Chapter 99 Misplaced Cognition

"Sidney is dead," the Chaos Wizard Mendez said in his hoarse, dirty voice.

On the plains hundreds of kilometers away from the Arenal Valley, next to an abandoned hive is the fortress and camp of the Skulltaker warband on this planet.

The former auxiliary buildings next to the hive are full of broken walls left over from the war. Occasionally, a few rooms that were saved from destruction because of their excellent construction quality or good location became the transactions of interstellar pirates here. location and the headquarters of the Chaos warband.

The main force of the Skull Snatchers is not here.

At this time, they were still roaming the entire universe on their ship, the Styx-class heavy cruiser "Bloody Dawn", led by the Chaos Lord Jufo.

Staying here is a small detachment led by the warband's nominal number three: the Chaos Wizard Mendez.

They have their own mission here - to run this gathering place for interstellar pirates, while firmly guarding the interstellar channel leading to the asteroid belt behind the planet.

This is one of the many escape routes that the cunning Chaos Lord has reserved for himself, and it is also a key source of intelligence for the "Bloody Dawn" heavy cruiser to repeatedly escape from the empire's encirclement and suppression.

At this time, it was already late at night and the hall was extremely quiet.

The dry voice of the wizard Mendez, who suddenly woke up from meditation, sounded harsh in the empty hall.

The leader of his guard, Melkor, the skull champion who believed in Khorne and was also the leader of a team of Chaos Terminators, responded to his Lord's call immediately:

"That mortal psyker? Don't you like him very much? Even though he has been unwilling to dedicate his soul to you."

Mendez's eyes did not open, he was savoring in his soul the wail of Sidney's soul as it finally shattered.

"That's not important. What's important is that he died."

Melkor did not accept this explanation.

As a champion of Khorne, he has no bad habit of using his precious power to think unnecessarily.

Melkor simply answered frankly:

"Is it weird? People die every moment on this planet. Fights, murders, duels, murders... and no matter what method, these killings themselves are the best gifts to please the Skull Master."

Mendes was not angered by Melkor's sophistry, or in other words, the conversation with his top thug, who was too lazy to think, was originally one of his few pastimes.

He maintained his dry voice and continued:

"No, there are thousands of ways to die, and the mark I left in his soul told me that his soul was wiped out the moment he came into contact with the other person."

"Is this so?" Melkor finally understood what his Lord meant:

"Ah! We have a guest, right? Who else on this planet can do this except you? I'm going to call all the brothers now. I think we have something to do!"

Melkor stood up excitedly, and the servo in the red cavalry Terminator's power armor made a heavy roar.

He couldn't wait to walk out, and behind him came a rare warning from Mendes:

"Wake up Mog as well and reset his memory. Gather all ground troops and wait for me at the door."

After receiving the warning, Melkor finally became serious. He turned around and looked at the figure who was still sitting cross-legged under the icon of the Skull Lord:

"Devil Engine? Are you sure we can use it? You know, it kills as many of us as its enemies every time it wakes up."

"Of course, you have to understand the difference between actively annihilating a soul and passively annihilating it. This guy who sneaked in is more dangerous than you think."

——

"This is it?"

Calvin, who was deep in the ruins in the middle of the river valley, looked at the ancient stone cabinet in front of him and took out an unknown mechanical creation and asked Constantine.

"Yes. I think we can return." Constantine's eyes were fixed on the reliquary containing the mechanical fragments, and he didn't want to leave for a moment.

"Is this the relic you are looking for?"

"No, this is just a fragment that carries an ancient message. We have to go back, purify and analyze it, and only then can we know whether the message in it is the one we have been looking for."

Perhaps knowing what the Gray Knights were thinking, Constantine patiently explained to them.

"No matter what, thank you for your help along the way. The goal of this mission has been completed halfway. As long as we can return safely, there will be no surprises in what we promised you."

This is what Calvin and his comrades want to hear most.

"Then notify everyone to return the same way..."

Before Calvin could finish speaking, the screen on his left arm and the communication device next to his ear simultaneously sent out contact signals representing urgent matters.

The initiator of the contact signal was the Inquisition's black ship "The Noble and the Nasty" that was supposed to be on standby in orbit.

"Arbitrator Calvin! I am Matthew!"

"I'm Calvin, what's going on?"

"Just now, the astropath on my ship told me that there are a huge number of unknown large objects coming from the nearby subspace! Within a few hours, they will break through the constraints of the Manzeville Point and appear in the orbit of this planet. superior!"

Matthew's voice was extremely dry due to impatience and nervousness, and Calvin could already imagine how anxious he was on the track.

But he still insisted on telling Calvin the conjecture he was least willing to say:

"I guess the exploration fleet from Grea has arrived!"

"How could it be so fast? Wasn't it expected to be within a year?" Calvin also realized the seriousness of the situation.

"I don't know. According to the exploration records of their appearance last time, there should be at least three more exploration sites among us. I think they may know something."

Ma Wei's voice was also full of doubts and puzzlement, but more of the fear of being discovered.

He couldn't imagine what the purpose behind the behavior of a large exploration fleet from the Crown of Miracles coming straight from three distant sections was.

"We have got the things and can return within an hour at most." Calvin calmly comforted the panicked Ma Wei.

"Your Majesty! That's great! I will open the transmission array now. Please return as soon as possible!"

"Received!" Calvin cut off the communication signal, then picked up the mechanical priest beside him and the holy box in his arms, and strode out.

"Be gentle! In the name of the God of All Machines, I order you to be gentle! What happened! Put me down! I can walk by myself!" Constantine, who didn't know what was going on, loudly condemned Calvin's rudeness.

Calvin had no time to pay attention to the protests and questions from the mechanical priest under his arm. He walked while giving the latest instructions to the entire team on the communicator.

"Everyone, return to the surface as quickly as possible! At the same time, order the surface team to conduct signal docking and adjustment with the transmission array on the orbit! This is not our strike cruiser, we must do these tasks in advance."

Under Calvin's command, the entire team of Grey Knights adjusted the energy output of the power armor to the maximum standard, and then moved towards the surface with their huge strides, seemingly slow but actually fast.

And it was not until then that Calvin had time to answer the mechanical priest's questions.

As he strode, he explained to the priest under his armpit in a concise manner: "The chicken has been stolen, and we should leave. And the master you least want to see seems to have received some reminder and has rushed here from three sections away. According to Matthew, they may arrive in as soon as an hour."

As Calvin's voice fell, Constantine, who was still struggling, stopped struggling immediately. Obviously, under the premise of escaping, he had to admit that the taller and longer the better.

The Grey Knights finally successfully evacuated from the ground to the orbit at 4:50 a.m.

The "Noble and the Filthy" did not stay for a second longer. After receiving the return of the Grey Knights, it immediately started the escape route.

Its main engine, which had already been fully heated up, sprayed a huge wake at Ma Wei's command, and took the uninvited guests on the ship to quickly escape from this place of trouble before the arrival of the owner.

After leaving the orbit, the black ship did not head towards the Manzeville point where there was a clear possibility of danger.

On the contrary, under the guidance of the experienced captain, they avoided the possibility of a head-on encounter with the exploration fleet and turned to the direction of the asteroid belt behind the planet.

In the eyes of this old captain who has served for 300 years, the priority is to ensure that they are out of all observable possibilities.

This choice was proved to be extremely correct and predictable 30 minutes later.

When the Noble and Dirty were about to hide themselves at the edge of the asteroid belt, Calvin and Constantine, who had already arrived at the bridge, could barely see the planet through the portholes on the black ship.

The Manzeville point outside the planet's orbit was suddenly torn apart by the power of the subspace, and then a super fleet of more than 30 ships was spit out.

The scale and quality of this fleet are so huge that there are more than five battleships alone!

As for the slightly inferior heavy cruisers and cruisers, as well as the heavy landing barges attached, they are even more lined up and connected bow to bow.

Constantine even used the excellent vision of his mechanical artificial eyes to see some heavy landing ships marked with the Titan Legion logo!

This fleet obviously has a clear goal and is full of anger at being robbed. As soon as they finished leaving the state of subspace navigation, they couldn't wait to launch a global announcement on the public frequency to the entire planet.

While declaring the legitimate rights and interests of the Forge World of Grea, which it represented, on this planet, the fleet ordered all armed forces on the surface of the planet to give up resistance, otherwise they would be subjected to a devastating blow without hesitation, and they had not been warned.

And those special heavy landing barges discovered by the sharp-eyed Constantine, under the escort of a group of warships, were unscrupulously and purposefully pressed directly to the surface of the atmosphere, releasing waves of super-large anti-gravity landing capsules towards the Arina River Valley where Calvin and others were previously located.

At this time, on the surface of the river valley, there were a group of people led by Mendes and Mirko, who had just arrived at full speed from the assault boats hundreds of kilometers away to prepare for war.

They stared in amazement at the countless large unknown objects falling from the sky - these were only seen during the Great Expedition, representing the fire and steel rain that would appear when the Titan Legion attacked the ground.

Their only thought was: "Xin Liezhi's ass! It's just stealing something, why do you care?"

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