Number Nine City

Biodata

Governance

• Three-family rule: The Zhang, Wang, and Li families jointly manage the city. The Zhang family holds the nominal leadership and political influence; the Wang family controls extensive commercial interests; and the Li family deals in arms, narcotics, and other underworld businesses 486 586.
• Internal rivalry: The Zhang family's authority weakens after the apocalypse, while the Wang and Li families gain influence. Their competing interests repeatedly threaten the city's balance of power 486 497 533.
• Hope Base: Number Nine City was originally established to obey Hope Base, but its leaders later dispute that subordinate status. The two bases also share research interests 486 495.

City and Technology

• Surveillance and security: Robots patrol the streets, while flying machines monitor the city and can attack with lasers. Departing residents face biometric checks and laser scans; special underground electric grids can disrupt ability use 488 524.
• Automated forces: At the time of Jiang You's infiltration, artificial intelligence accounts for roughly seventy percent of the city's armed forces. After its central system is compromised, leaders move to increase the role of human combat teams 531 539 586.
• Research and medicine: Number Nine City produces many of the apocalypse's effective medicines and operates an R&D center that conducts human experiments, including research on fire seeds 157 491 495.
• Underground zombie farm: At least a million zombies are kept beneath the city as a source of crystal cores and a defensive resource 514 515.
• Narcotics: The city permits and cultivates addictive drugs, giving rise to its “City of Ultimate Bliss” name. Drugs are also used to control people whom its ruling families want to keep or subdue 486.

History

Number Nine City's technological development accelerates after it makes an agreement with Sansheng: the city treats the critically ill Long Luo, and Sansheng cooperates with its research. Data supplied by Sansheng contributes to advances in the city's weapons and robotics 526.

The city attacks settlements in the Hundred Thousand Mountains while searching for something it cannot precisely locate. Its campaign reaches Longshan, where Tingfeng City's forces and allied settlements resist it 478 479 493.

Jiang You enters Number Nine City as an experimental subject. During her captivity, researchers study her ability to fuse with fire seeds. She later helps Sansheng seize the central control system, paralyzing machinery across the city; the resulting chaos damages the R&D center and exposes the risks of its reliance on artificial intelligence 488 491 530 531 549.

Relations with Tingfeng City later become more practical despite the conflict. Number Nine City sells protective suits under an agreement that gives Jiang You a share of the profits, rents Tingfeng City's rain-summoning device, and joins other bases in extending signal coverage to human settlements 304 792 806.

Relationships

• Sansheng and Long Luo — Sansheng's cooperation drives the city's technological growth in exchange for Long Luo's treatment. Long Luo's wishes later take priority over that agreement 526 531.
• Jiang You and Tingfeng City — Enemies during the Longshan campaign and Jiang You's captivity, but later parties to commercial agreements 479 491 304 792.
• Hope Base — Former superior and research partner; disputes arise over control of Jiang You as an experimental subject 486 495.
• Forbidden Island — Expects experimental subjects from the city and later receives its mechas as part of a proposed surrender 586 825.
• Dawn Tower — Sends Jiang You to Number Nine City as a prisoner and has acquired some of the city's technology 488.