The Trade Route is an exohuman two-part paved artery linking the twilight settlements of the Asari Region to the ice-bound outpost of Firetown on VOI 700 D’s Dark Side. It consists of two sections: The Asari- Section which connects New Kourou, Hope and Morningstar and the Ralar-Section that connects New Kourou and Firetown.
First laid in the early Beta Age by the Free State of Settlers, the road was engineered largely by penal-labor work crews sentenced to infrastructure duty. Financed in part by private investors such as the New Kourou Trade Guild, the Trade Route quickly became — and remains — an indispensable pillar of Exohuman commerce. Caravans, courier convoys, and Federal supply trains still roll over its stones in the Gamma Age, stitching together the planet’s most populous zones.
Its economic value also makes it a magnet for trouble. In the Gamma Age, the Trade Route is one of the prime targets for ambushes and raids by Outlaw bands — most notoriously the Jane Mendoza Gang — who strike for loot, hostages, or sheer disruption before vanishing into the Dark Side wastes.