The Nurgle forces on the battlefield were purged almost instantly following the departure of the Great Unclean One.
Mortal soldiers, clad in protective gear, separated the remains of their fallen comrades before incinerating them with heavy flamers. Against the plagues of the Warp, the only recourse for mere mortals was the purifying embrace of fire.
The Astra Militarum's chirurgeons were utterly outmatched. Most Imperial Guard medics were trained only to handle basic trauma and infection, their expertise peaked at crudely digging out bullets or performing primitive amputations on wounded guardsmen. They would spray standard-issue medicinal salves onto wounds or shove pills down a soldier's throat just to keep them from expiring on the spot.
As for curing a true Warp-malady, it was nothing short of a joke.
Setting aside the perennial lack of medical supplies, most field chirurgeons lacked any formal training; they were often hive-city back-alley quacks or tribal medicine men. They possessed nowhere near the knowledge required to combat these horrific contagions.
However, those of unwavering faith showed a fierce resistance to the viruses once the source of the corruption had vanished. Provided they were not exposed to the epicenter of the rot for too long, many found that even without medicine, they could achieve a miraculous recovery simply by clutching a copy of the Emperor's Word and offering fervent prayers before His icons in a chapel.
As thousands of corpses vanished into the pyres, the mortal soldiers remained at their posts, doggedly repelling the daemons and cultists closing in from all sides to secure the landing fields.
All of this transpired under the watchful gaze of Vashtorr.
The lesser daemons lurking in the shadows were Vashtorr's lackeys, minions who, when not performing unpaid labor in his Soul Forges, served as multifaceted tools of his will. Espionage was chief among their duties.
Vashtorr was incensed as he watched the Great Unclean One flee in a fit of rage. When Guilliman burned Nurgle's Garden, the Plague God became the laughingstock of the Ruinous Powers. Vashtorr had expected the Great Unclean One to fight with suicidal valor for the Grandfather's glory upon seeing the Avenging Son; instead, the bloated coward had broken and fled.
Worst of all, the daemon-beast had contaminated a vast number of Vashtorr's Daemon Engines. These machines, now encrusted with malignant pustules and spewing virulent spores, could no longer be bartered to other daemons for support.
Suddenly, a blinding white light erupted from the void.
Countless Chaos vessels tore through the veil of the Warp, manifesting on the periphery of the planet Wyrmwood. A savage opening salvo instantly crippled several Dark Angels cruisers. Violent explosions illuminated the planet's surface like a series of newborn suns.
Guilliman, standing beside Lion El'Jonson, wore an expression of grim expectation.
As the explosions blossomed, Vashtorr immediately activated the numerous Chaos battery emplacements across the planet. Although he was startled that the Lion had located him so easily, and even more surprised that Guilliman had dared to land with the vanguard, everything was proceeding according to his design.
Abaddon had returned with his Dreadfleet. This time, he kept the slow, gargantuan Arks of Omen at the rear of the formation, deploying his conventional warships ahead.
The Loyalist fleet was now trapped. Massive gun batteries across the planetary surface shed their camouflage, elevating their muzzles to pour fire into the ships in orbit. Encircling them from the outer reaches was the entirety of the Dreadfleet. Hundreds of Chaos vessels filled the void almost instantly. In a single broadside, several Imperial ships were utterly vaporized.
The Lion's heart wrenched as he watched his ships bloom into fire in orbit. He realized with a jolt of clarity that the earlier Chaos retreat had been a ruse; if he did not act decisively, all his sons would be consigned to the void.
As a second exchange of fire lit the heavens, the planet's surface grew even brighter. But this time, the explosions erupted from within Abaddon's own Dreadfleet.
At a far-point on the planet's flank, countless beams of light lanced out from the darkness. The Second Fleet, which had seemingly retreated, reappeared at the edge of the war zone with nearly double its original strength.
The initial ambush instantly decimated over a dozen of Abaddon's warships. Guilliman looked up at the crisscrossing lances of light stitching the sky.
"Impossible! That fleet was confirmed to have translated into the Warp! From whence did these extra Imperial ships come?" Vashtorr hissed in disbelief, staring at the reinforcements emerging from the deep void.
The Lion, seeing the carnage being wrought upon the enemy fleet, turned to look at Guilliman, who appeared entirely composed.
"We must extract immediately," the Lion urged. "The enemy force is still too vast. Even with your reinforcements, the odds are not in our favor."
Guilliman knew this well.
The additional fleet had been acting on his clandestine orders long ago. The temporary withdrawal of the Second Fleet had been a calculated feint to deceive the Chaos spies. Though the combined Loyalist fleet numbered barely two hundred vessels, paling in comparison to Abaddon's thousand-strong Dreadfleet, the situation was not as dire as it appeared.
Aboard the Pectaro, Axion silently reviewed the formal authorization document provided by Guilliman before activating all weapon systems to maximum output.
Beams of immense power, fundamentally different from standard Imperial Nova Cannons, erupted from the prow of the Pectaro. Faced with the dense formation of the Chaos fleet, this terrifying lance of energy pierced through four cruisers in a single discharge.
Sweeping waves of plasma, glowing with a brilliant cerulean light, raked across the Chaos ships. Every vessel struck saw its void shields flare violently; shield generators redlined instantly, each impact carrying the localized force of an entire lance battery.
Threads of high-energy particles wove through the plasma fire, ignoring void shield harmonics to punch through hull after hull. The lucky ships merely suffered dozens of decks worth of cellular disintegration; those less fortunate had their bridges swept, their entire command crews vaporized in a heartbeat.
The Vengeful Spirit, Abaddon's own flagship, did not escape unscathed. A beam from a relativistic particle projector grazed its flank, turning the Black Legionaries and rebels within several compartments into a slurry of decomposed flesh.
The suddenness of the strike left Abaddon shaken. Faced with unknown weaponry, panic is inevitable, even for the Despoiler.
"Combat assessment complete. Plasma operational efficiency at 5%; area-of-effect damage insufficient. Adjusting to staggered fire patterns."
"Relativistic particle projectors: biological lethality at 12%. Attack angles restricted. Adjusting hull attitude."
"Nova Cannon: combat efficiency 413.21%. Note: operational efficiency may drop to 0% following hull reorientation."
Observing the densely packed Chaos fleet, the logic for optimizing lethality was clear. While the Nova Cannon was devastatingly effective, its recharge cycle was too long. Compared to the particle projectors, it was simply too slow.