Lucian frowned. "What are you trying to say?"
He really hadn't expected Yuxia to say something that unsettling.
She seemed to realize it too. A little nervous, she fiddled with a lock of her hair. "Don't get the wrong idea. I really just want to talk about it objectively."
Lucian shrugged. "Even saying it objectively is pretty harsh. Kicking the Infected out? You sound like someone from Laterano."
As the Holy Son, Lucian had lived in the Grand Cathedral of Laterano since he was a kid. He'd barely gotten a proper look at his so-called "homeland."
But he did know Laterano's laws and how its society worked.
Angels were infamous for being strict and rule-bound. Every citizen enjoyed their citizenship rights, but they also had to follow extremely rigid regulations.
Of course, even Angels committed crimes. But the price of committing one was so high that most Angels were indoctrinated from childhood, to the point they never even questioned the logic of those rules.
One of Laterano's laws was that the Infected were never allowed to set foot in the country.
No matter how high-ranking an Angel was, once they became Infected, they had to leave the nation and were never allowed to return.
It was a brutally cold rule.
But on Terra, simply exiling the Infected instead of persecuting them was already considered merciful.
And that was essentially what Yuxia meant. She wanted the Slums to adopt the same policy as Lungmen—drive out every Infected person.
She sensed the faint criticism in Lucian's tone and spoke with a conflicted look. "Because after thinking and thinking, it still seems like the most direct solution."
The Mouse Princess tipped her head back and downed the entire cup of Soy Milk in one go.
Wiping the white foam from her lips, she glanced at Lucian in frustration. "I've been thinking about how to make the Slums actually become part of Lungmen. You grew up here, so you know, right? Decades have passed and nothing has changed. Everything just keeps rotting. One day the people will decay right along with the crumbling houses and streets."
Lucian finally understood what she was getting at. "So you want to develop the Slums?"
Yuxia had always been interested in municipal work. She wanted to take over her father's responsibilities someday and actually improve life in the Slums. Lucian knew all this.
And she wasn't wrong—things here really were always falling apart.
Those who lived here weren't acknowledged by Lungmen and were treated as if they didn't exist. Naturally, there were no community upgrades or public projects. Everything had to be handled by the Slums themselves.
Even basic things like water and electricity were barely manageable. And since just entering the city center put Slums residents at risk of being arrested by the Lungmen Guard Department, everything had to rely on self-production and Underground Channels.
It didn't take a genius to see this wasn't sustainable.
For decades, these problems had only been manageable because the Rat King had such massive connections and control. The Slums had access to everything through the Underground Channels.
But even then, ordinary life was still difficult. Kids like Xiaoling and Misha couldn't get proper schooling. There was no future where the next generation could get on the right track.
So what now? How could the Slums become a normal community, become a genuine part of Lungmen?
Yuxia had been thinking about this constantly.
Her fingers tightened around the pillow until her knuckles turned white. "I can't think of a way. The Slums can't go against Lungmen. Smuggling only covers small-scale daily necessities. The moment we get involved with anything serious, that lizard geezer and that horny cat won't leave us alone."
"Hold up." Lucian raised his hand seriously. "I get the lizard geezer—Wei Yenwu, right? But who's the horny cat? Swire? Why bring her up?"
Yuxia rolled her eyes at him. "Do you really not know this and still manage to survive in Lungmen? Wei Yenwu is the boss of Lungmen, yeah, but only in terms of governance. The real lifeblood of Lungmen is in that cat family's hands. Capital and money are Lungmen's foundation. If that cat family ever fell out with Wei Yenwu, Lungmen would go bankrupt and collapse in under two months."
Lucian rubbed his temples. "Sorry, I don't really understand economics. Is money that important? I hate money more than anything."
The serious atmosphere she'd been building up evaporated instantly thanks to Lucian playing dumb.
Yuxia let out a heavy sigh and pinched Lucian's cheeks with one hand.
Then she blinked in surprise. "Huh… Swire was right. Your face really does feel nice. Soft and smooth like a baby's… Why does a grown man have skin this good? It's infuriating."
"Isn't that a little too much misdirected anger, Yuxia?"
Lucian let her knead his face, helpless but also amused. "I get why you worry about the Slums, and I get the dilemma. The Slums can't really survive on their own, right?"
The Slums were basically a place where refugees huddled together. Because everyone here was at the bottom of society, they didn't discriminate against the Infected.
But for that exact reason, the Slums would one day disappear—or be erased.
Lungmen kept developing, and Wei Yenwu really was capable. Today's Lungmen was completely different from twenty years ago.
So the stagnant Slums would only fall further behind. And as Yuxia said, they couldn't get into high-profit illegal industries without outright opposing Lungmen.
The only way for the Slums—or at least the people living here—to survive was to achieve some kind of "reconciliation" with Lungmen.
But a very real problem stood right in front of them.
A boundary the Slums could never cross. A divide between the Slums and Lungmen's city center that, in Terra right now, was impossible to overcome.
Still pinching Lucian's cheeks, Yuxia continued, "As long as the Slums keep accepting the Infected—even secretly—we'll never be recognized as part of Lungmen."
In Terra, the general public's view was that the Infected should be rejected. Lungmen was no exception.
As a commercial metropolis, Lungmen didn't need large amounts of cheap labor. So unlike the Ursus Empire, it had no reason to send the Infected to mines.
Lungmen simply didn't need them. Just like it didn't need the Slums residents who couldn't keep up with its fast-paced lifestyle. And Infected were easily seen as destabilizing. So its policies strictly forbade Infected from entering the city.
Yuxia had thought it through again and again and reached a conclusion: drawing a clear line between the Slums and the Infected was the only chance ordinary people here had to climb upward.
She spoke earnestly. "The Slums don't just have Infected residents. Even counting the foreign Infected smuggled in, normal people still make up seventy percent. I know it's cruel, but what else is there? Even if we keep things the way they are, once Lungmen's city area becomes saturated, the rich will need more land, more factories, more mansions—and they'll tear the Slums down first."
Despair flickered in her eyes—the despair of someone powerless against the world.
Lucian didn't answer right away, still trapped in her grip.
After a long breath, she continued. "Wei Yenwu, Swire… they're all enemies of the Slums. But besides surrendering, what else can we do to protect this place? If everyone in the Slums just became Infected and joined that movement or whatever, that's a path too. Maybe they could hurry up and take over Lungmen. And it'd be great if they got rid of the lizard geezer and those Capitalists from the cat family."
"Yuxia." Lucian caught her cold hand firmly. "That's going way too far. Even as a joke, you shouldn't say things like that."
"…Sorry."
The young Mouse Princess drooped her shoulders like a little kid being scolded.
Her thoughts had gotten extreme.
Because she felt responsible for the Slums' future, she'd been overthinking alone for so long that she'd ended up spiraling.
Lucian obviously didn't agree with her black-and-white way of seeing things.
But if he had to answer how to make Lungmen accept the Infected while staying prosperous…
Holding her icy hand, Lucian could only joke, "Once Ch'en Hui-chieh replaces Wei Yenwu, you take your father's place, and Swire inherits her family's position, maybe the three of you can set a new precedent."
"…What a stupid joke, you idiot."
Yuxia muttered under her breath, but at least she finally smiled again.