Warhammer: In the Name of Nirvana

[The rise of an empire requires the fall of countless empires, just like the crown of a king requires the blood of countless kings. 】

[For an empire, expansion is its life, war is its food, and the army is its blood. But when its territory can no longer be expanded, its army can no longer be brave, and it has to usher in peace, then This is the beginning of its decline and death. 】

[So, we need war, just like the empire needs war: it has nothing to do with justice, honor, interests, or any ideology or class identity. It is just for a longer life, just for the empire to continue to exist. 】

[And for our existence, they must die, they must experience war, fire, and ravage, and they must fall into the abyss together with their proud civilization, becoming rich nourishment for another victory. 】

[They may never understand the mystery, but that doesn't matter. 】

[Because they must accept it. 】

——————

On the third day after the war began, Morgan stood alone in front of the star map. Countless brass-style sensors, dials and remote auspices still loyally guarded her temples, like a group of people who only knew A pedantic knight who sticks to his post.

And closer to home, those symbols and numbers that surged like the torrents of early spring, poured into the command network through the meditators and data links surrounding her, and also poured into her side. It simply didn't stop for a moment, until the Primarch was completely submerged in the ocean of battle, and her originally silver-white hair was completely immersed in the bright blue reflection.

The Spider Queen's eyes wandered among these vital numbers, using her will to arbitrate the life and death of countless soldiers thousands of miles away. She watched the main force of the First Legion fight bloody battles on [No. 1], and also watched Those destruction troops working efficiently at the edge of the galaxy did not dare to let down their vigilance for a moment.

At the same time, a considerable amount of energy still needs to be placed in the center of the battle line, because Ran Dan's fleet is continuously coming from the home star in the deepest part of the galaxy, engaging in bloody battles with the main fleet of the Human Empire. For many days, the battle lines between the two sides saw each other repeatedly. Every second, hundreds of firefight records came from the asteroid-studded void, recording the pride and fall of countless war engines.

And all of this is just less than one-third of all the messages. War is like the palm of a young god, rashly reaching into a bag full of spikes, leaving behind countless bright red sacred messages. Every drop of blood needs to be wiped carefully by the Spider Queen, a vicious angel with fluttering wings.

Compared with these flickering and most anxious war fronts, those secondary mission data: such as the assault of the Dawnbreaker Legion in the Void Fortress community, the current situation of the Space Wolves Legion beyond the distant stars, and the next When should batches of supply fleets be able to safely sail into the war zone? They also occupy the somewhat depleted energy of the Lord of the Second Legion. If each of them is taken out individually, it is worthy of serious consideration. The key points, possessing an amount of data that mortals simply cannot effectively absorb, can only rush to the side of the Spider Queen.

But compared to [No. 1], they are all insignificant.

On the fortress world named [No. 1], the sleepless war has been burning for fifty Terran standards. The main force of the Dark Angels Legion is following their Primarch, methodically uprooting the aliens on the surface. Alien fortresses continuously divided and surrounded hundreds of millions of alien legions, and then sent them into the non-existent purgatory in an orderly manner.

On the third day after the war began, more than 80% of this fortress, which was the same size as Holy Terra, had been planted with the flags of the Empire and the First Army. The siege areas on the surface were even far away. Far faster than the final battle for air supremacy in low-Earth orbit: While the dilapidated Randan battleships were still clinging to their last few airspaces in the [No. 1] space, Kali, who was commanding the pro-army forces on the ground, The leader of the squad had already cut off the ugly head of the commander of Randan Fortress and turned those mountain-like forts and military stations into dust.

At the very first moment of this war, the Emperor's Lion opened his bloody mouth and exposed his sharpest and most deadly fangs: without the high position and vision needed to coordinate the overall situation, After no longer serving as the commander-in-chief he was not accustomed to, but returning to the simplest frontline commander, all the potential and power of Caliban finally found the most suitable stage.

Johnson, who walked out of the Forest of Behemoths and the Palace of Knights, could only step onto the battlefield. In addition, even the staff room or strategic warehouse that was closely related to the battlefield would make his mane feel inexplicably depressed.

So, after leading 50,000 of the best Dark Angels and some necessary backup means to attack [No. 1], Zhuang Sen's progress even exceeded Morgan's expectation. He accurately captured Ran Dan. Every tiny loophole in the defense line, in places where even the Spider Queen could not find a weak spot, relied on her beastly instincts to stab the alien defenders with vicious moves one after another that made them bleed.

In Morgan's estimation, the offensive and defensive battle of [No. 1], which was supposed to last at least a week, ended sixty-two hours after it actually started, with the alien main fortress being planted with the imperial flag: Ran Dan's The organized defenses have collapsed, and the remaining stragglers are little more than minor nuisances that the mortal auxiliaries can deal with.

At this time, less than eighty Terra standard hours had passed since the first warship loyal to the Human Empire rushed into the galaxy and ignited the war.

The Spider Queen took an extra second to appreciate the power of blood relatives. She suddenly understood why there was so much dissatisfaction with Zhuang Sen in the First Legion, but those who had eyes above their heads, even the bloodline of the Gene Father The veterans of Terra, who had little regard for authority, still obeyed every order given by their Primarch on the battlefield.

Because they know that will be the key to victory.

Zhuang Sen is indeed not suitable for battlefields that are too grand and complex, but when the war is limited to continents and planets with close combat, he is the most terrifying opponent and the most astute general that no one is willing to face.

In terms of how to serve as a lethal short sword, perhaps no primarch can surpass the Caliban: Horus is not as intuitive as Jonson, and Guilliman is not as decisive as Jonson. As for Ferus, he is indeed a perfect war calculator, but that's all.

The top generals need some innate inspiration, whether that inspiration is barbaric or cunning, cruel or ruthless, but after all, it will not be a rule-based calculation: at this point, Ferus is somewhat disadvantaged. .

Blinking her eyes, the leader of the second legion took a moment to reflect on all this. She immediately withdrew her attention from [No. 1], glad that she could transfer her spare energy to other places: The next moment, thousands more messages of firefights and action reports poured in from all over the galaxy, mixed with tens of thousands of casualties and a mountain of damage reports.

The Naval Battle Shura Field at the forefront of the battle line is naturally the top priority among all the information. Those like Coswayne, Arachos, Rana and Bayar come from the two Astartes Legions. The important ministers, second only to the Primarch, have commanded nearly a thousand battleships. They have been fighting sleeplessly for three days at the protrusion closest to Randan's home planet. The battle line they are on is illusory, and any small sign that can be used as a mark The planets and debris have long since dissipated.

The destruction of two alien space stations and the death of six Imperial cruisers came to Morgan's mind almost at the same time, but they did not cause even the slightest ripple, even though every word symbolized endless blood, even though the Second Legion The Lord could read between the lines and see everything on the battlefield: torpedoes, light spears and nova cannons ravaged the crumbling defense line, and the flames gradually dissipated into light and ignited within the void shield, mercilessly devouring every inch of the deck and belly compartment, thousands of Tens of thousands or more soldiers will be turned into ashes, and their blood will be accompanied by ions, gush out from the broken ship pipes, and be submerged in the darkness of the void.

But even though this scene could vividly appear before her eyes, the Lord of Avalon did not waver at all: sacrifices like this are ordinary in war, even if it is the fall of a cutting-edge battleship, or the conquest of a satellite-level alien fortress, It was just a brighter wave in the ocean of war. The moment these messages appeared in front of Morgan, they became meaningless.

The Spider Queen took less than a second to deal with them. She did not take action, but turned her spirit into thousands of invisible psychic tentacles, fulfilling the decision of her brain: she was the first to receive these messages. In one moment, she successfully processed at least one-third of the information, and before the next second came, she completed the processing of the remaining messages. She even had time to take an overview of the situation in the galaxy and adjust several upcoming gaps. He came over and unhurriedly absorbed a wave of nutrients from the places where the battle was most intense to support the next second of consumption.

After doing all this, the Spider Queen, with full firepower, found that there seemed to be a little time before the next second arrived, so she took the time to pay attention to the situation near Mandeville Point: there were at least a thousand warships approaching Waiting to enter the subspace, most of them are filled with supplies to support the continuation of this war, while others are filled with mortal legions as new forces, and control and assemble these troops who are still leaping, and Ensuring that they will not be disturbed by the weirdness in the subspace is a task that is so difficult that it can only be handled by the Spider Queen herself. She cannot even trust any of her think tanks at this point, because their brains will be affected by it. This huge data was exploded without hesitation.

After once again guiding the direction of those parts of the subspace, the Spider Queen heard an obvious clicking sound, which came from her neck that had not moved for a long time, but she had no time to care about it: she had just arrived from Mandeville Point The influx of brand-new fleets still needs her diversion and assignment. They will become the latest element of this rock-heaping war, pushing the fleets ahead to move forward, just like the ruthless cold rivers of the Ice Age that swallowed up the original mountains for countless epochs. , until this big wave reaches Ran Dan’s home planet.

Morgan took another moment to solve these problems that required continuous attention. She felt that her mind was turning clouds and rain, and countless accumulated alien souls were screaming and being thrown into the incinerator to support the Spider Queen's state and maintain it. Guilliman is on the same level as Perturabo: She doesn't know how long she will need to maintain this state. She is just lucky that there is no shortage of fresh food around her. It's just the [No. 1] captured by Jonson. There are billions of alien soul consumables on the Internet, and the biggest problem Morgan faces is that there is not enough time to pick them one by one.

But even so, at the last moment of this second, the Lord of Avalon still completed her last extracurricular homework: she quickly collected and screened the information on the major battlefields, and at lightning speed, The general situation and her analysis were written down, and then thrown away in one piece through her personal contacts with Caliban's blood relatives.

Although she did not add a single explanatory sentence, Morgan was convinced that Zhuangson understood her implication: since the highest priority [No. 1] has been solved, the Lord of Dark Angels should also choose the next one. Target.

No matter which ones Jonson chooses, Morgan has reason to throw out the corresponding fronts to reduce her own pressure and at the same time improve her control over other fronts.

Caliban did not disappoint her in the end.

About five seconds later, Zhuang Sen, who was still on the surface of [No. 1], responded to the message from the Spider Queen: The Lion marked three of the main battlefields, which are two fortresses of extremely important strategic significance. And a satellite that had changed hands twenty-eight times, and as for the rest, he threw them back intact.

Caliban also didn't mark any explanatory words. He didn't even bother to write a word, but Morgan still understood what he meant: Jonson will solve the three marked goals one after another, and as for the rest , it is still the leader of the second legion who coordinates the overall situation.

And it seems that he does not intend to return to his "Unyielding Truth": As early as when he left this Glory Queen-class battleship and led five hundred people and the main force of the First Legion to the front line, Caliban The Lord gave his flagship, his fleet, the remaining strength of his legion, and all auxiliary troops to the command of the Lord of the Second Legion.

And he himself was on the front lines of the war, one front at a time: he even seemed to enjoy it.

【……】

Okay, that's very Jonson: only able to think about one thing at a time, doing extremely well in the area he's temporarily concentrating on, but dealing with other areas at an extremely poor level, or even ignoring them outright. .

If this kind of behavior is magnified in the military field, it is Zhuangson's evaluation as a military strategist: the best general, and a somewhat crappy overall commander, and Morgan are almost completely opposite, but completely complementary.

After all, although the Spider Queen is not outstanding in adaptable tactical command, in any field involving [overall] and [multi-threading], she is enough to stand side by side with Guilliman, Dorn and Perturabo and become a genetic origin. The first sequence in the body: even Horus and Ferus are slightly inferior.

Morgan couldn't even imagine how Jonson would conduct this war without him coordinating everything from the fleet firefights on the front lines to the material supplies at the rear: The answer may be that if the Spider Queen had never appeared, Caliban Will the leader passively discover his skills as a commander?

Who knows.

Random thoughts like this inevitably ran through Morgan's mind, like an anxious student taking an exam, involuntarily playing a song in his head.

The Spider Queen immediately crushed these useless emotions. She continued her work that seemed to never change, and looked at the empire's war machine with satisfaction as it exerted its power under her control, bit by bit. Crush the alien's defense line, using sheer strength and size to turn all skills into ashes.

At the forefront of the battle line, with repeated bloody see-saws, a trace of emptiness finally appeared behind Ran Dan's fleet. Although the endless torrent had not yet dried up, there were already several signs of drying up, and the two legion generals were Holding on to another batch of reinforcements, they looked at the opportunity to break through the void defense line.

At the edge of the galaxy, the Dark Angels detachment whose names had been erased appeared in Morgan's message. They simply reported their results, and the Spider Queen did not ask them more. Secrets and trust lie in Proliferating in such a strange atmosphere, what followed were deathly alien worlds and countless delicacies above them.

The Lord of Avalon also happened to notice something. Although these quietest warriors under Zhuang Sen's command have always been as silent as machines, they still have a few traces of living people. Even without meeting each other, they can feel: The obvious point is that although their reports are highly similar, they are somewhat different each time, and the difficulty of the task can even be detected from them.

However, there were a few reports from the [Dark Angel Detachment], and each time they were completely similar, even a little scary. When the Spider Queen took a casual look, she also found that she could not execute the extermination orders on those high-speed moving On the boat, I smell a little bit of soul.

However, these ships can travel through the fiercest battlefields, and they can drive better than even the most experienced captains, and their tasks are also the most efficient ones: The Spider Queen did not continue to think, she just sighed casually, As expected, his blood kinship is quite deep.

After all, she has experienced no fewer than ten [detachments] like this.

Compared with these little secrets of the First Legion, the respectful tone from the internal communications of the Dawnbreaker Legion made the Primarch feel limited comfort: The dotted void stations surrounding [No. 1] were finally captured by Morgan. The children knocked one by one, waiting for the next order to be issued.

The Spider Queen did not hesitate. She did not even ask too much about the casualties. She just quickly opened the star map, searched for the most important gaps in the front line, and then sent her descendants there one by one: nearly A team of 20,000 people was sent without reservation except for necessary reserve troops.

Morgan knew that under the constant onslaught of the Human Empire, these gaps in the human front were not accidental mistakes, but the consequences of Ran Dan's desperate counterattack: the battle there was destined to be the most brutal, so brutal that she could The few heirs suffered, suffered hundreds or even thousands of terrible casualties. Such a number was enough to drive her crazy enough to risk everything and rush to the forefront of the war herself.

But even so, Morgan also knows: she must send her heirs there, because these most dangerous gaps also have the corresponding most important tactical value, and the failure of each of them may completely ruin them. A squadron can even shake up the battle situation. In the face of such danger, whether it is the Dark Angels or the Dawnbreakers, their lives must become consumables in the war, and they must pay everything for the probability after the decimal point.

Jonson has already put most of his descendants into the battlefield. The Dark Angels have taken up the front line spanning half of the galaxy. In the past three days, they have paid nearly a five-digit death toll: Could it be that Morgan's descendants Should I just be a spectator?

You know, from the moment they were created, no Astartes warrior was tasked with living a long life.

It pained Morgan to admit this fact.

But if she ignored this fact, Morgan also knew that she would not be able to bear the consequences.

【……】

The mission was accurately transmitted to all the Dawnbreaker companies in the next second. One after another, companies that swore to give everything to the Queen of Avalon poured into their respective battleships and rushed towards the most terrifying hell. .

The Spider Queen took a second and watched their ships rush to the front line. She sighed and mobilized the surrounding fleets, desperately seizing air superiority along the way to ensure that her children could stand in the fighting field alive. On the other hand, it would be more meaningful to die, rather than to die inexplicably in a space battle: more than one million mortal auxiliary troops have suffered this fate in the past three days.

This is all the preferential treatment Morgan can give to her heirs. When she shook her eyes again and looked at the star map on the front line, whether it was the Dark Angel or the Dawnbreaker, in her eyes, they were all the same consumables. .

There is no difference between them.

The Spider Queen blinked and confirmed her thoughts. This action took her another second. Thousands of mixed messages were already piled on both sides of her.

After another sigh, the Spider Queen continued her homework: she must maintain this terrible and pathetic posture before this war enters the next stage.

But even she doesn't know when the next stage will come, and which commander will start it: the main fleet advancing steadily here, the lions who have rushed to the next battlefield, or the ones outside the field, It is said that the merger of Leman Russ and Luther is going smoothly?

she does not know.

She could only guess.

Maybe Jonson.

Maybe Luther.

Maybe Conrad.

Or... even Ruth.