71: Chapter 71 Oil River, Love River

"I don't play cards well, but the... the tickets for that latest musical, do you... do you have any?" Cheng Yu asked.

"You should've said so earlier! But those tickets are in high demand, and they aren't cheap. How many do you want?" Cheng Yu replied.

"You... I want as many as you have. No, I'm not... I'm not trying to steal your business. I... I'm giving them away as gifts."

"Alright, the guys and I can pool some together. We definitely have thirty or forty. I'll give you a discount!"

Cheng Yu made a gesture, "Just this much."

"Fine. Go... go get them. I'll wait here for you," Cheng Yu laughed.

"Got it. Please wait a moment." Cheng Yu let out a sharp whistle, beginning to summon the other Cheng Yu clones scattered throughout the market to gather tickets.

The large-scale musical they were discussing, titled "Kiss of Lies," was currently the most popular cultural product in the Cheng Yu Empire.

The Hive City Grand Theater, which had previously been lukewarm, was now packed for every show. Everyone who saw it praised it; men finished it and smoked in silence, while women finished it in tears.

Cheng Yu had seen it too. He thought it was average, but he couldn't stop the masses from loving it, so he wanted to hoard some tickets to give away as gifts.

In the banquet hall of the Ducalia Territory, Governor Ducalia and his spouse were also watching the play.

Naturally, they didn't have to squeeze into the theater with everyone else; they simply had the best performing troupe brought over to perform directly for them.

Also accompanying them were Isari and her husband... or one could call them the Viscount and Viscountess.

"Stare-Kill" Viscount Chengyu claimed he didn't want to go on blind dates, but he got married faster than anyone.

They got their marriage license the day after they met. The staff at the "Magpie Bridge" Guild tried to advise him to think it over carefully, but he wouldn't listen. He was all about being decisive and swift.

On stage, the first climax of the second act was unfolding: the heroine's identity as a spy for the enemy nation had been exposed, and the hero was leading a team to hunt her down.

Because it was currently very difficult for the Cheng Yu Empire to find human actresses with both the right appearance and acting skills, the heroine of this play was usually played by an Aeldari woman.

This also embodied the main theme of the Cheng Yu Empire: multiple races working together, setting aside past grievances to build a beautiful home... although the proportion of spies remained high.

But one could use love... use love to reform these spies.

"Ah, my dear mentor, when you looked at me with those flaxen-colored eyes; how could I have imagined that behind that gaze, there was no love, only lies? You broke my heart, Cecilia, you broke my heart!"

The actor playing the hero held his forehead with one hand and clutched his bolter in the other, firing uselessly at the starry backdrop on stage.

"She doesn't love you!"

"She's lying to you!"

"She's using you!"

The hero's three attendants took turns using three different singing techniques to mock his lovestruck brain.

"Stare-Kill" Viscount Chengyu laughed. The screenwriter definitely hadn't served in the military for very long.

Whether in the special forces battalion or the main battle chapters, provoking a superior was the greatest crime, on par with disrespecting the Emperor. After all, loyalty to the Emperor was loyalty to one's commander.

The hero in this play didn't even use his bolter to blow the heads off those three idiots... one could only call it fictional artistic creation.

Isari, on the other hand, was sobbing profusely. Because in the first act, both their meeting and their time together had been very sweet; this malicious misunderstanding was truly a heart-wrenching plot.

Next was a brilliant fight scene. The conspiracy group from the enemy nation, seeing their vicious plan fall through, went insane and wanted to blow up the entire Hive City, dragging countless innocent people to their deaths.

The heroic male lead and the repentant female lead, who had abandoned the darkness for the light, fought bloodily through the enemy's encirclement. The hero was unfortunately severely wounded, and it was the heroine who carried him out from the pile of dead bodies.

"Why aren't they using infrasound weapons? Why are they engaging in hand-to-hand combat? Are these two crazy?" Viscount Chengyu was still watching in confusion.

The staff behind the stage began using dry ice and buckets of water to create the special effects of a torrential downpour.

In that heavy rain that flooded most of the Underhive, the hero and heroine resolved their misunderstanding, embracing, kissing, and weeping bitterly in the downpour.

And this rain was actually also a conspiracy by the enemy; they had opened the Hive City's floodgates, rather than the Hive City failing to consider waterproofing during its design.

In the surging floodwaters, the hero left the hope of survival to the heroine.

After being rescued, the heroine was unwilling to live alone and committed suicide... As an Aeldari, her soul would be immediately captured by Slaanesh after suicide.

However, their love was so moving that even the Lord of Pleasure shed a tear for it and did not devour the heroine's soul.

In the very end, the two turned into two butterflies dancing in Slaanesh's garden.

The play ended. Isari was sobbing uncontrollably, and Arya's eyes were also red.

Consort Cheng Yu and Viscount Chengyu had no reaction; the two even wanted to go to the terrace for a cigar... and they actually did.

"Brother-in-law, among us clones... is there really such a thing as a lovestruck brain?"

Viscount Chengyu blew a smoke ring.

"Didn't they say it was adapted from true events? So, maybe, probably, it really exists. There are all kinds of clones."

Consort Cheng Yu also blew a smoke ring, and it was bigger than Viscount Chengyu's... men's boring desire to win.

"I look down on those henpecked husbands the most. 'Ear-rakers,' they'll never amount to anything in ten lifetimes."

Viscount Chengyu didn't know why he suddenly became agitated. "A man should achieve great things, die on the battlefield, and be wrapped in horse hide!"

"Hmm..." Consort Cheng Yu grinned with disdain but didn't say anything.

"Dear, how do I look in this for the wedding? Is it pretty?"

After Isari finished crying, she couldn't find her husband, so she went to her cousin's place and swiped some more dresses, preparing to show them to her husband one by one.

"Average." Viscount Chengyu, like a steel-straight man, just glanced back, his gaze not even lingering.

"Oh... then how about this one?"

"About the same. None of them look good. I'll buy you two better ones later."

"Alright... Dear, you're the best to me!"

Consort Cheng Yu didn't even turn his head, but judging by the speed at which he was smoking... he was a bit annoyed... Why was his wife so gentle?!

Carrying this slightly annoyed mood, the Ducalia couple saw off the Viscount and his wife.

From today on, Isari would be going off to live a quiet life with her man. Arya was a bit reluctant to see her go and stuffed some Xenos treasures into her hand before she left as pocket money.

"Isari, nothing lasts forever, and a flower doesn't bloom for a hundred days. Men cannot be trusted, and romance cannot be eaten as a meal. If you are wronged, don't hold it in; my place is always open to you, cousin."

"I can hear you, dear." Consort Cheng Yu was even more annoyed. Who was she being passive-aggressive towards?