Inside the command sanctum of the Vigilance Fortress, Emrys' breath hitched as he stared at the colossal star-map projection.
The icons symbolizing the Imperium of Man and the Chaos armada were no longer distinct lines; they were a chaotic, bleeding blur of blue and red, like an overturned palette of war.
High above, the Imperial Navy's macro-cannons roared, their shells tearing through the thin atmosphere of Vigilus' companion world. Even from the continent's surface, the sky was a lattice of searing light—lance beams with the power to sink tectonic plates raining down upon the heretic fleet.
But the Black Legion was no easy prey. In the cold mathematics of the void, macro-cannons were as cumbersome as they were powerful. Their reload cycles were agonizingly slow, requiring thousands of press-ganged ratings to haul shells the size of buildings into the breeches.
Worse, the shifting currents of the Warp made it nearly impossible for the ships' cogitator-arrays to maintain a stable target lock, while the enemy's ancient void shields swallowed kinetic impacts with mocking ease.
This was the grim reality of space warfare: a brutal stalemate that could only be broken by the savage "boarding action." Thousands of lives were spent in a single teleportation flare, aiming for the decapitating strike that would silence a flagship's bridge or cripple its plasma reactors.
This was not a skirmish. This was a campaign that would carve the future of the Nachmund Gauntlet into the annals of history. Billions were fighting; millions were already dead.
The Imperial fleet, a mix of cruisers and Space Marine strike vessels, held a crescent formation, using the gravity well of the companion world like a curved scythe. In opposition, Abaddon's vanguard acted as a jagged arrow, thrusting directly at the heart of the Victorious Laurel—the flagship where Marneus Calgar waited.
Despite the carnage, Calgar remained as steady as a mountain of stone. He sat in his command throne, his Gauntlets of Ultramar resting on the armrests, his voice calm as he addressed Emrys through the vox-link.
"Boy. Give me your assessment of the field."
"Abaddon's target is you, Lord Calgar," Emrys answered honestly, though he wondered why the Regent was seeking his opinion in the heat of a system-wide slaughter.
"A surface-level observation," Calgar replied, a hint of dissatisfaction in his tone. "Abaddon's appetite is not so small. He doesn't just want my head; he wants to break the back of the Imperial Navy in this sector."
Calgar's armored finger traced a point on the star-map. "Look here. This flanking element."
Emrys peered at the shadowed corner of the display. His pupils contracted. "A hidden reservoir of ships... he's holding back a secondary spearhead."
"Exactly," Calgar sneered. "Once his main line draws our center into a brawl, that flanking armada will surge forward, severing our right wing and encircling the fleet. In this universe, the true masters of fire are not the Astartes or the Titan Legions—it is the Imperial Navy. If the Navy dies here, the ground war on Vigilus is lost. Chaos will have the absolute initiative to bombard us into oblivion."
Calgar looked at the shattering Imperial front line. "Abaddon intends to end the war for Vigilus today. He is as committed to this gamble as we are."
"Lord Calgar," Emrys said, his voice tight with anxiety as he saw a blue icon representing a cruiser flicker and vanish. "The trap is set. They are within the singularity's kill-zone. Should we trigger the Void Claw?"
"No. Wait."
Calgar was expressionless. To him, the thousands of souls perishing every second were not lives, but variables in a cold equation. "It is not enough. We have paid a staggering price in blood. We will not waste it on a partial victory."
Emrys gripped the edge of the console. He had proposed the plan, but he had never imagined the sheer cruelty of its execution. Every second of delay meant tens of thousands of lives vanishing into the void.
"I understand, Lord Calgar," Emrys whispered. This was his true education—a practical lesson in the horrific cost of command, orchestrated by the Lord of Macragge himself.
"You are brilliant, Emrys, but you are still young. Still naive," Calgar said, his voice sounding suddenly weary. Through the vox, the desperate final prayers of dying captains crackled in the background.
"Sacrifice is the cornerstone of the Imperium. It is not a hollow phrase; it is a peace forged in the blood of billions. Every victory has a price, and the Emperor's currency is human life. My only value is in spending that currency wisely."
"Lord Calgar, I don't understand—" Theodore, the Chapter Master's most trusted Honor Guard adjutant, finally broke his silence. "Why put such stock in this Rogue Trader? Even for a scion of a Merchant Dynasty, this risk is... excessive. To put yourself and the fleet at such peril for his plan?"
Calgar was silent for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse.
"I do not place my trust in the boy alone, Theodore. I place it in the man who came before him. The Lord Solar Macharius himself believed in what that child represents."
Theodore stiffened. The name of the Solar General, who had conquered a thousand worlds in seven years, was sacred.
"That medal—the Macharian Cross—chose him," Calgar said deeply. "My duty is to pave the path for him before the darkness truly descends. The Imperium is a machine that has lost its lubrication; it is decaying. We have lost our spirit of enterprise, our will to reach into the stars."
Calgar's gaze seemed to pierce through the deck of his ship, looking toward the distant light of the Solar System.
"The Macharian Crusade was the last time humanity truly looked outward. I believe... if we survive this, the next great expedition will not just defend the Imperium. It will be the sword that reaches into the very heart of the galaxy."