Warhammer: Striving to Be a Grinding Man

Chapter 190 The Cyber ​​War (7)

As Cohen stepped off the Stormbird, the dome of the main hall unfolded before his eyes. This barrier was encased in a membrane, with sacred bones embedded within its surface. An adamantine lining supported the three nested layers of the membrane, sacred bones, and adamantine, making this barrier one of the few places in Karastal capable of isolating the whispers of the warp. Here, the Techpriests no longer needed to constantly defend against erosion, allowing them to focus all their senses on witnessing.

The standardized components of the dome curve inward from the edges to the center, its adamantine frame stretching out in the cold light. Data cables and cooling pipes are embedded in the walls, and a Thinker terminal operates every few meters. Tens of thousands of tech-priests are arranged along the multi-tiered platforms of the walls, their crimson and dark gray robes blending together in the cold light, their optical lenses all locked in the same direction.

When Cohen walked in, they all prostrated themselves. The ancient prostration ritual, passed down through generations, was performed simultaneously by tens of thousands of people at that moment, the bending angle of each mechanical joint as precise as if it had been cast from the same blueprint.

The hem of the robes spread across the terracotta floor, the joints of the mechanical prosthetics were completely locked in the prostrate position, even the hum of the servo motors was reduced to an almost imperceptible level, and all the speakers were turned off. From the observation platform at the highest point of the dome to the maintenance passage at the lowest level, from the high-ranking sages standing in the front row to the mechanical apprentices kneeling in the corners, tens of thousands of people completed the same action at the same moment. Waves of crimson and dark gray spread from the entrance into the depths of the dome, like a layer of fabric pressed into the water, unfolding endlessly in the cold light.

Only the servo skulls remained uncrouched. They hovered throughout the dome, the dark red spots of light from their optical lenses forming a floating constellation in the dim light—extensions of the Eye of Myriad Machines, indispensable witnesses to the ancient rituals of the Mechanicus. The recording chips inside the skulls were all activated, sealing everything that was happening frame by frame; each frame would be repeatedly interpreted and incorporated into the commentaries of the sacred texts in the future.

The binary hymn began to resound. Low-frequency pulses seeped from the interfaces of every Thinker terminal, from the shielding of every data cable, and from the fiber optic conduits stretching for kilometers beneath the floor. It was the constant whisper of the God of Machines, uninterrupted in trillions of logical operations, now simultaneously accessed, amplified, and recoded by the will of tens of thousands into a hymn perceptible to mortals. The low-frequency pulses reflected back and forth between the adamantine skeletons, slow and heavy, each beat like the heart of a colossal beast pounding in the darkness. The prelude to the hymn lasted for several seconds, then tens of thousands of transmitters connected simultaneously. The binary prayers of the Mechanicus converged beneath the dome into a continuously rising wave of sound, without melody, only rhythm, like a furnace breathing under fire, like the ancient roar of a world being forged in constant motion, never heard by anyone.

Cohen ignored them. The hymns weren't for him; he didn't need to be sung. As he walked down the central aisle of the main hall, the prostrate technical priests on either side maintained the same posture—no one looked up, no one moved. Where he passed, the scent of holy oil briefly shifted the density of the air, like the only trace left by the pantheon himself in the mortal realm. His footsteps tapped a steady rhythm on the terracotta floor, stretching from the entrance to the massive adamantine platform in the center of the hall.

The cold, psionic light above the platform illuminated the entire area. Hundreds of Thinker terminals were already connected to the main network, energy conduits extending from the platform's edges and merging into the power supply system on the hall walls. Dozens of servo skulls hovered above the platform, their dark red optical lenses all aimed at its center.

Cohen stood in front of the pedestal and looked up for a moment. Then his consciousness sank into the field.

Atoms were retrieved from the higher-dimensional warehouse and condensed layer by layer according to the repeatedly deduced blueprint. As the atoms entered the blueprint's orbit, they were injected with the initial pulse of the machine's soul beacon—each one, while positioning itself, listened to the soul frequency that the still-forming Titan would bear. Armor plates grew from the skeleton, one after another, from leg armor to chest armor to shoulder armor, each plate's curvature and thickness perfectly matching the blueprint. Energy conduits spread along the inner lining grooves, connecting the reactor, joint servos, and weapon platforms. Cooling grilles formed on the back of the shoulder armor, their spacing and angles precisely calculated to evenly guide the reactor's residual heat to the rear.

The sister of the Emperor-class Titan "Burning Fury" has the same skeleton, the same armor, and the same machine soul blueprint.

As the first Imperial Titan took shape, the rhythm of the binary hymn changed. The pulse intervals compressed to two-thirds of their original size, and the amplitude of each beat increased. The technical priests beneath the dome remained prostrate, but some began to whisper prayers; ancient consecration incantations emanated simultaneously from tens of thousands of transmitters, converging, rising, and coalescing in the blue smoke of holy oil. The flight paths of the servo skull array converged, gathering from all parts of the dome around the platform, hovering in a semi-circular array at the height of the Titan's shoulder armor, all optical lenses locked onto the surface of the forming armor plates. The eyes of the myriad machines watched, the ears of the myriad machines listened, and the spirit of the myriad machines awaited.

As the cockpit hatch of the Imperial Titan flipped open on hydraulic pushers, several Titan pilots entered. They were from the reserve corps of the Martian Titan Order, now clad in crimson pilot suits, their data cables at the back of their heads connecting to neural link arrays upon entry. The hatch closed behind them, the click of the airtight latches swallowed by the pulse of hymns.

The Titan's machine spirit indicator light jumped from dark red to dark green. The moment it opened its eyes, the amplitude of the binary hymn increased by one degree—tens of thousands of technical priests sensed the change simultaneously, and the machine spirit resonators began to tremble, as if an invisible shockwave had swept across the entire barrier. That was the machine spirit's first cry. The pilot's consciousness and the machine spirit had completed a preliminary neural connection and synchronization. He spoke almost chanting into the communication channel: "Great God of Machines, your servant is in position—"

The Machine Soul was overjoyed. Then the Emperor-class Titan took its first step. Its massive foot landed on the terracotta floor at the edge of the platform, causing the entire hall to tremble slightly. It passed through the passage beneath the dome, heading towards the specially opened area behind the barrier. On the walls of the passage it traversed, the consecrated adamantite skeleton emitted a faint hum in the lingering warmth.

The skeleton of the second Emperor-class Titan had already begun to grow on the platform. Cohen didn't look in the direction the first one had left. His consciousness was locked on the armor layers of the second skeleton; atoms were being retrieved from the warehouse, armor plates were being applied layer by layer, and energy conduits were extending along the grooves in the lining.

One after another, they grew from the center of the platform outwards, each one immediately taken over by reserve pilots of the Martian Titan Order upon completion, stepping out. The process was like the birth of machine spirits, one after another, being drawn from the void into reality, confirming their self-identity the instant they took shape, and then stepping onto their battlefield. When the twelve Imperial Titans emerged from the barrier, the rhythm of the hymn had reached a limit indistinguishable to the human ear. The pulse intervals were compressed to the extreme, each beat like a forging hammer striking a fine gold anvil. The shoulder armor patterns of each Imperial Titan were unique—patterns etched by the machine spirits during their formation according to their positioning within the synchronization network. Some were intersecting gears, some rose like flames, and some were simply straight lines. These were their signatures, the marks they had chosen for themselves outside the blueprint of the God of Machines.

The Warrior-class followed closely behind. They spread out in the more open space, their skeletons growing simultaneously on both sides of the platform. Cohen's consciousness switched between several skeletons, and armor plates formed synchronously in different locations. The Warrior-class was smaller than the Emperor-class, but their numbers were several times greater. More than a hundred Warrior-class units spontaneously displayed their signature patterns on their shoulder armor as they took shape, and each one was immediately taken over by a pilot upon completion.

The Marauder-class followed. Thousands of them materialized on lower platforms, smaller and faster. The bases for the molten lava cannons and Gatling guns grew on either side of the shoulder armor, with armor plates gradually covering the outer layer of the skeleton. Thousands of machine spirit indicator lights flashed green one after another, like a layer of ignited light spreading under a dim dome. The weapon configurations showed subtle differences during their formation—some had molten lava cannons on both shoulders, some had a molten lava cannon on the left shoulder and a Gatling gun on the right, and some had an additional set of missile launchers on their backs. These were the fine-tunings made by the machine spirits according to their own preferences during their formation.

Finally, there are the Warhound-class. They emerge rapidly from the lowest level, the most numerous and moving at the fastest pace. Skeleton growth, armor coverage, weapon installation, machine spirit activation, pilot boarding—every step is compressed to its limit. Some are equipped with plasma explosive cannons, others with Vulcan giant explosive cannons. Each Warhound-class's anti-joint drive structure exhibits a slight geometric shift during formation—the machine spirit adjusting its gait, preparing for the impending run.

Thousands of Titan machine spirits awakened sequentially within the same area, each indicator light turning green at slightly different times, like a stretched-out, slowly unfolding sea of ​​stars. The order of those green lights had its own inherent logic; they were confirming each other, establishing a nascent battlefield synchronization network at the machine spirit level. Each newly awakened machine spirit instantly sensed the location, type, and weapon configuration of the other machine spirits, as if opening its eyes in the darkness and already knowing the direction of all its brothers. They were not thousands of independent war machines awakening separately. They were siblings from the same mother, born in the same field, formed in the same pulse.

The pulse frequency of the binary hymn continued to climb, each activation of a Titan adding a new amplitude. The servo skull array darted rapidly beneath the dome, its crimson optical lenses leaving trails of moving light in the dim light. The prostrate technical priests remained seated, but some trembled—a tremor inexplicable by fear, a pulse surging from the depths of their bones as long-suppressed faith was released. They were witnessing a forging, a re-infusion of the God of Machines' wrath into this battlefield, dormant for millennia, through the hands of mortals.

Cohen's shaping process didn't time itself. Only the numbers on the timer ticked. Atoms were continuously retrieved from the warehouse, the skeleton grew, armor was applied, energy conduits were laid, and machine spirits were activated. Each Titan left immediately after taking shape, making room for the next. The platform was never empty; as soon as one left, the next one was already growing.

Hundreds of mechanical sages stood on multi-tiered observation platforms behind the main platform. Only high-ranking sages were allowed to stand and witness; the rest remained prostrate below. Crimson robes were lined up in rows on the observation platforms, all their optical lenses focused in the same direction.

Belisarius Caul stood in the first row of the observation deck, his massive body, supported by dozens of metal legs, casting a deep shadow in the cold light. His optical lens switched back and forth between Cohen and the forming Titan, and with each switch, his microphone emitted a very short binary pulse—he was recording. The representative of the Underworld VIII stood to his right, his robes edged with the dark emblem of the Heretics, one of his mechanical prosthetic limbs unconsciously flexing its knuckles as he recorded. The representative of Riza stood further away, the built-in Thinker array constantly humming. Agrippina, Triple Far, Uldesh—almost all the representatives of the Empire's most renowned forge worlds were present. Each name represented an industrial empire spanning the galaxy, and each representative carried the weight of their world's millennia-long gaze.

Sages from various forging worlds across the Solar System filled every level of the observation platform. The representative of Mars, the closest comrade of the Mars Forging General, stood at the forefront. The gear and skull emblem on his shoulder armor gleamed with a dark luster in the cold light. His optical lens never left the center of the platform, and his body trembled with each Titan that took shape. The great Mars now possessed a Titan swarm, a true swarm.

Voss's representative stood to the left of Mars, his mechanical prosthetic limbs twitching slightly with each Titan's formation, as if counting. Phaethon's representative stood to the right of Mars, while Kaullam's representative stood silently behind Mars, his robes still bearing traces of sediment from a distant star system, clearly indicating he had only just arrived.

The representative of Lucis stood on the right flank of the crowd, having just arrived in Karata after a long voyage across the Misty Starfield. His position maintained a subtle distance from the sages of the Solar Starfield, neither too close nor too far, as if he were preserving his own independent scale while witnessing the event, his optical array closely monitoring Cohen's every move.

On the observation platform, during the intervals of binary chanting, extremely low-frequency pulses silently leaped between the optical lenses—

That was the communication method among high-ranking members of the Mechanicus, transmitting encrypted pulses through the shielding layer of data cables, without needing a speaker or any visible signals.

"Observation log: Each Titan exhibits a unique machine spirit signature pattern upon formation. Preliminary assessment indicates this is a personalized location marker within the synchronization network, not a blueprint preset."

"Confirmed. Additional observation: Weapon configurations exhibited non-command differentiation during the formation stage. The machine spirit displayed autonomous preferences from the early stages of formation."

"Karl, is there any precedent in your forging log?"

Kaul's pulse was delayed by half a second: "In the records left behind in the Emperor's laboratory, autonomous fine-tuning of machine spirits during the formation stage was observed. However, the scale and order of magnitude were different. The current observational data exceeds all previous benchmark values. It is recommended that this event be included in the highest priority sample database for machine spirit synchronization rate research."

The representative of Huangquan-8 stated: "This scale exceeds the conventional aggregation path. The technical ownership path has been locked to the Martian Titan Order. The allocation of permissions needs to be reassessed."

Riza's representative: "Rejected. Mars has already been injected with its deep reserves. There is no objection to the attribution of authority."

Silence. No further pulses were received.

The binary chanting continued unabated. Tens of thousands of technical priests remained prostrate on the ground, maintaining the same posture, their crimson and dark gray robes spreading out in the cold light like a fabric frozen in time. Dark red spots of light from the servo skull array continued to move beneath the dome, and recording chips wrote new data with each pulse. Hundreds of sages stood on the observation platform, their crimson robes motionless in the cold light.

When Cohen finished crafting the last Warhound-class machine, the adamantite platform in the center of the hall was empty. Thousands of Titans had already departed from behind the fortress in batches, heading to the training grounds for final integration drills. Thousands of machine spirits maintained low-power synchronous resonance in the same area, like a sea of ​​steel awakened by the same command.

He stood at the edge of the platform for a moment. The numbers on the timer were ticking—he had long since stopped counting how many days had passed. Exhaustion, suppressed by the Emperor's psychic power, had receded to the edge of his consciousness, but beneath that edge, the undercurrents continued to surge, never calming.

Cohen is ready to return to Garros—at least temporarily. His research into the Webpath's pathways has yielded initial results; his consciousness can now travel along the Webpath's psionic veins to perceive the depths of very distant tunnels, opening up a truly human long-distance Webpath navigation route. The Emperor won't object; he doesn't need to be stuck here waiting to be dispatched—the Emperor can sense him and will find him when needed.

At this moment, he already knew why Horus had rebelled—or at least a small part of it. The seed of that rebellion was likely sown in a similar "sermon," at some point when the Emperor demanded witnessing, prostrating, and faith from them. Standing here, watching tens of thousands of mechanics prostrate themselves, watching hundreds of sages who forged the world be summoned to witness the ceremony, watching it all unfold like a meticulously orchestrated sermon—this was never the necessary process for creating the Titans. This was the Emperor's deliberate arrangement.

He didn't look towards the observation platform, nor at the prostrate technical priests. He stepped down from the adamantite platform and walked back along the path he had come from towards the entrance to the fortress. The rhythm of his boots on the terracotta floor was as steady as when he had come.

As he walked through the prostrate crowd, no one rose. The rhythm of the binary hymn shifted the instant Cohen crossed the exit—from a dense war drumbeat back to the scale of a heartbeat, the intervals between pulses lengthening, the amplitude of each beat slowly receding. It was the signal that forging was over, but the war on the net had only just begun.

Kara stood at the entrance to the fortress, clad in dark gold power armor, her face expressionless beneath a crimson cloak. Behind her stood the Stormtroopers, lined up in two rows on either side of the entrance. As Cohen walked past her, she stepped aside, following half a step behind him.

The Stormbird glided out of the rampart entrance, its thruster exhaust trailing a thin blue streak in the cold, psionic light of the Karasta. The Black Pearl's silhouette magnified in the field of vision, and the hangar doors flipped open as the Stormbird approached, guiding beams illuminating the darkness and locking onto its course.

As the Stormbird slid into the hangar, the psionic cold light was blocked by the adamantite armor plates. Cohen released the locking clips, stood up from the pilot's seat, walked through the passageway, and headed towards the bridge.

The battle raged in the distance at Karasta. But on this ship, all was quiet.

The void ripples of the Hessonic Gate continued to spread. The Radiant Macragge was traversing the Webway—a Queen of Glory-class battleship, twenty-six kilometers long, the largest of any Imperial class of warship. As its bow emerged from the cold psionic light, the tip of its adamantite ram gleamed with a dark gold sheen, and the massive gun emplacements on its sides formed neat rows of arcs within the halo of holy light. The cathedral spire above the bridge stood erect in the cold psionic light, and the rose windows of its stained-glass armor briefly lit up as it passed through, before returning to silence.

Behind it, hundreds of warships were following, traversing the netgate. The Ultramarines' fleet, in dense formation, attacked cruisers, frigates, destroyers, and transport ships—their deep blue paint blending into a moving sea of ​​light in the cold psionic glow. Each ship's bow was etched with a U-shaped chapter insignia, and the exhaust plumes of each ship's thrusters left parallel blue streaks in the darkness.

In the core section of the Makragora, a stasis field pulsated continuously around the marble throne. Guilliman sat upon it, his hands resting on the armrests, the Imperial Sword lying across his knees. His face was frozen in slumbering eternity, like a statue of a monarch sealed by time. He had slept for millennia, yet time had left no trace on his face.

In the gaps between the Ultramarines' fleet, the Mechanicus fleet was also pouring into the Gates of Hessonic. Their crimson and dark gold paint scheme overshadowed the Imperial Navy's standard dark gray. Their ship designs were older, their armor thicker, and their weapon platforms more densely packed. The arrangement of their broadside cannon arrays differed from the Imperial Navy's standard—the barrels were thicker, the spacing closer, and each cannon was embedded in an independent adamantite base, the edges of which were etched with consecrated inscriptions and binary prayers.

These ships were clearly identified as exploration fleets. These technology retrieval ships, dispatched by Mars to various parts of the galaxy, had been continuously advancing into unknown stellar regions for millennia, searching for lost technologies and ancient relics. The Emperor's interstellar broadcasts pierced through the warp, traversing tens of thousands of light-years, reaching those exploration fleets still navigating the edge of the galaxy.

These exploration ships, their hulls covered in sediments from different star systems, some bearing the burn marks of alien weapons on their armor plating, others still harboring the outer shells of undismantled ancient relics embedded in their bows. The Mechanicus's private sage guards, composed of eccentric mechs and armed servants, lined the decks, equipped with ancient weapons and alien technological artifacts collected by the exploration fleet from across the galaxy over millennia. These warriors, meticulously selected from every explored world over those millennia, were well-equipped and highly experienced in combat.

Calgar stood on the bridge of the Makrag's Glory, silently watching the Karasta unfold outside the porthole. Guilliman was still asleep in his stasis chamber, having been brought here to be one step closer to the Emperor's will.

Behind him, the Ultramarines' fleet was unfolding. Their deep blue paint, bathed in the cold glow of psionic energy, formed a moving sea of ​​light, advancing deeper into the Karasta Nexus. The Martian exploration fleet followed on the flanks, their crimson hulls leaving parallel trails in the darkness, like a ignited river flowing into eternal darkness.

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