He Only Took a Few Star Coins, So There Was No Way He'd Be Found Out

In a Star Cup shop on a street corner on Canghai Star.

Wuma Xiu bit down on the straw in his empty cup, his gaze fixed on the silver-white light receding across the sky.

Thousands of streams of clear radiance converged into a silver river, retreating into the depths of the Sea of Stars.

Their figures grew smaller and fainter.

Finally, they became a few tiny specks of light.

They blended into the stars filling the sky, indistinguishable from the rest.

The remnants of the insect tide floated beyond the atmosphere, like a stretch of scorched earth that had been plowed over.

Canghai Star's emergency fleet was conducting its final cleanup.

Several small spacecraft darted among the remains, gathering the Zerg's severed limbs in one place to await further processing.

The alarm had long since stopped.

In its place came an announcement that Canghai Star's starport had reopened.

It was all over.

"A miracle... it really happened!"

A voice beside him trembled with barely contained joy, almost overflowing.

Sun Qing braced his hands on the counter, and something seemed to be swirling in his eyes.

He tilted his head back and looked at the large screen.

His lips moved several times.

In the end, he only repeated the same words:

"It really happened..."

Wuma Xiu withdrew his gaze and gently set the empty cup on the table, about to rise.

Sun Qing came back to his senses.

He glanced at the empty cup in front of Wuma Xiu, and a heartfelt smile spread across his face.

"Sir, you've finished your Star Cup. Would you like another? It's free. Let's call it a celebration of the miracle, and of the fact that we survived."

Wuma Xiu couldn't stand being looked at with shining eyes.

So he sat back down and nodded.

"Another one, then."

"Coming right up."

Sun Qing answered promptly and turned toward the work counter, his steps much lighter than before.

His movements were orderly as he picked up a bottle of fruit purée.

But he couldn't suppress the curve of his lips, and even the hand scooping ice trembled slightly.

Not from fear, but from happiness.

As Sun Qing deftly worked the machine, he began to speak.

"Actually, my family has been running this Star Cup shop for a long time. It goes back to my grandpa's grandpa's grandpa... many generations ago. I couldn't tell you exactly how many, but my family has been doing this for as long as I can remember."

The machine hummed as it blended the fruit purée and ice crystals into a brilliant galaxy.

Sun Qing lowered his head to adjust the proportion of fruit purée, his hands never stopping, nor did he stop talking.

"When I took over this shop from my dad, he told me where Star Cups came from."

Sun Qing pressed the stop button and poured the blended drink into a transparent cup. Bits of star mango slowly rose through the milky-white cream, like little stars lighting up one by one.

He brought the Star Cup over and presented it to Wuma Xiu with both hands.

"Legend has it that a very, very long time ago, someone recreated it from an ancient recipe. The recipe said this drink meant, 'I want to put an entire starry sky in a cup and give it to you.'"

Sun Qing smiled as he spoke, his eyes shining.

Wuma Xiu accepted the second Star Cup.

He remembered something.

It was one night when he was playing the role of the Moon God.

His younger brother, the Star God, was sitting on the steps of his temple.

One leg was bent, the other hanging down, his toes lightly tapping the churning nebula below.

The Star God tilted his head back, his deep purple eyes reflecting the stars filling the sky. Their light flickered in his pupils, as though the entire Sea of Stars had been contained in those eyes.

"Brother."

Wuma Xiu was looking down at a scroll he had found somewhere. Hearing him, he lifted his eyes from the page.

The Star God moved close beside him.

He rested his chin on Wuma Xiu's shoulder, extended a finger, and pointed toward the boundless Sea of Stars.

"Look at this Sea of Stars."

Wuma Xiu followed his gaze.

The Sea of Stars was boundless, its countless stars seething.

Countless streams of starlight intertwined, forming a long silver river that stretched across the void. It surged from beneath their feet, sweeping grandly toward the edge of their vision.

Some of those lights were a cool white, some faintly blue.

Some had a hint of pale purple, as if someone had overturned a whole box of diamond fragments, or frozen every firework in the universe at the instant it bloomed.

Silent, magnificent, and endless.

"Is it beautiful?"

The Star God's voice came beside his ear.

Wuma Xiu didn't think much of it at the time.

He simply thought this Sea of Stars was indeed beautiful.

So he nodded.

"It is."

Joy blossomed little by little across the Star God's face, impossible to hide. It spread from his eyes to his brows, from his brows to the corners of his lips, until his whole face lit up.

Then he said:

"It's all for you, Brother."

Wuma Xiu finished his second Star Cup, set down the cup, left forty-three Star Coins, and stood up.

"Thank you for the treat."

The wind chime rang once behind him.

The door opened, and Canghai Star's sunlight greeted him.

Wuma Xiu walked into the sunlight.

Why would the Moon God carry Star Coins around with him?

That was a good question.

Those Star Coins had, of course, come from Wuma Xiu, who had taken them from the Moonlight Clan's treasury. As the god who had created the Moonlight Clan, surely it was reasonable for him to take a little of the wealth his own children had saved up?

How could anything between a creator and his creations be called stealing?

Besides, even putting that aside, he had created the entire Moonlight Clan himself.

It was only right for him to take forty-three Star Coins to buy a drink.

Besides, he had only taken forty-three.

Just forty-three.

The Moonlight Clan's treasury was piled high like a mountain. Taking so little was practically the same as scooping a ladleful of water from the Sea of Stars.

There was no way anyone would notice, right?

That was what Wuma Xiu thought.

So he had taken those forty-three Star Coins, gone out, and paid the bill with a clear conscience.

What he didn't know, however, was that

The Moonlight Clan knew exactly what was in their treasury.

How exactly?

They meticulously registered every Star Coin that entered it. It wasn't because they were stingy; those were the Moonlight Clan's rules.

So when those forty-three Star Coins vanished without a trace, the Moonlight Clan member responsible for taking inventory counted them three more times.

Then he quickly reported the matter up the chain.

And so the matter was reported from one level to the next.

The details were checked repeatedly, every suspicious point was investigated, and the surveillance footage was pulled up and examined frame by frame.

Finally, the whole matter landed on the table of the Moonlight Clan's highest council.

And so the Moonlight Clan convened a formal meeting.

The topic of the meeting was

—Who had breached the layers of defenses they were so proud of, found the treasury, and slipped inside without leaving a trace, only to face those mountains of countless treasures...

—And take just forty-three Star Coins!

"...Arrogant."

"Far too arrogant."

That kind of conduct practically had "There was nothing in your Moonlight Clan's treasury that caught my eye" written all over it.

It did little harm, but the insult was immense.

And so the meeting descended into another round of heated discussion.

Meanwhile, the culprit was walking in Canghai Star's sunlight, savoring the lingering taste of the Star Cup he had just drunk.

He was in a thoroughly pleasant mood.