At the canyon's exit, the air thickens with a sickening stench of rot and sulfur. Green toxic fog churns in the distance as bone-chilling roars draw closer, like the gates of hell slowly grinding open.
On the battlements blocking the canyon's sole breach, the company commander stands at the trench's edge.
Refusing to cower behind cover, he waves a modified laspistol, shouting over both the comms channel and the roar of the field: "They're here! Check your weapons one last time—don't let me catch anyone forgetting where their safety switch is!"
A chaotic series of clicks echoes across the line as soldiers rack bolts and check energy mags. Actions are uneven, and a few dropped magazines clutter the mud, but under the commander's glare, the recruits pull their pre-battle prep together.
Double-checking the line, the commander sprints back and forth, shouting: "Hold your fire! Hold! Let them get close before you shoot!"
The commander's heart aches.
If these Helldivers were veterans from Perditia, he wouldn't need to baby them like a nanny. Facing a predictable trench defense, seasoned veterans would play cards in the dirt until the enemy was on top of them, leaving him free to sip tea at the command post.
Instead, high command mandated a "veteran-led rookie" structure to acclimate new players to high-intensity warfare. Elite units were split up, their members placed into green regiments to serve as officers.
Though these rookies had hunted Ork Warbands in the wasteland, those skirmishes were led by high-level players, backed by respawn anchors. Mindset-wise, it was a day at an amusement park. That carefree attitude—knowing someone would clean up their mess—is light-years away from a brutal defensive engagement where losing a position means the line collapses.
He cannot risk them making panic-driven blunders out of sheer excitement. As company commander, he must stay on the front line to set an anchor for their morale.
Watching the wave of rotting corpses surge from the horizon, the commander calculates the distance.
800 meters... 500 meters... 300 meters...
A veteran regiment wouldn't blink, but eyeing the nervous recruits white-knuckling their rifles, he decides to widen the margin.
They're new—better not let the enemy get too close and shatter their nerve. Call the fire order at 50 meters. Accuracy holds up there without being overwhelming.
Murphy's Law rules the battlefield.
At roughly 100 meters, several heavy thuds slice through the mist.
Bloated, gas-filled corpses are hurled over the horde by immense force, tracing arcs through the air before crashing down mere meters from the trench.
Splat!
With a wet pop, the bloated zombies burst, showering the line in yellow-green pus and squirming maggots. Viscera splatters over the helmets of nearby recruits.
Gagging noises flood the comms.
Not good, the commander realizes.
Visual and olfactory overload like this shatters a rookie's composure.
Before he can shout "Hold fire," a maggot-covered recruit instinctively squeezes the trigger.
Zzzzt!
A crimson laser beam cuts through the dim canyon, striking a wandering corpse in the shoulder and blowing a clean hole through it.
That single shot knocks over the first domino.
Tense nerves snap. Hearing the discharge, nearby players let their reflexes bypass their brains and pull their triggers.
"Kill them! Fire!"
"Open fire!"
In an instant, dense laser fire illuminates the front line, as brilliant and chaotic as erratic fireworks.
Then come the heavy, rhythmic thuds—the unmistakable roar of heavy stubbers and heavy bolters.
Thump-thump-thump-thump-thump!
Watching the dirt fly 100 meters out while barely dropping a single zombie, the commander loses his cool, roaring into his mic: "Cease fire! Cease fire, damn it! Why are the heavy stubbers and bolters firing?! Those are for armored targets—why are you dumping ammo on zombies 100 meters away?!"
His voice is drowned out by the noise as the trench succumbs to panic and mass hysteria.
As he rushes over to physically stop a heavy weapon crew from wasting ammo, a Death Guard warband watches from the fog through their helmet visor slits.
Observing the scattered fire patterns and prematurely exposed heavy weapon nests, a Death Guard marine lets out a low, rasping laugh of pure contempt. "Rookies."
Turning to the Plague Marines behind him, he speaks: "The veterans we fought before waited until they could see the fractures in our armor at twenty meters before pulling the trigger. But these... useless."
Even so, these battle-hardened Traitor Astartes take no chances. Beneath their corroded power armor, ice-cold lethality replaced honor long ago.
"Initiate Protocol Rot," the squad leader orders over an encrypted channel. "Let the dead drown their line and absorb their fire. Squad, target the high-value commander for a decapitation strike."
Rather than charging mindlessly like Berserkers, they stick to the plan. Nurgle zombies act as tireless meat shields, walking into the dense laser fire to pave the road forward. Under cover of the horde and toxic mist, the Death Guard move in like sharks, closing in on the screaming officer.
"Maintain formation! Suppress on my mark!"
The commander is still shouting to restore discipline, oblivious to the fact that his animated gestures make him a beacon for the enemy.
"For the Grandfather."
With a low murmur, a Volkite round drills through the battlefield smoke.
BOOM!
The commander's shouting cuts off instantly as the desecrated blast shatters his armor, reducing his upper torso to red mist.
"The commander's down!"
"Holy crap, he's dead!"
Ripples of panic stir the line. For ordinary auxiliary infantry, losing a commander triggers an immediate rout. But these Helldivers are "players." While the officer's death creates brief confusion, it fails to spark true panic.
Instead, squad leaders—the slightly more experienced players—take charge.
"Don't panic! He's on his way back! Listen up!" a squad leader roars over the comms. "The front is falling! Pull back to the middle of the bunker! Narrow choke points—hold them there!"
"Fallback! Stop wasting ammo!"
To the Death Guard's surprise, these greenhorns display unexpected resilience after losing their leader. Rather than scattering, they conduct a fighting retreat, abandoning the open perimeter to fall back into the narrow interior corridors of the bunker.
The decapitation strike succeeded, but the plan to route the recruits and shatter their line fails.
The undead flood the perimeter like black tar, surrounding the bunker as rotting hands beat against steel doors and firing slits. Inside, the defenders leverage the tight choke points and heavy fortification to weave a kill zone, holding the horde at the threshold.
Minutes drag on; bodies pile high.
Half an hour later, a familiar voice echoes across the comms channel: "I'm back, boys! Hit them from both sides—push out!"
It's the commander, freshly respawned and leading a squad of returned players back into the fray.
"The commander's back! Charge!"
Morale surges inside the bunker, turning defensive posture into a counteroffensive. The heavy doors slide open as flamethrowers clear a path and combat knives carve through flesh. The two forces cut through the horde like blades, pinning the zombies in a pincer movement.
After a bloody melee, the commander—drenched in foul gore—fights his way through the dead to link up with his troops.
"Status?" he asks, swapping the mag in his laspistol while sweeping his eyes across the field.
"Lost a heavy stubber, but the merit points from this wave are enough to buy another," a squad leader says, wiping black blood from his visor. "But boss... the big guys are gone."
The commander freezes, raising his macrobinocular to scan the mist.
Aside from twitching Nurgle corpses and a few stragglers in the distance, the imposing Death Guard Marines have vanished. Their tactical markers have faded completely into the fog.
"They pulled back?" The commander frowns, a sense of unease settling in. "That's not like Space Marines, unless..."
Unless they have a high-priority target elsewhere and refuse to waste time and ammo here.
Heavy rumbles echo from every direction, cutting his thoughts short.
He looks up toward the horizon.
Across dozens of kilometers of line, flashes of fire burst into the sky, lighting up the mist like a thunderstorm. The roar of heavy artillery, the discharge of tens of thousands of rifles, and the distant shrieks of the horde meld into a ground-shaking roar.
No more probing attacks. No more small skirmishes.
Total war has begun.