When Max left the Jedi Temple, he received another major piece of news.
"66."2
Lord Figg sent a short numeric code to the Cloud City. As agreed beforehand, it meant everything was going smoothly—he had finalized the arrangements for Bespin to join the Corellian Republic as an autonomous territory.1
"Send a reply to Crown City: '99.'" Max ordered.1
"Yes, boss."
As agreed beforehand, it meant Max had received the message and would rendezvous with Lord Figg in Crown City within ten days.
Set up the Crazy Horse Club's operation, then pull out—Max made his decision.
The first thing to do was to buy property.
"Buy property? In the Republic 500 Building?" Aayla Secura looked stunned, as if she'd misheard.
"That's right." Max nodded hard. "Come with me, Master."
Hearing that, the Jedi Flower couldn't help but warn him, worried: "Max, Coruscant real estate is extremely expensive. A Crazy Horse Club—running it for a hundred years might not even break even."2
"It's fine, Master." Max didn't care. "As long as the galaxy stays at peace, you'll never lose money investing in real estate in the capital of the Galactic Republic."1
"Can the galaxy really stay at peace forever?" Aayla murmured, gazing out through the viewport. They had arrived at the Republic 500 Building.
In the original timeline, once the Clone Wars broke out, Coruscant's prices—more precisely, prices in the upper levels—actually surged even more. Elites from the Mid Rim and Outer Rim flooded to Coruscant to buy safe-haven property, driving prices up several times over prewar levels.
Later, it took General Grievous of the Separatists pulling a lightning strike on Coruscant to finally cool the runaway housing market a little.9
Should he recruit "Big G" for himself? The hatch of the T-6 shuttle opened. Max walked down the ramp, thinking as he went.
"You want to buy?" The sales staff beamed.
In the blink of an eye, chairs were brought over, water was poured, shoulders were kneaded, backs were pounded—people swarmed around Max and Aayla.
"How about this unit—"
"Two floors," Max cut the property advisor off. "I'm buying two full floors."
"Oh—two units, yes, yes, we have those."
"Floors. Two floors."
In the end, Max spent 368 million Galactic Republic credits to buy the entire 4,399th floor and the entire 5,002nd floor of the Republic 500 Building. He planned to use one floor as Bespin's Coruscant liaison office, and the other to operate the Crazy Horse Club.1
Thanks to Tolom Pyke, Max had quite a bit of private cash. Still, he didn't pay in full—he chose InterGalactic Banking Clan's plan: a 184 million down payment with a ten-year mortgage.
Even so, that night, deep-pocketed Max still made the HoloNet News entertainment front page—"Shocking: Outer Rim Warlord Spends a Fortune to Woo the Most Beautiful Jedi!"3
In the Galactic Senate Chancellor's Office, the Chancellor—who was once again working late for the galaxy's future—also saw the tabloid headline. Time to clock out. Palpatine smiled.
"Wow—an Outer Rim warlord and a Jedi woman. A 'warlord-and-Jedi romance' plot is happening right next to me!" Lisa said, putting on excitement, though the disappointment in her eyes was impossible to hide.
[Adaptation note: the original uses a Chinese web-serial genre term; I rendered it as "warlord-and-Jedi romance plot" to keep the meaning without a distinctly Chinese reference.]
Max raised an eyebrow. "Guess who I bought it for."
"Wasn't it for your mentor, Jedi Knight Aayla Secura?"
Max immediately repeated to Lisa the Crazy Horse Club plan he'd discussed with Aayla two days earlier. As for the intelligence-station purpose behind it, it still wasn't time to reveal that to Lisa.
Max looked at Lisa and said seriously, "Lisa, help me. Run the Crazy Horse Club."
"M-me? Me?" Lisa pointed at herself, incredulous.
"Yeah." Max nodded, firm.
"No, no—I can't. I can't do it, brother…" Lisa took a step back, waving her hands again and again.
"Just try." Max caught her hand. "If you do badly, it's fine—I'll switch to someone else. If you do well, I'll hand the entire Crazy Horse Club over to you. You'll be the boss lady. Try it. Don't burden yourself."
Lisa stopped backing away, came over with the motion, and sat down in Max's lap.
"Brother… why did you pick me?"
"Who else would I pick?" Max lowered his head and asked. "You want me to pick one of your old coworkers—one of your 'sisters' from back then?"
"Mmph—no. I don't want that." Lisa shook her head hard.
"That's more like it." Max pinched Lisa's cheek. "Happy? Wanna go up?"
"Yes!"
"Come on."1
On the afternoon of Galactic Standard Calendar 4, November 17, members of the Bespin delegation gradually returned from leave, lugging big bags and small bags back to the Republic 500 Building to report in.
That day, the Coruscant police still failed to give Christopher Rейн a satisfactory response. They didn't just fail to touch Ziro the Hutt—the real instigator—they couldn't even arrest the Black Sun sub-boss whose cheek Max had pierced through with a barbecue skewer.
"Commander Williams, you pick the people. Form the staffing team for Bespin's Coruscant liaison office. Try to secure Bespin's observer-state status in the Galactic Republic before the new year. As for everyone else—we're pulling out tomorrow."
"And over there?" Billy Williams looked at Max.
"Yeah." Max held up a "six" hand sign and nodded. "I don't see the Galactic Republic showing us any respect. If that's how it is, then so be it."
"Understood. I'll go handle it." Billy Williams saluted and took his leave.
"Lisa, you're coming with us too," Max ordered. "Do you have any luggage to pack?"
"Huh? I don't." Lisa looked surprised. "Brother, shouldn't I be staying to run the Crazy Horse Club?"
"You're going to Crown City on Corellia first. Study with the teachers from the Figg consortium. When they say you're ready to graduate, you'll come back. In Crown City, I'll fully staff your team for you."
"Mm! Got it!"
...
"Intercept him on the way home," Ziro said coldly. "Let him see home—then make sure he can't reach it."
"Yes, Great Ziro."
...........................
PS: Grievous is the general of the Separatist droid army, but he himself is not a droid. He is a Kaleesh, turned into a cyborg by the Banking Clan's technical specialists after a shuttle accident.
At the time point of this chapter, Grievous is on his homeworld Kalee, locked in a desperate war against the Kaleesh's enemies—the nearby Huk.8
PPS: There will be two more updates tonight.
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🛡️🔥🌌 STAR WARS: THE RISE OF MANDALORE 🌌🔥🛡️
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