Barbarus, now.
Hades looked at the messy battle scene in front of him, took a deep breath, and raised the grenade in his hand.
Beside him, Mortarion raised his pistol and Hades Lantern with a stern look on his face, and the Death Shrouds became alert.
They were now walking on the corridor leading to the Death Guard gene-seed warehouse, but the once neat corridor was now full of bullet holes and corrosion marks.
"I certainly didn't expect anyone to dare to touch the gene-seed of the Death Guard."
Mortarion's whispers came from the channel.
Gene seeds will determine the next generation of the legion and affect the strength of the recruits to a certain extent.
Each gene seed extracted from the previous generation of Space Marines will carry with it the combat experience of this Space Marine, allowing the next recruit who receives his gene seed to cultivate organs to know a vast amount of combat skills from the very beginning of joining the army.
The gene seeds are not very stable. Each gene seed may undergo "mutation", and the probability and direction of mutation are related to the legion.
The gene seeds of some legions have a high probability of mutation, while those of others are relatively stable, such as the Fourteenth Legion, the Death Guard.
The directions of mutations vary, both good and bad.
For example, Rogal Dorn's gene seed would make the Imperial Fists more tolerant of pain, but at the same time their salivary glands would be slightly degraded.
But besides mutation, there is another way to change the impact of genetic seeds on the next generation.
That is—
pollute.
For example, the III Legion, the Emperor's Children, had seen large numbers of their gene-seed infected with the Blight in the early days of the Legion's history, causing a sharp decline in the number of Legion members before their Primarch was recovered.
The importance of genetic seeds is self-evident.
If someone deliberately tampered with the Death Guard's gene-seed and they hadn't come back to check and discovered it,
Loss and fear crept up Mortarion's spine.
Karastiphon. It seems there is a real problem. Why
The Primarch was also glad that he discovered the problem in time. As long as this batch of gene seeds was destroyed before they infiltrated the Death Guard, not much damage would be caused.
Mortarion glanced at Hades who was on his way ahead. How did he manage to detect these tiny threats every time
The closer we got to the gene seed library, the more obvious the signs of fighting became. The remains of servitors and skitarians were scattered under the walls, lifeless.
Gripping the explosive gun tightly, turning the last corner—
Hades gasped.
The body of a mechanical sage was clinging to the explosion-proof door like a giant octopus, his blood-red robe squeezed by the deployed weapons to leave only a corner. It was slowly turning, and the muzzle of the machine gun, still emitting smoke, was pointing at the visitor.
The entire corridor had been deformed by the bombardment of bullets and fire, and bullet shells were piled on the ground as far as the eye could see.
A red light flashed on the Mechanical Sage's face.
[Reinforcements?]
A binary ciphertext containing the Mechanicus' secret orders was transmitted to Hades' mind.
However, the next moment, Mortarion's tall figure appeared from the corner. Seeing the Primarch and realizing that friendly forces had arrived, the Mechanical Sage, who no longer needed to defend, immediately peeled off the blast-proof door, revealing the blast-proof door behind him that was sealed to the ground with no seams.
It was not until the Mechanical Sage fell to the ground that Hades realized that most of the Sage's infrastructure had been corroded and could no longer maintain its basic structure.
After making sure there were no threats around, Hades quickly squatted down and gave the sage the most basic first aid and dealt with the unstable power supply.
"My Lord of the Death Guard, I am sorry that I cannot perform the salute at this moment."
Mortarion looked at the scene in front of him and was silent. After a long time, he slowly spoke.
"You did well, Sage."
"The Death Guard will thank you."
"Thank you, my lord. Now let me recount the previous battle for you."
"I am a biological sage druid. In the Mechanicum, I am responsible for the cultivation of the gene seeds of the Death Guard, the connection with the pharmacists, and other duties. I am also responsible for some of the biological transformation of Barbarus."
"A Death Guard pharmacist who claimed to be Ladon came to me one day before Barbarus Standard Day and asked to inspect the next batch of gene seeds to be implanted into Death Guard recruits, as well as the culture system for other organs."
"He showed me the Death Guard's seal and ciphertext. After checking it several times and confirming that it was a valid seal for the Death Guard's recruitment of new soldiers, I chose to take this pharmacist to the gene seed bank."
Hades glanced at Mortarion, but Mortarion decisively ignored him.
"Just in case, I added seven-level screening scans in the corridors in front of each gene seed library. However, when we passed the third check, the data from the detector showed that the pharmacist was carrying potions that might contain psychic radiation."
Mortarion frowned.
"Sage, I originally thought that these were some of the pharmacist's own medicines. Pharmacists do have the habit of preparing personal medicines, but according to the Gene Seed Preservation Regulations, radioactive medicines must be removed."
"So I asked him to keep the potion."
"But he rejected my request and immediately launched the attack."
"That pharmacist was manipulating some psychic skills to attack, which caused most of the Skitarii and Servants around me to be damaged. He also successfully pressed to the last line of defense in front of the gene seed library."
"But I, Sage, managed to defend myself in the end. I am sure that I pierced both of his lungs. The pharmacist quickly escaped."
"Since all the mechanical servants and the Crusaders were killed, I chose to defend here and wait for reinforcements to arrive."
"But the distress signal you sent was not received."
Hades spoke slowly as he tightened a screw.
In fact, before Hades proposed to go to the gene seed bank, he was surprised to find that all the relevant personnel who were previously in charge of this area had been cleverly transferred away. That Rodan used Karas's power to recruit new Death Guard soldiers to send everyone away.
If the druid sage had not chosen to continue defending, it is very likely that the pharmacist would have made a surprise attack.
But. Pharmacist Laton.
He had come out of nowhere again, and Hades began to quickly recall his memories of the Death Guard.
Finally, his memory stopped at the afternoon when the think tank library was burned. He was standing in the disinfection room. Outside the glass of the disinfection room, a group of pharmacists were supervising him in the disinfection.
That guy was right there, at the very back of those pharmacists.
Staring at him with interest.
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There is another update tonight, I am coding it
(End of this chapter)