After Waking Up I Inherited the Earth [Interstellar] – CH128

Chapter 128

“Ning Xian, have you made the reservation yet?”

Just as he was about to go to sleep, he unexpectedly received a call from his friend Yajin. Ning Xian felt a bit helpless.

He yawned, shook his head sleepily, and said, “No. I haven’t gone yet.”

Although Yajin didn’t explicitly say what the reservation was for, anyone who had been on StarBlog knew exactly what “reservation” meant.

The moment he heard Ning Xian still hadn’t reserved, Yajin panicked. “Ning Xian, you’re way too slow! Hurry up and do it. The number of reservations has already hit eight digits. If you wait any longer, they might close the reservation channel.”

That instantly chased away Ning Xian’s drowsiness.

He sat bolt upright on the bed, stunned.

Eight digits already?

How long had Earth Trading Company’s reservation channel even been open? How could it already be over eight digits of lifeforms reserving?

With no time to think, Ning Xian hurriedly said a few words to Yajin and ended the call. Then he opened Xie Xingchen’s StarBlog, tapped into the newest post, jumped to the Earth Trading Company holographic auction reservation site, and then… started waiting in line?

Ning Xian: ?

What the heck? Even reserving needs a queue? StarBlog is trash!

Where did the old “instant speed” go?

Seeing this, Ning Xian’s heart jolted and he grew anxious.

No way… could it be that once reservations hit a certain number, they stop letting people reserve?

No, don’t—please don’t!

He was still waiting to watch the fun!

Two minutes passed. The page still displayed “Queuing…,” and Ning Xian felt awful.

Thankfully he wasn’t that unlucky. After another two minutes, the “Queuing…” prompt disappeared, and he finally—painfully—reached the reservation page.

After filling in the basic terms, linking his personal terminal account, and paying 10 star-coins, Ning Xian received a number—98632987.

Clearly, that was his auction attendee ID.

Ning Xian stared at the rare little thing with curiosity, and his sleepiness vanished completely.

When he tapped the green ID, a panoramic seat map of the auction appeared in front of him.

The venue used for Earth Trading Company’s holographic auction was extremely grand.

Compared to an auction hall, it looked more like a key dungeon location from some epic fantasy masterpiece.

Freed from real-world constraints, everything here operated according to Xie Xingchen’s vision.

It was a massive venue shaped like a gigantic bird’s nest. High-tech silver light shimmered everywhere, stunning at first glance.

The huge raised circular platform at the center was the auction stage. Around it, seats formed ring after ring from inside to outside, divided into the VIP ring (VIP seats), inner ring, middle ring, outer ring, and so on.

Each ring had several rows, and each ring was higher than the one before it. By the outermost ring, it was no exaggeration to say the seats were already five or six stories high.

On top of that, there were countless huge floating screens in the air, and the adjustable line-of-sight tech widely used in holography—so even people in the farthest seats didn’t have to worry about not seeing what happened on the stage.

By default system settings, after buying a ticket, every attendee received a seat that matched their attendee ID number. But there were exceptions—the VIP ring and the inner ring.

Those two areas were the VIP service zones for this auction. As long as you were willing to spend money, you could get the best view and the most comfortable seating.

Ning Xian had a decent amount of money. Neither the VIP ring nor the inner ring was a problem for him.

But after thinking it over, he still only paid 10,000 star-coins and upgraded his seat from the back to the inner ring.

At the same time, he received a warm reminder from Earth Trading Company.

[Earth Trading Company: Dear customer “98632987,” hello. This is the Earth Trading Company holographic auction reminder assistant. The assistant reminds you that on May 4, please enter at least 10 minutes early (i.e., the best entry time is before 21:50 on May 4).]

Such smart reminders were common. To Ning Xian, it was nothing worth mentioning, so he didn’t pay much attention.

But—

Thinking about that annoying queue page, he decided to behave and follow the assistant’s advice. He planned to log in ten minutes early on auction day.

“Ning Xian, are you done yet?”

Just as Ning Xian exited the reservation page, Yajin contacted him again.

Ning Xian nodded. “Done. I even changed my seat.”

Yajin wasn’t surprised at all. He asked directly, “Did you switch to the VIP ring or the inner ring?”

Ning Xian: “Inner ring.”

Yajin: “Oh. I switched to VIP.”

They stared at each other, both unable to understand why the other chose VIP/inner ring.

Ning Xian said, “Aren’t we just here to watch the fun? VIP seats are too conspicuous and too close, aren’t they?”

He felt VIP-seat people might act too reserved for there to be much fun, so he chose the inner ring instead.

To him, it was the perfect spot—especially since he picked the last row of the inner ring near the regular seats. It was basically the ultimate “melon-eating” seat.

Yajin complained, “Are you stupid? It’s an auction. Only rich people can afford to bid. Where are the richest people? Obviously in VIP. That’s why I spent 100,000 star-coins to buy a VIP seat.”

Ning Xian: “…” There was nothing he could say.

Seeing Yajin still wanted to argue, Ning Xian—stubbornly sticking to himself—raised a hand to stop him. “Alright, fine. Let’s do it this way—split up, two routes, and we’ll eat melons together then.”

Yajin thought about it and felt Ning Xian had a point, so he nodded in agreement.

They chatted a bit more. In the end, Ning Xian couldn’t hold on anymore and needed sleep, so Yajin finally hung up.

May 3, Trading Day — Day 3.

Today was the day large-scale trades across the various planets entered the most intense stage.

On this day, Yu Cheng’s tianrong flower was successfully purchased by a major planet lord for 3 billion star-coins.

And using those 3 billion as a foundation, Yu Cheng bought a vast stretch of wasteland near his manor, then purchased related planting supplies, intending to expand his small estate into a large estate.

That tianrong flower—containing 20% green substance—broke records in both green substance content and sale price.

For a while, Yu Cheng was the undisputed center of attention. The entire day, he was basically a living trending topic—top ten trending searches on the main list, and if you clicked ten of them, all ten were him. Even if it wasn’t him, it was the tianrong flower he cultivated.

No other reason—simply because the buyer was a major planet lord who loved showing off.

Even if Yu Cheng wanted to keep a low profile, he couldn’t. Whether he liked it or not, he was forced into the spotlight, squeezing down everyone else who wanted to trend—including Earth Trading Company.

Xie Xingchen didn’t care at all.

Whether it was “heat” or not, he honestly didn’t value it that much.

To put it bluntly, his holographic auction tickets had already sold over a hundred million.

Just from ticket money alone, he had already earned two to three billion star-coins.

He was extremely satisfied!

Because—his ten bolts of colored cotton fabric might not even earn him that much, yet he’d already gotten it from ticket sales.

What did that mean?

It meant that before he even sold anything, he had already earned back the money he originally planned to make by selling items.

And the money was still continuing to flow in!

Xie Xingchen felt fine about it, but he didn’t know that his earning speed had completely terrified the insectoids.

After all, this time, in order to let more people participate, tickets were only 10 star-coins. Even with inner-ring seats at 10,000 star-coins and VIP seats at 100,000 star-coins, in their eyes, it still didn’t seem like much.

Everyone thought they’d only make a small profit. But the number of reservations was simply too huge—people forced the total revenue up purely through quantity.

Thinking of the person who created this effect, Hill’s gaze toward Xie Xingchen naturally grew gentler.

And with Xie Xingchen intentionally trying to build a relationship, it was no wonder their rapport rose quickly. In outsiders’ eyes, in a short time, they actually seemed like close friends!

It made one sigh—

Money’s charm was truly immense.

So immense that even insectoids couldn’t escape it.

Anyway, after seeing big deposits come in every so often, these hard-edged-aesthetic insectoids started thinking about how to decorate the auction venue better.

Otherwise, with such a bare steel auction hall, they felt like they were earning money with a guilty conscience.

Xie Xingchen was happy to see that.

He even sent several of his design department employees to help a little, asking them to make the venue feel warmer using Earth Trading Company’s popular greenery and merch (holographic decorations), and so on.

The final effect was indeed pretty good.

Especially the VIP and inner-ring seats. When those two areas were switched to luxurious, soft single-person sofas, with matching tea tables, flowers, and fruit plates, the vibe was simply…

This was absolutely another money-attracting point!

Seeing that, Hill forcibly dragged in even more tech staff to set up tasting seats. The way he looked at Xie Xingchen was like looking at star-coins—he loved him to death.

When Xie Xingchen suggested offering outfit-change options for attendees, Hill’s eyes shone even brighter than the sun in the sky.

Xie Xingchen said, “It’s an auction, right? We have to consider that some people may not want others to know who they are. So we should thoughtfully provide more disguise equipment—masks and cloaks of different styles and levels of refinement.”

Based on the TV dramas and novels Xie Xingchen had seen, at auctions you always had to hide your identity.

Some people used private boxes, some used treasure items—now they had one-click holographic outfit changes.

He wasn’t doing this for profit—he was being considerate to customers, innovating and upgrading the experience.

As for making a little extra money? That was just an unexpected bonus.

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Xie Xingchen smiled. “Everyone paid for tickets to get in, so we can give every guest one free basic disguise outfit. Of course, if they feel the free one isn’t to their liking, they can choose paid outfit services. But one thing—since this outfit change is a one-time service, we can’t charge too much. Selling those items for about 1 star-coin per piece should be enough.”

After all, tickets were only 10 star-coins, right?

If tickets were 10, but an outfit-change experience for a few hours cost more than the ticket?

He was afraid he’d get cursed out after the auction ended.

However—

Xie Xingchen was completely wrong about that.

After the auction, not only did no one curse him for the “dress-up mini game,” people even begged him to release a real dress-up game.

Their logic was—

One-click outfit changes were just too thrilling!

Xie Xingchen: “……”

He truly hadn’t expected this “thoughtful little feature” aimed at making small money to turn into a crazy cash cow when faced with netizens who had no rationality.

Clearly, people could choose the free service, or spend just 1 star-coin on a low-key black cloak to cover their faces.

But what did the netizens do?

VIP and inner-ring lifeforms were relatively normal (maybe because they knew each other and couldn’t afford to look ridiculous), but regular netizens were on another level.

They bought pretty dresses and cool outfits—and then had to match shoes, accessories, even makeup looks.

Even if each item cost only 1 star-coin, a full set easily cost 20–30 star-coins, no question.

And these items?

Hill’s team got them for free from major brands under the pretense of “helping you advertise”—meaning it was basically pure profit.

By checkout, Xie Xingchen finally understood why Hill had been smiling so happily.

Xie Xingchen had thought Hill was happy about earning a few extra tens of millions. Turns out Hill had gone straight into the stratosphere.

Hill had somehow “gotten” the joy of future dress-up girls/boys—he not only turned 2D dress-up into holographic dress-up, he even added one-click makeup switching, with tons of options, enough to keep people happily playing all day without stopping. Some people got so obsessed they didn’t even watch the auction—they stayed in the background changing outfits the entire time.

Of course, that was a story for later.

After Xie Xingchen suggested connecting tasting seats and increasing anonymity props, Hill immediately requested more tech staff from above.

Normally, this would’ve been difficult to handle, but with revenue reports that refreshed everyone’s worldview every few hours—and with Hill claiming that tasting seats and outfit changes could bring huge profits—upper management not only sent the tech personnel Hill asked for, they even doubled the number.

The military holographic technicians who received the notice were stunned.

At first they didn’t want to go, but once they learned how insanely profitable a mere holographic auction was, those military males didn’t hesitate. They drove the fastest hovercars to the Insectoid Hotel, arriving at the banquet hall to help Earth Trading Company.

Yes—the Insectoid Hotel banquet hall.

The same banquet hall Xie Xingchen had wanted to rent before, and now the hotel was letting him use it for free.

All to provide “behind-the-scenes staff” with a formal, spacious workplace.

The tianrong flower’s hype continued to climb, making Earth Trading Company’s holographic auction seem like it was cooling down.

But that “cooling down” was only on the surface. In reality, as time passed, the reservation count kept climbing.

As of now, nine digits worth of lifeforms had reserved the Earth Trading Company holographic auction.

It really made one sigh—there were just way too many people these days who loved joining the excitement.

It was both painful and joyful.

Painful because Hill’s team had been so busy lately they couldn’t even sleep properly. They sent request after request to upper management for tech support, until upper management got annoyed and simply shipped 100 technicians over and told them to handle it themselves.

Joyful because counting money felt unbelievably wonderful.

So wonderful that walking around felt like stepping on clouds.

It was the kind of feeling that made you grin and chuckle to yourself whenever you thought about it.

This kind of joy was just too good.

It was the first time the insectoids realized that money could be this easy to earn!

In the past, making money wasn’t “hard,” but it certainly wasn’t “easy” either.

Unlike now—they’d only been busy for a few days, and they’d earned money the hotel couldn’t possibly earn in twenty years!

If business during those few hours of the auction got even hotter, they might even earn as much as the city’s annual tax revenue.

Such a brutal amount made insects’ hearts race.

It also shut up all the tech military males who had originally complained about being transferred from the military.

In a certain banquet hall of the Insectoid Hotel…

The tech department’s military males were so busy they couldn’t even drink water, while on Earth Trading Company’s side, everyone was also busy, but still had time to sneak a sip of milk tea and eat a couple cookies.

Only Wang Qianqian—who had successfully taken the “auctioneer” role—was so nervous she didn’t even want to drink water.

Well… even though she was a fairly well-known streamer on the star network, having ten million viewers per stream was already considered good.

But this time?

Nearly one billion lifeforms!

So why were there so many bored people in this world?

Wang Qianqian couldn’t help complaining.

Too many people was genuinely stressful.

Even though she had already memorized all the selling points of the colored cotton fabric, the nervousness made her fear she’d forget something.

And the more she recited, the more she actually forgot.

At first, she wasn’t that nervous. But then her parents pulled some ridiculous stunt.

If they wanted to attend the auction themselves, fine.

Given the Wang family’s wealth, they were definitely qualified—heck, they could even buy everything if they wanted.

But if you’re attending, then attend—why did you invite every relative, friend, and business partner?

And worse, why were you bragging about “my daughter this, my daughter that”?

Now look what happened.

The bragging her father did… she, the daughter, now had to make it real. QAQ

Xie Xingchen took another sip of milk tea and said casually, “Don’t be nervous. If it really doesn’t work, you can make a cue card and just go up and read it.”

Colored cotton fabric might not match the tianrong flower, but in a sense it was far stronger.

Because the tianrong flower was only one bloom—while colored cotton fabric was ten bolts.

It was the kind of thing where—as long as you had money—you could buy enough to make clothes for the whole family, letting everyone live in an environment free from dark matter interference.

So the same point again—once you put its function and proof on display, even if the auctioneer were mute, it wouldn’t affect the auction.

The only difference was that a great auctioneer might hype it into a sky-high price.

But Xie Xingchen made it clear he didn’t want a sky-high price.

Because this was something that could be mass-produced.

Once his colored cotton trees matured, the cotton harvested could be made into lots of colored cotton fabric.

If the first batch sold for an outrageous price, and then not long after he sold the second and third batches at normal prices…

There was no guarantee those lifeforms who paid sky-high prices the first time wouldn’t hold a grudge.

So why bother?

He still planned to use this auction’s final price as a middle reference for future selling prices.

Holding his milk tea, Xie Xingchen took two more sips, comforted Wang Qianqian half-heartedly, then slowly left the meeting room.

Wang Qianqian didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

But she had to admit—it worked absurdly well.

She immediately stopped feeling nervous.

No choice.

If the boss didn’t care, how could an employee possibly stay nervous?

And besides, the auction looked grand, but in reality they were only auctioning one product—there wasn’t even much to memorize.

And honestly, it didn’t even need memorizing.

The moment she learned the colored cotton fabric contained 10% green substance, she already remembered its functions and effects.

As long as she remembered the key selling points, the rest wasn’t that important. Even if she forgot everything, it didn’t matter—she could improvise.

She’d only been so nervous because it was her first time facing so many lifeforms, and because of the bragging her father had spread.

Don’t think she didn’t know—those people praised her on the surface, saying how amazing she was and how blessed her father was to have such a daughter, but behind the scenes they mocked her family.

They mocked her father for being a suddenly-rich poor man who couldn’t wash the “poverty stink” off his body. They mocked their family for still acting shabby like poor people even after squeezing into high society. They mocked her for refusing to be a proper rich young lady and instead going out to work, acting proud of it rather than ashamed.

Wang Qianqian had heard these kinds of ridicule since she was little—countless times. But no matter how many times she heard it, it always felt harsh.

That was why she wanted to do even better, to prove to them that her parents weren’t fools—they simply loved her and respected her choices, and her choices were meaningful and correct.

She had walked into a dead end mentally, which was why she became so tense.

But after her boss handled it like that, she suddenly felt she’d been stupid.

They were just insignificant people—why care?

Once she understood that, the weight on her shoulders vanished.

Like—if the boss didn’t even mind you slacking off, then maybe she really didn’t need to work that hard?

After all, she was a known streamer and already had live-speaking ability, so… whether she tried hard or not might not change much.

Having practiced for a long time and being able to recite her notes backward, Wang Qianqian thought about it and lazily followed behind her boss out of the banquet hall.

Not long after, the others who felt their work was done also left the banquet hall.

Soon, only the hard-working military males remained inside.

The serious military male: “……”

Are humans all like this?

Because insectoids were exclusionary, there weren’t many other-civilization lifeforms on insectoid territory. For most of the military males present, this was their first time interacting with humans in real life.

And it had to be said—these people left a deep impression, so deep that the insectoids nearly formed a stereotype—

Humans must all be leisurely, carefree, and able to make money!

Trading Day continued. Most lifeforms with large-scale trade needs had already arrived.

Compared to the previous days, today’s foot traffic clearly increased, but at the same time, there were fewer booths selling goods.

Because many small planet lords / small estate owners had already cleared their inventories in the first two days.

By normal practice, they would’ve closed their booths.

But after seeing Earth Trading Company’s “model room,” many of those who had already sold out started tinkering with their booths too.

Due to time constraints, they didn’t build a physical “model room.” Instead, they lazily bought holographic backgrounds, used those as backdrops, and displayed product samples on staggered shelves of different shapes and heights.

It still looked a bit disjointed—but compared to a bare booth, it looked much better.

Most importantly, this kind of booth cost less (holographic backdrops could be recycled), required less effort, and took far less time!

As long as you didn’t mind the small issue of “the scene doesn’t perfectly match,” you could finish it in a few hours.

Economical, practical, and time-saving.

So for a while, booths like this sprang up like mushrooms after rain.

First among the sold-out booths, then the trend spread to medium booths that still had stock, and finally it spread even to large booths—because with backdrops everywhere, their own bare booths looked especially ugly and out of place.

The moment you entered the Trading Day venue, the colorful booths made your eyes hurt.

This “terrifying” scene left Xie Xingchen completely numb.

Sure enough—how bold people are determines how wild their output is.

They even had a Jurassic-style backdrop now. What else couldn’t they do?

Mountains and rivers were basic. The truly insane stuff was “giant beasts battling lifeforms.”

Anyway, Xie Xingchen would never understand this kind of aesthetic.

He walked to Earth Trading Company’s booth with a blank face.

Only when he arrived at his own booth did he feel like his aesthetic had come back to life.

But just as he was about to sigh in relief, he choked that breath back—because he saw someone there whom he never expected to meet at all—

Little Randy.

After Waking Up I Inherited the Earth [Interstellar]