After observing for a while, Augustus entered the bar with a few soldiers, leaving the rest to secure the perimeter.
The bar was unexpectedly clean and well-kept. A pleasant scent of incense mingled with the dry chill from outside. The floor was wooden, patched up in places. There were about a dozen tables and chairs, and only four or five patrons inside—most likely, the rest had bolted as soon as they heard the Marines were coming.
Augustus walked straight to the bar counter, each step from his power boots creaking heavily on the floorboards.
"I want to buy some intel on the Kel-Morians," Augustus said, tossing a thick stack of cash onto the counter.
"Sargeant Mengsk is this loaded?" Tychus's voice came through the comms, full of surprise. He quickly estimated the amount just by the thickness of the stack—it wasn't a small sum.
"Of course," Raynor replied smugly. "Augustus might be the richest man on this planet."
"What's it to you? Why do you sound so proud about it?" Tychus grumbled. But deep down, he was already trying to figure Augustus out. If the guy really was some kind of big shot, Tychus didn't mind cozying up to him.
"A-ah! Sir, I don't know anything!" the bartender stammered. He was a middle-aged man missing one hand. At first, the cash had startled him—but after a second's thought, he decided his life was more important.
"You're afraid of retaliation, aren't you?" Augustus asked.
"Come on, come on. That guy definitely doesn't know more than I do."
At that moment, a man dressed in strange attire leaned in close to Augustus, slapping both hands on the table as he swept up all the cash. He then excitedly began counting the money with a companion at his side.
Augustus turned to look at him. The man was dressed much like the locals—wearing a thick woolen military coat, dark brown insulated boots, and a fur-lined earflap hat with three flaps. The hem of his dark brown coat reached all the way to his ankles.
If everything else still seemed relatively normal, then the sunglasses he wore in the middle of the night definitely stood out. Judging by his youthful voice and appearance, he looked to be in his early twenties.
"It's an honor to meet you—really, I'm moved to tears. You probably don't know this, but Remy and I are starting a business," the man said after finishing the count. He looked up at Augustus and, ignoring the clear height difference between them, enthusiastically shook his hand. "Oh, I'm Graven Hill, from Umoja. I'm a mercenary. Here's my card—it has my email address on it."
"Is that so? Then why are you so sure your intel is worth that much?" Augustus accepted the card and tucked it away. Behind his visor—out of Hill's sight—he was smiling.
Graven Hill. That was the same mercenary leader aboard the Hyperion in the game—the one who constantly tried to sell mercenary contracts to Raynor.
"It's definitely worth it, sir. A Kel-Morian Sea Dragon assault team is planning to launch an attack on Fort Howe—tonight," Hill said.
"How do you know that?" Augustus's expression turned serious.
"I'm a mercenary. I used to take jobs from the Kel-Morians. Some of the mercs who've done dirty work for them—through me—are still mixed in among their ranks. I've got no shortage of intel," Hill explained. "Of course, I've signed plenty of contracts with both the Confederation and the Kel-Morians."
"The Kel-Morians are under a lot of military pressure right now. Honestly, things aren't easy for us either. Demand's high, supply's tight. Commissions should be rising, but they can't pay—they're all running on credit."
Maybe it was because he was still young, but Hill was quite talkative. "Mercenaries have to eat too, y'know. We've got parents and kids to feed. Plenty of folks back home can barely put food on the table."
"So really, you can't blame me for this. It's not like I want to betray them."
"Jim, come on—we need to find Reagan. He's the only one with equipment that can connect directly to Captain Warfield," Augustus said, turning to leave.
"Wait—you trust me just like that?" Hill asked, momentarily stunned.
"Doesn't matter. Either way, we need to verify it," Augustus replied, tossing the words over his shoulder as he walked out of the bar with a confused Raynor and the others in tow. "We'll be in touch. And if your intel turns out to be true—I'll pay you double."
"I'll be in touch," Hill replied.
"That guy's a potential high-paying client," Hill's companion, Remy, said. "We should definitely keep in touch with him."
...
Just as Augustus was about to contact Third Platoon's commanding officer, Second Lieutenant Reagan, a sudden order came through the platoon's command channel: "All squads, regroup at the drop-off point immediately."
"Did we find the Kel-Morian troops?" asked one of the squad leaders.
"We did. They're right next to Fort Howe," Reagan replied. "Brothers, the Kel-Morians caught us with our pants down. Less than a minute ago, the command center at Fort Howe issued a distress signal to all units within a 2,400-kilometre radius. An unidentified number of Kel-Morian troops are attacking the fort."
"Which Kel-Morian unit is it?" Augustus wanted to confirm Graven Hill's intel. Though the information was already outdated and hadn't helped him much, it had still provided a warning—albeit a short-lived one. Even so, it served to prove that the mercenary's intel was, at the very least, trustworthy.
Augustus hadn't given that stack of credits from earlier a second thought. Before leaving Korhal, his mother had not only given him sixty thousand credits in cash, but also three Tarsonis Covington Bank accounts. Every month, his personal accounts saw deposits ranging from 500,000 to 1,000,000 credits.
Looking at the bigger picture, making the acquaintance of a future mercenary magnate certainly couldn't hurt.
Over the past few months, Augustus's letters to his mother had gradually devoted more and more space to Korhal IV's political landscape and his father's revolutionary pursuits. In the end, he had successfully convinced her that her son was deeply concerned about his father's cause and the future of Korhal.
Augustus was fairly certain that, while his father, Angus, might not read every single letter himself, he would always ask about their contents.
Last week, in a heavily encrypted email—triple-encrypted, with the sender's address and identity scrubbed—his mother passed along a message from Angus.
Angus's response to Augustus's concerns was crystal clear. In his eyes, to forget history was to betray it. The revolution would not—and must not—stop. Korhal must achieve independence in his generation.
He had even hinted, albeit subtly, at the timeline for the independence referendum—a detail that was no longer a secret. It would take place next year, in April 2489.
The Federation's assassins likely infiltrated Korhal shortly after that. 2489 marked the beginning of the storm—the tipping point in a rapidly shifting situation. Since Korhal's independence now seemed inevitable, Augustus believed he had to begin preparing for the eventual assassination attempts on his family… or even a full-blown war between Korhal and the Federation.
"It's the Sea Dragon Legion," Reagan answered. "A very well-known mountain warfare unit, also trained in siege combat. You'll find them on nearly every battlefield across the stars. Everyone agrees—they're one of the toughest nuts to crack."
The Sea Dragon Legion was one of the newest corps born from the Kel-Morian Rippers, a restructured military force. Their headquarters was located on Feronis, a mining world within the Kel-Morian Combine.
Compared to other life-sustaining planets, Feronis orbits much closer to its sun. As a result, nearly 90% of its water resources evaporated early in the planet's formation, and the remaining water lies deep underground.
The surface of Feronis is dominated by crimson deserts, jagged plains riddled with bizarre rock formations, and towering mountain ranges that pierce the clouds—together forming the planet's vast primary continental plate. Once, Feronis had been one of the most overlooked wastelands in the galaxy, indistinguishable from countless others. But everything changed with the discovery of rare and valuable minerals.
Kel-Morian traders, laborers, and mercenaries flooded in. Prosperous new cities sprang up across the virgin lands uncovered by Kel-Morian adventurers. Feronis quickly became the most critical mining world under the control of the Moria Consortium.
The Sea Dragon Legion of Feronis was formed after the Terran Federation Army invaded the planet. It was composed of local Rippers and militia forces.
In the absence of reinforcements from other Kel-Morian Combine planets, this hastily assembled army nonetheless managed to defeat a Terran Federation field army of around 50,000 troops over the course of two years, gradually wearing them down by leveraging their familiarity with the terrain. The final enemy battalion was surrounded and annihilated on a plain called Sea Dragon.
It was after this campaign that the Sea Dragon Legion was formally established. They swore to make the Terrans feel every ounce of the suffering their ravaged homeland had endured.
---
I will post some extra Chapters in Patreon, you can check it out. >> patreon.com/TitoVillar
---