TL/N: Sorry for not uploading yesterday, guys. I had a virus, but don't worry I'll post yesterday's chapters along with today's chapters,
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At the exact same time, Sector Five, Outer Perimeter of Kent Hive.
Two moons, one crimson and one stark white, illuminated the sky above Aurelian IV as a light drizzle began to fall.
A Rhino armored personnel carrier idled before the blast doors, its engine emitting a low growl.
The vehicle's livery was unusual. Its base coat was a drab, dark grey, but the snarling maw insignia of the World Eaters had been roughly spray-painted onto its hull.
The side hatch slid open.
Paul was the first to drop to the ground. His Mark VI Corvus pattern power armor, bearing prominent World Eater markings, gleamed coldly in the rain.
He glanced back inside the vehicle. "Final gear check, everyone."
Inside the troop compartment, seven Astartes were making their final preparations.
Tax Bro was recalibrating his bolter's trajectory, the bright yellow ceramite of the Imperial Fists still eye-catching even in the dim light.
White Scars was inspecting the disruption field generator of his power tulwar, the jagged red lightning bolt patterns on his white armor looking like genuine thunderbolts.
G Bro's deep blue Ultramarines armor was utterly immaculate.
Have You Been Loyal Today? bore the ferocious Luna Wolves insignia on his pale grey Sons of Horus warplate.
The wolf's head emblem on Don't Ask Me My Orky Senses Tell Me It'll Work's Space Wolves armor seemed to be growling low in the shadows.
Execute Old Man the War Criminal's matte-black Raven Guard armor almost entirely blended into the darkness.
Hidden beneath the grey-blue of Tau Buddy You're Right's Alpha Legion plate were the primer coats of seventeen other Legions.
"Comms channel encryption complete." Schrödinger Bro's voice crackled through Paul's power armor vox-bead. He had remained behind at the Governor's Palace to provide remote command. "According to the timetable, you have a five-day handover window. The Iron Hands fleet will completely withdraw from the Aurelian System in twenty-four hours. The Blood Angels fleet will need at least five days to fully deploy their garrisons and establish a comprehensive orbital surveillance network. These five days are a blind spot for orbital monitoring. Take as much as you can within this timeframe. Don't overextend yourselves—Sanguinius's forces are still incredibly formidable."
Paul nodded and looked at the seven men. "Did you all hear that clearly?"
"Loud and clear!" the seven chorused.
Their voices, booming through their armor's external vox-casters, rumbled like deep thunder.
"Route of action." Paul pulled up a holographic map, tracing a path marked in red. "First stop: Sycamore Hive. Distance: one thousand two hundred kilometers. Six hours out at maximum speed for the Rhino. It's the Hysman Merchant Guild's fourth-largest warehouse district. It holds at least thirty million tons of raw promethium ore, five million tons of refined plasteel, and... a batch of heavy self-propelled artillery components smuggled out of Ryza."
Tax Bro let out a low whistle. "Heavy self-propelled artillery? Now that's the good stuff!"
"Which is why it's our primary target," Paul said, shutting down the map. "Remember, our objective isn't occupation, and it isn't killing—unless they get in our way. The goal is supplies. Every piece of industrial resource, raw mineral, and heavy machinery we can haul away. Anything we can't take, log the coordinates. We'll come back for it later when we have the strength and our own transport fleet."
"What if we encounter resistance?" White Scars asked.
"The probability of encountering Astartes-level resistance is practically zero," Paul stated confidently. "The elite forces of the four major factions suffered catastrophic losses during the final battle against the daemon. What's left of the PDF and local enforcers... wouldn't even be enough to warm up just one of you." He paused for a moment. "But if you do encounter an unexpectedly powerful enemy," Paul's eyes flashed coldly, "lethal force is authorized. However, you must camouflage it using the combat doctrines and stylistic quirks of your respective Legions. Understood?"
"Understood!"
"Finally," Paul said, turning to Tau Buddy You're Right. "Are the 'notices' ready?"
Tau Buddy You're Right nodded and retrieved a stack of metal plates from his storage compartment.
Each plate was roughly thirty centimeters square, its surface deeply etched in High Gothic:
[This material has been requisitioned by the Imperial Legions for the Great Crusade.]
[For inquiries, please contact the Departmento Munitorum, Bureau of Logistics, Archive Classification: ALPHA-976-M30-007.]
[Glory to the Emperor.]
A perfectly forged Departmento Munitorum official seal was stamped at the bottom.
The tech-priests of Crimson Machina had spent three days meticulously studying authentic records to replicate it flawlessly.
"Slap one of these on the main gate of every warehouse we hit," Paul instructed. "Put it somewhere painfully obvious and weld it down with melta-rivets. Make sure they can't easily tear it down."
Execute Old Man the War Criminal snickered, trying to stifle his laughter. "When the four major factions see these, they're going to lose their damn minds."
"That is exactly the effect we're going for," Paul said, grabbing the handle of the Rhino's side hatch. "Mount up. We're moving out."
The eight Astartes piled into the Rhino.
The hatch slammed shut, and the engine roared to life.
The personnel carrier shot out of the blast doors, plunging headlong into the rainy night.
The exhaust fumes spewing from its rear vents left a brief white trail in the rain before quickly dissipating.
–
Far away, on the top floor of the Governor's Palace.
Schrödinger Bro stood before the grand window, watching the vehicle vanish into the pitch-black night.
Five days.
"It's all on you now." Schrödinger Bro muttered softly.
Meanwhile, Inside the Rhino.
Paul sat with his eyes closed, resting. The others sat in silence, lost in their own thoughts.
"Hey, Paul," Tax Bro suddenly broke the silence. "Once this op is done, does that mean we can start building our first transport fleet?"
"Depends on the haul," Paul replied without opening his eyes. "If we really manage to drag back three hundred and twenty million tons of ore... forget a basic light transport fleet. We'd have enough to buy two Lunar-class cruisers."
A wave of suppressed, excited cheers echoed inside the compartment.
"But before we get to that..." Paul opened his eyes, his dark golden irises glowing fiercely in the gloom. "...we have to stay alive and actually pull this off."
The Rhino tore across the desolate wasteland.
The rain beat down harder.
Ahead, the jagged silhouette of Sycamore Hive slowly materialized on the horizon.
"Everyone, prepare to log off and rest," Paul's voice rang out through the vehicle's internal vox. "We'll arrive at the target zone in fifteen minutes. Once there, we hold position until the Iron Hands Legion has completely withdrawn before making our move. As per the plan: Tax Bro, White Scars, G Bro, and Have You Been Loyal Today?, you'll take the left flank and breach the Underhive through the sewage network. Don't Ask Me My Orky Senses Tell Me It'll Work and Execute Old Man the War Criminal, you have the right flank, pushing through the main gate. Tau Buddy You're Right and I will launch a feint attack down the center."
"Our targets are the warehouses in the Mid-Hive and the manufactorums in the Underhive. And remember this above all else." His voice hardened into absolute seriousness. "We are Imperial Astartes. We are the Eight Champions. We are the Emperor's Angels of Death."
–
The Governor's Palace, Kent Hive.
Inside the conference room, under the harsh glare of the 3:00 AM lighting, the blue optics of Cogboy's mechanical eyes whirred and refocused.
He stood behind Schrödinger Bro, the hydraulic systems in his right arm releasing a faint hiss of depressurization.
"How are things looking?" Cogboy's synthesized voice buzzed.
Schrödinger Bro didn't turn around. His gaze remained firmly locked on the massive tactical display in front of him, where seven green dots—representing the vital signs of the Astartes—blinked steadily.
"They are already in a concealed position outside Sycamore Hive."
Schrödinger Bro's fingers swiped across the console, pulling up the exact coordinates. "Coordinates X-1086, Y-9527. Deep inside an abandoned mineshaft. Seven kilometers linear distance from the hive's main blast doors. The surface cover is a hundred and thirty meters thick, which should shield them from the vast majority of orbital scans."
He paused before adding, "All eight of them are holding position in radio silence. Vital signs are stable."
Cogboy nodded, the blue light of his mechanical ocular implant flickering.
He pulled an extended cigarette from his robes, lit it, and took a deep drag.
"Captain Karon sent a message," Cogboy said, blowing a smoke ring that dissipated against the glow of the tactical display. "The Iron Hands fleet will... begin their withdrawal and handover in one hour. The Gloriana-class battleship Fist of Iron has already initiated main engine pre-ignition. All ground forces will complete their evacuation within twenty-four hours."
He pulled up an encrypted comms log. "The exact words of the Iron Hands Primarch were: 'Tell Cage the treaty stands. As long as production quotas are met, he needs to fear no one and nothing. If production falls short, or if there is corruption and degeneracy...'"
Schrödinger Bro turned to look at him. "And the second half of that sentence?"
"There is no second half." Cogboy flicked his ash. "The Lord Primarch cut the comms off halfway through."
Schrödinger Bro fell silent for a couple of seconds before suddenly bursting into laughter. "Having no second half is infinitely more terrifying than having one. Which means we need to execute this flawlessly."
Cogboy snuffed out his cigarette. "We strike during the window after the Iron Hands fully depart and before the Blood Angels complete their garrison deployment... Operations begin then."
He looked at the seven green dots on the screen, along with the dark golden dot representing Paul. "Let's hope everything goes smoothly for them."
Schrödinger Bro sighed, a rare note of anxiety creeping into his voice. "Pulling a stunt this massive right under the nose of Sanguinius, the Great Angel..."
He pulled up the database files on the Ninth Legion. "Blood Angels. The Emperor's ninth sons, Legion numeration IX. Primarch Sanguinius, also known as the Great Angel of the Imperium, the Flawless One, the Child of Prophecy. Legion characteristics: Revere honor, value humanity, afflicted by the genetic flaw known as the Red Thirst. Known combat records: The Cleansing of the Baal System, the pacification of the Caliban fringe worlds, the Thramas Crusade..."
Schrödinger Bro paused his reading here. "Is Sanguinius's precognition really not going to foresee everything we're about to do? If he foresees anything..."
"That's exactly why Paul insisted on disguising them," Cogboy interrupted him, his mechanical eyes locked on the screen. "We looked up Sanguinius's lore data in reality. Even by the late 30K era, his precognition wasn't as potent. He can only catch glimpses of vague fragments. Eight Astartes from entirely different Legions, combined with the interfering effects of Paul's Champion trait, plus all those ridiculously ostentatious laurel wreaths... Even if Sanguinius glimpses a few fragments, all he'll see are Astartes running an op. His first suspicion will be that some other Legion is running off-the-books maneuvers behind the Munitorum's back. He would never associate it with us, a bunch of wasteland ruin scavengers."
Schrödinger Bro thought about it and nodded. "Makes sense."
He looked back at the screen, where the green dots remained perfectly stable.
Twenty-three hours and fifty minutes until the operation began.
–
At the same time. City of the Holy Anthem, Planetary Supreme Council Hall.
This magnificent structure, standing three hundred meters tall and covering over thirty thousand square meters, was the nominal administrative center of Aurelian IV.
But for the past eighty years, it had functioned more as a squabbling ground for the four major factions to divvy up their spoils.
At this moment, the atmosphere inside the circular conference room on the top floor was so oppressive you could wring water from it.
Four people sat around the long conference table, with the powerful figures of their respective factions standing behind them.
Achil Hysman, the current head of the Hysman Merchant Guild. At sixty-five, his hair was impeccably combed, and he wore a regal purple-and-gold silk robe. Behind him stood Archimedes and the bald, purple-robed Busir Hysman.
Greave Atens, patriarch of the Atens Knight House. At fifty-eight, he was as heavily built as a bear; even his formal attire couldn't conceal a physique thoroughly augmented by chemical steroids.
Garrison Conmo, patriarch of the Conmo Psyker Dynasty. At forty-three, he was the youngest of the four, yet his gaze was the gloomiest, and his skin was unnaturally pale.
And...
The head of the Order of the Omnissian Mind's Aurelian branch, Magos Occus Kane.
The Tech-Priest sat at the head of the table. His entire lower body had been retrofitted into a cluster of mechanical, arachnid-like legs, while his upper body retained only a fraction of its biological tissue.
His right arm was a complex array of precision mechadendrites, and his left arm was the mounted base of a lascannon.
Only a third of his head was still flesh and blood; the rest had been replaced by a silver-grey alloy skull, a single optic lens glaring with a frigid red light.
"Magos Occus," Achil Hysman was the first to speak, his voice dry and raspy. "You previously assured us that the Iron Hands Legion would be transferred away shortly. Indeed, and things have unfolded exactly as you said. The Iron Hands are leaving."
He raised his head, looking through the conference room's transparent skylight into the night sky.
Suspended in low orbit against the backdrop of the void were two colossal behemoths.
One was sharply angular and silver-grey, resembling an icy steel tombstone—the departing Fist of Iron.
The other was smoothly contoured in blood red, a winged angel sculpted upon its prow—the newly arrived Red Tear.
Two Gloriana-class battleships hanging like inverted mountains, pressing down heavily on the hearts of all who looked up at them.
"But you promised that an ordinary company from some standard Legion would be garrisoned here." Achil turned back, fixing his gaze on Occus's half-mechanical face. "And now?! The Ninth Legion is here! The Blood Angels! And they are led personally by the Lord Primarch Sanguinius! Have you heard the legends of the Ninth Legion? Do you have any idea what kind of being Lord Sanguinius is? Rumor has it they absolutely abhor evil and cannot tolerate even the slightest hint of corruption! Now that they're here, if everything we've done gets dug up..."
Achil's voice began to tremble. "It won't be like Primarch Ferrus, simply confiscating sixty percent of our assets! They will claim our very lives!"
As his words fell, a deathly silence gripped the conference room.
Greave Atens slammed his fist heavily onto the table. "Magos Occus! For eighty years, our Atens House has provided armed escorts, suppressed rebellions, and purged mutant beasts for the Mechanicus! Even if you ignore our achievements, you cannot ignore our tireless toil! In this recent military campaign against the Warp heretics, we lost twenty Knight engines! Thousands of our family's scions died in battle! You cannot do this to us! We have made massive contributions to the great Cult Mechanicus!"
Garrison Conmo didn't speak, but his psychic emanations caused the water glasses on the conference table to tremble faintly. His pale fingers tapped lightly against the tabletop.
Occus's single mechanical eye flickered frantically, streams of data cascading down his visual interface like a waterfall.
Three seconds later, he stood up abruptly, his numerous mechanical legs stomping down hard onto the reinforced stone floor with a deafening reverberation.
"Enough!" His synthesized voice roared out. "How was I supposed to know Lord Sanguinius would come?! The message I received from Mars HQ stated: after the Tenth Legion transfers out, a company from the Fourth Legion, the Iron Warriors, would take over the defense! The Iron Warriors! Not the Blood Angels!"
Occus's mechadendrite lashed out viciously against the table, instantly cleaving the entire surface—crafted from impossibly rare, expensive timber—clean in two.
"You ask me? Who am I supposed to ask?! Ask Mars? Ask the Great God of the Omnissiah?! Ask Holy Terra?! Or should I go straight to the Emperor Himself and ask Him why He sent His ninth son here in person?!"