Respectfully mine

Leland Hale is the galaxy’s most infamous thief, a six‑foot‑six, razor‑sharp mind wrapped in a legend that rivals Robin Hood or Jesse James. He lives by a single creed—if something belongs to the universe, he will take it, then claim it as his own. Scholars have even tried to map his personality down to the seventieth decimal, a testament to how his reputation eclipses the facts of his life.

On the sparsely settled world of Apfahl, two rival cultures—farmers of Nordapfahl and nomadic herders of Sudapfahl—have been locked in a decades‑long stand‑off over governance. When Hale first sights the planet from his private starship, the distant globe looks like a ripe apple waiting to be plucked, and he sets his sights on a heavily protected time capsule hidden somewhere in the contested borderlands. The opening act follows his meticulous planning, his clash with local authorities, and the clever twists that only a master criminal could devise.