When Dominic hurriedly retraced his steps back to the bridge, his bootfalls echoing across the metal decking carried a subtle, urgent tempo.
The silver-crimson shimmer in the shadows and that cryptic warning had acted like a needle pricking his tightly strung nerves, leaving zero room for complacency or a reliance on blind luck.
"Karen," he commanded in a deep register the absolute second he crossed the threshold into the command deck, his aura—which had temporarily softened following the destruction of the enemy flagship—hardening back into cold iron.
"Mobilize a detachment of Naval Armsmen immediately. Deploy them to the lower decks to conduct a comprehensive sweep of the habitations."
The first officer, who was actively compiling the battle damage assessments, snapped his head up. The residual joy of their grand victory still lingered on his features, but it dissolved instantly upon hearing the mandate:
"Sir? The civilian enclaves on the lower decks are a sector we rarely interfere with outside of routine patrols. Right now, the void theater is at a critical tactical juncture; to suddenly reassign military personnel..."
He left the sentence hanging, but his implication was entirely transparent.
The civilian quarters across the lower decks had always been the grey zones of Imperial warships—filthy, chaotic, and heavily congested with mixed demographics. Conducting an investigation there was bound to be an operational nightmare.
"Execute the order," Dominic replied without offering an explanation, taking his seat with a tone that barred any room for negotiation.
"Pull up the surveillance feeds and vox-link telemetry from every single compartment down there. I want a total operational overview of the sector immediately."
"Understood, sir!" Karen pressed no further, pivoting instantly to cascade the directives.
The prime obligation of an Imperial soldier was etched deep within his bones; regardless of his internal bewilderment, the order had to be executed to the letter.
Barely three minutes following the issuance of the command, the intelligence officer at the vox-station suddenly paled.
"Major General, sir!" he blurted out, rising rapidly from his seat with a trace of irrepressible panic leaking into his voice.
"All surveillance feeds from Habitation Zone H4 have completely dropped offline. The localized communication terminals are entirely non-responsive, and we have completely lost contact with the patrol detail assigned to the sector!"
"How long ago?" Dominic walked over to the intelligence console, his gaze locking onto the snow-blizzard static filling the displays as his brow furrowed into tight knots.
"Based on the last recorded data packet, the telemetry severed approximately seven minutes ago," the intelligence officer reported, his fingers dancing across the terminal keys.
This happened to match the exact timestamp of the enemy flagship's detonation. The automated diagnostics had initially flagged it as a circuit failure induced by the explosion's shockwave, so nobody had given it a second thought...
Dominic's heart plunged.
Seven minutes ago—the precise microsecond the Pale Rose had disintegrated within the holy fire.
Solin was entirely correct.
The adversary had never turned to ash alongside their flagship. Instead, utilizing the cover of the detonation, they had leveraged unknown means to directly infiltrate the interior of the Gemstone. Furthermore, they had selected an exceptionally clever insertion point: Habitation Zone H4 on the lower decks.
Dominic discharged a heavy sigh.
This was the perennial vulnerability plaguing all massive Imperial vessels.
A capital battleship like the Gemstone, which had been in active service for over a millennium, was never merely a singular military asset. Across its roster of millions, there were regular soldiers, Tech-Priests, engineers, and Ecclesiarchy clergy.
And naturally, there were the civilian populations that had drifted alongside the fleet for generation after generation.
Among these populations, a portion comprised military dependents who were born and raised aboard the vessel, ultimately inheriting their parents' functional roles to serve the same hull for lifetimes—acting as a vital auxiliary pool for the crew roster.
Yet a far greater proportion consisted of the orphans of fallen soldiers, displaced drifters, the descendants of forgotten penal laborers, and void-scavengers who had boarded the vessel across various declining star systems.
They crowded into the dampest, darkest recesses of the lower decks, scraping by on waste reclamation and odd jobs. They existed like moss clinging to the structural framework of the warship—impossible to shake off, and impossible to thoroughly purge.
Out of humanitarian considerations, and to preserve the morale of the lower-ranking crewmen, the Departmento Munitorum tacitly permitted their presence, merely deploying sparse patrols to maintain baseline order without ever implementing deep administrative control.
And such loosely managed, heavily congested, and spiritually destitute sectors...
Comprised the ultimate breeding grounds for Chaos cults and Genestealer cults alike.
All it required was a single plague-bearing zealot and an obscured sacrificial rite, and within half a day, the entire lower deck could be transformed into a playground for the Grandfather.
"Transmit my directive," Dominic's voice was utterly detached.
"The Thirteenth Armsmen Company is to deploy with live ordnance immediately. Seal every single entry and exit vector for Zone H4. No one is permitted to cross the perimeter."
"Notify the attached Chaplaincy corps; detach a company of Battle-Brethren equipped with holy relics to accompany the deployment."
"Instruct the Tech-Priests to prepare purification assets and stand by for immediate deployment."
"Inform the commanding Armsman Captain: ascertain the situation within the perimeter and report back at the absolute first availability."
"If localized Chaos corruption is verified, he is authorized to implement terminal containment protocols on-site. No further clearance required."
"Understood, sir!"
Down within the seventh sector of the lower decks, the air was thick with a foul combination of mildew and low-grade tobacco smoke.
Yet considering the Gemstone had passed into the ownership of the wealthy Ventria line centuries prior, the environmental parameters here were still significantly superior to those found within the underhives of a hive world.
When Captain Kael arrived before the main blast valve of Zone H4 at the head of three hundred armsmen, his instinctive reaction was to knit his brow.
Something was deeply wrong.
The thick, blast-resistant alloy valve, which should have gleamed with a cold, silver-grey metallic sheen, looked as though it had been submerged in stagnant, corrosive fluids for centuries. Its surface was blanketed in a loose, dark-brown layer of oxidation, and grey-green fungal mold was actively spreading outward along the seams of the seal.
Even the surrounding bulkhead walls had been eaten away into pitted craters, looking as though they had been bathed in potent acid.
An indescribable, putrid stench leaked through the seams, laced with the copper tang of fresh blood. A single inhalation was enough to make one's stomach churn violently. Even with the filtering arrays of their carapace armor operating at maximum capacity, it proved impossible to completely block out that invasive, unnatural odor.
"Captain, this..." The lieutenant beside him masked his respirator with a hand, his eyes wide with shock. "How did it oxidize to this degree?"
Kael offered no verbal reply. Instead, he pressed a diagnostic scanner against the exterior wall of the valve.
The rapid breakdown of the metal was actively generating thermal energy, indicating that the corrosive reaction was progressing at a frantic velocity that completely defied conventional physical principles.
Decades of military service and countless operations purging heretical cells told him that what lay beyond this portal was absolutely not a simple outbreak of disease.
Someone was executing a ritual inside.
Only a malevolent warp rite could corrode a reinforced blast valve into this grotesque state within such an incredibly truncated timeframe.
"Report to the bridge immediately," Kael ordered, stepping back and signaling his men to fan out into a tactical perimeter.
"Large-scale corruption and contamination confirmed within Zone H4. A suspected warp ritual is actively underway. Requesting immediate deployment of heavy ordnance and purification assets for support."
"All units, cycle bolts and chamber live rounds. Set power armor filtration arrays to maximum output."
He tightened his grip on his chainsword, the expression beneath his targeting visor hardening into iron determination.
"Prepare to breach."
"Sir!"
The armsmen racked their bolts in unison, the metallic snaps of the firing mechanisms echoing clearly through the corridor. Their weapons locked onto the corroded valve, waiting only for their captain's command to unleash the Emperor's judgment.
From behind the door, a muffled, slurred chanting began to register.
It was low, turbid, resembling the prayers of countless souls forced up from the absolute depths of their throats, carrying a cadence that made one's skin crawl even through the thick metal structure of the bulkhead.
Kael knew with absolute certainty that their window of opportunity was evaporating.
Once that ritual reached completion, throne alone knew what monstrosity would claw its way into reality.