The Emperor’s Angel of Death

Chapter 3114: Running a Deficit

Ibankhs had indeed heard some rumors about the Holy Flame Order. As early as when he first arrived in the Archdiocese, he had heard that among Sosiun's entourage, there seemed to be a sect with a less orthodox doctrine. In addition, there seemed to be some unofficial personnel changes among the high-level officials of the Archdiocese.

So, when Sosiun proposed using certain sects as a front, he couldn't help but have some concerns. After all, this looked somewhat abnormal, not like an arrangement that an Astartes would make, but Sosiun's attitude seemed very firm.

Therefore, Ibankhs asked Sosiun how the important personnel of the Archdiocese should be arranged. Sosiun told him that it would naturally be arranged by the Pontiff, and the sect was just a fig leaf.

In addition, in order to dispel his concerns, Sosiun also stated that after the militarization of the Archdiocese was completed in the future, he could even launch holy war expeditions to many dark areas in the Storm Nebula, further expanding the influence of the Ecclesiarchy. At the same time, the Star Knights would actively respond to the call of the Ecclesiarchy.

The key point was naturally the last sentence, which was a pleasant surprise for Ibankhs. It should be known that most Space Marines have a respectful but distant attitude towards the Ecclesiarchy. No matter how the Ecclesiarchy venerates them, it doesn't have as much influence as the Inquisition on the Space Marines. This has been a very frustrating thing for successive Pontiffs, even the Internal Affairs Department has a Space Marine hit squad.

But now, Sosiun had the intention of actively approaching the Ecclesiarchy, and Ibankhs did not dare to underestimate it. He quickly stated that this matter was significant and needed to be reported to the Pontiff.

Sosiun also said that this was no problem, but the Tyranids were not waiting for anyone. The time it would take for this news to go back and forth was too long. In the meantime, he couldn't guarantee that there wouldn't be any urgent matters that would require him to leave. Under this circumstance, Ibankhs could only allow Sosiun to get things started first, which was equivalent to acting first and reporting later. In order to appease his uneasy heart, Sosiun told him that he was willing to write a personal letter to the Pontiff, explaining the current situation and expressing the Star Knights' willingness to establish a good relationship with the Ecclesiarchy.

This made Ibankhs extremely happy. If things were successful, it would be a great achievement, drawing a powerful Space Marine Chapter to the Ecclesiarchy. This achievement and capital were enough for him to compete for the position of Terra Cardinal!

Shortly after the discussion, Ibankhs convened the high-level Ecclesiarchy personnel of the Archdiocese and announced the decision to "permanently militarize" the Archdiocese. He would increase 13 fortress worlds, develop 16 industrial worlds, and add the position of Holy War Lord under the Patriarch. They would be the rulers and military leaders of every fortress world under the Archdiocese. At the same time, he would promote a universal conscription system, where every adult male would undergo regular military training and a series of other measures.

As for the Holy Flame Order, Ibankhs chose to turn a blind eye and let it develop. After all, he was the Pontiff's representative and could not support unorthodox sects, but pretending not to see was enough.

However, Ibankhs did not realize that the symbols of the Holy Flame Order not only began to spread within the Archdiocese, but also began to appear in large numbers among the unnoticed low-level personnel of the Silent Knights and Faith Watch.

Logically speaking, these matters could keep Sosiun busy for a while, but fortunately, with the assistance of Viletts and Silru, and Ustad's handling of government affairs becoming increasingly mature, Sosiun was much more relaxed and had time to deal with military affairs, including awards, decorations, promotions, and a series of other tasks. In addition, considering that the Scar of Victory must already be in chaos, Sosiun asked Malakim, Seth, and others to lead their respective Chapters back first, leaving only Arash and the White Templars.

Before Malakim and others left, Sosiun also replenished some ships for the allies of the Covenant of Sorrow. After all, everyone suffered heavy losses in this battle and had no spoils. Just in time, Zhao-Akada and Ulan Huda, as well as other forge worlds (settlement of previous auctions), provided a batch of new warships that arrived in the Archdiocese. Sosiun simply transferred some small ships such as frigates and destroyers to the allies. Among them, Sosiun was also the most generous to the Lamenters, who suffered the greatest losses, giving two Strike Cruisers and six frigates to Malakim, at least allowing their fleet to restore some combat power.

After this distribution, there were only a few warships left in the hands of the Star Knights: 2 Retribution-class Battleships (Greia's delivery), 1 Roggon-class Light Carrier (Ulan Huda's delivery), 2 Styx-class Heavy Cruisers (Yellow Springs Eight's delivery), 3 Manticore-class Missile Destroyers (Ulan Huda's delivery), 2 Dauntless-class Light Cruisers (Griffin Four's delivery), 5 Nova-class Frigates (Zhao-Akada's delivery), 14 Cobra-class Destroyers (joint delivery by multiple forge worlds), and 3 Goliath Forge Ships (Griffin Four's delivery). So far, Yellow Springs Eight has delivered 3 Styx-class ships to the Legion, and there are still 10 Cardinal-class ships being modified and waiting for future delivery.

And these warships cannot even make up for the losses in this battle, but there is no way, war is like this, there is no such thing as a sure profit.

When heading to the Archdiocese, the Legion dispatched 27 capital ships and 128 smaller ships. In a series of battles, the Luna-class Cruiser *Naysmith Blade*, the Tyrant-class Cruiser *Saint Shield*, *Excluder*, the Pluto-class Heavy Cruiser *Formless Fear*, the Vanguard-class Strike Cruiser *Tornado*, and the Dictator-class Heavy Cruiser *Spinel* (which was damaged too severely in battle and forced to be abandoned) and 6 capital ships sunk. The heavily damaged Mars-class Battlecruiser *Triumphant* and the Battle Barge *Soul Bringer* were urgently repaired in the shipyards of the Cardinal World, and although they regained their ability to sail, their combat capabilities were not restored and needed to be sent to Zhao-Akada for further repairs. In addition, 54 smaller ships were sunk or abandoned, which means that the Legion lost 8 capital ships at once, and only 4 capital ships were replenished, or 5 including the Abyssal-class. Only half of the lost small ships were replenished.

Then there is the issue of troop rotation. Now the main force of the Faith Watch is deployed in the Benson System and the Cassattsas System area. This area is already in the central part of the Archdiocese, quite close to the Cardinal World, and will be a very important defense line in the future. Now the Archdiocese basically provides the Faith Watch with recruits at a training speed of 14 weeks per batch.

Although the previous series of fierce battles caused heavy losses to the Faith Watch, with more than one million soldiers killed and wounded out of a total of eight million Faith Watch, which is already an exaggerated number, it also trained a large number of experienced, brave veterans and officers. With them as the backbone, the Faith Watch is recovering very quickly.

By the time they arrived at their new garrison to redeploy, the number of Faith Watch had increased to 15 million. Although the rapid expansion of the number of people has led to a certain decline in their combat effectiveness, and various heavy equipment is difficult to supply in time, and many Faith Watch regiments are only light infantry regiments, they are still far superior to the level of local militias.