The Emperor’s Angel of Death

"A festering wound, brother, you described it well, that's exactly what it is."

Sorskyan sighed, scratching his head in some vexation.

"Unless the High Lords give me the entire Orpheus, I don't have the confidence to fight a war of attrition with the Necrons here, but judging from Terra's reaction, they seem to value this place quite a bit."

"That's the thing, the Imperium is becoming more and more turbulent now, the situation worsens every year. In this situation, a remote star sector like Orpheus, which mainly supplies manpower, is becoming increasingly troublesome for the High Lords, because there are too many more important worlds that need support. If it really can't be defended, they might even execute an Exterminatus order on the remaining areas, but since you've come, that possibility is less likely. Their restrictions on the Astartes will also be relaxed somewhat, and more importantly, you already have enough allies in the High Lords Council. I think this matter can be managed."

Talos said, and Sorskyan thought for a while, then nodded.

"I roughly know what you mean, but before that, we have to win a battle first."

Sorskyan stood up.

"Talos, go gather the senior officers and company commanders, I want to hold a meeting. Amnak, go help Occam, I asked him to establish an intelligence network in Orpheus, but he keeps saying he doesn't have enough manpower."

Having received their respective assignments, the two turned and left the training room, while Sorskyan walked towards a large door. After pushing it open, he found a small section of corridor, with another door at the end. It automatically opened as he approached, revealing a huge bath decorated in a simple style, wreathed in mist. As his private training room, it naturally had a full set of facilities.

Sinking his body into the circular, enormous bath, Sorskyan closed his eyes slightly, resting his head back on the edge of the bath.

After about ten minutes, following the sound of soft footsteps, a pair of slender hands gently pressed onto Sorskyan's shoulders and began to massage him.

Sorskyan didn't open his eyes, but said calmly:

"How is the fleet doing?"

"Having not received instructions, they have not engaged the Necrons and have already withdrawn."

"When you return, order the fleet to continue to maneuver and stand by. The instruction remains the same, avoid engaging the Necron fleet as much as possible."

"Yes, Your Highness, are you... are you alright?"

"I'm fine, nothing's wrong."

"I was terrified when I heard the news of your coma, if anything were to happen to you."

"I'm fine."

After speaking, Sorskyan stood up, walked to the drying room next to him, quickly dried the moisture on his body, and went to the armory, where an automatic mechanical arm began to put on his armor for him.

Soon, a military conference was convened in the main conference room of the Randaal, with participants including officers, representatives of the Mechanicum, and Prince Andrea of the De Bondt family—because Matthias's mech had been severely damaged in the last Tyranid War, and he himself had been injured, Sorskyan only let him send his son as the family leader for this expedition, which was also regarded by some as Sorskyan's official recognition of Andrea's status as heir.

At the meeting, Sorskyan once again made adjustments to the star system's defenses, because he already had a certain understanding of the Menak Dynasty's strength, and Sorskyan realized that the star system's defense forces were far from enough.

Now the most critical issue was how to deal with the two Tomb Ships that the other side might send.

Although, in his judgment, the other side shouldn't send both Tomb Ships to one battlefield at the same time. At least, if he were the commander on the other side, there's no reason to send two such important capital ships to one battlefield at the same time. One should always be kept as a reserve to deal with possible emergencies, but he also knew that these ancient races had different war mindsets from humans. He currently knew nothing about the Necrons' war philosophy and methods, and it was hard to say whether the other side would launch a decisive battle in the first engagement. Considering the amassed military power of Amarah was already very large, the Menak commander might really choose to take it all in one go, so considering it from the worst-case scenario was not inappropriate.

But that was the problem. Even though the Randaal was very powerful, Sorskyan would never think it was powerful enough to fight two Tomb Ships. Not to mention two, even in a one-on-one fight, Sorskyan felt that the chances of winning were only four to six—due to the greater advantage in mobility, the Tomb Ship would have an even better chance of winning.

The only way was to find another way.

Instead, Falzad came up with an idea at the meeting. Although it wasn't a new idea, and could even be called an old method, it did open up Sorskyan's thinking.

"No matter how powerful the alien warships are, weren't they ultimately destroyed by our blades and courage? This time will be no exception! I am willing to be the first to board the enemy's flagship!"

Falzad's words elicited unanimous cheers from many officers. If it were in the past, Sorskyan would definitely call him brainless, but this time the situation was really different.

He thought about it carefully, and it seemed to be true.

Although Tomb Ships were fast, they were indeed slower than other Necron warships, which made a certain tactic potentially effective, such as boarding, as Falzad said.

After discussion, the others also believed that boarding was the best choice to confront alien ships that completely overwhelmed human warships in numerical terms.

But the tactic was determined, but another problem followed. The Tomb Ship itself was a huge mobile city, and there must be a large number of Necron troops inside, and even factories producing constructs. Based on the scale Sorskyan had seen, it was not much smaller than the World Engine. A small number of Astartes boarding it would be a gamble, and most likely a one-way trip.

You need to know that the Star Knights, especially himself, had the most say in this matter. Back then, an entire chapter of the Star Knights was almost not enough to fill it, and it was the chapter master who desperately released the core of the World Engine, the shard of the Star God, that succeeded.

But this time he only brought less than four companies of troops. If they were evenly distributed to two Tomb Ships, then each Tomb Ship would only have 2 companies of troops. This wouldn't be called boarding, it would be no different from suicide. Even with the power of Grey Marrow, Sorskyan was certain that the other side must have defenses against this power after the confrontation with the Silent King, and the Umbral Watchers would probably not have any advantage.

This was also the first time Sorskyan had encountered a situation where he had tactics but not the conditions.

So if he really wanted to board, the number of people couldn't be small, but there were only so many Astartes.

After thinking about it, the only way was to send a large number of mortal troops up there, send them in, and fight a super-scale boarding battle with no return, and they would have to be equipped with fully enclosed protective gear that could operate in the oxygen-free void.

This was extremely rare in the history of Imperial warfare. Previous boarding actions were carried out by small groups of troops, but this time they were going to conduct large-scale boarding operations, which placed very, very high demands on command ability, soldier quality, and equipment.