I went to Sothis ...
17 Oct 2015Grey Pilgrim
... and all I got was 320 t of Crystalline Gold, nearly 30 MCr of smuggling profits and a promotion to Trailblazer. 
After doing about 10 missions for "our" minor faction, I went to Sothis and found about 320 t of Crystalline Gold waiting for me. Wow! Took all 80 t that fit into my ASP and went to the next best system at least 100 ly away. At Takurua I sold my cargo and made more than 1 MCr profit. I found a lot of long range smuggling missions there, too, most at about 5-6 MCr. I took all I could get and went back to Sothis, looking for Federation missions, but didn't get very many, and nothing > 1-2 MCr. Got impatient and filled the other half of my cargo space with Crystalline Gold, and back to the Bubble it was.
Got many "friends" on the way who wanted to share my cargo, and a lot of nosy System Authority ships - in empty anarchy systems ... whatever "authority" they may have there. Outrun them, killed them, went on.
On my way to Sothis and back, I scanned every unknown system and cashed my exploration data at the first Imperial station I found back at the Bubble, together with the Crystalline Gold I was carrying (still working on my Imperial naval rank ...). On top of the ~ 29 MCr I made, all in all, I beacme Trailblazer. Not bad for about four hours fo work.
Afterwards I went to Tabaldak and fought for the Glory of the Empire.