Chapter 365: The Destruction of Scintilla
Fletcher, teleported back to Komus, strode into the control room with a ferocious expression and threw the still-unconscious Pacini to the side.
"Useless," he snarled, looking at Pacini with hatred. In his eyes, this failure was inextricably linked to these "followers." It was precisely because they had provided faulty intelligence that he had launched the attack so rashly, and had almost died on Scintilla.
He turned his head to look at the holographic display. Seeing the chaos among the Imperial and Lucan's warships, his expression softened slightly. At least, in the current situation, the enemy's fleet could not pose a threat to Komus. One after another, the Imperial warships were turned into wreckage under its assault. The Gorgons and other warships that had tried to jump in for a boarding action had also failed to break through Komus's defenses.
Empowered by the divine might of all Four Gods, Komus could even warp the trajectory of the Imperium's longest-range lance beams before they could even hit it.
Olivia looked at the battered Fletcher and the remaining twenty-four Annihilation Engines. She knew that his decapitation plan had failed.
"Fletcher, what happened? Even with the Annihilation Engines and yourself, you couldn't deal with those usurpers?"
"Those usurpers are very strong," Fletcher admitted, the memory of Damon and the others still sending a chill down his spine. "Their mastery of psionics and genetic technology is no weaker than ours... perhaps even stronger."
If the other party hadn't been able to devour his psychic energy, he was confident he could have killed them. But with Lucan's support, the physical advantages of Damon and the others had been pushed to their absolute limit.
"Stronger? How is that possible?" Olivia was incredulous. "Didn't those Navigators say that the usurpers suppress psionics? If their technology has really reached that level, why are their warships so weak?"
"Isn't that just like that hypocrite?" Fletcher sneered, clearly referring to the Emperor of the Golden Age. "And the technology tree of the humans of this era is clearly flawed."
"How many of the weapon systems on Komus are still operational?"
"Due to the damage to some of the internal facilities, about 50 percent."
"And the planet-killer psychic weapon array?"
"I have already checked. If we need it, it should still be able to operate at about 60 percent of its power. If we wish, it is more than enough to inflict an extinction-level strike on the planet before us."
"Olivia, activate the weapon array!" Fletcher commanded, his voice filled with venom. "We must destroy this planet! I don't believe that no matter how strong they are, they can survive the planet's explosion!"
The stronger Lucan and Guilliman were, the more determined Fletcher was to kill them.
Olivia nodded, her face impassive. Knowing that there were tens of billions of lives on this planet, she still felt no mercy. The colonization of humanity had always been a cruel process. The number of xenos and other races they had destroyed in this way was countless. And this group, who were considered extremists even among the Men of Gold, had long since come to see themselves as a higher form of life in their pursuit of psychic ascension.
The mainstream Men of Gold, while improving their genetic and psychic technology, had wanted to bring transcendence to all of humanity, to allow all humans to master psionics and thus ignore the disasters brought by the warp. After all, humans, like the Eldar, could use psychic powers, but there was a difference between using them and being a naturally psychic race. For most humans, using a psionic-mechanical construct to wield psychic power was no different from using solar power. And psykers who did not rely on machines were still a minority in the Golden Age.
But Fletcher's group had wanted to ascend themselves, to rise above all other human individuals. In their hearts, they had already transcended the human race. They felt nothing at the prospect of killing tens of billions of their own kind.
As Olivia activated the weapon system on Komus, which was powerful enough to destroy a star, one weapon array after another began to reactivate. A massive amount of warp energy was drawn in, including the divine power of the Four Gods.
Fletcher and Olivia looked at the continuously rising power levels on the panel with expressions of pleasant surprise. Komus's efficiency in utilizing warp energy had exceeded their original estimates. It was far more than 60 percent; it had even surpassed its original limits.
At that moment, Lucan and Guilliman, along with the group of controlled Navigators, had returned to their warships at top speed. But the ships had not been out of orbit for long before a piercing alarm for warp energy began to blare throughout the entire bridge. The crewman's voice was even trembling. He had never seen such an astonishing level of warp energy before.
"Lord Lucan! A massive warp energy signature... Emperor preserve us! It's coming from that strange sphere!"
Lucan and Guilliman both guessed what was about to happen.
"Initiate an immediate jump out of the Scintilla system! Now!"
At the same instant, the weapon arrays circling Komus fired a massive beam of warp energy across the void at Scintilla.
The second the Stellar Pioneer jumped out of the Scintilla system, the massive warp beam struck the planet's defensive shield. The shield, which was already in a state of semi-paralysis due to the daemonic invasion on the surface, began to disintegrate under the massive energy wash.
As the shield was completely breached, the energy beam struck the surface directly.
When Lucan, having finished the jump, looked back at Scintilla through the viewport, he saw only a wave of energy, with the point of direct impact at its center, spreading across the entire planet. The magnificent, towering hive spires began to collapse.
And the tens of billions of humans on the planet, even those who did not die from the explosions and the collapsing buildings, began to melt into puddles of liquid the moment they came into contact with this energy. Perhaps, before they died, they did not feel any undue pain. Humans, daemons, psykers... in the face of this power, they could not last even a single second. The power of the individual seemed so insignificant.
And the disaster did not end there.
Using Komus's own technology, combined with the power of the Chaos Gods, this beam was tearing through the veil of the material universe. A brand-new warp rift appeared behind Scintilla. And this rift, which had been torn open, was now slowly pulling the entire planet into the warp.
Seeing this, both Lucan and Guilliman were silent. The creation of a warp rift was extremely difficult. It was usually only possible at nodes where the veil of reality was very thin, such as during a galaxy-sweeping Chaos incursion. For example, Cadia, or Vigilus. The conditions for its formation were extremely harsh.
And yet, in the stable space of the Scintilla system, a new rift had been created just like that, even if it was a small one.
"Lucan," Guilliman said, his voice grim, "we must find a way to destroy Komus. Otherwise, the Imperium will face a terrible disaster." He could already see new warp rifts opening up all over his empire.
"Full speed ahead!" Lucan commanded in a low voice. "Advance on Komus!"
Fletcher and Olivia also noticed the Stellar Pioneer and its escort fleet approaching them. Although the Stellar Pioneer had been heavily modified, they still recognized its basic frame as a colonization vessel.