episode_0632
by admin
Planet Noir, one of the planets in the Altair system.
The planet Noir, like most planets in the Imperium of Man, was governed by a single government made up of several cities.
One of those cities is Grayscale.
Grayscale is a city that best shows the characteristics of Noir, a planet without color. This gray city, composed only of black and white contrast and light and shade, is a place where the silhouettes of buildings form a unique landscape.
This gray city was famous for commerce, so you could see all kinds of goods being traded in the market, but its true value was revealed in the darkness that was darker than gray.
Back alleys of grayscale.
A pawn shop that exists deep inside.
The interior, which was surprisingly brightly lit, was filled with various objects on display.
From pocket knives smaller than the palm of your hand to industrial property converters the size of a person.
No matter how bright the lighting was, there were no colors other than light gray and white, but it was a pawn shop that had everything.
Basnit, a middle-aged man who has been running a pawn shop on the planet Noir for three generations, regarded this gray building as his alter ego.
Knock knock knock knock knock.
‘We have guests.’
Basnit thought to herself.
That rhythmic knocking sound signaled that a guest with a special purpose had arrived.
A signal he had only heard twice in his life.
It was a signal from the expedition team that they wanted to make a black market transaction.
Basnit opened the back door of the pawn shop, which was firmly locked, rather than the main door.
Then, the dead end opened gently, revealing a hidden pawn shop connected to an alleyway.
“Welcome.”
Basnit welcomed guests with their hoods pulled down low.
“Since neither of you want to introduce yourself, let’s get right to the deal. Tell me what you want to sell and what you want to buy. The price will vary depending on the type of item… … .”
But he had no choice but to stop talking.
This is because the expedition team that sent the signal that they wanted to do a black market transaction suddenly started introducing themselves.
“I am One-Eyed Jack! Here is a sample that our Awaken Exploration Team brought back from an unexplored planetary system. With this… ”
“Hey, Jack. You’re not a one-eyed person anymore, are you? Then shouldn’t you change your nickname?”
“What?! How dare you call me by my nickname… That’s right, I see.”
Declaring themselves the Awaken Exploration Party, they did as they pleased, regardless of what Basnit said.
He would immediately reveal his name and thrust a sack full of things at me, but then when someone started nagging him, his attention was quickly diverted to that person.
‘What kind of crazy people are these?’
Rather than being an expedition team, they behaved more like other smugglers or mercenaries that were commonly seen in the smuggling business.
Naturally, Basnit’s eyes could not help but narrow.
But even those who followed Bassnit could not ignore their words.
“Then from now on, I guess you can call me Jack of the Yang Eyes.”
“No, that’s just a meaningless nickname. Most people have two eyes anyway. If you’re going to give them a nickname, you should give them a characteristic that stands out, like this merchant here. For example, a small… giant or a black beard.”
He looked down at Basnit as he spoke to them.
“What, what…?! Are you talking about me just now?!”
Basnit jumped up at the sudden spark.
Basnit was clearly a dwarf with a short stature and bushy body hair that barely reached the guests’ foreheads.
But this was a physical characteristic shared by most of those born in Noir.
He had never been teased about his looks before, and he was starting to feel dizzy.
What was even more ridiculous was that the expedition team was actually concerned about his feelings and gave him nicknames like “little giant.”
It was only after all the fuss had passed that they finally resumed trading.
In order to quickly drive them away, Basnit had no choice but to tell them to call him by his better nickname, Blackbeard.
‘Blackbeard… That’s not a strange nickname. It seems like a nickname that would suit a space pirate, though.’
Wow
“Huh? This looks a little… ”
The man who introduced himself as Jack looked puzzled at the object he took out of his backpack.
Basnit clicked his tongue at the attitude that many beginner traders showed.
“… This must be your first time in Noir. There is no such thing as color here. There is only a difference in brightness. So even if things outside have unique colors, you can’t tell them apart here.”
“That’s… ”
Actually, Basnit, who says that, has never escaped noir since birth, so she doesn’t know what a world with colors looks like.
But he was used to seeing outsiders express their confusion in that way, so he conducted the transaction skillfully.
However, the samples brought back by this Awaken expedition were valuable even though their colors were faded, so there was no need to refuse the deal.
‘At first glance, it looks like they’re a real expedition team. Their behavior is so strange that I thought they were thugs from another city…’
After calmly appraising the item, Basnit concluded the transaction at a reasonable price.
Once they finished reporting their investigation to the Noir government, it was clear that the government would purchase these specimens at a high price once they were released into the market.
“Well, the sale is over… So what do you want to buy?”
The real deal was what they wanted to buy.
If the purpose was simply to sell the exploration specimens, there was no need to go to a back alley pawn shop. Any store in the market, or even the government, would have given them a reasonable price.
But the fact that he went to this place after finding out the signal for black market transactions meant that he wanted something that was hard to obtain, and perhaps even illegal.
It was not Jack, who had been leading the deal, who answered Basnit’s question.
A man who was quietly watching the transaction process from the back of the group.
As he took a step forward, the explorers who had been chattering away took a step back.
I don’t know about Basnit, but his name is Kai Delshad.
He was the man who served as the acting leader of the Awaken Exploration Team.
What came out of his mouth was a substance that was both a specialty of Noir and one that was strictly prohibited from being taken off the planet without permission.
“Noir Black. We want to buy Noir Black.”
.
.
.
“So what is that black noir substance?”
-… It’s not black noir, it’s noir black.
Maria sighed and emphasized again.
Actually, I already knew that, but I pretended to forget because it was funny to see her react like that.
“Yeah, Noir Black.”
It’s been a few days since I sent my subordinates out on an expedition to rescue Noir Black.
The expedition team consisted of navigator Maria, temporary leader Kai Delshard, and the rest of the men they had rescued from the Frontier planets.
Unfortunately, since there is no such thing as tachyon communication in this world, the only way to communicate with other planets or galaxies was for the spaceships that had the information to warp directly.
So, communication spacecraft for that purpose are also actively operating. Although the universe is so vast that there are still many planetary systems from which it takes decades just to receive news.
Anyway, thanks to that, there was no way to contact the exploration team from the planet Novaris where we were now.
But that doesn’t mean he didn’t receive assistance from Maria.
She was able to detach the nanobots and assist me even when she couldn’t contact the main body, just like using the martial arts technique of dual intentions and mind control.
-Noir Black is an essential material for making Dyson Spheres.
She continued speaking.
The Altair planetary system is located in the outer spiral arm of the Pioneer galaxy, about 15,000 light-years away from the center of the Lazarian family. The star in this galaxy, Altair, is a blue-white A-type main sequence star, and is about 1.5 times more massive and 10 times brighter than the Sun in our solar system.
Naturally, most of the planets here had surfaces that were blazing hot due to the light coming from Altair.
Inferno, the planet closest to Altair, had a very high surface temperature as its name suggests, so liquid metal existed, and it was covered in a sea of lava due to constant volcanic activity.
As a result, the atmosphere contained a large amount of toxic gases, making it unsuitable for human habitation, but because the tectonic activity had created an abundance of rare minerals and energy resources, unmanned drones and probes were constantly visiting the area.
In the Altair system, there were two inhabited planets: the fourth planet, Silva, and the third planet, Noir.
The fourth planet, Silva, is an Earth-like planet located in the Goldilocks zone, and has an environment suitable for human habitation. Thanks to its atmosphere and climate similar to Earth, it has abundant water and diverse ecosystems.
Silva was the center of culture and commerce in the Altair planetary system, where exchanges with other planetary systems were quite active.
On the other hand, the third planet, Noir, was a bit of a unique planet.
Noir should have had a higher surface temperature than Inferno, although not as high, due to its orbit being much closer to Altair than Silva.
However, the actual climate of Noir was slightly cooler than that of Silva.
A unique environment where there is enough water to support life without being in the Goldilocks zone.
The thing that made this possible was the noir black that mixed into the atmosphere and absorbed 80-90% of Altair’s light.
A special substance unique to Noir that not only blocks the light that burns the planet’s surface, but also blocks cosmic radiation particles.
There, the function of Noir Black was not limited to simply blocking light.
This Noir Black was an essential material for the Dyson Sphere produced by the Lazarian family.
Thanks to this substance, Noir was able to develop just as much as Silva.
However, there was one unique feature…
It was precisely because of the influence of Noir Black that there was no color on the planet.
Only black and white.
When I look at the noir landscape, those two things are the only things that catch my eye.
A planet without color or saturation, with only differences in brightness based on luminance.
That was the biggest characteristic of noir.
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