Chapter 128: The Cannons Roar!
Cannon fire shook the heavens and the earth. The armored assault group, supplemented by Astartes and Knights, was a moving tide of iron, tearing apart the green tide and the fortress-like reefs of scrap within it.
"Are you the one in charge of this sector?" Arthur asked the Commissar in front of him. The intensity of the war on this planet was high, but there were no real masters. With Karna on the front lines, killing was taken care of, so he had been sent to deliver the goods.
"Yes, my Lord!" the Commissar nodded, putting away his last will.
Due to the utter incompetence of the Navy, the high command of the Astra Militarum, along with the Imperial Navy's high command, had been wiped out in space at the beginning of the war. Fortunately, the ground-based defense arrays had been effective, shooting down the big Ork scrap-heap. And the Orks had been stupid enough to just crash their fleet, which meant that although the war was a mess, they had strangely managed to hold on for several years.
Of the million or so Astra Militarum left on the planet, the highest-ranking officer besides himself was the captain at his side.
"Do you know how to operate armored vehicles?" Arthur asked the captain.
"No, my Lord!" the captain shouted.
"Can you pilot an aircraft?"
"No, my Lord!"
"..."
You don't have to shout so loudly.
Arthur looked at the Astra Militarum around them. Many of them were even using old-pattern lasrifles, and their standard-issue armor was incomplete. Not every Astra Militarum regiment was from Cadia.
The Commissar immediately spoke up, his reply serious. "They are from the local Astra Militarum of the prairie world of Elks, and the Pyros Dragoons from the neighboring sector. They specialize in cavalry assaults and the use of heavy artillery."
"Where are the cannons?" Arthur asked, surprised. This planet was a complete meat-grinder. Tens of millions of PDF and Astra Militarum were fighting Orks and Chaos all over the planet. The intensity was terrifying, but there was very little heavy firepower, which meant the three sides were just slowly grinding each other down.
"Gone." Heavy firepower was usually deployed by the Navy. The Imperial Navy was gone. Even the regiment the Commissar was currently commanding was not his own. His own regiment was still drifting in outer space. The thought of it pained the Commissar. It should have been a simple suppression of a rebellion. The Imperial Navy should have cautiously dealt with the Ork fleet from a distance, then fired a few macro-cannon volleys at the two polar portals, and it would have been over. Even the local PDF and Astra Militarum could have handled the cleanup on their own.
But it had turned into this.
"My Lord, our warriors are currency tempered by the fires of war. We will fulfill the mission the Emperor has given his people. Please, give us your orders." The Commissar had some sense. The deployment of such an absurd number of Astartes and armored forces... the battlefield they were about to enter would be on a grand scale. Forget whether they could win; even if they did, they probably wouldn't survive.
"You can use self-propelled artillery, correct?" Arthur asked, ignoring the Commissar's suicidal intent. He pressed his comms to notify Romulus, then said to the Commissar, "How many men do you have who can operate artillery?"
"Four hundred thousand," the Commissar immediately replied.
"Muster them."
"Yes, my Lord." Although he was still filled with doubt, holding to the principle of "ask less, do more," the Commissar quickly went to gather his troops. With the help of the Astartes, the pressure on the front lines had been drastically reduced. Detaching troops was simple.
"Commissar, look!"
The reaction speed of the Imperial front line was not bad. At the very least, the frontline troops had the necessary professional skills.
The Commissar followed the captain's direction and looked up. In the now-clear sky, countless super-heavy transport aircraft were descending. These thin-skinned, large-capacity strategic transport units were usually only deployed before a battle or after air superiority had been achieved. As a counter-intuitive fact, in the vast majority of Imperial campaigns, the Imperium was the side with air superiority.
"My heavens—" the Commissar said, looking at the self-propelled artillery rolling out of the transports. Basilisks. A common model in the Imperium. But wasn't this number a bit too absurd? And those cannons... they didn't look quite right, did they?
"Can you use them?" Arthur asked.
The crusade was a perfect way for the transmigrators to snowball and earn their initial capital. Both the cannons and the chassis had been simplified by Dantioch, and the cost was very low. The transmigrators had contingency plans for mass-producing basic equipment, and they had the technological reserves to save souls in this area.
"Absolutely, my Lord," the Commissar said, swallowing hard, his mind racing to guess what they would be facing in the future.
"Immediately organize a regional artillery barrage. Here—and here—I will issue combat orders to you in real-time." Arthur quickly began to plan a combat strategy for the Astra Militarum, following Romulus's directions.
"My Lord, are you seeking a swift victory?" the Commissar asked, keenly observing the tactical plan. To win a swift victory with overwhelming military superiority, seemingly without considering whether the enemy had additional reinforcements.
"Yes." Arthur glanced at him and noticed the last will tucked into the collar of his uniform with a pen cap. "This planet is only a part of the battlefield. We must crush the enemy in the shortest possible time. You need not worry about being purged after the battle."
"In other words, we will win soon?" The Commissar found this Astartes lord to be exceptionally easy to talk to.
"Correct. When the sun appears on this planet for the second time, what will greet us will be the glory of victory and the bones of our enemies." Arthur nodded seriously.
"I understand, my Lord."
It seems the lads will survive.
The knight's voice had a quality that made you instinctively want to believe him. At the very least, the Commissar didn't think this Angel of the Emperor would lie to him on this matter.
The Commissar let out a long breath, then shouted to the officers in the command post, "Did you hear that, lads?! Get moving! Get the troops and the cannons moving!"
"Fire! Send these xenos to hell!" First Captain Pedro Kantor of the Crimson Fists ordered, his powerful, resonant voice echoing across the battlefield.
The Crimson Fists warriors at his side responded instantly, rising from behind their cover, their boltguns roaring in unison. A dense rain of bolts, like a torrential storm, instantly cut down several ranks of Orks charging from a narrow fortress passage. Thousands of corpses, along with blood and shattered armor, rolled down the steep steel cliff, making a dull, thudding sound.
A sharp whistle came from the sky. A barrage of shells, covering almost the entire fortress, slammed down. The fire from the explosions shot into the sky, kicking up a large cloud of dust mixed with flesh and mud.
The sudden, ferocious firepower didn't even give these tough and adaptable xenos time to react. The densely packed charging Orks were blown to pieces, their formation instantly disintegrating.
However, these hideous green-skins did not retreat. A dozen or so heavily armored Ork Nobs quickly climbed onto the breach in the fortress, trying to block the charge of the "big humie tin cans." They fired down from their high ground, their twin laser-cannons blazing. Thanks to the ingenious work of the Mekboyz, and a few Grot or Ork-brain sacrifices, their armor, enchanted with the power of the WAAAGH! and a deflector shield, perfectly withstood the weak bolter weapons.
"I reckon I can krump dem big humies," the heavy Nobs roared against the cannon fire, trying to suppress the Crimson Fists' advance with their fierce firepower, their shouts mixing with the gunfire, sounding particularly jarring.
However, standing high up, while it could attract the envious gazes of the boyz and make them even more WAAAGH!, also made them the target of everyone.
Although the firepower of the heavy Ork squad suppressed the Crimson Fists, making it difficult for them to raise their heads, the warriors behind the cover did not panic. They waited calmly until the Valkyries, which were conducting a low-altitude assault, skimming the Stormbirds' void shields, passed by. Countless super-heated explosives were dropped, engulfing the heavy Nobz and their surrounding guards. Seizing this moment, the Crimson Fists warriors rose against the enemy's cannon fire.
Heavy explosive rounds only dented their frontal armor. The weapon modules of the fire support squad quickly switched to super-heated plasma. The white-hot plasma, heated to its limit, ignited the air and shot straight for the Orks on the rock.
The slow-reacting heavy Nobz were instantly vaporized, leaving only mangled limbs. And the quick-witted, sneaky gits quickly retreated into the fortress, snatching the teef from the unlucky ones who still had their heads attached.
"I reckon dis ain't workin'! I reckon dis ain't workin'!" the heavy Nobz all ran towards the interior of the fortress.
SQUELCH!
A Mekboy casually kicked a Grot aside and sneered at the idiots who had just gotten themselves killed. He couldn't help but praise his own cleverness. If the fortress was breached, it was breached. These idiots, who only knew how to chop and shoot, where could they possibly understand the "astonishin' kunnin'" that Gork and Mork had given him?
The Big Mek giggled. He was already very tall, rivaling the bosses of the other Ork warbands. The recent great war with the humies had earned him the adoration of the boyz and grots, simply because the weapons and equipment he produced were the most WAAAGH! and the strongest.
Especially this giant war-fortress. Its interior was filled with sliding iron blocks and shearing iron pincers. If those tin can big humies dared to come in, the various moving rooms and the heavy Nobz inside would surely give them an endless supply of surprises!
THUMP!
A group of running Nobz missed their footing and fell into a sealed room. A few unlucky ones were still crying over their knocked-out teef, and then they started fighting because they had seen the bigger teef of the guy next to them.
The war-fortress had not yet been breached, but the interior of this massive building was already in an uproar.
But it didn't matter.
Fightin' is good! Fightin' is a good fing! My weapons are for dese kunnin' and tough boyz!
Power began to unlock in his genes. Inspiration erupted in his skull. The gaze of Gork and Mork was about to fall upon him.
The Big Mek was constantly thinking of new inspirations and technologies. The shield coils glowed, and arcs of electricity zapped his skull, making him feel that his inspiration was endless. He reckoned he could krump those big humies. He reckoned he could turn this fortress into the biggest, baddest mobile fortress. He reckoned he could turn these technologies into reality.
THUMP!
Another unparalleled tremor. The Big Mek slammed a button, preparing to show the humies a super-transformation.
BOOM!
The entire weak section of the fortress's roof was blown off. A ray of sunlight shone through the breach and onto the Big Mek's head.
"Oi, what's dis?" the Big Mek asked, looking up in confusion.
At the same instant, a giant, triple-barreled tube, which in his eyes was super-big and super-badass, poked in through that breach.
It was the triple-barreled flamer of a Dominus-class Knight Valiant.
"?"
(End of Chapter)