Chapter 356: It's Over
BOOM!
Massive hulls collided, applying near-infinite force under the thrust of promethium fuel, subjecting the Iron Blood to friction and heat unbearable even for a Gloriana-class battleship.
CRUNCH!
The Eternal Crusader was an unstoppable sword.
While the Imperial fleet had just completed its torpedo salvos and fire coverage, tacitly spreading to the sides to clear firing lines for friendly forces, only this battleship bathed in holy light brazenly tore through the enemy's defensive net.
Its sharp prow pierced straight through the port aft supply storage of the Iron Blood, simultaneously severing the rear energy conduits.
BANG!
Countless metal fragments shot into the void with destructive force.
The two colossal Gloriana-class battleships were entangled.
The roar of cannon fire echoed in the sealed compartments. Even as the two ships nearly fused, their weapon arrays stubbornly turned, pouring devastating energy onto the enemy ship at point-blank range.
Thousands of macro-cannons and lance arrays roared continuously, using every means to destroy each other, using all strength to end the grudge that had lasted ten thousand years.
Machine spirits roared. Technicians were surprised to find that the internal facilities of both ships were operating at an exaggerated efficiency at this moment.
These two Gloriana-class queens were practicing their bone-deep killing intent towards each other in the most primitive way.
Just like the warriors they carried.
"Iron rots!"
Led by High Marshal Helbrecht, the Black Templars chanted hymns of victory, swarming in through the torpedo tubes opened on the prow of the Eternal Crusader.
"Stone endures!"
They charged at the Iron Warriors swallowed by chaos and pain.
Gazes met in the smoke, instantly recognizing each other's identity.
The roar of bolters immediately resounded through the compartments, a rain of hot lead becoming their most direct greeting.
The Iron Warriors were known for their tenacity, these warriors baptized by ten thousand years of war always adhering to the Iron Lord's creed.
But now, the iron had crumbled.
On the bridge of the Iron Blood, the Warsmiths fell into unprecedented chaos.
Barban Falk wielded a meltagun, the hot energy beam precisely cutting the magnetic seals on the Iron Lord's throne, while Honsou and Forrix were driven to defend distant positions.
The latter seemed to have turned back into a statue that couldn't respond without orders in an instant, mechanically pulling the trigger of his combi-bolter.
Forrix stood frozen, clutching his unactivated hammer. Honsou followed reluctantly, the light released from his modified right arm trying hard to dispel the darkness in the bridge.
The bridge at this moment seemed to be a mirror image of the rigorous command center of the past.
Warp creatures were spewing from every rift, scrambling towards the breathless body of the Iron Lord, as if they were in the warp and had forgotten to turn on the Geller Field.
Forrix clutched his chest in pain.
Despair overwhelmed him.
For a moment, he almost forgot what the command deck of a Gloriana-class battleship should look like.
"Forrix! Forrix!"
Falk's roar pierced the smoke, briefly pulling Forrix back from the abyss of despair.
He turned his head mechanically.
The Warsmith was dragging the Iron Lord's massive body towards the defensive line, waving the meltagun to disperse the daemons coveting the corpse.
This scene was heartbreakingly absurd, like a young beast futilely dragging its dead mother.
But the cold Iron Lord could no longer respond to this offense.
"He is dead."
Forrix stared at the lifeless body.
The burning wreckage of the Chaos fleet floated in the void, molten metal cooling and solidifying at a speed visible to the naked eye.
The flagship of the Iron Warriors, the Iron Blood, was still moving forward, its prow ruthlessly pushing aside the fragments of 'allies', but it could no longer shake off their enemies.
It was all so tragic.
They came with great ambition, determined to win glory for the Iron Lord.
But when they left, they were quiet, only able to flee embracing their gene-father's body.
In the end, they achieved nothing.
They were nothing.
The First Captain's illusions of war were shattered.
Once again, Forrix fell into despair, not knowing what he was fighting for.
"No, he still has a chance! He won't die! He will never fall!"
Falk shouted sharply, then ignored the completely collapsed Forrix and roared at the sorcerer beside him.
"How is the ritual going?"
The sorcerer's face was constantly changing.
Like melting wax, his features morphed endlessly.
His limbs writhed in anatomically impossible postures, arms sometimes piercing from the top of his skull, sometimes curling between his hips. On the exposed skin, brilliant feathers rotted into pustules as soon as they bloomed, cycling through mutations.
"Patience, my respected Warsmith. We are in the material universe, and the barrier between here and the Sea of Souls was strengthened just a moment ago."
A beak split open on the sorcerer's shoulder, giving an answer in a voice that made Forrix physically uncomfortable.
"Not enough time."
Falk said gruffly, then spoke.
"We go to the warp engine. Forrix, organize the troops. We are evacuating with the Iron Lord."
"Forrix?"
"Mm."
After a few seconds of lag, Forrix tore his gaze from the twisted body of the Tzeentchian sorcerer and nodded mechanically.
He gripped his weapon and unlocked the blast door.
Click!
The Iron Warriors surrounding Perturabo poured out.
They fired at every enemy in sight.
"Forrix, open the corridor, send out the decoy units."
Forrix executed the order silently. The Iron Warriors cut a bloody path out of the bridge amidst the encirclement of daemons.
"Forrix, blow up the rear passage, let the Siege Tyrants clear the way with melta cannons. We can no longer care about the damage to this ship."
Forrix complied. Under the pursuit of the Black Templars, the Warsmiths reached the chaotic midsection of the ship and tried their best to escape.
"Forrix, destroy the corridor, leave troops to cover the rear. We need to get to the manual control room first."
Forrix complied. The moment Falk gave the order, he decisively blew up the corridor, leaving Honsou and others who hadn't caught up on the other side of the bridge.
"Good job, Forrix, let's go!"
Forrix stopped where he was.
"Forrix?"
Carrying the Iron Lord's body, Falk looked back in confusion, led by the Tzeentchian sorcerer.
This unidentified sorcerer hid their tracks well. Forrix could feel that the other party genuinely wanted to help them, to let more Iron Warriors survive.
They promised to resurrect the Iron Lord.
But would the resurrected being still be the Hammer of Olympia?
Time passed minute by minute, the harsh battle cries of the Black Templars getting closer.
"...I'm not going."
Forrix spoke, his voice like two rusted gears grinding.
"I'm not going, Falk. I can't walk anymore."
Amidst the approaching roar, Forrix looked around.
Falk's gaze wandered, waiting for the teleportation ritual to complete. Heavy breathing came from behind the grille of his baroque helmet, his entire attention seemingly fixed on Perturabo's body.
Honsou writhed, roared, struggling against the hand of an Emperor's Champion choking his throat.
Barban Falk superstitiously believed in the power of the warp, expecting another ascension to save their father.
Honsou was full of ambition. His ambition, mismatched with his strength, gave him an unprecedented will to live, now turning into fuel for a dying struggle.
What kind of monster would the twisted emotions of these people create?
Forrix was tired.
He used to numb himself with loyalty to Perturabo, knowing he had no other way.
From the moment he broke his oath of allegiance to the Emperor, Forrix knew he was cursed. He could only continue along a branch road because he had nowhere else to go.
Now, this road was broken too.
The moment Perturabo failed, Forrix realized everything was meaningless.
Nothing changed, nothing brought them closer to victory.
"..."
Barban Falk looked back, leading the Iron Warriors into the portal activated by the overload of the warp engine amidst the laughter of the Changer of Ways.
Finally deciding to stop, Forrix turned with his Terminators and charged at the Black Templars.
He saw countless familiar faces among them.
He began to charge.
The 'Breaker of Cities' charged blindly into the riddled corridors of the Iron Blood, meeting a squad of Black Templars unexpectedly.
They all saw each other and recognized each other.
So, they began to settle the grudge of ten thousand years.
Iron Warriors fell beside him, and he got closer and closer to those familiar faces.
In the final moments of the war, the Iron Warriors commander led his Terminator squad to attack a Saturnine-pattern Dreadnought that nearly killed him.
Under the cover of fire, Forrix struck the Dreadnought's injured ankle joint with a power fist, bringing down the massive war machine. Then the commander managed to climb onto the sarcophagus, intending to shoot the pilot inside with a meltagun.
The surging stream burned open the iron armor, but Forrix found the control system inside was precision mechanical components.
He looked at the Techmarines under the cover of friendly forces and laughed self-deprecatingly.
Just as Forrix laughed, another controlled Dreadnought stepped forward.
The roar of lasers tearing steel rang out. In a roar of release—
Forrix, the Breaker, First Captain of the Iron Warriors, Leader of the Trident...
This Terran-born warrior, once full of glory and battle-hardened, felt only brief pain and depression, then turned to ash.
It was over.
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