V3 Chapter 50: Maybe His Ancestors Are Getting High
Necron Overlord Hektarren Sautekh had returned to the underground tomb.
He sat upon his throne, the runes along its sides lighting one after another. Before him, a holographic projection unfolded showing Vulcantia's ash plains, where the landing forces of the lesser races advanced upon his defence line.
Hektarren's metal knuckles tapped lightly against the throne's armrest.
Contrary to his expectations, the lesser race invading this time was proving harder to deal with than he had anticipated. Their weapons were primitive in structure, their energy efficiency poor, and their material craftsmanship unremarkable.
Yet on the battlefield, those weapons were genuinely effective.
Their crude armour pushed forward against gauss fire, tracked vehicles carving paths through the scrap heaps. The flesh-soldiers followed behind the armour, enduring the effects of the silence nodes and the lingering shriek of the Doom Scythes, yet still holding formation.
Hektarren had already committed a portion of his Destroyers.
He had also woken several massive constructs, a number of which were capable of annihilating an entire flesh-life legion in short order. By his old data models, this lesser race should have lost the ability to advance after the first wave of long-range strikes.
Reality was not conforming to his calculations.
The lesser race's line was still moving forward.
Slowly, but without stopping.
"This is not reasonable."
Hektarren said.
Septarakh, the Tomb Cryptek standing beneath the throne, did not answer immediately. His mechanical arm interfaced with the battlefield projection, breaking apart and reassembling section after section of observational data.
Firing logs from the Doomsday Arks, close-combat footage from the Skorpekh Destroyers, Tesla impact data from the Annihilation Barges: all of it was projected into the air.
Septarakh's voice was even and cold.
"The invaders' performance does not match existing samples."
"Their kinetic weapons resemble low-order chemical-propellant arms in form, but the lethality they deliver exceeds projections. Their vehicles' loading speed, sustained fire capacity, engine stability, and armour endurance all show anomalies."
Another set of images was enlarged.
It showed several human tanks continuing to advance even after gauss weapons had stripped away their outer armour. Their repair vehicles had not yet drawn near, and yet the turrets had already reacquired their targets.
"Their flesh units show anomalies as well."
Septarakh continued.
"Fear response is below projection. Fatigue degradation is below projection. The probability of command collapse following casualties is below projection. The physical performance displayed far exceeds the average this species should possess."
Hektarren fell silent for a moment.
"So. They are a band of lowlifes disguised as a lesser race?"
He was genuinely at a loss.
He had seen the ships of these lesser races, and he had seen their fighters. Crude, inefficient constructions that relied on numbers and sacrifice to make up for their flaws.
And then there were those half-mechanical beings.
They mixed faith, scrap iron, spice, and simple logic circuits together, and then claimed to understand machinery.
And yet, right now, this force, which appeared to be the most ordinary and most primitive of all their ground forces, was displaying combat capability that exceeded his projections.
Septarakh's optic lens flickered once.
"The cause cannot yet be confirmed. Recommendation: capture a sample, or destroy a high-value enemy unit and recalibrate the model."
Hektarren let out a cold snort.
Just then, the tomb control pillar behind Septarakh suddenly lit up.
Several warning runes surfaced from the darkness, then bloomed into a harsh green.
"My lord."
Septarakh turned his head.
"Outside intruders are approaching the phase gate hall."
Hektarren's body leaned forward slightly.
"Again?"
There was a trace of irritation in his voice.
These lesser races seemed to be fond of this approach. Draw attention first with a mass of gunfire and steel vehicles, then send a small elite force toward the key nodes.
It had been so aboard the ships, so on the surface, and now not even his underground tomb was spared.
Hektarren sat upright, and the blackstone runes beneath his throne let out a low resonant hum.
"Send the Lychguard into the phase gate hall."
"Seal all secondary passages. Open the second-tier dimensional traps. Since these lesser races are so fond of decapitation strikes, let us indulge them a little."
Septarakh lowered his head.
"By your command."
Hektarren's gaze settled back onto the battlefield projection.
"Wake every available Deathmark kill team."
"Order them to hunt down every high-value target the enemy has."
Septarakh accepted the order slowly, and a cold echo rolled through the depths of the tomb.
Certain long-dormant vaults began to open.
Hektarren leaned back into his throne once more.
Truthfully, the enemy's combat strength had somewhat exceeded his expectations. But it was still a long way from anything that would alarm him.
He still held the tomb, the phase gates, his Destroyers and Deathmarks, and those terrifying massive constructs.
More importantly, he himself had not yet entered the field.
"Redeploy the outer defence line."
Hektarren said.
"Send the Destroyers to cut into the gaps in their armour. Pull the Doomsday Arks back three hundred units and have them continue striking their heavy vehicles. Leave those noisy bipedal machines to the massive constructs."
Septarakh's mechanical arm moved at once, feeding the orders into the tomb matrix.
Deep underground, more green light kindled.
The Blade Unbound, pilot of the Golden Tarantula, Sir Aurek Arachnus, was running across the ash plains.
Far off, the pyramid-shaped massive construct locked onto him once more.
Its outer runes lit up, and a beam capable of destroying an entire tank squadron fired from its summit. Aurek dodged with an agility that made no reasonable sense, and the beam grazed past the Golden Tarantula's flank, ploughing a glowing furrow into the ground.
Aurek did not stop.
His speed had reached a degree that any observer would struggle to comprehend. The Golden Tarantula's reactions were faster than in any battle before, every turn of its frame as though it already knew where the enemy fire would land.
Aurek remained joined to the Knight's throne.
His body and mind had become one with the sacred war machine.
He could feel the machine spirit's emotions, and he could feel the murmuring of ancestral minds deep within the throne. In the past, those voices had given him warnings, counsel, and restraint.
Now, all of them were urging him forward.
Aurek had never seen the Golden Tarantula's machine spirit this exhilarated.
It was roaring.
It was howling.
It was pouring its emotion out without restraint.
That savage fervour, in turn, affected Aurek. His breathing fell into rhythm with the machine's engine, his heartbeat overlapping with the tempo of the auto-loader.
He wanted to fire.
And so, the Golden Tarantula answered him.
The auto-loader began working furiously, feeding rounds into the chamber at a speed beyond imagining. The rapid-fire battle cannon poured high-explosive shells into the dense enemy formation, explosions spreading in a continuous wave across the ash plains.
Aurek had already lost track of when he had begun firing.
He only knew that he had not stopped.
The shells seemed inexhaustible, the machine spirit satisfying his battle-hunger in a way that defied all reason. Every shot landed as though pre-calibrated, high-explosive rounds falling among the Necron Warrior phalanxes, the Scarab swarms, and the hovering vehicles, tearing the green light to pieces.
The Golden Tarantula ran on.
Aurek began to love the feeling.
A wind from some distant world drifted through his consciousness, carrying the scent of open grassland. It was not Vulcantia's wind, nor the wind of his own homeworld, and yet it made his movements faster still, made his fire more dangerous still.
He had even outpaced the main force, charging out at the very front.
Countless green beams surged toward him.
Gauss beams grazed across the Golden Tarantula's outer plating, Tesla arcs bursting at the edge of its ion shield. The Doomsday Ark in the distance tried to reacquire him, but he changed direction each time an instant before it fired.
Aurek paid it no mind at all.
He let out a roar and continued charging toward the pyramid-shaped massive construct.
The Golden Tarantula answered his fury.
A long, resonant cry rose from deep within the Knight, passing through armour, engine, and throne-link, carrying across the entire battlefield.
The sound rose above the gunfire, above the explosions, above even the shriek of the Necron weapons.
Across the whole ground battlefield, every Knight suit answered the long cry.
Like a pack of wolves howling together.
Kleist raised his head and looked into the distance.
The long cry from the four Knights nearly drowned out the gunfire. They had been running faster and faster, growing more savage in their movements, since the fighting began.
They were driving deep into the enemy line.
Nearly reckless with abandon.
Kleist watched the distant flashes of fire, and couldn't help but frown.
What was it with these Knight nobles, suddenly acting like they'd taken something.
"Fuck."
Stroud's voice came through the vox.
"These Knights have gone completely fucking mad. They just blew that damn pyramid-looking thing to pieces."
The channel fell briefly silent.
Then Elias cut in.
"I think maybe their ancestors are getting high."
He paused, then added.
"First time feeling the boss's power is like that. Give them a few more goes and they'll get used to it."
A few stifled laughs and curses came through the channel.
Kleist did not join in the chatter.
His attention was fixed ahead.
The Eisenmark Armoured Regiment was advancing, the Fury of Balhaut's hull creeping slowly forward across the ash plains. Leman Russ and Rogal Dorn heavy tanks spread out to either side, their fire arcing over wreckage and scrap heaps toward the Necron line within the grey mist.
In the distance, a three-legged metal xenos burst out from among the burning wreckage.
It raised a great green phase-blade, moving with a speed that seemed impossible for so heavy a construct. The first Leman Russ tried to turn, its turret only just beginning to depress, when the blade tore its frontal armour open.
A second Leman Russ opened fire.
The shell burst against its flank, but only shattered a single layer of living metal, which quickly repaired itself. The Skorpekh Destroyer plunged through the smoke of the blast, and in the next instant was already at the tank's side.
The green phase-blade swept sideways.
The Leman Russ's side armour was cut open, its tracks and turret both losing control at once.
A third tank reversed, trying to open the distance.
The Skorpekh Destroyer's three legs drove hard against the rubble and it lunged straight onto the hull. Its weapon punched into the base of the turret, and with a violent wrench, tore the entire turret out of position.
Kleist's voice rang out inside the cabin.
"Gunner."
"Target that three-legged metal bastard."
The Fury of Balhaut's main gun began to turn.
The gunner asked no questions.
Range data, wind speed, ground vibration, and target movement speed all fed into the fire-control instrument at once. The Tech-adept accompanying the tank murmured a brief prayer at its side, and the machine spirit deep within the hull gave a low answering hum.
The Skorpekh Destroyer seemed to sense the danger.
It raised its head, its green gaze cutting through the grey mist toward the direction of the Fury of Balhaut.
Kleist met its gaze coldly.
"Fire."
A tremendous roar shook the entire Baneblade.
The terrible shell tore through the grey mist and struck the Skorpekh Destroyer's position directly. The explosion swallowed the metal xenos, the surrounding tank wreckage, and several Necron Warriors all at once.
The shockwave swept across the nearby ground.
When the flash faded, all that remained of that stretch of ground was a heap of twisted metal and fading green fragments.
Kleist drew his gaze back.
He did not celebrate, and said nothing more.
There were more enemies ahead.
Deep within the grey mist, new green beams were igniting. Several Ghost Arks glided low along the ground, the Tesla weapons of an Annihilation Barge began charging, and a Doomsday Ark in the distance had already realigned its cannon.
"Load the guns."
Kleist said.
"Ten o'clock. Continue advancing!"
The Fury of Balhaut let out another roar.
The Eisenmark Armoured Regiment advanced behind it, gunfire once more knitting itself into an unbroken sheet across the ash plains. The distant cry of the Knight suits had not yet faded, as though urging every steel-clad body onward to keep charging.
This battlefield had ignited entirely.
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