At the chaos Rift on planet Eldia, Zeke's personal guard and knight Attendant forces continued their steadfast defense.
A torrent of chaos, heretics, and cultists constantly surged forth, only to be brutally slaughtered by the Space Marines' formidable combat prowess.
Khorne's demons and followers loudly chanted, "Blood for the Blood God! Skulls for the Skull Throne!" Their shouts met no response; only the cold blasts of lasguns answered them.
After Abaddon resolved to unleash a devastating blow upon the knight Household, Khorne's forces were fully mobilized.
If conventional armies proved ineffective, then send in the Space Marines!
The chaos warbands arrived—
As the warp rift violently twisted once more, a more ferocious energy surge than before swept across the battlefield. Zeke's tactical display suddenly flashed with blinding red warnings—dozens of new warp signatures were rapidly approaching.
"Sir! Detecting chaos Astartes warband signatures!" Lissa's voice trembled slightly with tension, "It's... it's the world Eaters Legion!"
Before her words fully registered, the first drop pods, like meteors, slammed into the ground. These twisted metal capsules were adorned with spikes and skull decorations, and the moment their hatches burst open, blood-red figures roared out.
These were a full three hundred world Eaters Berserkers! Their bodies were clad in crimson armor, their chainaxes stained with congealed blood, and inhuman howls emanated from their helmets. The Warboss leading them raised his twin axes, their blades burning with Khorne's blessed flames.
"Blood for the Blood God! Skulls for the Skull Throne!" the world Eaters roared in unison.
However, after their furious shouts, they froze in place.
Their originally thunderous roar, at this moment, seemed to have its throat gripped by a giant hand, stammering and unable to utter a single word.
What in the world is this?!
The world Eaters: Did we walk onto the wrong set, or what? Why are there tens of thousands of Astartes waiting for them here?
Seeing the dense ranks of over ten thousand Space Marines before them, these world Eaters, no matter how much they yearned for blood for the Blood God, had to regain their composure.
What's more, among those ten thousand ordinary Space Marines, they also saw 500 gleaming golden figures.
Custodes?
Why would there be Custodes in this godforsaken place?
Hadn't their orders been to lead the chaos forces to defeat the knight Household troops blocking the entrance, then occupy this hive world and sacrifice the entire hive world to allow more chaos fleets to descend?
An immense pressure directly weighed down upon them.
Reflected in the world Eaters' crimson visors was the despair-inducing tide of steel before them. Their proud three hundred Berserkers were like ants rushing against a steel fortress wall when faced with this defensive line composed of over ten thousand Space Marines and five hundred Custodes.
The Warboss leading them, Gorgorlak "Bloodroar," felt his hands, gripping his twin axes, tremble slightly.
As a veteran who had participated in twelve Black Crusades, he felt the emotion called "fear" for the first time.
"This... this is illogical..." His hoarse voice emanated from his helmet, "The intelligence didn't mention an entire legion here!"
"Aren't the Imperial space marine legions supposed to have been broken down into Chapters due to the Astartes throne Paper? How can there be an entire space marine legion here?!"
In the comms channel, the breathing of the other world Eaters warriors grew heavy. Although their minds were twisted by the Blood God's blessings, their basic tactical judgment remained intact—this army before them was enough to crush them ten times over.
Not to mention the tens of thousands of Space Marines, even those 500 Custodes alone would be enough to chop them up into fine mince.
A feeling of fear, which should never appear in a follower of Khorne, now manifested in these individuals, these chaos Space Marines who had betrayed the Imperium, each of them dumbfounded.
No one could understand why these Custodes, who should always guard the Golden Throne, would appear on such a remote planet.
Even if this knight Household had a 20,000-year legacy, even if this household held a seat on the High Lords of Terra, it shouldn't warrant the deployment of Custodes.
Their shock was far from over; a strange blue light flashed, and behind Zeke's legion, a full 1,000 knight titans appeared.
The knight Household's reinforcements had arrived... As a knight Household that had existed since the Golden Age, the Yaeger family naturally possessed its own trump cards; at least, they had preserved some of the black technology from the Golden Age.
After Grisha completed his deployments, he personally boarded his own knight titan and assembled all the knights within the family who could participate in the battle at that time.
Thanks to the previous preparations, there were over 1,000 knights present on the family's main knight planet.
After leaving some knights to guard their home base, the remaining knights were gathered by Grisha.
Relying on the STC templates passed down from the Golden Age, the Yaeger knight Household had one major difference from other knight Households: their knight titans were all equipped with miniature warp drives.
Of course, this was not the warp drive from the stars in Zeke's STC template, capable of direct jumps over hundreds or even thousands of light-years; this was merely something capable of jumping between planets within a star system, but even that was sufficiently abnormal.
This spatial jump technology didn't traverse the warp; it directly tore through space to perform the jump.
This was a preliminary research legacy from a Human Golden Age laboratory, brought to the Nebulous Sector by the Yaeger family's ancestors at that time.
This black technology from the Golden Age could be said to be one of the reasons for the Yaeger family's strength, as with such an engine, the losses of the Yaeger family's knights were far lower than those of other knight Households.
For the Yaeger family's knights, if they couldn't win, wouldn't they just run away?
To be honest, if it weren't to temper his heir, and Grisha hadn't told Zeke that his titan had a warp drive, he wouldn't have brought people to support Zeke, because he believed his son could escape.
After all, when fighting orks, why would he tell his son that the family's knight titans could actually escape at any time?
Should his own heir also run away when fighting orks?
Moreover, unlike other knight Households that could only rely on the Adeptus Mechanicus to produce their knight titans, the Yaeger family had the capability to produce their own knight titans.
Among these 1,000 knight titans, a full 150 of them were Acastus knight Asterius, the "king of Giants" type!
This was the heritage brought by a knight Household that had been passed down since the Golden Age, a heritage far surpassing that of other Thousand Machine Households.
The appearance of 1,000 knight titans, including 150 king of Giants knight titans, made these Chaos Space Marines' eyes widen in disbelief at what they were seeing.
Sometimes, they really wanted to call the police.
What good had they done, a mere 300 chaos Space Marines, to warrant being targeted by five hundred Custodes, along with 10,000 Astartes Space Marines, and a full 1,000 knight titans, 150 of which were king of gigantic!
For a moment, the world Eaters wondered if Abaddon was trying to set them up, deliberately sending them to their deaths.
Chaos Space Marines: Is this the treatment we deserve? Answer me!