When the Lamenters arrived in the Aberrus System, it had been almost entirely devoured by Hive Fleet Kraken.
Saint Vaux's Hope, a Forge World guarded by the Iron Lords themselves, had already fallen completely.
The death worlds of Luann, a jungle world, and Glacemaw, an ice world, were currently being consumed by millions of Tyranid organisms. Because both planets possessed meager populations, the invading swarms were comparatively limited. Yet even so, the Catachan Jungle Fighters and Valhallan Ice Warriors, alongside the remnants of the local Planetary Defence Forces, were locked in a brutal war of attrition across the changing terrain.
The four Space Marine Chapters advanced with clear, undivided objectives. The Iron Lords and the Lamenters deployed to secure the jungle world of Luann, while the Knights of the Raven and the Scythes of the Emperor hastened toward the frozen wastes of Glacemaw.
On Luann, within the Hinnoq Delta, the 81st and 935th Luann PDF regiments crumbled under the sheer crushing weight of the Tyranid tide. The world's primary planetary bastion, Fort Permaberg, had been breached by the swarm, leaving the Tyranids to rampage unchecked across the sub-arctic tundra.
The Catachan Jungle Fighters, the Battle Sisters of the Order of the Crimson Chalice, and the Knightly Houses of Curtana and Borgius were holding on with fanatical desperation, defending several millennia-old clover-woods. Should this foliage be eradicated, the planetary capital would fall to the Tyranids within three days.
Meanwhile, on Glacemaw, the 103rd Vostroyan Firstborn Regiment, the 21st, 34th, and 76th Glacemaw PDF, and several detachments of Valhallan Ice Warriors fought a grueling, agonizing campaign against the Tyranid bio-monsters.
The arrival of the Adeptus Astartes provided desperate salvation, sending a massive surge of morale through the Imperial lines.
On Luann, the Lamenters swiftly recaptured four watchtowers that were being besieged by Tyranid organisms, structures originally built to fend off Luann's native mega-carnivores. Concurrently, the redeployed Iron Lords focused their attention on the local Hurac Mountains, searching for the optimal coordinates and timing to trigger a massive landslide to relieve the frontal pressure on the Imperial lines.
On Glacemaw, the vanguard and armored elements of the Knights of the Raven and the Scythes of the Emperor tore across the vast, frozen tundra, fighting fiercely while hunting for Tyranid synapse creatures.
Yet just as the Imperial forces attempted to rally their strength, an even worse nightmare materialized.
A transmission from a deep-space watch-station shattered any burgeoning hope: a second splinter tendril of Hive Fleet Kraken was about to arrive. The volume of Tyranid bio-forms it carried was estimated to be at least double the current vanguard.
Ordo Xenos Inquisitor Shalisha Talaris dispatched a near-hopeless distress signal to the nearest Deathwatch Watch-Fortress.
Meanwhile, the four Chapters were entirely consumed by the slaughter unfolding right before their eyes.
None of them knew that Axion, leading his fleet aboard the Heart of the Forge, had already altered course directly toward the Galactic Rim.
Though this maneuver meant his Imperial allies would have to endure far greater pressure, Axion's calculations indicated that outflanking the enemy and severing their rear would yield vastly superior strategic results.
After all, the Iron Man's objective was not merely to break the swarm. Perhaps he could offer some compensation to the humans afterward for utilizing them as bait, but for now, he required more time. Axion could not risk the Tyranids detecting his presence prematurely and fleeing the star system.
Time bled away, second by agonizing second.
Compared to the frozen wastes of Glacemaw, the conflict on Luann was the first to swing in the Imperium's favor.
On the terrestrial battlefield, the strategy of the Iron Lords bore fruit. A colossal landslide successfully engulfed hundreds of thousands of Tyranid organisms, the cascading boulders crushing vast waves of lesser bio-gants to pulp. Even a massive Swarmlord sustained severe trauma under the impact of the falling stone.
Shaken by this sudden, devastating blow, the Tyranid forces enacted a retreat for the very first time.
The battlefield was a scene of apocalyptic ruin. The twisted carcasses of xenos bio-forms and fractured shale piled into sickening mounds, venting an intolerable stench into the air. Their thick, ichorous green blood pooled in the craters, hissing with unnatural, roiling bubbles. Wherever the vitae touched the rock, eerie white smoke billowed as the stone dissolved under the extreme corrosion.
This sight prompted the mortal auxiliary forces to raise their voices in a collective cheer.
"For the Emperor! Victory is ours!"
Throughout the grueling campaign, they had seen no glimmer of hope; this was the first time they had broken the disgusting xenos swarm. Though their bodies were broken by exhaustion, they could not conceal their euphoria, it was the radiant light of survival.
However, the Lamenters and Iron Lords who received the strategic vox-feeds shared none of their joy.
The Battle Sisters, whose faces had just begun to soften with rare smiles, froze instantly as the Astartes shared the updated data feeds across the tactical network. The current swarm was already pushing them to their absolute limits.
And now, there were more on the way?
Yet they had no alternative. The Aberrus System could not be abandoned; if it fell, the entire surrounding star cluster would quickly be devoured by the Tyranids.
The Iron Lords were the first to board their Thunderhawks to return to the planetary capital. They had to utilize every available second to fortify the bastions and weapon emplacements, preparing for the far more savage slaughter to come.
The mortal regiments, who had anticipated orders to pursue the retreating xenos, instead received a directive for an immediate, fighting retreat back to the hive cities. If they remained exposed in the wilderness when the second wave of Kraken struck, they would inevitably be consumed.
However, just as the Lamenters and the Sisterhood began their forced march with the mortal auxiliaries, the Knight suits that had returned to the staging grounds before the outer curtain walls, along with the Hydra flak tanks and heavy macro-cannons atop the ramparts, opened fire simultaneously.
A tempest of flak and ordnance erupted across the sky.
Through the auto-senses of their helmet visors, the Lamenters clearly discerned the incoming threats descending from the upper atmosphere.
"By the blood of Sanguinius... how can the xenos be so fast?!"
A catastrophic deluge of mycetic spores filled the firmament, plunging toward the earth like a dense, apocalyptic meteor shower.
A virtually identical nightmare was unfolding across the ice world of Glacemaw.
The second splinter tendril of Hive Fleet Kraken had made landfall.
Massive bio-fleets were hurled directly into the system by the hive tendril. The Imperial Navy warships and Astartes battle barges were driven from low orbit almost immediately by the sheer mass of the bio-vessels. Faced with such overwhelming numbers, they were forced to break orbit and open the distance, relying on long-range bombardment profiles just to maintain a fighting chance.
Stripped of orbital fire support, both worlds faced a simultaneous, saturation-level planetary insertion.
This vision of the end of days caused the morale of the PDF regiments to collapse into hysteria. Yet every soul understood that violence was the only currency that could buy their survival. Against the forces of Chaos, one might turn traitor or offer false worship to survive; the Tyranids accepted no surrender. Every living thing would be slaughtered, cast into the reclamation pools, and drawn up into the bio-ships via the capillary towers.
Roaring oaths of fury, the Lamenters drove the faltering PDF troops forward, forcing them to accelerate their retreat into the hive cities while shifting their own defensive lines to shield the retreating mortals.
The Iron Lords, conversely, urged the Lamenters to abandon the liabilities. In the cold calculus of war, the martial output of a single Adeptus Astartes outweighed a hundred planetary troopers. At this juncture, they needed to conserve their elite strength to prolong the planet's death throes.
As for the Catachan Jungle Fighters, they harbored no intention of retreating into the hive fortifications. They turned on their heels and slipped back into the remaining pockets of dense clover-woods; that was their arena. Standing in open trenches trading fire with xenos was not their doctrine.
If death was inevitable, they would sell their lives at the absolute highest cost. There were no cowards among the Catachans, and they did not fear the dark.
On the other side of the system, upon the freezing plains of Glacemaw, the local PDF was ordered to act as the rearguard for the hive withdrawal.
Under the tactical directives of the Knights of the Raven, the Valhallan Ice Warriors and the Vostroyan Firstborn entered the hive city trenches first, preparing for a harrowing siege. Meanwhile, the Knights of the Raven prepared to execute fluid guerrilla strikes, leaving the grueling defense of the primary trenches entirely to the Scythes of the Emperor.