Chapter 126: Two Cautious Ones

The storm bolter’s roar echoed through the air,

The Viceroy’s palace was shrouded in shadow, lit only momentarily by the flashes of gunfire.

Gene-thieves poured endlessly from the palace’s shadows, surging toward the twenty Space Marines of the First Company, clad in Terminator power armor.

Captain Kaelen swung his Hammer of Baal, smashing the pure-blood gene-thief charging at him into fragments.

Amid the howling energy field of the hammer, the pure-blood gene-thief’s head exploded into thick pulp,

The Hammer of Baal, a master-crafted power hammer, was one of the sacred relics of the Blood Angels Chapter, forged with painstaking effort by master artisans a millennium ago and personally bestowed upon him by Dante.

The stored energy field surged forth in roaring blue arcs, blasting another fearless pure-blood gene-thief attempting to close in into charred, blackened meat.

But at that moment, a claw lashed out from behind, striking toward Captain Kaelen—

“Captain!!”

The roar of a chainsaw fist erupted as Sergeant Aforey slammed his chainsaw fist into the face of the gene-thief attempting to ambush Kaelen.

The chainsaw whined, tearing the gene-thief cleanly in two.

Captain Kaelen nodded to Aforey in silent gratitude.

Terminator power armor was sturdy and reliable, but according to Captain Kaelen’s experience, some pure-blood gene-thieves’ claws could slice through tank armor—compared to them, even Terminators might as well be silk.

“Maybe their claws carry a disintegration field!”

Aforey, as if reading Kaelen’s thoughts, joked half-seriously.

“Do you think these mad bugs even look like they have a civilization?” said Barthro, wielding a flamer beside Kaelen.

As he spoke, he adjusted the flamer’s nozzle, blasting the approaching horde into ash,

The xenos turned into pillars of fire, screaming as they died,

“Xenos! Perish in the flames of the Emperor and Saint Guilliman!!” Barthro roared.

Hearing this, Kaelen and Aforey couldn’t help but smile.

“Look—they’re clearly waiting for us!”

Aforey continued joking:

“Such thoughtful xenos—maybe they even formed a welcome committee for us!”

“Only civilized races show this much courtesy! Don’t you agree, Barthro?”

Barthro’s only reply was an even hotter jet of flame: “Sorry, brother, I’m busy carrying out the Emperor’s will—no time for your nonsense!”

The storm bolter roared again, covering Kaelen as he crushed the surrounding gene-thieves into pulp with the Hammer of Baal.

Kaelen felt a flicker of irritation,

Though they’d just exchanged jokes, their situation was far from good,

There were too many gene-thieves—Aforey was right, they were deliberately waiting here for them.

Since entering the Viceroy’s palace via teleportation, Kaelen had felt uneasy, as if eyes—perhaps more than one—were watching him from the dark.

Those elusive gazes alternated between hostility and chilling patience,

It sent a chill down Kaelen’s spine.

“Too many!!” Aforey roared, his roaring power fist tearing open another pure-blood gene-thief’s skull: “Did every gene-thief on this planet come to greet us?!”

“More xenos filth! More sacrifices for the Emperor and Saint Guilliman!” Barthro growled in fury.

Short bursts of flame drove back the gene-thieves attempting to close in.

“Aforey’s right!!!”

Kaelen roared, thrusting his Hammer of Baal like a spear, pinning a gene-thief against the wall and crushing its innards flat.

The corridor was too narrow for Terminator armor to maneuver effectively,

While the gene-thieves were smaller, more agile, better suited for combat in such confined spaces.

Kaelen pointed toward a corridor leading to the People’s Hall and shouted to his First Company warriors: “Move there—better ground for us!”

“Happy to oblige!” Aforey’s chainsaw fist tore through gene-thieves as Barthro unleashed torrents of flame.

Under their cover, Kaelen and several other Terminators sprinted toward the corridor.

As the Blood Angels vanished, a monstrous creature hidden in the darkness slowly revealed itself,

A red-armored giant—the enemy it had never encountered in all its long life,

The Underhive Worm had only heard the name, knew them as dangerous foes,

Even from this distance, the Underhive Worm could feel their terrifying violence.

To deal with them, the Underhive Worm summoned all its offspring in Fardia City—the Hive Mind disapproved, but the Underhive Worm defied its command.

This should not have happened.

The Underhive Worm extended its long, crimson tongue, then retracted it swiftly. Under the Hive Mind’s control, it should never have shown emotion—it should have merged without hesitation into the Song of the Leviathan.

But the Underhive Worm was furious. The Underhive Worm hated.

The bitter memories of the past clung to its mind,

That man—Augustus Flax—its brother, the one who killed its parents, the one who drove it into exile.

The Underhive Worm hated him. It wanted to kill him.

To do so, it was willing to defy the Hive Mind—even temporarily.

The Underhive Worm led its offspring into the darkness. Moments after it vanished, Zhou Yun stepped slowly out of the shadows, clad in the Rogue Trader DX suit.

The Rogue Trader DX suit enhanced Zhou Yun in every way, with stealth being its most prominent feature,

Neither the Underhive Worm, the gene-thief patriarch, nor the elite Terminator Space Marines of the First Blood Angels had noticed him,

That was normal—the Rogue Trader DX suit was designed for theft.

Since entering the Upper Nest, Zhou Yun had continuously used the Seeker Staff to track the positions of Augustus Flax and the Underhive Worm,

Augustus Flax’s position remained unchanged; the Underhive Worm kept moving,

This gene-thief patriarch was incredibly cautious, always retreating behind swarms of pure-blood gene-thieves,

All attacks against the Blood Angels were carried out through his blasphemous offspring,

He remained hidden in the dark, motionless, watching the Blood Angels’ every move.

As for how Zhou Yun knew—Zhou Yun had been following it, motionless, watching it.

“You’re even more cautious,” said the winged figure in white light, shaking its head.

“It can’t be helped,” Zhou Yun’s lips twitched slightly.

In a one-on-one fight, the Underhive Worm could never defeat Zhou Yun now.

But the problem was, the Underhive Worm had a swarm of pure-blood gene-thieves protecting it,

And whenever it sensed even slight danger, it fled without hesitation.

Zhou Yun had already witnessed this once in the Lower Nest,

It ran with no dignity whatsoever—six limbs on the ground, moving like a giant centipede.

!.read

And if one attack failed, the Hive Mind would detect Zhou Yun through the Underhive Worm,

Then Zhou Yun wouldn’t just be facing one Underhive Worm.

He had to wait patiently, until the Underhive Worm let its guard down, then strike with lethal precision—to hunt the Underhive Worm.

“So damn cautious,” the winged figure in white light muttered.

Zhou Yun was currently using his own subordinates to draw the Underhive Worm’s attention.

But the winged figure in white light had no complaints,

Fighting humanity’s enemies required both warriors like the Space Marines who fought head-on, and old schemers like Zhou Yun.

“But aren’t my subordinates fighting well?” asked the winged figure in white light.

Zhou Yun nodded approvingly,

One could say—no surprise—the elite of the Blood Angels’ First Company fought as if they were a single organism.

Too bad there were so few,

Even Commander Dante probably hadn’t anticipated that Augustus Flax had such a gene-thief patriarch as an enemy.

Twenty Terminators thrown into the flood of gene-thieves stood no chance of escaping unscathed.

Unless Dante sent reinforcements.

“Not just their reinforcements,” the winged figure in white light murmured vaguely: “Yours too.”

When the twenty Terminators of the First Company entered a relatively safe chamber, standing beneath a broad dome,

“A spacious hall—pity there’s no banquet,” Aforey joked: “What a bunch of uncivilized—”

Aforey’s voice was abruptly cut off—he saw a shadow moving in the corner, and swung his chainsaw fist instantly,

A gene-thief hiding in the shadows dodged Aforey’s attack,

Its sharp claw pierced straight into Aforey’s ankle, slicing through the Terminator power armor and carving deep into his flesh.

Blood and oil sprayed from the shattered ceramite; Aforey grunted and knelt.

Gene-thieves surged toward him.

“Get off! You damn xenos!”

The hammer’s wind howled, shattering the gene-thief lunging at Aforey as Kaelen rushed to shield him.

Barthro charged forward in silent fury, his heavy flamer spewing searing flame,

In his visor’s reflection, the gene-thieves writhed and screamed as they burned to death.

“Can you walk?” Captain Kaelen tried to pull Aforey to his feet.

The heavy Terminator power armor now felt like a burden.

“No, my legs are done for,” Aforey said, leaning against the wall and shaking his head.

Even with Kaelen’s help, he could not stand up.

“Damn, it looks like everything’s been severed,” Kaelen said, glancing at Aforey’s wound.

Such a wound would kill a mortal, but Aforey is a Saintblood Angel, isn’t he?

Kaelen suddenly noticed that Aforey was staring fixedly at the dome, as if he had discovered something.

“Sergeant!” Aforey gasped sharply.

Kaelen followed his gaze upward,

and saw the dome above them writhing.

(End of Chapter)