Chapter 219: Lion El'Jonson's Leadership
The unfeeling Lion did not express the kind of casual friendliness toward his brother that he considered unnecessary. Such lukewarm sentiments were doomed to be unfit for a battlefield shrouded in smoke and fire. Since he had been marked as "commander" for this campaign, he would issue his orders with an unquestionable tone and a scrutinizing, judgmental gaze.
Even if Mortarion would remain disgruntled for a long time after their disastrous first meeting, Lion El'Jonson would not waste much energy on it. For him, it was merely a matter of a legion skilled in frontal warfare being positioned along the retreat path of the Rangda splinter. He would delegate that command to his knights, for his focus had to remain on the grander, more brutal war forest, where everyone was bleeding and sacrifice was more common than breath itself.
The flames of war burned endlessly, setting entire stars ablaze. Stars fell, and solar furnaces dimmed. Multiple legions were committed to this drawn-out campaign. Rangda, already devastated in the previous two battles, would finally make its exit from this galactic drama.
But that did not mean the campaign would be easy. The First Legion took the lead, with the Second, Sixth, and Eleventh Legions joining in the main war zone. However, this campaign differed from any Lion had fought before. Apart from carefully dealing with the threat posed by the Rangda xenos, the Lion and the Wolf both caught the scent of something unusual in the air, beyond the usual stench of blood.
It was not a scent coming from the other side of the battlefield.
Compared to the Wolf King, the Lion was even more perceptive. Mysterious soldiers from the lost legions had infiltrated the fighting, forcing the Lion to proceed with heightened caution.
Every legion had its own unique Imperial function, and the First Legion, the Dark Angels, alongside the Sixth Legion, the Space Wolves, just happened to hold the blades turned inward for decapitation strikes.
They were granted the authority of "oversight," "vigilance," and "eradication."
But Lion El'Jonson knew that compared to the Wolf King, who acted in strict accordance with Imperial edicts, the Lion himself preferred to take the initiative and remain vigilant. He knew secrets his other brothers did not, and upheld boundaries the others had not even realized existed. Because of Lion El'Jonson's own resolute and loyal character, their father, the Emperor, had gifted the First Legion with quite a few gifts.
Some gifts could make trouble and annoyance disappear with ease.
The Dark Angels were even the only legion that could pass judgment on and exterminate a Forge World of the Mechanicum. Unlike other legions, which to some extent relied on cooperation with the Mechanicum, the Dark Angels possessed their own unique technologies.
Beyond the Imperium, beyond Terra, beyond even the Emperor, the Lion had the authority to purge everything if necessary—
Therefore, he paid little mind to Mortarion and his Fourteenth Legion. In the tangled battlefields of Rangda, Mortarion and the Death Guard were nothing more than lucky ones, pressed into service by the Imperium's needs. They did not need to shed needless blood, nor did they warrant much of the Lion's attention.
Thus Lion El'Jonson merely assigned the Death Guard their tasks in simple terms, and, because of the "Primarch brotherhood" that chained them together, granted Mortarion a brief meeting.
If Mortarion possessed true strategic wisdom, he would have understood the Lion's behavior. For the Lion to take the time, while commanding the main Rangda front, to personally speak with Mortarion—Lion El'Jonson considered that already a very high mark of respect and courtesy.
Sadly, this "obvious" goodwill from the Lion was clearly not accepted by the "lacking in strategic wisdom" Mortarion.
Perhaps it was the Lion's initial aggression, or his later arrogant words, but Mortarion uncharacteristically furrowed his brow all the way back, and repeatedly brushed off Hades' attempts to console him. Though Mortarion kept cursing in his mind, he still led the Death Guard forward along the route assigned by Lion El'Jonson.
Although he was extremely displeased—no, very displeased—Mortarion also sensed something unusual in the high-scale mobilization of Imperial legions this time.
In just a single face-to-face confrontation with the Lion, Mortarion could see, for a brief moment, the Primarch's undisguised wariness.
Mortarion was certainly familiar with such an attitude, but he hid his own feelings well. The shadow of his hood, the cover of his rebreather, the drifting of poison gases—no one could see through him.
It was not the same kind of disgust Perturabo showed. Even Perturabo would not look upon another Primarch with that sort of gaze. Things became clear: besides having learned of the Death Guard's future role ahead of time, the First Legion was at least on guard for a future where stars would fall and civilization would be stained with dust.
And the peculiar nature of this campaign's edict, along with the deliberately sealed-off information, made the Lord of Death faintly sense that there was something about this war that was not ordinary.
The Primarch thought indifferently that he had not met most of his brothers yet—though he no longer expected to.
So even if Mortarion was still upset, he nonetheless obediently, carefully, commanded the Death Guard along their assigned route. The construction on Barbarus and Galaspar had at least taught Mortarion to recognize the scarcity of legion resources, and he had no desire to waste his strength on matters he had yet to fully understand.
The Death Guard's fleet sailed steadily through the void.
As they advanced along the Lion's route, the astropathic relay station in the Starword system near the Mandeville point of the Rust system did not respond to the Death Guard's hails. Although small stellar relay systems did sometimes fail, a system with a Forge World should not have made such a rookie mistake.
The Rust system was a small, remote sector, but its position happened to connect two larger sectors. In the warp, only the route through Rust remained stable, while in realspace, Rust was obviously quite distant from its neighboring systems—relying on simple sublight travel, it would be very difficult to reach the next star system smoothly.
This unique geographic position made Rust essentially a stellar choke point. Because the system was located on the far-flung edges of the Imperium, it was usually rather quiet and neglected.
But now, with Rangda in retreat, this system has returned to the strategists' tables. If they could strangle the enemy here, then behind Rust lay several rich and bustling Imperial systems—Rust simply could not be allowed to fall.
According to the First Legion's calculations, Rangda should never have withdrawn to this place. Even in the worst-case scenario, Rangda could not possibly have retreated here. However, because the planetary governors behind Rust kept screaming for help, the Death Guard had been dispatched.
For these planetary governors, shouting loudly and calling for rescue was never a bad idea—and indeed, the arrival of the Death Guard had saved their lives.