Warhammer: Start with a dog

Former Stormdiver Denison Mede just celebrated his fifty-eighth birthday in Temple City.

Four hundred and seventy years have passed since their ancestors' colonial fleets broke out of the warp and crash-landed on the world they called Dalchana.

Now that he has lived to this age, he can be called an old man. Now, he is sitting up from the sofa that has been used as a bed since the birth of his son Reval, trying to blink away the soreness in his eyes. tears, and the dust accumulated in his joints made him feel as if the seams of his bones were being cut by thousands of tiny razors when he tried to stand up.

People who live on this endless planet, with the exception of tiny gravels that can penetrate anywhere on the human body, will eventually end up like this, including but not limited to infections caused by skin being worn away, eyes dry and tearful, and corneas worn. Sore eyes, problems that accumulate in the ear canal making it difficult to hear, dust that gets inhaled into the lungs and eventually turns it into black lung disease, and joint problems.

In short, he had every reason to complain, but he didn't. He just gritted his sore back molars and tried to stand up.

Like the generations of colonists who lived in the southern part of Temple City before him, from the beginning their residence was made from the few materials of military landers and decommissioned military ships, except for the Regent's residence, the sturdiest Residential.

Therefore, the people who live here must also bear corresponding responsibilities. After Reval inherited his job as a storm diviner, Dennison picked up the old and dilapidated laser gun and, together with other volunteer watchmen, fought every difficult moment. Go out when Gray Winter arrives or shoot the looters right inside the city.

He heard someone banging hard on the armored flanks of the cannon that had served as his door for centuries, and a voice he recognized as Watchman Roma, who patrolled South 43rd Street to No. 55 at the end of the South Block. ·Chayzeko's voice.

"What's the matter? Rom?"

"Get up! You old guy with bad ears," the Watcher said, holding his equally ancient laser gun, with a rare urgency in his voice, "Didn't you hear the alarm? Come with me to the shelter."

Dennison saw through the crack in the door that residents in the dusty bunkers and armored plates were constantly pouring into the muddy and narrow streets, and people were hurriedly walking towards the shelter.

The old man smiled, revealing his blackened and receding gums, and shook his head, "The gray winter will indeed be early this year, but not so early. Rom, am I mistaken? Reval told me that it will be at least a few weeks away. Maybe in a month, the wandering marauders won’t show up so early.”

"It's not Gray Winter! It's something else! You old guy! There must be some big shot coming from outside... Hey! I just received an order for everyone to gather in the shelter temporarily. I don't know how to tell you, come and see. Look to the sky!"

"Who?" The old man's shocked look was in contrast to the other person's panic. "Who would know that we are here? Who would land here to see us?"

"How do I know? You'd better hurry up!"

After saying this, Rom ran away with the crowd, and Dennison saw his hand wrapped in cloth pulling up a child and running with him in the direction of the shelter.

Dennison leaned against his door and thought for a while, then went into the room to wrap himself up. When he came out, he still had his laser gun in his hand, and then slowly pointed his painful legs toward the crowd. Move in the opposite direction, which is the direction of the residence of the great regent.

The roar of the beast came suddenly and threateningly from the gray sandstorm sky.

People screamed and huddled in the streets, skinny parents trying to cover their even skinnier children with their bodies.

"Dragon." Someone said in a low voice and fearfully.

But Dennison was different, he was the Technician, or as they called him in older centuries ago, the Master of the Oracles, his ancestors had served on the bridge decks of the glorious Pilgrim Ships, and he had a special knowledge of the One in the Heavens. The winged, fire-breathing thing that makes a sound like a roaring beast knows more than most of the residents here.

That's not a roar, that's the sound of a powerful engine.

It wasn't a dragon, that was a flying machine, a gunship, a real flying vehicle capable of withstanding the force of the sandstorms that had prevented their fragile civilian craft from flying over Dalchana for centuries.

The gunboat seemed to glance at the crowd on the ground, or something similar, then raised its head and flew upwards into the atmosphere.

The old man clenched his smooth old gun, endured the severe pain in his legs and finger joints, and started running.

If there was any superior here who needed Denison Meder to fulfill his duty as a Watcher, he would damn well have done it instead of running and hiding.

——————

"Now." After not being particularly surprised but still disappointed to find that there was really no non-human product that could be used to cover his body from these midnight lords, Lamizane slowly exhaled a long breath, and then walked in the tower. Surrounded by the war gang members led by Ross, he condescended to board the Prophet's personal Thunderhawk "Dark End".

His eyes lit up at the pilot who greeted them outside the cockpit.

"Thank God there is finally a person wearing decent clothes here!" (*Our primarch's body is the most exquisite thing in the world, why do you care so much about the world's eyes? There is nothing wrong with wearing flesh and blood.)

Septimus knew at the first sight of the god-like arrival that his fate would not be decided by him, let alone by his master, because it was the first time that a slave pilot who had served his master for many years saw these things. The demon demigods are so eager to please a certain being, they are like a group of small beasts surrounding the master's feet, but there is no chirping - the Night Lords even attack quietly, with almost no war cry.

But what he didn't expect was that the other party had no interest in "skinning half of his skin alive first and flexing his fingers" or "opening his brains first and listening to the screams". Instead, he only looked at him and asked him to hand over his body. So clothes other than underwear.

so now--

The ash-blond haired slave stood in the corner shivering with cold, holding his arms and wearing only gloves, underwear, socks and shoes.

The adults of the Eighth Legion, who had watched dumbfoundedly as they had managed to defeat their other brothers and board the Thunder Eagle, were fist-bumping each other - because the tallest, skeletal Death-like adult had asked them to do so.

"Uh, why are you still fighting for seats? Didn't there be a battleship on the track? You are so old... You want a duel, right? If you want to duel, fight hand to hand, don't cause additional casualties. This place is in short supply of medical care. .”（*……）

And when that adult said these words, his master Talos lowered his noble head in shame. (*Soul Hunter... is a more suitable title for my son. Pharmacist is not his strong point.)

"My lord...!"

Septimus heard his master looking at the giant, speaking the ancient honorific with complex and rich emotions, and the dead language being recited from his throat like poetry.

His masters'... masters? But that's not... that's not already... The slave blinked his only remaining eye in silence and shock, and the other half of the biochemical prosthetic eye circle shrank slightly.

"Please allow me to serve you first..."

Then he saw the adult shaking his head, picking up the clothes he had just taken off, shaking them, glancing at the dirt that made him pick his toes in embarrassment, and then tore off a few strips of cloth from them, first He tied up his long black hair and rolled it back, completely revealing his skeleton-like skinny and pale face in the dark cabin.

Septimus thought he would be frightened.

But he didn't.

What he saw was the skull face of a helpless but gentle god. The pale skin was painted with an alabaster color. Inlaid on it was a pair of extremely deep black eyes, as black as a starless night, but What he saw was - he didn't know how to describe it, but Septimus' human intuition immediately understood one thing:

Something big is about to change.

For a moment the slave thought of many things and one person.

The mark of the Eighth Legion on his body felt a burning itch.

May that change be for good.

The next moment, noisy and shrill alarm signals came from everyone's communicators.