"Move quickly! You slow-moving idiots! Follow your commander to get the equipment! Then line up in the open space according to the number!"
Less than a thousand kilometers away from Tianxi City, the capital of the Federation Tianxi Star, on an artificial plain cleared by small-caliber naval guns for parking spaceships, several Qien people wearing gorgeous robes stood motionless on the metal On one side of the high platform, they looked coldly at the representative of the Fiery Star Slave Catching Group who was shouting loudly through a loudspeaker in front of them.
One of them holds a professional instrument for calculating taxes in his hand. Every time a certain number of slaves emerge from the hatch of the transport ship, he will lightly press the button on the instrument to collect the amount required for these slaves. The actual tax is calculated.
What the members of the Slave Capture Corps and the Imperial Army were driving off the transport ship were the more than one million Toth slaves captured by the Fiery Star Slave Capture Corps a while ago.
Just as Chairman Zorchi had planned, none of the 1.2 million Thoth people, Blazing Star, was left for him. They were all sent to Krohoka in the name of supporting the war. They were shown rubbing their hands in the projection to express their gratitude. Zobagis, the commander-in-chief of the Empire's Outer Rim Legion, smiled and accepted it.
Judging from the current deployment of Krohoka's army forces, Zobagis believes that although we have many slave legions supported from the empire to fill the front line, compared with the human federation's elite army that is renowned in the galaxy, perhaps four Five slave soldiers may not be able to replace one human soldier.
Therefore, judging from the current strength of more than 10 million of our own troops against the enemy's three to four million troops, this ratio is not very safe.
If the diplomats of the two countries were not still doing their last useless work on the Xinghai Community, trying to buy more preparation time before the war machines of both sides were fully launched, perhaps their own fronts would have been attacked by the well-trained People's Alliance Corps. It was riddled with holes.
In this crisis-ridden situation, the 1.2 million Thoth slaves generously supported by the Blazing Star are enough to make Zobagis, who is ignored in the inner circle, but the imperial ministers who are the most powerful in the outer circle feel extremely excited. This is true even if these slaves are not given for free, but are charged at market prices.
As long as this battle can be won, investing tens to tens of billions of imperial coins in purchasing slaves is nothing at all.
What makes Zobagis most gratified is that shortly after the League of People’s Declaration of War was issued, the royal family in the inner ring issued a hard directive of “war above all else”, allowing the governments of various colonial planets in the outer ring parliament to They had to spend a huge sum of money from their increasingly empty wallets as military expenses for this war.
Take Vallao, the hometown of Captain Zozi, for example. In order to support the development of the outer ring economy and to facilitate the inner ring to better plunder resources, the royal family has never levied even one of the rare crystal mining on the planet Vallao in recent years. Taxes on Imperial Coins.
But now, the time of reckoning has arrived.
Emperor Sazha XXII, who is sitting in the Shahai Palace of Chiennia, the imperial capital, personally issued a decree requiring that in future wars, the colonial council must spend no less than 100 billion imperial coins as military expenditures for the outer ring legions. , if you won’t be able to come up with so much cash for a while, you can also replace it with materials of equal value according to the market price.
As for other poor planets that do not have pillar industries like Vallao, the emperor is not too harsh. He just hopes that they, that is, the parliaments and governments of each colony can understand the importance of this war to the empire, and calls on all major colonial planets to take action. Money gives money, strength gives strength. After winning the war, the royal family will reward each planet according to its contribution.
As the saying goes, there must be brave men under heavy rewards. Many outer-ring planets that are not as wealthy as Vallao, after receiving the emperor's guarantee, simply broke the pot and regarded this battle with the Human Federation as their own turnaround.
Many MPs who were not wealthy even took out their coffins from the Imperial Bank and donated them to the Outer Rim Legion for free. Commander Zobagis was deeply moved, but at the same time he was also under greater pressure.
In order to better understand the battle situation and stimulate the fighting will of his own soldiers, he even ignored the dissuasion of his staff and personally came to a secret bunker on Krohoka to direct the battle. This move really surprised the informed imperial soldiers on the planet. They were greatly encouraged, and with red eyes they all wanted to rush out of the fortifications and fight to the death with the People's Alliance troops.
It's a pity that except for these normal soldiers and officers, the slave soldiers whose brains have been installed with neural implants no longer have such strong emotions. Even if there is, it's just neural implants using chemicals to deceive their senses and forcibly create emotions.
After the tax collector of the Slave Traders Guild pressed the instrument in his hand exactly one hundred and twenty times, he tore off the paper spit out from under the instrument and solemnly read the contents to the representatives of the Blazing Star Slave Catching Group.
"In this transaction, the total number of slaves brought by the Fiery Star Slave Catching Group is 1,206,05, and all the slaves are of the Toth tribe. The current guild representatives, royal representatives and inner circle representatives I am here to exercise and supervise the sacred and legal power granted to our Slave Traders Guild by the imperial royal family, to tax the slave trade of Blazing Star, the transaction number is XXXXXXX."
"After calculation, the total regular transaction tax and additional trade tax on Toth slaves collected this time totaled 980 million imperial coins. Does the representative of Fiery Star have any questions about this?"
"Of course there is no problem. I would like to ask all representatives to conduct official business."
After the three representatives sent by various forces witnessed the completion of the transaction between Fiery Star and the Outer Rim Legion, and after collecting the taxes and leaving in the spaceship, several members of Fiery Star's slave-catching group gathered in a group and began to curse.
"These damn blood-suckers! Almost half of the profits have been taxed by them! Your Excellency, the Speaker, is really good at predicting things. According to the Slave Traders Guild's terrible tax rate, we can't make more than 100% of the profits no matter what!"
A strange man with fiery red scales gritted his teeth and said: "We have only more than one million slaves, and one-third of the transaction amount is levied as tax. Those guys in the inner circle often trade slaves for tens of millions of people. Isn’t this a loss-making business?!”
The companion next to him was obviously smarter. He shook his head and lowered his voice and said: "I have learned a lot today. The royal family, the Inner Circle Council and the Slave Traders' Guild are all in the same group. Sigrisvanf The director is right, it is only through collusion between government and businessmen that we can make money. No matter how hard we work, we at the bottom will never be able to eat at the same table as those in the inner circle!"
Compared with the sighs represented by a few flaming stars and the crowded open space, the fate of millions of Thoth slaves is obviously more miserable.
For the soldiers of the Slave Legion, not only are their bodies controlled, but their senses have also been completely controlled by neural implants. Just press the operation panel lightly. If their superiors want them to laugh, they must laugh. If they want them to cry, they must cry. Otherwise, they will be regarded as having a loose implant. , executed on the spot.
However, in the eyes of the outer ring officers who accepted the slaves, these slave soldiers, who are born with hard shells and powerful strength, will definitely become good helpers for Qien soldiers. Their absolute obedience to orders and disregard for their own lives and the lives of their comrades are enough to make them discipline. The strictest army.
In addition to being relatively rigid and unable to execute too complex orders, the extremely cost-effective slave army is simply a perfect war machine. Especially after equipping them with weapons similar to those of the Qien soldiers, these silent soldiers who even charge can definitely surprise those arrogant humans.
A Qien officer who was in charge of commanding the slave army looked back along the endless queue not far away, and then glanced at the logistics staff beside him who were distributing weapons to the slave soldiers, and mentally calculated the cost of one slave soldier. Approximately how much.
A red laser assault rifle and enough energy magazines to last them to death, as well as a bottle of heat-insulating reflective coating that slaves can apply all over their bodies, so that they can effectively resist human laser weapons with their carapace.
Of course, we can't forget the flimsy military uniform that has no protective capabilities. After all, the Empire is an interstellar civilization that respects basic ethics and will not engage in barbaric behavior that leaves soldiers naked.
Calculated this way, the cost of arming one Qien soldier is enough to buy a set of pretty good equipment for four or five slave soldiers. And on the battlefield, four or five obedient soldiers can obviously accomplish many more tasks than a single soldier.
"Captain Cassix, this is the unit assigned to you by the command department. The slave soldiers are numbered 18001 to 19000."
It didn't take long for this low-level officer of the Empire's Outer Rim Legion to receive the slave troops assigned to him from the logistics staff, as well as the neural implant controller that could be directed to individuals based on numbers.
After taking his own thousands of Toth slave soldiers onto the transport ship heading to the front line, the officer opened the garrison location assigned to him by his superiors and took a few glances. He found that there were many friendly troops in front of him and said indifferently. He closed the electronic map and focused his attention on the green vegetation flashing past the porthole window of the transport ship. This was a scenery he had never seen in his hometown.
However, if the officer knew that the main force of the Eighth Theater Zone of the Human Federation was less than a few dozen kilometers away from his destination, I wonder if he would feel so relaxed.
