40k: Midnight Blade.

Chapter 724 16. Catching the Eagle (Part )

"Anazion?"

no answer.

Restart the communication process A-23-09, the restart failed, the process did not respond. The initial judgment is that the communication is interrupted. Call the communication protocol No. 29 to restart the process, the restart failed, and the process did not respond.

reboot.

No response.

Continue restarting to hold the call until it is answered.

Belisarius Cole gently put down the tools in his hands and temporarily left the workbench in front of him.

He was surrounded by darkness, and most of his body was shrouded in it, making him look as if he was standing in nothingness. The workbench with a hazy glow was a boundary stone, used to mark his existence.
Unfortunately, it only worked so far, because Kaul had already turned and left.

The light was gone, leaving only darkness, ancient dust and hollow winds howling through the mysterious machinery that was the product of someone's ingenuity and sweat.

They are waiting, calling, longing to be reawakened - we want to be used again - they whispered to him.

It was an attractive suggestion, but Kaur could not agree to it.

After all, they were not his design, he did not understand them, and it was difficult for him to understand them. And he would never wake any of them under these circumstances, and if he did, the results could be disastrous.

The man who had entrusted him with this laboratory and these machines had placed great trust in him, and Cawl would not fail him, even if his instincts as a mechanical priest demanded it at the volume of his roar.

The reason why humans are nobler than beasts is that they can overcome their instincts.

Call quickened his pace, leaving the darkness.

The core of his engine was roaring - the boiling emotion was familiar to him, he had experienced hatred in detail long before he got the fragment.

But the situation back then was probably different from now. He soon realized that he had to restrain himself, otherwise his engine would overload, and the series of consequences that followed were unbearable for both him and Chemos now.

He restrained himself, without realizing that he was taking a comically deep breath: he had long since stopped needing air.

After several minutes, he finally left the darkness. The two heavy doors slammed behind him, as if they were also very dissatisfied with his avoidance of his curiosity.

Caul put it behind him and ignored it, just activated some programs while walking, and then more, more, and more - high-temperature steam escaped from behind him, blurring most of his shape in an instant.

Vibrations came from deep within the cold deck beneath his feet, the battleship began to move, and the machine soul, which was working at full capacity in accordance with his will, immediately emitted waves of indescribable bloodlust.

It seems to have always been like this, always wanting to use the purest power to prove the glory of the God of All Machines to the world
Kaur gave it permission indifferently.

One hundred and ninety-five composite artillery positions began to warm up, four thousand five hundred production arrays suddenly roared on the lower deck, and one after another, the sleeping fighter servants were awakened by electricity, armed, and then walked into the airborne capsule and were transported to the launch silo.

How many are there?
Cawl himself didn't have the answer. When he left Sosa, he took away nearly half of the servitor reserves and one-third of the production array to arm this ship that belonged only to him.

Yes, his ship, the Ardent Zeal, a Retribution-class battleship.

Roboute Guilliman had it built on the Forge World named after his father, and named it himself - a name he used to pay Cawl a compliment, and told him he was free to make any modifications to the Nemesis-class battleship he pleased.

This was undoubtedly a great gift, and an acknowledgement from Guilliman of his silent assistance to the loyalists of the Five Hundred Worlds in Sotha for nearly ten thousand years, but Cawl had not actually made many drastic changes.

He didn't think the journey back to Terra with the Combined Fleet was the right time to do that.

Although the Lord of the Five Hundred Worlds is aware of his radicalism, others may not be happy to see him unleash his talents, at least not the non-Martian priests who have cooperated with the Ultramarines in the Five Hundred Worlds for more than ten thousand years.

They had expressed their concerns about Belisarius Cawl, a great sage who was only heard of but not seen, more than once in certain meetings. Some who considered themselves to be more capable had even despised his designs.
A bunch of stupid old fools, Kaul thought, not caring at all that he was actually more worthy of that title.

He stopped, his huge body looking small and lonely in the empty corridor. He turned around and looked at the porthole beside him. His artificial eye zoomed in and helped him see the scene of Chemos accurately.

The sickly green color occupied the land and almost completely enveloped the planet, as if a huge and naughty child had played a coloring game here with a cheap spray pen.

Cawl looked at it coldly, and the index finger of his right hand trembled slightly. A few seconds later, a torrent of steel began to fall towards the green, and the Supreme Zeal also began to move. It was about to officially enter Chemos's low-Earth orbit and directly enter the atmosphere.

To avoid being attacked by the orbiting space station in the process, Cawl also sent a message to its servo technicians, saying not to be surprised - of course, how he would add mocking exaggeration was his own business.

Belisarius Cawl certainly didn't care what the people who suddenly received it in the space station's mind space would think.

He simply borrowed the authority of the space station, entered the communication channel of a small shuttle, and then operated its holographic projection platform to create his own image from scratch and appeared in front of the two people.

"My Lords." Cawl nodded slightly. "My battle group is expected to reach the surface of Chemos in three minutes and begin the battle."

He received no answer, but that was to be expected. Cawl had already done a character profile of Fulgrim based on extensive data, even though it was rude and would most likely get him branded a heretic.

Moreover, his sources of information were Roboute Guilliman, Sanguinius and Rogal Dorn. He had originally asked the Lord of Steel before leaving for Chemos, but the latter seemed to be busy with other things.
In short, Cawl's understanding of Fulgrim was beyond that of most Imperials of this era, so he bluntly threw out another thing.

"The Supreme Zeal is entering Chemos' atmosphere. I will conduct a detailed inspection of the vines as soon as possible. In fact, I had already conducted a scan and mapping in low-Earth orbit seventeen minutes ago, but at that time, my chaos detection radar did not give any warning."

Sure enough, after hearing these words, the Primarch, who was temporarily made up of holographic blue light, slowly cast his gaze over.

"Go on," said another. "Tell me all you think, Cole."

Kaul bowed slightly, and then said, "I want to correct you, sir. What I am about to say is not a guess, but a guess based on a large amount of evidence, details, and the truth that I have simulated many times with nearly 60% of my computing power. I believe its accuracy can reach more than 80%."

"Speak," the Primarch responded in a gentle tone. "I will listen." "First, let me say that the power that is harming Chemos and its people undoubtedly comes from one of our great enemies. However, based on the data provided by various battles and post-event reports, its outbreak at this time is full of doubts."

"First, the question of omens - and, if you will excuse me, Lord Fulgrim, I have taken the liberty of invoking many of the authorities of your planetary government."

"Nothing," said Fulgrim. "Go on."

"Okay, back to the omens. According to the data, the source of this power usually spreads a variety of diseases that have never appeared before the disaster breaks out. A world may even have 30% or more of its population fall ill or even die before the war officially begins. Looking at many cases, even those events that were handled more quickly and perfectly also showed this kind of omen."

"Furthermore, considering that He and His creations actually always follow certain rules, I believe that this omen is actually one of His rules. Or, to put it another way - one of His instincts."

"He cannot go against his instincts, but Chemos is showing abnormal phenomena. I have not found any reports of new infectious diseases in the six months submitted by any of the disease control and public health centers in the twenty-one cities."

"The same is true of the news reports. Given Chemos's situation, I think the probability that these officials lied collectively to cover up their guilt is infinitely close to zero."

"To sum up, let me add two more pieces of evidence: First, Chemos did not spread any new diseases or plagues for at least half a year before the disaster. Second, my chaos detection radar did not report any related problems seventeen minutes ago."

"So, I have come to the conclusion that the vines that cover the surface of Chemos are not actually the creation of the forces of chaos, at least not before the catastrophe. I have very strong evidence to prove this conjecture -"

Call finally paused in his narration and looked at Caryl Lohars.

"--Sir, have you ever felt anything during your stay in Chemos?"

Khalil shook his head slowly.

Kaul's old face suddenly revealed a smile: "That's the problem. Since even you didn't notice anything unusual, it makes sense that my detection radar failed."

He paused, glancing at Fulgrim, who nodded expressionlessly. "I understand you are hinting at me not to blame myself, Belisarius Cawl, but I just want to hear you finish your words."

"As you wish." Kaul sighed. "My guess is that these plants have actually been sleeping in the ground of Chemos."

He suddenly paused again, and when he spoke again, his voice was much louder.

"One of my battle groups captured half of the vine and examined it. The results show that it is at least a dozen centuries old. Considering the time it took to rebuild Chemos' environment, I would like to propose a new hypothesis."

"I think it is very likely that these vines had already taken root deep underground long before you returned to Chemos, and in the form of natural plants. If this disaster had not occurred, they would have remained dormant without any abnormality."

Grimm pondered calmly for a while, then nodded slowly.

"Chemaos was originally a crumbling mining world, its natural environment destroyed long before I joined the Great Crusade. I don't think these things exist from that time. The garrison lords are greedy for resources beyond your imagination, Cawl. I think they came here when I began to rebuild Chemaos's natural environment."

"Name?" Cawl suddenly interrupted. "Rebuilding the natural environment is something that has always been the responsibility of the priest of the Mechanicum who is working with you. What is his name?"

"What's the point of saying this now?" Fulgrim finally laughed. "Perhaps I will go find him and completely destroy the thing hidden behind it, but there is only one thing I want to do most now."

He stopped smiling.

"Your ship is close, Call. Send a gunboat to pick me up, okay? And get me some usable weapons."

"It is my honor, my lord." The Archsage bowed again. "In the name of the Emperor, these evils shall be purged."

The holographic projection went out.

"You remain here," Fulgrim said to Khalil.

He said this with a decisive tone, without any hesitation or hesitation, with a firm look and calm eyes. It was obvious that he had thought about this matter.

"Why?" Khalil asked briefly.

"You can't go to the ground." Phoenix stepped forward, raised his hands and placed them on his shoulders. "You've paid enough, I don't want you to endure those screams again. Can you still hear them, Khalil?"

"Yes."

"So you can't go up to Chemos. Conrad told me that the noises would drive you crazy, just like it did me."

Khalil was silent for a moment, shook his head, and uttered a comment: "Talkative child."

His words brought a fleeting smile to Phoenix's lips - but the smile quickly turned into astonishment.

The reason was nothing but a sharp blade that was suddenly thrust into his hand. The blade was unusually curved, like a sickle, with a silver-shining guard and a dull blade.

It was cold enough to make Fulgrim's teeth chatter.

"I may be protective, Fulgrim, but I respect you. If you don't want me to go, that's fine, but you have to take it. Hold it tightly at all times, understand?"

"What is this?" Fulgrim whispered.

Khalil smiled and answered in the same low voice: "My fear. Now go and do what you have to do, and I--"

He stepped back as darkness rose up and engulfed him. In a split second, the man before Fulgrim was transformed once again into the horrible god.

It spoke softly, its voice sounding like countless people screaming at the same time, but its tone was as gentle as that of an elder.

"——I will go and seek justice for you."

(End of this chapter)