!" Before Chu Xuan could finish, Xiao Song had already patched them through.
Then, as though he hadn't seen the blade-sharp look in his lady's eyes, he turned his head and walked off.
Off to the side, the female adjutant tactfully drew away as well.
Chu Xuan put a hand over her face; in her ears at once sounded two voices, familiar past all familiarity.
"Precious granddaughter, are you all right! I heard a tier-2 cosmic bug-nest appeared over there — you went into battle with just 30 ships?"
"Little Xuan! You're not hurt, are you? I've already sent my own fleet off to reinforce you!"
Two old men appeared in the two comm windows respectively.
"You old creature named Zhu — I told you before not to let Chu Xuan go to your side, and you swore up and down to me nothing would go wrong. And now look! A thing this grave has happened. If any harm comes to my granddaughter, I'll lift the very lid off your skull!"
"Hey now, you can't put it that way. It's because Little Xuan was scared off by your smothering that she came running to me, her maternal grandfather. And this time was purely an accident; I'd never have thought interstellar hive-race would appear. But rest easy — Little Xuan is quite safe now; there'll be no trouble whatever!"
"Precious granddaughter, you'd best hurry back. Even if you truly want to go down to the grassroots and command a fleet — our family has fleets of our own; whichever you fancy, we'll go to that one. Or, if it comes to it, you may command Grandfather's own fleet! And its flagship's a resounding T4 interstellar battleship! You've always liked those — it's yours! I hear that over at that old creature's side, your flagship's a mere T2 ship! That thing hasn't even a star shield; what if you run into danger?"
"Our North Wind Star Region may have no T4 ships, but we have T3 carrier starships! With the interstellar fighters swarming everywhere — how grand a sight, and you needn't even be up on the front line, far safer than any interstellar battleship. I'll arrange it for Little Xuan right now; tomorrow our Little Xuan's a captain!"
Chu Xuan wore the look of one who'd sooner die than live; it was exactly this "smothering love" from the two old men that had driven her out here in the first place.
Now she could only set the matter of Zhao Chen aside for the moment and soothe the two old men first, promising she'd go back to see them.
Otherwise there was no telling what the two of them might get up to.