101: Chapter 101 Nest City Ecology

Cassius, citing the immense scale of the project and the difficulty of finding qualified personnel, obtained permission from Cheng Yu to recruit literary officials outside the imperial examination system.

For a time, officials selected and recommended by Cassius were spread throughout the court and the public, known as the "University Scholar's Strict Selection".

However, these matters high above the nine heavens had little to do with the common folk in the Hive City.

Some days ago, the Third Master of the Jinmen Group suffered a gunshot wound and was on the verge of death, but he suddenly returned from the brink.

He began a sweeping and ruthless purge of the dissenting factions within the group.

This event was already enough to make people marvel, but recently, an even more explosive matter ignited discussions among almost everyone in the Hive City during their leisure time.

It was originally a small matter; the Hive City Security Force was on routine patrol when they discovered a suspicious woman looking around near the Hive City Bank.

Upon seeing the Security Forces, she appeared even more flustered.

The Security Forces stepped forward to question her and discovered she was an undocumented resident—that is, an outsider who had not registered at customs.

This in itself was quite rare, as the Cheng Yu Empire had extremely lenient immigration checks; as long as you did not present a spy work ID when proving your identity, the customs inspectors would grant entry without exception.

After a more detailed investigation, the Security Forces recovered a large amount of cash from the woman's temporary residence.

The staff at the Hive City Bank had to count the money in three shifts, and after several people fainted from exhaustion, they finally made a preliminary count of approximately two billion in imperial legal tender, including various banknotes, foreign currency, bonds, and money orders.

This was by no means a minor case.

Drake, the Nine Gates Commander; the leader of the Iron Fist Clan; and the Commander-in-Chief of the Hive City Security Force, Cheng Yu, held a joint trial and finally uncovered a massive bride-scam ring.

These criminals exploited the current imbalance in the Empire where men outnumbered women, luring foreign women to the Empire under the guise of introducing high-quality dating prospects, while charging imperial men large fees for matchmaking.

Once the men's money was obtained, the criminal agency would immediately lose contact.

When the women found that the men were not the high-quality prospects they had imagined, they would naturally choose to leave.

Cheng Yu's clones were thin-skinned, and even though they realized they had been scammed, they chose not to report the crime, preferring to suffer in silence.

Such a scheme, which could hardly be called a sophisticated scam, exploited the shared personality weakness of the various Cheng Yus and managed to develop into such a massive case that even the leaders of the criminal group felt guilty, thinking the money came too easily and was too dangerous.

All of the above was false, merely fabricated for the Hive City Daily to fool people.

In reality, as the internal imperial reference clearly stated, there were no lured women at all.

These people were all scammers; they knew before they arrived that they were coming to fish for suckers, completely exploiting the fact that the Cheng Yu Empire treated women favorably and had no death penalty.

And the woman who was caught was not a ringleader at all; she was just an ordinary con artist, not even a big fish in this chain of fraud.

Drake, the Nine Gates Commander, dared not be negligent and submitted a memorial requesting the Emperor to issue a decree to strictly investigate and punish this group of vicious people.

He wanted nothing more than to dig two large pits and bury all these wretches who blasphemed the Emperor's divine majesty.

However, this memorial was left unaddressed by Main Body.

By evening, Main Body had the Court of Imperial Sacrifices bestow a dish upon Drake.

It was a curry chicken dish, with shit-yellow curry mixed with shit-yellow chicken skin, making it indistinguishable and completely unappetizing.

Nevertheless, Drake knocked his head in gratitude for the imperial grace and ate it while standing.

Although Drake was a bit lazy, he was a smart man.

The Emperor's meaning was clear: the Empire did not kill women, not because women were noble, but because the reality was that there were more men than women.

Although it was usually not apparent, it was easy to cause major chaos during certain special periods.

Therefore, this fundamental policy could not be changed.

Even if this group of scammers was disgusting, the "meat" had to remain in the pot.

Was there any difference between curry-colored chicken and chicken-skin-colored curry?

Only the one drinking the water knows its temperature.

You aren't being asked to marry those scammers, so why are you getting so worked up?

...

A speck of dust from the era, when it falls on an individual, becomes a mountain.

Wild Dog Cheng Yu was one of the people who had been scammed.

After accepting a secret assignment, he went to the Hive City Bank to unfreeze his bank card, which had been under risk control.

He had thought that he would live a stable life from then on... and then he was scammed out of everything.

Now, not only was the money to reopen his gambling table gone, but his entire life was thrown into a desperate situation.

With the mission handover date approaching next month, he didn't even have pocket money for food.

Wild Dog Cheng Yu had considered asking his old buddies he used to run with to borrow some money for expenses.

But the Emperor had already issued a strict decree earlier this year: all private lending was illegal; if you want to borrow money, please go to the Hive City Bank.

Making private IOUs would result in immediate exile upon discovery.

If you like lending money so much, go do it slowly at the labor camp.

In utter helplessness, Wild Dog Cheng Yu, who used to be well-connected on the streets, started delivering food.

The pay for running an average of three kilometers was only two coins.

Wild Dog Cheng Yu nearly broke his back just to earn enough for a single meal.

Squatting on the roadside, gnawing on a steamed bun with cold water, he reminisced about the bustling past, tears falling silently before he could even speak.