but a quadruple chapter!
GOT YA GOOD!
________________
With the heavy hiss of a pressure valve opening, Archer stepped into an area thick with the scents of machine oil and burning incense. This was the deepest recess of the Perditia industrial core, and the private laboratory of his mentor, Tech-Priest Reditto.
Countless data cables hung from the ceiling like drooping vines, while servo-skulls zipped back and forth between the racks. Reditto was hunched over a massive holographic projection table, his mechanical mechadendrites rapidly manipulating delicate instruments.
Hearing footsteps, Reditto did not pause his work immediately. Only after completing a set of data calibrations did he slowly raise his head. His bionic eye flickered with a red lens glow as it turned toward the doorway. "My student, haven't you been quite busy lately? You personally took charge of the factory's three-shift schedule, so how do you suddenly have time to visit your teacher?"
Archer skipped the pleasantries. He walked up to the console and recounted the situation outside with a grim expression.
As Archer spoke, Reditto's movements gradually ground to a halt.
"An entire renegade Astartes Legion?" Reditto's voice carried a distinct electronic warble, sounding incredulous. "This is illogical. Perditia is merely a fringe industrial world. Even with its rapid development, it is hardly enough to draw attention of this magnitude. How did you manage to provoke them?"
"That is precisely what puzzles us," Archer said, looking Reditto directly in the eye. "Which is why we came to ask you."
"Ask me?" Reditto paused. The sensor lights on his head flickered violently, accompanied by a low mechanical hum. "I see... With the Great Enemy at the gates, did your Governor finally make up his mind to purge internal unstable factors to ensure absolute line stability?"
"You misunderstand," Archer said sincerely. "Regardless of why you hid your identity back then, I will always view you as my teacher. The Governor also believes you have made indelible contributions to Perditia's industrial construction. If we considered you an enemy, we would have acted long ago."
"True," Reditto said after a brief logical calculation. "If you wanted to kill or arrest me, you wouldn't have sent you. It would have been the Martyrs' Astartes or a fully armed squad of the Helldivers."
Yet this brought a new puzzle. The focus of Reditto's bionic eye zoomed in and out in confusion. "Then why inform me of this news specifically? If not for an execution, is it to let me run away?"
"If you wish to leave, we will express our regrets and provide a ship," Archer said. "However, I came today to ask an open and honest question. When the Governor saved you, you mentioned a 'holy relic' you were bound by oath to protect. What exactly is that relic?"
The laboratory fell into a dead silence, broken only by the faint hum of the life-support system.
Reditto remained silent for a long time, seemingly engaged in a fierce internal struggle. Finally, he let out a long sigh and shook his head. "...You suspect the Plague Fleet's arrival is because of that relic? You think Typhus is coming for it?"
Before Archer could answer, Reditto let out a harsh, screeching burst of electronic laughter. "Nonsense! Absolutely impossible!"
"Why are you so certain?" Archer pressed.
"Because that so-called holy relic is a complete STC data plate," Reditto blurted out, dropping a bombshell.
Archer was stunned, his pupils contracting sharply. "An STC?! A technological artifact from the Golden Age? Teacher, you actually have something like that? If it's an STC, then Typhus coming for it makes complete sense! It would be worth destroying multiple star systems just to obtain it!"
"Heh, you think that's a good thing?"
Reditto looked at his excited student, his voice growing chillingly dark. "Let me tell you, if the existence and function of this STC were leaked, I would have faced certain death back then, and the Adeptus Mechanicus would have branded me a heretic among heretics."
Archer froze. "What do you mean?"
"This STC... is cursed." Reditto manipulated a mechanical arm to retrieve an ancient data plate wrapped in layers of lead shielding from a hidden compartment in his chest, his eyes filled with dread and disgust. "It records the manufacturing process for something called the 'Panacea.' At first, I thought I had discovered a miracle, believing I could save countless lives and gain supreme glory. But after I loaded the resources into the template and began production..."
Reditto trembled as he spoke. "The STC's core algorithm involved Warp technology. The agent it produced was no life-saving cure, but a potent mutagenic toxin! Ingesting it causes severe, irreversible physical Warp mutations!"
"When I conducted secret live-subject testing back then, the moment the three subjects were injected, they screamed on the operating table and turned directly into twisted Chaos Spawns!"
Recalling that hellish scene, Reditto still felt lingering horror. "That thing isn't technology—it's a daemon's trap! Yet as a Tech-Priest, my thirst for knowledge and my dogmas prevented me from destroying an STC template. It is a gift from the Omnissiah, even if twisted. So I shelved it, swearing never to activate it again."
At this point, Reditto looked at Archer. "Do you think Typhus would mobilize an entire force and come all this way for an STC that produces nothing but mindless Chaos Spawns?"
Archer was speechless, clearly finding it implausible as well.
Reditto's red-glowing bionic eye took one last deep look at the lead-sealed data plate, as if staring at a nightmare that had haunted him for half a century.
Finally, the Tech-Priest extended his cold metal hand and solemnly pushed the data plate toward Archer. "Take it, my student. This thing is torture to me and sacrilege to the Mechanicus. But since the Governor has decided to face the Great Enemy, perhaps... No, it likely won't help at all and will only bring disaster."
Reditto's voice sounded exhausted. " The automated production line paired with this STC has not been dismantled. I sealed it on the fourth underground level of the Holy Trinity Manufactorum, inside the enclosed workshop marked as the 'Scrap Recycling Zone.' Inserting this data plate will instantly restart the line; it only requires basic organic matter and water for raw materials."
Archer took the heavy lead box, feeling as though he were holding a ticking time bomb. He nodded to his teacher without saying another word, then turned and walked briskly out of the lab.
---
The Governor's Palace, Strategic Command Room.
The air was thick with the bitter smell of tobacco and the scent of ozone emitted by the heavily loaded tactical holographic projectors. Robert stood before a massive star map, brow furrowed, simulating potential landing zones for the Plague Fleet.
The doors opened, and a dust-covered Archer walked in, gripping the lead box tightly.
"How is it?" Robert turned, his eyes instantly locking onto the item in Archer's hands. "What did Reditto say? What is that relic?"
Archer took a deep breath, placed the lead box on the tactical table, and said with a complex tone, "It's an STC Standard Template Construct."
"An STC?!"
Several nearby staff officers and players gasped. A flash of surprise glinted in Robert's eyes.
In this universe, an STC represented a priceless treasure, a giant leap in technology.
"Don't celebrate too soon," Archer offered a bitter smile, waving his hand to interrupt their imagination. "This thing is a total trap."
Archer then recounted Reditto's story word for word—from the so-called "Panacea" to the Warp mutagen it actually produced, the tragedy of the test subjects turning into Chaos Spawns, and why Reditto had kept it hidden all this time.
After hearing the account, a strange silence fell over the meeting room. The anticipation for a "god-tier artifact" vanished, replaced by a sense of absurdity.
"So," Archer summarized, "the reason Typhus is coming here remains a complete mystery. Aside from causing chaos and creating monsters, the output of this STC is utterly worthless. For the Death Guard, who possess countless Poxwalkers and Nurgle daemons, a drug that merely creates Chaos Spawns isn't even worth icing on the cake."
Archer looked at the lead box on the table. "Keeping this around is a hazard. To prevent it from falling into enemy hands, I suggest we destroy it completely right now."
Saying that, Archer reached for the lead box, intending to send it to the plasma incinerator.
"Wait."
A hand pressed down on Archer's wrist. Robert had walked over to the table at some point, his eyes fixed firmly on the lead box.
"No," Robert said, his fingers tapping rhythmically on the lead casing with a crisp sound. A dangerous spark lit up his eyes. "Don't destroy it. Archer, not only will you not destroy it, but you will also head to the Holy Trinity Manufactorum immediately and fire up that production line at full power."
Robert raised his hand and swiped through the air a few times, navigating a game forum interface visible only to players.
"Take a look at this," Robert said, tapping his finger to forward a post link to Archer via private message.
Archer opened his system panel in confusion. It was a post titled:
Dammit! This Nurgle corruption is disgusting!
Robert's voice sounded from the side, filled with the excitement of someone who had just discovered a new frontier.
"I was browsing the forum just now and happened to see this unlucky guy's complaint. He ran into Typhus's fleet in another sector and got hit by Plague Marines. He complained that bugs were frantically burrowing into his body, while boils and tentacles were sprouting externally, dropping his SAN value through the floor and making him feel terrible."
"But this proves one crucial point—" Robert turned around sharply, his eyes beaming. "Even after players are severely corrupted by Chaos energy, though their bodies mutate and their stat panels shift, they still retain their self-awareness! Our consciousness will not be swallowed by the Warp!"
Looking at the post, Archer seemed to realize something, his pupils dilating slightly. "You mean..."
"Since we are facing the Death Guard who dabble in plague and sorcery, conventional bolters and lasers might work, but their effectiveness will definitely be dampened by those meat-sacks packed with Warp energy," Robert clenched his fist. "So why don't we build a Helldiver Legion of Chaos-corrupted troops? Use magic to fight magic! Use mutation to combat mutation!"
"I was just wondering where to find a stable, efficient, and mass-producible method of corruption."
Robert pointed at the lead-sealed box on the table. "Isn't this the exact answer I was searching for? A stable, mass-produced corruption agent that requires only water and organic matter for unlimited supply! Regular people might turn into mindless Chaos Spawns, but we can master this power!"
Archer listened in utter shock. This was the plan of a madman. Yet upon closer thought, for the Fourth Apocalypse, it seemed to be the only viable "meta solution."
He lowered his head to look at the post again, but his brows knitted together. "However... this post has very low engagement. Look, zero replies, only around a hundred views, and it was posted a day ago."
"Yeah," Robert nodded, his tone casual. "I thought it was strange too. It's like a drop in the ocean that nobody noticed. But when I refreshed just now, it popped up right on my homepage. It instantly gave me massive inspiration, allowing me to draft the blueprint for a Chaos Strike Team."
Robert paused for a moment. "And the very next second after I came up with this idea, you pushed open the door and walked in holding the Panacea STC that perfectly executes my plan. Tell me, isn't that quite a coincidence? Just like in a video game.... Hahaha."
Archer let out a dry laugh along with him. "Indeed... way too coincidental. It's almost like it was scripted. Hahaha."
Their laughter echoed in the empty strategic command room for a moment, then cut off abruptly, as if snapped in two.
After a long silence, Archer swallowed hard and asked in a raspy voice, "...Do you really think this is just a coincidence?"
Robert replied, "Let's not look a gift horse in the mouth, so how about we treat it as one?"
----
Sub-level four of the Holy Trinity Manufactorum, inside an urgently reinforced, sealed testing chamber.
Behind the thick blast glass, a Helldiver sat upright on a ridiculously small metal stool.
He took a deep breath and flashed an "OK" gesture through the glass to the observation room outside.
Inside the observation room, Archer kept his eyes glued to the various readouts. Pressing his finger on the comm button, he said into the microphone in a heavy voice, "All set. Inject it."
Inside the testing chamber, the Helldiver hesitated for a single moment before decisively activating the carapace armor's built-in injection sequence. Accompanied by a faint hiss of pneumatic pressure, a high concentration of the "Panacea" was pumped directly into his bloodstream via his jugular vein.
Almost the instant the agent entered his blood vessels, the mutation began.
In under fifteen seconds, his human limb structure collapsed entirely. The carapace armor burst open, and his original human form twisted like a melting wax figure, transforming into a complete and total monster in the blink of an eye—
Its main body no longer possessed distinct arms or legs, but instead sprouted countless gray, slick tentacles. Far from smooth, these tentacles were densely covered with what seemed like a hundred million needle-point-sized pores, crazily snapping open and shut at a sickening frequency as if breathing. Deep within those pores grew innumerable fine red cilia, each tipped with tiny eyes and minute, razor-sharp teeth—
Just looking at this sight was enough to plunge a normal person's SAN value through the floor and send chills running down their spine.
"So Chaos Spawns aren't round after all?" In the observation room, an unknown player muttered under their breath as they stared at this indescribable blob, shattering the dead silence.
Archer ignored the comment. Although he felt physically revolted as well, he was far more concerned with the test results.
Pressing the comm button once more, he asked into the mic, "Are you okay? Can you hear me?"
The moment the voice echoed through the speaker inside the testing chamber, the monster acted as though it had been violently stimulated.
The previously quiet Chaos Spawn instantly flew into a frenzy. Countless tentacles thrashed madly through the air while its hundred million pores emitted a collective, piercing screech. Its massive body slammed hard into the blast glass, seemingly trying to break free from the sealed space.
"Prepare for combat!" The Helldiver Guard, having prepared for this scenario, immediately raised their lasguns and locked their muzzles onto the beast.
However, this indiscriminate, violent attack lasted only a brief moment before coming to a sudden halt.
The Chaos Spawn let out a silent, soul-piercing scream. Immediately afterward, its twisted frame began to vibrate at high speed, as if its internal structure could no longer hold together. The gray tentacles dissolved like melting ice, and its flesh quickly separated and disintegrated under the surge of Warp energy.
A few seconds later, the monster that had occupied most of the room vanished completely, leaving behind only a patch of eerie, frost-covered ground emitting cold vapor.
Shortly after, the Helldiver re-formed beside Archer.
The moment he revived, his legs went soft and he nearly collapsed to the floor, his face pale as paper. The two Helldiver nearby acted swiftly, stepping forward to grab his arms, hauling him up and supporting him into a chair.
Archer walked quickly out of the observation room to stand before him, asking with concern, "How is it? How do you feel?"
The Helldiver panted heavily, his eyes still somewhat unfocused, as if still immersed in the experience. After a long while, he took a deep breath and raised his head. Though his voice was weak, it carried a strange mix of excitement and calm: "It was... incredible. Seriously, words can hardly describe it. And I did real drugs."
He looked at his hands as if the sensation of the tentacles still lingered: "My senses and nerves suddenly became completely different. In that field of vision, the world was no longer physical—it was made of pure energy. It was so mind-blowing that I could control any of the pores on my body to breathe, and I could feel trillions of specks of light flickering around me..."
At this point, he looked up at Archer: "Most importantly, I still retained my own consciousness."
"If you kept your consciousness, why did you lose control earlier?" Archer pressed.
"That was an operational issue," the player laughed bitterly. "When I heard your voice, I tried to reply and control that new body. But the result was disastrous. That body was too complex, with thousands of 'limbs' needing simultaneous coordination. I had no idea how to do it. It was like a dead-drunk guy trying to fly a fighter jet—I meant to wave a hand, but ended up doing a full-body wild dance instead."
"In the end... I think I pushed too hard and played myself into disintegrating. That energy structure is extremely unstable; if you don't control it properly, it collapses on itself."
He paused, adding with lingering fear, "Thank goodness the system suppressed the pain. I didn't feel much pain through the whole process, just that my body became extremely light."
Finally, he offered a serious piece of advice: "I recommend keeping regular players away from this stuff. That sensory overload is too terrifying—it's like pouring an ocean into a teacup. Without sufficient mental fortitude, that terrifying perception might cause irreversible psychological damage, maybe even leaving real-world trauma."
Archer nodded thoughtfully. Staring into the player's eyes, he asked the crucial question that would decide their strategic direction: "Hypothetically—and I mean hypothetically—if you were trained and managed to barely control that body, keeping it stable so it doesn't self-disintegrate like just now, how far do you think you could go?"
"That would be tough, Commander Archer. The erosion of that energy is continuous, like clutching a red-hot branding iron. It doesn't just burn your hands; it constantly melts your flesh and bones," the Helldiver evaluated as he recalled the sensation.
"Extrapolating from that, even if I fully adapted to that control scheme, the dual limits on my mind and body would probably only hold out for a bit over an hour. Beyond that time, I'd dissolve into a pile of foul sludge from failing to contain the Warp energy, without the enemy even raising a finger."
He paused, the deep-seated fear in his eyes gradually fading, replaced by a longing for extreme combat stats.
"But that one hour... is more than enough. During that time, I felt like a biological meat grinder. Laws of physics were mere suggestions to me, not restraints. In an open area, I alone would be enough to slaughter over a thousand fully armed Imperial Guardsmen, or completely level a fortified heavy defense position."
Fearing that Archer might underestimate the sheer value of this combat unit and assume he was referring to the PDF cannon fodder, he raised his head again and added earnestly: "And Commander Archer, I don't mean ordinary Imperial Guard—I mean us, the Helldivers."
The air inside the observation room seemed to freeze for a second upon hearing those words.
A thousand players?
A single unit capable of taking on a thousand players in a duel was no longer something comparable to ordinary vehicles or heavy weaponry. It was practically a Warp Daemon Engine engineered solely for slaughter.
Archer reached out and slapped the player's shoulder heavily, the force making the man sway: "Get some rest. Write up a detailed report covering all your sensory experiences and operational difficulties, then post it in the encrypted section of the forum."
"You guys are going to become a vital force on the battlefield."
----
A colossal shadow blocked the starlight—a gift from Nurgle in the form of the terrifying warship Terminus Est. The Plague Fleet, resembling a pod of rotting whales, slowly drifted to a halt outside Perditia's turbid atmosphere.
Typhus stood before the viewing window on the bridge. Through the murky glass, the decayed face beneath his Terminator armor looked down upon the planet below. Gray and desolate, most of its surface was covered by barren wastes and badlands, with only a few scattered settlements clinging to the ground like a chronic illness.
"Not bad," Typhus said, letting out a sound like thick phlegm rolling in a trachea, nodding in satisfaction. "Harsh natural environments are the only true forge for unyielding warriors. The soil of this planet breathes a scent of death that I quite enjoy; the Grandfather will love this gift."
He turned, swung his scythe, and commanded, "Begin. Launch the first wave at the optimal landing zones identified by the auspex scans. No need for elites—drop the basic forces, the swarms of plague insects and revived corpses. Clear a path for the landing zone first."
The order was swiftly executed. Innumerable drop pods and landing craft packed with Nurgle organisms fell like rain, tearing through Perditia's hazy gray skies.
However, to Typhus's surprise, these forces encountered no resistance from the ground during their descent. No roaring anti-aircraft guns, no interceptor harassment; they descended so smoothly it felt like an unhindered exercise, dropping straight onto those flat, open strategic sites.
"Could it be they don't even know we've arrived?"
Typhus quickly dismissed the absurd thought. His gaze swept over the planet's surface toward its sole towering hive city, where a blue-glowing void shield had already risen. Clearly, the Helldivers were in a state of full combat readiness.
If they knew the enemy had arrived, why didn't they stop the landing?
Just as confusion began to brew in Typhus's mind, a brilliant white light—clearly visible even from space—suddenly erupted at the landing zones where the plague creatures were still merrily squirming about.
The blinding glare consumed everything in an instant, followed by mushroom clouds rising into the sky. Shockwaves swept across the land, flipping the newly landed Nurgle forces into the air alongside the very topsoil.
"...Are those nukes?" Typhus looked at the life sign readouts that had instantly dropped to zero on the display, a rare trace of astonishment in his voice. "They buried nukes in the ground?"
"I believe so, my Lord," a mutated crew member replied cautiously, staring at the radiation indices jumping frantically on the auspex. "And... I suspect those landing zones can no longer be considered optimal. The terrain has been completely altered; radioactive dust and high-temperature glassified ground have rendered them entirely uninhabitable... Should we switch to another?"
Typhus remained silent for two seconds before letting out a cold snort. "Switch to the second-best ones."
The Plague Fleet stirred once more as the second wave of landing forces was dispatched to the secondary strategic strongpoints.
They still met no anti-air fire, still touched down smoothly, and still established temporary corruption fields—
And just as smoothly, several tactical nukes detonated with pinpoint accuracy right beneath their feet.
BOOM—!
Another series of extreme light and heat reduced the advance vanguard attempting to spread the Grandfather's gospel to ash.
"?"
Looking at the mushroom clouds rising yet again, Typhus slowly registered a question mark in his mind.
Even for the widely experienced First Captain of the Death Guard, this tactic was a bit too advanced.
"Would a planet's will really allow its own children to inflict such damage upon itself?" he muttered to himself. Generally speaking, any defenders of a homeworld would do everything possible to avoid using such destructive weapons on home soil, let alone blowing their own home to smithereens just to deny an enemy landing.
It was as if a homeowner had demolished their own porch and foyer first just to keep a robber from entering through the front door.
"My Lord, what should we do next..." The crew member's voice trembled slightly. After all, this suicidal method of defense was genuinely unnerving.
"Continue. Switch to the third-best ones," Typhus's voice chilled, a dangerous glint flashing in his murky eyes as he dug his heels in against these Helldivers. "No need to ask me after this. If the third-best are nuked, move to the fourth-best, and so on down the line."
Typhus gripped the haft of his scythe, staring intently at the planet through the viewport. "Today, I want to see if these lunatics have buried nukes in every single inch of their homeworld's soil, and I want to see where the battlefield they've chosen for us actually is."
Clearly, Typhus had realized that the Helldivers were deliberately letting them descend, only to use these extreme means to physically obliterate the terrain, forcing the Death Guard to go to the sole landing site they had pre-selected.
It was an open trap inviting them right in.
Except...
Looking at the massive craters dotting the surface below, Typhus couldn't help but feel a sense of absurdity: Was this utter ruthlessness toward their own homeworld just routine for them?
---
As time passed, Perditia's surface seemed to undergo a grueling plastic surgery.
One massive mushroom cloud after another rose across the planet in succession, resembling toxic flowers blooming over the earth. In a mere half day, one-tenth of the planet's landmass—the plains, hills, and highlands best suited for deploying large-scale forces—had been turned to scorched earth in the flames of nuclear blasts.
This continued until the Plague Fleet's auspex locked onto a rugged canyon network north of the hive city.
The terrain here was broken and jagged with towering rocks. The narrow passes restricted heavy vehicles, making traversal extremely difficult even for infantry. To any commander, this was a nightmarish landing zone—the kind of place you wouldn't even consider unless you flipped the map upside down.
"Deploy," Typhus ordered mechanically with a wave of his hand. He didn't even turn to look at the screen, already counting down to the detonation time in his head.
Drop pods packed with Nurgle poxwalkers and plague insects roared downward, crashing into the rock-strewn canyon.
Three minutes, five minutes, ten minutes...
The expected white light did not appear, nor did a destructive shockwave sweep through the canyon. The low-tier Nurgle creatures crawled out of the drop pods, and aside from a few unlucky ones who broke their legs during impact, most gained a solid foothold on the terrible terrain and began spreading corruption.
Although the terrain was far from good—riddled with dead ends and sheer cliffs—it was at least better than the glassified land that still flowed with lava or the deep pits filled with lethal radioactive dust. At least they had a place to step.
Dead silence filled the bridge. Every mutated crew member held their breath, staring fixedly at the screen, as if unable to believe that those lunatics called the Helldivers had actually stopped.
"M-My Lord?"
A crew member cautiously stepped forward to report, breaking the suffocating silence. His voice made Typhus's mind—numbed by the continuous nuclear explosions—jolt sharply.
Typhus turned around, looking at the green icons representing surviving units on the screen, finally realizing one thing: the Helldivers hadn't detonated a nuke this time!
"They didn't attack... The landing zone can be considered established," the crew member swallowed hard, asking in a low voice, "Though the terrain is awful, we do have a foothold. My Lord, what are your orders?"
Typhus didn't answer immediately. He stared at the single gap on the holographic map—a mandatory path leading to the hive city, and a glaringly obvious corridor of death.
This wasn't a battlefield; it was an invitation card reading "Welcome," except it led straight to hell.
"Heh..."
After a moment of silence, Typhus let out an ambiguous, cold laugh. He knew it was a trap, but as the Herald of Nurgle and the First Captain of the Death Guard, he had no reason to back down—especially when he had no other choices left.
"Examine the ground thoroughly. I don't want my warriors vaporized by buried nukes the moment they land," Typhus instructed methodically, his voice regaining its usual icy authority. "Also, have the orbital fleet ready for interception. Though they've stopped for now, those lunatics could change their minds at any moment. Warm up all interception systems; I want to ensure not a single nuclear warhead lands on my main force."
He paused, his gaze piercing through the void as if locking eyes with the players waiting in full array on the surface.
"Once safety is confirmed, have the warriors of the First Company land first."
----
With heavy thuds and the screech of anti-grav engines shutting off, massive drop pods slammed open in the rock-strewn canyon.
Murky steam billowed forth, thick with the rot and stench unique to the Garden of Nurgle. Immediately following, heavy metallic boots crushed Perditia's hard rock beneath them. The plague vanguards of the Death Guard First Company, clad in massive, rust-pitted Terminator power armor, slowly stepped onto the chosen battlefield like phantoms emerging from an ancient nightmare.
The air here was dry and cold, a stark contrast to the humid, putrid environments they were used to.
A burly Death Guard halted, viscous fluid dripping from the bolter in his hands. Looking around through a scratch-covered visor, he asked in a deep rumble, "Confirmed no nukes?"
His caution was entirely justified. After watching their advance forces blown to kingdom come like fireworks wave after wave from orbit, anyone would harbor second thoughts.
The lead Death Guard didn't answer directly. He merely raised a swollen, mutated arm and gestured gently.
The dirt churned, and a giggling Nurgling drenched in pus with razor-sharp teeth burrowed out from underground. Like a playful monkey, it scrambled up the Death Guard's leg armor, finally perching on his rust-eaten pauldron and affectionately rubbing against the horned helmet.
"The little ones just checked beneath the soil again and again; this area is clean. No high-yield thermonuclear devices buried below."
The lead Death Guard patted the Nurgling's bald head, his voice raspy like two gravestones grinding together: "Besides, even if they try to strike with long-range missiles, the orbital fleet will do its duty. Lord Typhus is watching closely this time."
"Good." Another Death Guard nodded, the bronze bells hanging from his armor letting out a dull chime as he moved. "Same old strategy this time?"
"Of course," the leader replied, looking deeper into the canyon toward the players' defensive positions. "We are the shield of resilience and the spear of corruption. No need to rush the charge. First, invoke the Grandfather's blessings, use endless waves of plague poxwalkers to drain their ammunition and fill their trenches—let us offer these 'Helldivers' a little greeting first—"
Before his words could finish, a sharp whistling ripped through the atmosphere. The sound approached rapidly with an ear-splitting screech, instantly drowning out the Nurgling's giggles.
Several Death Guard raised their heads simultaneously, squinting up at the gray sky.
"Well," the leader said flatly, watching the black spots dragging long trails of flame as they plummeted. "It seems they're greeting us first, and quite loudly at that."
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The next second, heaven and earth shattered.
Dense heavy artillery shells blanketed the entire landing zone like a torrential downpour. Blazing detonations instantly engulfed the landing pods that had just touched down, while shockwaves carrying shrapnel and rock fragments whipped madly across every inch of ground.
For mortal armies, a bombardment of this magnitude would be utterly catastrophic. But for the Death Guard First Company—clad in Terminator armor and shielded by Nurgle—this physical damage felt rather toothless.
Shrapnel struck their thick ceramite plates with a series of metallic clangs, at most shearing off a few pieces of long-decayed flesh. They stood firm amid the trembling earth, without swaying even a fraction of an inch. As long as one wasn't unlucky enough to take a direct shell hit, the threat was minimal.
Still, it was a nuisance.
"Damn it!" The leader swatted away a piece of shrapnel flying toward his face. Looking at a small cluster of Nurglings and plague insects that had just gathered—now obliterated in the blast waves—he grunted in annoyance, "This is going to severely disrupt the formation of the zombie horde!"
The First Company's original tactic was to use Nurgle sorcery to raise the dead beneath the soil or splash plague concentrates to create a massive meat-shield. But this high-density artillery barrage, while unable to kill Space Marines, could blow fragile walking corpses into unsalvageable mush. Without a horde of corpses for cover, relying solely on elites like themselves to plug the frontline clearly violated the Death Guard's operational aesthetics.
However, as a veteran Astartes Legion, they naturally had countermeasures. The relevant data was immediately uploaded to orbit.
"This is Terminus Est. Enemy artillery battery coordinates confirmed."
Almost the moment the bombardment began, the belly hatches of the Plague Fleet anchored in low-Earth orbit swung wide open. Several squadrons of bombers and plague drones poured out like flies swarming from a corpse, diving toward Perditia's surface with a sickening hum.
Their target was clear: destroy the artillery emplacements still spitting tongues of fire.
---
The instant the plague aircraft broke through the cloud layer, blaring sirens echoed across the Helldiver airbase.
"Here they come! Boys, we've got work!"
Player pilots already idling on the runway eagerly pulled back on their control sticks.
Accompanied by the roar of engines, Thunderbolts—painted in all sorts of absurd patterns, some even featuring ridiculous memes—soared into the sky. Trailing white vapor behind them, they flew headlong into the green-glowing Warp aircraft without a moment's hesitation.
Above the clouds, hundreds of Thunderbolts formed an iron torrent, charging head-on into the diving Nurgle swarm. The engine roars were deafening, yet inside the players' internal comms, the mood was bizarrely relaxed—even spiked with a strange sense of euphoria.
A player executing a barrel roll asked in confusion over the channel, "Strange, my touch is on fire today. This plane controls so smoothly, like my hands grew wings."
"What a coincidence," another voice chimed in. "I feel like I could take on three of yesterday's me today. That high-G turn earlier? I used to stall eight times out of ten, but today it was smooth as butter."
"Is it an illusion? I feel like the flight performance got a huge boost, like there's wind pushing my tail."
"Me too! Engine output has been sitting steadily at peak. Since when was this junk Thunderbolt so durable?"
More and more pilots noticed the anomaly. It wasn't just a matter of feel—the entire aircraft seemed to have come alive, responding to every micro-adjustment from the pilot far beyond its designed limits.
Just then, an exclamation rang through the channel: "Holy crap, look at the status bar! We got a mega BUFF!"
Hearing this, the pilots pulled up the system interface usually reserved for quest prompts.
In the top right corner of their vision, lines of golden text flashed—an unprecedented global buff:
[Defend Perditia!]
Factory Output: +30
Accident Rate: -80%
Land, Sea, and Air Fuel Consumption: -80%
Land, Sea, and Air Tech Reliability: +80%
Reconnaissance Efficiency:+50%
Everyone froze for a second, then scrolled down to read the lengthy note beneath.
Once, this planet was severed from the Imperium by Warp storms—a fully isolated sector declared a lost cause. Genestealer bugs festered in the lower hives, Chaos dissidents spread illegal propaganda, and Ork hordes threatened total planetary collapse.
Zero stratagems available. Zero reinforcements inbound. Perditia was tagged as a terminal casualty, merely waiting out its timer for Exterminatus.
Then the Helldivers dropped straight into the meat grinder and delivered managed salvation.
It was YOU who executed surgical strikes on cultists. It was YOU who purged the foul Genestealer nests with heavy flamer fire. It was YOU who suppressed the Ork horde with high-yield democracy.
The citizens of Perditia were liberated! We have cleared the shadow, and for the first time, free men and women stepped out of fear into managed safety, government-issued nutrient paste, and an approved view of tomorrow's sun.
Now, a new bio-hazard threatens our way of life. Nurgle's Plague Fleet darkens the sky, dropping toxic spores onto key defensive sectors. Perditia faces total environmental contagion.
Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duty, for though the air is foul and the skies are dark, the spirit of humanity shall never be enslaved! Do the men and women of Perditia despair? Do they run from the fight?
NO!
The machine age gave us abundance, but machine spirits must be driven by human soul! Tech-Priests overcharge reactors not for cold metal, but for the liberty of our blood!
Patriotic assembly-line workers sacrifice their sleep shifts to manufacture extra bolt-rounds! Planetary Defense Forces hold the line at every choke point, vigilant against any threat to planetary security!
We shall fight on the hive spires, we shall fight in the lower sumps, we shall fight in the open wastes; we shall never surrender!
You, the people, have the power, the power to create stratagems, the power to create happiness, the power to make this life free and beautiful!
They give every drop of blood because victory is non-negotiable—and because they put their absolute faith in the Imperial Galaxy's elite: YOU!
THE HELLDIVERS!
Reading these words, a brief silence fell over the comms channel.
"Heh... this story flavor text almost brought a tear to my eye."
Inside the channel, a player sniffled, then yanked the flight stick up. His fighter traced a perfect arc through the air, autocannons roaring as they locked onto a decaying plague drone ahead.
"Brothers! You all see that? These NPCs put all their stakes on us!"
"Then what else is there to say?" another voice laughed wildly as his engine roars intensified. "Reliability up by eighty percent? If we still lose this, I'm deleting my account on the spot!"
"Defend Perditia!"
"Wipe out these toxic green flies!!"
Carrying the collective will buffed by the entire planet, the Helldiver air formation plunged like a razor-sharp blade deep into the bloated, rotting ranks of the Nurgle swarm.