Seraphs of the Emperor’s Judgment

Chapter 184: Capturing the King

Although it was a direct hail, Malakim still cut the com-link.

"Damn it, their position is five percent off from the projected coordinates; they might not make it in time!!"

Soshyan cursed, turning his gaze back to the battlefield.

The Grounded had already disengaged from its entanglement with the Endless Night and was beginning to reorganize the remnant fleet.

But its objective had changed—from securing a victory to fleeing.

It was already a certain distance away from the Endless Night. Countless tiny, glowing specks covered the surface of its yellow-and-black hull; those were a myriad of artillery pieces too numerous to count.

Shells screamed through the starry void, grinding any ship that dared sail rashly into such pure, terrifying power into powder.

The previous impact had not caused it fatal damage; it even had the strength left to counterattack. The Endless Night, conversely, having taken a volley of torpedoes and been caught in the ensuing explosions, had suffered significant damage to its hull and engines, its speed plummeting to half of what it originally was.

Soshyan scrutinized it, his eyes carefully sizing up its silhouette, searching for any possible weak point.

Weakening its defensive capabilities would still require some time."All ships."

Soshyan announced loudly, having already made up his mind—there was an old Terran proverb: to catch the bandits, first catch their leader!

He was going to capture that bandit king!

"Focus fire on the enemy flagship, whatever the cost. Coordinates will be transmitted to you shortly."

The fleet immediately reacted. Every ship on the battlefield pulled back to disengage, shells loaded and ready to fire.

"Incoming transmission from the Endless Night."

Suddenly, the communications officer called out a reminder.

"Put it through."

Soon, Magyar's face appeared on the screen.

"Let us hunt this beast together."

On the face of the Excoriators' Chapter Master was an unrestrainable lust for battle.

"Shatter its shields, and then we will board. This bastard's head will be a prize of immeasurable value."

"Copy that, we'll keep it tied down."

"Good!"

On his bridge, Magyar stood up, striding forward as he issued his directives.

"All warships, hear my command! Accelerate to full and push in! Slaughter the xenos!"

Abruptly, the bridge shuddered, this time even more violently than the previous explosion. Many crewmen lost their footing and fell to the deck.

"Enemy attack!"

Magyar steadied himself while the auspex arrays scanned their surroundings.

"How could—"

A second, even more powerful strike closely followed. Now the entire ship began to shake violently, three full layers of void shields dissolving into ionized particles.

Warning claxons shrieked, followed by a torrent of crimson alarm runes springing to life. Before emergency power could provide enough thrust to the secondary sub-warp engines, the Endless Night was already beginning to lose its balance under the pull of gravity.

The crew frantically scrambled to execute a series of emergency remedial measures, trying to balance the ship's main axis while re-routing power from the Warp engines to restart the void shields.

Warning signals continued to flood across the sensor lenses in an endless stream—all of them information regarding intercepted attacks.

For a moment, Magyar was completely baffled. Weren't the Greenskins already routed?

Why—

"The enemy is reforming their fleet, they're charging right at us!"

It wasn't until the scream echoed across the bridge that Magyar realized what was happening.

The opponent truly proved to be a veteran of the sea of stars. It clearly realized that simply holding its head and running away would only result in being chased and annihilated along the way, so it did the exact opposite.

It was like two exhausted boxers in a ring; one of them prepares to gather their last breath to lay the opponent out completely with one heavy punch.

As long as they crushed Magyar's portion of the fleet, no one would be able to stop them from retreating from the battlefield.

It just so happened that Soshyan was still some distance from the core of the battlefield, while Malakim was focused on pursuing another Greenskin fleet; neither had any force capable of intervening right away.

It was a fleeting opportunity, but Nazdreg had seized it firmly.

Soshyan saw this play out as well. He realized that victory was slipping through their fingers, so he once again sent a transmission to the Mother of Tears.

This time, the other party finally connected.

"What happened?"

Malakim appeared somewhat dazed, not entirely aware of what was going on.

"Chapter Master Malakim, come to our aid immediately! Nazdreg is trying to escape!!!"

"What!"

Realizing that a major problem had arisen, Malakim immediately ordered the surrounding warships to converge on him and accelerated toward the main Greenskin fleet, but the distance between him and the enemy was actually farther than expected.

The same was true for Soshyan; the Starfire's engines were pushed to their absolute limits.

However, the battlefield situation changed in the blink of an eye. A single mistake could result in an entirely different outcome.

The space around the Endless Night was already piled high with the capsized wreckage of warships. The Greenskin fleet's offensive didn't lessen in the slightest. They wove through the dark, toxic clouds formed by burning plasma, while disruptor cannons capable of piercing shields maintained an unending barrage.

Under such tactics, the human fleet quickly lost three cruisers.

Once their shields were broken, they were powerless to strike back against the dense enemy formations, until their engines were paralyzed, completely leaving them vulnerable to a baptism of lasers and shells.

Up until this point, the Grounded still stood tall—unless the fleet guarding it was cleared out, it would be extremely difficult to deal it any substantial damage.

Magyar could only do his best to stall for time.

But the first charge launched by the Greenskin fleet successfully tore a massive hole in the human fleet array, shattering their tightly guarded formation, and cutting portions of the ships away from their comrades, leaving them isolated, helpless, and ripe for slaughter.

The Endless Night had already destroyed two Greenskin capital ships, and now its sights were set on a third.

Yet the Grounded proved very cunning, constantly prowling the bottom of the battlefield, firing on the Endless Night from beneath the cover of surrounding warships.

At this moment, the other two human fleets were also closing in at high speed.

Realizing that human reinforcements were about to arrive, the Grounded suddenly moved diagonally forward and fired a lance beam toward the Endless Night.

The rest of the Greenskin warships moved upon hearing the signal, focusing their fire to besiege the Endless Night.

Clearly, Nazdreg planned to destroy this human flagship before disengaging from the battlefield, which would make things significantly easier.

This caused the pressure on the Endless Night to double instantaneously. It could only fight with all its might to fend off the enemies swarming from all directions and try to mount a counterattack.

"It won't hold out much longer."

Sol's voice was low, his eyes fixed on the battle barge. Its last layer of void shields had already begun to flickered.

And the Grounded's main battery array was fully charged, about to unleash its most powerful strike.

"Charge forward, intercept the Grounded!"

Soshyan issued the command.

"Allocate all reserve power to the void shields."

The Starfire's speed was already pushed to the maximum. It sped swiftly toward the gap between the Greenskin warships, solidly taking that hit from the Grounded in the Endless Night's stead.

BOOM——————!

A majestic torrent of energy slammed into its underbelly. Taking such an attack dead-on at such close range and such high speed, the consequences were undoubtedly horrific.

The Starfire suddenly spun out of control, hurtling forward as every strut and mast screamed desperate warnings.

Four layers of void shields shattered almost simultaneously. The ship completely lost its defensive capabilities, and its internal electrical systems collapsed in paralysis, leaving only the dim flickering lights of the combat lumens to keep the interior from plunging into total darkness.