On the fifteenth day since the opening of World #5: The Gravel-Yard Asteroid Belt, all ten thousand linked asteroids were decorated with red silk lanterns and fluttering colorful banners.
Today was the First Monthly Gravel-Yard Productivity & Model Debtor Awards Ceremony, held concurrently via live spirit-screen broadcast with the grand upgrade of the Dry-Well Planetary Star-Gate back on Planet Canglan!
On the main stage of Asteroid #001, fifty thousand miners in spotless, freshly ironed neon-yellow vests sat in neat rows, clapping rhythmically like primary school students waiting for field day.
Standing on the wooden stage behind a red-cloth table was Pei Xuan, flanked by General Tie Zhan, Abacus Su, Old Guo, and Chief Ticket Inspector Ye Guhan (who had scheduled a seven-minute station stopover so his passengers could watch the ceremony).
“Fellow citizens, workers, and debtor-students!” Pei Xuan spoke into a fused brass microphone, his warm voice echoing across all five worlds at once. “In just two weeks since opening the Gravel-Yard Mining Ring, our fifty thousand new miners have extracted three hundred million tons of High-Grade Spirit-Coal, eighty million tons of Star-Copper, and ten million tons of Void-Silver! Not a single workplace injury occurred, not a single train was delayed, and Night School literacy reached 100%!”
