The morning whistle of Star-Train No. 1 echoed across the gray craters of Dust-Rock Moon, loud enough to rattle the long white ears of ten thousand Moon-Rabbit station attendants.
Inside the front command car, Pei Xuan sat behind a wide oak desk bolted to the iron floor, sipping a mug of hot sweet-spring tea while looking at the glowing blue screen floating in front of his eyes.
“One hundred feet of black farm soil,” Pei Xuan whispered, his eyes shining brighter than a pile of Spirit Stones. He tapped the floating map with his finger. “Back when I first got kicked out to Dry-Well Village, I had to scrape three inches of yellow sand just to plant a single potato. Look at this whole green planet sitting out here with nobody farming it! What a terrible waste of good dirt!”
Sitting across the table, Hong Ling slammed her heavy iron account book shut and held up two fingers. Two fused laser-cleavers hung from her waist belt, humming softly.
“Young Master, we need that dirt right now!” Hong Ling said, her voice sharp as she pointed at her ledger. “With five hundred thousand brick workers commuting to the moon every morning, plus the hundred thousand long-eared rabbits we just hired, our daily food consumption went up by forty thousand tons! General Tie’s soldiers alone ate six train cars of steamed pork buns yesterday!”
