102: Chapter 102 Unfounded Discussions, Expanding Cooperation

Twilight seeped into the window lattice of the Council Hall's rear hall, and Chen Wuwang's fingers were still tapping.

Three long and two short; the rhythm remained unbroken. The jade talisman lay on the stone table, its cloud-thunder pattern glowing with a gentle white light in his peripheral vision.

He did not spare the object another glance.

When the door was pushed open, it brought with it a gust of wind, carrying the distinct scorched metallic smell of the Artifact Refining Workshop and the faint humming of residual Spirit Arrays.

Chen Tiezhu walked in carrying a toolbox, his shoulders still dusted with a few uncooled rune slag, and he shouted the moment he entered:

"What happened again? You had the messenger brat acting all mysterious, and I couldn't even bother to shut down the No. 7 Pill Condensation Arm I was calibrating."

Ling Zhenzi floated in right behind him, his robe hem sweeping across the threshold, muttering:

"Making people lose sleep in the middle of the night, insisting on an 'Emergency Council', I thought the Zhao Clan had attacked us."

He lifted his eyes and saw the jade talisman on the table, his voice cutting off abruptly. "...Oh. This thing, it actually has some weight to it."

Chen Wuwang finally stopped tapping his fingers, grabbed the jade talisman, and slapped it onto the table with a crisp sound.

"The Zhao Clan wants to cooperate," he said.

Both of them were stunned.

"What?" Chen Tiezhu's brows knit into a knot. "One moment they send people to seize the Medicinal Field, and the next they extend an olive branch? Have their brains been backlashed by a spirit explosion?"

"It's not just the Zhao Clan."

Chen Wuwang leaned back into his chair, his Mechanical Prosthetic Eye slightly adjusting its focal length, reflecting the Star Domain map of the Eastern Wasteland hanging on the wall.

"It is a joint probe from three of the Seven Clans—the Zhao of Cloud-Thunder, the Li of Black Scale, and the Wang of Golden Palace. Who came today was only the vanguard. They have seen the Medicinal Pill market take shape, and they have seen that we can mass-produce high-purity Qi Condensation pills using machines. Now, they don't want to seize it; they want to buy shares."

Ling Zhenzi narrowed his eyes. "Fifty-fifty profit split? Sharing the risks?"

"Those were their exact words." Chen Wuwang sneered. "Thirty percent of resources in exchange for core technology, and they also want us to hand over the formulas, distribution channels, and pricing power. They are dreaming."

Chen Tiezhu spat on the ground. "A dog can't change its habit of eating excrement. They talk about cooperation, but in their hearts, they are calculating how to move our Pill Furnace back to their Family ancestral hall to worship it."

He walked to the table, picked up the jade talisman, and examined it back and forth. "This thing can command an escort fleet and serve as a clearance token, but do they dare stake their reputation on it? I don't believe it."

"So, it's not a question of belief."

Ling Zhenzi suddenly interjected, his fingertips tracing a dotted line in the air.

"It's that they have already realized that by relying solely on traditional methods, they can no longer suppress us. In this path of Medicinal Pills, they cannot keep up. Transportation cannot keep up, production capacity cannot keep up, and even their methods for testing purity are three generations behind ours. What they fear is not that we are strong, but that we are fast."

Chen Wuwang nodded. "They are envious. But envy and respect are two different things. What they want is not a partner, but slave labor."

"Then why did you make them wait three days?" Chen Tiezhu stared wide-eyed.

"Because I want to make them wait."

Chen Wuwang stood up and walked to the Star Domain map on the wall, his fingers pointing to several red dots on the edge of the Eastern Wasteland. "Smaller clans have already started lining up to purchase, the He Clan is willing to survey abandoned workshops for us, and the Liu Family wants to trade liquid Spiritual Plants for Medicinal Pills."

"Our production capacity can still be increased, but our distribution channels cannot keep up."

"Without the starship networks and cross-domain teleportation nodes of the major clans, the best we can do is stay trapped in the Eastern Wasteland."

"So you genuinely want to negotiate?" Ling Zhenzi frowned.

"Negotiate, yes, but not according to their rules." Chen Wuwang turned around, his gaze turning cold. "We must set our own rules."

The three of them gathered around the stone table.

Chen Tiezhu slapped the table:

"Let's talk about the benefits first. If they are truly willing to provide rare Artifact Refining Materials, like Cold Marrow Crystal Sand or Thunder Nucleus Mother Liquid, our pill condensation System can directly upgrade. And there's the starship permit—once cross-domain transportation is opened, the automated Pill Furnace can be deployed to outer Star Domains, and production will more than double."

"But there is a prerequisite." Ling Zhenzi immediately added. "The Materials they provide must undergo our independent quality inspection. Otherwise, if they mix in some Yin-Corrosion Powder, a single pill could ruin ten clansmen."

"Correct." Chen Tiezhu nodded. "And the production line must absolutely not be copied. I just added a self-destruct fuse mechanism to the new batch of rune chips last night; as long as there are more than three external read attempts, the core array will instantly vaporize. But this move won't stop them from reverse-engineering the finished mechs."

"Then we must lock it down through the cooperation structure." Ling Zhenzi raised his hand, drawing two intersecting rune lines in the air. "I suggest implementing a 'Dual-Key Activation Mechanism'—all core control arrays of the joint workshops must be activated by both parties entering their keys simultaneously. We control the main logic, and they hold the energy access permissions. Whoever tries to act on their own, the System will immediately cut off the flow and shut down."

"Good." Chen Wuwang noted it down. "Add another point: all joint workshops must have Chen Clan members stationed on-site for supervision, at a rank no lower than an Artifact Refining Deputy Envoy. They can send people, but they must not touch the core operation area."

"We also have to monitor the flow of raw Materials." Ling Zhenzi continued. "I am thinking of building an independent audit Spirit Array, embedding a Spiritual Qi waveform tag into every batch of raw Materials to track their whereabouts in real-time. Even if they secretly withhold half a gram of Cold Marrow Sand, the System will raise an alarm."

Chen Tiezhu grinned. "When the time comes, if they want to play tricks, we can directly issue an ultimatum on the Jade Slip network: 'Clan X withheld strategic Materials on Day Y, evidence as follows'—let's see where they can hide their faces."

"Not only that." Chen Wuwang's eyes flashed. "We will not accept fixed dividends. We will implement 'Technology Equity + Dynamic Profit Sharing'."

Both of them looked up.

"We will use our formulas, equipment, and control Systems as capital, holding sixty percent of the shares."

His tone was steady. "They will use their resources, channels, and escort fleets as shares, holding forty percent. Initial profits will be distributed accordingly, and later, it will be re-evaluated based on actual contributions."

"Whoever contributes more gets more. But the core technology will always belong solely to the Chen Clan."

"Prohibit them from replicating the production line independently." Chen Tiezhu added. "Violators will have all cooperation projects frozen immediately, and the delivered equipment will be remotely locked."

"Add it." Chen Wuwang picked up a pen and carved the first clause onto the Jade Slip. "All joint workshops, without joint authorization from both parties, may not perform any technical replication or parameter export. Violators will trigger the self-destruct protocol."

Ling Zhenzi watched him write them down one by one and suddenly asked, "What if they don't agree?"

"Then we wait." Chen Wuwang put down the pen. "Wait for the smaller clans to come to us themselves. Wait for their starships to be unable to outrun our underground transport network. Wait for their Elders to get stuck at the Bottleneck of their Breakthrough, while our youths use the machine-made pills to charge into Foundation Establishment in one go."

He paused, his voice dropping a few degrees. "We aren't afraid of dragging this out. They are."

On the stone table, the pages of the Jade Slip lit up one by one, with thirteen clauses appearing line by line, the handwriting looking as if it were carved by a knife and axe. "The Thirteen Clauses of Joint Operation".

Chen Tiezhu picked up an unfinished rune chip, his fingertips rubbing the edges:

"I will reinforce the technical protection. Tomorrow, I will upgrade the authentication protocol for the new batch of chips and add a biological spiritual frequency binding—only the Chen Clan Bloodline can activate the core commands."

"I will start setting up the audit Spirit Array tonight." Ling Zhenzi formed a hand seal, and several golden veins appeared on the star map on the wall. "Starting from the main workshop, I will gradually cover all possible cooperation nodes."

Chen Wuwang stood in the center, his Mechanical Prosthetic Eye scanning every line of text, confirming it was correct.

He didn't smile, nor did he heave a sigh of relief.

He knew that this draft was not the end, but the beginning of another game of wits.

The major clans would not easily agree to these terms. They would haggle, threaten, and look for loopholes. But as long as this proposal was placed on the table, the initiative would remain in their hands.

He picked up the last Jade Slip, recorded the "Thirteen Clauses of Joint Operation" in full, and sealed it.

"Tomorrow," he said. "Summon all core stewards to attend and listen. The day after tomorrow, we will officially receive the envoys."

"Let them know," Chen Tiezhu grinned, his eyes shining with the light of a craftsman. "To discuss cooperation with the Chen Clan, one must follow the Chen Clan's rules."

Ling Zhenzi huffed softly. "They had better not harbor any crooked thoughts. Otherwise, I wouldn't mind making their flagship suddenly have a 'signal loss' during a warp jump."

Chen Wuwang did not speak.

He simply placed the sealed Jade Slip on the table and let his gaze fall back onto that cloud-thunder pattern jade talisman.

His knuckles tapped three times.

Three long and two short.

The rhythm remained the same.