Chapter 131: Dividing the Spoils_1

But Jiang Shiliu matured mentally at a very young age.

He had been enduring in silence, unable to threaten his enemies.

Now, as Jiang Shiliu watched Earth's technology reserves about to be depleted, he might never have the chance to wash away his past disgrace, and inevitably, he felt some discontent in his heart.

Jiang Yu said, "You can look more into 'Dark Forest'; perhaps there will be unexpected gains."

Jiang Shiliu nodded, indicating he understood Jiang Yu's meaning.

Then Jiang Yu changed the subject, and the atmosphere at the dinner became gradually more relaxed.

At night, Jiang Yu lay awake for a long time. Although he had comforted Jiang Shiliu, he himself felt somewhat weary.

The Trisolaran Civilization was only the current crisis. Civilizations like the Singers that would come later were the true enemies humanity would face once it ventured out.

Thinking about the disparity between Earth civilization and the Singer civilization, Jiang Yu felt the road was much too long, and the journey would surely be exhausting.

The key issue was that the human compatriots in the "Three-Body" world were somewhat disappointing: they lacked the psychological readiness to fight desperately when they needed to and were recklessly aggressive when they should have been cautious!

Jiang Yu, smoking, stared out into the night until he suddenly remembered Mr. Lu Xun's description in "Mr. Tengno": when nights were hard, Lu Xun would look at Mr. Tengno's photograph and find the strength to fight again.

Somehow, Jiang Yu also drew some strength from this narrative.

For those like him who were searching for a way forward for humanity, for those who never considered compromising with the Trisolarans, for those who kept striving.

Jiang Yu believed that all his efforts would not be in vain.

So the next day, Jiang Yu met with Bil and Qi Guanglu at the airport, full of vigor as he boarded the international flight headed for the United Nations Building, ready to engage in a new round of fighting.

Jiang Yu hadn't paid much attention to the building during his last hasty visit.

The office building of the United Nations headquarters stood like a monument inscribed with the profound history, highly recognizable.

In contrast, the several chambers that had made countless major decisions looked unremarkable from the outside.

This was Jiang Yu's first visit to the United Nations since being granted the identity of a Wallfacer, and it attracted the attention of the global media.

Jiang Yu, who had entered hibernation shortly after becoming a Wallfacer, rarely appeared in public, and this ancient Wallfacer from The East seemed to possess a unique sense of mystery.

Moreover, Jiang Yu was currently the only person with multiple Wallfacer plans, the only one so far who had defeated a Wallbreaker, and in many ways, he was a rather special Wallfacer.

Both those who overly idolized Wallfacers and those who opposed the Wallfacer plans were curious about the purpose of Jiang Yu's visit.

Some television stations even provided special live coverage, reporting on his every move.

After arriving at the United Nations and taking a short break, Jiang Yu met with delegates from the United States, China, and three other countries in a small conference room, as had been arranged in advance.

The delegates from the five countries had been waiting silently in the meeting room. Jiang Yu entered first, followed by Bil carrying a model of the Moon.

Jiang Yu greeted the delegates warmly, as Bil placed the moon model on the conference table and quietly stood to the side.

The Chinese delegates had already been informed of Jiang Yu's intentions, while the representatives from the other countries were guessing the purpose of his visit.

Because of the model of the Moon that Bil had brought, they assumed that Jiang Yu was there to address issues related to Moon City.

On this issue, the countries tacitly maintained a superficial harmony with the Moon City project.

If Jiang Yu was merely proposing the construction of Moon City, they would all offer strong support. Despite the fierce opposition to escape-ism, there was a consensus among the elites of the various nations:

They needed to vigorously develop space capabilities to stand a chance in a fight against the Trisolarans.

However, the discovery of so many resources near Moon City was a different matter. They would not support the construction of Moon City until the resources were properly allocated.

They might even, within their capabilities, hinder the project team.

Even the Chinese side could not avoid this customary stance, as it represented the interests of over a billion people and certainly could not be left behind in the division of lunar resources.

After everyone was seated, Jiang Yu smiled and said, "The Moon seems like a huge cake God prepared for us. It's been lying in front of us for billions of years, and now we finally have the ability to slice it.

"First, I hope that everyone will take a long-term perspective. The resources around Moon City are just one percent, or even one thousandth of the entire Moon's resources."

As he said this, Jiang Yu leaned forward slightly, "Here I must apologize, for I have taken the liberty to pick up the knife to cut the cake.

"Because I am the only one so far who knows where the cream and fruit of this cake are."

The representatives from various countries exchanged glances—wasn't that a bit of an exaggeration?

Those present represented space-faring nations, and given enough effort, in ten or twenty years' time, they could have mapped out a batch of the Moon's resources too. It's just that no one had the time to spare at the moment.

Jiang Yu continued, "You may have heard that a few days ago, we launched a batch of detectors.

"We just received a message from the Moon that four more locations rich in resources have been discovered."

Bil was stunned at first—weren't the detectors only supposed to land on the Moon this morning?

No data had been transmitted back yet!

But thinking about Jiang Yu's "unique ability," Bil felt at ease.

The representatives who had heard about Jiang Yu's project but knew nothing of the details were also stunned. Were there so many resources on the Moon? The probability of finding them seemed too high!

The words that followed from Jiang Yu left everyone astounded.

Jiang Yu said, "My project team has found the trick to locating lunar resources. You all can go back and give it a try. Without this trick, exploring the Moon for resources is very difficult.

"I know these past years, the space industry has drained everyone's coffers, so I'm sharing the locations and types of these four resources with all of you.

"To support the main planetary defense efforts."

In the meeting room, after a brief silence of one or two seconds, the representatives highly praised Jiang Yu's virtue.

Originally, they had been thinking about how to divide the resources near Moon City, but Jiang Yu had simply offered up four separate independent resources, which delighted them.

Dividing the resources near Moon City became irrelevant, as those belonged to the PDC's project and in theory were the common property of all humankind.

If they wanted to divide them, they had to be careful about appearances and face lengthy negotiations.

They were diplomats, after all—everyone knew how to say a few nice words, and it didn't cost anything.

Jiang Yu received no information about Deception Points, meaning not a single word he had said was believed by anyone present.

Jiang Yu smacked his lips—where was the trust between people?

Cough, cough, he suddenly remembered, he too was deceiving everyone.

Steadying his emotions, Jiang Yu briefly outlined the four locations, the types of resources, and their reserves as planned.

Everyone immediately ranked these four resources in their minds, and who got to choose first became extremely critical.

Moreover, the representatives realized a serious problem; there were five countries' representatives, but only four spots to choose from. Whoever ended up last would get nothing.

Then, everyone turned to look at Jiang Yu, because he had only outlined the four locations' resources and reserves without giving the exact locations.

The initiative had quietly shifted into Jiang Yu's hands.

Though everyone planned to immediately launch their own national Moon resource exploration projects upon returning,

this division of spoils had already begun, and if they didn't strive for it, other countries would benefit.

After all, other lunar resources had not yet been explored, and now Jiang Yu indeed had tangible resources in hand—better to divide these up first.

Jiang Yu said, "I have arranged the order in which countries may select resources based on their contributions to the 'Moon City Project'.

"The order is China, Russia, the U.S., and for the last spot, the UK and France will need to negotiate who gets to choose."