Warhammer: Empire Reboot

Cadmus looked up.

“If Lawson discovers us, the Kill Signal won’t last long. What we can do is not engage in battle, but create a target that he must deal with first.”

"for example?"

"Smash the evil signal at the Battle Moon!!"

Herax looked at him: "A stealth cruiser crashing into a combat moon? You want to leave a scratch on Lawson's armor?"

Cyrus is also conflicted.

This is not an ordinary choice.

Evacuation would preserve the seven fragments, the ominous signal, and the fruits of years of infiltration, but would mean losing the most crucial fragment deep within Assamor.

The operation might yield core fragments, but it would place them within Lawson's search radius.

From a traditional profit perspective, taking the key is worth the risk.

Judging from Lawson's behavior, any delay could turn into death.

Cyrus thought for eight seconds before making a decision.

"Get the key."

He pulled up a surface map of Assamolo.

"Instead of sending the main force down, release three sets of disguised probes, which will simultaneously enter from the northwest of the temple, the fault well, and the Tau evacuation passage. Each set will carry a fake resonance source to guide Lawson's underground probes to a different direction."

"The actual operations team?"

"I go."

Herax immediately objected: "It's too risky for the leader to go down himself."

“So Lawson won’t assume I’ll go down,” Cyrus said. “He’ll do the opposite.”

Iskan said, "What do we do about the ominous signal?"

"You prepare to jump, I'll take the debris back to the ship and leave immediately."

"What if you didn't come back?"

Cyrus looked at him.

"Take seven fragments with you."

Iskan nodded.

This is the kind of order the Alpha Legion can accept: layered objectives, and even in failure, there must be gains.

One of the members suddenly reported in a low voice: "The outer probe has received an abnormal echo."

The argument on the bridge immediately ceased.

Iskan rushed to the stealth system, his fingers quickly tracing the control runes.

"The edge disturbances during the preheating of the gravity net indicate that they are laying the net!"

Herax asked, "Have you spotted us?"

“It’s not completely locked on yet.” Iskandar stared at the data stream, “but the search area is narrowing. Stealth targets within 300,000 kilometers on the shaded side will be screened out.”

Cyrus made a decisive decision.

"Cancel the key pickup, let's go!!!"

The decision made eight seconds earlier was overturned. Cyrus did not hesitate, and no one in the Alpha Legion questioned it.

When intelligence changes, decisions change; only by surviving can there be a next time.

Iskan started the engine and preheated it at a low temperature.

The ship remained dark, its hull optical camouflage refracting starlight into background noise.

The engine was not fully ignited; the ship's bow direction was adjusted using only the lowest power output.

Subspace jumps require tens of seconds of preparation.

The Deathwatch ships shouldn't be this slow.

But the navigator is dead; they killed him too cleanly.

Now, the only way to assist in warp jumps is through preset flight paths and rewritten machine spirits, making it more stealthy and more dangerous.

Cyrus watched the countdown.

On the outer screen, a small dot suddenly appears outside the trajectory prediction line.

"Boarding torpedo".

"Intercept..."

The black hull suddenly shuddered.

Brief bursts of gunfire came from the weapons deck.

"Two targets at the intrusion point!"

The torpedo drill unfolded, and two combat personnel emerged from the black smoke and metallic vapor.

Cadmus led four Alpha members to flank from the side.

The camouflage markings on the Deathwatch armor were still on, and they even retained the original tactical hand signals of the original warband.

The shield-wielding assassin didn't see the hand signals.

He smashed the first Alpha member's explosive rifle, the shield edge pressing into his chest armor, pinning the man to the wall.

The bladed assassin sidestepped the chain blade, his metal short blade slicing into his opponent's armpit and tearing the entire nerve bundle along the seam of the power armor.

Cadmus raised the plasma gun.

The moment the gun barrel flashed, his wrist stopped.

He can't move.

Not just him.

The entire ship went silent in the same second.

The Alpha crew in the engine bay stood frozen in front of the control panel.

Iskan remained on the bridge, still in the position of inputting the warp command, his fingers hovering above the rune. Heracles' hand rested beside the explosive pistol.

Cyrus's neck can still turn half an inch.

He used that half-inch to look at the projected image of the intrusion point.

After two combat orders, one person stepped forward.

Lawson.

The psionic field has covered the entire warship.

Every corridor, every cabin, every weapon server, and the bones and nerves of every Alpha member of the Killer Signal were all suppressed under the same hand.

Cyrus confirmed one thing: Vashtor's assessment of Lawson remains conservative.

Losen walked forward along the corridor.

He passed the first corpse of the Death Watcher.

The silver skull shoulder armor, two close-range blast wounds on the chest, and fake alien claw marks on the back were used to mislead the subsequent investigation.

The second one.

The third one.

Then there were the corpses of two Keystone sequences. One had its cervical vertebrae severed, and the other's head was shattered by a bomb.

Lawson walked onto the bridge.

Thirty-seven Alpha members are still alive, but none of them can move.

Cyrus tried to activate the venom sac under his tongue, but to no avail; his psychic field suppressed the muscles in his throat.

He then tried to activate the self-destruct mechanism built into the power armor, but to no avail.

Control commands cannot reach the wrist interface.

Lawson looked at the Deathwatch armor on their bodies, then glanced around at the corpses of the real Blackwatch veterans on the bridge.

"Impressive tactics; they even managed to infiltrate Blackwatch."

Lawson looked at Cyrus: "What benefits did Vashtor give you to make you work so hard?"

Cyrus discovered that his vocal cords had been loosened.

“Vashtor is looking for the key, Abaddon is looking for the key, the necromancers are chasing the key, and you are looking for it now. We are just one step ahead of the others.”

"So you killed my men."

"They discovered an anomaly that shouldn't have been discovered."

Cyrus's speech rate remained unchanged, his breathing was steady, and his pupils did not dilate; the Alpha Legion was trained to maintain physiological indicators under extreme pressure.

“If you kill us, you will get our bodies, armor, a ship, and seven fragments.”

He said, "If you spare my life, you can get the list of false targets for the next phase of Vashtor, the communication codes for the remnants of Abaddon's fleet, and more than one line of communication within the Alpha Legion."

Herax's eyes flickered slightly.

Cyrus knew he understood.

This statement contains a mixture of truth and falsehood.

He knows part of Vashtor's next objective, the old version of the Abaddon remnant fleet's code, and the Alpha Legion's internal wiring—he can easily sell one of the long-abandoned lines.

The key point is not the chips themselves.

It was to convince Lawson that he had more in his mind, enough to warrant keeping him alive.

Lawson raised his hand.

The magnetic backpack on Cyrus's back detached on its own and slowly floated into the air.

The lid popped open, revealing seven key fragments suspended inside, emitting a dark resonance.