Ceres is the largest body in the asteroid belt and the site of Tianshui, the first human settlement beyond Mars, established by a Chinese crew that landed on 19 January 2091. China’s strategic objective for Ceres — named in the Kaluga Protocol (2068) — was its extensive water-ice reserves, confirmed as at least as extensive as pre-mission modeling suggested.
Through the 2090s, Ceres served as a refueling foothold for a slow trickle of independent mining startups working the belt, with port traffic building gradually rather than explosively due to NTP-drive transit times. By 2100, belt mining startup activity spiked sharply, and Ceres became a crowded port — the beginning of the real belt rush, a decade after the slow build-up began.
In January 2100, Governor Liu Wenjing introduced SP (shuǐpiào, 水票), a water-ice-backed credit instrument — the first currency issued in the asteroid belt. By the mid-2110s, most belt mining corporations operating under legitimate UN license carried Arabic names, reflecting Gulf capital’s dominant role in licensed belt extraction.