Chapter 135: A Galactic Shopping Spree

The cheapest tea? One ton costs 300 trade points.

But what does that even mean?

If Tuoba wants to buy tea, he’ll first need to sell raw resources to earn Federation trade points.

According to the list Mu Qingxue gave him, take iron for example—one ton goes for just a single trade point. So…

The lowest-grade tea basically costs as much as 3,000 tons of iron per ton. The priciest teas? Even more. That’s just crazy.

Still, Tuoba didn’t throw a fit. Instead, he started seriously working out how much he could afford.

Meanwhile, Violet stood by his side, watching him with an amused smile.

Of course, Tuoba wasn’t really going to haul an entire fleet of iron over. With a hundred transport ships, why would he waste the cargo space on something so basic?

Even if he filled every cargo hold, sent the hundred ships off, how much profit would he really make?

So, in this shipment, there’s not even a ton of iron—most of what Tuoba brought are goods with a much better price per unit, but ones that aren’t rare at all in the Xitoris Kingdom.

For example…

Helium-3!

Here in the Solar System, sure, this stuff is rare. Even over at Proxima, there isn’t much to go around.

But in the Xitoris Kingdom—or, to be precise, in a border star system under Tuoba’s family control—they’ve got so much helium-3 it’s ridiculous. Their reserves are over a trillion tons.

One third of Tuoba’s convoy this time? It’s all helium-3.

Just for perspective—even on the Moon, helium-3 reserves are only about a million tons. That’s nearly seventy percent of the entire Solar System’s known supply.

A few hundred years ago, people used to say the Moon’s helium-3 could power humanity for ten thousand years.

What nonsense.

That was based on humanity’s needs back then.

Now that we’ve entered the interstellar era, demand hasn’t just doubled—it’s outpaced that by far.

Forget ten thousand years, we’d be lucky if it lasted a thousand.

According to the latest Federation figures, after centuries of mad mining, the Moon’s helium-3 will last about another two hundred years at most.

Some scientists even warned: if humans can’t get beyond the Solar System in the next two centuries, extinction’s the only way forward.

And now humanity is pushing production to the max, expanding the Federation Fleet at a breakneck pace.

None of that happens without helium-3.

Unless, one day, humans master vacuum zero-point energy—those zero-point modules.

Otherwise, that demand is here to stay.

After crunching the numbers, Tuoba decided to buy 100 tons of each type of tea, just to test the waters back home.

He didn’t stop at tea—wine, drinks, he grabbed them all.

After all, that border star system his family controls? Even if they went wild mining helium-3 for another thousand years, they wouldn’t come close to running out.

He felt zero pressure. If anyone was an interstellar version of the tycoon, it was him.

Once he was done at the herbal pavilion, Tuoba wandered through the crop exhibits, the poultry section, the ceramics gallery—you name it.

Dozens of halls, and at every one Tuoba just waved his hand and said, “I’ll take it all!”.

But even after browsing all these everyday goods, he still didn’t see what he truly wanted. He couldn’t help but quietly ask Violet:

“Chief Violet, is there no weaponry for sale?”

“Of course there is. This way, please!”

Violet smiled, having shown off everything else. Now, it was finally time to get down to business.

She led Tuoba straight to the arms trading exhibition.

Unlike the other halls, this was a massive space—at least five times the size of a regular one.

But standing inside, Tuoba realized there wasn’t any real hardware here. Everything was a scale model, each one accompanied by a holographic introduction.

That didn’t dampen Tuoba’s enthusiasm one bit. He strode over, checking out each piece with intense focus.

“Railgun? The projectile speed on this is up by 38% compared to what my Pioneer Fleet uses. Not bad, really not bad!”

“Bai Ze Mechanized Combat Platform? A mech? What is this thing—is it better than a starfighter?”

“Sweet, there are close-range, long-range, and general-purpose versions. The long-range variant even comes with a custom heavy ion beam rifle—that’s a max range of 10,000 kilometers?”

“Incredible. I want it so badly!”

“Wait, a ship-mounted heavy ion beam cannon? The Federation actually sells these too?”

“Wow, you can even buy the whole warship!”

“According to the info, these are Federation-standard general-purpose warships for subordinate civilizations. The overall tech level is about a Type 2.5. Main weapons are still railguns, but each ship boasts two heavy ion beam cannons as its main turrets.”

“Very nice. If I had my Pioneer Fleet refitted with these…”

Violet just watched from the sideline as Tuoba darted around excitedly, letting out a new shout of surprise every few seconds.

It wasn’t until a few minutes later, when Tuoba started calling out for her urgently, that she finally walked over.

“Mister Tuoba, see anything you like?”

“Oh, absolutely!”

Tuoba was so excited he could hardly keep still.

“Chief Violet, about those warships…”

“Yes, these are provided within the Federation system for purchase by subordinate civilizations. I had to push for it, but they finally agreed to add them to our trade list. Of course, the price is a bit higher than the internal Federation rate.”

“Makes sense, totally understandable. Just give me a quote, Chief Violet!”

Tuoba knew full well: all this talk about limited access and higher prices was just bluff.

But he didn’t care.

Why should he? He—or rather, his entire family—was loaded.

If the goods were good enough, even paying ten times the price wouldn’t faze him.

“Ten trillion trade points per ship!”

Ten trillion trade points?

Hearing the number, Tuoba began furiously calculating.

At that price, how much helium-3 would it take?

Is it expensive?

Honestly, yes—it’s a jaw-droppingly high price.

But it all depends on who’s buying.

For Tuoba, this was completely acceptable.

In fact, their family’s star system already had confirmed helium-3 reserves of 17.8 trillion tons.

That’s enough to exchange for over 3.5 million of these warships.

So, buying a few hundred for his second Pioneer Fleet to fully upgrade—

Is there a problem?

Not in the slightest.

And for humanity?

Swapping half the Moon’s helium-3 reserves for a single warship—any issue there?

That’s even less of a problem!

——

In the end, Tuoba went ahead and put in orders for 500 Seawolf-class general-purpose ships, a batch of Bai Ze mechs, and a mountain of spare railguns, ion beam cannons, electromagnetic rapid-fire cannons—you name it, he bought it. He practically emptied the entire arms exhibition.

According to the agreement, deliveries would start after three years, with all orders completed within ten.

And the reason? The journey’s long even if the ships left the Federation right now—it takes three years just to get here.

Violet did, however, refuse Tuoba’s idea to pay for everything entirely with helium-3.

Her reason was simple—the Federation didn’t need so much helium-3 from Tuoba, especially when he had endless amounts. So…

After negotiations, they agreed that up to 80% of the payment could be settled with helium-3, while the remaining 20% had to be covered with other resources.

Tuoba wasn’t thrilled, but in the end—

He still agreed.

What Tuoba didn’t know, though, was that it wasn’t actually Violet’s decision. Throughout these talks, someone else was watching and passing instructions directly through Violet.

The true mastermind was the highest official in the Proxima Administrative District.

Governor Mu Qingxue!