Chapter 251: The Daemon Primarchs
The Daemon Primarchs had been lurking in the warp space corresponding to Cadia's position all along, waiting for Lucan and Guilliman to arrive. They had deliberately not revealed themselves alongside the main Chaos fleet. They feared that a fleet so overwhelmingly large would cause Lucan and Guilliman to abandon any attempt to relieve Cadia.
Furthermore, the endless rivalries between the Four Gods had never ceased; they were constantly scheming against one another, which made them reluctant to gather their champions in one place prematurely. For these Daemon Primarchs, the fate of Cadia itself was no longer important. Their only objective was to complete the mission their patrons had given them.
"Karax! Destroy those warships with the Solarite Beam!"
Seeing the rituals nearing completion, Lucan had no intention of waiting for the enemy to emerge from the warp.
"My Lord! The ships are too dispersed! It is impossible to destroy them all simultaneously!" Karax reported.
Lucan's gaze swept across the distant ritual vessels. The unique colors emanating from the warp rifts allowed him to instantly identify which of the Four Gods they belonged to. Without a second's hesitation, he ordered the Spear of Adun to target the spatial rift representing Nurgle.
Angron and his World Eaters were powerful, but Lucan's soldiers in their powersuits could still put up a fight. As for Fulgrim and his Emperor's Children, while his legionnaires appeared periodically throughout the Imperium, Fulgrim himself had been secluded in the warp indulging his own bizarre passions for a long time. There was no recent data to assess his threat level.
With Fulgrim discounted, Lucan focused on Nurgle's champion, Mortarion; the Crimson King, Magnus; and the Red Angel, Angron. He prioritized the threats and divided his available forces into three groups.
In Lucan's eyes, Mortarion posed the greatest threat to his forces. The psychic sorcery that was Magnus's greatest weapon was of little concern to him, thanks to his own abilities. He had withstood the psychic might of the Emperor himself; what did he have to fear from Magnus? His conventional human soldiers were vulnerable to powerful psykers, but he had dozens of Artificial Blanks at his disposal, and the Protoss possessed a strong natural resistance to psychic energies.
However, if Mortarion were to unleash some unknown plague concocted by Nurgle, Lucan had no specific countermeasure. He could well imagine that a plague created by a Daemon Primarch would be no trivial matter. If it spread through his fleet, he did not have enough Blanks to suppress a pandemic on that scale. If his mortal crews fell, he alone could not possibly operate so many warships.
The Spear of Adun, the Stellar Pioneer, and all Dynasty warships equipped with warp drives moved as one. The Spear of Adun's target was the ritual vessel dedicated to Nurgle.
The Solarite Beam fired, a precise and devastating strike. Under the searing energy, the entire warship began to disintegrate. The blasphemous ritual aboard it was instantly severed. Having lost its anchor in the physical universe, the supply of warp energy was cut off, and the rift behind it began to collapse, slamming the door shut on the Daemon Primarch attempting to enter realspace.
Lucan could almost hear the enraged, frustrated roars of Nurgle and Mortarion echoing from the other side. They would surely find another way to enter the material universe, but it would not be quick. As long as Cawl could activate the Blackstone Pylons before they reached Cadia, all would be well.
The Daemon Primarchs had planned an ambush, and now it had backfired spectacularly. Their lack of knowledge about the Spear of Adun had allowed their own strategy to be turned against them.
Meanwhile, the fleet of conventional Dynasty warships assigned to the second target was engaged. Gorgons and light cruisers, retrofitted with warp drives, hammered their target with macro-cannons, lances, and Yamato Cannons. The results were less than ideal; the sheer size difference meant they could not destroy the ritual vessel quickly enough. However, the constant bombardment was disrupting the ritual within. The warp rift dedicated to Khorne began to flicker violently, looking as if it might collapse at any moment.
Then, to everyone's surprise, a blood-red meteor shot out from the unstable rift, followed closely by a fleet of blood-red Chaos warships. They were the World Eaters, led by their Daemon Primarch, Angron.
Impatient to the last, Angron had launched himself from his warship, his profane body streaking through the void. The blood-red meteor slammed directly into the hull of a nearby Gorgon transport. No one could have predicted Angron would make his entrance in such a manner.
He was a terrifying sight: vast, fleshy wings, the Butcher's Nails still embedded in his skull, and in his hands, two immense chainswords, each containing the bound soul of a Greater Daemon. The Butcher's Nails, a product of physical technology, had been impossible to remove when Angron was mortal. Now, even after his ascension to daemonhood, they remained, their influence more severe than ever.
A mindless, bloodthirsty roar echoed through the Gorgon. The mere sight of Angron filled the Imperial soldiers with an uncontrollable terror as the Primarch began his slaughter. The transport's warp drive was still in its cooldown cycle after the jump; it could not escape. Angron tore through the ship like a force of nature, his daemonic strength allowing him to rip through reinforced bulkheads with his bare hands. Nothing could stop him.
Seeing the bulk of the World Eaters fleet about to pour from the rift, the remaining Dynasty warships made their final decision. The two light cruisers that had been fitted with warp drives diverted all power to their engines and, using their armored prows, rammed directly into the gash in the ritual ship's hull created by the Yamato Cannons.
"For the Rogue Traders! For the Mongorte Dynasty! Tech-priest, force a warp jump, now!"
The captains of both ships knew the consequences of activating a warp drive during its cooldown. The Stellar Pioneer itself had nearly been torn apart by such a maneuver; for a standard warship, it was suicide. But as the ships disintegrated, the resulting energy unleashed by the rupturing warp drives would be enough to tear the ritual vessel apart with them.
The two light cruisers were annihilated, taking the Chaos warship with them in a flash of violent energy. The ritual circle was broken. The warp rift dedicated to Khorne collapsed. Only a small vanguard of the World Eaters fleet had managed to escape; the vast majority were now trapped in the warp.
"Mortarion failed to enter realspace! We succeeded! A pity that lunatic Angron got out…"
The eyes of both Guilliman and Ferrus held a clear disgust when they spoke of Angron. Even before his betrayal, Angron had been dangerously unhinged. The cruelty he had shown his own sons was enough to earn their revulsion. But the combat prowess he now displayed left even Lucan stunned.
"Bring me the man! Bring him to me! Where is he?!"
Angron's roars blasted through the bridge's communications channel, punctuated by the sounds of blades slicing through flesh and agonized screams. Lucan knew exactly who Angron was looking for: the DOOM Slayer. Khorne's obsession with him had become absolute.
"Hold him back! Hold him! Marauder squads, suppressing fire! Firebats, use your flames! Ranged weapons are ineffective! Switch to melee! All of you, together!"
But courage is not always enough. Angron butchered any Dynasty soldier who stood in his way. It did not take him long to carve a bloody path straight through the kilometer-long Gorgon. He sliced through the outer hull with his daemonic blades and, using the chain reaction of explosions from the ship's engines and magazines, launched himself back into the void, another blood-red meteor streaking towards the next of Lucan's ships.
Lucan could only watch in shock. He had never imagined a boarding action could be conducted like this.
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