Warhammer: Empire Reboot

Several orc leaders gathered together, brandishing crude rocket launchers and large machetes, and roared angrily.

Xiong Wei did not give them time to complete their assembly.

The shoulder-mounted rapid-fire cannon fired first.

The axe blade fell like a slaughter line.

Fifty minutes later, Xiong Wei's advance team occupied the outer slope of water tower No. 3.

This advance force of only 500 men pushed back an orc tide that had once overwhelmed the Astrail's defenses by 10 kilometers.

On the seventh hill, the remnants of the Corona Guard Regiment and the 82nd Regiment were mesmerized.

A young noble officer asked in a low voice, "If this is just an advance team, then what is the main force?"

Armand glanced at him.

"You still have the energy to care about this?"

The man gave a bitter laugh: "I just wanted to know if I was already dead. The thing the Emperor sent to pick me up is a bit... big."

The veteran next to him coughed up blood.

"If you really died, the one coming to pick you up wouldn't be someone this big. You owe the Ministry of Military Affairs three heat guns; you'll have to pay them back before the throne."

After a moment of silence, they all chuckled.

The laughter quickly subsided.

Because they saw Victor's mangled body, the crater left by Sergeant Brock, and their comrades who had fallen in the circle.

The smile faded, replaced by weariness and sadness.

Before they could compose themselves, the air in the center of the Seventh Highland distorted once again.

This time, the static force field extends over a larger area.

The sequence of 100,000 foundation stones begins to descend.

They wore standard gray armor and carried toolboxes, explosive guns, folding heavy machine guns, automatic turret modules, mine boxes, ceramic steel protective plates, and tactical terminals.

They emerged from the static force field and immediately dispersed to various parts of the highlands.

In less than ten minutes, Hill 7 was transformed from a desperate position held up by flesh and blood into a war machine that was restarting.

Aurelia stared, her eyes wide with disbelief.

She received military education from a young age and also studied positional defense theory at Terra Noble Academy.

But she had never seen such efficiency before.

The remaining soldiers of the Corona Guard Regiment and the 82nd Regiment were quickly evacuated from the front line.

Armand watched as a Cornerstone assassin took his heat gun to examine it, and instinctively said:

"Be careful, that's a custom-made gun from the Valmont family. The focusing crystal requires..."

The cornerstone assassins didn't even glance at him.

"Focus on three crystal cracks. Heat sink blockage. Energy interface overheating. Retirement and maintenance required."

At this moment, a young nobleman behind him asked in a low voice:

"They say the one who holds the seal... is it Lord Makado?"

Armand turned and glared at him: "Did the orcs chop your brain off? What era is Lord Makado from?"

"I've only heard about the Seal Bearer..."

Another female officer whispered, "It's Lord Lord Lawson. Agrippina's man."

Aurelia listened to their conversation, and a thought struck her.

The answer came the next moment.

Behind the Seventh Highland, Lawson emerged from the light.

He was surrounded by eighteen guards.

Er Gou and San Gou stood at the front.

The remaining Mastiff-numbered guards spread out beside him.

The members of the Corona Guard reacted almost simultaneously.

Aurelia was the first to kneel down.

"Aurelia Vane of the Terra Corona Guard greets the Marker."

Armand followed closely behind: "Armand de Valmont, the second son of the Valmont family, pays his respects to His Excellency the Seal Keeper."

The surviving noblemen and ladies all knelt down.

The veterans of the 82nd Regiment were a step behind.

They were exhausted, and some nearly collapsed to the ground as they knelt down.

Lawson walked across the Seventh Hill, his gaze sweeping over the ruins, corpses, craters of burning, broken heat guns, and the young men whose wrists were bound with fragments of their family cloaks.

"You guys are very good."

"Worthy of the name 'Corona'."

Aurelia looked up.

In that instant, the hardness that had been pressing down on her face for so long almost cracked.

Armand gripped his trench shovel tightly, his eyes reddening slightly.

Lawson continued, "The front line is now under my command. You will temporarily retreat to the second line to rest and regroup."

Aurelia immediately lowered her head.

"Yes, Your Excellency, the one in charge of the seal."

Lawson looked at the cornerstone command node next to him.

"The wounded will be transferred first. The identities of those killed in action in the Corona Guard Regiment will be registered and their family insignia preserved. The wounded of the 82nd Regiment will receive the same treatment."

The cornerstone node bowed its head.

"Command confirmed."

These words made the veterans raise their heads.

Equal treatment.

Within the Imperial Military Affairs system, the corpses of nobles and ordinary soldiers were never treated the same.

The bodies of nobles would be collected, numbered, boxed, and returned to their families.

For ordinary soldiers, it depends on the battlefield conditions.

Sometimes they are burned, sometimes buried, and sometimes left unattended.

With a single sentence, Lawson smoothed things over.

Lawson quickly made the arrangements.

The focus of the warning star is not on the seventh high ground.

This is the outer ring of the water storage nest, merely a wound in the battle.

The true command center is located in the planetary capital, the Hyperion Nest City.

More precisely, the Parliament Palace deep within Port Sainte.

There gathered the remaining planetary high-rankings of the Vigilant Star, representatives of the Ministry of Military Affairs, the chief priest of the State Religion, the priests of the Mechanicus, the commanders of the Astral Army, and various noble councilors.

The Chaos Legion is pressing in, and the defenses of Vigilant Star are crumbling.

If the people in the capital are still passing the buck, Lawson wouldn't mind helping them achieve unification.

The atmosphere on the Seventh Hill eased a little after Lawson left.

Armand breathed a sigh of relief.

"He just praised us."

“I heard you.”

"The Lord in charge of the seal said that we are worthy of the name of the Sun Crown."

The young man suddenly laughed: "If my father heard this, he would have it engraved in the family chapel."

Aurelia glanced at him.

"Get back alive first, then think about your father's wall."

The group fell silent.

The excitement was quickly overshadowed by death.

They began collecting the bodies.

Victor's remains were placed on a clean ceramic slab.

Armand cleaned the charred corona emblem of the Caslan family and placed it on Victor's chest.

Aurelia knelt beside him, tore off a piece of her robe, and covered his bruised face.

“You’re behaving like a Kaslan,” she whispered.

Armand stood before the scorched pit left by Sergeant Bruck, looking for something to cover himself up, but found only a charred fragment of a dog tag.

The cornerstone sequence is highly efficient at treating the wounded.

Hemostatic glue, automatic suture device, analgesic injection, and anti-infective agents were removed from the static force field.

Many wounded soldiers who were originally destined to die were quickly stabilized.

The second-line retreating troops moved slowly backward.

They passed through the defenses that were being rebuilt.

The 100,000-stone sequence has transformed the Seventh Highlands into something entirely different.

Heavy ceramic steel plates were embedded in the remaining wall, automatic turrets were installed at a high position, and multi-barrel heavy machine guns were connected to the fire control system.