The Creators: From Night City

Page 533

It abandoned the pursuit of range, protection, and versatility, and devoted all resources to "destroying the most organic targets at the closest distance, in the most ferocious way."

It is a portable "flame welding torch", specially used to burn the plague "pustules" hidden deep in the crevices of the ship's hull.

And its performance was also outstanding.

At first, the battle went very smoothly.

Under the cover of his guards, Thor Erikson charged into the enemy ranks. Facing a horde of bizarre, colorful Nurgle creatures, he frantically spewed promethium dragons, filling the spacious corridor and relentlessly roasting their rotting, bloated bodies, firmly halting their offensive.

But the situation soon took a complete turn for the better.

Thor Erikson coughed up a few mouthfuls of pus and blood, not through the observation equipment connected to his nerves, but directly through the terrifying rift in the cockpit in front of him, to glimpse the current situation on the battlefield.

Silence.

Hundreds of defenders lay silently on the ground, letting the proliferating virus and rotting polyps spread unchecked.

They all died, at the same instant.

A look of terror was frozen on the face of the ammunition loader, like amber. Through the gap, Thor Erickson could clearly see the terror in the young man's eyes.

What took their lives? What destroyed their defenses? And what defeated them in an instant?

Thor Erikson struggled to think, and under the influence of the pain, his numb brain finally recalled some scenes from before he lost consciousness.

A massive, unclean scythe, a gigantic figure with moth-like wings, and the accompanying plague-like aura, eerie white mist, and a chilling, sinister atmosphere.

Without a doubt, the opponent was a powerful demon. Facing a hail of bullets, he simply flashed and covered dozens of meters. The scythe in his hand was simply swept left and right a few times, and the metal it touched was smoothly separated. The flesh was neatly cut off. Of course, many more people died from the invisible poisonous plague.

The armor, strong enough to withstand bullet gun fire, was smoothly ripped open, and Thor Erickson's cheek was only slightly grazed by the blade of the scythe. The attacker, as if confident, no longer paid him any attention.

And indeed, the poison seized Thor Erickson's consciousness in the blink of an eye.

The driver raised his hand and laboriously stretched his fingers toward his cheek, only to find that it was already festering and suppurating, with thick green tissue fluid oozing out continuously.

'I'm still alive?' the elite veteran thought to himself.

"You're still alive!" A cold, mechanical voice entered his ears from the crack.

After the sound disappeared, it was immediately followed by a high-energy laser and the 'buzzing' sound of power tools running.

A window was quickly opened in the cockpit, and a multi-functional robotic arm belonging to a tech priest reached in first, holding a high-energy laser cutter, which he aimed at the weakened pilot.

Then, a servo skull made from a female skull floated in and began to scan him in detail.

"It's truly astonishing, Sergeant Thor Erickson, that you survived the attack." The cyborg priest was genuinely surprised, his strange metallic voice trembling slightly.

"The Sages of Alttas are all just protected by the Emperor."

Thor Erikson watched as the other man stealthily but swiftly worked to remove him from the machine.

To ensure maneuverability and agility, Thor underwent corresponding neural modifications, becoming completely integrated with the "Hellhound" self-propelled mech.

The mech was already damaged; a horrific wound pierced through it, completely destroying its structure.

After the mechanical sage busied himself with the task, the stuck twisted armor was removed, the deformed support pillars were cut off, the cockpit was exposed, and Thor Erikson's spine was finally freed from a 'whip of thorns' covered in needles.

Before he could even speak, the other person hoisted him up and ran off at breakneck speed.

“Sage Ottos, why are you here? Shouldn’t you be guarding the armory?” Thor asked, enduring the jolting.

The servo skull glanced at him, scanned his facial expression, and gave the same answer on his behalf.

"There is no more armory, Sergeant Major Thor Erickson. The 'Olota' was destroyed 13 hours ago."

"The overload explosion of the plasma reactor completely destroyed 80% of the ship's main structure, turning the 'Olota' into a huge pile of space debris."

The mechanical priest used one of his mechanical arms to lift the head of the seriously wounded soldier so that he could see the horrific scene around him.

The once spacious corridor has been completely twisted and broken by the enormous force, the walls have been shaped into waves, and some have been compressed, resembling instant noodles.

Countless pipes resembled broken bones, with numerous sharp 'bone fragments' exposed to the air, constantly flashing sparks.

Even more deadly was the fact that the broken walls and ruins were crawling with twisted flesh and foul-smelling plants, and a pale green mist filled the few enclosed spaces inside the ship.

“Sage Ottos…”

"Sergeant Thor Erickson, shut up and conserve your strength. Your survival is of utmost importance," the mechanical sage coldly reprimanded.

"But why is that?" Thor Erikson was well aware of his own limitations. Although he was a rare "Hellhound" Sentinel mech pilot, he was not worthy of being treated with such caution as a mechanical priest.

"The person who attacked you, who destroyed the 'Hellhounds' and the positions, has been identified as the commander of the Plague Fleet, the Death Guard Primarch who has betrayed the cause, Mortarian."

"43% of the personnel on the entire position died directly from the virus carried by the enemy, and you, you actually survived his attack, and even got cut. This is undoubtedly a miracle."

"The Empire needs you to live, Sergeant."

Chapter 1081 Erikson's Adventures

When Sergeant Thor Erickson awoke again, he was lying on an operating table made from a worn-out armor plating.

The air was filled with the pungent smell of ozone, the greasy smell of promethium and lubricating oil, the burnt smell of insulation materials, and a faint... stench of slowly rotting flesh.

"You're awake?" The mechanical priest's electronic voice came from the side.

"Where are we now, Sage Ottos?" the sergeant grunted, asking with difficulty.

"The gap between the forward starboard observation deck and the adjacent primary navigation data room of the Imperial Navy's Luna-class cruiser 'Olota'."

"what?"

Thor Erikson stared in disbelief at the ceiling covered with a strange adhesive made of a mixture of insulation debris, condensed fire extinguishing foam residue, and dried coolant that had leaked from a broken pipe.

"This warship has been destroyed, sergeant. We are now barely clinging to life inside this deadly creation."

The flashing light from the laser welding device stung the sergeant's eyelids. Miraculously, only half of the huge reinforced glass observation window on the former observation deck was shattered. The broken part was roughly welded and sealed by the mechanical sage using alloy plates cut from the bulkhead and heavy doors removed from the spare airlock as repair materials. The weld seam created by the high-energy laser was ugly, like a centipede coiled on the smooth observation window. Although it was not beautiful, it could ensure at least a basic airtightness.

"By the Emperor!"

Through the half-viewing window, Thor Eriksson could see the slowly rotating stars in the universe, the distant starlight, and another part of the ship's wreckage floating not far away, with its jagged edges. Of course, there was also an endless light that seemed to be shining continuously in the far distance—that was the battlefield where fierce fighting was still taking place.

"Thank goodness, Sergeant Major." After finishing his reinforcement work, the mechanical priest started checking the life support system.

A dozen or so standard oxygen cylinders collected from various parts of the wreckage were connected in parallel by a section of pipe to a regulating valve that the mechanical sage had assembled himself and which was still hissing and leaking air, serving as the gas life support system for this space.

It is truly remarkable that such a place, barely clinging to life, exists amidst the ruins of this spaceship.

"You need to drink water to increase your chances of survival," the mechanical sage said, glancing at the patient who had just woken up from his coma. He then brought over a water container made from a modified helmet.

"I don't understand, Sage Alttas, am I really as important as you say?"

"It's more important than you think, Sergeant Major. Although I'm not an expert in the field of biology, your appearance has the potential to become a crucial factor for the Empire and for the Son of Guilliman to win this war."

The mechanical sage held up the helmet and handed it to the sergeant.

"Drink it. You and I must do our best to ensure your survival."

The water had a slightly fishy taste. The small water circulation device modified by the mechanical sage was not advanced, and the purification filter had not been replaced for a long time.

“How are we going to get out of here, Sage Ottos? After all, we’re already buried alive in this metal tomb.”

"This is my mission, Sergeant."

The sage staggered back to his workbench and continued his tireless work.

It's called a workbench, but it's really just a flat table.

The makeshift workbench, crudely welded together from three heavy alloy desks, had no machining aids whatsoever; even one of the legs had to be reinforced by welding a broken cannon barrel.

"The great Om Messiah has given me the knowledge of the truth, and this knowledge is the key to our salvation."

A ripped-out shipborne Thinker core lay on a makeshift workbench, with several differently colored energy batteries hastily bundled together with insulating tape, serving as the energy core of a beacon transmitter violently removed from a lifeboat's navigation system.

The Mechanical Sage connected its own connecting pipes in parallel with the Thinker Core's built-in circuitry to reprogram the logic engine, turning this haphazard device into a hand-operated signal transmitter.

The sergeant struggled to sit up, trying to get out of bed, but found that his lower body was as lifeless as a stiff armor plate, unresponsive to his commands.

"C, what's wrong with me?"

"The failure to follow the prescribed violent separation procedure has severely damaged your spine, causing complete disruption of your nervous system," the Mechanical Sage explained without turning his head.

Am I paralyzed?

"You are still alive, Sergeant Major. You can still think clearly. This is the most perfect blessing the Emperor and Om Messiah have bestowed upon you."

"The Emperor's shit!" the sergeant blurted out.

The mechanical sage had no time to listen to the old soldier's rambling. He skillfully finished programming the system, retracted the connection cable, and activated the original beacon system that had given him hope.

Countless cables were wrapped around the beacon core, like a heart grafted onto countless blood vessels, and began to beat weakly with the supply of energy.

The Thinker Array began to work, broadcasting the information that the Sage had prepared in advance throughout the cosmos.

"We succeeded?"

Success was certain, but the outcome was not as expected.

The signal transmitter's power was insufficient to propagate the signal far enough, after all, it was just a beacon device on a life pod.

The two could only hope that a passing imperial force would discover this faint signal and come to their rescue in time.

Of course, there is also the possibility that the forces of chaos might discover them in advance, in which case an even more desperate fate awaits the two.

"What should we do next, Sage Alttas?"

The mechanical priest extinguished all the light sources, leaving only an eternal lamp—made from an oxygen cylinder valve and a glass sight glass—burning with the last bit of holy oil, illuminating the shrine in a corner of the wall.

In this recessed area is enshrined a fragment of armor painted with a golden double-headed eagle and the remains of a chainsaw sword painted with a skull of a sacred gear of the Mechanicus.

"pray"

The wise man's words are concise and to the point.

The small space fell silent, with only the low, metallic groans of the ship's deformation under cooling and microgravity echoing in the background.

After an unknown amount of time, just as the ever-burning lamp was about to go out, a strange noise suddenly came from the passageway beside it.

Like the dense, rhythmic patter of raindrops hitting metal tiles, the sound gradually grew louder and filled the entire enclosed space.

The drowsy sergeant suddenly opened his eyes, only to find that the mechanical priest was already on high alert.

He grabbed the gear axe lying against the wall, and the mechanical arm on his back pulled a dirty, airtight suit from under the workbench and tossed it to the paralyzed veteran.

“My servo skull for surveillance has been destroyed. Put it on, Sergeant Thor Erickson. We need to move out immediately.”

Before the sage had finished speaking, a twisted, deformed object was pasted onto the observation window.

It resembles a fat caterpillar, but is formed from the twisted flesh and blood of countless corpses.

Hundreds and thousands of fingers and toes transformed into its tentacles, densely distributed on its abdomen, supporting its continuous crawling.

A disgusting Nurgle!

Chapter 1082 The Motor Oil Guy Bravely Charges Forward

run.

run.

Run as fast as you can.

It ran like a wild donkey.

The unstable humming and hissing of the gears spinning wildly due to the overpressure of the Sage Ottos's own servo system even reached the ears of the sergeant major who was carrying him on his back.

But the other party had no time to care about any of that at the moment.

He gripped a precision-engineered automatic gun tightly in his hand, frantically spitting fire at the enemy behind him.

Dozens of 'caterpillars' the size of a normal person were wriggling their hundreds of fingers, frantically approaching the two of them.

This is a Nurgle, a product of flesh and corpses being aggregating by the Plague, a common tactic used by the Plague Fleet.

They would spread this plague among all the defeated positions, fortresses, underground military bases, or starship wreckage, both to expand their own manpower and to make it more difficult for the enemy to retake and utilize these positions and resources.

All starships that have been defected to the Nurgle forces must be thoroughly eliminated, which is what makes them so difficult to deal with.

However, the number of these caterpillar-like beasts was not as large as expected, and their combat strength was not as powerful as recorded in the data.

They seem to have suffered some kind of invisible weakening.

However, these Nurgle beasts were enough to devour the two of them clean.

The veteran's marksmanship wasn't bad, but when the thick bullets hit the bodies of these disgusting monsters, it was like raindrops falling into a mud puddle, causing little more damage than splashing up a spray of blood and flesh.