A churning tide of steel, densely packed and entirely engulfing their field of vision, threatened to completely drown Rowan and his retinue.
Given the sheer volu of enemies, even an entire squad of Astartes plunged into the thick of it would highly likely be sward and beaten to death.
However, this ti, the Greenskins had encountered their absolute natural predators.
Three Killa Kans lunged fiercely toward Rowan. The Grot pilots inside shrieked in maddened frenzy, the massive buzz saws bolted to their chassis roaring like dying beasts.
Yet their completely uncoordinated, wild swings were riddled with fatal openings. Without the slightest hindrance, the Living Saint and the Custodian violently dismantled the walkers, shearing them into scrap tal in the blink of an eye.
Unlike the chaotic and ineffective Grots, the Deff Dreads piloted by proper Ork Boyz perford significantly better, though the end result was fundantally the sa.
Rowan showed zero intention of breaking his stride. With a casual sweep of his sword, several Deff Dreads attempting to charge him were instantly reduced to puddles of molten slag.
Even the tank-class vehicles displayed a pathetic impotence. Before an Alpha-class psyker, they were treated like discarded toys—violently hurled into the air by invisible telekinetic force, plumting back down to crush scores of Ork Boyz beneath their massive weight.
"Blast 'em! Blast 'em to bits! Right zoggin' now!"
Atop the Battle Fortress, Warboss Galiya roared furiously as he witnessed the slaughter through the observation slit.
He could already sense that it wouldn't be long before these humies completely shattered the defensive line and carved a path straight to his face.
As a heavily armored Warboss of the Blood Axe Clan, Galiya possessed a modicum of tactical intelligence; he wasn't foolish enough to believe he could take these terrifying humies in a straight fight.
"Right-o, Boss!"
A kboy bellowed in response.
With an ear-piercing screech of grinding gears, a colossal primary cannon mounted on the Battle Fortress slowly traversed, preparing to lock onto the invading humies and unleash a devastating payload to blast them straight to Gork and Mork.
As for what exactly this shell was, or what highly volatile payload it carried, it was highly likely that not even the kboy who built it knew.
But who cared?
It would definitely blow those stinkin' humies into bloody paste. As for the Orks swarming around them... well, may Gork and Mork bless their souls.
"Lord Rowan, be careful! The xenos appear to be preparing an artillery bombardnt on our position!"
Perceiving this through her psychic sight, Cybia imdiately shouted a warning.
"I see it," Rowan replied calmly. "However, they no longer have the opportunity."
He rapidly calculated the distance. "This should be close enough."
At this precise mont, the squad had completely shattered nearly half of the Greenskin defensive depth. The vast majority of the heavy armor blocking their path had been eradicated, and they were now exceedingly close to the Battle Fortress.
Rowan engaged his will. The familiar, suffocating sensation of bending reality washed over him. The deafening crack of shattering atmosphere filled his ears, and in the next microsecond, he vanished from his position, instantly materializing atop the hull plating of the Battle Fortress.
Every physical obstacle in his path had been violently shattered by sheer kinetic displacent. He carved a bloody corridor through the air, sending severed limbs and jagged shrapnel flying in his wake.
While the surrounding Orks were still paralyzed by shock, Rowan calmly swung the Ceremonial Sword of Solomon.
Incandescent golden light flared like a newborn star, an apocalyptic spike in temperature flashing into existence and fading just as quickly.
The colossal cannon turret was instantaneously reduced to free-floating molecules in the atmosphere. The kboy stationed inside was likewise erased into absolute nothingness, not even leaving ash behind.
Only after executing this did Rowan cast his gaze down into the command cab, slowly extending his hand toward the Ork Warboss.
Just as Warboss Galiya prepared to mount a desperate counter-attack, his massive fra violently seized. He felt the ambient air around him solidify into an impossibly dense physical substance. It was as if his entire body had been encased in hardened adamantium; every single joint was absolutely paralyzed. Like a fly trapped in amber, he was rendered utterly immobile.
Subsequently, his massive form floated weightlessly into the air, drifting helplessly toward Rowan.
Rowan casually took a step forward and gripped the beast by the throat.
Knowing his impending doom, Galiya surprisingly abandoned his previous panic. He gnashed his massive fangs and roared in Low Gothic directly into Rowan's face: "Don't get too zoggin' cocky, humie! Da real Warboss of da Blood Axe Clan is waitin' for ya in Iron Keep! You's gonna taste a right proppa stompin' beneath dem walls!"
"And our Warboss is gonna rip dat head right off yer shoulders and use it as a shiny new hood ornant!"
As the roar faded, Galiya's eyes suddenly bulged in disbelief.
He had anticipated various reactions from the humie upon hearing this—contempt, mockery, rage, or perhaps stoic silence... but he never expected this.
Rowan's eyes lit up brightly, a flash of genuine, unadulterated excitent crossing his features—an expression so primal that even an Ork could perfectly comprehend it.
It was an expression Galiya was intimately familiar with.
As a true Greenskin, he had seen it on his own Warboss's face countless tis—the bloodthirsty, ecstatic thrill of discovering a worthy opponent or a spectacular prey.
"Ah, I see. You are not the true leader of this Waaagh! There's actually a bigger fish to fry?"
Rowan laughed heartily. "Well then... that is absolutely perfect."
With that, he hoisted his captive high, displaying the paralyzed Ork to the surrounding Greenskins who were staring in dumbfounded horror.
Then, Rowan raised the Ceremonial Sword of Solomon, its blade wreathed in roaring golden flas. With a flash of blinding light, he violently plunged the blade straight through Galiya's chest cavity.
An agonizingly bright flash erupted, and the Warboss's entire body from the neck down was instantaneously reduced to drifting ash.
Rowan hooked the severed, roaring head onto his belt. Sweeping his gaze over the utterly terrified Greenskins, he bellowed at the top of his lungs:
"SLAUGHTER THEM! LEAVE NOT A SINGLE XENOS ALIVE!"
Amplified by his reality-bending dominion, the rolling thunder of his voice saturated the entire battlefield.
With that singular, apocalyptic decree, the morale of every Ork present shattered entirely. They broke and fled in absolute panic.
The utterly one-sided massacre comnced.
...
On the other flank, Burke raised his Hellgun and squeezed the trigger.
As the searing las-beam burned straight through the back of the twenty-eighth Ork fleeing from him, he couldn't help but fall into deep contemplation.
Earlier, when he was crouched in the trench and saw the Imperial reinforcent vessel arrive, Burke had been ecstatic.
After all, with orbital supremacy and the threat of lance strikes, even the most incompetent commander couldn't possibly lose this engagent.
But when he saw the voidship deploy drop pods instead of orbital bombardnt, he was left in sheer bewildernt.
"Even if those drop pods are carrying the Emperor's Angels of Death, they wouldn't just blind-drop directly into the teeth of a xenos armored column, would they?!"
As a hardened veteran of the Armageddon Steel Legion, Burke's extensive combat experience scread that this was nothing short of suicidal.
We have to reinforce them!
This thought surfaced in his mind with profound naturality.
Subsequently, the commander of the Armageddon Steel Legion, "The Old Hound," demonstrated his tactical acun to his subordinates, just as he always did.
Following a brief silence, the pre-planned contingency operation was initiated. Leman Russ tanks and Chira transports rumbled out from the rear echelons, advancing along pre-plotted vectors to crash into the Ork flanks.
Burke vaulted over the trench parapet. Alongside his squadmates, he ford up with their designated armor elent and advanced to engage the green tide.
He had expected a grueling, desperate rescue operation, but the reality was almost comically smooth.
Along their axis of advance, the Steel Legion encountered virtually zero enemy armor. Whenever a vehicle did appear, it was instantaneously annihilated by a concentrated volley from the Imperial tanks—which, for the first ti since making planetfall, actually held nurical superiority.
The Ork Boyz they encountered completely lacked their previous, terrifying ferocity. They fought with zero combat resolve and were effortlessly mowed down in droves.
"Tch!"
Burke clicked his tongue in disbelief.
This counter-charge, which by all rights should have been a bloodbath, was proving to be less intense than so of the minor suppression campaigns he had fought in!
Following a firefight that barely deserved the title, they finally established visual contact with the Astartes vanguard.
But the sight before him left Burke profoundly astounded.
The towering Astartes exuded an aura of sacred, chilling apathy. Their power armor appeared virtually unblemished, a far cry from the catastrophic casualties he had anticipated.
Sweeping his gaze across their formation, he couldn't spot a single critically wounded or fallen Space Marine.
"How is this possible?"
Scattered across the surrounding battlefield was an apocalyptic graveyard of Ork vehicular wreckage, clear evidence of the insanely intense armored engagent that had just occurred. Yet, upon the blood-soaked earth, there lay only mountains of Greenskin corpses—not a single Astartes casualty was in sight.
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