The Emperor’s Angel of Death

Thwack—

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Before an Immortal could even raise his gauss flayer, he disintegrated amidst a barrage of gunfire, his ribs blossoming open from the impact of a rocket, charred bones falling into the bone pile beneath his feet, turning into cold iron filings.

Then, black figures in wedge formations swept through the black stone passage filled with metal wreckage and corpses like the wind, their greatcoats billowing and fluttering in the rapid charge, like banners waving in the wind, the lenses of their rebreathers reflecting a bloody crimson in the green flashes of the alien runes on the surrounding walls. They seemed not to be living beings, but an iron army of the undead from the void, with no communication, no slogans, only silent, unwavering advance.

The equipment of these Krieg soldiers was not much different from before, but they appeared bulkier. To operate in low-temperature and low-gravity environments, they wore naval boarding party void suits under their greatcoats.

Although removing the chest armor seemed to weaken their defense, it made little difference against opponents like the Necrons.

On the contrary, maintaining body temperature was more helpful for combat effectiveness.

Soon, a large group of Necrons wielding gauss weapons appeared ahead. These Immortals formed a square formation in the hundred-meter-wide passage, their skulls and gauss weapons emitting a ghostly green light, seemingly expressing their anger.

Then, they opened fire.

Green rays of death pierced through bodies, turning everything they touched into atoms. Mangled bodies fell to the ground with a thud, only to be trampled over by heavy military boots.

There were no screams, no roars. The Krieg soldiers were like mechanical soldiers moving more quickly, ignoring the rapidly rising death toll, ignoring their comrades disappearing one by one beside them, only striving to charge forward, charge...

Grenades and rockets roared past, crashing into the advancing Necron ranks like warships cleaving through heavy waves, erupting in bursts of fire in the dim and cold tomb, scattering the Immortals at the front of the formation.

Cloaks fluttered, bayonets gleamed. The soldiers of the Death Korps did not fire, because their lasguns could hardly inflict effective damage on the Immortals, and the enemy's gauss weapons were far superior to human infantry weapons in both power and accuracy. Therefore, exchanging fire was a disadvantageous tactic. All soldiers were instilled with one order—to get as close to the enemy as possible by any means.

Only by closing the combat distance could they offset the enemy's ranged weapon advantage, although this would entail extremely high casualties.

In an instant, the soldiers of the Death Korps stepped over the corpses and ashes of their comrades, arriving before the enemy and directly charging into the enemy ranks with entrenching tools and bayonets, unstoppable.

Ordinary opponents would surely shatter like withered leaves under such a charge, falling into rout, but these mechanical soldiers stood firm, merely wielding intersecting blades, emitting silent shrieks from their twisted mandibles, staggering and constantly swarming towards the Krieg.

The living and the dead crowded together, wrestling, fighting. Their task required neither skill nor discipline, only the application of overwhelming force in numbers.

In addition to these conventional weapons, the Krieg infantry also used a weapon they had never used before: cavalry-style demolition lances.

These Krieg infantrymen, holding lances, formed ranks near the two-story walls of the passage. The lances in their hands were half the length of the standard lances used by cavalry, but the heads were a circle larger.

They charged towards the corners of the enemy formation, then thrust the lances into the enemy's metal bodies. The trigger-activated fuse in the head would detonate, with enough power to destroy an Immortal's body. However, because the lance was too short, the force of the explosion would also cause damage to the user. They were constantly sent flying backward, smashing into their teammates or falling to the ground. If they were lucky, they suffered minor arm fractures or lost a few fingers. Under the influence of strong painkillers and stimulants, they could continue to fight with grenades. If they were unlucky, their hands were covered in blood, or metal fragments pierced their masks or bodies. At this point, they could only wait for their teammates to give them final mercy, or quietly lie on the ground and make their final prayers to the Emperor—

Live to fight, sleep only in death.

No glory in life, only redemption in death.

Because there were no medics, no medical soldiers, everyone had only one goal: to fight to the death, or rather, to die.

They came for victory and death!

As the battle entered a fever pitch, things also changed in the skies above the battlefield. Roaring Vulture gunships swept past, their small missiles raining down, each hitting the metal bodies behind with unerring accuracy, knocking off skulls, severing spines, leaving a ground full of broken bones.

But soon, tomb scarabs buzzed in, using cutting beams to slice open the Vulture gunships, or directly splitting them in two. The fighter gunships responded with arc burst cannons. This type of arc weapon had amazing power against armored units and machinery. As the Krieg soldiers fought bloodily with the Necrons below, the area only twenty meters above their heads also became a chaotic battlefield. Beams rained down, lightning flashed and thundered. The speed of the tomb scarabs was useless against the spreading arcs, and they constantly fell due to damaged components, while the defensive capabilities of the Vulture gunships could not withstand the enemy's cutting beams, and they constantly exploded and crashed.

In another passage, separated by only a wall, another more tragic battle was also taking place simultaneously.

An Immortal who had lost his lower body was crawling, trying to retrieve his dropped weapon, when suddenly a rumbling metal behemoth rolled over the dark, hard black stone ground, dragging him into the rolling gears. The solid living metal could only crack and shatter under the immense force, until its skull was crushed and the light within dimmed.

Five modified Hades breaching drills were driving side by side through the passage. Although they were slow, they were as unstoppable as a giant bulldozer.

These four-meter-high, ten-meter-long behemoths were not actually combat weapons, but civil engineering equipment. Krieg engineers usually used them for battlefield fortification repairs and post-war processing, and they were only sent to the front lines in the most intense battles.

Error-free version reading! Premiered this novel.

Its head had four huge crushing drills that could drill through any metal, bunkers, and buildings. Any fortifications would turn into a pile of rubble when it passed.

If it encountered something more solid, it would use a melta cutter on the power head to melt the target into a liquid paste, then use the four huge drills to grind the residue into powder. These drills and cutters were designed to pull the drill forward when breaking through rock, and the chassis was equipped with a conveyor belt to remove waste from the front rock face.