The gangway of the azure boat extended, connecting with customs located over four hundred thousand kiloters above this comrcial planet's surface in orbit. Bai Zhongqi, Han Jiaxue, and Zero, among others, descended from the stairway and arrived at what looked like a service window.
It was made of transparent, high-strength material with a force field shield layer on the outside. An alien, slender as a bamboo pole and similar in size to humans from Earth, sat on the inside, scrutinizing the three individuals who had erged with a pair of huge black eyes.
The reason Bai Zhongqi so easily referred to this being as an alien was mainly because its race was clearly different from the primate clan of the Galaxy to which Earthlings belonged. Very much like the large-brained E.T.s from Earth's science fiction, at the very top, there were two rows of organs that looked like bone spurs or tubes, the purpose of which was unclear. The alien had deep eye sockets and very three-dinsional features; however, the eyes had no whites, just a deep black. Its nose and ears were tiny, almost invisible on its face. The mouth was the only part sowhat similar to a human's.
The alien raised its hand, and Bai Zhongqi noticed it had only three flexible fingers, two pointing upwards and one inward. Clearly, the fingers of this alien species were very agile, able to curl freely in different directions and also capable of gripping motions.
"Hello, welco to Bupinga Star. I am Yousa, a customs officer of Bupinga," said the customs official, looking at Bai Zhongqi and the others without any surprise. The primate clan was nurous within the Galaxy, and many had grown into formidable civilizations, which were even more than the primitive civilizations that had no contact with others.
Zero was a bionic human who had mastered all of the languages of Bupinga and even understood so of the comrcial customs of this trade planet. Behind Bupinga Star stood the Ion Consortium, with exiles from the powerful Levya civilization of the Galaxy. Levya was a highly technologically advanced civilization that pursued efficiency and virtues; it was now at a civilization level of 31, slightly higher than Iridium Star's current level.
In Levya, so individuals did not agree with the civilization's ideals. These renegades favored the once-flourishing Trade Alliance of the second golden era of civilization and strongly advocated for privatization. The trade proponents were mocked by the Levya people and even given animal nas as surnas. Ultimately, these individuals parted ways with Levya civilization and established Bupinga Star in this star region, forming the influential Ion Consortium in dozens of nearby star regions.
The business handbook of the Bupinga people openly inford custors of their origins without any hesitation, seeming even proud of it. Indeed, being descendants of a level 31 civilization, they naturally possessed many high-level technologies, making them not an easy target for provocation despite branching out with a comrcial planet.
"Noble guests, as new clients to our Bupinga, we have a reward program. For your first transaction with the main body of our Consortium, we will offer you a ten percent discount; for legal transactions that you conduct on Bupinga with other clients without exceeding the amount limit, we waive notary fees, interdiary fees, and a series of other additional charges."
Although Bai Zhongqi could not make out any expressions on the Bupinga person's face that he could understand, he knew that what he was doing was probably similar to what those salespeople on Earth did when promoting products.
"We need you to register your client information. If you choose to beco a mber of Bupinga Trade Star, you can waive many fees incurred during your transactions, and you will also enjoy a variety of thoughtful services provided by this trade star to make your business more prosperous and trading easier," the official explained.
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Bai Zhongqi nodded without wasting too much ti chatting with a customs officer who doubled as a salesman. A simple entry was free of charge; for most civilizations in the Galaxy, trading was a complicated affair. The trade within each civilization might not even use a unified dium of exchange, let alone between civilizations with different values and species.
In the comrcial handbook of the Bupinga people, two forms of in-demand diums of exchange were listed: one was energy currency, which was important to all civilizations, and for most, energy was relatively easy to circulate and asure. The energy storage diums might vary, and they usually occupied a lot of space. The Bupinga people cleverly used their efficient energy technology to create high-energy-density small carriers—essentially batteries—and used them as a base currency for many transactions. This energy currency was widely accepted, with the basic unit being 1 Pulun, equivalent to about 2.5 billion kilowatt-hours—aning that 10,000 Pulun was equivalent to Earth's annual power generation.
The technology to store the energy of 1 Pulun in a carrier the size of a cubic ter was not available to the people of Iridium Star; obviously, Iridium Star was not particularly strong in energy storage technology. But when Bai Zhongqi heard that the Bupinga people had such storage capabilities, a strong desire to possess it erged.
However, he also understood that since the Bupinga people used Pulun as a currency and employed it widely, no civilization had cracked this core technology. Pulun was useful precisely because it could be directly utilized in the production and daily life of a civilization as an energy source.
At the mont, Bai Zhongqi naturally would not disclose the real nas of Iridium Star Civilization or Earth. In fact, as he neared the location, he consciously hid the Sacred Falcon's three-pointed lightning crest on his ship and replaced it with a temporary Eagle Shield crest.
Crests are the most easily distinguishable thod of recognition among Universe Civilizations, functioning essentially as flags.
"We are a rchant group from Thousand Year Eagle Civilization, hoping to conduct trade on Bupinga Trade Star," Bai Zhongqi declared.
Beyond the fictitious na of the civilization, Bai Zhongqi did not provide any further details. Naturally, the Bupinga person did not ask any additional questions, including where the so-called Thousand Year Eagle Civilization's ho planet was, what special technologies the civilization had, its political system, or its civilization level.
For many civilizations that ca just for business, except for information related to their ho planet, which they would not disclose, they would readily provide other details. This was all to optimize search engines for business, as others wanting to conduct trade would check if their trading partners were sufficiently qualified. Civilization level and technological prowess were very effective filtering criteria.
Bai Zhongqi wasn't planning to sell anything; what he wanted was intelligence on the Teizene people.
However, just because he had no intention of selling, it didn't an others wouldn't be interested in buying.
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