The space battle entered its final throes after just twenty-three minutes.
The primary space station had completely disintegrated, reduced to a sprawling cloud of metallic debris spanning hundreds of miles.
Of the three smaller orbital defense platforms, two had taken direct macro-cannon hits to their cores and had been blown into scattered wreckage.
The last one had been continuously scorched by lance fire until its outer hull melted through, suffering catastrophic explosive decompression that killed all aboard.
The twenty-seven Dal ships? Utterly annihilated.
Not a single one successfully fled or mounted an effective counter-attack.
On the Crimson Dawn Fleet's side, only three frigates suffered temporary void shield overloads from sustained fire, requiring a two-hour cooldown. Zero casualties.
Paul stared at the post-battle sweep telemetry feeding back to the sensors.
Massive clusters of debris floated in orbit, littered with the corpses of the Dal...
The simian-headed, humanoid xenos had flash-frozen in the vacuum, their grotesque split-maws locked in eternal expressions of agony.
"Scan the surface," he ordered.
"Scanning... The primary continents of Dal hold twenty-seven major terrestrial cities. Extreme architectural density, chaotic urban planning."
"Detecting massive bio-signatures. Total population estimated between... two to five billion."
"Energy signatures?"
"Concentrated in the city centers. Consistent with heavy reactor profiles."
"Also detecting anomalous thermal blooms from multiple containment facilities... extremely dense bio-signatures inside, but virtually zero power supply."
Schrödinger Bro brought up an enhanced feed.
They were walled-off quarantine zones packed with sprawling shantytowns. Thermal imaging revealed them absolutely stuffed with humanoid figures.
Outside those high walls lay the relatively spacious, fully powered residential districts of the Dal xenos.
"Livestock pens," Tax Bro said, his voice dropping to a freezing chill.
"And they're massive." White Scars chimed in, "Every major city has at least one of these zones. Some have two or three."
Paul remained silent for several seconds.
His dark gold eyes swept across the surface of Dal. The Wisdom trait was rapidly analyzing the cities' defense grids, troop distributions, and... the most optimal breach points for a planetary drop.
"Attention, Dawn Defense Force."
His voice resonated across the fleet once more.
"All vessels advance to Dal's geo-synchronous orbit."
"Transport squadrons initiate drop pod and landing craft deployment sequences."
"Warriors of the Dawn Defense Force..."
"On the planet below, over a billion of our fellow humans are currently enduring inhuman torture."
"We came here today to accomplish three things."
His voice suddenly spiked, ringing out like a warhammer slamming against iron.
"First, we will slaughter every last Dal xenos."
"Second, we will liberate every single human captive."
"Third, we will send a message to this dark galaxy..."
Paul slammed his right fist over his left chest, his golden Aquilon Terminator Armor producing a heavy, muffled clang.
"Humanity is not livestock for any species!"
"Labor earns dignity, Hope guides the dawn..."
"Today, we will trace the first stroke of those words in the blood of these monstrous aliens!"
A tsunami of roaring replies erupted from the chests of every soldier and player across every ship in the fleet.
"For the Dawn!!!"
"Slaughter the xenos! Liberate our kin!"
"Victory to Crimson Dawn!!!"
The shockwave of their voices felt practically physical, echoing endlessly within the metallic hulls.
Watching the fiery passion igniting before him, Paul slowly nodded.
He cast one final look at Dal. In his eyes, that azure planet was now tainted by a filth that absolutely had to be purged.
"Orders to the entire army."
"The orbit is clear. The path is paved."
"Now, it's your turn."
Through the fleet vox, the response of half a million souls converged into another roaring wave.
"We will not fail you, Archmagos Paul!!"
"We vow to burn away the world's darkness with the fires of Dawn!!"
"For Crimson Dawn! For Aurelian!!"
--
The massive bay doors of the transport ships slowly ground open.
Half a million Dawn Defense Force soldiers had completed their final wargear checks. They stood in rigid, perfectly aligned formations, awaiting the order to board their drop craft.
They wore standardized dark grey composite carapace armor, the Crimson Dawn insignia on their chests catching the dim light.
Their lasrifles were polished to a mirror shine, their tactical webbing stuffed full with power cells, and the gazes hidden beneath their helmet visors were a wellspring of calm, unyielding resolve.
Among these men and women were hardened veterans who had stared down a literal daemon in the Arlu Industrial Zone twenty-three years ago, alongside young, vigorous, elite recruits.
But right now, their postures were completely identical.
Because they knew exactly what stood behind them...
...the home they had rebuilt from the ashes, and thirty billion brothers and sisters who no longer had to starve.
And they knew exactly what lay before them...
...a barbaric, alien race that saw humanity as nothing more than cattle, a threat that had to be brutally and utterly exterminated.
"Labor earns dignity," a veteran of the First Legion muttered softly.
"Hope guides the dawn," a young soldier beside him finished the phrase.
Their voices were hushed, but in the dead silence of the staging bays, they carried far.
More and more soldiers began to repeat the two phrases in low whispers, chanting it like some sacred, unyielding vow.
"Labor earns dignity..."
"Hope guides the dawn..."
The voices merged, rising from a soft murmur into a clear, unified oath, and finally swelling into an earth-shaking, thunderous roar.
"Labor earns dignity! Hope guides the dawn!"
The transport ship's drop engines began to pre-heat.
The assault ramps of the Thunderhawk gunships slid open. Astartes players, clad in their multi-colored, personalized power armor, were the first to board.
Tax Bro's Imperial Fists, White Scars' White Scars, the loyalist Salamanders...
Three thousand four hundred transhuman warriors would act as the spearhead, tasked with ripping the Dal defensive lines to shreds in the first wave of the drop.
Grey Knights, Brothers of Silence, Tech-Priests, Dreadnoughts, Terminators, Assassins...
These specialized units were deployed to absolutely critical choke points.
They would handle any sudden psychic threats, technological hurdles, or execute decapitation strikes against high-value targets.
Sixteen thousand newer players were scattered across the various divisions.
They would use this live combat scenario to learn, adapt, and prove themselves... or die, respawn, and fight again.
Paul stood silently before the observation deck of the Light of Dawn.
He watched as, one by one, transport ships and Thunderhawk gunships detached from the fleet, plummeting straight into the atmosphere of Dal.
Within his dark gold eyes, the five stars slowly began to spin once more.
Go forth! My beloved brothers of the Dawn!
The Crimson Dawn will eventually illuminate this entire Warhammer universe.
Paul's gaze slowly shifted past the planet of Dal, staring deep into the void behind it. The star representing the Wisdom trait was pulsing brightly, pointing the way, guiding him ever forward into the dark.
--
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