Warhammer: Hail to the Void Lords!.

Chapter 856, 08.855: 'Glorious Sacrifice'

"Skyhawk One is being pursued by enemy aircraft! It is returning to base! We have detected the approaching enemy ships. Repeat, we have confirmed the number of enemy ships: one battleship as flagship, three light cruisers, and twelve destroyers!"

The distress signal from Skyhawk-1, mixed with the piercing static noise and the roar of an explosion, shattered the silence of the flagship's bridge like a sharp blade.

The brave interceptor, leaving a long contrail of plasma and depressurized gas, sped relentlessly toward the mothership.

While frantically maneuvering to evade capture, it desperately tried to transmit the crucial intelligence, obtained at the cost of its life, in all directions via radio.

“By the Divine Emperor… how is this possible…” A lieutenant in charge of tactical analysis looked at the final confirmed enemy ship data on the holographic sand table and murmured in disbelief, “Captain, this number… is exactly the same as the number predicted by His Excellency the Captain!”

A suppressed murmur, tinged with awe and fear, rose among the officers.

No one knows how the silent man on the throne obtained this incredibly precise data without any intelligence support.

In an instant, various speculations about the captain possessing mysterious precognitive abilities quietly began to sprout in their minds.

But soon, as a series of clear and decisive military orders were issued through the ship's communication system, all distractions were put aside, replaced by an iron discipline that put the ship into a state of maximum combat readiness.

Seven massive imperial warships, like ancient beasts awakened, began to slowly adjust their posture in the void.

The engine nozzles roared deafeningly, and the massive hull drew a solemn arc in the void, reforming into an indestructible shield array with its defensive focus at the rear of the fleet.

"Captain, there is an enemy battleship." Louise's voice was heavy with tension, and a fine layer of sweat appeared on her forehead. "With the current strength of our fleet, it is difficult to confront it head-on. The distress signal has been sent, but... there has been no response yet."

"I understand." Horatio's voice remained calm and composed, revealing no emotional fluctuation.
"Prepare for battle. We must survive the enemy's first wave of attacks." He stared at the cold, ever-decreasing readings on the tactical screen, representing the distance between us and the enemy, while issuing precise and complex orders to the entire fleet and various departments within his own ship.

This is Louise's first time taking over the position of Captain of the Lord. As the acting vice-captain, she still has a lot to learn.

However, the harshness of space gave her no time to adjust. Horatio had to simultaneously command the flagship and manage the entire fleet, leaving him no energy to help her.

It was an incredibly difficult process, but he had no choice but to face the challenge.

Meanwhile, within the towering Star Speaker's Tower, a sacred yet terrifying ritual is underway.

Chief Star Speaker Melon was quietly leaning on her Star Speaker's staff, made of high-grade psychic material and disproportionately large for her height.

On her head was a headdress made of pure gold, symbolizing the Imperial Eagle.

The nerve plug interface at the back of the headband is connected via dozens of cables to a massive integrated device consisting of several giant nutrient solution tanks.

In those nutrient solution tanks emitting a faint green light, soaked one after another naked psionicists with their eyes closed.

These psionicists are usually confined in separate cabins in the middle of the Star Tower, strictly guarded by the most loyal heirs among the ship's security forces.

Unlike Melon, who possessed the "Star Speaker's Certificate" personally granted by the Inquisition and was allowed to move freely, these uncertified psionicists were pitiful consumables necessary for the Empire's astral communication. The Chief Star Speaker was like a flint capable of igniting a divine spark; while these psionicists were one after another, sorrowful flames waiting to be lit.

Each time a wide-area interstellar communication is sent, it's like a flint igniting a flame; the powerful psychic energy, strong enough to tear reality apart, can instantly burn away a psychic's mind and soul.

When their silent screams of agony, audible only in the warp, reverberate through the highest heavens, a communication, specially psychically encoded, bursts forth from that door, invisible to mortals, through the will of the Chief Star Speaker.

Any intelligent life form or non-human entity capable of perceiving the subspace will receive this message.

However, only those who know the special compilation and cracking methods can extract useful information from it.

This is the operating principle of the bloody and brutal psionic communication that the human empire relies on to maintain its vast territory.

“I’m sorry… I have to do this.” The girl knelt devoutly at the feet of the emperor’s statue, gripping the long staff tightly in both hands, holding it up before her.

This was the first time she had ever actually sent a wide-area psionic communication. Before that, she had only rehearsed the process in a simulation environment time and time again, but had never actually done it in practice.

She took a deep breath, forcing herself to banish all the negative, compassionate emotions from her mind, and instead focused intently on feeling the vast, boundless power emanating from the highest heavens.

Mysterious whispers began to surround her, voices that seemed to come from the ends of the universe, filling her with a deep, chilling terror. But the girl suppressed her fear and began to concentrate on repeating the captain's orders.

As a powerful surge of psionic energy was transmitted through the cable into one of the nutrient solution tanks, the liquid inside instantly began to boil violently. Gradually, a nauseating, foul odor, resembling the smell of cooked, spoiled protein food, filled the air.

A psionicist stopped trembling.

Her soul let out a shrill howl in the subspace, violently impacting the solid bulkhead of the navigation tower, and then rebounded, like a stone thrown into a lake, gradually drawing back the incomparably thick curtain of the highest heavens.

Mei Lun suddenly looked up, her eyes, shining with golden light, gazing at the golden dome of the Star Language Tower.

The psionic beams shooting out converged on the giant glass lens at the top, eventually forming an even more powerful, visible golden ray that shot straight toward the "Gateway to the High Heavens" atop the "Swift Eagle," a dense mass resembling a physical dark cloud.

On the command bridge.

"Captain, the wide-area psionic communication has been sent and will be retransmitted every five minutes."

Now, all the surrounding forces capable of monitoring psionic energy can see our distress signal. We... are completely exposed to the public eye.

“That’s right.” Horatio’s voice was completely calm. “But this is the only way we can survive.”

He stared at the alien fleet, radiating an ominous purple light, hurtling towards them at high speed on the holographic star map, and issued his final order in an unquestionable tone: "All fleet, prepare for a delaying operation. We must slow down the alien fleet's advance at all costs."

(End of this chapter)