White Scars jetbikes sliced the air; the engines' high-pitched sound rang repeatedly through the city's ruins.
Datch led a small White Scars unit across an elevated bridge destroyed by bombardment.
More than half the bridge-girder had collapsed; exposed rebar protruded from the cracks.
Shockwaves from explosions in the distance continued to blow away rust and gravel.
Their mission was to infiltrate deep into the battlefield, find remnant units lost in the chaos, and guide them to the Eternity Wall spaceport under Imperial control.
Datch remembered part of the story concerning the Eternity Wall spaceport.
After the fall of Lion's Gate spaceport, Imperial military strength was insufficient to hold every defence line.
Rogal Dorn had planned to abandon the Eternity Wall port.
In order to maximise benefit, he intended to use the Saturnine Wall to set a trap and kill traitor elite units.
To make this performance more convincing, Dorn dispatched soldiers and several high officers to the spaceport.
They were instructed to pretend they would fight to the death to defend the spaceport no matter what.
As a result, the Eternity Wall port fell. Abaddon, leading elite units of the Sons of Horus and Emperor's Children, launched a fierce attack against the Saturnine Wall, yet was completely annihilated by the ambushing traitor—no, by Dorn.
Fulgrim himself was forced to transform into a daemon in order to escape that battle.
The Sons of Horus lost most of their elite veteran soldiers; that led to the Legion's terminal collapse.
Datch could not prevent the fall of the Eternity Wall spaceport.
The final battle between the Emperor and Horus is the most important objective in the story.
If too many important points are changed hastily, it will deviate from the core plot of the story.
The only thing we can do is evacuate as many people as possible safely after the spaceport falls.
The jet-engine motorcycles descended and passed through lowlands covered in acid fog.
Datch and his party were heading toward the palace's north-eastern corner.
It had once been a gigantic city; now it had been reduced to ruins by fierce bombardment.
Flames and shaking generated by explosions spread through the entire city; the ground constantly trembled.
Stone, granite, and iron shattered to pieces; buildings were easily torn like petals in a storm.
Because this city has a vast area and complex terrain, loyalist remnants can continue combat here and use ruins and tunnels to carry out harassment and blocking operations.
To sweep the remnants, the Iron Warriors brought large siege engines and bombardment devices to the city's edge.
Gigantic shells poured onto the city centre and indiscriminately bombarded every building where loyalist soldiers might be lurking.
Both sides waged fierce urban combat over the ruins day after day.
The streets around here are deserted. Residents who did not evacuate lost their lives in the bombardment that was still continuing.
Abandoned civilian vehicles were scattered haphazardly in the middle of the road.
Some car doors remained open, covered in ash-white ash.
The sky was covered in yellow acid fog. It was miasma formed when poison-gas bombs the Death Guard continuously released at the city's edge mixed with the atmosphere.
Even through the power armour's breathing filter, a faint, sweet, rotting smell drifted.
White ash fell like snow, telling that the city had been blazing.
Wherever one looked, traces of war caught the eye. Walls riddled with bullet marks, bodies hanging from streetlamps, military vehicles overturned and burning at street corners.
Various messages were left on walls and doors; they were all left by refugees for missing family members.
Pitiful people cling to the hope that their families will see the news and reunite with them.
Unfortunately, these messages are destined to receive no reply.
Suddenly fierce gunfire rang from ahead.
The sharp scream of lasguns mixed with the roars of beastmen.
"Go and look," Datch ordered through the comm-line.
The jetbike unit immediately changed course and rushed toward the direction of the sound.
These jet-engine bikes are specially modified so that engine sound can be kept extremely quiet.
Mingling with the ash-white acid fog, the motorcycle unit moved silently like ghosts and soon arrived at the scene of the firefight.
...
"Your Majesty, the current situation is truly miserable."
Veteran Ollanius Piers took up a lasgun and, while firing toward distant enemies, grumbled.
He had been evacuated from Lion's Gate spaceport. No evacuation order had been issued, yet because everyone around him fled, he fled as well.
After Lion's Gate spaceport collapsed, the spaceport's communications network also paralysed.
Smoke and toxic gas covered the sky; distinguishing direction was impossible.
He nearly plunged into enemy positions several times.
Having no other choice, he could only join the other remaining soldiers, form an improvised team, and wander the ruined city covered in acid fog and ash.
They changed hiding places one after another.
They had not betrayed the Emperor; in the Emperor's name they continued fighting those small enemy groups.
While gathering supplies, they encountered a group of traitors.
They wore rags; beastmen were mixed among them. Eight-pointed-star emblems were carved on all their weapons; they were immediately identifiable as traitors.
The instant both sides encountered each other, they opened fire at once.
Piers had several veterans evacuated from Lion's Gate spaceport. They were good shots and experienced.
At first they joined forces and thoroughly beat the traitors; the traitors could not even show their faces.
However, the appearance of a World Eater wearing bone-white power armour and a cloak of human skin changed the situation.
The World Eater leapt from the dust-cloud behind the traitors at astonishing speed.
Before everyone's eyes, he smashed through the load-bearing wall blocking the road and instantly chopped several militiamen to pieces with a chainsword.
Even a veteran like Piers would lose courage seeing a World Eater.
During the combat at Lion's Gate spaceport, the shadows these berserkers created were terrible for ordinary people.
Many comrades who fought together lost their lives to World Eaters' chainswords; severed limbs flew in all directions as if at a slaughterhouse.
When the World Eater charged toward him, Piers pulled the lasgun's trigger again and again.
His marksmanship was excellent; every shot accurately struck the target.
However, those whistling lasers left only scorch marks on the other party's power armour.
When the enemy charged toward him, accompanied by a stinking gust, Piers floated an expression of despair and prepared for death.
At that time, a figure wearing a white power suit with a crimson lightning emblem embedded in the shoulder armour leapt from the air, holding a longsword covered in bright electric light.
When Datch's powered longsword came down vertically, the electric arcs wrapped around the blade sliced the air and released a burnt smell.
The World Eater had no choice but to abandon the attack on Piers; he hurriedly raised the chainsword to receive the attack.
When the two weapons collided, the collapsing force field and the chainsword's blade scraped violently; sparks flew.
Due to that tremendous force, the World Eater's knees suddenly bent, and he was forced into a kneeling posture.
As a result, the concrete below the knees cracked and spread like a spiderweb.
Datch gave the other party no time to breathe; he lightly flicked his wrist,
used the momentum of the collision to slide the longsword along the back of the World Eater's chainsword so that the blade bypassed the lower edge of the helm.
While rotating, he slashed horizontally; bright electric light accurately cut into the seal-ring of the other party's neck and beheaded the roaring World Eater.
The headless corpse knelt on the ground, spat vivid red blood, collapsed with a thud, and did not move again.
The other White Scars members did not remain silent either. They immediately took up boltguns and opened fire on the traitors.
The instant a human body is struck directly by an explosive bolt, it is blown to pieces.
Parts and fragments of bloody remains scattered across the floor of the ruins; severed limbs mixed with rubble, ash, and fragments of load-bearing walls.
Piers stood dumbfounded for a while, then realised he was still alive.
Datch sheathed the longsword and walked toward the other man.
Piers instinctively stepped half a pace back, then bowed awkwardly.
"My lords."
"From now on you are under my command." Datch wasted no further words.
The remaining soldiers did not have the courage to object. They well understood that the only hope of surviving and escaping these ruins was to rely on these angels of the Emperor.
After adding Piers and the other survivors to his comrades, Datch set out again.
The instant they left, several shells struck that place and blew the surrounding buildings away without a trace.
Piers and the others were relieved to see this. If they had departed a little later, they would have been caught in the flames and lost their lives.
Datch led the team along an old transport route through the ruins.
White Scars veterans used the sensor arrays mounted on the jetbikes to probe the route ahead; Datch waited at the rear so that if an ambush occurred, he could immediately provide fire support from the back of the column.
Along the way, they encountered a remnant unit led by Camba Diaz of the Imperial Fists.
Datch added Diaz to the team; the Imperial Fists did not object and silently followed orders.
As the unit advanced, remnant soldiers were gathered one after another.
After Lion's Gate spaceport fell, far too many units had been scattered.
Driven by loyalty to the Emperor, they endured hunger and continued fighting in the ruins.
Datch and the others did not need to work that hard to add them all to the team.
Just as they were about to leave the city's ruins, a fire broke out in the north-eastern direction.
The firewall stretched more than thirty kilometres and was higher than the city walls.
Even from this distance, the heat wave struck us.
The traitors, sick of harassment from loyalists, chose the most thorough scorched-earth operation.
Standing on high ground using binoculars, Datch and his team saw survivors trying to flee from the flames.
However, the fire spread in an instant and swallowed many people.
Realising there was no escape, the veterans raised the Imperium's double-headed eagle banner before the vortex of flame and faced death with unshakable resolve.
This sight was extremely painful for the survivors.
Far too many people have died in this war.
The team led by Datch continued to advance and finally reached the outer perimeter of the Eternity Wall spaceport.
At present, construction work is proceeding in earnest in the suburbs of the Eternity spaceport.
Loyalist units, Solar Auxilia, militia, and other units were all mixed together.
They used recovered reinforced terrazzo plates and granite fragments to construct new temporary turrets, filled cracks in the parapets with quick-drying cement, and dug tank-ditches and anti-armour ditches with bulldozers.
Wooden stakes were driven into extensive barbed wire; on them metal-nail fragments were deliberately scattered to hinder the enemy's advance.
After confirming Datch and his party's identities, the Imperial forces behind the bunker let them through.
Realising they were temporarily safe, many in the group leaked uncontrollable sobs.
They had all thought it impossible to escape those ruins alive; who would have imagined they could reach the Eternity Wall spaceport alive?
A chronicler named Harry wrote down everything that happened.
"All that is left to us is history."
When people asked Harry why he did such a thing, he answered that.
Datch ignored the NPCs' inner thoughts and went directly to report to Shiban Khan, garrisoned at the spaceport.
We obtained defence briefing materials concerning the Eternity Wall spaceport from the other side.
At present, overall command is held by High Primary Niborran.
He was supported by Shiban Khan and several high officers of the Imperial Fists.
Shiban was responsible for coordinating mobile defence and White Scars units' harassment operations in the surrounding regions; meanwhile, the Imperial Fists were responsible for constructing the spaceport's main fortress and guarding the core defence line.
Datch was assigned to an outpost to monitor enemy movement toward the city ruins.
Piers and the other survivors were also assigned to his provisional combat order.
The reason they were transferred is simple: he brought them back, so he should continue to be responsible.
The current command centre has lost the capacity to process any more business.
The enemy gave the defenders almost no time to prepare.
On 22 May the rebel main force began an attack from the west targeting the Sunbridge.
The bridge spanning that gigantic fissure was the shortest route for ground troops to attack the spaceport.
Alarms rang; then a rain of shells poured onto the bridge-girder and its piers.
Ceramite-steel protection panels peeled away layer by layer; from the structural frame deep inside the bridge, a dull, ear-splitting roar rang with every explosion.
After the bombardment suppressed the ground, World Eaters appeared together with daemons and launched attacks on the Imperial Fists and White Scars defending the Sunbridge.
The former's numbers were more than ten times the latter's; the bombardment used to burn them never ran out.
The loyalists were brave and did not take a single step back, yet the result did not change.
The Sunbridge fell in an instant and was occupied by the enemy.
Diaz himself commanded the withdrawal at the last moment and detonated explosives planted in advance at the structurally weakest part of the bridge.
The bridge was blown from the centre; gigantic terrazzo fragments and broken piers fell into the fissure; that dull reverberation rang for a long time.
They thought that if they destroyed the bridge, they could stop the enemy's advance.
However, the Dark Mechanicum replaced the broken structure with blasphemous reinforced metal and used a daemon-possessed metal framework as a temporary bridge.
The destroyed bridge was repaired in less than a day.
The enemy poured into the spaceport through the repaired Sunbridge.
After two days of fierce urban combat, they seized the main eastern road.
Imperial defence units were forced to withdraw to near the inner bailey, and there barely succeeded in stopping the enemy's advance using overwhelming firepower.
"It's over." Piers stood beside the trench observation window looking outside.
The sight outside the window was utterly hopeless.
Daemons and World Eaters roared without cease and launched attacks on Imperial fortresses and strongpoints.
Gigantic battering rams crushed everything in their path, slammed into thick walls, and destroyed every obstacle with overwhelming force.
"Don't say such discouraging things," the narrator Harry said. "There is still a chance to win."
"This is just self-deception," the veteran said mockingly. "Stopping the enemy is utterly impossible. There are too many enemies. The enemy's angels are dying. I saw it with these eyes."
"Quiet." Datch cut off the humans' discussion and prevented them from falling into a still more pessimistic state.
"Everyone dies. That is unavoidable. But how one dies can be chosen. And those traitors will not win. In the end they will surely be held responsible."
Datch's words silenced the trench.
Everyone fell silent and anxiously awaited their own fate.
Harry seized the opportunity and asked each soldier in the trench their name.
"What do you want to do?" Piers asked the young man.
"I want to record your stories. Heroes must not be forgotten."
Harry raised his face. The young face was covered in sweat and ash, yet the eyes shone; the tone had not a shred of hypocrisy and was sincere.
"The heroes all died on the front line." A veteran who had lost one arm said in a mocking tone. "We're just cowards clinging on like stray dogs."
"…"
Datch ignored these ordinary NPCs. Their speaking was a means of releasing stress so long as they did not voice excessively pessimistic topics.
Datch looked across the trench and discovered something unexpected.
Right nearby was the leader of the Sisters of Silence, Jenetia Krole.
For most people, the existence of Krole is as good as non-existent.
She wore special transparent armour; combined with her innate quiet, nun-like nature, she could vanish on the battlefield.
Krole noticed Datch's gaze and nodded to him.
As Knight-Commander of the Sisters of Silence, Krole had also attended the conference concerning the fate of the Eternity Wall spaceport.
I personally overheard the conversation of Rogal Dorn, Valdor, Malcador, and others.
She knew Dorn intended to abandon the Eternity Wall airfield and use it as bait for a trap, and that the soldiers garrisoned there were all disposable pieces.
Yet she still came. Only to stop daemons and buy time.
When Krole was about to leave, Datch made a placard written "Good luck."
Krole was surprised. She had never imagined a White Scar would understand the Sisters of Silence's sign language.
However, she immediately returned the greeting.
"Good luck."
...
When the alarm rang again, World Eaters and Iron Warriors began a full-scale attack on the Eternity Wall spaceport.
Countless soldiers and beastmen poured onto the battlefield and consumed the defenders' ammunition and strength with overwhelming numbers.
Gigantic siege engines reinforced again and again by the Iron Warriors were pushed to the front line to bombard the fortress's soaring outer walls. Most terrible of all was that Angron joined the war.
The gigantic ascended daemon-body burned with hellfire and incinerated everything in its path.
Heavy armoured vehicles that tried to block the Primarch's advance were easily destroyed by the gigantic sword in the other party's hand.
No warrior can withstand Angron's advance; if a hero tries, he will be torn apart in an instant.
The spaceport's last high wall collapsed under ceaseless bombardment; the spaceport became completely defenceless; countless enemy forces poured toward the Imperium's last defence line.
"Now everyone evacuate to the drop-site," Datch ordered Piers and the others. "There is another evacuation route over there."
"We can't run." Despair seeped into Piers's voice.
"I will hold Angron and the World Eaters. One who challenges the Blood God's servants to a duel must be answered. Otherwise they will lose the god's favour," Datch said and activated the power sword.
The force-field generator attached to the hilt growled into operation; bright electric arcs ran from the blade's root to the tip and covered the sword's entire length.
Then Datch summoned the Infinity Gauntlet.
As the four Chaos Gods invade the palace, Datch's player privileges are gradually released.
When the final battle between Horus and the Emperor breaks out, all privileges will be completely stripped.
Then he will be able to lead the Emperor of the new timeline and numerous Primarchs to destroy this anchor point and reconstruct the timeline.
At this stage, the power of the Infinity Stones cannot be used.
However, the amplification effect brought by the Infinity Gauntlet is sufficient to raise his speed and muscular strength to a new level and enable him to fight a Primarch.
"Now go quickly." Saying that, Datch turned and walked toward the World Eaters, roaring and charging toward him.
Piers and the others hesitated to leave the spot, yet followed orders and withdrew to the drop-site.
Datch walked to a high place and looked down on the swarming World Eaters.
They drooled without cease and screamed hysterically like a horde of mindless zombies.
Datch gripped the sword with both hands and entered a combat stance.
The next instant he tilted his head and looked in another direction.
"Lady Krole should go as well."
Krole was standing not even ten metres from Datch. Because she wore cloak-like armour, she could hide even amid blazing flames.
Krole showed surprise, then pointed at Datch and signed, "My mission is to remain here and fight together with you."
Datch said, "Get out of here. Losing your life here is meaningless."
"I do not understand what you are saying. If it is meaningless, why do you not leave?"
At Krole's sign language, Datch involuntarily smiled and commented that this NPC is truly interesting.
"I am different from you. Death has no meaning for me. Death is once, parting is once, Lady Krole."
Krole furrowed her brows, found White Scar suspicious, and suspected some secret was hidden.
If the other party remains here, how can there be a next time?
"Get going already," Datch said again. "I remain here because I rose from death. But you cannot."
"There is no need to waste your life here. There are many more important places that need your talent."
Seeing Datch's strong insistence, Krole nodded and was about to leave.
Alone, Datch turned his eyes toward the pack of World Eaters drooling and roaring as they charged toward him. He gripped the sword with both hands and entered a combat stance.
Rejoice, fools.
The fall of the Eternity Wall spaceport will only hasten your doom.
When the rebels breach the last wall and are one step from final victory, true despair will arrive.
This applies not only to you but also to the gods behind you who use you as pieces and push you to the front line.
The first World Eater to charge raised a chainsword and slashed at Datch's left neck; Datch received it while holding the sword horizontally with one hand and then brought the sword down horizontally just as he was.
Dazzling electric light punched through the World Eater's neck-seal and cut off that head. The bone-white helm spun several times in the air, then rolled into a deep crater in the ruins.
Then a second World Eater charged from the flank, intending to exploit the gap before Datch withdrew the sword and launched a horizontal slash.
Datch used the momentum of the horizontal slash to reverse his body, changed stance, and grazed the chainsword against the edge of the breastplate.
The longsword gripped in his hand slashed the inside of the other party's pauldron and pierced the heart.
The third man tried to unbalance Datch with his shoulder; at that instant Datch seized the man's arm and stabbed the joint of the abdominal armour.
Through the power of the Infinity Gauntlet, Datch's combat power improved dramatically.
Unfortunately, we still cannot use the Infinity Stones.
Otherwise, he should have been able to finish all these traitors alone.
If he opened a spatial passage leading to a black hole, he could send all these traitors there and put them to work.
Datch fought alone and defeated World Eaters one after another; not one was his match.
At that time Khârn, driven by inexhaustible anger, appeared.
This one, favoured by the Blood God, immediately launched a leaping attack.
Datch evaded sideways so the war-axe missed its target, slammed into the ceramite floor, and produced a crack fifty centimetres deep.
Khârn brought the axe down horizontally; Datch evaded it. Then, using that momentum, Khârn brought the axe down diagonally from below to above and forced the other party half a step back.
In the mere instant of sheathing the sword, Datch struck again with his shoulder, made Khârn stagger two steps, then thrust the longsword into Khârn's chest and pitifully tore out the heart.
However, Datch had no time to deliver the final blow.
Angron fell from the sky and slammed into the place where Datch was like a meteor.
That terrible force carved a deep crater in the ground and produced countless cracks.
"We meet again, Angron," Datch said in a calm tone.
"Uoooo…" Angron roared.
Deep in the brass realm of Chaos, the Blood God saw the nameless one through Angron's eyes and raised a roar of anger.
"Kill him. Completely kill this accursed Nameless One."
Driven by the Blood God's will, Angron raised the gigantic sword and charged toward Datch. Every time he took a step, the ground trembled.
Datch charged without fear, longsword in hand.
In the last duel with Angron, he played a human.
This time he plays as an Astartes; game restrictions are relaxed, so he can use items such as the Infinity Gauntlet that improve ability yet are not too strong.
Today we slay Angron and first quell the Blood God's arrogance.