In this moment a question exceedingly hard to answer had been set before the angel Tilia.
She was much torn; she wished to say something, and the words would not come.
Zhao Chen saw the stir within the angel Tilia.
The seed was planted.
What came next was for him to water it of his own accord.
To gain a thing, one must of course pay some price.
Zhao Chen knew this very well.
There is no advantage in this world got for nothing.
"If the Angel Race is willing to go on helping us, our Owl Dragon is willing to give some recompense." Zhao Chen opened this subject himself.
At hearing this the angel Tilia asked, without thinking, "What recompense?"
Speaking for herself, the angel Tilia wished to help the Owl Dragon.
But a business so large — to deal with the Demon Race, and then with the interstellar hive-race.
Without a sufficient account to give the three Angel Kings, leave would be hard to come by.
And these words of Zhao Chen's now were as good as giving the angel Tilia her opening.
"For instance…" Zhao Chen hesitated, as though weighing it, but soon made his decision. "We are willing to open to the Angel Race the sales rights of our Owl Dragon-line T3-grade interstellar warships!"
To hear this, had it been said back among the Angel Race before, would likely have drawn a snort of contempt.
But now, and here!
And above all before these three high-order angels, who had seen the Owl Dragon Legion's combat capacity with their own eyes.
They knew very well that the combat capacity of Owl Dragon-line interstellar warships might be said to surpass Angel-line warships of the same grade — the build cost alone being unknown to them.
"We want your T5 interstellar warships!" The high-order angel Berkeley named his requirement almost without thinking.
Zhao Chen's expression checked, and he put on a look of displeasure.
Within, in fact, he knew the quarry was on the hook; but the play was to be carried on all the same.
Zhao Chen rose straight up and struck both hands upon the conference table. "Out of the question! These T5 interstellar warships we can on no account sell abroad!"
The high-order angel Berkeley looked at Zhao Chen coldly. "My lord, the life or death of the Owl Dragon now hangs upon this. Is that not worth a few T5 interstellar warships? Still more when it is not the technology we ask for!"
Zhao Chen's face darkened, with the look of a man holding down his anger. "As a high-order angel and a legion commander of the Angel Race. You should know what cost the building of a T5 interstellar warship wants. How many T5 interstellar warships has your Angel Race in service? And how many has our Owl Dragon even now? We have not enough for ourselves; how should we sell them abroad? This requirement — forgive me, I cannot obey it!"
The high-order angel Berkeley would have said more, but the high-order angel Jessie beside him stopped him, and she looked toward Zhao Chen. "My lord, we too wish we could help the Owl Dragon. But your sincerity is not enough to make us bear such a risk."
Zhao Chen, black in the face, sat down again in his chair, crossed both hands beneath his chin, and closed his eyes with the look of a man thinking.
Several seconds later.
Zhao Chen did not open his eyes, but spoke. "I can sell you a portion of the Owl Dragon-line T4-grade interstellar warships."
"We want the technical drawings!" the high-order angel Berkeley required.
"The technology is out of the question." Zhao Chen's tone in this was past all shaking.
The high-order angel Jessie said at once, "Within this portion of T4 interstellar warships, are the interstellar missile ships and the interstellar gunships included?"
"They are not," Zhao Chen said outright.
"My lord…" The high-order angel Jessie would have said more.
Zhao Chen cut in first. "The T3 Judicator-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Ship may be opened to sale to you; that is already the utmost we can offer. As for the rest, forgive me, I cannot obey."
The air within the conference room was silent for some seconds.
At the last the angel Tilia stepped out to smooth it over. "There now; a matter of such importance the few of us cannot decide. Let the lord give us a little time; we must get in contact with our Angel King."
"I understand; I hope to have your answer as soon as may be. For… we have not much time." So saying, Zhao Chen walked out of the conference room with a dark face, and every look of being in a very bad humor.
At this the three high-order angels exchanged a glance, and said nothing further.
And went quietly, led by Owl Dragon crew, off this interstellar warship; and in the shuttle.
The high-order angel Berkeley spoke first. "Why did we not ask them for that T4 interstellar missile ship class! I know they will never give the T5s, but this T4 missile ship class we might have striven for — and their technical drawings besides!"
His opening with the T5s had in fact been made knowing perfectly well the other side would never agree.
But to set a high requirement first, and then put a fitting one after, might perhaps succeed.
"The technical drawings they will never give. Starship technology has always been a thing every interstellar power holds as its life; how should they hand it lightly to another? As for the T4 missile ships… I could see he had little wish to give us those either. T4-grade though they are, they are one of their trump strokes. That he will provide us T4-grade interstellar warships at all is already a very good result. And when the time comes we can carry out our own reverse engineering; I believe that, resting upon our Angel Race's technology, we shall have digested it entirely within a few decades!" The high-order angel Jessie said it confidently from beside him.
"Those Owl Dragon-line interstellar warships… to speak honestly, my eyes truly burn for them. Seeing their combat capacity upon the field before…" The high-order angel Berkeley said it full of expectation.
But at this the angel Tilia threw a basin of cold water over them. "Do not rejoice too early; what comes next is whether we can persuade our lord the Angel King. Jessie, when we are back, use our extreme-long-range communication equipment directly and contact the lord Angel King. Tell her what has happened here, and the content of the talk just now."
"Yes!" the high-order angel Jessie answered.
This extreme-long-range communication equipment belongs to the topmost order of the Angel Race's communication technology; it can complete a communication across a very great distance with no node between, only its energy consumption is exceedingly high and its build cost very high besides.
In the whole Angel Race there are not many.
And it was only because they wished to come to this far stretch of the universe this time that the Holy Angel King had granted them one by special warrant.
——————
Through the viewport Zhao Chen watched the three angels' shuttle draw away.
Upon Zhao Chen's face at this moment there was no grief or indignation or helplessness at all.
That performance just now had been wholly to invite the guest into the jar.
To offer certain T4-series interstellar warships as the condition was a thing Zhao Chen had settled upon long since.
But it could not be said at the outset, or those angels would assuredly have supposed he could pay more yet.
So Zhao Chen had played out that piece.
And Zhao Chen had a longer view besides.
He could take this very chance, seeming to take the loss, to open the Owl Dragon-line interstellar warship's road of sale into the Angel Race.
"The Swarm Surge…" Zhao Chen muttered the quarterly mission over, put his hands behind his back, and gazed into the pitch-black universe.