Chapter 363: Reinforcements Arrive
Just as Ryo expected, the World Eaters' attack method was simple and brutal.
Countless drop pods, like burning meteorites, ignored any orbital tactical advantages and smashed directly onto the surface of the Death World, exploding into patches of blasphemous landing zones on the wasteland surrounding the base.
Before the hatches were even fully open, berserk roars and the thunder of bolters tore through the air. These lunatics implanted with the Butcher's Nails were like starving beasts, brandishing chainaxes and power klaws as they launched a chaotic, fierce charge toward the defense line.
Ryo calmly observed the battlefield situation. The evaluation of this tactic in his computing core was only two words: inefficient.
The frigate in orbit had already evacuated, leaving the entire Death World completely undefended at this moment.
The World Eaters' fleet could have easily lowered their altitude with impunity, entered low-earth orbit, and used lances and macrocannons to conduct precise, devastating orbital bombardments, completely erasing the ancient ruins and the canyon testing ground he had painstakingly built from the planet's surface.
Even if they wanted to seize the technology or samples in his hands, the optimal solution was to weaken and suppress the defenses through continuous orbital strikes until the defense forces collapsed to an acceptable degree, and then dispatch squads for precise clean-up.
However, this group of lunatics chose the most direct and stupidest method—a planetary ground assault.
"Logic absent; tactical thinking completely overridden by the desire to slaughter," Ryo's synthesized voice calmly stated the conclusion within the command nexus. "Their behavioral pattern is exactly the same as the choice their Primarch made on Isstvan V."
He recalled that historical record. Angron had similarly abandoned orbital superiority, insisting on deploying ground forces to engage in a bloody, hand-to-hand melee with the Loyalists.
Now, his sons had perfectly inherited this tradition.
Perhaps, in their brains—constantly scorched by the Butcher's Nails and left with nothing but anger and agony—concepts like "tactical advantage" and "efficiency" simply did not exist.
Close-quarters slaughter, the sensation of flesh and blood flying, and the feedback of skulls shattering beneath chainswords were the only things they craved.
Ryo quickly adjusted his defensive strategy.
Facing this irrational charge, fortified positions, intersecting fields of fire, and precise ranged strikes would become the most effective harvesting tools.
He ordered the Skitarii to pull back the defense line, relying on fortifications to form a multi-layered firepower trap. The Cybernetica Automata were deployed at key nodes, using their tireless, precise shooting to make up for the lack of numbers.
The Imperial Knights served as a mobile counterattack force, ready to crush any clusters that broke through the firing net at a moment's notice.
Since the enemy insisted on fighting a bloody ground war, he would use the calmest, most efficient method to turn this wasteland into a slaughterhouse for the World Eaters.
They craved melee? Then let them bleed out their last drop of blood on the way charging the positions.
Just as Ryo was relying on the defense line to calmly harvest the World Eaters' berserk charging waves, Sigismund and his Black Templars fleet were also rushing to the Death World at the absolute maximum speed they could achieve.
However, the fury of the Warp had not ceased. Deadly energy storms still raged, blocking normal deep-dive navigation.
Faced with this situation, the conventional approach was to look for gaps in the storm or detour, but this meant unpredictable delays.
Sigismund did not have this time.
He issued an unconventional command: "Abandon deep dive. Adopt a shallow-jump mode, keeping the fleet traversing the crevice between the real universe and the edge of the Warp."
This was an ancient and inefficient method of navigation, usually only used by Imperial colonial fleets or small patrol fleets lacking powerful Navigators or high-performance Warp engines.
It was like skipping stones across a turbulent ocean surface. The ships briefly cut into the shallow layers of the Warp, utilizing its propulsion to complete a short-distance faster-than-light jump, then quickly dropped out, returning to the material universe to recalibrate.
Each "skip" could only cross a distance of a few light-years to over a dozen light-years. Afterward, they had to surface to avoid the immense risks and navigational deviations brought by prolonged exposure to the Warp's edge.
Its efficiency was far lower than the long-term, high-speed travel conducted deep within the Warp.
But at this moment, the advantage of this method revealed itself—it was almost unaffected by that terrifying storm deep within the Warp.
The fleet could advance like a stubborn stone moving upstream; although the progress was arduous, it moved continuously and firmly towards the target.
The Eternal Crusader and its escort vessels transformed into a series of silent skipping stones, stubbornly shortening the distance to the Death World with each brief jump.
The scans conducted each time they briefly dropped out of the Warp failed to detect any other intercepting fleets. This seemed to confirm Sigismund's judgment—the main obstructive forces were concentrated on the Death World itself, and on the Death Guard he had encountered earlier.
The voyage was vastly prolonged, and time was slipping away minute by minute.
Sigismund stood on the bridge like a boulder, gazing out the viewport at the bizarre, constantly shifting scenes of the Warp's shallow layer.
He could imagine how intense the battle on the Death World must be, and the pressure Ryo was facing alone.
All he could do now was to arrive at the fastest possible speed, at any cost.
Even if this method was like a turtle crawling, it was still better than stagnating.
Just as Sigismund's fleet was struggling forward using the clumsy but determined "skipping stone" method, the reinforcements from the Forge World of Nexum were traversing this disturbed Warp in a completely different manner, one that highlighted the technological prowess of the Adeptus Mechanicus.
Although the Warp storm targeting the star system remained violent, as if an invisible giant hand was trying to strangle all routes to the Death World, the voyage of this expeditionary fleet composed of Skitarii macroclades and Titans was not fundamentally hindered.
The ships of the Adeptus Mechanicus, especially those capital ships belonging to important Forge Worlds, often carried ancient engines and precise navigational equipment that far exceeded standard Imperial Navy models.
They did not rely entirely on the psychic eyes of Navigators. Instead, they combined inertial navigation systems based on ancient STC templates, powerful calculations from star chart databases, and mathematical model predictions of Warp tide patterns.
In certain extreme situations, they could even activate a powerful Gellar Field stabilization array. Like an icebreaker, they could forcefully carve out a brief but stable channel amidst the furious Warp energy over relatively short distances.
At this moment, deep within the massive Ark Mechanicus at the core of this Forge World fleet, countless Tech-Priests were working in tandem with powerful cogitator arrays, continuously calibrating the course in the form of binary prayers.
The reinforced Gellar Field projected from the bow acted like a wedge, forcefully pushing aside the surging Warp energy. Although this consumed a massive amount of energy and placed immense pressure on the ship's structure, it was indeed effective.
The fleet maintained a strict formation, like a giant metal whale swimming steadily through treacherous waves. Although its speed was somewhat reduced by resisting the storm, its course remained clear, sailing steadfastly towards the Death World's Mandeville Point.
Finally, in the void of the material universe, the dim silhouette of the Death World gradually magnified in their view.
The fleet successfully broke through the storm blockade, dropped out of the Warp, and anchored securely in planetary orbit.
Almost simultaneously, on the surface of the Death World, Ryo's sensor arrays received the IFF signals from orbit.
That unique, encrypted binary greeting of the Adeptus Mechanicus announced the arrival of reinforcements.
Massive transport ships began releasing drop pods and transports like a swarm of bees, carrying two full macroclades of Skitarii soldiers and engines of war.
Even more eye-catching were several specially built, exceptionally massive transport ships adjusting their attitudes. Their temple-like cargo bays were slowly opening, preparing to unleash the slumbering Gods of War within—the Titans belonging to the Legio Steel Hounds.
The mastermind behind the scenes might be able to mobilize Greenskins, incite the Death Guard, and even stir up the Warp to a certain extent, but their power was clearly insufficient to simultaneously and effectively block reinforcements from both the Black Templars and a fully mobilized Forge World.
The scales were beginning to tip.