40k: Midnight Blade.

Chapter 664 46. Interlude: Burning Kamas (Part )
Caryl Rohals lived by a principle he practiced - to solve all problems with a knife.

This is not something to be proud of, after all, this principle is too stupid. If killing to stop killing can solve all problems, then Kamas will never fall into the flames of war.

But if someone wants to find out the reason and know why he adhered to this principle so firmly in the past, he will probably find a surprising answer after a long search: it is simply because Caryl Rohals had no choice.

He does not understand the strategic depth, how to control people's hearts and minds, how to control government affairs, and how to turn a ruin into a thriving and progressive city from scratch.
So they had to kill him. What else could they do? Did they have to learn from scratch? Of course they could, but they didn't have the time - there were too many things that had happened.

The four words "lack of time" were like a sharp sword hanging over the heads of all those who could see through the fog during the Great Crusade, shining a cold light on them. Under the threat of this sword, even the Emperor had to compromise in many places.

But now what?

Khalil pulls out a right hand.

The chest of a beast was torn apart, and it wailed, trying to struggle but unable to do anything. Its limbs had been cut into pieces, and it was obvious that a butcher had patiently and carefully dismembered it.

Its sticky blood and splattered flesh were scattered around the scorched earth. It should have seeped into the ground, but it was bound by some living shadows and could not sink.

Khalil leaned down and looked into its only remaining eye, then suddenly thrust his right hand deep into its chest again. He groped, ignoring the struggles of the hairy, winged, lion-headed monster, and focused on doing his job.

Not long after, a turbid light pink gem was taken out from his chest. Khalil frowned, raised his right hand, and looked at the sky of Kamas filled with gunfire for a few seconds.
A cold snort came from his shadow.

"That creature is starting to make big bets, Khalil."

Khalil shook his head, held the gem in his palm, turned around and jumped down the huge hill of corpses, sliding down into a trench full of corpses at a speed that was difficult to explain.

"Why? Do you have a different opinion?"

"I don't think they are gambling. The fall of Conrad Kamas is a foregone conclusion. Although the fleet that Leon pre-deployed can easily destroy the enemy's warships, the chaos pollution has already spread to Kamas."

"Soon, the surviving people in this world will be taken away from their homeland. Perhaps after a few centuries, when the purification is complete, Kamas can be redeveloped, but that will have nothing to do with them now."

Walking in the soft and wet trench at an unpredictable speed, Khalil spoke these words with a calm expression, completely ignoring the waves of coldness coming from his shadow - until he reached the end of the trench half a second later.

This place looks like it has been bombed and is completely unrecognizable. The only way to tell from the road behind is that this was once part of a trench.

"But appropriate revenge is necessary," he added, his breath cold. "How about cutting off their outstretched claws, Conrad?"

"At your service, Father."

The coldness subsided, and Khalil squatted down and began to dig the ground with his hands. Compared with his previous killings, his movements were not fast at all, and even seemed gentle.

The dirt and rubble were removed, and a large portion of the fragments of the Empire's unique cheap engineering products also occupied a large part of it. Soon, a half-destroyed Chimera chariot was seen again.

Khalil reached out and grasped the exposed steel beam at the front, and the shadow under his feet climbed up like a living thing. Then, he just raised his hand slightly and lifted the chariot out of the ground and put it aside.

His movements were very gentle, but for the passengers inside it was like reliving an earthquake, and several shouts were heard.

Khalil tilted his head, took a step to the left, and narrowly avoided several beams of light shot from the gap inside the tank, then knocked on the hull very politely.

"Cease fire, soldiers. This is Inquisitor Caril Rohals. On behalf of the Inquisition, I would like to call on the combatants in this Chimaera chariot. Please report to me within one minute. Violators will be punished."

He gave a time limit of one minute, but the soldiers moved much faster. Twelve seconds after he finished speaking, the already dented door of the Chimera was torn apart by several knives.

Seven soldiers came out, covered in blood and wounds. The leader was a bearded man. He stood up and saluted Khalil, but his face was suspicious.

"Sir, you don't look like a judge. Where are your followers? Where are the others? We have been buried for more than an hour. You can't have dug us out by yourself, right?"

Khalil nodded at him, then pulled up the Sky Eagle emblem and the Inquisition emblem from his neck and showed them to the man, which was considered to have initially dispelled his doubts.

However, this was not enough, so he raised his right hand again, recalling the expressions of the priests on Lion El'Jonson's ship when they prayed on weekdays, and imitated them.

He closed his eyes, held the Sky Eagle emblem in his right hand, and saluted the Emperor devoutly: "May His light soothe your body and mind, and regain your courage, soldiers."

Bursts of golden light - or rather disguised golden light - burst out from the eagle's eyes and sprinkled on the soldiers' shoulders, healing their wounds before they knelt, wept, and trembled.

Soon, a frenzy of enthusiasm surged among the remaining soldiers. The soldier who had previously doubted Khalil was the first to stand at attention and salute, reporting his name and rank.

"Gerhard, sir, corporal of the 11th Company of the 6th Armored Regiment of the Kamas Defense Army."

"Nice to meet you, Corporal, but don't get too excited. Our primary goal next is not to return to the battlefield. Soldiers, is there anything you need in the car? No? Very good, follow me. In the name of the Emperor, we have important things to do."

As soon as he finished speaking, he turned around and led this small team on a road completely opposite to the war front. For the entire war in Kamas, this team was so small that it was insignificant, but things soon changed.

Just two hours later, the number of people in the team increased from eight to four hundred and sixty-nine, and at the same time, their route quietly reversed. Another four and a half hours later, when it was almost dark, the number of re-enlisted soldiers was enough to be reorganized into an entire infantry regiment and two armored companies, but this was still not the end.

At 11:53 p.m., the war command center on the Kamas space station received a communication signal from a position that had been confirmed to be 'lost' three hours after the war began.

Prall Fallin, the supreme commander of the Kamas Defense Force at the time, personally picked up the signal before anyone else, without even giving it time to connect to the public channel. He learned a piece of news that excited him.

After hanging up the phone, the marshal with red eyes immediately roared in his temporary command center.

"Send out all our fighter planes! Take all the ammunition and head to this coordinate point for bombing!"

"But, sir?"

His adjutant immediately questioned, and other senior officers showed the same expression. Prall ignored them and rushed to the command desk in a hurry, and began to manually issue orders with his highest authority. He even called the last part of the remaining ammunition in the space station's weapon array. Just then, there was a flash of artillery fire outside the window, and the vacuum was illuminated as if it were daytime. Several gunboats rushed past, and a behemoth belonging to the Dark Angels drove to the other side of the space station with murderous intent, chasing some fleeing ships of the Ten Thousand Eyes War Gang.
The marshal's face was revealed to be extremely hideous in such a war.

"We were able to reorganize the troops that were scattered during the day and recapture four positions along the east side of the Duddon River."

He issued orders and whispered explanations, appearing both focused and irritable.

"It was done by an Inquisitor, by the Emperor. Whatever he was planning to do in Camas before this, I will give him a medal, no matter if he lives or dies after the battle. Adjutant, come here!"

His adjutant rushed to his side with great tacit understanding and took over the command console.

"Pass on my order to dispatch the 3rd Armored Regiment, the 5th Armored Regiment, the 2nd Artillery Regiment, and the 11th and 14th Infantry Regiments from the western front to support the positions at the coordinates."

"I only give them two hours. Do whatever it takes to get to the coordinates. Do you understand? The airstrikes must not stop until support arrives! We must contain those Chaos scum at both ends of the Dadon River!"

"Understood, sir."

The adjutant carried out all his orders in an orderly manner. The communication network built by the battleship cluster and the Kamas underground facilities was indestructible. Even the advent of chaos could not completely destroy it.

The marshal's order was clearly transmitted to the ground, but this was not the end, and the adjutant knew it very well. He raised his head and looked at Prall, only to find that the old marshal, who had worked with him for twenty years and had already turned gray, was actually smiling.

"I know what you want to ask, Fix." The old marshal said in a low voice. "But don't rush now. The traitors haven't reached the ground yet. Tell the lords of the Knights, I guarantee with my life that now is still not a suitable time for them to land."

"Are you still going to keep them on standby?"

"This is my right."

The old marshal narrowed his eyes and answered like this, his expression suddenly becoming extremely cold.

His adjutant raised his left hand and gestured, indicating that he had connected the marshal to a new communication channel - at the same time, on the bridge of the Edge of Reason, Chapter Master Raphael heard his voice clearly and distinctly.

"The Lion himself has given me this responsibility, and I am the commander-in-chief - I will take full responsibility for this, but if anyone dares to disobey orders, they will be immediately declared a traitor."

"I respect your will, Marshal Prall."

The Chapter Master replied calmly, and raised his left hand slightly to stop the anxious Dark Angels. They were all fully armed and murderous, just wanting to set foot on Kamas immediately. Only Raphael himself remained motionless and calm.

He turned his head, looked at his brothers, and said word by word, "We will wait, my lord, until you think the time is right."

The old marshal laughed and hung up the phone.
-
Khalil reached out his hand and carried himself to the top of the trench in a mortal way. He changed into a short uniform of the Defense Forces that he took out from the crate. The emblem of the Inquisition was still hanging on his chest, and the emblem of the Sky Eagle was wrapped around his right hand.

The blood that had dyed his entire body red was gone, replaced by the original paleness. His face was blurred, but his eyes were shining, allowing everyone crowded in the trenches, positions, and all directions to see clearly.

Khalil looked around, then raised his right hand high, and a golden light flashed. Compared with the dark darkness above their heads, this little light was insignificant, but what about the people who were gazing at this glory?
They stared at it intently.

Khalil spoke slowly.

"The Emperor is with us."

He only said this one sentence, and his voice was so clear that it reached everyone's ears. However, I don't know if it was a coincidence, but right after this sentence, the dark sky like a curtain was torn apart by a sudden burst of light.

A huge beam of light, piercing the sky and the earth, fell from the sky and landed accurately at the far end of the position, in the surging turbid shadows on the other side of the Dadon River, which was already submerged and piled up with corpses.

In an instant, the night became as bright as day, and countless ghosts and monsters disintegrated in the beam of light, emitting unheard-of screams. They had just crossed the waves of chaos to the world, and now they were about to return to the waves again.

And this was just the clarion call for the beginning of the destruction against them. Soon, even before the light beam disappeared, hundreds of fighters, bombers and gunboats tore through the dark fragments of the curtain, descended from the sky, and brought more destruction to the other side of the river.

The crowd surged, and an unparalleled sound erupted. The gunner began to load ammunition with great joy, the machine gunner took a deep breath and held the gun tightly, his assistant loaded the belt and told him which rounds were tracer bullets, and the crew members in the tank or armored vehicle who swore to live and die with this machine put on their helmets, and the engine roared. The soldiers of the infantry regiment rushed to the firing hole with courage and revenge, holding their weapons tightly.
Khalil jumped off the top of the trench and did something he had never done before - he picked up a lasgun, loaded a new magazine, and began to wait for the demon tide to approach.

Kamath was doomed to fall, yes, there was no doubt about that, but he could do more than just kill.

On a macro level, from today on, no matter where the Kamath Defense Forces are ordered to go, the fact that they once fought alongside an "Emperor-possessed Inquisitor" will follow each of them. From today on, the "Emperor" will truly be with them.

This is what he did for the defense army, and behind the battle line of the Dadon River, the civilians who gave up going to other positions to kill and instead resisted the demon tide here and got more time to retreat were able to survive more.
An old dog with new teeth? Khalil thought with a hint of regret.

He raised his gun and began to aim at the demons whose numbers showed no sign of decreasing.

On a macro level, he had done everything he could, but from a micro perspective, that is, from his subjective point of view, one thing was not yet finished - the main force of the Ten Thousand Eyes War Gang had not yet landed on Kamas.

They did not teleport, did not airdrop, nor did they arrive here through Chaos magic. Since the war began, they have only done two things. One is to send many small ships to break into the encirclement of the Dark Angels.

This behavior has been determined to be intentional, as all the warship wreckage that fell into the atmosphere of Kamas created an endless and continuous tide of Chaos at the crash site.

The second thing was to avoid. Their main force, those dirty warships that were stolen and disappeared, did not engage in direct battle with the Dark Angels, and remained indifferent no matter how the Knights mocked and insulted them through communications.

It is unprecedented to fight a void naval battle to this extent. Combined with what they have done in the past, it is hard not to suspect that they actually have far-reaching ambitions.

But it doesn't matter, Khalil thought, and pulled the trigger. A beam of light shot out from the muzzle and hit a flying bird accurately, burning it into pieces.

When they get to the surface of Camas, they'll find me here.

He smiled and squeezed the trigger.

(End of this chapter)