Warhammer: Striving to Be a Grinding Man

Chapter 207 The War of the Internet (16) Bloodstained Gamor (Part 2)

In the pale aura, the spires of Gamor crumbled layer by layer. Each hit of the macrocannons was accompanied by a continuous shriek of shattering spirit bones. The fragments drifted slowly in the low gravity, exploding again upon impact with the next spire before settling down. The combined fleet's advance line had pressed into the densest defensive array on the city's outskirts. Beneath the bases of those spires lay countless underground tunnels and fortress nodes, cultivated by the Dark Eldar over millennia, each simultaneously unleashing beams of dark spears and entangled explosive shells. Three pale golden Eternal Bastion-class fortresses alternated firing in the center of the battle line. The macrocannons tore scorch marks through the spirit bone structures, but the Dark Eldar fleet at the front still stubbornly held onto a continuous battle line.

They are return fleets scattered throughout the galaxy, rapidly returning to defense via Gamor's extensive network of branch roads.

More than a dozen Torture-class cruisers burst forth from a veergency tunnel. The distorted aura of the Shadow Field had not yet stabilized, and the Dark Spear beams hadn't even had time to be calibrated before bursting coolant vapors erupted from the gaps in their armor. Their arrival didn't immediately change the course of the battle, but it filled several gaps in the defensive line that were on the verge of collapse, abruptly slowing the Imperial fleet's breakthrough. Hours later, dozens of Burning Scale-class light cruisers poured into the battlefield from the network tunnel exits towards Gamor's inner city—they didn't even have time for tactical coordination, crashing directly into the outer perimeter of the Imperial fleet at warp speed, filling every cracking gap in Gamor's defenses with reckless abandon.

Governor Celestia's fingertips gripped the edge of the tactical panel, her nails digging into the grooves of the spirit bone panel. Her ship had just returned at full speed from a raiding site in the Human Storm Starfield, its hold piled high with the corpses of Imperial citizens—those brutally murdered in a fit of rage, their bodies accumulating from the cargo hold to the hangar deck. Blood splattered across the deck, some already beginning to blacken and congeal. The burn marks left by the Imperial outpost's defensive turret remained on the fractured armor plating along the ship's side.

She gazed at the three pale golden colossal structures ahead—embedded in the walls of the network, relentlessly unleashing their firepower, the cannonballs exploding around her ship in streaks of blazing white light. "Those monkeys, why do they possess ancestral technology, those damned apes," she forced out of her throat. "I want to hear the cries of their women, their children, their souls."

Her venomous nozzles spewed out the last drop of corrosive liquid with a roar, but no one responded to the governor's screams.

In the Dark Eldar fleet, silence often means you are heading to death along with everyone on your ship.

"Push forward." Celestia's voice returned to its icy tone. "Break through the monkeys' lines and tear them off the spire."

Her ship accelerated into the flank of the Imperial fleet. The Dark Spear beam exploded on the armor plating of a Calithis light cruiser, melting a piercing gash. Celestia was preparing to fire a second shot, but the Eternal Bulwark II's plasma salvo first covered the midsection of her ship. The Burning Scale-class's shadow field distorted violently at the point of impact, attempting to deflect the beam's path, but the plasma macrocannon's trajectory was too wide. The field only had time to push the core energy away from the bridge before being torn apart in the next instant. The shell pierced the side armor and exploded inside the ship. Celestia's last glimpse was of the signal marker representing her on the forward tactical panel dissipating in a blue-white halo, vanishing silently like the insignia on the Spire of Gamors, marking the countless slaves she had personally executed.

Her ship broke in two, the rear half sinking into the cold psionic light, the front half torn apart by Imperial cannons. Around it, more reinforcements were pouring into the Imperial lines in the same manner, like swarms of insects emerging from a destroyed nest.

The Dark Eldar fleets scattered throughout the galaxy were making their way back through Gamor's extensive network of tunnels. Their speed exceeded the limits of the Empire's pre-war assessments. The outer defenses of the Combined Fleet were beginning to buckle. The Whitescar destroyers' torpedo reloading rate couldn't keep up with the losses, the remaining barge squadrons had fallen below 20%, and the flagship of the Calithis fleet was forced to be towed away from the front lines due to severe damage. But every returning ship that broke through the lines was shattered by the concentrated fire of the Imperial fleet; their wreckage piled up on the sacred grounds outside Gamor, forming a cooling mountain of steel, the lingering heat of the shells giving the edges of the debris a dark red glow.

Deep within the city of Gamor, the eternal king Asrubel Victor sat upon his spire throne. Gamor's dome stretched above him, and a forbidden miniature sun burned slowly at its highest point, its rays filtering through the gaps in the skeletal structures, casting slow-moving patches of light across the grand hall.

Gamor was never a single city. It was an aggregation of dozens of network hubs, each subdomain an independent cluster of spires, interconnected by portals forged from spirit bones. These portals were part of the original network structure; the Dark Eldar could open and close them, but after the Eldar's decline ten thousand years ago, no one truly knew how to repair or rebuild them. At this moment, on Victor's tactical projection, every spire, every suspended corridor, and every layer of the network of pipes in the main hub was marked with a different color indicating the state of engagement. Dark red was advancing inward from the outer edge of the main hub, the boundary clear yet slow, like a layer of septicemia seeping into the very fabric of the body.

At the edge of the projection, the portals to the seventh, ninth, and fourteenth subdomains were marked in dark—indicating they were closed. The governors of those three subdomains had chosen to lock the portals, attempting to isolate their families and territories from the war at the Nexus. Victor's gaze lingered on the dark markings for a moment before shifting away. They would pay the price for that choice—if the Nexus fell, he was certain those closed portals wouldn't stop the Empire. The fact that the monkeys could enter the network and continuously receive supplies and reinforcements spoke volumes. These fools, short-sighted idiots.

His left hand rested on the armrest of the throne, his fingertips tapping the surface of the spirit bone with an extremely light touch. The rhythm was constant, as if locked to a scale, the intervals between each tap precise, as if conducting a piece about to end, using the sound of the collapse of the main nexus as its beat. Around him, dozens of conspiratorial leaders were arguing fiercely. Some demanded abandoning the outer spire and shrinking the defenses, while others insisted on filling all the passageways with the corpses of slaves. Still others silently calculated how to escape into the subdomain before the main nexus fell, and then lock the portal. Victor listened to those voices, the curve of his lips maintained by the cold light worn thin by millennia.

"The outer defenses are being compressed, that's a fact. But as long as my throne tower stands, this city will always stand at the heart of the Webway. Our fleets scattered throughout the galaxy are still returning, coming back at all costs. We still have a chance." His gaze swept over the faces, and the arguing subsided. "The Eternal King of Gamor never leaves before the pool of blood dries up. So do you, and you must."

Behind him, a messenger hurried across the grand hall and knelt below the steps. "Your Majesty. The slave restraint systems in the five arenas of the West Wing have been simultaneously severed, causing chaos. Governor Solata's territory has been directly impacted, and she requests reinforcements."

Victor didn't turn around. "Tell her I've noticed her loyalty. Those slaves don't need to be re-locked; one just needs to stop standing. She can allocate the troops in the West Wing herself." He paused. "Let my private guard oversee the battle. Deserters will be executed."

The messenger rose and strode out of the grand hall. Victor leaned back on his throne, his gaze returning to the slowly spreading dark red border on the tactical projection.

At the same time, a new fleet signal surged into the battlefield from the direction of Garros Netway Port. The sensor array completed identification within six seconds, encoding and matching the Garros fleet sequence. Led by the Phoenix, followed by the Truth and Valor, several Odysseus-class armed transport ships trailed in the middle of the formation, while twelve Sword-class frigates spread out in a sentry formation on both flanks.

Marcus's right mechanical eye shrank slightly. He switched all-channel communication to the internal link of the Garros fleet.

"Phoenix, this is Black Pearl. Arrival confirmed."

The captain of the Phoenix replied briefly: "Your Excellency Commander, the Galos Fleet never backs down." His voice paused for a moment on the communication channel, "The Papal Forces have completed loading in the cargo hold. The medical module and logistics support module have all been connected to the landing ship sequence."

Marcus looked up from the tactical projection at the outline of Gamor on the main display screen: "Phoenix confirmed. Cleared to move into designated positions. Truth, Valor, and Odysseus-class formations, adjust course and move into cover positions."

"Truth received." "Heroic confirmed." The two voices replied simultaneously.

At the rear of the formation, the belly hatches of the Odysseus-class ships opened one by one during the voyage, revealing the neatly arranged landing modules and airdrop platforms inside.

Deep within the hull of Eternal Bulwark One, a psionic pulse that had lasted for hours finally completed its final transmission. The psionic energy of the net channel spread along the sacred bone guiding patterns to the entire skeleton of the fortress ship, and the surface of its boundary membrane shimmered with a pale golden luster brighter than before. The settling process was complete. Eternal Bulwark One was completely embedded in the net channel wall, its structure now intertwined with the ancient saint's net channel skeleton, and a continuous stream of psionic energy was pouring into its boundary membrane and sacred bone structure from the wall. The firing rate of the macro cannon array doubled, and the charging time of the light spears was reduced to 60% of its pre-battle value. It was no longer a steel behemoth resting on the wall; it had become part of the net channel wall.

Eternal Fortress II and III followed closely behind, completing their landing simultaneously. The three pale gold behemoths formed a steel bulwark spanning the battle line, firmly pinning the Combined Fleet's lines to the outskirts of Kama.

Victor's gaze fell on the colossal structure on the tactical projection—its outline stabilizing from motion, settling into stillness. He raised his left hand from the throne armrest, pointing to the converging pale gold outline in the projection. His voice echoed through the grand hall, every shadow there hearing the command—it was indisputable.

"Tear that fortress off my city. Tell the Despairing Scream—ram it. Let the Despairing Roar and the Despairing Howl follow behind. Destroy it at all costs."

The messenger's footsteps briefly echoed through the grand hall before subsiding. In the airspace surrounding Gamor, the "Desperate Scream" was the first to respond. Its commander, Ursin Nol, stood in the center of the bridge, the backlight sweeping across the flood of readings on the control panels—the outline of the Eternal Barrier magnified continuously at the edges of the sensors. A slow grin spread across his face. Then he raised his hands and roared amidst a burst of laughter from the entire bridge: "Die! Be happy!"

The ship accelerated, its shadow field exploding at the last moment due to overload. The bow ram pierced the boundary membrane, but the adamantite and sacred bones remained unmoved, supported by the psionic energy of the net channel. The combined force of the impact and the energy from the exploding force field tore open the surface of the boundary membrane—a tear lasting several seconds appeared near the point of impact. The rear half of the "Desperate Scream" then broke off. Then the boundary membrane healed, the pale golden substance at the edge of the tear contracting inward. The battleship gained less than four minutes.

Behind it, another Sunset-class ship, which was accelerating, suddenly came to a stop, its bow turned, and slid back into the shadow of the battle line.

The Fireseed and Starfire began their advance. The two Expeditionary Forged Arks propelled themselves at full power under the barrage of the Dark Eldar's artillery fire. The hatches of the Titan hangar opened simultaneously, and pulses of binary hymns overflowed from every seam of the Ark's armor, spreading along the psionic conduits towards the surface of Gamor.

Cohen stood on the observation platform of the Titan hangar on the Starfire, watching the steel colossi being loaded below. Dumas stood to his side and slightly behind, the hem of his dark gray robes creased cleanly by the circulating wind, the adamantine mechanical structure on his left arm gleaming darkly in the cold light. His optical lens lingered on the outline of each Titan in turn, confirming that the machine spirit status lights were uniformly dark green, before turning to Cohen: "Director. The Garros Titan Legion is fully loaded. The Starfortress machine cluster is in position. Data craftsmen are ready."

Cohen said, "Place it."

The moment the heavy elevator descended from the Ark's belly, the pulse frequency of the binary hymn jumped an order of magnitude. The elevator passed through the skeletal dome surrounding Gamor, its exhaust trailing four parallel blue streaks in the eternal twilight of the city's skeletal structure. The first Imperial Titan stepped off the elevator's fixed support; as its massive foot slammed into the skeletal ground, shattered fragments of skeletal bone flew up from the edge of the landing point, and shockwaves spreading for kilometers along the city's structural framework. In the still-uncleared spire windows, surviving Dark Eldar archers watched as the steel colossi, so close they were inches away, descended one by one from the elevator. In one archer's scope, the image was no longer of an Imperial soldier, but rather the incandescent, white plasma cores charging inside a Warlord-class turret. Following closely behind were the Warlord-class, Marauder-class, and Warhound-class, one after another, lined up at precise intervals as the entire Titan legion quickly deployed upon landing, with the Machine Soul Synchronization Network pressing the perception of each Titan into the same command stream.

As Starcage infantry landed in waves, binary hymns poured from the Titan's loudspeakers, covering the entire landing zone. The Starcage infantry, arrayed in dozens of parallel advance lines within the shadow of the Titan's leg armor, their bomb turrets pointing towards the depths of Gamor.

Atop a spire on the outskirts of the western district, Archon Solata stood behind a shattered frame of a spirit bone window, watching the steel colossi advance in formation from the landing field. Her left arm, severed in half by shrapnel during the earlier battle for the defensive lines, was sealed with a venomous hemostatic agent, but blood still trickled down the seams of her armor. Her territory was crumbling—the Empire's Titans were crushing the fortifications she had built over centuries, her guards were being torn apart by the dark gold steel colossi on the front lines, and freed slaves were setting fire to the lower levels of her galleries. Her right hand swept across the tactical panel, activating a pre-programmed spirit bone meltdown sequence—her last resort for her territory, enough to bury the lower galleries along with the invaders before the spire fell.

She turned to the communications officer behind her and said, "Tell the Eternal King that the West will not fall." Her voice was as if soaked in venom. "Before those monkeys trample every inch of Gamor's bones, I want to see my spire stained with their blood."

The communications officer paused before sending the pulse. He knew the West District didn't have enough troops to hold the line. But the Solara governor's stance was clear. He pressed send, then took a step back.

At the base of the spire, the Dark Eldar defenders retreated layer by layer from the hanging corridors and tunnel exits. Frontline warriors were crushed by Titan fire, while reserves clashed with freed slaves in the tunnels, and the Everlasting King's personal guard, overseeing the battle, executed deserters attempting to break ranks. The defenses of Gamosi were under triple pressure—Imperial troops at the front, a slave revolt at the rear, and the overseers within. The spire of Zolatar had not yet fallen, but its defenses had been breached in countless ways.

At the same time, the stern doors of the first batch of combat transport ships opened at the edge of the landing zone. As Marshal Luce of the Apostolic Guard stepped down the gangway, the first squad was already lined up in front of him, unfurling a dark gold Type 120 power armor. Crimson cloaks billowed in the cold light of psionic energy, servo skulls hovered behind each soldier's shoulder, and laser emission arrays glowed with a dark red glimmer in standby mode.

Lucé wore the standard dark grey marshal's uniform of Garros, with a gear and skull emblem etched on his left shoulder armor and old burn marks from the Battle of Invernus on his right. He was one of the commanders of the Garros Papacy, second only to Cole. He stood at the gangway, watching the crimson ranks surge out of the cargo holds, spreading out in tiered advancing lines across the landing field, advancing alongside the Titan legions.

More than a dozen Eldar armored regiments deployed on the landing zone. The tracks of Lemanrus and Macarius rolled over the spiritbone ground, their turrets rotating as they moved, high-explosive shells exploding on the remaining defensive fortifications surrounding Gamor. Chimera armored vehicles and Hellhound flamethrower tanks weaved through the gaps between the tanks, responsible for suppressing fire and clearing urban areas, respectively. Fighter-bomber formations swept over the landing zone, their missile pods releasing missiles in a dive, blasting a wall of orange-red explosives across the upper facades of the Dark Eldar spires.

Midway through the medical corps' formation, dozens of medical module units were being assembled piece by piece by servitors into a mobile medical area several hundred meters long. As Dr. Liz stepped off the transport ship, the mechanical limbs on the back of her crimson technical priest robes were already deployed in standby mode, their optical sensor arrays locked onto the direction of the wounded sorting area. Her voice, amplified through a loudspeaker, reverberated throughout the entire medical line: "Prioritize open wounds in the sorting area. Life support pods receive the seriously wounded. All units retaining wet signals are prioritized for access to life support pods. Servant transport teams must not obstruct the passageways."

Behind her, tens of thousands of sergeants followed closely, carrying sealed crates containing CMC-500 power armor. On the battlefield of Gamor, these crates meant that the seriously wounded were no longer "losses," but "assets to be recovered." Even the advancing Papal infantry would unconsciously quicken their pace as they passed through this medical zone, knowing that as long as they had a breath left, the road ahead would not end even after they fell.

The first wave of Primal Forged Space Marines from the Phoenix Legion arrived simultaneously. Small in number, about three hundred, they wore Hades-type Terminator armor, their energy claws retracted into the lining of their arm armor while in standby mode. Rellano walked at the head of the column, power sword at his waist, explosive rifle tucked under his arm. He did not participate in the advance. Cohen's orders were to hold the flanks of the medical module, ensuring that Liss's team was not infiltrated while taking over the wounded at the front.

The massive Eldar ground counterattack arrived thirty minutes after the landing. Simultaneously, structural fissures in Gamor's surface billowed upwards, and hundreds of thousands of Eldar warriors poured forth from the cracks. This was only the first wave. Behind them, deeper within the tunnels and the base of the spires, more ranks surged upwards from the lower levels. The residual energy of the Shadow Field seeped from the gaps in their shells, distorting light in the dimness and making aiming difficult. Poison crystal weapons sprayed corrosive liquids at close range, hissing against the blast shields of the Apostles, dissolving the terracotta surface into charred grooves. Hellchariots surged forth from the lower levels, crushing the walls of the spirit bones, their rapidly spinning grinding blades leaving piercing metallic shrieks as they dragged across the sacred bone ground.

The Raven fighter squadron simultaneously catapulted from the top floor of the building, its dark spear beams sweeping low over the flanks of the landing zone.

The raven's dive and the Hellchariot's assault failed to reach the medical pod. After several failed attempts to infiltrate the flank, the Dark Eldar abandoned that direction—every time they tried to approach the pod area from the tunnels or building mezzanines, they were met with precise bursts of explosive rifle fire and silent interception from Terminator armor. There were no alarms, no shouts, only the brief flashes of gunfire in the darkness before fading away. Rellano and his three hundred Proto-Forged Space Marines guarded this crucial node in the shadows.

Gamor is trading his own skeleton for time. Each spire is detonated at a predetermined point, and each retreat leaves behind a poisonous fog trap in the passageway.

The Titan Legion's artillery fire blanketed the Eldar front lines as the Apostles deployed. Warhound-class plasma cannons moved at high speed between the spire bases, while Vulcan bombardments wiped out Eldar infantry attempting to flank and retreat from the bone walls. Marauder-class molten cannons relentlessly suppressed the upper echelons of the buildings, and Gatling gun barrages carved parallel scorch marks into the passageways, gradually sealing off the Hellchariots' assault routes. General-class volcanic cannons locked onto the most prominent cluster of spires on the outer perimeter of Gamor, each salvo causing the entire row of buildings to vanish for a moment in a pale aura. Emperor-class plasma annihilation cannons fired in slow, alternating bursts, gradually widening the gaps in the attempting-to-close defensive perimeter.

Behind the Dark Eldar lines, within the inner passages of a spire, a Dark Eldar tactician was issuing new commands to all remaining units via a spirit bone resonator. Her voice, encrypted by Gamor's defensive network, traveled along the spirit bone's energy channels: "Abandon the outer spire. Converge towards the second level. Seal off all access points. Lure the monkeys into the pre-set trap zone. Let them chase and hack us down in a sea of ​​fire until their blades buckle."

Commands were executed simultaneously across dozens of corridors. The connecting bridges of the suspended corridors began to detach segment by segment from the skeletal walls, slicing the advance routes across the area into isolated fragments. Hellchariots retreated into pre-designated passages, leaving behind a barrier of poisonous mist along their escape paths. The Dark Eldar's defenses were contracting, but this contraction itself was creating even deadier traps.

The Starforge mechs continued to deploy in deep formations along their contracted advance lines, their bomb turrets firing alternately, while their powered gauntlets cleared out any Dark Eldar infantry formations they encountered at close range. Under the cover of the mechs, the Cleric infantry sealed off the gaps between the building's lower levels and the tunnel entrances. The two sides' ranks repeatedly intertwined, tore, and regrouped in the suspended corridors and domed plazas, the advance lines surging forward like tides, only to be pushed back by the Dark Eldar counterattacks, and then pushed forward again.

In the gap between the defense zones of the First and Second Regiments of the Faith, Kara's Stormtroopers were infiltrating deep into Gomor.

The dark gold Type 500Y Radiant Gold Power Armor reflected almost no light in the cool glow, while crimson cloaks billowed into shadows as they moved rapidly. Dark Eldar energy weapons exploded with dark purple sparks on their armor, but could not penetrate the adamantite armor protected by both Radiant Gold and a mental barrier. A small squad moved silently through the shadows of the building's upper floors, pinpoint bursts of explosive rifle fire knocking two Dark Eldar sentries off the walls at close range without raising any alarms. Another team cut into the base of a spire from the side of the utility corridor, clearing the entire floor before the Dark Eldar Guard could complete their reinforcements. After completing their clearing mission in a specific area, the Stormstrike Forces were relieved by the Guardians, while the Stormstrike Forces continued their infiltration of the next command node.

Each eliminated node—the command center of the conspiracy, the communications relay array, the Raven hangar under preparation—slowed the Dark Eldar's defensive response, making it impossible for them to maintain a continuous counterattack.

The structure of Gamor extended simultaneously in every direction. Above, in the cluster of spires, Eldar snipers and Dark Spear turrets relentlessly poured fire downwards; on the suspended corridors and domed plazas above, the Empire and the Eldar engaged in a fierce, multi-dimensional battle across a surface several kilometers wide; underground, in the tunnels and slave passages, another war had raged for hours. Within the noble spires, greenery and water flowed between the buildings—landscapes plundered from various worlds by the Eternal King were now burning, breaking, and shattering in the flames of war.

The underground tunnels were narrow and dimly lit. The Dark Eldar defenders knew the terrain better than those on the surface, setting up defensive lines at every corner. The Cleric engineers used thermobaric cutters to breach the skeletal walls, advancing segment by segment, clearing each intersection with explosives and flames. The Starforge mechs could only advance in single file through the underground passages; their turrets couldn't extend their firing arcs, forcing them to use their power gauntlets to clear rooms at close range. Deep within the tunnels, the screams of slaves and the echoes of explosions surged up from the lower levels, mingling with the roar of bomb guns and the whistling of chainswords.

Beneath the network of tunnels, the Inquisition's infiltration operation achieved a breakthrough. Taking advantage of the disarray within the Gamor defenses and the communication disruptions caused by the Chagatai invasion, infiltrators severed the slave restraint systems of several arenas within a cabal's controlled territory in the Western District. No human slave, imprisoned for months or years, had survived longer—soldiers, civilians, and even survivors from long-forgotten sectors from all over the Imperium's worlds poured out of their cages after their bonds were broken. Unarmed, they learned the most primal methods of killing in the Dark Eldar arenas. Inquisition support personnel marked the tunnel exits with pathways to Imperium-controlled areas, and the freed slaves surged forward, forming several reinforcements behind the Guardians of the Order, flanking the Imperium's main force from the Dark Eldar rear. Some paused upon seeing the Guardians' crimson cloaks; they couldn't identify the unit, but they recognized the gear and skull insignia. In the lower levels of the arenas, the same mark occasionally appeared on the bodies of executed Imperium prisoners. Now it appeared on the armor of the living—that was the signal. The riot had created continuous fire and chaos in the Gamorsey district, forcing the Dark Eldar to withdraw forces from their surface defenses. Although it was only a small area within the vast city of Gamorsey, its symbolic significance and tactical constraints far exceeded its physical scale.

At the base of the Spire of Zola, a Dark Eldar messenger traversed an abandoned passage, delivering a final message to a defensive node deep within the tunnels. Each section of Gamor's lower-level tunnels was pre-designed with a bone-melting point—a last resort in place since the city's construction. If intruders advanced to a certain depth, the defenders could sever the structural integrity, burying the entire passageway in collapsing bone.

"The Governor orders—abandon the lower-level utility tunnels. Detonate all pre-set spirit bone meltdown points."

The command was executed. The energy conduits at the fusion point overloaded and exploded after a pre-set delay, the skeletal walls crumbled from the inside, and the entire tunnel structure collapsed layer by layer in a continuous chain of fractures. The Apostolic Army engineers withdrew from the tunnel at the last moment. A sergeant's helmet still held a glimpse of the collapsing tunnel; he saw the rapidly spreading skeletal fissures engulf the lines that had been just meters behind him. He pressed the communication button: "Tunnel breakpoint closed, searching for alternative routes—they are burying us with their own skeletons." More tunnel sections were being severed in the same way, sealing off Gamor's lower levels piece by piece. The Dark Eldar were burying the invaders' advance with the very structure of their city.

Cohen's gaze fell upon the burning spires. Beneath Gamor's bones lay the remains of countless empires, each of those spires a starting point for raids—from Amegiddon to Maraudon, from Calicut to the farthest frontiers.

At this moment, the tower spires are being extinguished one by one amidst the gunfire. Gamor is the source of all plunder, and now, that source is burning.

"Director," Eleanor's voice came through, carrying the hoarse echo characteristic of psionic transmission, "Gallos Webport has forwarded a report that the advance rapid reaction fleet of the Mechanicus in the Misty Starfield of the Chogris direction has just passed through the 0828th node hub, and is still two days' journey from the front line of the Gamor War. The follow-up formations are still passing through and are expected to continue arriving in the coming days."

Cohen's self-beam did not leave the main display screen: "Reporting to the Marcus and Calicus fleets, as well as the White Scar fleet, massive Imperial reinforcements are arriving."

"Director, Kublai Khan forwarded Chagatai Khan's Storm Prophet's message—inquiring whether Garros has any way to reopen the portals in the subdomains after they were closed. If not, we must find a way to seize those portals."

"Reply to Kublai Khan: The portal is not the problem. Letting them escape into subdomains and sealing themselves off will only allow us to defeat them one by one."

Cohen's gaze lingered for a moment on the main display screen. The Eternal Twilight flickered continuously amidst the recurring flashes of gunfire. Gamor was burning, slowly crumbling beneath the giant feet of the Titans and the crimson tides of the Guardians. The city was too large, too complex; it would require a long and protracted struggle to utterly crush it.