Chapter 221: The Red Corsairs and Vashtorr
At this moment, in the warp, an entire planet corrupted by Chaos served as the stronghold of the Red Corsairs within their domain. And there was more than one such planet. In the warp, besides daemons, those who could occupy a planet as a stronghold were either powerful independent warlords or possessed a massive force. And around these planets, hundreds upon hundreds of warships were gathered.
It had taken Huron only one percent of the time it had taken Abaddon to assemble a fleet that could rival his. Among these fleets, one could even see many xenos. These space pirates who roamed the various parts of the galaxy were also an important force for the Red Corsairs. Huron provided them with materials and wealth, and they, in turn, used their lives to reduce the casualties of Huron's own men. Both sides took what they needed.
At this moment, Huron, whose body was fifty percent replaced by various life-support devices, was sitting on his throne, thinking. This body brought him physical and mental pain every moment, but Huron had not been driven mad by it. He had become one of the few relatively sane traitors among the forces of Chaos.
"The Dark Gods... even Vashtorr has set his sights on a Rogue Trader?"
On his road to power, Huron had had no small amount of contact with these Imperial Rogue Traders and had also reaped great benefits from them. But in his eyes, Rogue Traders and pirates were no different. He had never taken such people to heart.
He had heard that Abaddon's Black Crusade had been thwarted. And now, the Dark Gods were not paying attention to that battlefield, but were proposing a deal with him to go to Macragge and hunt a Rogue Trader? It was hard for Huron not to connect the two.
He had directly and unhesitatingly refused the Chaos Gods' proposal that he lead his entire force to attack Ultramar, find Lucan, and kill him. As a pure egoist, there was no benefit in it for him or his Red Corsairs. And the blessings of the Chaos Gods? If he had been willing to accept them, he would not have had to endure his current suffering long ago. But compared to becoming a daemonic being, he preferred to continue to exist in the form of a "man." Although his current body was far from that of a normal human, he still cherished everything he could obtain in this world as a man.
In his eyes, falling to Chaos was ultimately a helpless act. He did not want to rebel; he had been forced to by those vermin-like High Lords and the corrupt policies of this Imperium! If those High Lords had been willing to provide him with resources, he could have even cleared out the Chaos forces in the Maelstrom for the Imperium and relieved their pressure.
However, while he was unwilling to do so, the countless ambitious individuals in the Red Corsairs were willing to take on this task. Many of them craved the power of the gods, and to obtain this power, they were willing to try everything to please them, willing to become the pawns of the Chaos Gods.
"My lord... Vingaard has taken the Blackstone Fortress that Abaddon gifted us and has left without authorization. Besides him, some other fleets have also allied with him and departed. Accompanying them are also many xenos pirates. This is betrayal!"
Huron looked at the former Astral Claw before him, a brother who had come to the warp with him. He did not show any anger.
"An ignorant fellow trying to gain more fame and exchange it for power from the Chaos Gods, in order to replace me. Is there a shortage of such people in the Red Corsairs? Have these fools, blinded by the temptations of Chaos, not thought about why the gods want them to do this? The Ultramarines... do they really think it will be so easy to defeat them? That is not fighting in the warp; that is in realspace! Let them go. Perhaps they can help me clear out the unstable elements in my ranks."
"Yes, my lord. Then I will not dispatch a fleet to stop them."
"Wait... assemble the fleet. We will not directly join the war, but the Blackstone Fortress must be secured. If Vingaard cannot hold on, then I will bring the Blackstone Fortress back. This warship is still very important to the Red Corsairs."
"I will see to it at once!"
As Huron's order was given, the forces that were completely loyal to him also began to set sail, crossing the turbulent warp.
And in the Blackstone Fortress gifted by Abaddon, the Blood Angels' traitor, Vingaard, was leading the Red Corsairs who were willing to follow him towards Macragge. Viewing the Black Rage and the Red Thirst as a curse of the warp, he had been exiled from his Chapter and declared a traitor.
The massive Blackstone Fortress was surrounded by the warships of various space pirates—xenos, Greenskins, and even a group of wandering Dark Eldar. And besides the Red Corsairs, there was also a huge flesh-warship. The size of this warship was very unusual. From the outside, it did not look like a warship at all, but like countless space hulks that had been forcibly fused together by Chaos sorcery.
And Tzeentch was using his power to open a path for them in space. Tzeentch had already promised Vingaard that if he succeeded, he would be ascended to a daemon prince and helped to obtain the position of Lord of the Red Corsairs.
And Vingaard was not only cooperating with Tzeentch this time, but also with the master of the Soul Forges, Vashtorr.
At this moment, Vashtorr, dragging his blasphemous body, was walking within the Blackstone Fortress. His hands slid across the walls of the fortress, and the scrap-code that was his divine power flowed within this warship, corrupting the machine spirit within. Vashtorr could feel the madness of the machine spirit, but he could also sense that it was still resisting him. One by one, the Dark Mechanicum hereteks took over many of the controls of the Blackstone Fortress.
"Vingaard, I can provide you with a large number of daemon engines, as well as weapons and equipment. I can also provide you with warships when you contend for the position of Lord of the Red Corsairs. But you must hand that human over to me!"
In Vashtorr's tone, there was an undisguised hatred. As the influence of the technology brought by Lucan grew larger and larger, the portfolio of the God of Machines also grew stronger. Lucan was eroding and taking away the portion that originally belonged to Vashtorr. His plans to invade the Cult of the Holy Machine had almost all failed, and his conspiracy to steal technology by starting with the branches of the Cult had also been unsuccessful. The existence of the Purity Seals had turned his proud Chaos scrap-code into a mere decoration. Their low cost allowed Pavian to have the tech-priests slap one on every time they activated a machine, ensuring the purity of the machine spirit. And Vashtorr's followers who had infiltrated the Imperial Adeptus Mechanicus had also been completely defeated in their clashes with the Cult of the Holy Machine.
His influence within the Imperium was getting smaller and smaller. His followers had even begun to doubt whether the Chaos scrap-code he had given them was truly powerful enough. This questioning from his followers was pushing him further and further away from the godhood he dreamed of, and the power of faith they could provide him was becoming less and less.
He knew very well that Tzeentch was deliberately using his power to eliminate Lucan, but he had no choice but to eat this poisoned apple. Feeling his power weaken, Vashtorr knew that he was running out of time. The only thing he could do now was to get rid of Lucan, seize everything that belonged to him, and prove himself to his followers. For him, this was also a gamble. If he lost, it would be very difficult for him to make a comeback. But if he won, he might get unprecedented benefits.
For this, he had brought his most elite Dark Mechanicum army, as well as the Arks of Omen, which should not have appeared here. He had not yet completely controlled these灾厄-like warships. These living warships needed to be linked by his daemon-steel neuro-bundles. One by one, the daemons of the warp who had signed a pact with Vashtorr or had been forcibly captured were bound in brass, machinery, and gears, to control these warships for him.
"I will not fail! I will use the life of that so-called Rogue Trader and the failure of the Ultramarines this time to establish my position in the Red Corsairs! I will become the Lord of the Red Corsairs!"
However, Vashtorr sneered at Vingaard's bold words. In his eyes, these Astartes were still just weak humans, forever their tools.
As the warp passage was opened, countless warships headed for the various planets of Ultramar. Vingaard was arrogant, but not stupid. He needed these pirates and fleets under his command to draw away the fleet of the Ultramarines. As a former loyalist, he had a certain understanding of the Ultramarines and knew their strength.
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