Seraphs of the Emperor’s Judgment

Chapter 141: The Battle of Gachis

The barren world of Gachis was located in the asteroid-filled outer ring of the Vorenus System. A once-defeated Ork empire was rising again; in the Greenskins' own words, a great Waaagh was gathering.

Once their power expanded to its limits, it would be a massive disaster for the worlds surrounding the system, and even the entire sector.

To stop a forming great Waaagh often required the coordinated efforts of several, or even over a dozen Astartes Chapters.

However, the current Segmentum Tempestus did not possess such conditions.

Therefore, to prevent the Greenskins from turning the entire sector upside down, the best method was to weaken the Waaagh beforehand, before it could reach a certain scale.

This had also been the Imperium of Man's best strategy against the Greenskin Xenos over the past ten thousand years—because completely eradicating them from the roots was virtually impossible.

A month ago, under the planning of the Chapter Master of the Excoriators Chapter, the Imperial legendary hero Magyar, the Imperial armed forces of the entire Segmentum Tempestus were mobilized, launching an encirclement and suppression campaign against this Xenos empire from all directions.

The Greenskins on one planet after another were eradicated, and one fortress after another met its destruction.

But this was far from enough.

The Greenskin empire on Vorenus Prime had already grown to a point where it could not be ignored. Simply eradicating some peripheral strongholds was not enough to change the situation.Lord Malakim's strategy was to first wipe out the Greenskins' peripheral strongholds, trapping them within the system. Then, they would focus on attacking the strongholds capable of manufacturing starships. After uprooting those strongholds, they would launch a general offensive against Vorenus Prime.

The advantage of this tactic was that it could swiftly minimize the Greenskins' ability to roam and flee through space. This prevented a situation where, after eradicating the Greenskin ground forces, a massive swarm of Greenskins would still be roaming the void, thereby minimizing the future damage they could cause.

The disadvantage was that the duration of the war would inevitably be prolonged.

Gachis was exactly one such Greenskin dockyard.

Here, the Greenskins collected the wreckage of spacecraft and spliced them together with appropriately sized meteorite fragments nearby, creating a type of "Meteor Assault Ship" unique to the Greenskins.

These warships did look crude on the outside, even looking not much different from a regular meteorite, but this kind of thing could cause devastating disasters for planets without much orbital defense capability.

The Greenskins would ride these giant "Drop Pods" and smash directly into a planet's surface. Then, while the local inhabitants were still reeling from the meteorite impact, they would charge out from inside and sweep across the entire world.

It was very difficult for any defensive force to withstand the impact of a meteorite.

Therefore, eradicating the Greenskins of Gachis was immediately placed on the Expeditionary Army's priority agenda. Because Gachis possessed relatively strong ground defense firepower, in addition to orbital attacks, the Expeditionary Army also had to have a relatively strong ground assault force.

The Expeditionary Army deployed an entire detachment fleet and over five hundred thousand Astra Militarum troops into this battle, determined to eradicate this Greenskin world that produced Meteor Assault Ships.

However, no one anticipated that Gachis would be a surprisingly stubborn planet.

Any hopes of taking this planet with a single, swift, and precise strike were shattered when the Expeditionary Army's detachment fleet entered the system's borders and witnessed the unbelievable scale of the ramshackle fleet assembled there.

Hundreds upon thousands of Greenskin vessels were forcefully withdrawn from the most hotly contested war zones by their Warboss in order to protect its most important dockyard.

This grand army was filled with the wreckage of warships driven by ionic reactors. Using their unimaginable mechanical Sorcery, the Greenskins welded the rusted hulls dragged back from battlefield ruins into massive Gargants—all this scrap metal that should have been dead beyond dead miraculously sprang back to life just like that.

Escorted by this fleet was an ash-iron planet.

The surface of this planet was a wasteland inlaid with raw iron veins. The rugged mountains were covered with shockingly massive orbital cannons and dense missile silos, shielded by ground Void Shields of astonishing area.

As the human fleet approached, its protective fleet charged straight at the Imperial Navy's line formation like crazed barbarians wielding massive clubs.

Generally speaking, it was very difficult to strictly adhere to any battlefield rules when fighting Greenskins. From the very moment the participating sides made contact, they would fire at their opponents without reservation.

Warships bit tightly into each other, and space was filled with the straight lines of Las-fire, the parabolic arcs of Torpedoes, and the sky-filling debris left behind by explosions.

Space encounters usually commenced across vast distances, but the Greenskins' penchant for close combat also influenced their style of space warfare. As a result, the combating sides were often separated only by inches—such close quarters even led some Greenskins to ignite shoddily made jump packs, attempting to initiate boarding actions directly just like that.

At the most intense moment of the battle, an Astartes Chapter answered the Expeditionary Army's call.

Soshyan Alexey, leading the Astral Knights Chapter, rushed to the battlefield.

The moment it leaped out from The Warp, the Starfire plunged directly into the storm of war.

Its broadside cannons unleashed overwhelming wrath, converging into a barrage so bright it was impossible to look at directly, while launching row upon row of Torpedoes.

A Gargant tumbled and struggled within this curtain of death and ultimately submitted completely. The almost wholly unprotected armory below its decks suffered a chain of explosions. Accompanied by shooting shrapnel and ionic arcs, the ship exploded from the inside while spewing out countless Greenskin corpses; the scene looked exactly like a fungus spewing spores outward.

The Starfire maneuvered at full speed with an agility entirely unsuited to its size. As a result, the warship's superstructure groaned like a living creature, the ancient hull vibrated under the thunderous effects, and the decks constantly shook from the recoil brought about by the continuous firing of the broadside cannons.

The area of space between the two fiercely fighting fleets was filled with debris of varying sizes, dissipating Plasma vortexes, and dogfighting flight squadrons.

A mere few warships could generally hardly change the situation, but they were enough to tear a small opening in the opponent's formation.

The experienced detachment fleet commander immediately seized the combat opportunity, throwing all the capital ships at hand into it. They quickly fragmented the Greenskins' formation and focused fire on several of the largest ones.

This tactic was quite effective. Like an osprey diving straight into a school of fish, it immediately beat the Greenskins into a resounding defeat, causing them to abandon the targets they were supposed to protect and flee toward outer space in succession.

Outside, the fires of war raged.

But on the bridge of the Starfire, everything remained orderly.

"Chapter Master, Vice Admiral Yarrow, the commander of the detachment fleet, has sent a comm request."

The ring-shaped halos released by the parallel Dataslates and flashing circuit frames bathed the entire bridge in an oscillating, profound lighting environment. Hundreds of mortal voices relayed orders for various posts, chattering vox-casters repeated ammunition consumption reports, and Tech-priests calibrated Void Shield readings and firepower intensity using Binary code.

"Approve."

Sitting high upon the command throne, Soshyan nodded. The hololithic projector immediately lit up, clearly recreating the image of a tough-looking military man's face on the bridge.

"I am Vice Admiral Yarrow Melson, commander of the detachment fleet. Thank you very much for your assistance in this operation, Chapter Master Soshyan."

"Vice Admiral Yarrow, I am merely here to fulfill our duty. There is no need for thanks."

"Then I will speak plainly. The Greenskin fleet has already been routed. The next step is to land on Gachis and completely eradicate all the industrial and production facilities upon it. The routed Greenskin fleet will very likely make a comeback. We don't have much time."

Soshyan pondered for a moment, knowing the other party was speaking the truth.

This was a routing battle, not an annihilation battle. The Greenskin fleet had suffered a heavy blow, but not a fatal one. They still retained the capacity for combat; their organization had merely been temporarily scattered.

If they received reinforcements, organizing a counterattack was not at all impossible.

In fact, the possibility was extremely high.

Given that Gachis had already been fortified incredibly solidly by the Greenskins, with an astonishing density of anti-air firepower and massive Void Shields protecting key facilities, the difficulty of Orbital Bombardment was quite high.

And the fleet also lacked rapid Exterminatus weapons like Cyclonic Torpedoes.

Then there was only one best option left.

Dispatch a landing force to find a way to shut down or destroy the ground Void Shield Generators, and then the fleet could fully display its capabilities.

There was no doubt that the most suitable force to execute such a mission was the Astartes Chapter.

"Ten hours from now, deploy the Astra Militarum as a ground pinning force. We will ride Thunderhawks and airdrop directly into the enemy's heart."

After deliberating again and again, Soshyan decided to use the Astartes' classic decapitation tactic.

Generally speaking, large Void Shield arrays were primarily for defending against high-velocity kinetic and energy attacks. They were basically in a state of open doors to relatively "slow-moving" vehicles. Therefore, when facing enemy targets protected by Void Shields, Astartes mostly used Thunderhawks to conduct airdrops.

"Agreed. The operation will commence in ten hours. Chapter Master, we look forward to your victory. For the Emperor."

"For the Emperor."