The moment the transport docked with the Iron Revenant, a completion prompt appeared before Datch.
[You have successfully completed the mission: Assist Castellan Creed in evacuating the last Imperial Forces from Cadia's surface.]
[Reward: 800 XP, 800 Points, Reputation +40, Power Weapon: ruyi jingu bang ×1]
A black-iron staff, capped with gold-fitted metal at both ends, appeared in his warehouse—an exact replica of the Monkey King's weapon.
Datch checked its info. Green-grade, too.
[Item: Ruyi Bang (Fine) — weapon of the Chosen One. A replica of the ruyi jingu bang. This potent power weapon can easily shatter helmets and power armor.]
[Blessing: "Size at Will" — changes length on command from 0.5 m to 6 m.]
[Appraisal: "Take this, fiend—taste my staff!"]
Datch slotted it as his sidearm.
The next instant, the staff snapped to the back of his armor, held by mag-locks.
He yanked it free—surprisingly heavy.
When activated, a crackling power field danced across its surface. Every swing felt like it could pulp ceramite.
"Fiends, dare you make trouble? Taste my staff!"
After cosplaying the Great Sage for a while, Datch happily stowed the weapon.
Creed's attention never left him.
Watching the man conjure a staff-shaped power weapon out of thin air, Creed was shaken again.
Where does this guy come from? Always pulling out bizarre gear…
Does he—like the Necrons—command pocket dimensions?
Creed stepped forward to ask—
—but Datch bounded off deeper into the Iron Revenant.
The exclamation mark over Creed's head vanished.
No more quests.
Instead, Datch saw a new golden question mark on the ark mechanicus mini-map—and went to investigate.
As an ark mechanicus, the Iron Revenant was larger than a city, packed with manufactories and forges.
Sectors were linked by rail-cars and cargo haulers moving men and materiel.
A normal visitor would get lost in the maze of corridors.
Datch, however, had a mini-map.
He soon found his first objective: a Sister with a golden question mark above her.
The moment they met, he opened her profile.
[Celestine — Living Saint, embodiment of faith, the Emperor's mortal herald.]
"Honoured nameless warrior…"
Celestine curtsied, intending to ask his story, but—
"Skip, skip. What's the quest?"
"Ah…?" Celestine blinked. "Nameless warrior, what did you say…?"
"Skip. Just give me the quest, not the lore."
"…Could you escort Archmagos Cawl to Macragge for us?"
She decided not to waste breath.
[Mission: Aid Living Saint Celestine in escorting Cawl to the Ultramarines' homeworld—Macragge.]
[The Great Rift has torn the galaxy apart. Cawl's mysterious cargo is humanity's—and the Imperium's—only hope. Help Celestine deliver him to Macragge.]
[Reward: 1,500 XP, 1,500 Points, Reputation +120, Iron Halo ×1]
"I'll escort Cawl to Macragge."
Quest accepted, Datch hopped away to find the next golden question mark.
The second belonged to a woman in an Inquisitor's coat with a bionic eye.
Datch opened her profile.
[Katarinya Greyfax — Puritan Inquisitor of the Ordo Hereticus, Psyker.]
"What exactly are you?" Greyfax demanded as Datch bounced up.
As an Inquisitor sworn to purge traitors and aberrations, she trusted no anomaly—
—not even Celestine, proclaimed Living Saint.
A warrior with no Chapter markings who returned from death itself topped her watch-list.
"Skip, skip. What's the quest?"
Datch crouched and rose, occasionally shadow-boxing the air.
"What do you think you're doing?" Greyfax narrowed her eyes, tempted to order his arrest.
Yet she remembered how he had stood alone against Chaos to buy time for the evacuation.
Judging by his actions, there were no signs of heresy.
"Skip, skip. What's the mission?"
No matter what Greyfax said, Datch gave the same reply.
He didn't want dialogue.
Lore was for Hammer-nerds, not him.
After several loops of this, Greyfax finally relented.
"Very well. If you insist on something to do—keep an eye on Celestine."
"I don't trust this 'Living Saint.' The galaxy is too dark and vicious. I suspect she's poison wrapped in honey—sent by the wicked gods."
"When the ignorant masses finish tasting the sweetness… tragedy will follow."
[Mission: Monitor Living Saint Celestine]
To an Inquisitor, any miracle is suspect—most likely a lie of the Chaos Gods. Greyfax hopes you will watch Celestine and uncover anomalies in her behavior.
Rewards: 800 XP, 800 Points, Reputation +60, Jump Pack ×1
"I'll help you."
Datch hopped away, leaving Greyfax staring after him.
"Where did that man come from… and why are his mannerisms so bizarre?"
…
A battered Imperial fleet of broken warships and weary souls fled the pursuing Chaos armada toward the edge of the system.
No one cheered.
Survival tasted like ash.
Cadia had held eight hundred and fifty million souls.
Now, barely four million had escaped the surface.
Unable to enter the Warp, every ship pushed plasma drives to the limit to outrun their hunters.
"Whatever lies ahead—grind it to dust."
Tor Garadon, Third Captain of the Imperial Fists, roared the order.
He commanded the Phalanx to fire everything, carving a path of blood and flame for the ships behind.
Boarding a transport wasn't safety.
Under brutal load, the plasma drive of the agri-transporter Sacred Seraph's Pride failed. The ship began to fall behind.
"Abandon them," Garadon commanded without hesitation.
Even though the Pride carried hundreds of thousands of Imperial citizens.
"This is dishonorable—we will not leave a single survivor."
The captains of Emperor's Wrath and Victor's Aegis scorned Garadon's pragmatism and moved to aid the stricken Pride.
Noble.
And foolish.
Warp-empowered, the Chaos fleet's firepower dwarfed the Imperials'.
While Emperor's Wrath and Victor's Aegis rescued Cadian soldiers and refugees, the Chaos fleet arrived.
A storm of shells obliterated Emperor's Wrath in moments. More than two hundred thousand souls died.
Victor's Aegis was pounded. Her captain fell; officers panicked.
Iron Revenant signaled urgently, ordering the ship to close with the Mechanicus flotilla for a slim chance at survival.
But in terror, the executive officer ignored Cawl's analysis and ordered an emergency Warp jump.
The rash act delivered one hundred and fifty thousand Imperial citizens into the feast of Slaanesh's daemons.
…
"A foolish decision. Little better than suicide."
Cawl watched Victor's Aegis tear into the Warp. The last scraps of humanity in him flared—then logic smothered it.
"Continue ahead. Ignore any vessel that has lost propulsion."
He had barely finished when clamor erupted outside the bridge.
Through his linked Skitarii, he saw the nameless warrior trying to enter the command deck.
"What does he want?"
Bewilderment flickered in Cawl's core logic, but recalling the man's earlier antics, he ordered the guards to admit him.
Datch barreled onto the bridge, ignoring protests, following his mini-map straight to Cawl.
…