Mr. Wu and his wife's pioneer team, the mercenary company led by the famous Talrabi mercenary Mr. Silverbeard, and the Gu Meiyaan work crew led by Agnes had all come together to form the Northwind Pioneer Company, thanks to a certain "Dragon of Dawn" brokering the deal.
The Human Alliance—back then, it was still the Red Star Institute—held the largest share as the investor, while the remaining shares were divided among the three founders. Of course, in theory, they held those shares on behalf of their respective teams. As a result, the company had taken on something of a collective-enterprise character.
In the years that followed, the company prospered. Northwind took on plenty of work in New Shenzhou, making substantial contributions to the development of remote planets untouched by human settlement.
Then came the War of Condemnation, and the discovery of the Lansa system.
With the Dawn Star Domain in hand, the Blue Star Commonwealth simply didn't have the manpower or resources to develop a system so far from the Dawn Trade Route and the New World Highway. So, after Mr. Qi and Old Master Bai made contact, the Earth government signed a planetary development agreement with Northwind Company and readily paid them an advance.
This was hardly some shady backroom deal. Northwind was a new company, but Mr. Wu and Mr. Silverbeard were both famous figures. They fit perfectly with the government bureaucrats' usual habit of choosing people based on reputation alone.
Of course, bureaucrats had their other virtues, too. Once they decided they trusted you, they were much more generous with their money than the capitalists out there.
In any case, thanks to the advance payment, the company's initial development work went smoothly. Mr. Wu even purchased a batch of slaves from within the Empire, from all kinds