From Titan Corporation to the Empire of Man

November 11, Starship Troopers Universe numbered "15";

The expeditionary fleet that was dispatched to the New Hope Galaxy by the Federation's top brass to wipe out the Human Empire is now in a "precarious" situation.

There were only twelve escort transport ships left, as well as a Paris frigate that was "captured" by chance. The size of the entire fleet was truly "only one tenth of it remained."

Putting aside the Paris class, the firepower of the twelve escort transport ships alone is not enough to support the original goals of the expeditionary fleet.

What's more, the morale of all members of the expeditionary fleet had long been crushed by the Blood Angels' powerful firepower. Captives, escapes, and Zerg attacks had greatly reduced their combat effectiveness. How could they engage in a head-on confrontation?

What's worse is that these thirteen frigates were packed with more than 30,000 mobile infantry, making the already tight supply of materials even more severe.

Against this backdrop, the mobile infantry led by Leon, Maggie and others, in accordance with the "script" provided by the Investigation Department, successfully captured the ship and escaped from the surface of the New Hope Galaxy.

The remaining personnel also formally launched an urgent "escape operation" in an attempt to retain a glimmer of hope and preserve the "spark" for the expedition fleet.

If you use the wormholes throughout the galaxy in the Starship Fleet universe for navigation, its efficiency will be even higher than that of the jump engine.

In fact, it took only about one Earth day for the expedition fleet to depart from Earth 14 and arrive at the New Hope Galaxy.

But Leon, Maggie and the others don't want to easily return the more than 30,000 mobile infantrymen they "tricked" into their hands to the Federal Civil Government.

After all, this is an important "tool" for the Empire to disintegrate the Federation, and it is also the key to reducing casualties among compatriots.

Therefore, on the pretext of "getting rid of the human empire's fleet as soon as possible", they ordered the fleet to directly start the warp engine and head for the nearest frontier colony.

The efficiency of warp travel is indeed much lower than that of wormhole and jump travel.

After half an Earth-month of difficult sailing, the remaining fleet finally broke free from the warp state and arrived at a frontier colony called "Campbell".

This colony is located in the third orbit of the star system. Its size and mass are similar to those of the Earth, and its environmental conditions are much better than those of the desertified New Hope, which greatly comforts the remaining personnel and mobile infantry.

When the fleet entered Campbell's gravitational range, what came into everyone's sight was a habitable planet whose atmosphere reflected a blue light.

Its land is covered with dense forests and open grasslands, and the ocean is clear and green, like a "perfect" natural painting.

After half a month of warp-speed sailing, and with the number of personnel on board the ship already exceeding normal specifications, the necessities of life were almost exhausted.

Under such circumstances, Lyon decisively gave orders, instructing the fleet to immediately enter Campbell's atmosphere and sail to the capital city for anchorage to carry out necessary rest and replenishment.

The ship slowly passed through the atmosphere, and then, accompanied by the roar of the engine, gradually landed at the star port of the capital city.

At this moment, in the bridge of the Paris-class;

Lyon could see the entire capital city and star port through the porthole.

Compared with the desolate scene of New Hope, Campbell does indeed display "incomparable" prosperity.

According to data, Campbell's total population has exceeded two million, more than ten times that of New Hope.

The colony's main economic pillars include providing food supplies to surrounding galaxies and exporting large quantities of civilian electronic products.

This capital city is the core of Campbell and has one-third of the colony's population.

More than a dozen giant buildings soaring into the sky, a developed transportation network, modern infrastructure, as well as merchant ships, cargo ships and luxury cruise ships moored in the star port, present a thriving scene.

However, behind the apparent prosperity, the situation in Campbell was not peaceful.

Smart AI further reported Campbell's management movements to Lyon in secret.

After investigation, it was found that Governor Campbell and his federal officials had long been seriously dissatisfied with the federal top brass.

These officials believe that the Federation is still spending huge amounts of taxes and resources to maintain a large fleet to deal with the so-called "rebels" despite the increasing threat from the Arach Zerg, rather than maintaining peace in the frontier colonies.

This not only caused Campbell's relatively comfortable quality of life to decline rapidly, but also caused the colony's economic structure to stagnate.

Campbell, which was previously self-sufficient and able to make profits by exporting food and electronic products, is now forced to be caught up in the "waves" and loses the opportunity for stable development.

As the federal government fought on multiple fronts and continued to fight numerous rebel forces, Campbell's situation worsened.

From time to time, the Arachi Zerg will use wormholes to launch meteorites containing insect eggs at them, causing low- and medium-scale insect plagues.

Fortunately, Campbell had some savings, so he was able to hire retired infantrymen, organize militias, and deal with insect eggs and adult insects in a timely manner, thus preventing the insect plague from breaking out completely.

Therefore, the intelligent AI pointed out that this dissatisfaction with the Federation was the best entry point for the Empire to instigate Campbell's rebellion.

Campbell's management, especially those officials who only care about Campbell's interests, may be the most easily attracted to the Empire's governance environment, and then there is hope to promote Campbell to become the Empire's strategic stronghold in this star region.

This is also one of the reasons why the smart AI took the initiative to recommend Campbell as a target to Lyon before the fleet fled.

There are cracks and potential opportunities in the political environment here.

at this time;

"Sergeant." A communications officer reported to Lyon:

“Governor Campbell Johnson Hallhold has fully approved our stay here and expressed his willingness to provide us with a ground station and supplies.

At the same time, the other party also invited our command level to go to the Governor's Mansion to hold talks with Campbell's senior management."

"very good."

Hearing this, Leon turned to the communications officer and ordered:

“Using Campbell’s communication base station, continue trying to restore contact with Earth Headquarters.

If communications are restored, immediately submit an application to the headquarters for our temporary stationing here. After all, the defense here is really weak, and as a frontier colony, they need our protection.

It just so happens that we also need to rest here and wait for the opportunity to counterattack."

"Yes, Sergeant."

"Ah."

After giving the order, Leon left the bridge with Ace, preparing to board the Viking to head to the Governor's Mansion.

At present, Leon and Maggie are the supreme commanders of these more than 30,000 mobile infantry.

However, it stands to reason that the Federation should promote their military ranks based on their performance in the expedition, or at least grant them the rank of captain or major, so that they can better manage this remnant army.

However, since the communication had been interrupted by the intelligent AI, the expeditionary fleet was temporarily unable to contact the headquarters, and Leon, Maggie and others were unable to receive formal promotion appointments. However, this did not affect their authority.

In fact, Lyon had already selected more than 2,000 elite troops with non-commissioned officers such as Rico, Tiz and Ace as the core, and formed a reinforced assault battalion equipped with mechanical skeletons and clone individual equipment.

This force not only possesses the most sophisticated weapons and equipment in the expeditionary fleet, but also occupies the Paris-class frigates with the strongest firepower.

More importantly, the intelligent AI has always been secretly assisting Leon, monitoring the situation of each escort transport ship to ensure that it can discover and suppress those non-commissioned officers who attempt to launch another mutiny and seize command in the first time.

Therefore, even without the official appointment from the Federation, Leon and Maggie became the real controllers of the expedition fleet.

And now that he has come to Campbell, Lyon has no intention of leaving.

Because if he obeyed the order from the federal headquarters and immediately returned to Earth 14, the federal high-ranking officials would forcibly sentence him to death by hanging on charges of "disobeying orders" and "inciting mutiny."

Even before entering the military court, he might be assassinated by Honald Thompson's family.

As for Colonel Honard Thompson, who repeatedly made incompetent decisions but still served as the commander of the expeditionary fleet, and his trusted lieutenants, they are still imprisoned in the Paris-class detention cabin.

In fact, if Honard Thompson had made any "mistakes", he would not have been defeated by Leon and Maggie.

Lyon did not intend to execute them immediately. Instead, he planned to hand these people over to the Empire's military court for trial after weakening the Federation's rule over the major colonies, and let the Empire's laws decide their fate.

Currently, Lyon’s top priority is to reach an agreement with Campbell’s senior management to ensure that the remnants of the expeditionary fleet can be stationed here for a long time.

As a strategic location in a frontier galaxy, Campbell is not only rich in resources but also has an extremely advantageous geographical location.

If this place can be brought under the control of the empire, it will greatly weaken the federation's ruling power on the border and provide a new support point for the expansion of the empire.

At the same time, Lyon also knows that if he wants to achieve this goal, he must act carefully.

Although Campbell's top brass are dissatisfied with the Federation, this does not mean that the other party will directly stand on their side.

Therefore, he must show enough patience in the subsequent negotiations.

It is necessary to make Governor Campbell and officials realize the benefits of cooperation, and also to use appropriate force to deter them.

soon.

Leon and Ace led twenty commandos wearing mechanical skeletons and flew away from the hangar of the Paris-class frigate in a Viking landing craft.

During the flight, they hovered for a moment along the northern part of the starport, and then met up with three other Viking landing craft.

These Vikings carried Rico, Tiz, Maggie, and several non-commissioned officers who had a good relationship with Leon and others.

After completing the rendezvous, the four Viking aircraft formed an orderly formation and flew together towards the center of Campbell City, aiming directly at the Governor's Palace building standing outside the bustling neighborhood.

-

Soon after, at the main entrance square of the Governor's Palace;

A middle-aged man in his early forties stood at the front of the officials. He was Campbell's governor, Johnson Hallhold.

Johnson and the local officials beside him looked serious as they cast their eyes towards the approaching Viking landing craft.

The armed security forces of the Governor's Palace appeared to be extremely tense, and cordons were set up around the square.

The armed personnel responsible for the security of the Governor's Palace are mainly composed of locally born police officers and militiamen.

Although these people have never seen a real battlefield, they have all participated in pest control operations. In terms of combat experience against the Arach Zerg, they have much more experience than the federal recruits.

The militiamen are equipped with old-fashioned military equipment and tactical gear, ready to deal with possible emergencies.

Compared with the equipment and weapons of police stations on Earth, the police officers appear to be even more backward, and are almost the same as the American police in the main universe at the end of the 20th century.

Even so, the militia, police officers, special police, and mercenaries hired by the Governor's Office still repelled several invasions of the Arach Zerg.

As the engine sounds of the landing craft became clearer, almost everyone in the square held their breath, waiting for the arrival of the "seniors" of the expeditionary fleet.

The four Vikings released their landing gear and, under the control of the pilots, parked not far in front of Johnson and others.

As the landing craft landed, a strong gust of wind rose up, ruffling the hairstyles of Johnson and others, forcing them to involuntarily close their eyes slightly to avoid the wind and sand blowing in their faces.

Wait until the engine is turned off.

When the hatch opened, they saw Leon, Maggie and others wearing Federation Army uniforms, as well as dozens of commandos equipped with clone equipment.

NCO??

Seeing the scene before them, Campbell's senior executives, including Johnson, showed confusion on their faces.

Especially when they found out that the people who came were actually a group of non-commissioned officers, Johnson felt even more indignant and dissatisfied.

Even though Campbell is not as big as the near-earth colonies and has a small population, and is not even ranked among the top in the entire federation, they are still the top leaders of the entire colony. And the expedition fleet only sent non-commissioned officers to negotiate with them?

We have already lost the battle, are you still looking down on others? !

Johnson suddenly looked angry, thinking that he and his colleagues were being looked down upon.

"Governor, look at the equipment of those mobile infantrymen! They seem to be much more advanced than the elite troops on Earth!"

However, following the reminder of the secretary beside him, Johnson also focused his attention on the commandos.

Although he was not aware of the development of the Federation's latest equipment, and was unaware of the existence of the mobile infantry power armor and predator mecha projects, the commando's fully enclosed combat uniform and mechanical skeleton immediately aroused his vigilance.

The equipment of these commandos was obviously far superior to any federal army he had ever seen.

While Johnson was still looking at him, Lyon took the lead and stepped forward, took the initiative to stretch out his right hand, and said with a smile:

"Sergeant Leon Kennedy, it is an honor to be received by Governor Hallhold."

Although he still had doubts and dissatisfaction in his heart, Johnson still maintained diplomatic etiquette, suppressed his emotions, smiled and stretched out his hand to shake hands with Lyon:

"It is an honor for us at Campbell to host you."

When the two men let go of each other's hands, Johnson immediately asked:

"Sergeant Kennedy, who is your commander?"

When Leon heard this, he smiled helplessly and explained:

"The situation is rather special and it's a long story. Currently, the remnants of the expeditionary force are under the command of me and several non-commissioned officers. Let's go in and discuss the specific situation in detail."