Jacob Prime loomed like a city built upon a bronze-colored metallic mountain.
Tens of thousands of skyscrapers and navigation towers stood atop the colossal mountains of waste metal and slag. The distance between the topmost buildings and those at the very bottom exceeded 9 000 m, with breathtaking vertical gaps between towers and roads, resembling a colossal termite nest.
At the city's heart, the central aerospace port was built on the highest peak of the metallic mountain, surrounded by swirling clouds of mist and smoke. Gales swept across the docking platforms, where every aircraft was clamped tightly in place by magnetic locks.
The Kel-Morian had every capability to encase this open-air aerospace port in glass, yet they stubbornly held to tradition, believing that only against the fiercest winds could a giant eagle truly take flight.
Compared with the Terran Confederacy and the Umojans, the Kel-Morian carried their traditions and customs into every facet of life. Their overseas merchants were smooth and cunning, but insult their family, and these ever-smiling traders would instantly become a powder keg ready to ignite.
When Augustus disembarked from his transport ship, his bodyguards in dark gray ceremonial uniforms were already lined up at the hatch, carrying sleek C-13 Gauss rifles in perfect formation.
Waiting at the aerospace port to greet foreign guests was a diplomat in a sharp suit, wearing framed glasses like goggles and sporting slick, gleaming hair combed straight back.
Facing Augustus's guards stood two ranks of Kel-Morian soldiers in gray-white dress uniforms. They bore KMC Gauss rifles, wore blue berets, and carried at their waists scabbards bearing sword-and-shield insignia edged in amber. This was the emblem of the Moria Guild Guards, a name long famed despite their rare appearance on the front lines.
Only recently had Augustus learned that "Guild Guards" was not actually the designation of a single elite unit. In truth, every Kel-Morian soldier—from Rippers to labor auxiliaries—proudly called themselves Guild Guards. Misunderstandings between the Terrans and the Kel-Morian permeated every aspect; to this day, the Kel-Morian still believed that the Terran Confederacy's Re-socialized soldiers were clone-grown from containers.
Augustus made no comment on the diplomat's hairstyle, which was clearly in line with the fashion circles of Tarsonis City, and instead fixed his gaze on the busy workers across the docking platform.
Compared with the tall, slim diplomat in his sharp suit, the ground crew and dockworkers on the platform all wore thick windproof work clothes and goggles to shield themselves from Moria's harsh ultraviolet rays and direct sunlight. They were generally stocky in build, with solid muscle on their arms.
Their skin was dark and rough, no different from the Kel-Morian of Meinhoff. In contrast, the Moria middle and upper classes sitting in their luxurious offices seemed almost like another race entirely.
"Hello, I am Augustus Mengsk." As the Kel-Morian diplomat approached him, Augustus removed his combat gloves and extended a friendly handshake.
"The famous rebel leader, the Wolf of House Mengsk, the Eagle of Korhal IV, the savior of all Terrans." Adjusting his glasses, the diplomat recited the titles one after another.
"Your victory on Mar Sara has already spread across all of Moria and its dependent planets and asteroid settlements. Throughout the entire Koprulu Sector, your name is known to everyone—there is no one who does not know it."
"That's even better. I thought the Terran Confederacy would keep silent about such a defeat." Augustus showed his surprise. For the past two weeks the Revolutionary fleet had been traveling through hyperspace lanes, and he truly had no way to read the latest news.
"Alpha Squadron was once the rising star of the Confederate Navy. Few could remain indifferent to such a crushing defeat—during UNN's morning news, host Mr. Liberty had his broadcast interrupted when the crew accidentally switched to a clip." The diplomat's tone was dripping with irony.
"Colonel Edmund Duke's speech about joining the Korhal Revolutionaries infuriated his own uncle, and now—everyone knows that Alpha Squadron suffered the most devastating defeat in its history on Mar Sara."
"The Confederacy's press spokesman even claimed that only one Alpha Squadron battlecruiser had crashed on Mar Sara, and that Edmund Duke was nothing more than a rebel impersonator. Yet they couldn't produce the real Colonel Duke to explain—after a week, the Confederate government changed its line again, declaring that Duke and his Alpha Squadron had been deceived by the rebels, injected with dangerous psychoactive drugs, and spoke against their will," the diplomat said.
"What a ridiculous farce."
"The fools in the Confederate government can't even manage the simple game of tearing down one wall to patch up another." Augustus commented with a smile.
"A most satisfying turn of events."
"Indeed, most satisfying. To many Kel-Morian, you are already a hero." Once more, the diplomat gripped Augustus's hand firmly.
"I swear, I am proud of it." Augustus allowed a slight smile.
In the Guild Wars, Alpha Squadron had once dealt the Kel-Morian fleet a heavy blow. Now, tens of thousands of Kel-Morian, upon hearing that Alpha Squadron had been defeated by the Revolutionaries, were all talking about this young heir of Korhal's House Mengsk, curious about just what kind of man he really was.
Was he the demon painted by Confederate propaganda, or a freedom fighter proclaiming justice?
After the Kel-Morian defeat in the Guild Wars, civilians who had long suffered under the unequal treaties came to hate the Terran Confederacy with every fiber of their being. For countless Kel-Morian, anyone who struck at the Confederacy was a friend to them.
"Please, come with me. The board representatives are waiting for you, and their time is worth more than gold." With that, the diplomat led Augustus toward a nearby luxury hover car, while his entourage was guided toward several other vehicles.
"These are my guards." Augustus pointed to the woman following close behind him—Sarah Kerrigan, clad in a form-fitting dark gray military uniform, a black belt cinched at her waist accentuating her S-shaped figure, red hair flowing.
"She is truly a beauty." The diplomat smiled, offering the compliment out of habit.
"Thank you." Kerrigan lifted her gaze at him, gave a faint smile, and flicked her bright red hair before moving to check whether the car Augustus was to ride in was secure.
As Augustus stepped toward the luxury hovercar the Kel-Morian had prepared for him, he could more distinctly feel that Moria's gravity was noticeably stronger than that of other planets; every stride and swing of his arms carried a sense of resistance. This was also the reason Morian people were generally shorter than Terrans and Umojans, whose homeworlds had only 0.96 times standard gravity.
Augustus climbed into the rear seat of the lavish car, with Kerrigan and Corporal Faraday seated to his left and right. Raynor, Warfield, and others, along with Augustus's guards, boarded other vehicles. When the convoy started up and moved down a sloping ring road, towering bronze spires and countless intersecting ring roads immediately came into view.
"A Kel-Morian imitation of the Terran Confederacy's Terra-made hovercar model. The engine and intelligent navigation system were imported from Umoja. The driver once worked for the Chairman of the Kelanis Shipping Guild. Everyone here, including the guards, has received professional agent training." After sitting down, Kerrigan leaned close to Augustus, lowering her voice so only the two of them could hear.
"The Combine's Board of Directors attaches great importance to your visit. They're willing to offer some assistance to you—the greatest internal threat to the Terran Confederacy—but at the same time they remain vigilant against the rise of the Mengsk family."
"Let us carefully listen to the directors' demands." After sitting down, Augustus calmly adjusted the hem of his greatcoat in an orderly manner.
On this trip Augustus had not had much direct contact with the Kel-Morian Combine's nominally independent government. As for who the true holders of power were in the Combine, everyone in fact knew very well.
A unified government and a workers' union fighting for rights were nothing more than puppets propped up by the capital holders who truly wielded power in the Combine, mere devices to deceive the populace. These capital holders controlled wealth, technology, and knowledge. Reviewing the history of their ancestors' struggles back on humanity's motherworld Terra, they understood that unions would inevitably emerge sooner or later, so they personally established Moria's one and only union.
It was the Combine Board of Directors that was the true ruling authority of the Kel-Morian Combine, equivalent to the Federal Parliament of the Terran Confederacy or the elected Assembly of the Umojans. Its members came from dozens of the largest family-style guild corporations as well as the chief executives of the United Guild. Among these directors, representatives of Moria's two industrial giants—the Morian Mining Coalition and the Kelanis Shipping Guild—held absolute voice and authority.
The Kel-Morian Combine was not, as it claimed, a republican political system led by workers. In essence, it was still a massive corporate conglomerate composed of guild enterprises. The Kel-Morian Combine was a political and economic entity dominated by the Morian people, dressed up with unions and an independent government for show.
After traversing a stretch of undulating ring road, the hovercar Augustus rode in slowly unfolded the wings tucked into its roof. As the roar of the ignited engines rang out, the car lifted into the air within the spreading shockwave, merging into the great flow of flying cars and spacecraft across the sky.
The ring road receding behind them hung thousands of meters in the air, suspended between towering buildings. There was little greenery here, not even scattered patches of it to be seen. On the bronze-colored high-rises, even the wedge-shaped windows were tinted brown.
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