102: Chapter 102 Nest City Council

Wild Dog Cheng Yu was gnawing on a steamed bun and drinking cold water by the roadside all by himself. Before long, a crowd of people were squatting with him, also gnawing on steamed buns and drinking cold water. Then, all of these people were fined by the Hive City Security Force in the name of affecting the city's appearance.

"Th-th-this... this isn't right, is it? Is there any imperial edict from His Majesty that says you can't squat by the roadside and eat?!"

The Security Forces member who fined him didn't even bother with him, instead directly inputting Wild Dog Cheng Yu's identity information into the police mobile terminal to see if he had any outstanding cases against him.

"Heh, you're a victim of that series of fraud cases. You didn't know you could go to the Hive City Bank now to reclaim a portion of the money you were swindled out of?"

"No way, no way, you must have made a mistake. How could I ever fall for something like that?"

Wild Dog Cheng Yu's eyes darted around, but his feet had already started turning toward the Hive City Bank. It was truly embarrassing to admit this. Even though the official statistics stated that about three percent of the clone residents had suffered financial losses, in reality, when people discussed it, no one had ever heard of anyone around them actually getting scammed.

Half a day later, after filling out countless forms, signing, taking photos, and recording videos, and promising never to be scammed again, Wild Dog Cheng Yu reclaimed a portion of his assets.

As for the remaining portion, it was temporarily frozen and would be distributed as an annuity after retirement. It wasn't that His Majesty was greedy for these people's pocket change; he was genuinely worried that their brains didn't work well enough and that they would starve themselves to death in the future.

After receiving the money, Wild Dog Cheng Yu was just preparing to redeem his old assets, but things often go wrong when you act on impulse. He saw a few clones holding signs and shouting at the entrance of the pawnshop, so he stopped to watch the commotion.

Seeing that Wild Dog Cheng Yu was interested in the situation, those people handed him a flyer and invited him to attend a rally that evening.

"This group of yours... it isn't some organization that opposes His Majesty, is it?" Wild Dog Cheng Yu shuddered.

In the Cheng Yu Empire, individuals or groups that opposed the original were called "Great Treason." They would not only be completely exterminated but also have every trace of their existence erased.

Perhaps such individuals or groups had existed once, but they wouldn't be recorded in the old imperial archives, and certainly wouldn't be included in the national history. Thus, these things had never happened.

"Of course not, how could you think that?!" The clone handing out flyers was also made nervous by his comment. "We are just planning to build some momentum to run for Hive City Councilor."

"What's that?" Wild Dog Cheng Yu was essentially a released convict, and he wasn't familiar with these latest developments in Hive City.

"Oh?! That means you don't have any ideological proposals for Hive City construction yet!" The person displayed the excitement of someone who had just recruited an unregistered new customer, hurriedly giving Wild Dog Cheng Yu a pile of gifts, such as cooking oil and tissues, and urging him to attend the rally that evening.

Wild Dog Cheng Yu was noncommittal. He still wanted to redeem his old assets first and wasn't very interested in the matter at hand.

But for some reason, today everything was going wrong.

The clone in charge of the pawnshop spread his hands and told Wild Dog Cheng Yu directly that all the assets he had previously pawned there had already been forfeited due to overdue deadlines.

Upon hearing this, Wild Dog Cheng Yu was about to lose his temper, but the pawnshop manager immediately placated him:

"Oh, my dear old sir, we have to make a profit in our business. You got sentenced to life imprisonment the moment you got into legal trouble; our pawnshop can't just wait indefinitely for the interest to accrue day after day."

Seeing that the people inside were about to get into a fight, some people outside tried to break it up, while others snuck out to report it to the Security Forces.

Before half a day had even passed, Wild Dog Cheng Yu had already been arrested for the second time.

This time there was no leniency; he had to be detained for a solid day.

Back when Wild Dog Cheng Yu was riding high in the Underhive, even when he entered the detention center, he was surrounded by followers as if he were on an inspection tour.

Now, however, he was squatting behind a blank white wall, lost in thought. A young thug named Cheng Yu nearby was eager to come over and provoke him; Wild Dog Cheng Yu recognized that look, the look of a young person wanting to replace an old veteran.

Just as Wild Dog Cheng Yu was about to give this clone some "old-timer" lessons, the telescreen on the wall of the detention center suddenly lit up, followed immediately by a burst of passionate orchestral music.

All the clones stood up in alarm. When the telescreen blared, it meant either a major event or a major change; someone was getting promoted, or someone was losing their head.

The so-called telescreen was a giant, horizontal dark, except that a dark only crawled your personal information from time to time, and it did so covertly without letting you know.

But the telescreen had someone monitoring you from behind the screen twenty-four hours a day, while also serving as a broadcast and advertising tool.

"Under the guidance of our wise and great Emperor, the Imperial Army has conquered the Paradise World of Cheng Tianjun Planet, rescuing millions of humans living in dire straits there..."

What was playing on the telescreen not only included neatly marching clone armies but also intermittently broadcasted clips of the trial and execution of the Corpse Emperor's bandit gang and unscrupulous nobles.

The main reason was that most of the audience watching the telescreen didn't have much interest in things like unifying the galaxy or recovering the solar system, but they did love watching beheadings.

They especially loved watching the beheading of nobles; they would giggle stupidly the moment they saw it.

Normally, when asked to shout slogans, everyone would be listless, but only when they were shown beheadings would they shout "May His Majesty live forever!" with such vigor.

"They even have to hold trials before killing nobles now? Didn't they use to just pile up the heads into monuments directly?"

Wild Dog Cheng Yu couldn't help but sigh that the changes in the world were truly too fast. He had only been locked up for less than a year in total, yet the changes in the Empire were already becoming incomprehensible to him.