Above the sky, there was a thorough gray-white color. Between the clouds, strange and fluctuating colorful lights were watching all things in the world.
A cold wind whistled past.
The roar of the armor tore through the continent, and the tracks rolled over the sand, making a creaking sound. On the flat desert, a long deep iron line that stretched as far as the eye could see was slowly advancing. Layers of thin sand were raised, and the yellow earth covered the fine steel. The speeding steel warriors did not slow down at all.
The sound of breaking wind was heard from high in the sky. The sharp blades of the Storm Bird's wings tore through the sky, and the blurry silhouettes of countless flying ships were reflected in the gray sky. Looking far away, the small black and gray dots actually extended backwards, with no end in sight.
The sand and gravel trembled, then were violently shaken up, a huge iron machine passed by, and above the layers of dark gray, there was not a trace of the flags of the original Titan Legion - they were corroded, then erased, and finally the greedy Lord of Steel put his own legion's flag on them. This was the Titan family belonging to the Iron Legion.
The huge figures of the knights seemed so small under the feet of the Titans. They flexibly moved under the shadows of the divine machines to provide assistance to the steel giants.
Hades stood silently on the small stone slope in front of the Black Stone Obelisk. He frowned and counted Perturabo's troops. At the same time, the bird servant scanning results of the Thunder Eagles of the Order of Silence also flowed smoothly into Hades' mind.
Surrounded by enemies.
Based on previous estimates of the Iron Warriors fleet, Hades estimated that there were at least 80,000 Iron Warriors stationed on the planet, as well as countless armored units and Stormbirds.
Staring at the figures advancing steadily, Hades frowned.
No, something's wrong.
Hades thought that the rebels were advancing in too much unison. In the world of sound and radio waves, this army was completely silent, like an army of the dead. No one gave any orders, but everyone was marching as if it was planned.
Hades originally planned to launch an electronic warfare first to cut off the opponent's communications, but the strange scene at this moment made him have other ideas.
At least on a physical level, Hades didn't detect any signal, so the other side didn't need to communicate...
You still need to get up close to know what's going on.
Hades thought, but what they had to do first was to withstand the first few rounds of fire bombardment from the Iron Warriors. He had already heard the sound of the artillery arrays slowly rotating and the violent energy accumulating.
The army that was slowly advancing also slowed down. The long armoured troops began to raise their gun barrels, calculating data and aiming.
Hades was calculating the time. He first ordered the reconnaissance Thunderhawks hovering in the sky to urgently avoid this airspace. Although the opposing air force was Stormbirds and the Order of Silence had more advanced Thunderhawks, these small birds were obviously not enough in the face of the huge number of Iron Warriors.
The figure of the Thunder Eagle disappeared from Hades' eyes, and the air supremacy of this airspace was temporarily vacant. If Hades did not fill it up next, the Stormbird of the Iron Warrior would occupy this place.
But now, Perturabo would not send the Stormbirds, Hades knew it very well, because he knew that the Lord of Steel was about to launch a ground-mass bombing.
Hades took a few deep breaths, and arcs of pale green electricity appeared with his breaths, crackling like tiny static electricity, but it was too far away—Perturabo cleverly kept a distance far enough away, as if he realized that distance would weaken Hades' power.
Hades was thinking, the black stone obelisk occupied by the Order of Silence was located at the junction of a sandy desert and a low hillside. In the sandy desert, there were three black stone obelisks standing in a triangle, while there were no traces of these alien buildings behind the low hillside.
But no matter which direction, as long as you look far away, you can see the army of Iron Warriors. The army closest to Hades is the armored company in the sandy desert. The sharp color of steel stops not far from the black stone obelisk in the desert, which is closest to Hades.
The good news is that the Iron Warriors who were previously stationed under the Blackstone Obelisk left them trenches to avoid the war. The trenches are dark and deep, and they are made by the Iron Warriors and look very solid.
Hades smiled, and briefly recalled his past cooperation with the Iron Warrior Trident Dantioch. He wondered if he had left the Iron Warrior in time. Hades remembered that in the original book, Perturabo had sent this brave Iron Warrior to another battlefield, and Dantioch had thus escaped.
Hades glanced at the trenches deep in the black stone obelisk. The Titan lowered his strong left arm beside him, and Hades stepped onto it silently. There, the psychic Titan's unique shadowy left hand was reflecting the faint sunlight.
He now has two Psionic Titans and a team of Wandering Soul Knights. Except for the necessary Soulless Guarding under the Blackstone Obelisk, Hades did not order too many Soulless down.
The Titan stood up silently, the huge steel trembling slightly. Hades tapped its shoulder casually, and a dull sound rang out. As if sensing something, the Alpha-level psyker who was forcibly imprisoned inside the psychic Titan and served as a charging battery seemed to tremble.
The Warlord Doom-class Psychic Titan belongs to the Doom Order. The stingy Malcador finally gave two to the Silent Order. Three psychics are responsible for charging it, and a male Untouchable is driving it - yes, before the establishment of the Silent Order, female Untouchables would be incorporated into the Silent Sisters, and male Untouchables would be secretly trained by the Empire to be drivers of these big guys.
It's just that... the Warlord Doom-class Psychic Titan that Hades is riding now does not have a Soulless pilot inside.
Pale green arcs lit up, and silver-white droplets silently flowed through the nutrient chamber that imprisoned the psychic. Now the driver of this big guy was outside its cockpit, and Hades was directing it to aim at the armored cluster in the distance.
Those long dark grey lines were reflected in Hades' dark eyes.
Perturabo thought he would go into the trenches to avoid the battle? No, no, no, since Perturabo was the builder of these trenches, Hades was sure that the Lord of Steel knew how many shells would be needed to completely blow them up.
Although the Order of Silence also has an advanced close-in interception system, Hades believes that the temporarily deployed system is still not enough to counter the oversaturated bombing.
So... for Hades, the choice he needs to make is obvious.
The engines roared, and in a very short time, Hades' troops were warmed up to their best condition.
Hades smiled. Perturabo, who only cared about staying in one place and seeking stability and accuracy, probably didn't expect what Hades would choose to do.
According to habitual thinking, Perturabo would only think that Hades would use the bunkers and trenches to lead his troops to defend the stronghold they had just captured.
That's why... why his army is still so close to Hades.
Perturabo was cautious and knew to stay away from Hades, but he was also arrogant enough to think that this distance could stop Hades' scythe.
The Lord of Iron believed that Hades would never take the risk of challenging the Iron Warriors' long front line with such a small army without any reserve forces - this would be tantamount to hitting a rock with an egg.
But he underestimated Hades. At the same time, Hades only needed to hold on until the Iron Hand arrived.
The gray mist was floating weakly, and a faint smell of gunpowder passed by the nose.
In an instant, the black blade charged towards the steel wire.
At the same time, tens of thousands of artillery shells screamed into the air, and black lines weaved a huge spider web in the air.
————
In the strategy room behind the battle line, Perturabo stood up suddenly and "stared" at the battle line angrily.
What are they doing? What are they doing
They... They want to be sacrificed right here?!
Cannons roared, earth and rocks flew, and blazing flames violently struck the earth, but the knights' charging steps never hesitated, as if they had predicted the landing point of each shell in advance, and they accurately crossed the deep pits created by the explosion.
The strange Titan strode forward fearlessly, the void shield lighting up with bright white ripples two meters away from the Titan's divine machine. Unlike a knight who could dodge flexibly, the Titan charged directly into the firepower, the shells hit straight at it, and exploded into scattered fireworks on the white curtain.
Before he knew it, Perturabo had gritted his teeth and fired, bombed, bombed!
The Titan's void shield reactor has a limit, as long as the opponent's shield energy is depleted, an effective attack can be launched... Or, the Iron Warriors need to deploy armor that is enough to match the opponent's weird Titan.
Behind the armored line, a giant figure that was originally used as a long-range fire support platform began to move forward slowly.
The smoke from the first round of main bombardment began to dissipate, but Perturabo never wastes any opportunity. The faster-loading artillery has already begun the transition bombardment, but after taking the first round of artillery bombardment, the other side realized that the Iron Warriors also needed to adjust their trajectory, and began to change their movement routes. The speed of the charging column was even getting faster and faster!
How could that be!
Perturabo stared intently at the images coming back from the front. Not even a single knight was left behind. The strange silver-white metal covered the parts that were blackened by the artillery fire, and it was slowly wriggling like a living thing.
What kind of witchcraft is this...
Perturabo wondered when his father had hidden such a strange being among his men. Compared to the cursed one, the psychic tricks Magnus had once shown Perturabo seemed more approachable.
But this was not the time for him to think about these things. Perturabo adjusted the angle of the turret. He opened his eyes angrily. Since the indirect firepower did not eliminate the opponent...
The Order of Silence will soon be within direct fire range of the Iron Warriors, and when that happens, the Iron Warriors armored forces will give them a surprise -
The hot and smelly wind hit Hades high up in the sky. The Lord of the Underworld did not blink, and the Titan under him was running and shaking violently.
They were about to come into direct fire range of the armored forces - in other words, the Iron Warriors were already charging in a wedge formation, within fire range of the Order of Silence.
"emission."
Hades said, and at the same time as his words, an ominous light shone on the left arm of the Doom-class Psychic Titan.
The broken engine on Shadow's left hand let out a terrifying scream, and a strangely fluctuating black spherical lightning twisted and swam in the space, piercing towards the armored company in front of Hades. From the ominous black light turning on to the scream exploding, it seemed to take only a moment, and a violent scream rang out. Within the company of Iron Warriors, the space was forcibly torn apart, and a strange light lit up from that end.
It was like a small whirlpool existing in this space. The heavy armor that Perturabo was once proud of was torn apart easily like paper. The steel was twisted into fragments and then sucked into the whirlpool.
Hades silently stared at the crack that suddenly appeared in the Iron Warriors fleet. Now the seemingly perfect array of the Iron Warriors had been torn apart in a physical sense. The vortex finally expanded, struggling to take away more lives.
This is like an enlarged version of the vortex bomb that Mortarion once used. The principle is to tear a hole in the subspace, and then let the distorted and mixed space tear apart everything around it.
In an instant, the vortex screamed, and the armors that had been standing still seemed to be in chaos for a moment, as if they could not react. But Hades would not give them a chance. At the moment when the space was torn, the thermal cannon fire of the knights under the feet of the Titan also hit their enemies.
Just a little bit more, Hades thought.
"emission."
Like witchcraft, as Hades spoke, two more whirlpools formed, easily dragging all creatures they met into the abyss.
At this moment, the heavy artillery fire falling behind Hades and his charging team seemed like a joke. Hades didn't even need to look back to know that the continent behind them had been blown down to two or three meters of sand.
Buzz buzz buzz—boom!!!
The first violent Wandering Soul Knight had already charged into the enemy ranks, its Reaper Chainsword roaring and shredding metal, its Adamantium armor ramming directly into the Predator Tank, which brutally chose close combat, swinging its Chainsword wildly.
The roar of the chainsaw was the next horn, and the knights rushed into the steel ranks one after another. The tall cavalry broke up the opposite ranks. At the same time, the dark gray knights also rushed out of their own layers of battle lines. They wanted to fire artillery, but the wandering knights led by Hades had already rushed to the opponent first, and the chainsaw swords slashed directly at the cockpit!
The next moment, a huge Titan also entered the battle line. Hades lowered his eyes, and invisible ripples seemed to suddenly appear around the psychic Titan. Then, a violent pulse wave vibrated, and the inside of the small armor around the Titan had been shattered into scrap metal.
As violent pulse waves spread in all directions, darkness began to fall, violent green lightning lit up from every knight and Titan, fanatical praises rang out in the channel, silver-white tears dripped onto the sand, slowly and silently spread over countless metal corpses, and climbed up onto the unconscious dark gray steel.
Hades frowned deeply.
"keep away."
There was a moment of darkness, and the next moment, Hades frowned as he watched those beings who were struggling to attack the charging formation fall into deathly silence.
No—they have no souls
Hades thought, but the Titan he controlled still did not hesitate, and rushed straight towards the black stone obelisk in the steel queue -
Perturabo slammed the command desk hard, and Vashtor beside him glanced at him slowly.
Above the wasteland, black lightning lit up on the second black stone obelisk.
Good
(End of this chapter)