Interstellar: Start as a cleaner.

Chapter 1264 The Opportunity to Control Devon
"Thank you, sir!" Ning Xue now adopted a very humble attitude.

Because no matter what identity Bart held, he was already climbing the social ladder.

Whether it's his status as Grand Duke Barth or his A+ level superpowers.

Or perhaps it's Barthes' achievements in his professional field.

My family was lucky to have met Bart!

Many of the newly nobles were implicated in the internal power struggle within the royal family.

“Hmm!” Yang Bo didn’t stand on ceremony; Ning Xue owed him a favor after all.

Yang Bo hadn't had a leisurely afternoon tea like this at Devonstar in a long time.

However, Yang Bo was not blinded by his good fortune.

The fact that I can sit here leisurely and enjoy afternoon tea is entirely due to my usual hard work.

"Human society has been able to develop entirely because of desire!"

"If humans are only satisfied with being fed and watered, then humanity would probably still be in a primitive society!"

"It is precisely because of humanity's endless desires that civilization is driven forward!" Yang Bo looked at the three beauties, feeling quite pleased with himself.

The three women on Ning Xue's side were completely different from the three women on Su Wei's side.

Ning Xue was not only a top student but also a master swordsman, possessing a heroic and spirited aura.

Bai Lu, on the other hand, has a passive charm superpower. She had nowhere to settle down before and now relies on Bart. She seems like a little woman who lacks her own opinions, but her charming temperament combined with her sexy, hot, and mature figure gives her a unique flavor.

Hongxiu is an obedient little maid, and a special little maid who has undergone genetic modification.

Su Wei gave Yang Bo the impression of a charming and innocent young girl.

As for Annie and Sia, they both idolized Yang Bo, just like charming older sisters who were obsessed with him.

Wang Muxue deserves to be singled out, mainly because of her identity as a strong woman.

Just like the female general in the novel who strategizes and conquers all, she never expected to be outsmarted by herself.

As for the remaining women, most of them were either attracted by their looks or formed alliances based on mutual benefit.

For example, Su Ruoxin, Lisa, Vivian, and Lin Yue.

"To be honest, my private life as a Grand Duke is relatively simple!" Yang Bo knew, of course, that his number of women was far less than that of other Grand Dukes.

Yang Bo sipped his afternoon tea while listening to Ning Xue and Bai Lu discuss the international situation. Hong Xiu remained quiet and did not participate in their discussion.

Yang Bo listened carefully to see how others viewed his identity as Li John.

"This John Lee is truly a warlord!"

"Anyone who disobeys him in the slightest will be completely wiped out," Ning Xue said.
Bai Lu nodded upon hearing this: "However, those pirates were asking for it. Lee John seems to be their nemesis; any pirate who encounters Lee John ends up in a bad way!"

Ning Xue took a sip of tea and said, "This John Lee has extremely rich combat experience, but it's mostly luck!"

"Like the location where John Lee launched his ambush this time, online discussions have shown that there's only a 10% chance of encountering a defeated pirate crew!"

"Because the journey from the star system where the Fifth Fleet of the Federation was pursuing these pirates to the star system where John Lee was lying in ambush involves passing through two neutral star systems!"

"But John Lee just happened to be waiting for it!"

"I've heard people say that war is mostly about luck!"

Bai Lu nodded: "Luck plays a part, but I suspect that this John Lee might have intelligence within the pirates' ranks?"

"That's unlikely, because the internet says that these four pirate groups have been sailing silently since they broke away from the Fifth Fleet of the Federation!"

"Furthermore, the four pirate groups share some warship permissions with each other to ensure that no one else can notify the outside world."

Bai Lu sighed upon hearing this: "That person is incredibly lucky."

"What do you think, sir?" Ning Xue asked, noticing that Bart had been drinking tea.

"It's hard to say, but I always feel that there's something wrong with this John Lee!"

"It must be someone's front man. How could he possibly break through the warship's intelligent system by himself? And with so many of his fleets, how many people would that require!"

"During each battle, who exactly controls these people on the warship? And where do they come from?"

"Let's just wait and see!"

"What we see may not be the truth."

"Besides, as the Grand Duke now, I can't comment on these matters. I'll just focus on managing the affairs of our Devon Star!"

“Originally, many people disliked me after I became the Grand Duke,” Yang Bo said.
“That’s true. This John Lee is rather mysterious,” Ning Xue replied.
Yang Bo spent the night at Bart's manor.

Yang Bo arrived at the Roundabout Hotel the next morning.

Yang Bo is here to attend the first Imperial Space Technology Exchange Conference.

"Greetings, Your Excellency the Grand Duke!" Yang Bo led White and the other two to the Circle Hotel, where Su Ruoxin and many others greeted Grand Duke Bart at the hotel entrance.

Su Ruoxin was dressed in a business suit today, a white blazer, but the blazer had royal patterns and emblems on it.

"Your Highness!" Yang Bo nodded to Su Ruoxin.

"Grand Duke Bart!" Allen followed behind Su Ruoxin and bowed to Bart.

“Earl Allen!” Yang Bo nodded to Allen as well.

Then Allen introduced Bart to the other members of the Imperial Space Technology Oversight Committee!

The families inside are all relatively friendly with the Bart family.

Those who have conflicts with the Bart family are definitely not allowed to join this oversight committee.

There are also cliques within the various departments of the Empire.

For example, the Allen family and other families with which they have good relations basically maintain the empire's financial department.

If we're talking about balance, the Imperial military is the only one that's relatively balanced, as it contains all sorts of factions!
In terms of numbers, the military is dominated by the new nobles, but the new nobles mainly occupy the middle and lower-ranking officers in the army.

Few newly nobles were able to enter the ranks of high-ranking military officers.

As for the other businessmen, whether from the Federation or the Alliance, none of them were qualified to approach Bart and speak with him.

Yang Bo is here today mainly to explain the application of space technology to everyone, along with White and two others!

This appears to be a purely academic forum, and journalists are also allowed to attend.

However, some people were excluded during the screening process for meeting attendees!

The application of science and technology knows no borders, but scientists do have borders; White and his two companions have already joined the empire.

The Union government must be the one that regrets it the most. If they had known that White and his two companions had made such great achievements in space technology, they certainly wouldn't have let them go.

Most of the organizations that joined the alliance were purely academic institutions.

White and his two companions first gave a professional presentation on space technology.

In fact, the achievements of White and his two colleagues in space technology research mainly relied on Bart.

The others wanted to conduct some space experiments, but they lacked the funding, physical strength, and unique abilities of someone like Bart. White and his two companions were completely unaware that Yang Bo, disguised as Bart, possessed spatial teleportation abilities and was therefore very knowledgeable about the direction of space technology research.

"I have things to do tomorrow, so I'll leave this meeting to you!" After a day of meetings, Yang Bo didn't say much; it was mainly White and his two colleagues having theoretical discussions with other researchers.

Of course, White and his two companions weren't fools. If they couldn't answer certain questions, they wouldn't say anything themselves.

Since the other party can't explain what it is, it proves that they don't know much about this topic, and there's no need for me to explain these things to them!

“Yes!” Allen nodded.

“Mm!” Su Ruoxin nodded as well.

After returning to Bart's estate, Yang Bo stayed another night and then went to Bart's private laboratory the next day.

Then, disguising himself as Wood, he continued his inspection at the customs office on Devon.

Last time, Yang Bo found three suspicious individuals who were part of a tour group from the alliance. There were three people in the tour group: two men and one woman. One of the men was a lawyer, and the other was a financial analyst. The woman was a nutritionist.

Yang Bo was unsure whether any imperial nobles would bring the Red Earl's men into Devon.

In fact, Yang Bo has an even simpler method: he can release the spiritual seed into Wood!

However, this also has a drawback: Wood may not be able to remember everyone he sees.

Yang Bo also knows that the more spiritual seeds he releases, the greater the impact on himself.

Furthermore, some things are completely different when you see them yourself compared to how others remember them.

This time, Yang Bo focused on checking the entry lists of those he hadn't looked at last time, as well as some nobles.

The situation on Devon is quite complicated right now, having suffered several terrorist attacks in succession, so any nobles who come to Devon at this time should be viewed with suspicion!
Because nobles have special privileges and access channels, they can bring people directly into Devon Star without registering or going through customs.

Does that mean there's no way to find out who these nobles brought with them?

Of course not, because these nobles arrive here in their private spaceships, or when they are on or off a transport ship, these shopkeepers must disembark first.

Therefore, Yang Bo can make a judgment based on the spacecraft warning information and the passenger boarding and disembarking schedule.

First of all, there weren't many private spaceships docked during this period, only two.

Yang Bo checked the airport's surveillance video and found nothing unusual about the people who disembarked from the two spacecraft.

Then it was discovered that the departure times of the passengers on the four transport spacecraft were slightly different.

This is because intelligent facilities are used for passenger departures here.

Passengers need to travel from the airport to the ground, so transportation capacity needs to be planned.

Therefore, the departure time for passengers on each spacecraft is the same!

If the departure time of passengers on a spaceship is delayed, it proves that there are nobles on that spaceship.

Because on the Empire's side, nobles have their own transportation force, meaning that the Empire can exclusively use both space elevators and transport ships.

"Tsk tsk!" Yang Bo checked the video of the arrival time of the transport spacecraft and actually found some clues.

There were indeed nobles on those four transport ships: three earls and one marquis.

Two of the three counts were there to attend the space technology forum.

Another count has businesses on the planet Devon. This count is planning to dispose of some of his businesses on Devon, including a large area of ​​land and some other flying vehicles.

The land was purchased by Bart, who then used it to house Ning Xue's family.

Then Bart will also grant Ning Xue's family a hereditary viscount title.

Because Barth was a Grand Duke, he could bestow titles upon some hereditary nobles.

In other words, Ning Xue's family, from the day they received their hereditary noble titles, broke away from the new nobles and joined the old noble camp!
This is fine too!

The remaining marquis is problematic. Although he has a hereditary marquisate, his family has fallen on hard times.

The hereditary marquis's father invested in a mineral planet, which led to his bankruptcy.

In the empire, it was not uncommon for nobles to go bankrupt.

For a nobleman, the easiest way to go bankrupt is by making some reckless investments!

Of course, there's also inheritance tax.

In other words, the head of each family in each generation must live long enough to reduce inheritance tax.

In other words, if the head of one of the two families can live for two hundred years, then an inheritance tax will be paid every two hundred years.

In another family, the patriarch died unexpectedly after a hundred years, and the next patriarch who inherited the family business had to pay an inheritance tax!

If the clan leader were to encounter another mishap within a hundred years, it would mean that he had paid the inheritance tax twice within two hundred years!
If we expand this timeline to two hundred, three hundred, or even five hundred years.

Some families are able to pay inheritance tax seven or eight times, while others are able to pay it four or five times.

This marquis's name is Marquis Mingde, and he is also a hereditary marquis!
Yang Bo sensed something was wrong after seeing the people Marquis Mingde brought.

Marquis Mingde didn't bring many people with him, only five people: three women and two men.

Yang Bo suspected that the three women and one of the two men were Earl Red's butlers.

Although these people were wearing headscarves and sunglasses, and had not gone through customs, we did not know who they were.

However, Yang Bo could tell from their walking posture and every move that something was wrong.

Yang Bo directly used the mental seed to control the interstellar creatures in Bart's private laboratory.

This interstellar creature was equipped with a special mechanical input device, similar to a keyboard, so that it could send messages to Allen by typing on the keyboard.

Yang Bo asked Allen to find out where the Marquis of Mingde and his men had gone!
After receiving the message from Bart, Allen immediately sent someone to investigate without asking why.

Yang Bo, disguised as Wood, received a message from Allen before he had even left work.

Marquis Mingde rented a guesthouse by the sea, which came with its own yacht.

Allen also posted the yacht's trajectory.

Looking at the yacht's trajectory, Yang Bo felt that this guy was here to take advantage of him.

"it is good!"

"The Imperial Grand Duke's territory has been attacked!"

"Hehe!!" Yang Bo watched as the yacht's trajectory gradually approached Bart's territory, and he felt that the other party was coming for him. However, Yang Bo was not surprised, but rather felt somewhat happy.

After the Grand Duke himself was attacked, he could use this as an excuse to purge the military and political forces of Devonstar.

Replace them all with people you trust, and you'll truly control Devonstar!

Moreover, you don't need to take the initiative to do it; the other dukes will let you arrange it, because whoever comes has to give you an explanation for this matter, unless it's someone you've helped to get promoted!
Who would dare come to Devonstar under such circumstances?
I'll make him regret it!
"The alliance's tour group is arriving tomorrow, and it looks like these guys will probably make their move tomorrow too!"

"But I'm going to make my move tonight!"

"This Marquis Mingde might have some issues!"

"So tonight, we'll capture Marquis Mingde first, and then release the spiritual seed into him!" Yang Bo vaguely sensed that he was very close to finding out the Red Earl's last base or his last secret.

(End of this chapter)