Chapter 26 Hundreds of millions of credits.

For the next three days, the alien woke up, asked for some water, and soon after receiving it went back to sleep.

The only change was that it stopped struggling when it was conscious.

During that time Andrew continued with his routine of exercising and studying.

He also got the universal translator research done along with the Mid-sized storage module research.

Once these were done he immediately started to research an upgrade for the medical module called the Xeno medicine.

It would allow the medical equipment to treat other species instead of only being able to treat the humans.

He also needed this research to unlock the regeneration tank research and since almost all of his guests so far were aliens, it made sense to have the ability to treat their injuries if it proved necessary.

The other research module was also working on another project which was the Gas storage module.

This was very important if Andrew wanted to stop relying on solar energy alone and this research was the first step to getting a power generator that used fuel.

Another reason for getting that research was the ability to gather Helium 3 which was worth much more than the uranium ore he was selling right now.

During this time he also got the second drone recharging module he ordered and now he had a dozen of them.

It was not much considering that lately he had been buying dozens of modules from the merchant, but it was proof that he could expand the station on his own if he needed to.

Another piece of good news was that the damaged solar power module got repaired and was now back to 100%.

Other than that the only other thing that happened was the call from Lanarine who informed him that she found no intruders at her station and she also had a favor to ask of him.

-Could you allow me to gather some uranium ore?

She asked.

-Sure, I don't see the problem with that.

He agreed without hesitation, in the end, she was the one who found the uranium.

Also, there was more of the uranium in that asteroid than he knew what to do with.

-Do you want my mining drones to cut out a few chunks of it for you?

He asked, knowing that she didn't have any mining drones.

-That would be great.

-Ok, send the drones, I will make sure that there are enough pieces of the asteroid waiting for you.

Lanarine was once more surprised at how cooperative he had become after she left.

-They are on their way and thank you for the help.

-You're welcome.

After that, they talked for a moment longer before closing the channel as they both had work to do.

Lanarine was currently 65 thousand kilometers away and decided to stop there.

It was more than enough distance to prevent them from accidentally interfering with their resource-gathering and at the same time it was close enough that they could cooperate or help one another if they needed to.

The Dranixian lieutenant wanted to try and build some trust between them again, but this time she decided to take her time with it.

Other than that she was trying to get over the fact that Andrew had a different value system than she did and operated in a much different way than her species did.

Thinking about their quarrel over the drones, she finally admitted that he was right and there was no need to consult her on something like this.

During the last few days, she had a lot of time to think and thanks to it she finally realized how badly she messed up back then.

She was very lucky that he decided to just kick her out with her freedom and a new station, instead of simply spacing her, or cranking up the chip to the max and keeping her as a living doll.

However, that was in the past and now she was trying her best to focus on the future, her goal, for now, was to get the level 5 regeneration tank and get rid of the chip from her head once and for all.

But that was easier said than done as the level 5 tank was a tier four research and it would take her a lot of time to reach that high, not to mention that it also required a lot of research to unlock.

That was also part of the reason why she asked Andrew for the uranium.

She needed to get a research module and a computer core module to even start the research and her resources would not allow her to buy both of them at the same time.

Additionally, she had to get more storage modules and more drones to gather enough resources for the research and the only way to get everything she needed was to ask for help and then copy the human's approach to the resource-gathering issue.

Thankfully the human agreed to help her so she would have enough credits to get what she needed.

When the day of the merchant's return arrived, both of their stations were filled with resources.

This time the merchant ship was even larger than previously and it was armed.

The last bout with the pirates forced them to use an armed ship now.

Andrew was the first to greet the merchant but this time the short elf didn't show himself and it was only the droid.

After the usual greetings and questions about resources, the droid calculated that the resources this time were worth 277 million credits, added to the 50 million he had left from the last time he had 327 million credits which were more than enough for what he planned to buy.

-Do you also buy modules?

Andrew asked the droid before it left.

-Yes we accept the modules, do you wish to sell some?

The droid asked.

-I want to sell some of the storage modules, would that be alright?

-Yes, please detach the modules you wish to sell from your station and their worth will be added to your balance.

Andrew wanted to sell some of the basic storage modules to replace them with the Mid-sized ones.

-Is it okay to do it after I'm done with my order?

Andrew asked.

-Of course.

The droid confirmed and left.

Andrew immediately opened the list of items and found everything that he unlocked through the research and even some stuff that was added randomly.

Knowing which modules he wanted and how many of them he finished it in less than five minutes and then moved on to buying items, which by the way included some things he had never seen before but quickly realized that they were items for his captive, such as food, clothing and other necessities.

He bought some of them but hesitated when he found an item called a gravity compensator, which looked like a bracelet and its description stated that it was designed to help compensate the gravity difference for its user.

It was an expensive item as it cost 10 million credits each, but eventually, he decided to buy two of them.

One was for his prisoner and the other one was for him if he ever needed to deal with higher or lower gravity.

Then he continued with his purchase, getting everything he wanted and even some additional items he wanted.

All in all the cost this time was around 214 million credits.

This was an astounding amount of money, but most of the modules he bought were tier 2, and the higher the tire the more expensive the item.

Andrew knew that in the near future, this amount of credits would be nothing compared to the prices of goods of the higher tiers.

He finished the shopping and instructed the drones to detach 86 of the storage modules, leaving only 10 of them behind, since he needed them for production resources he bought from the merchant.

His balance got the addition of a few hundred thousand credits, but that was it as the basic storage modules were quite cheap, considering their upgraded version price.

The detached modules vanished in a burst of light like they were never there, as soon as they were a hundred meters away from the station.

Not long after that, the new modules arrived and it was a sight to behold as most of them were the Mid-sized storage modules.

They were much larger than their smaller counterparts and they also had much more storage space.

Each of them could hold 500 tonnes of materials and he bought 50 of them, each module cost him 1 000 000 credits but it was worth it as now he could gather 25 000 tonnes of materials.

This opened the door for more advanced research that was out of his reach till now.

Other than that he also bought 6 more drone recharging modules, 20 more solar power modules, 2 more hydroponics modules, two more cannons, six more shield modules, and a research module with another computer core module, last but not least, he bought 4 more resource processing modules.

That was all the modules he got this time as there was nothing more he needed that didn't require the research.

As for the upgrades, he managed to get the Xeno medicine upgrade for the medicine module and that was all he could get for now as the rest still required the research to be done.

Other than that he bought another batch of seeds and some nutrient solutions for the hydroponics modules, the universal translator, which he bought 3 off just to be sure he had a spare.

He also didn't forget to buy some handcuffs since he would most likely need them.

After he got everything he needed or wanted, he just resupplied the materials needed for the drone production and that was the last item he bought this time.

What surprised him the most this time, was that the Xeno medicine upgrade was the most expensive of them all.

The upgrade alone cost him 70,000,000 credits.

However thanks to it he could now treat any alien he met without exception as they were all in the new database now.

And he was still left with over 113 million credits to his name which was a lot of credits at least for now.