The trip to Extinct Soil Star posed a challenge for Gu Hang, presenting a long-term risk (Iron Armor Battle Group) and an imminent threat that could erupt at any time (Ashen Dead).
Leaving the distant issue aside, the reason the Ashen Dead are considered an immediate threat is that, since Blaywins and his group could find us, so could Zhong Jihua and his.
Gu Hang was a bit annoyed.
However, since he had already decided to handle crises through development, that remained the focus.
And what is the biggest booster for development within the alliance?
That would, of course, be the Grace Points in Gu Hang's hands.
The last time he spent a large number of Grace Points was four years ago.
At that time, he mainly boosted the alliance's shipbuilding industry, which directly created the current industrial situation.
Now, after four years, although there hadn't been any large-scale wars within the alliance during this period, Gu Hang's control had stabilized over the entire Tianma Star Sector, with a total population reaching 61 billion. Over these four years, the average lifespan under the alliance's rule had improved, the birth rate hadn't changed much, but what was key was the significant drop in the death rate. All these reasons led to quite a high level of population growth.
The alliance's population increased by about one billion during this period.
Such high population growth scared some worlds.
More people means more money when the world population is next assessed for tax allocation.
But the alliance wasn't afraid.
Having a large population is a good thing.
Fatchess Tri-Star, Hongjian Star, and even larger population capacity spaces.
Korolya is expected to continue relocating people outward.
Beyond population, the alliance's productive forces had been improving these years.
The education system on Flying Wing Star opened up to the entire Star Sector, higher population quality, all of which drove the rise in the alliance's productive forces.
Together with the improvement in living standards...
All these factors, population size, population quality, average living standard and happiness, level of productive forces... all are strongly and positively correlated with the monthly income of Grace Points that Gu Hang receives.
This also made Gu Hang's monthly income skyrocket.
Four years ago, before securing Flying Wing Star, Fatchess Tri-Star, and Hongjian Star, Gu Hang's income from Grace Points was 7,000 — and that was after pulling up Korolya's situation by a lot to return to the levels when he only controlled Rage Owl Star and Heijian Star.
But now, this number has grown to 32,000.
An increase of 4.5 times.
Of course, this number gradually rose, not skyrocketing all at once, and also, the rate of increase has slowed down a lot recently.
But all in all, the cumulative monthly income Gu Hang obtained in these four years also exceeded one million.
However, although he hadn't made any big spending all at once, Gu Hang had also spent about 600,000 of it in bits and pieces over these four years.
The main uses were essentially in 'people' and 'construction.'
He activated more heroes, spent a large number of Grace Points on political commissar training at the Loyal Heir Academy, a fair amount on military training, occasionally exchanged Gene Seeds, and through basic training templates of the military badges, screened personnel to supplement new blood for the Interstellar Warriors...
He exchanged many academy templates, factory templates, and even church buildings, bestowing them upon corresponding real-world structures to take effect.
It was precisely these investments that led to high growth.
Whether it was the growth of the alliance's income or the increase in Grace Points income.
And now, it was time to use the remaining more than 400,000 Grace Points in batches.
First off, he planned 200,000 Points for use on Interstellar Warriors.
With the continuous increase in the past, the number of Phoenix Interstellar Warriors had already reached a scale of over two hundred people.
And with this expenditure of 200,000 Points, the number of Phoenixes shot up directly to 500.
Apart from the Gene Seeds that Gu Hang directly exchanged, the first batch of Phoenix newcomers from early years had already passed five years, their first Gene Seed has matured and been harvested.
Initially, Matins was thinking about whether to save some of these Gene Seeds to prepare for the Gene Seed taxation to be paid by Phoenix later on.
This idea, when brought to Gu Hang, left him speechless.
The Imperial Army's collection of Gene Seed taxes is calculated based on how many new seeds a Battle Group has produced in the last ten years. It's an accountable number: how many new recruits have grown to the five-year mark in the past ten years, how many veteran warriors have fallen, this is the total number of Gene Seeds over ten years, and they just need one-tenth of them.
In regular circumstances, it's not too difficult for the Empire to grasp this information. Generally speaking, the loyalty of the Interstellar Warriors is somewhat assured, they report a number themselves, and the Empire generally accepts it if it's not far off; for inspections, it's actually a bit difficult, though counting the dead is practicable since Interstellar Warriors usually don't fight alone and other Imperial Army forces may control some of the situations; monitoring the development of new blood is truly challenging.
But it doesn't matter, the Empire won't be so stringent. The Sect of Mechanics and the Star Warrior Management Agency will check a Battle Group's total manpower, calculate an average number, follow routine experience to estimate how many seeds you can pay for ten years—a Battle Group with a thousand people usually gives five to ten seeds in ten years, unless there is a major event—just about the right number will do.