Warhammer: I am the Hammer of the Empire.

Chapter 269
The once beautiful sky in Loander has turned gray-green. The poisonous and greasy rain will invade this world for thousands of years, mixed with suffocating demons and filth. This world is hopeless, at least any imperial person will think so.

The light of the stars climbed out from the back of the planet along the endless metal mountains. This place that once operated and hosted tens of billions of people is now lifeless, silent and scary.

The thick tracks of the Chimera armored vehicle and the infantry's military boots carried the muddy flesh and blood across the Gothic-style bridge erected by alloys. The ground, which is stronger than concrete, could have been used for tens of thousands of years according to the inference of the Mechanicum. Now it was smashed like cheese with holes in the craters that dripped with thick juice.

The thin, pale Imperial Guard soldier used a simple fully-sealed gas mask, a device commonly known as a "pig nose" and a few pieces of blessing filter cotton and charcoal to maintain heavy and uncomfortable breathing.

The light of the stars has just sprinkled on the ground. According to the time of Terra, it is only about four o'clock in the morning today, but now, the sunshine in Loander comes very early, accompanied by toxic fog, biochemical weapons and psionic toxins used by heretics, ticking down. on people.

Captain Jesk looked out from the window of the command vehicle. The mighty Legion moved forward like lifeless corpses wrapped in the Emperor's faith, but the space fighters did not show up beside them, only using mobility to move forward. Higher methods, such as several Thunderhawk gunships or even better methods, close to the enemy.

The captain thought of this, and realized that those giants would be doing more efficient and great things than them no matter in the present, in the past or in the future, and take this as the cornerstone of their loyalty to the empire.

Can he do it, if it is him, can he "love" this world so selflessly?The captain's thoughts were complicated, but he didn't realize how great their deeds were. This stemmed from his belief in the emperor. To do it was not a job or job for them, but an obligation to be born as an imperial person. It is a reality that is difficult to be resonated by people from other worlds, and it is also the cruelest reality for them.

The sky is now ignorantly waking up. Captain Jeske only hopes that the enemy has not yet awakened. They are prepared, but there is not much time. Tiredness and illness have erupted in the body one after another, and he just asked the soldiers to collect them. Receive an elixir that can temporarily suppress pain.

Those medicines are blessings for suppressing psychic viruses, and they are also supplements for the Imperial Guard, but they are far from as great and powerful as people imagined. They just use stimulants to increase metabolism and use blessings to suppress viruses. Commander sees They look healthy, just because they are usually far away from the battlefield and their defense equipment is relatively complete.

Now those viruses are accumulating day by day, making the captain feel sore and painful, so their time is running out.

The effect of the stimulant was getting worse and worse. He even felt that his blood was full of those white bitter medicines. The military doctor recommended him to switch to injections, but it didn’t matter now. The captain watched the long and wide road in front of him begin to change. It is so narrow that even armored vehicles cannot pass in parallel, and this viaduct obviously cannot move forward.

The captain exhaled a smoke ring, then pressed the cigarette on the solid steel of the car body to extinguish it, then carefully tied the half of it with a rubber band, and put it in his pocket. This is what he learned when he was a scout, shouted. "All, let's get off the bridge from the side road, and then go to the fort by the road close to the ground."

In the next hour, they marched smoothly. They naturally passed through the entire city, watching the once familiar place turn into a mess in no man's land. If this is a kind of psychological warfare, then this battle was both successful and Failure, because after the lows and the pain, only anger is ignited, not fear.

Soldiers trod over poisonous dirt, rotting ground that grew strange plants, collapsed shops, or distorted, distended corpses that would fill mouths where flies seldom eat, maggot-spraying sights in the mouth-moist earth, but everything Nothing compares to the fact that the 20-meter-high statue of the emperor on the central square of the city was bombarded by mortars, and now only half of it is on the ground.

His flaming sword, the Emperor's Sword, could no longer be found, his broad arms could no longer protect the believers, and his piercing eyes could not look at the people here, so the soldiers expressed their inexplicable anger.

Their pace was faster, their will was stronger, and those restless emotions drove the children of the emperor to burst into anger like enemies, and the engines of the vehicles roared. They took out various potions and began to march, and stuffed them into their mouths like adding gasoline With dry and unpalatable green-brown starch lumps, it goes down with the not-so-clean drinking water.

The urban area passed quickly, and the Imperial Guard also ushered in a comfortable end. This place was turned into a combat area, and the enemy had been waiting for them for a long time. The captain watched the battle area from his car with a binoculars.

Intricate trenches and fortresses have replaced the reinforced concrete forest. The enemy's infantry is separated by five meters per person and 50 meters by squad, which means that there will be a logging gun every 100 meters!

Those trenches were stacked in front of the damn barbed wire and sandbags. The Roanders were not good at attacking, so they found it tricky, and the captain didn't see anti-vehicle weapons, but he didn't relax. To be precise, the enemy definitely didn't lack those things , and he is actually very clear about the place to place it.

Those bunkers, made of fine gold, are things that stabilize the battle situation at alternate positions in the trenches. The entire small X-shaped trench has 15 bunkers from left to right, and it is dark and terribly dark.

He got back in the car, his aide said. "We can shell the enemy from here."

The captain picked up the communicator and asked the space fighters to communicate, but there was no response. A strange look flashed across his face, but he answered without hesitation. "No, think about it, if we advance step by step, this trench about 5 kilometers deep will delay us for a long time. We only have less than three days, and the artillery must be in place in one step!" He refuted this safe method, and the Imperial Guard What is needed now is not victory, but time. If they can't break through here, they can't threaten the inside of the fortress at all, let alone attract the enemy's core force.

In his eyes, those trenches became tricky and painful, but his battle plan was very clear from the beginning, he needed a breakthrough, and the three staggered trenches were terrifying in depth, but they lacked heavy firepower, and if important bunkers were destroyed, things would be easy .

"Three fortresses, I need three of those things disappear to occupy the vantage point, and now a charge is required, the Lemanus and Chimera armored vehicles cannot go up, must be disarmed by soldiers, and we have no self-propelled artillery, and no Missile vehicles, air power..." the captain muttered, and everyone knew that many brothers would be lost in this war.

"Go forward in two echelons. The first echelon has most of the infantry and presses forward. The second echelon detours to the outside to bypass the enemy's detection. It doesn't matter if you go far. I need Lemanus' main gun intact. "

"Sir, should we wait for the Space Marines?" one officer asked.

"Space warriors, space warriors, if we rely on angels for everything, then we will have nothing. I admit that faith alone cannot conquer the enemy, but the emperor will not like children who can only rely on other people..." Although the captain said, But he is also clear that the space fighters have not contacted them, which means that they do not expect to cooperate with each other. Is it to hide themselves tactically, or there are other plans, anyway, he can only believe...

This decision was cruel, but sacrifices were inevitable. When the roar of the engine was mixed with the harsh sound of the track rolling over the concrete road, the attack began.

boom!boom!boom!In the beginning, the smoke grenade launched dozens of smoke bombs to the position of the trench, and the smoke suddenly filled up, drawing a lifeline for the soldiers on the battlefield. Then there were sporadic shouts and a few empty guns from the defenders. Voice.

"Rush, rush!" the staff officers yelled, and the infantry of Loander charged without hesitation until they completely entered the smoke, and then the half-track armored vehicle Chimera and the grenadier infantry followed closely until they completely attracted the entire army. Firepower on the front lines.

When the detour troops smashed a howitzer belonging to Lemanus on the fortress 10 minutes later, it made a muffled crackling sound, violent trembling, and the steel issued when the 35 cm thick rolled fine gold armor was torn apart. The soldiers inside were instantly cooked, and the high temperature generated by the explosion alone was so powerful, and of course the accurate shooting of the crew was also indispensable.

Then her turret was set off high by the huge fireball generated by the splashing detonator of the armor-piercing fragmentation missile fired by the enemy's fortress in the distance, and then fell to the ground due to the effect of gravity.

The parts of the tank were scattered around with the explosion, and the communicator that had been turned on could only hear the "crackling" fragments of its surface armor rubbing against each other until a flat hatch penetrated the armor of the side turret, completely silencing the communicator. , a Lemanus died.

At the same time, the first fortress was completely destroyed under the heat of the imperial howitzers. Such a swap is hardly worth the same price, but as an attacker, the Imperial Guard has no choice.

The sad thing is that the space fighters have already arrived, they just don't want to be discovered by the enemy so early, they lie in ambush like eagles on the nearby metal mountain, that is, on the huge raised base of the hive city and other Thousands of servants are on standby.

They have been operating this area for a long time. Since the raid of the fourth company commander, the space fighters have launched attacks on the enemy here, but the positional warfare has made it difficult for those super fighters to move. Therefore, soldiers who have experienced the login battle have a vigilant view of the trenches here. .

But if they joined, it would not be difficult to attack the fortress, but as planned, there would be no loss of the Imperial Guard, but some brothers would still die.

But a young sergeant from the Master Chief faction suddenly asked the veteran with the highest rank in doubt. "Shouldn't we help the Imperial Guard? Brother!"

But the current commander of the Destroying Eagle doesn't trust mortals exactly, he asked. "If they take the area in front of us, we can move forward without any loss. A brother is worth a whole regiment of infantry, as long as they don't get fooled enough to take out Lemanus and Earthshakers. No, then any enemy bullet they lose is an aid to our attack."

His words chilled the sergeant, and he wasn't the only one here. In fact, the person who should be in the command position in this battle is the dreadnought machine soldier, but the mental state problems caused by the dreadnought made those living ancestors unable to make decisions. But they are not without rights...

The sergeant looked at the two huge mechs beside him. Those fighters with bodies full of honor just acquiesced in such brutal behavior!
And he scolded. "What are you talking about, Patriarch, what are you doing? The Master Chief didn't tell us to do this!"

"Me?" the current conductor asked. "Do you think those mortals are worthy? This is not Phantom Peak, nor Skadi, and they are just crazy people who believe in the Emperor. It is their lifelong hope to die for the Golden Throne. I am just trying to make things satisfactory. !"

He didn't trust those soldiers, especially their broken bodies, and a few puffs of smoke burst, and the charge down the hillside had already begun. A Lemanus was pierced by flying armor-piercing missiles and turned into flames of chaos. Fortunately, the loyal crew destroyed a fortress.

But the smoke is also dissipating, and the situation is becoming more and more unfavorable. The crossfire and high-intensity depth of the trenches form a death wall composed of war machines. Only a lot of sacrifices under the endless meat grinder can be exchanged for a Lemanus bombardment. In the case of missing the observation hole, it is not enough to destroy the bunker.

Even if the powerful howitzer stopped the attack inside, the inside of the bunker was blown up, and the dizzy cultists turned their weapons, and the armor-piercing missile group locked on another tank on the side.

the Space Marine sergeant cursed. "I can't stand it anymore! If this is your life to die, then I will challenge you to a duel!"

This sentence makes the atmosphere different here. Although the cultural style of Ruin Eagle is similar to that of Space Wolves, duels are not allowed at such an important command moment with obvious status gap.

They were Guilliman's children at heart, and they still worshiped unity, order, and tactical cooperation, which the officer obviously would not accept. "I reject."

"You dishonored..." the sergeant replied.

"Honor? We can't pursue honor at this time, death and war, I will be responsible for my brothers!" the commanding officer yelled.

"Even if I accept it, if you get the red helmet and step back [-] steps, the brothers will not accept the task of supporting mortals!"

The sergeant looked helplessly at his brothers, but he saw dodging gazes. They were timid, being beaten by rune warriors, psionic wizards, and being brought to death again and again...

he asked helplessly. "I joined the warband for this? Brothers? Are we joining the warband just to hide here?"

"So there is no company commander, master chief, and adjutant. Are we cowards?"

His words ignited the honor and anger of the space warriors instantly, but they could not refute them. After experiencing too much, they left the illusory beliefs of the chapter more and more, but those rules and regulations had buried the seeds of honor in their bones. tear apart...

"Enough!" The fearless mecha, which was already shaken, suddenly walked out, and the veteran of the two veterans strode forward, cursing. "You said it like this, it's too much if we don't attack, and, boy, you did a good job, if it weren't for you, I would be a coward!"

Another answer. "Yeah, you remind me of the days when I was young, living to death... Destroy the eagle, the natural disaster comes!"

The sergeant nodded and bowed. "Live to death, fearless ancestor!"

And the opening of the two of them represented a change in the hearts of the legion.

They spoke to the commander. "Brother, we are sorry, your tactic has been rejected for not being in line with the Chapter's values!"

The commander could only nod his head, compromising on such a situation. Therefore, the Thunderhawk gunships of the space fighters had already started buzzing, just like their slogan, natural disasters are coming!

　It's not a question of good or bad, it's just a matter of values, will you let the space warriors and your battle brothers cast by the empire spend tens of millions of dollars to work hard for a few mortals, or take the risk of covering for mortals, and use Lemanus and Earthshakers? Things that mortal servants can do.

The essence of this matter is very contradictory. In order to reduce sacrifices, greater sacrifices are made, but in fact, some people just forget that the value of life does not exist, because whether it is a space soldier or an imperial guard, it is not for the people's army. One of Warhammer's darkest ironies is also its horrific militaristic romance.

　
(End of this chapter)