The Emperor’s Angel of Death

Chapter 2909: Escape from the Serpent's Mouth (Part 1)

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Faced with the new type of Tyranid bio-ships, Malakeen knew he couldn't take them head-on, so he immediately selected three bio-warships, marked them with firing runes, and issued orders.

The two flagships fired fiercely at these incoming "missile ships." Lasers and shells struck the bio-warships' bone armor, but didn't cause significant damage, or only left deep cracks, but failed to destroy them.

Suddenly, a bio-warship closest to the 'Mother of Tears' exploded. The powerful energy burst through the carapace, letting plasma flames roar in space. Dazzling light poured out from the observation windows, imprinting itself on Malakeen's retina. Its power was no less than the super-giant plasma shells fired by those Nova Cannons.

In an instant, the hull of the 'Mother of Tears' shook violently.

"Void shield output exceeding 110%, about to overload!"

"Cracks appearing on the forward deck! Emergency repairs in progress!"

At this moment, Malakeen's heart was ice-cold. His long-prepared decapitation strike had been so easily defused by the Hive Ship. Although they were very close to the Hive Ship, and could already see its ugly, hole-filled exterior, this distance had become an insurmountable barrier.

Malakeen was certain that no torpedoes fired from here could hit the target, because it had enough small creatures to intercept them.

Malakeen, who was panting with his head down, supported himself on the command console with both hands, then suddenly raised his fist and slammed it down with force. The loud noise silenced everyone on the bridge.

"Brother Malakeen, change course 190."

Suddenly, a calm voice appeared on the bridge. Malakeen immediately looked up.

"Brother Sotha Null!"

"Change course immediately."

Hearing this, Malakeen didn't hesitate and said loudly:

"Change course!"

Immediately, the two battle barges heading straight for the Hive Ship changed direction, turning to pass along the side closer to the planet. This sudden change caught the Hive Mind off guard for a moment.

"Fire torpedoes, don't worry about whether they hit or not, fire all except the most important torpedoes."

"Understood, firing all torpedoes!"

The two battle barges, while intersecting with the Tyranid escort fleet, endured dense bio-fire, launched a string of torpedoes, and created a series of destruction in the void.

After that, they sprinted all the way along the orbit, passing through groups of large Tyranid bio-ships that were struggling to rise, and finally appeared in front of another fleet centered on the 'Eternal Loyalty', which was responsible for clearing the orbit above Snow Palace. At this time, many transport ships could still be seen rising from the ground to the orbit.

"Our current strength cannot eliminate this Hive Ship, so let's leave it at that for now."

Standing on the bridge of the 'Eternal Loyalty', Sotha Null looked at Malakeen's virtual image with a smile.

"Brother Malakeen, no need to mind it. There will be plenty of opportunities in the future. Thanks to you, this strategy could be executed so perfectly. You are the greatest contributor to this battle."

"I was always worried that it might be too late."

"It's not too late. It's not too late when we arrive."

"Then I'll leave the command to you, Brother Sotha Null."

As Malakeen's image disappeared, Sotha Null turned his gaze to the huge tactical display. Strategically, Malakeen's arrangement was flawless, even ingenious. The only problem was his final gamble. Sotha Null didn't like this kind of behavior. After all, there was no conclusion on how many Hive Ships the Tyranids actually had. Rashly betting one's life on a probability was something only done when at the end of the road.

And now it was clearly not the end of the road.

This was also a trend among the Astartes that he considered not so good, an excessive reliance on that kind of all-or-nothing "brave" behavior, treating the battlefield as a casino, but gamblers are destined to lose in the end.

At this time, Sotha Null could finally review the gains and losses of this operation.

The two Hive tendrils were basically annihilated. Based on the changes in combat markers, it was roughly estimated that nearly 30,000 Tyranid void units were destroyed. Although the vast majority of them were micro-sized targets, there were also nearly a thousand large units among them. This was undoubtedly a huge victory, and possibly the best record against the Tyranids that humanity had achieved.

More importantly, cutting off two tendrils could greatly slow down the Tyranids' advance. Sotha Null had realized that the Tyranid Hive Mind would "learn," meaning it would absorb this lesson, which would prevent it from easily dividing out tendrils again. Although this made it more difficult to deal with, it also greatly slowed down its rate of harvesting biomass.

Weighing the two, Sotha Null believed that time was more precious now. Only with enough time could he deploy strategies, gather more military forces, and wait for possible reinforcements from the Imperium.

The price paid was 26 warships sunk and 17 warships damaged, most of which were Legion ships. After all, other chapters didn't have many ships. Among the sunk capital ships were the Astral Knight's strike cruiser 'Pandora', the White Templars' Dictator-class heavy cruiser 'Spinel', plus the newly sunk 'Rogue Trader', the Legion lost three capital ships at once, accounting for one-ninth of the entire Legion's capital ships.

It was painful, but there was no way. He couldn't blame Malakeen for poor command, because the other party had indeed tried their best.

Fortunately, the various forge worlds still had unfinished orders and ships waiting to be transferred, so they should be able to be replenished soon.

"How is the ground evacuation progressing?"

"Reporting, Lord, it's basically complete!"

Although Malakeen's actions were reckless just now, they did have an effect, which was to attract the attention of the Hive Mind, allowing Sotha Null's evacuation to proceed relatively smoothly.

"Fleet heading adjusted 120, waiting for the last batch of transport ships to return."

Faced with the fleet trying to snatch food from its mouth, the Tyranid Hive Mind emitted a roar that spread through the warp, and then the huge serpent began to constrict its body, with a large number of bio-ships attacking the evacuation zone. Countless bio-torpedoes streaked across the void. Although many of them were intercepted by lasers, the resulting shockwaves were enough to shake giant ships like the 'Eternal Loyalty'.

The very few bio-torpedoes that were not intercepted bombarded the human ships with bone heads as thick as ship armor. Some bio-torpedoes disintegrated when they hit the ships' void shields, but some passed through the void shields and tore huge cracks in the hull the moment they exploded.

Sotha Null had been calmly observing the Tyranid fleet's attack. He could feel the anger of that will. Even the huge Hive Ship moved. More finned new bio-warships could be seen falling from the wide mouth of the huge sac-like structure below the Hive Ship.

Being able to manufacture ships while fighting, this efficiency is even more exaggerated than the Bonesingers. If the scale of this terrifying life were even larger, Sotha Null really couldn't imagine how humanity would fight a war of attrition with them.

"All ships, attack the areas I have marked with all firepower."