The Creators: From Night City

Page 545

The wind swept across the vast land, tugging at the flags of the 8th Regiment of the Cardia, which fluttered in the wind.

The deafening roar of engines echoed across the entire human front. Accompanied by the roar and an earthquake-like tremor, a divine creation broke through the dust and arrived from behind the fortress, taking its place on the earth.

This is an Emperor-class Titan, the "Divine Judgment".

Standing at 155 meters tall, its massive size is so large it practically blots out the sky, its colossal form covered with Gothic churches and densely packed military fortresses.

The metal hummed incessantly as hundreds of thousands of slave laborers busied themselves within this divine creation, driving its operation.

It belongs to the Imperial Titan Legion "Iron Prophets," a divine creation that eternally guards Kadia.

After this Emperor-class Titan was deployed to the surface of the planet Cardia, there were no plans to relocate it. Its size and weight were so enormous that the Empire simply did not have the appropriate means of transport to lift it off the planet.

Its appearance and deployment signify that the ground battle in Qardia has entered its final decisive stage.

All positions and legions equipped with warp energy reading devices began to hiss wildly.

The battle formation of the Chaos faction suddenly became noisy.

A warp rift suddenly opened, and thanks to the combined efforts of the cultists and the dark mechanical priests, the warp rift was opened with exceptional precision.

Amidst the roar and tremors, a Warmaster-level demonic Titan, clearly corrupted by chaos and blessed by an evil god, strode out of the rift and into the battlefield.

Unlike the grand and orderly mechanical creations of the Imperial Titans, although the original Imperial-style skeleton of this Titan can still be seen, its overall appearance has long been distorted into something inhuman.

It is more like a 140-meter-high blasphemous monument, exuding the savagery and oppression unique to Khorne worship. Its skeletal structure has become abnormally thick and twisted due to warp corrosion. The armor plates are covered with brass spikes and barbs, like the wailing emotion of metal after its rage is activated. A large number of corpses and skulls are piled up in every corner of this Titan, making it look evil and eerie.

Its head has been distorted into the shape of a huge brass horned helmet. Its eyes, which were originally detection arrays, have become two deep, blood-red energy rifts. Its mouth has been transformed into an openable metal jawbone that spews out high-temperature steam. A cursed piece of obsidian is embedded in its forehead, sealing the souls of 999 imperial martyrs inside, who wail eternally.

The towering energy tower on its back was sculpted into a giant spine-like bone, with battle flags stitched together from living human skin and written in blood at the top.

A giant, 80-meter-long double-edged battle axe replaced the traditional weapon arm. The axe blade, forged from subspace metal, was perpetually flowing with scalding blood and molten slag. The axe itself was a twisted brass altar, on which several living psykers were chained, serving as "living sights" to guide the weapon's direction.

Countless chains hung from the joints of this blasphemous creation, their ends bearing skulls, fragments of broken armor, and the still-struggling bodies of prisoners.

As it moves, the "skull furnace" that supplies power emits a low, continuous, heart-pounding roar, accompanied by endless shrieks of the souls around it, constantly assaulting the minds of the creatures around it.

The standoff between the two sides plunged the entire battlefield into an unusual silence.

Chapter 1106 A Frenzied Melee

The battle itself was nothing new.

It's nothing more than you killing me, me killing you, and trying every possible way to persuade the other side to accept your point of view.

Abaddon prepared more than one Titan for this negotiation. In addition to a 'warlord-class' Titan corrupted by Khorne, there were 4 raider-class demonic Titans, 12 warhound-class demonic Titans, 6 knight tyrants led by several rebellious knight families, and 15 small and medium-sized knights.

At the start of the battle, they formed a wedge-shaped assault formation, with the "Blood Promise" in the center as the spearhead, and launched a general offensive.

Large numbers of Chaos Astartes, demon cultists, imps, and demon engines poured out from the positions or summoning rifts.

The once desolate plain was instantly filled with heads.

As the ultimate war unit in the ground dimension, Titans do not usually rely on close combat as their primary means of warfare. Each Titan is essentially a super-heavy firepower platform, equipped with a massive array of weapons, advancing under the cover of the Void Shield and bombarding the enemy.

However, this does not mean that Titans are bad at close combat. In many cases, due to the existence of the Void Shield, the way to eliminate an opponent's Titan is often through close-quarters combat.

The Blood Promise's volcanic cannons fired their first salvo, targeting the Emperor-class Titan, the Divine Judgment.

The massive shell was intercepted by the Void Shield when it was 800 meters away from the target, but the shock wave emanating from the Void Shield still shattered a nearby bunker in an instant.

The counterattack was carried out simultaneously. The "World Destroyer" volcano cannon of the "Holy Judgment" was also blocked by the void shield mounted on the enemy, and it only burst into a dazzling fire in vain.

The two enormous creatures moved in unison, launching a desperate charge and assault.

Relying on the Blackrock Fortress barrier for defense is impossible. Without the Void Shield, the earthen bunkers are no better than tofu under the attack of the Titan's weapons.

The Imperial Titans deployed their classic circular defensive formation, with two Warmaster-class Titans and more than a dozen Marauder-class Titans and Warhound-class Titans landing on the battlefield, either by airdropping from orbit or by launching attacks from behind cover.

The three knight families, "Cardian Iron Guard," "Fist of Mars," and "Eaglefire," also followed in the Titans' footsteps and launched a full-scale attack.

Three Cadiz armored divisions and approximately 600 Leman Rustanks patrolled the Titan's turf, conducting combined arms operations.

Dozens of various aircraft took off simultaneously, some carrying bombing power and others carrying air-to-air weapons, to cover the advance of the main force.

Nearly 100,000 Astral Army soldiers were like ants, and several Astartes companies were scattered out, filling every inch of this vast plain.

Without any warning, the war escalated to a fever pitch in an instant.

A Raider-class demonic Titan, blessed by Tzeentch, raised its Prism Scepter and launched a psionic attack.

A fan-shaped beam of light burst forth from the suspended crystal sphere at the top of the scepter, weaving into a massive time-stopping field that enveloped the three Warhound-class Titans on the left flank of the Imperial battlefront, freezing them into several live targets.

The six Chaos Knight Tyrants forming the "Battle Ram" took advantage of this opportunity to charge straight towards the Imperial left flank under the cover of fire from the Demon Titans, attempting to close in on the Titans during a lull in enemy fire.

However, the Imperial Psionic Choir, located inside Blackrock Fortress, simultaneously initiated a counter-ritual, mobilizing the golden starlight to dispel the time-slowing field and defuse the crisis in time.

Strictly speaking, Knight mechs cannot be considered Titans. They are more like traditional mechs or Gundams. The smaller Knight mechs are generally not equipped with heavy firepower. Instead, they rely on their agility to move around the battlefield and wait for an opportunity to perform close-range explosions on Titans, destroying the leg structure of these tall and heavy war behemoths and causing them to become stranded.

A Titan that loses its mobility will instantly become much less threatening. Without mobility, even the strongest Titan is no different from a military fortress.

Of course, the Titan Combat Manual also places great emphasis on defending against these 'Kamikaze Special Forces' attacks, and the most classic and effective countermeasure is to deploy Knight Mechs of the same level for equal interception.

The commander of the "Eaglefire" family was prepared for this, and immediately led five knight swordsmen to charge forward and meet the enemy when the enemy knight mechs charged out of the battle formation.

Meanwhile, several Knight Rangers from the "Cardian Iron Guard" family took the opportunity to harass the enemy from the side with relatively weak firepower.

Two teams of knight mechs, each about 10 meters tall, spewed out surging streams of plasma and collided with a deafening roar.

There was no back-and-forth, dozens-round battle; it was just a brief exchange, yet nearly half of both sides were killed or wounded.

None of the knights selected as mecha pilots are mediocre, making it difficult for the two sides to create a significant gap in combat strength.

This brutal exchange ratio is just a microcosm of the cruelty of this war.

After a few exchanges, the two teams of knight mechs were almost wiped out.

After each of the two clan leaders, piloting their relatively powerful knight commander-level mechs, eliminated the enemies before them, they tacitly adjusted their positions and launched an attack on each other.

Like two ancient knights charging at full speed on horseback, each using armor in inconsequential locations to withstand the other's long-range fire, and then, in the instant of close combat, striking each other's reactor and cockpit with their power swords and blood axes.

Without any suspense, both pilots were killed simultaneously, and the reactors then exploded, turning both mechs into fireballs hundreds of meters high.

The Imperial soldiers advancing around them were inevitably wiped out by the shockwave, but no one chose to retreat. Even though they were just ordinary people, the soldiers of the Cardia Legion still used sacrifice and courage to firmly pin themselves in their various bunkers, steadily advancing and eliminating any enemy they could see with their guns.

The crisscrossing artillery fire from both sides practically illuminated the battlefield as bright as day. The Titans spared no effort in unleashing their missile arrays, bombarding the enemy positions with sniping attacks to inflict as much damage as possible on each other's basic ground units.

In this kind of battlefield, the Astartes were nothing more than high-level infantrymen who were faster, stronger, and more accurate with their guns.

Their role is extremely limited, but when faced with a barrage of bombs and bullets, their chances of survival are not much different from those of ordinary Astragalus soldiers.

However, the Astartes will still join the battle, scattered throughout the battlefield.

Their main role is to form the spearhead of the assault team and then try their best to lead their own troops to break through the enemy's infantry lines or carry out special operations such as decapitation strikes.

At this moment on the battlefield, if we only consider the number of Titans and the level of heavy firepower, the Empire undoubtedly has the advantage in the battle. However, since Abaddon dared to plan this decisive battle, he must have his reasons.

In the heart of Chaos, thousands of prisoners were brutally tortured and then executed en masse. Their wailing souls were then extracted into the skulls of Chaos wizards and used in a bloody ritual to create a skull altar, which was then used to summon the Great Demon Khorne as reinforcements.

Amidst the frenzied chanting and the pervasive aura of blood, a crimson subspace rift suddenly split open in the sky above the center of the battlefield.

A terrifying monster, half again as tall as the knight's mech, leaped out from within. As it landed, it flapped its blood-red wings and used its giant axe to sever the massive chainsaw sword arm that a Warhound-class Titan used for parrying. Then, amidst a barrage of attacks, it took to the air and descended upon the Imperial forces, where it began a bloodbath, unleashing a storm of carnage.

This Khorne was the Chaos' reinforcement in this war, the Bloodthirsty Kabanhar.

Chapter 1107 The Quagmire of War Devours Everything

The combat power of the Great Demons, especially the Great Demon Khorne, is no joke; their dominance on the battlefield is not just empty talk.

Kabanha, the first demon, drew the attention of most of the knight mechs and suppressed these steel creations.

Then, during the continued blood sacrifice ritual, another spatial rift was torn open, and yet another Khorne's great demon was summoned.

Or rather, the great demon that once belonged to Khorne.

Skabrand, the "Exile" and "Wrathful Reaper," was a great demon who had been eternally exiled by Khorne and had long since transformed into a monster who only knew how to kill in a frenzy.

Its body was devoid of thought and emotion, containing only endless rage and a thirst for slaughter.

It is controlled only by anger and the desire to kill.

Of course, Abaddon never intended to control it. He merely provided a channel to deploy this killing machine onto the appropriate battlefield at the right moment, allowing it to indiscriminately slaughter all living beings and create trouble for the enemy.

Skabrand's tattered wings were studded with iron chains, exposing the white bone fragments. The wounds inflicted on his body during Khorne's exile would never heal, bringing him eternal bloodshed and suffering.

However, this banished demon didn't care about the pain; all it wanted and wanted to do was slaughter.

Massacres that indiscriminately kill friend or foe, good or bad, and of all kinds.

One of the Chaos Knight mechs got too close and was cleaved into pieces by the demon's blood axe without hesitation. With its roar, a blood-red tornado was rapidly forming and sweeping toward the Imperial positions.

The dual obstacles of demons and machines severely hampered the Empire's offensive strategy of using offense as a form of defense.

However, these minor changes could not prevent the two colossal Titans from colliding in full view of everyone.

Their hand-to-hand combat captivated the hearts of every fighter.

At a distance of 1000 meters, both sides simultaneously launched all the missiles in their missile bays, ignoring the thick smoke from the rocket contrails that obscured the sky.

The dense explosions outlined the general shape of the Void Shield used by the Titan, but did not cause any effective damage.

The pilots on both sides did not expect these missiles to establish any advantage; they merely used them as a means of deterrence before the actual attack.

At a distance of about 500 meters, the plasma cannon on the left arm of the "Holy Judgment" unleashed a close-range salvo, penetrating the minimum effective range of the Void Shield, burning through the chest armor of the "Blood Promise", and exposing the screaming demonic engine core inside.

This war behemoth, already saturated with the power of Khorne, felt no pain and was only focused on killing the enemy before it.

200 m.

This distance is now within the range of close-quarters combat between the two Titans.

Both sides launched deadly close-quarters attacks simultaneously, with the eerie blood axe of the "Blood Promise" colliding fiercely with the "Divine Judgment's" "Heavenly Hammer" powered fist.

The clash between these two super weapons was like a collision between Mars and Earth.

The shockwave from the weapon collision spread for hundreds of meters, obliterating any buildings, people, or vehicles that might exist on the ground.

The two war creations, like towering giants, continued their unstoppable advance until their bodies were completely pressed together.

The Chaos Titan's Blood Axe was directly embedded in the volcanic cannon barrel of the "Holy Judgment," rendering this weapon equally powerful whether at long range or close range.

Meanwhile, the "Holy Judgment" used its waist-mounted laser array to continuously fire at the opponent's vitals at close range.

The brass armor gradually softened and deformed under high temperatures, but its owner inflicted even greater damage during this period.

Its massive weight brought with it an overwhelming force, turning fists, elbows, heads, and shoulders into the most lethal weapons, smashing the heavy "Holy Judgment" until its armor plates flew everywhere.

The power of Khorne endows this Warmaster-level demonized Titan with formidable offensive and defensive capabilities, and grants it a flexibility that surpasses that of mechanical creations.

It's no exaggeration to say that the "Holy Judgment" was almost stunned by the attack. Its massive metal hull was quickly damaged, and alarms instantly filled the entire command and control room.

At this moment, the complex psychological struggle and the massive and tedious calculations of possibilities by the pilot were unknown to others. A very short time later, all the Titan operators received the order from the pilot Theseus to activate the plasma engine and overload it.

Faced with the fierce offensive, the "Holy Judgment" launched a final, somewhat clumsy, counterattack.

It spread its arms and tightly gripped the other's body.

Without hesitation, all the mechanical priests responsible for maintaining and operating the equipment within the massive machine, driven by their loyalty to Om Messiah and their hatred for the enemies of humanity, unhesitatingly overloaded the plasma reactor that they had meticulously maintained in the past.

Soon, the massive plasma flow, freed from its constraints, instantly transformed the "Divine Judgment" into a temporary stellar core.

A blinding white light shone across the battlefield, and the temperature at the center of the light instantly soared to the level equivalent to that of the sun's core.

Countless demons and human soldiers were reduced to ashes in the light, mercilessly wiped out. The earth softened and collapsed, the air boiled and distorted, and the light was so intense that it briefly blinded all observers on the battlefield.

The blinding white light lasted for 17 seconds before gradually dissipating.

The two Titans had completely merged into one under this offensive, each containing the other.

All the weapons, armor, mechanical structures, and personnel had been melted by the high temperature, and most of their mass had been vaporized. What remained was cast into a deformed metal monument, which was transformed into a towering metal monument forged from the blurred shapes of two Titan corpses.

At the foot of the towering, twisted monument lies a vitrified crater 800 meters in diameter, where the violent plasma flow has transformed all matter into crystal-clear glass.

However, such a painful exchange was not the end of the battle, but rather the clarion call for the intensification of the fighting.

There was no mercy, no retreat; the Empire's Titans, Knights, Astartes, all kinds of vehicles, and Astral Army had fought to the point of madness.

While the Black Fleet had a large number of demons as cannon fodder and a large number of scattered Chaos Chapters as auxiliary forces, Abaddon's 'loyal' Sons of Horus were still being consumed at a rate that was suffocatingly painful to him.

Not to mention, the losses from the fierce battle on the tracks far exceeded those from the war in front of him.

Robert Guilliman's offensive is not something just anyone can withstand.

Even with two Blackrock fortresses as a stabilizing force and the Black Fleet's ships far outnumbering their opponents, Robert Guilliman's relentless offensive still overwhelmed Abaddon.