Chapter 226

Agria, New Kulder Fort.

In just two months, a city called New Kulder Fort has sprung up north of the Agria settlement.

The new city is nestled against the mountains and beside the water, situated on an alluvial plain at the southernmost tip of the long, narrow continent of Agria, where water and grass are abundant. The city is near the Tropic of Capricorn, with a warm climate and indistinct and short spring and winter seasons. Monsoons from the ocean bring abundant rainfall every standard year, nourishing the lush green vegetation.

The plant seeds brought by the Korhal people and the animals preserved using embryo cryopreservation technology eventually adapted to the air composition and natural light wavelengths of Agria after several twists and turns, and gradually developed into increasingly prosperous populations on this planet.

Giant rhinoceroses, iguanas, yomoyans, cows, and mammoth beetles—native species of the Koprulu Sector that had already been domesticated by Umojan —were introduced to Agria along with Earth's cattle and sheep. At the same time, in order to control the population of these docile herbivores, the Korhal introduced their natural enemies: scorpions, whiptail leopards, and the infamous Korhal wolves.

This fertile land soon rewarded the Korhal people who had chosen it. The humus-rich soil here could be cultivated with rye, wheat, and corn without the need for fertilizer. The long, stable hours of direct sunlight and abundant rainfall throughout the year allowed the new settlers to begin trying another crop from the ancient earth—rice.

Agria's abundant marine life meant that the new colonists no longer needed to worry about protein intake. The planet's vast oceans had given rise to a complex biological community, with ammonites and nautiloids, along with early vertebrates, evolving into diverse food chains.

Fishermen from Korhal quickly established the first open-sea port in the waters of Agria, naming it after a fishing village. Fishing immediately became a pillar industry for the Korhal settlers in Agria, and agriculture, animal husbandry, and fishing ensured that the settlers no longer had to worry about food.

The discovery of several crystalline veins and high-energy gas springs in the mountains by geologists and mineral deposit experts around the settlement immediately boosted the morale of the new Korhal immigrants.

The newly discovered Ardien Crystal vein is buried beneath the deciduous broad-leaved forest south of New Kulder Fort, with two-thirds of the vein exposed above the surface. New immigrants can easily pick up these beautiful blue crystals while walking through the forest. The Ardien Crystal vein is much easier to mine than the deep underground veins of Korhal IV.

The high-energy gas refinery, with its towering alloy chimneys, stands nestled among dense jungles in the mountains. The refinery's workers are doing what they did in Korhal in their new home. They skillfully operate SCV space construction vehicles to retrieve sealed canisters of green gas from the refinery's conveyor SCV and load these canisters of high-energy gas into trailers.

With only a few engineers, technicians, and supervisors, the highly automated oil refinery can maintain production. These yellow and black SCVs are like hardworking worker Drone in a beehive.

The settlement in Agria quickly showed signs of prosperity, and their development speed far exceeded the expectations of the local immigrants.

As Augustus's Revolutionary Army Fleets prepared to leave the Agria system for the center of the Koprulu Sector and enter the core territory of the Terran Confederacy, the new settlements established by the Korhal people in Agria were already self-sufficient and engaged in simple trade with the local settlers.

At this very moment, Augustus, standing on the bridge of the Revolutionary Army flagship Hyperion, was looking through a huge observation window at the blue-green Agria and its deep blue companion star. Beside Augustus, in front of the Holographic Projection control panel and console, were images of downtown New Kulder Fort and views taken from orbit by geostationary satellites. All the Revolutionary Army generals, except for Warfield, Londerstein, and Duke, were now standing beside Augustus.

The Hyperion was Augustus's first battlecruiser. After the Battle of Tarsonis, the Norad II remained the flagship of the Revolutionary Army Fleets because it was far more advanced than the outdated Hyperion in both weapon systems and Defensive Matrix.

It turns out that Augustus had his eye on Alpha Squadron's new flagship, the Norad III, and wanted to make it the new flagship. However, this move was immediately met with strong opposition from Duke and criticism from Raynor regarding his fickle nature.

Ultimately Augustus reinstated the Hyperion as the flagship of the Revolutionary Army Fleets, not because he was a nostalgic man, but because Rory Swann told him that he and Viktor Kaczynski had completed the upgrades to the Hyperion, and the latter firmly declared that the Hyperion would become the coolest battlecruiser in all of humanity.

Meanwhile, Rory Swann inserted several Void Crystals—which the Revolutionary Army had previously discovered in Mar-Sala and the Keldarin Crystals found at the Baysher-Tadarin base—near the main engine room of the Hyperion.

Although Swann still cannot figure out how these crystals work, the Xel'Naga Crystal and Protoss crystals do indeed provide a continuous power supply to the Hyperion's main engines, as well as the ship's life support and weapon systems.

This pure, pointed, man-made crystal energy is inexhaustible. If humanity can figure out how it works, then Protoss crystals could undoubtedly replace nuclear fusion reactors to provide energy for cities, factories, and warships far larger than Behemoth-class Battlecruiser. It is foreseeable that, in the eyes of the Protoss, human nuclear energy is still a primitive and backward technology, and their energy technology is far more advanced than that of humans.

From the orbit, New Kurdish City appears as a mere silver-gray dot, but as the camera zooms in, its standard colonial grid town becomes visible. The new city, built by the Revolutionary Army Engineering Corps and Bernard Hansen's Agria Construction Company, blends architectural styles from Tarsonis and Korhal IV. All the box-shaped houses are constructed from molten silver alloy sheets, topped with shimmering transparent glass and antennas.

New Kurds has no towering skyscrapers or magnificent buildings with silver alloy frames and glass; all the buildings are low-rise single-story or multi-story structures, with only one high-rise building standing alone in the city center.

Two jewel-like blue rivers flow through the city center, and the broad-leaved forests surrounding the immigrant settlement are ablaze with color. The silvery-white buildings of New Kurdish City resemble white metal cubes shimmering in the sunlight.

To commemorate the destruction of Kulder Fort in the Battle of Korhal, and to honor the fact that almost all the adult men and women in the city joined the Revolutionary Army, leaving the once prosperous city desolate, people, at the behest of the Revolutionary Army, added the suffix "NEW" before Kulder Fort, and it was also called Kulder Fort.

"Our home world has gained another one." Augustus opened the Hyperion's navigation star chart, manually marked Agria in green and made a mark on it to indicate that it was a planet that could be docked.

In Augustus's vision, after five years or more, Agria would become a huge granary, providing supplies for the entire Revolutionary Army.

When building the new settlement of Agria, the construction plan also included its deep blue companion star. Augustus also planned to establish biological laboratories and interstellar spaceports on the companion star, which was designated Agria I, and to deploy a permanent Fleets in the system.

Agria's strategic significance lies not only in its abundant resources, providing plentiful minerals and a near-inexhaustible food supply, but also in its location on the edge of the Koprulu Sector, adjacent to the Kel-Morian Combine planet Meinhoff and the uninhabited planet Haven.

If Augustus wanted to establish a stable base in the eastern part of the Koprulu Sector, then Agria was the best choice. Through the Agria settlement, Augustus could reach the Bhekar settlement on the edge of the Koprulu Sector and several planets occupied by the Taldarim Expeditionary Fleets, and to the west, he could reach the Sara System and the Vilityia Prime.

"This is a new beginning," Raynor said, standing beside Augustus. "The Korhal people have endured many hardships, and finally a new home has been established."

"We finally have a base of our own." Tychus spoke in a manner completely unlike a Revolutionary Army whose mission was to liberate all of humanity; he sounded more like a notorious bandit, "It will take the people on those two planets of Kalis quite some time to develop."

"I think you just want to claim those two colony planets so that when territorial disputes arise with the Confederacy, the Kel-Morian, or some other random alien race, we can claim that those two planets have been the territory of the Korhal since ancient times and are an inseparable part of it."

"Ha--" Augustus glanced at Agria one last time before speaking to the navigator of the Hyperion.

"Lieutenant, take us off the tracks. To Umojan, we need the support of the Umojan Protectorate," he said.

"Where's Ariel Hansen?" Tychus asked in a tone somewhat familiar to Augustus as the Hyperion accelerated into the hyperspace passage. "Why didn't you take your little sweetheart with you? Did you think I couldn't see you two exchanging glances just because she's wearing glasses?"

"How could you bear to leave that beautiful black-haired girl in Agria? I couldn't bear to—"

"Don't act like a pedophile, Tychus. Augustus isn't as scum as you." Before Augustus speak, Kerrigan pointed at Tychus's nose and berated him.

"She's right, Tychus," Augustus.

"Tychus, everyone knows you're a bastard," Raynor chimed in, also taking Augustus's side.

"Come on, you're just jealous of the boss." Harnack always took Augustus's side in everything.

"Ariel Hansen is about to go to college in Tarsonis, how could she possibly come with us to risk her life... This is a revolution, you think this is child's play or some kind of cool banditry," Raynor said.

"I was just saying. You guys don't have to be like this..." Tychus was speechless after being rebuked. He had only meant to tease Augustus.

"Especially you, Jimmy, that revolver you're holding was something I risked my life to steal from Tarsonis, otherwise you'd have to wait at least five or six years to get it," he said sourly.

"You have no conscience."

"Alright." Just as Raynor was about to say something, Augustus pointed to the main screen on the bridge of the Hyperion and said.

"Look at the recent news, we don't have much time left for vacation in Agria." Augustus looked at the Adjutant's avatar on the screen.

"Lieutenant, play the UNN frontline report from August 12th."

All media signals arriving in Agria were from more than two months ago. These delayed news reports were one of the sources the Revolutionary Army used to understand recent major events in the Terran Confederacy —because when even the UNN starts reporting on something, it means the Confederacy can no longer cover up their scandals.

"I have some unfortunate news to announce: Colonel Edmond Duke of Alpha Squadron has been confirmed to be under the influence of psychotropic drugs from Augustus Mengsk's rebel forces. He has gone insane and become a drug-controlled walking corpse."

"I am Gordon, a war correspondent. The First Fleets of the Confederacy Navy has arrived in Mar- Sara. The rebels have fled in panic and are in complete disarray. The people of Mar- Sara, who have suffered greatly at the hands of the rebels, have warmly welcomed us. The atmosphere at the scene is enthusiastic!"

The main screen then switched to the camera feed, where a pile of burning Molotov cocktails and wooden obstacles lay at the presenter's feet. Through the deliberately blurred edges of the lens, a Federal Marine Corps in Power Armor could be seen roughly dragging the struggling Ma Sara man out of his house.

"You must be investigated because you dared to put jam on a slice of bread! And there's a flag in your room that isn't the Confederacy's red and blue star flag." Tychus sarcastically narrated the silent video.

"I can imagine what happened to the people of Mar- Sara after we left, but that would only make them hate the Confederacy more." Raynor's expression was grim; he couldn't imagine what had happened to the town and the tavern they had stayed in.

"In fact, according to reports from the troops remaining in Mar- Sara, they inflicted considerable losses on the landing Confederacy forces through guerrilla warfare, while the Mar- Sara supporters also caused the Confederacy forces a great deal of trouble," Augustus.

Look at this.

The main screen's display began to change in response to Augustus's words, switching to a series of news reports.

"The elevated one-way maglev train track in the main city of Tarsonis was destroyed, causing one maglev train to derail and fall, resulting in more than 800 deaths—including a member of the Dorian Family Elder Family."

"André Tagore was found dead in his family's bathroom; he had previously been considered the most promising Heir to 'Queen Tagore ' Andrea."

"Confederate Congress Tylan Doyle is embroiled in an unprecedented sexual assault scandal, with hundreds of Confederacy officials reportedly implicated in the affair."

"Twelve years later, the Abran Rebels, who had been declared completely eradicated, have reappeared on Antiga Prime."

"--The Sons of Korhal declares himself responsible for this."

"Your Arcturus did a good job," Tychus commented. "Killing all those Old Families is exactly what should have been done."

Augustus silent. There were hundreds of news articles about the Sons of Korhal of Sons of Korhal, who dominated the front pages of various news media during the period when the Revolutionary Army had disappeared.

Arcturus Mengsk commands his Sons of Korhal from thousands of light-years away in Tarsonis, an organization that has gradually become the target of public condemnation for its bloody, cruel, and ruthless revenge against the Old Families.

Before Augustus say anything more, the main screen suddenly switched to this news item.

"The Sadin III Confederacy outpost was destroyed by an unidentified armed force. Local residents claimed that they saw mysterious lights and warships in the cloudless, moonless sky that night, and asserted that the lights did not come from stars or lamplight."

"It's the Tal'darim, they're taking revenge," Augustus.

At that moment, beneath the bridge of the Hyperion, a dozen or so iron-gray Behemoth-class Battlecruiser were simultaneously entering the hyperspace passage. When this Fleets reappeared in the material world, it was already 2491.