With the scale of a shelter city, if they truly wanted to strictly investigate smuggling, it would actually be as easy as turning one's hand.

They would only need to register all goods when merchant convoys entered the checkpoint, then verify against the registration list when goods were shipped out. Comparing the two would easily expose any smuggled items.

But the reason no shelter city chose to do this, instead tacitly allowing merchant convoys to trade freely after passing inspection, was mainly because shelter cities that had tried strict investigations in the past had, without exception, all been collectively blacklisted by merchant convoys.

First, the 20% inspection tax was actually a gambling-style incentive.

Wasteland merchant convoys had always been driven by profit. Without sufficient profit incentive, no one would risk attacks from infected entities, mutated creatures, and raiders to run trade routes.

Pure normal goods trading simply couldn't attract a steady stream of merchant convoys.

Even during Happiness City's most prosperous times, they had to take out an additional 5% profit as "sweetener."

Now that 5% was gone, the additional inspection tax had become the new incentive.

If they got away with it, it was equivalent to earning the profit of an entire truckload of goods.

If caught, at most they would only lose all profits from the smuggled goods and pay an additional 10%, which was still within acceptable range.

This gambling temptation made merchant convoys both love and hate the super shelter cities, unable to resist coming to try their luck again and again.

Second, even if shelter cities conducted strict investigations, where there were policies above, there were countermeasures below, which would only force out more complex smuggling chains.

Merchant convoys could completely sell goods to surrounding settlements first, then have scavengers bring them into the city batch by batch.

But each additional link in the chain meant another layer of profit had to be shared.

Once or twice was nothing, but with occasional accidents, more and more merchant convoys found it troublesome and simply put such "inflexible" shelter cities directly on their blacklists.

After all, there was more than one shelter city in the wasteland, and merchant convoys had plenty of choices.

You want strict investigations? Then I'll just go do business with the neighboring shelter city that turns a blind eye to smuggling.

For shelter cities, losing merchant convoys meant material circulation stagnation, which was a much greater loss than tolerating a little smuggling.

This was the tacitly understood balance between both sides.

"Shelter cities tacitly allow merchant convoys to test the boundaries of rules in exchange for continuous material circulation. Merchant convoys accept the percentage taken by inspection taxes, treating smuggling as a gamble where risk and profit coexist."

Cheng Ye didn't call off the inspection but stood beside the staff members, quietly contemplating. His mind constantly flashed through the handbook's introduction to smuggling.

These game rules written on the surface had seemed somewhat mysterious when he memorized them initially, but now they suddenly had vivid annotations.

Looking back now, wasn't the inspection tax not only an incentive for merchant convoys, but also for inspectors?

If they couldn't scrape up any profit, who would be willing to carefully inspect every vehicle, every corner, checking for contamination by infection sources?

If there was any oversight and an infection tide was unknowingly triggered, the cost would be unbearable!

More than ten minutes quickly passed.

The staff were still buried in checking the dried fish, everyone exerting themselves to search without the slightest negligence.

For them, discovering smuggled goods was also a great achievement.

With enough accumulated merit, they would have the chance to be promoted to observer, or apply for transfer to formal departments within the buffer zone, thus securing the "iron rice bowl" of official employment.

But reality was often disappointing.

Conventional inspection methods had long been thoroughly understood by merchant convoys. Finding problems under their noses was as difficult as ascending to heaven.

Someone had indeed considered splitting open the dried fish to inspect, but this thought was suppressed as soon as it emerged.

Because once split open, if there was nothing inside, it would be equivalent to damaging the merchant convoy's goods.

Among everyone present, only Cheng Ye, the inspector, had the authority to make this decision.

And whoever rashly suggested Cheng Ye do this, if nothing was found in the end, would have to bear responsibility.

At minimum, they would have to compensate for the goods at their assessed value, and at worst, be held accountable and dismissed by the checkpoint.

After all, the rules were clear: they couldn't search blindly for the sake of searching, and must have solid evidence before getting serious.

Otherwise, if everyone made random suggestions just to climb up, without any order, the checkpoint's discipline would have fallen into chaos long ago.

"Alright, everyone move the dried fish back into the truck. No problems found."

Cheng Ye raised his hand to call a halt, deliberately raising his voice a few notches. "Everyone be careful of the sword-tooth fish's mouth parts, don't get scratched again."

As his words fell, Jin Dafei, standing outside the isolation net, indeed showed an almost imperceptible smile at the corner of his mouth, somewhat pleased.

Of course, this was from Cheng Ye's perspective of observation.

In other people's eyes, it would appear as relief mixed with some sense of finally passing the test, tinged with grievance.

Bundle after bundle of dried fish were moved back onto the truck, stacked and arranged in the same manner as before.

"Snake, guide the truck in later, but don't rush to disinfect. Just let it wait there."

Cheng Ye said nonchalantly, nodding toward the isolation chamber. "You should know what to do without me reminding you, right?"

Snake was stunned for a moment, a flash of confusion crossing his face, which he quickly suppressed before nodding in agreement.

Had this young Inspector Cheng already discovered a problem?

"Sir, rest assured, I understand."

"Good, don't give him a chance to contact the outside, keep an eye on him."

This "him" naturally referred to the driver.

All the salted dried fish were moved back into the truck bed, and the truck was guided toward the disinfection area under direction.

Because the previous truck was still undergoing disinfection, the driver was guided by Snake to park the truck in front of the isolation chamber.

The moment the truck came to a stop, four guards who had originally been stationed in the corner quietly emerged, surrounding the truck in a four-corner formation. Their movements were so natural they seemed like routine security, yet invisibly cut off communication between the cab and the outside world.

Simultaneously, two guards quickly took positions on the left and right sides of the truck.

"Friend, get out of the truck first. You can get back in when it's your turn."

"Oh, alright!"

The driver in the cab sensed something wrong with the surrounding atmosphere. His hands gripping the steering wheel tightened, but he could only follow the guards' orders, getting out and standing in front of the truck.

Turning to look toward the inspection area, the distance was far and the rain affected visibility.

Jin Dafei obviously hadn't noticed anything amiss, completely unaware that the second truck had already been controlled.

Snake walked over and nodded slightly.

"Next truck!"

Cheng Ye called out, his gaze falling on the third truck slowly driving in, already roughly guessing what was in its cargo hold.

The truck was weighed, showing 14.7 tons.

Just as it stopped in the inspection area, Little Black began barking at the truck bed, attracting everyone's attention.

"Sir, there are some mutated crystals in there, it's written on the manifest!" Jin Dafei called out across the isolation net, his tone carrying deliberately obvious frankness.

Mutated crystals?

Everyone remained calm, knowing in their hearts that this was the toll fee.

After the driver completed inspection and went to the corner, as soon as the truck's rear cargo door opened, Little Black leaped up, barking frantically at wooden boxes in the corner.

"Quiet, Little Black!"

Snake patted the dog's head and led people to open the wooden box. Inside were indeed neatly arranged pale white mutated crystals, with what seemed like flowing clouds within the crystal interiors.

"Sir, these are the most common moonbird crystals, market price around 42 points per kilogram."

He crouched down and hefted the weight, which wasn't light.

Placing it on the scale, excluding the wooden box weight, the net weight was 44.3 kilograms, totaling 1860 points in contribution value.

According to the 20% inspection tax, this brought in 372 points of income for the checkpoint.

"Sir, as you can see, we all conduct business properly. We pay every bit of the inspection tax we owe."

Jin Dafei called out again, his face wearing just the right amount of deference.

Cheng Ye turned around and nodded slightly. This guy was quite the character.

Or rather, all the leaders who could run merchant convoys were shrewd people. Whether they had hidden anything or not was one thing, but their surface work was flawless.

According to Snake, yesterday Inspector Qiao had inspected three merchant convoys larger than this Red Mountain merchant convoy and only found a total of 2100 points.

Yet this Red Mountain merchant convoy alone had voluntarily submitted crystals worth 1860 points.

"Looking at it this way, they're quite sensible. They have quite a lot of smuggled goods, and they're willing to offer quite a bit as well."

Cheng Ye nodded slightly, his mind suddenly producing an additional thought.

Whether this thought could succeed still depended on Jin Dafei's reaction and attitude in what followed.

The third truck was quickly inspected. It was loaded entirely with small items from other shelter cities, including industrial products and handicrafts, all novel goods they hadn't seen before.

Prices couldn't be calculated, but they all fell within tax-exempt categories and couldn't be considered high-value items.

"Alright, drive it away!"

Cheng Ye waved his hand to let it pass. Only the last truck remained in the queue at the checkpoint.

This time Jin Dafei didn't continue waiting but climbed onto the truck door, following along with the truck as it entered.

This guy really had nerves of steel. Despite having 5000 points worth of smuggled goods in his truck, he showed no nervousness and appeared increasingly relaxed.

The truck was weighed: 10.9 tons.

The weights of the four trucks decreased successively. By this one, excluding the truck's own weight, the cargo load wasn't even half capacity.

Little Black's sense of smell was indeed sharp. The truck had barely stopped when it began barking at the rear cargo door again, its tail rigid as a rod.

Visibly, Jin Dafei's expression finally changed, putting on a nervous appearance.

After getting out of the truck, he muttered under his breath, his eyes mixing surprise with apprehension.

"Sir, I don't know someone else loaded things in there. It might have been missed during loading, but we definitely registered everything. All our goods are recorded on the manifest, we can prove it!"

"Is that so?"

Cheng Ye pulled out a faint smile, raising his hand to signal the staff to first conduct basic inspections on Jin Dafei and the driver.

Without reason, Jin Dafei shivered, reading something in that smile.

It was confidence, and also composure.

After completing the entire procedure, both men had no problems and were instructed to retreat to the corner.

"Good thing Old Lu insisted I prepare some toll money, otherwise this young inspector would really be hard to fool."

Jin Dafei secretly felt fortunate.

When he first saw Cheng Ye from a distance, he had even regretted it.

The crystal powder in the fourth truck was originally "passage money" left for the inspector.

In general large and medium shelter cities, inspectors who saw this stuff would mostly just let it pass directly.

Even in super shelter cities, where inspectors had become stricter, they would still show leniency after receiving benefits.

He had originally thought that since Cheng Ye was young, perhaps he wouldn't need to spend this money. Now it seemed fortunate he hadn't saved this expense.

Damn, that smile was too frightening.

It gave him the illusion that all his methods had been seen through.

"Open it!"

Little Black could no longer contain itself, its tail sweeping rapidly on the ground, throat emitting urgent low growls.

As soon as the rear cargo door was lifted a crack, it shot up like an arrow leaving the string, frantically clawing and biting at wooden boards on the truck bed floor, its canine teeth leaving shallow marks on the wood.

This black dog was really formidable!

Jin Dafei watched from the corner, his eyelids twitching. He had previously heard from other merchant convoys that Happiness City had a black dog that, as long as items weren't completely sealed or their scents masked, would leave absolutely no fish escaping the net.

Seeing it today, it truly lived up to its reputation.

Snake signaled his subordinates to step forward. Using crowbars along the wooden board seams, they pried with force, and the entire movable floor panel lifted with a sound.

Underneath were dozens of scattered crystal powder packets neatly arranged, all moonbird crystal ground into fine powder.

This stuff mixed into anti-inflammatory medicine could greatly enhance its effectiveness. Even in powder form, the purchase price was the same as whole crystals.

Staff quickly gathered and weighed the powder. The electronic scale displayed the numbers:

19.8kg.

At 42 points per kilogram, this was another 831 points in contribution value.

15% commission meant Cheng Ye the inspector could get 124 points, almost matching his entire day's earnings from working in Quarantine Zone A yesterday.

"30% tax rate according to regulations, no problems with that, right?"

Cheng Ye turned around, his gaze falling on Jin Dafei's face.

Jin Dafei was stunned, forcing out a stiff smile. "No, no problem. It was our oversight. We deserve the penalty!"

Cheng Ye hadn't clung to the registration issue relentlessly, indicating he already understood the twists and turns involved.

Since the other party had provided a way out, he was too lazy to continue performing that act of ignorance, and simply agreed readily to avoid complications.

"Sir, inside are all sea-sinew ropes."

"Bring them all down."

[NEXT CHAPTER]