Into a New Era

Humanity's first contact with an extraterrestrial civilization in 2046 marked its formal entry into the ranks of Interstellar Civilizations.

Nomo Civilization had ultimately become humanity's guide.

Most of the gifts from dozens of civilizations had little to do with ordinary people's lives, so the government kept them secret and stored them across the Solar System. For the time being, they remained classified.

Of course, being a guide did not mean Nomo Civilization sent people over en masse. Ordinary citizens rarely had a chance to meet an alien.

The Solar System was a protected zone, and unauthorized extraterrestrial life was forbidden to enter. The Nomu Race sent only a handful of people to be stationed on Mars as an embassy. Even when they visited Earth, the government received them directly. Ordinary people never saw them.

The open zone, meanwhile, lay all the way out at Proxima Centauri. Members of the Nomu Race visited often and proposed development projects to Earth.

But Earth Civilization was cautious about letting aliens invest in construction or hold property. For now, it had only leased a million-square-kilometer plateau on Proxima Centauri b for six hundred years.

In return, humanity earned its first pot of gold... fifteen Lang.

That was neither much nor little. Compared with real estate across interstellar society, it was pitifully little—practically a giveaway.

But to humanity, it was already a great deal, and the price was fair. Strictly speaking, such untamed land was worth next to nothing. By leasing and developing it, the Nomu Race was helping humanity build on Proxima Centauri b.

Humanity could not develop a place like that anyway. They had not even seen it. The Nomu Race had brought over a map and pointed it out to them.

Humanity had made money simply by saying yes.

Once humanity built