Tyrador III was the second destination of Augustus's journey through the Tyrador star system. It was the third planet of that system and one of the three worlds capable of supporting life.
The shuttle Augustus was riding was entering the range of Tyrador III's gravitational field and circling the planet along a synchronous orbit, preparing to enter this world's dense atmosphere.
This butterfly-shaped shuttle, painted bright blue, had a pair of symmetrical, narrow triangular auxiliary wings. Its three sets of plasma thrusters could ensure that the vessel had enough power and endurance to travel between the planet's surface and outer space, and its micro–warp engine could also support several short-range, interstellar jumps.
This shuttle had rolled off the line at Tarsonis's famous Bennett Orbital Shipyards. It could carry up to twenty people and an equal mass of cargo, and it was the most commonly used shuttle for Confederacy merchants traveling abroad. This time, Augustus had brought only Raynor, Harnack, and a squad of elite guards under Corporal Faraday.
Piloting it was a Revolutionary Army Navy Captain who had once been a seasoned cargo–berthing pilot. Just like many Korhal youths who had enlisted with burning zeal, this berthing pilot continued to shine in the field he excelled at most. His primary task was to pilot supply ships traveling between planetary supply depots, starports, and fleets.
On the control panel before Augustus's seat, a blue-and-green planet was being projected upon a screen formed by holographic projection.
Tyrador III's natural environment was vastly different from the graceful natural landscapes of its two sister planets, which orbited one another. On this world, the proportion of carbon dioxide and methane within its nitrogen-oxygen atmosphere exceeded that of an average planet. This allowed the atmosphere to block the excessive radiation it received due to its closer distance to the star, and it also created, for Tyrador III, a humid, scorching world rife with hurricanes.
Because the city established by the previous colonists who had immigrated to Tyrador III was destroyed in a terrible tsunami several decades ago, the Confederacy Immigration Bureau and the Central Security Bureau officials had to reconsider the possibility of recolonizing this planet. The intervals between the supernaturally powerful natural disasters capable of destroying a civilization ranged from several million years at most to no more than a few years at the shortest.
Yet the fossils and extant biological species on it made this place a treasure trove for studying species evolution and genetic diversity. This caused Tyrador's excessively extreme and ever-changing climate—though not suitable to serve as a stable, large-scale Confederacy colonial territory—to nonetheless host a large number of biological survey stations and Confederacy research facilities.
Now, Confederacy colonists were still considering completely altering Tyrador III's natural environment through a long planetary–terraforming process to make it more suitable for human habitation. But this proposal was believed to destroy more than 95% of this planet's native lifeforms and was fiercely opposed by the Koprulu Animal Protection Association.
And with the outbreak of the Guild Wars, this matter eventually came to nothing. After all, the Terran Confederacy did not lack habitable planets, and the Tyrador system possessed the extremely rare characteristic of having three.
The overwhelming majority of Tyrador III's population lived in a massive ring-shaped orbital city capable of housing several million residents. However, the person Augustus was looking for—Raynor's Raiders' Chief Scientist Egon Stetmann—was not on the orbital city, but rather in a small town on Tyrador III's planetary surface.
"How does it feel to board a shuttle? I heard you've never been to space before." Sitting beside Augustus were Kerrigan and the young Matt Horner.
"I feel great, Marshal Augustus." Matt's expression was quite excited. "I feel amazing."
"That's good. Most people who grow up within a planet's gravitational field do not adapt well their first time entering a space environment. Some unlucky fellows will vomit and have diarrhea." Augustus looked at Matt.
"I really can't believe you still came with us. In the eyes of many people, you are still a child, after all," he said.
"Because this might be my only chance to leave Tyrador IX." Matt said, "There has always been a voice in my heart telling me that if I miss this chance, then I may have to wait many more years."
"Very good. As long as you do not regret it, I have no problem here." Augustus said to Matt.
"Matt, I originally thought this might be a wasted trip. After all, you are still too young." Jim Raynor, sitting in the back row, said.
"Kid, I still have to remind you. In our Revolutionary Army, many people were full of ambition before joining the military, but at the very moment they stepped into the barracks or onto the battlefield, they regretted it. Some may still think the Revolutionary Army is merely a rabble like a peasant uprising army—but what awaits such people is the punishment for deserters." He sternly reminded the Tyrador youngster in front of him, who could still barely be called a big boy.
"Don't scare Matt. Otherwise, I can only count on Harnack to pilot the ship." Augustus laughed loudly.
"I've never piloted a ship, but I have driven a Vulture." Harnack, beside Raynor, immediately said when Augustus mentioned him.
"But I feel that this is no big deal. If I went up, I could handle it."
"Marshal, I will absolutely never become a deserter." Matt said with solemn respect. "I came here because I want to become the most valiant Revolutionary Army soldier, ready at any moment to sacrifice for this."
"I do not need you to sacrifice yourself, Matt. I have never doubted that in the future you will become a General or even a Marshal." Augustus said with a smile.
Augustus's words startled Matt. He had clearly never considered this possibility. By comparison, Matt believed the greatest accomplishment of his life might be serving as Augustus's dedicated driver.
"I have never thought about becoming a General." Matt said.
"Then now you must take this as your aspiration." Augustus put away his smile and said, "Next, I will arrange for you to serve as a trainee sailor aboard the Hyperion. After some time, you may be assigned to Captain Raynor's side to learn piloting and the daily administrative affairs aboard a warship from his First Officer and Executive Commander."
"Once the time is ripe, I will send you to the Umojan Capital University. After you complete two to three years of study, I will take you back and have you serve as the Captain of one of the battlecruisers in my fleet."
"Yes, Sir." Matt said seriously.
Augustus patted Matt's shoulder from behind. He was clearly very close to this boy, but Matt still sat upright and tense. Matt would need quite some time to adapt to the change in identity. The gap in age and status made it impossible for him to regard Augustus as a friend or older brother he could confide in; he always respected and feared this great leader of the Revolutionary Army.
At this moment, the shuttle Augustus was riding had already passed through Tyrador III's atmosphere and, after a bout of turbulence, landed on a steel-cast berthing platform in the northern hemisphere.
The landing site was located among low-lying marshlands, with forests and scattered small lakes farther away. Numerous strange and brightly colored organisms thrived in the humid swamps, and the sky was filled with flying creatures resembling small pterosaurs. On the ground, one could faintly see the footprints of giant creatures, and large groups of small, web-footed, multicolored lizards ran across the muddy marshes.
This berthing platform had been built during the early colonial era and had already been abandoned for quite a long time. Rust covered it all over; faded warning lines and painted hazard signs remained on the platform. Everywhere were filth, mud, and discarded machinery—yet no trace of human activity could be seen.
Tyrador III was currently in an extremely warm epoch. Lush forest ranges covered 70% of the land, and the variety of life was erupting in an explosive surge. A considerable portion of the local biological communities came from the cold-blooded creatures and mammalian animals brought by humans, and their evolutionary speed on this planet far surpassed that of their places of origin.
In just a little over one hundred years, the small lizards originally brought by the earliest colonists as pets had increased in size twentyfold and evolved into hundreds of regional subspecies, astonishing all who saw them. This was a paradise for biologists, and the most famous universities and research institutions in the Koprulu Sector all had research facilities on Tyrador.
Aside from Tyrador III's extremely rich and diverse biota and extraordinarily rapid evolutionary rate—both of which held immense research value—the lost civilization ruins buried within the thick geological layers were also one of the reasons this planet hosted so many scientific survey stations.
Much evidence showed that the planets of the Tyrador star system—even beyond the three colonizable worlds—contained a vast number of ancient civilization ruins. Enormous deep-green crystal pillars filled subterranean caverns, and the colossal temples built to extol their gods had evidently reached the pinnacle of art and aesthetics imaginable to humankind.
A significant number of alien mystics believed that this had once been the homeworld of some ancient civilization. This civilization had already developed into an interstellar-voyaging era and had completed colonization on most planets in this star system. They were even able to transform a dead, rocky planet to give it a complete atmosphere and biosphere, which might also be the reason why the Tyrador system possessed so many habitable worlds.
One thousand years ago, or even longer, this ancient civilization abandoned or temporarily left its homeworld for unknown reasons, and only afterward did humans discover this star system and begin implementing colonial policies.
Those still remaining on Tyrador III included the surviving early immigrants and the local residents from the second to third waves of small-scale immigration, as well as elite scientists from various Confederacy-allied colonies. On the planet's surface, the number of research institutions even exceeded the number of the local residents' semi-domed huts.
Augustus led more than a dozen heavily armed Revolutionary Army guards down from the shuttle and ordered Corporal Faraday to take men to confirm the surrounding situation.
Because the oxygen content in Tyrador III's air was higher than that of an average Earth-like planet, under Augustus's orders, everyone began putting on auxiliary respirators. Although it was not to the point of being impossible to breathe, outsiders staying in such an environment for long periods would very likely experience oxygen intoxication.
"There isn't even a shadow of a person here." Raynor put on his auxiliary respirator. "But I think we just came here to look for dinosaurs. Thanks to the excessively high oxygen content here, Tyrador's giant insects are ridiculously numerous. I heard the Zerg are constantly plundering the genes of other species in the galaxy—they might like it here."
While Raynor was speaking, a bloodsucking insect nearly one foot long flew past in front of them, only to be burned to ash by a Marshal's guard using a Umojan plasma flame gun. It was hard to imagine how the local residents survived on a planet full of poisonous insects and large predators.
"I do not want to see the day when the Zerg break into the Tyrador star system." Augustus said. "Chau Sara's fate proved that the Zerg bring nothing but destruction."
Augustus had recently received another report from the Mar Sara Revolutionary Army. They reported that the Chau Sara Zerg invasion had not been contained. Their forces numbered only a few tens of thousands, clearly outmatched by the massive Zerg Swarm. At present, the Zerg creep had already covered an entire secondary continent and vast oceans, while the Confederacy fleet rushing to assist had remained completely silent.
Those still resisting the Zerg invasion were all the militia and planetary defense forces of Chau Sara. If the Confederacy still did not take firm and decisive action, then no matter how they tried to block the news, it would be useless. Sooner or later, the entire Confederacy would know what had happened in the Sara star system, and when that happened, it would trigger panic among tens of billions of people and destroy trust in the Confederacy government and military.
The Revolutionary Army commander on Mar Sara named the Zerg Swarm invading the Sara star system the Jormungand Brood, because among them were vast numbers of Hydralisks, and these snake-like creatures reminded humans of the great serpent that coiled around the world in Norse mythology.
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