Chapter 148: Khrave Aliens
The entire company, like an elite special forces unit, advanced all the way into the city's massive government building.
The building was covered in dust and cobwebs, and completely dark. The company searched throughout the building, but found nothing.
Before long, a towering, fortified building over a hundred meters high caught their attention. They quickly moved in and infiltrated it. Upon arriving at the dark fortress, the Space Marines immediately smelled a foul stench.
They saw many human skeletons in the corridor. Unbeknownst to Skol and the others, mysterious monsters hung from the ceiling. These monsters seemed to be asleep and did not notice the Space Marines walking on the ground.
When they reached the second floor, the Space Marines used their night vision to examine everything in the darkness.
They quietly sneaked into a large hall, and some of the soldiers who were searching around noticed the ceiling.
Skol looked up and, through night vision and sensors, saw monsters that looked like demons hanging from the ceiling. These aliens had large, bat-like wings and dark, demonic bodies. They possessed a strange energy that made it impossible for the Space Marines to see them clearly. Skol knew this was their psychic energy.
Skol's hand moved to his weapon.
Without hesitation, the Space Marines raised their bolters and meltaguns, firing incendiary rounds to test the enemy's defensive capabilities.
A blinding beam of light densely covered the ceiling as a powerful blast struck a Khrave alien. A strange ripple of psychic energy followed, but had no effect. The same thing happened with the shots from the meltaguns and the incendiary rounds.
This scene surprised the Space Marines, who recognized it as a xenos psychic field, but the veterans continued firing.
The powerful attack immediately awakened the bat monster hanging from the ceiling. The powerful psychic energy spread and the monster's figure seemed to blur before the warriors' eyes. However, the continuous firing overloaded the monsters' psychic energy field and physical defenses.
The psychic shrieks filled the hall and continued to spread, while the incendiary rounds and meltaguns relentlessly covered the bat demons that had awakened and were about to attack from the ceiling.
Faced with the meltaguns and incendiary rounds, these bat demons couldn't withstand the assault for long before their bodies melted into slag and collapsed to the ground, kicking up clouds of dust.
It was only at this moment that the Space Marines saw the full form of these monsters: a black and gold demonic body with bat wings, bat-like fangs, and a pair of upright horns.
The Khrave xenos stood three meters tall and had a robust build. More importantly, they had power armor-like body armor and weapons similar to bolters.
The fierce battle in the hall, and the psychic screams of the bat demons, quickly awakened the Khrave aliens hanging from the ceiling throughout the massive fortress.
On the ceiling above the countless human skeletons on the first-floor corridor, the Khrave alien, wrapped like a giant cocoon, opened its eyes. Its red eyes snapped open, its body rapidly unfolded, detached from the ceiling, and soared into the air.
Inside the fortress, Space Marines engaged in fierce combat with the Khrave aliens, while Alpha warriors skillfully guarded the various corridors and key passages, firing rapidly.
The terrain of the building severely limited the Khrave xenos' flight capabilities.
A distance of only a few dozen meters was well within range of the bolters, and the powerful firepower of the meltaguns and incendiary rounds instantly melted any xenos that appeared before them into pools of blood.
After an hour of fighting, Skol's company dealt with the Khrave aliens in the fortress and discovered a disgusting truth.
In the bridge, Rex combined the anatomical analysis of the Khrave xenos with the operational data from Skol's company. After powerful analysis by the data think tank, the Alpha Legion gained a deeper understanding of the Khrave xenos.
The Khrave aliens, bat-like demons, were indeed a very powerful psychic race.
Ordinary Khrave aliens possessed physical attributes far exceeding those of ordinary human soldiers, including immense strength, defense, speed, reflexes, and flight. Their physical abilities were comparable to those of Astartes, and they possessed powerful psychic energy.
Among them, the elite captain-level Khrave aliens were nearly as strong as the Astartes, and this alien race was stronger than expected.
The Khrave xenos possessed their own technology, including psychic armor and psychic weapons such as aether blades, making it a civilization with force field technology.
This alien race enslaved other races, using them as food reserves to slowly consume them.
They not only ate people but also drained their spirits, which was why the humans on this planet were listless and like the living dead. This explained why all the humans on this lost planet were sluggish, transportation was deserted, and city buildings were decaying like ruins.
Omega understood this and, while horrified by the power of the Khrave xenos, also lamented that humanity on this planet was beyond saving.
Omega devised a corresponding tactic to counter the Khrave xenos.
Alpha warriors, skilled in infiltration, would serve as the vanguard, supplemented by elite mortal forces, infiltrating hundreds of cities on the planet to locate the Khrave aliens.
Then, missile and bombing units would bombard the Khrave alien fortresses. The remaining forces would be handed over to the Space Marines and the servitor units, while the Titan Legion cleaned up the rest.
After formulating the battle plan, the Alpha Legion launched a landing operation. Since the number of Khrave aliens was not large, they did not build a war base this time, but instead used the empty human cities.
After the order was given, a large number of gunships flew down to the planet Katya and landed directly in the major cities.
Infiltration and stealth were the specialties of Alpha warriors. With the Space Marines in front and elite mortal units behind, they quickly investigated the locations of Khrave xenos in cities. Some Space Marine companies directly eliminated any Khrave xenos they discovered.
The elite mortal forces perfectly executed Omega's orders, immediately calling for bombing upon detecting the aliens.
In a city, a hundred elite soldiers clad in light armor watched as thousands of bombers flew overhead, launching a barrage of missiles that bombarded the city's massive, fortified fortress.
Missiles struck the fortress with deafening explosions. One missile after another bombarded the fortress, sending plumes of smoke and dust billowing as it was blasted to pieces.
After the entire fortress was reduced to ruins, no intact architectural structure could be seen anymore, let alone any Khrave aliens.
The dust settled slowly across the devastated landscape.
The pilot in the sky happily greeted the elite squad on the ground and quickly flew away. This scene deeply impressed the elite squad present, who realized that they could also achieve the combat effectiveness of Space Marines.
The elite squadron leader smiled as he watched the departing aircraft. "The Legion's bombing is truly brutal. This time, we might not lose to the Space Marines! Let's go, we'll continue searching for the aliens. Once we locate them, these bizarre creatures are doomed."
The captain gave a shout and led his men to continue the operation. This was the situation everywhere in the cities. Once they found a fortress, they blasted it to the ground. The rest was left to the Space Marines and the servitor-controlled machine soldiers.
That was exactly the effect Omega wanted. Forget about psychic powers or mind control, they'd just blast it away. The enemy's lack of strong fortifications and energy shields made them perfect targets for the Alpha Legion's precision bombing.
"Let's see how many missiles a single xenos can withstand. We shall overwhelm these terrifying xenos with sheer numbers of missiles."
...
A month later, Omega's Legion dealt with the Khrave aliens on the planet Katya.
The most troublesome problem after the war was actually the humans whose brains had atrophied and whose spirits had been drained.
After some discussion, the Legion's high command ultimately handed the matter over to the Adeptus Mechanicus.
Having learned from the war on Katya, Omega divided his forces to fight in the same way, eliminating the Khrave aliens in nearby star systems. If there were planets with a large number of aliens, they would regroup their forces.
When the combat methods were similar to those in the Calesis Sector, company commanders like Skol were very familiar with them.
Six months later
The Khrave xenos and other xenos races in the Tresta Sector were wiped out by Alpha, Raven Guard, and Dark Angels, and the three Legions arrived at the Khrave xenos' headquarters on the core planet of the sector.
In space, three thousand warships of the Khrave aliens clashed with six thousand warships of the human side, while a large number of interstellar fighters flew through the starry sky.
[End of Chapter]