Emperor's Bane

Chapter 1001 The Day the Bottom Line Was Crossed (12)

This is the thirty-third day since the start of the Battle of Taran.

It was also the first day that the Death Guard launched its offensive against the world again after a period of silence.

on this day.

Orange rain began to fall from the sky over Taran.

……

Sergeant Chris of the Raven Guard was the first person on Taran to notice the anomaly.

It was four in the morning when he woke up from three hours of sound sleep. After greeting the brothers on guard duty on the perimeter, he slipped out of the underground fortifications and came to an observation post set up by the legion in the jungle, where he took over from another combat brother stationed there.

For the next twelve Terran Standards, he will be responsible for guarding this place, searching for, capturing, and killing any invading enemies.

He recalled that in the three days leading up to the start of the Battle of Taran, he fought no fewer than seven battles within a two-kilometer radius of the outpost, and six Deathguards fell to his gun. However, at the cost, he also lost two of his comrades-in-arms: they were among the most distinguished veterans in the Nineteenth Army.

Looking back now, it still evokes a sense of感慨 (gǎnkǎi, deep emotion/reflection).

However, compared to the start of the war, Sergeant Chris is somewhat complacent today: he hasn't seen a real enemy for more than ten days.

The front lines are quiet now.

In the three days leading up to the Death Guard's massive invasion of the Taran surface, the fighting in the jungle was almost non-stop. Countless small-scale skirmishes, which were completely disorderly, eventually escalated into a large-scale battle with considerable casualties.

The Mortarians' warriors left thousands of corpses in those three days, yet achieved almost nothing.

Meanwhile, the Taran defenders opposite them, even though they successfully held their line in the rainforest, suffered over a thousand casualties.

Of course, the Raven Guards only accounted for a small portion of these casualties: the main victims came from the Imperial Fist who held their ground on the plains and hills. It was because they held the line so firmly that the Death Guard, with no hope of breaking through, had to risk entering the rainforest where the Raven Guards were hiding.

It can be said that the ferocity of the Battle of Taran exceeded the expectations of both the attackers and defenders from the very beginning.

Therefore, when the Death Guard arrived on the fourth day of the war, instead of launching a large-scale offensive, they gradually retreated to the edge of the rainforest and began to fortify their landing sites on the surface of Taran. The Raven Guard and the Imperial Fist did not take the opportunity to launch a counterattack, but instead hid in the dense forest licking their blackened wounds.

They had assumed that the Death Guard's second wave of attacks would arrive soon, but on the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh days, Mortarion's offspring still showed no intention of seeking revenge. Taran, which was in the midst of war, was eerily quiet, like a dead city frozen in time.

This standstill lasted for a full month.

However, both sides knew that this was just a brief respite before another storm was brewing.

The Raven Guard had hoped that the Death Guard would back down, but when they heard that more Sons of Mortalion had been deployed to the surface and that Mandeville was sending a steady stream of transport ships, they could only accelerate the repair of their fortress and prepare to continue this brutal war of attrition.

Meanwhile, they were also constantly discussing it.

If the Death Guard dares to launch a new offensive, where will their confidence come from?

There seem to be too many answers.

Admittedly, the Death Guard paid their dues in the first few days of the war, but no Astartes Legion will fall because of these losses. As long as they are willing to continue bleeding on Taran soil, they will always find a way to see through the Taran's tricks.

The question is, which method will they choose?
At least when war broke out again, the Imperial Fist and the Raven Guard still hadn't come to a definitive answer.

However, Sergeant Chris, who was on the front lines of the war, would soon find out.

It was only a little past seven in the morning when he heard a muffled sound from the direction of the horizon.

That's not a sound that nature could make.

"By Corax..."

Without the slightest hesitation, Sergeant Chris, who had eighty years of service experience, quickly adjusted his state, the last trace of laziness in his mind vanished, and his body pounced to the battle position like a cheetah, gripping his weapon tightly and focusing all his energy on what was in front of him.

Behind him, on his flank, came extremely low rustling sounds from the deep, misty forest. They all came from those familiar, reassuring locations: here, Sergeant Chris was not fighting alone.

He waited quietly for the first enemy, who came into the Raven Guard's line of sight two minutes later.

It was a row of bombers that were both familiar and unfamiliar to him, specially modified, the Death Guards.

……

As mentioned before, Sergeant Chris was not an inexperienced recruit.

He had eighty years of service experience. Although he couldn't compare to the seasoned Terrans, he had at least witnessed the grandeur of the Great Crusade's end. He had participated in great battles worthy of being recorded in epic tales, seen hundreds of thousands of Astartes warriors shouting the names of the Emperor and Primarchs, and witnessed towering divine machines and formidable opponents who could rival them.

Even so, the scene he saw in the next few minutes still felt unfamiliar to him.

Accompanied by the roar of jet engines and the invisible iron wings cutting through the air currents, it was like an ancient herd of beasts migrating across endless water and grass. The dull roar and drumbeats came from the very edge of hearing, rushing up in the blink of an eye, making people's scalps tingle and the stones and soil at their feet tremble.

The raven guards, hiding in the rainforest, stroked the trembling ground beneath their feet, then looked up at the few remaining gaps in the treetops high above.

They were all too familiar with that sound.

Over the past few decades, they have fought countless battles amidst this deafening roar.

Back then, the sound of these steel behemoths galloping through the sky symbolized a sign of safety; they would unleash blood and fire equally upon their enemies, paving new paths for the legions on the ground. But now, when that familiar sound that once brought a sense of security reappears, it evokes a completely different feeling.

“The Emperor…”

Sergeant Chris muttered to himself.

He looked up and realized that the sunlight that would have gently dappled his face through the gaps in the tree canopy had been swallowed up by a much thicker shadow.

The sharp-eyed Astartes quickly realized that the shadows were not dark clouds or anything else: they were densely packed, continuous fighter planes.

Valkyrie, Storm Falcon, Archaeopteryx, Thunderhawk, Flame Raptor, Orgus, Raider...

Those who came rushing in like death were all names familiar to the Imperial soldiers.

Their numbers were simply overwhelming, like a swarm of locusts blotting out the sky, swallowing up the heavens in rows and rows, stretching from the edge of sight to the very horizon, from above the heads of the Dark Raven Guardians all the way to the edge of the unseen horizon. The sun was obscured, the wind was swallowed up, and the countless fighter jets flying overhead stunned everyone who had unfortunately witnessed their terrifying forms, until a piercing scream from the sky jolted them awake from their astonishment.

"This is hardly a fair fight..."

As the first bomb was dropped from the modified Valkyrie's compartment, Sergeant Chris could only murmur bitterly.

He didn't stand there and accept his fate, but immediately turned around and left his post: although it was an excellent observation post and shelter, it couldn't effectively block such a large-scale air attack, and he had to retreat to the underground fortifications a few hundred meters behind him.

As he sprinted through the dense forest he knew so well, Sergeant Chris caught a glimpse of other figures running at the same pace: before the first Death Guard bomb even hit the ground, the Raven Guards had already retreated back into their fortifications.

However, the expected explosions did not occur behind them as scheduled.

Thanks to his Astartes superhuman senses, even as he was running at full speed, Sergeant Chris was still able to detect something behind him.

Based on the timing, the bomb should have already been dropped.

Based on the distance, the deafening explosion that could rip off eardrums, the heat wave that could scald the power armor, and the shockwave that could knock him to the ground should have arrived a second or two ago.

But now, that hasn't happened.

Even if there were problems with the bombs, it's impossible for hundreds of bombs to malfunction simultaneously.

Could it be?

An even more terrifying thought quietly took shape in the mind of the Raven Guard. As he ran for his life, Sergeant Chris quickly turned his head, glanced behind him, and looked at the places that should have been swallowed by the heat wave.

"Damn it!"

The moment his gaze swept over, the Dark Raven Guard uttered a curse.

Because he saw it, he saw that the bombs did indeed fall to the ground as he had expected, but they were not detonated: when these cone-shaped grim reapers fell from the sky and cracked on the ground, what flowed out of the cracks in their bodies was not gunpowder.

Instead, it was a cloud of yellowish-green smoke.

The Raven Guards are all too familiar with this: back in the Great Crusade, they had dropped it countless times on worlds that refused to give up resistance.

That was a lightweight viral bomb.

It's fucking: the Life Eater virus.

The Raven Guard silently turned its head and sprinted away at twice the speed of before, simultaneously activating its power armor protection at top speed.

In the past, this reliable armor had protected his life in countless gas battles: hopefully it will live up to his trust when facing Deathguard, which is known for its chemical warfare.
Sergeant Chris could hear the rustling sound of the poisonous fog spreading rapidly behind him, but what made the Raven Guard even more desperate was that no matter how anxious he was, he could not outrun the formation of aircraft in the sky: the hundreds of meters that would normally pass in an instant now seemed so far away.

Before he even reached the underground bunker, Deathguard fighters had already swooped in front of him, dropping bombs with a roar of their engines, their corpses billowing with yellow-green and white smoke.

But the raven guards with the eyes soon discovered that not all the fighters dropped bombs.

There were also some modified fighter jets that flew almost close to the treetops, with huge containers hanging from their wings, constantly pouring out unknown smoke of various colors.

The most intense and abundant color is orange.

It was an extremely deep orange, so deep that it could almost be mistaken for black.

Hundreds of planes flew in unison over Sergeant Chris, each one unrestrainedly spewing out this deep orange mist from its wings, like a depressing artificial rain: these misty objects seemed to have weight, and they descended into the rainforest faster than expected.

The raven guards watched as the dense canopy of trees, so lush it blocked out the sunlight, withered and shriveled the moment it touched the orange objects. The vibrant green leaves, so green in the summer, turned yellowish-brown in the blink of an eye, as if late autumn had passed.

This irreversible death was accompanied by the slow descent of a thick orange fog, which, like a demon, devoured every towering tree in its sight.

The Raven Guard's face darkened further, but he did not stop running. Instead, he focused intently on completing the final stretch of the route. However, just as he was about to reach the underground fortifications he had been longing for, an aerial bomb landed to his left.

Before he could react, a pale white, almost transparent cloud of smoke, unlike anything he had ever seen before, had already obscured his entire view in front of him, and in the blink of an eye, it had also obscured every inch of the world around him.

"..."

Without hesitation, Sergeant Chris turned his power armor to its highest protection level, then lowered his head, temporarily stopped breathing, and plunged into the white mist.

A few breaths later, he burst out of the white mist and disappeared into the entrance of the underground fortifications like a shadow.

Behind him were dozens of Dark Raven Guards who emerged one after another from the white mist.

The combat brothers responsible for guarding the underground fortifications had already noticed the anomaly on the surface and had made all the necessary preparations before the observation posts returned.

The guards carefully counted each of the brothers who rushed into the underground fortifications, checking for any Death Guards who had taken advantage of the chaos. After the last person on the list crawled in, they quickly closed the gate, sealed all the gaps as fast as possible, and activated the surrounding automatic protection.

Meanwhile, the pharmacists and combat comrades who had been waiting on the side rushed forward. The ventilation pipes on the wall continuously poured out cold air to eliminate the remaining poison gas in the air as quickly as possible. The pharmacists checked on the people who had rushed back from outside while watching over them and preparing various anti-poisoning agents.

Every face was filled with seriousness.

And it's unbelievable.

"The Emperor is above..."

In the shadows, someone was muttering to themselves.

"Those Death Guards..."

"They actually... dare to do this?"

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There will be another update later.

Both this chapter and the next chapter are counted today and will not affect tomorrow's update schedule.

(End of this chapter)