Warhammer 40k: Melee Warriors

"This is a very valuable characteristic, which allows you to launch an unexpected attack on the heart of the empire."

"That's right... but we've also discovered a problem. This kind of travel is uncontrollable; both the timing and location depend on luck... This shows that your warships aren't as useful as you thought."

Moreover, this was merely a Blind Faith-class raider, practically the smallest of all ships capable of space warfare. Let alone sending it to ambush an Imperial armed caravan, even bringing destruction to a barbaric world would be incredibly difficult.

The presence of undead crews certainly reduced supply consumption, but these ethereal beings were far less efficient at executing combat orders than the modified servitude. They were slow, and the delay in responding to commands was as long as I was sitting here issuing orders to the scrap metal workers in Hell's Factory. In conclusion, your warships are of little value. Therefore, exchanging a complete destroyer for them is far beyond their worth.”

Before the blueprints were pushed to Komi, Komi picked them up and saw that it was an Icon Destroyer-class destroyer with a small and compact design.

This is not a powerful warship; it is only slightly stronger than the Blind Faith-class raider. In a large-scale naval battle, such a warship can be destroyed without leaving any trace with just one shot from a cruiser.

However, Komi was still willing to accept the price offered by Demas, since there was still one problem with the Blind Faith-class raider that Demas had not yet discovered.

That is, this warship cannot freely choose its course of navigation and can only slowly change course from point to point along the established route. If it really encounters any emergency, this warship is definitely unreliable.

"Are all the staff ready? Or will you be asking for a different price?"

Seeing that Gu Jian had asked an important question, Demas released a hint of cunning, the kind of shrewdness only a shrewd merchant possesses, from his fearless sarcophagus.

"If you want personnel and supplies... this dilapidated warship alone is not enough."

"Tell me, what do you want me to do?"

Chapter 140: Unexpectedly, I ran into an old acquaintance.

The door to the waiting room opened, and walking in was Komi, who was wearing Terminator armor and had received a reliable mechanical arm from Demas.

His appearance caused everyone to stand up and ask him how the transaction went.

"We will be replacing our warships. A destroyer with firepower and speed far exceeding that of the Blind Faith-class raider will become our new vessel." As soon as Komi spoke, Sharon lowered his head with great regret. He would miss the quiet environment on that warship.

"But Demas and his men won't provide us with all the personnel and supplies for the warships unless I do them a small favor."

"You'll do him a small favor?" Bennett asked. "And what about us?"

"You will remain as hostages until I finish that favor."

"It seems Demas doesn't trust you. He's afraid you'll seize the warship and run away," Antoine said jokingly.

To this, Koji simply replied, "Demas doesn't trust anyone unless he has something on his hands."

"So you're saying we're your weakness!" Ferren laughed a few times, wrapping his strong arms around Antoine and Sharon beside him. "We're a team that's bound together through thick and thin!"

Bennett leaned against the wall, curling his lip in disdain but offering no rebuttal to Ferren.

Komi patted Elaine's head one last time, indicating to everyone that he wouldn't waste any more time and would set off to complete the task he had been given.

They boarded the warship and left the port.

Three days later, Koji, along with the Iron Warriors, could see a huge, wrecked spaceship floating in the subspace. No matter how the soul waves crashed against this tomb made up of ships and space structures, they could not shake its position.

This wrecked spaceship has undoubtedly become a terrifying reef near the Broken Steel Fortress, its interior harboring nightmares that are blocking communications for passing ships and pulling them into it like a black hole.

"Go and complete your mission." Although they had been received by Demas, these steel warriors who had fought alongside Demas through thick and thin did not show much respect when speaking to Komi; they were simply being official.

Komi boarded a Fearclaw, an airdrop pod that, like Hela, had the ability to return to the warship via the same route, but its carrying capacity was far inferior to that of Hela, who was a Siren Assault Claw.

The laser cutting array at the bottom of the Fear Claw was breaking through the outer armor of the wrecked ship, finally stopping completely after a tremor. The hatch opened, and Komi activated a finely crafted chainsaw sword that Demas had given him as a gift from the Terminator power armor.

Walking among the wrecked ship, Komi recalled the simple task that Demas had given him.

A group of orcs somehow entered the wrecked spaceship. They quickly adapted to the living environment and, taking advantage of the chaotic internal structure of the spaceship, established a raiding hideout.

The cunning Greenskin pirates never caused any real damage to Demas's shattered steel fortress, but every now and then, hearing that some warships had been damaged by Greenskin attacks and that a lot of supplies had been stolen from their cargo holds was like swallowing a fly.

Demas assigned the task of clearing out the green pirates to Komi, more as a convenient excuse to prepare personnel and warship supplies for Komi.

He thought that if he took the initiative to thoughtfully prepare everything for Komi, it would damage his dignity as the master of the Broken Steel Fortress.

It would be better to assign Komi a task that he himself wanted to do, but which did not require a large-scale operation, in order to show the outside world that he had the ability to command Komi, the World Devourer, to serve him.

This was the arrogant nature that Demas inherited from Perturabo, which would never change until his death. Komi even found Demas quite interesting.

The Terminator power armor was indeed much more advanced than the old Mark 5 Astray power armor. The sturdy armor protected the more powerful power backpack on his back, making Koji feel that he was much stronger.

The shield device that Demas added was also in operation, and the almost completely transparent shield protected Komi's upper body.

The smell inside the wrecked ship was quite complex, with ancient scents intertwined, making it impossible for Komi to pinpoint the orc's scent.

Fortunately... he also has a dog with a keen sense of smell.

"You know those orcs, right? Go and lead me to their location."

As the dog sniffed around, Komi quickly found orc-style graffiti marks in the chaotic, dark tomb, as well as some fungal spores that were stubbornly growing even in the terrible environment of the warp.

This meant they had entered the edge of the orc camp. His past experience of mingling with orcs helped Komi at this moment, and he could even barely recognize the deeper meaning of these quirky symbols.

As he deciphered the symbols on the wall like a seasoned orc who had lived for three months, the dog sensed a dangerous aura from the spiderweb-like crisscrossing pipes above his head.

"Enemy!" Dog shouted, and a bullet landed on Komi's shield.

The rough bullets that struggled to penetrate the shield made Komi nostalgic; the shield Demas made was like a quagmire, which could reduce the speed of thrown objects to a very safe level.

The shield, supported by this principle, consumes energy at an astonishing rate, but it also avoids the possibility of overloading and becoming unusable due to excessive exposure to massive attacks.

Koji looked up and saw long, thin gun barrels protruding from the pipes and aiming at him. Judging from the caliber, these were definitely not the guns that orcs preferred to use.

A farting bastard who specializes in harassment?

Now the work is much easier...

Komi smirked, deciding to end all the battles within a day.

......

"I shouldn't have boasted back then... really..."

Three weeks later, Koji complained to the dog that the corpses of the fart demons were piled up at his feet. He had been working day and night to eliminate forty-seven of the fart demons' strongholds, but this still did not mean that the fart demons had completely lost their ability to fight back.

"They're so good at hiding..." Dog sniffed the corpse of the fart spirit, paying no further attention to the orcish's unique stench. Then he looked up at Komi and asked, "But I feel like you know them very well. You predicted many of their traps much earlier than I did. Like that one just now..."

The man and the dog looked back and saw that the path they had come from had collapsed into a pool of plasma radiating an orange-red light. The bastards had gathered all sorts of fuel rods and reactors they had found in the wrecked ship and tied them together to make a terrifying bomb that could melt down at any moment.

The fart demons put in all their effort to lure Komi step by step into the trap they had set, even deploying hundreds of fart demon killing jars that were kept under wraps.

Fortunately, Koji sensed the cunning in the fart spirit's noisy screams and quickly grabbed the dog and ran forward, thus avoiding being blown into a pool of molten liquid at the last moment.

Looking at a huge painting on the wall, Komi sighed and answered the dog's question, "I know them very well... I might be... the first warrior in this galaxy to get to know them."

"Really? I know nothing about these strange fart spirits... Did they exist during the Great Crusade?"

“No…after that…” Komi didn’t want to talk to the dog any more about this issue, so he waved his hand and headed toward the next camp of fart spirits.

On the wall was painted a tall, thin fart demon with a huge smile that stretched from his mouth to his earlobe, and beneath him were countless thin, dry hands of fart demons.

A slogan was placed to the side.

"Fight to the very last moment for the great Waaagh of the Farting Master!"

Chapter 141: Chaos is the Norm in the Warp

"Alright, all the orcs have been wiped out." Koji returned to the warship. After playing hide-and-seek and guerrilla warfare with so many orcs for so long, he felt deeply exhausted. So much so that when the Iron Warrior saw his face, he couldn't help but ask if there was a powerful and cunning orc warlord inside.

"Warlords?" Koji waved his hand. "If there really were warlords, that would be fine. I could probably fight my way out in two or three days. They're all cunning guys in there, sniping and waging guerrilla warfare in the wrecked ships... Do you know what I did to completely wipe out the last orc stronghold? I used the meltdown bombs I collected to blast open that gap that only a child could pass through, and then crawled in bit by bit through a hail of bullets thanks to the sturdiness of my Terminator armor... Okay, enough about that. Let's hurry back. These past few weeks have passed. Don't you want to go back to Broken Steel Castle and smell the stench of Hell Industries?"

The Iron Warriors turned and left; the past few weeks had passed in the blink of an eye compared to their long combat careers.

Once outside the interference range of the wrecked spaceship, a flood of information from the broken steel fortress rushed to the poor mutated communicator. His brain, already swollen to an enormous size due to corruption, expanded several times before exploding with a groan.

His brain, his skull, and every remaining piece of his skin were inscribed with lines of small characters, which the Iron Warriors immediately picked up and carefully deciphered.

Upon returning to Broken Steel Fortress, Komi immediately headed to the main fortress of Broken Steel Fortress to find Demas and collect his reward.

The twelve Iron Warriors followed Komi, showing everyone that he was a guest respected by Demas.

Passing through the sturdy steel gate, one enters a large hall, where a steel warrior company commander and his men block Komi's path. He orders Komi to stop there in a harsh tone.

The process was reasonable, and even the twelve Iron Warriors following behind Komi did not raise any objections.

Komi asked Demas directly what he was busy with and where his comrades were waiting for him.

"I am Company Commander Tieduo. Motidemas is currently busy with an important task and doesn't have time to receive you. However, he has already made plans; we will reunite you with your warband..."

Reunion? Doesn't that word sound a bit off?

Komi raised an eyebrow, but then, remembering that these Iron Warriors were the ultimate straight men, he put aside his doubts and prepared to follow them, who were carrying heavy shields and spears, toward another side door.

His gaze happened to fall on the tightly closed door at the end of the hall. For some reason, he suddenly started drooling, and a strong, fishy smell of chicken was churning in his stomach.

What's going on...?

Gu Jian paused for a moment when he was puzzled. The steel warriors who had come with Company Commander Tie Duo also tensed up immediately, and they clearly put more force into their grip on their weapons.

The atmosphere suddenly became heavy and strange, and Komi felt an increasing killing intent surrounding him.

Just as he was wondering if he was overthinking things, the silent dog barked.

"There's that damned creature in that door! It's that ever-changing Demon Lord you didn't manage to bite to death!"

Gu Jian was startled and met Tie Duo's gaze. He threw a punch that struck Tie Duo's helmet, shattering the veteran company commander's facial bones. His eyeballs had lost their support and were only kept from falling out by the helmet's restraint.

The sudden change shocked the 12 Iron Warriors behind Komi, who couldn't understand why Komi would hurt their company commander.

They raised their weapons behind Komi and shouted orders for him to give up resistance, while Komi saw intense killing intent in the goggles of these steel warriors wielding heavy shields in front of him.

Amidst the roar of gunfire, the dog howled and dodged, managing to save his life thanks to his agility.

Komi, relying on the sturdiness of his Terminator armor and shield, forced his way to the front of the Iron Warrior. In pursuit of speed, he didn't even have time to draw his chainsaw sword, and instead placed his hand on the heavy shield.

With just one burst of force, the Iron Warrior was overwhelmed, and the other Iron Warriors abandoned any thought of rescuing their comrade and opened fire, intending to shatter him and Komi into pieces.

Checking the shield's energy depletion, and relying on the tattered corpse of the Steel Warrior and the shield to withstand the increasingly dense barrage of bullets, Komi knew he had to turn the tide.

He roared and swung the mangled corpse in his hand like a weapon, deflecting incoming bombs while using the weight of the corpse to smash the steel warrior wielding the large shield to the ground.

Komi increasingly sensed that the Iron Warriors in front of him and behind him, who wore the same paint scheme, had completely different psychological states. One group wanted to kill him on the spot at the door, while the other group wanted to capture Komi and hold him accountable.

Demas's men appear to have betrayed him...

But why?

Because of the Demon Lord's lies? Temptation?

Komi felt that the reason for things was not so simple, and that the answers to all the questions could only be found after opening that door.