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The cogitator arrays of Fortress Kraff ran day and night. Exhaust vents belched scorching waste gas into the underground command center until the air sat thick and unbreathable.
Cadian High Command. Ursarkar Creed stood before the massive hololithic tactical table, cigar ash drifting down onto the tal surface.
The new Castellan's orders were cold and brutally efficient. All standing regints had their rest periods canceled. Penal legions from the underhive, labor-gang conscripts, even half-grown children barely tall enough to et the asuring line — all of them were issued carapace armor and herded into the permanent fortifications. The armories were stripped to the walls, down to the last reserve bayonets gathering dust in the deepest storage. This was an all-or-nothing gamble with no retreat built in.
At the sa ti, the shrieking of the Astropathic choir echoed through the fortress's lowest levels. Dozens of psykers sent the distress signal and died for it — Warp backlash tore through them in an instant, blood pouring from every orifice, bodies hitting the floor before the echo faded. The signal clawed through the storm's interference and stumbled its way toward the outer sectors.
The replies were sparse. The Great Rift's formation had shredded stable warp routes. Translation at this point was a death lottery. The vast majority of Imperial fleets were trapped on the far side of the webway or the storm.
Only a handful of Astartes Chapters, throwing their lives into the turbulence, forced their way through. The Black Templars' cross insignia, the Space Wolves' grey-blue livery, the Dark Angels' battle-barges flickered past the wreckage of the starport. Too few. Against the flood about to break the dam, this force couldn't fill the bottomless gap at the front lines.
Phoenix Infantry Regint, 7th Company. Periter encampnt.
Mud flew. Kaelen was hurled through the air by a massive force and slamd hard into the trench's sandbag wall.
He turned his head and spat blood, both hands trembling at the webbing.
"That bayonet technique of yours is riddled with holes, my friend." The three-ter-plus "Ogryn" stood at the edge of the mud pit.
Horus tossed aside the severed wooden training rifle.
"When you're facing an enemy in power armor, aiming for the breastplate is suicide. The bayonet goes for the gorget edge or the flexible joints under the armpit. Half a beat slow on the thrust, and a chainsword will churn your intestines out."
Not far away, Kullen was using the flat of his blade to swat two recruits face-first into the mud. No restraint. No rcy. This was the full-strength infantry platoon assigned to Kaelen after his promotion to Captain, thirty Cadian youths barely past their coming of age. For 3 months, these two monsters in mutant disguise had drilled the platoon to a state worse than death.
No complaints. Every soldier understood what was coming. To survive the at grinder, you pushed your body past its limits or you didn't survive at all.
"Your turn, Kullen." Horus beckoned.
The standing feature.
Astartes versus Primarch.
Kullen entered the ring with an unpowered training iron sword. His opening was the most orthodox strike of the classical knight, blade path vicious, aid straight for the Wolf Shepherd's lower body.
Horus shifted his footing. His body slid half a step sideways in defiance of physics, two fingers of his right hand pinching the flat of the blade with precise calm. A flick of the wrist. Trendous counterforce shot through the old knight's forearm. The iron sword flew from his grip and slamd into the mud.
One move. Done. The Primarch's teaching thod was to shatter your defenses with absolute skill and strength, over and over, until your muscles morized the path death traveled.
After training ended, Kaelen tossed a rag to Kullen.
"He used maybe ten percent of his strength on . Against you, at least thirty." Kaelen's tone was dry.
Kullen wiped the mud from his helt's crevices and picked up his sword. "Because I can still stand."
Training was tornt. It was also the only breathing room they had.
Air raid sirens wailed 40 tis a day.
The anomalous readings from the deep-space detection arrays multiplied and kept multiplying.
Extre low pressure hung over all of Cadia. Everyone was waiting for the guillotine blade above their heads to drop.
---
Ti passed.
The final year of M41. 999.
Cadia's violet-red sky went utterly silent. The star's light was swallowed whole.
The Imperial world of Ustoth died in a single shot from the Chaos fleet's Planet Killer. In its wake, countless Chaos warships surged from the Eye of Terror into realspace.
The 13th Black Crusade had officially begun.
Dense flashes ignited along the deep-space defense orbitals.
The Imperial Navy arrayed itself in traditional line formation and moved to intercept the black shadow squeezing out of the Eye. The sheer scale of it tore apart every tactical projection's upper limit.
The Chaos armada poured forth in full force. Warband raiders, Blackstone Fortresses, Gloriana-class battleships left over from the Great Heresy. A carnival of malice assembled from every dark corner of the universe.
The Vengeful Spirit.
Ezekyle Abaddon's flagship hung at the heart of the fleet. From that bridge, he commanded his forces to strike at the vast majority of the Imperium's key worlds and naval assets across Segntum Obscurus.
The void war was brutal from the first second. Lance beams and macro-cannons wove a web of annihilation through the deep void. The Imperial defense line was scattered across a wide front in the very first exchange. Burning warship wreckage trailed tails thousands of kiloters long, erupting in violent explosions as they tumbled through the void.
One Chaos fleet broke through the orbital defenses of Solar Mariatus, an outer planet of the Cadian System. The orbital station disintegrated. Its main reactor took multiple macro-cannon rounds, and millions of tons of debris superheated by atmospheric friction beca blinding swarms of fire streaking toward the surface.
The Chaos forces turned it into a forward base for the assault on Cadia.
When the news reached the fortress world, Fortress Kraff and every trench line went deathly quiet.
Astra Militarum soldiers gripped their weapons and prayed in the Emperor's na. Officers raised their heads periodically to watch the void. No one spoke. Everyone waited for the war to arrive.
Every person understood. The path of retreat had been severed long ago. There was only the wall at their backs and the fight ahead.
Days later, the Chaos fleet ca to Cadia.
On a trench line.
Kaelen lowered his magnoculars.
Horus wore a dust-filtering mask. He stood on the high ground of the position, letting the freezing wind, laced with prothium exhaust, scrape across his face. His gaze pierced through the cloud layer and reached into the depths of the void.
He saw that ship. The forr Vengeful Spirit. He had once commanded grand strategies from that bridge, planting humanity's banner across the galaxy. He had also, from that sa place, beco the plaything of the Four Gods and plunged the Imperium into an abyss it could not climb out of.
Now his firstborn, Ezekyle Abaddon, stood in that very sa spot. Returning to settle every score, with the hubris of a man who had never lost.
Kullen stood behind the Primarch, hand on his sword hilt. The Chaos vanguard had already breached the low-orbit defense net. Drop pods blotted out the sky, a locust swarm descending on the surface.
Cadia's anti-air positions opened fire along the entire line. Tracer rounds from multi-barreled autocannons surged upward, pulling thousands of red lines across the sky.
Horus raised his eyes. Reason nailed every surging emotion to the bottom of his chest and held it there.
He watched the falling wreckage. He watched the death-net unfurl across the sky.
"War has begun."
The Wolf Shepherd spoke quietly. Low volu. But in Kaelen's ears and Kullen's, the words landed with perfect clarity.
"Lupercal — do you think Abaddon wins this one? Every crusade he's ever launched has ended in victory."
Even now, Kaelen still had the nerve to joke.
"No."
Horus said the word and looked at them both.
"Victory is only temporary. We have the power to end his streak."
"We will maul his forces on Cadia. We will defend the glory of the Emperor and the Imperium unto death."
➤ Next: Cadia Ground War (1)
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