After Activation 1186 - Origin Universe
After Insertion 1147 - Cultivation Universe
Millennium 159-32M - 40k Universe
The tunnels that the Imperium had dug deep into the planet's core were working as intended. Instead of trying to parse their way through the warrens that was the Ork interior of the planet, they were instead going to be trying to dig their way through from the outside in directly.
Each of the digging pods was a massive beast, One that was as large as 2 Land Raiders placed side by side. Each of them packed to the brim with Guardsman platoons and heavy weapons. Each of the pods ejecting a charge as they breached a room that was larger than a certain size, the ones that were larger than the Pod at any rate. Once it detonated, the Guardsmen would disembark, kill everything in the room and secure it before waiting for reinforcements to arrive.
The pod after all had a very large spool on the other end that allowed for it to descent to the very Core of the planet if necessary while on the surface, there were teams ready to clamp on secondary pods that would be filled with ammunition, men, equipment and anything else that an assault would need.
These pods granted by the Adeptus Mechanicus were all technologies that had been recovered by the various expeditions out into the galaxy, ones by the Sojourners, by Magnar and the Adeptus Mechanicus themselves. Each and every one of them ready and able to do what would have taken an entire legion of Space Marines to do earlier.
As it was, they were diving deep into the planet, many thousands of pods, all depositing troops, all digging further and further in. Several weeks of fighting and they were finally inside of the facility, finally at the core of Ullanor Prime which of course was not what they had expected at all.
It was a vast cavern of some kind, as large as a moon. The entire facility was layered with many hundreds if not thousands of floors, all of them oriented in a single direction by the gravitic generator that the Orks were using. The fact that they were able to do this at all was infuriatingly surprising. In fact, the idea that they were able to just… go in and destroy the Ork Warboss in the middle had been rather naive.
The Orks had known they were coming and the first wave certainly experienced what that meant directly.
The Orks had not been idle and the fact of the matter was, that they had what was several million Orks inside the core, all of them massive. It was as if they took all of the Nobz and placed them into a single formation ready to engage anything that came through the roof… or the walls or the ceiling, when you were inside a giant ball it didn't really matter.
The Imperial Guard were wiped out and it was time for the next wave to go. However, instead of Imperial Guardsmen, they would be sending Space Marines as well as armoured vehicles, Dreadnoughts and before all of that, plasma torpedoes. There was no planetary core for them to be worried about and so maximum force could be applied.
As the torpedoes slid into the holes dug out by the melta-jaws of the tunnelling pods, the Space Marines loaded up behind them, while the Imperial Guardsmen sat inside pods that were descending following those ones. The Orks wouldn't know what hit them.
What must have been many thousands of Space Marines were heading downward, following them were tens of thousands of Imperial Guard, with many more ready to follow behind.
They would not be denied and the Orks had chosen a very bad place for them to try this. This was Ullanor and they would not give this world up without a fight and if it needed all the bodies of all the Guardsmen present, they would take back this world.
As many more pods descended into the planet's interior, the sound of the gears that turned the cabling that allowed for each of them to descend, filled the sky above each of the platoons waiting to embark. The many companies of Guardsmen surrounding each cable, ready for their own turn into the meatgrinder were standing ready. At the same time, there were thousands of Space Marines standing by in the event that even more of their kind would be necessary.
It was hoped that there would not be, they were Space Marine and if their initial number had been taken out, then there was very little hope for the rest of the Guardsmen that were standing in the area.
Luft was heading down into Ullanor again, only this time he was heading there inside of a pod that was nowhere near the same level of vulnerability as when he had been walking through the twisted warrens that was the Ork tunnels. Because the Orks were frankly ridiculous and one would think they could dig in a straight line when digging a tunnel that they were going to shoot down.
Still, they were heading down and Roger with his new Vox-Caster was coming with him. The poor man had to have the entire throat replaced by a Vox-Caster which in itself wasn't that new, but at the same time… he had lost his Heavy Bolter which naturally made him rather grouchy. The fact that he was now a walking vox transmitter certainly had not helped mattered considered Luft.
He would rather be thinking of something else, but the fact of the matter was that they were heading down to the planet, all the way down to the center of Ullanor Prime and that took hours if not days.
There was no convenient little… thing that would allow for them to just teleport there. Nope, they would have to travel for hours inside of this little pod, for hours down and down until they finally reached the core and in doing so they would be dropped into what he was assuming was hell on earth. That was the only thing that could really explain why it was that inside of Ullanor Prime there was something that required 5 full Chapters worth of Space Marines to deploy.
It was probably something that was terrifyingly dangerous and he didn't want to do this, that was just insane.
But… he was a Guardsman and that meant that insane was just the way he did things.
Closing his eyes Luft prepared to get some sleep as the pod he was in ground its way to the depths of Ullanor Prime and deposit him right into the fight.
Wherever that happened to be.
He wasn't picky.
One grave was the same as any other.
Luft aimed his lasgun at the Orks that were trying to breach their lines. He said lines because as any good Guardsmen knew, you had to establish a beachhead when you were breaking into an enemy held area. If you didn't then all it would take was for one determined push to take you out and that would just be bad.
Still, the fact that they had so many forces and they had barely managed to make a dent in the Ork forces showed just how many of the damned things there were.
The initial wave of Space Marines had managed to enclose the Orks in a wide sphere before they were then backed up by the Guardsmen. There were now in fact, enough Guardsmen to ensure that the Orks couldn't breach their perimeter. It was not a matter of defensive action more than anything else right now.
Luft thanked the Emperor for that one, he could handle a defensive action that would continue for as long as it took for them to take out the damned Orks.
Only it was proving just slightly harder than he would have liked, the fact being that the Orks had managed to somehow build what amounted to an entire city inside of what used to be the planetary core.
Entire buildings, vast walkways, massive roads, barriers and everything else. The damned Orks had built a city underneath the planet, one complete with generators that were receiving power from some kind of unknown source. Each of the blasphemous power generators cracked a brilliant green, tongues of green lightning dispersing from each into the surrounding atmosphere. And what made things worse, was the fact that if they touched an Ork, he actually increased in size as if he had promoted from one of the Boyz to Nob. Which itself meant that all the Nobz inside of Ullanor likely had been made in some fashion and that was terrifying in itself. An alien technology that could make all of the Orks they were fighting automatically many times worse? Something had to be done about it and Luft was already here, so he might as well.
The torpedoes had gone off but it hadn't been enough, what with the sheer size of the place.
He had called in what he had seen and the Guardsmen and Space Marines in the core began engaging the generators whenever they saw them. Deny the enemy power and a strategic resource, that being their Nobz.
It was working as anticipated with a few… side effects. Apparently, the Orks took it personally when they did that and rushed the front with thousands of Orks, Orks that had to be beaten off with horrendous casualties for both sides. The Imperial Guard were not used to the idea that there could be so many Nobz in a single place, all of them united. Something that likely meant their warboss was enormously powerful.
At the same time, it was very clear that their defences were not rated to handle this much threat being arrayed against them at the same time.
The Guardsmen were taking horrendous casualties with every single Ork wave and it looked as if there could only ever be more of them. The Orks continuously advancing until they finally defeated all of the Guard and the Space Marines. Maybe even the planet itself.
The Imperial Guard could not allow for that to happen and they were mobilizing everything they had to defeat the Ork threat. They could not be allowed to pose a threat to the core worlds, not for any longer.
If the Imperium was defeated here, it would give the Orks free reign of the system where they would no doubt merely head deeper into the Imperium as they followed the paths that led for them to the greatest amount of salvage possible. The damned things just followed their instincts.
As it was they were holding the Orks back and as Luft planting a laser bolt into the face of an advancing Nobz, he could only wonder what would have happened if the Imperial response to this had been just a little later.
If they had come at a time when everything was already destroyed and thousands of worlds had been crushed by the Ork menace.
Something to think about when things were, all going to hell he considered as he fired his lasgun again, and again as what seemed like a severe shortage in their intelligence was displayed. Did they not understand that without long ranged firearms, this wouldn't have been possible?
Regardless Luft was shooting them down only for a roar to come up from the front somewhere. An Ork that was angry and this damned Ork had the lungs of the God Emperor himself because he could hear him through the hundreds of buildings between him and the Ork… as well as the vast walls in the way between the Orks on the different levels of the base.
"By the Emperor! It's massive! There's an Ork the size of a Titan in here! Oh by the Emperor! Fire! Fire! Shoot the thing down!" Came the shout over the Vox Caster on all lines.
It looked like things weren't going to be that easy after all.
The Nobz were redoubling their efforts which was rather annoying, one would think that they would be more focused on escaping with the distraction the giant one was offering them. It would be the intelligence decision… which likely meant that the Orks weren't going to choose it for that very reason.
Still… Giant Ork? Someone probably saw a Gargant that looked like an Ork and called it an Ork.
After Activation 1186 - Origin Universe
After Insertion 1147 - Cultivation Universe
Millennium 159-32M - 40k Universe
Damned Orks.
Goddamned Orks.
God-Emperor Damned Orks.
Luft crouched behind the burning wreck of what used to be a Predator as he watched the 6 enormous Titan Sized Orks just rampaging around the lines.
Anything done to them was healed in an instant, not that anything worked. All of their weapons just were deflected by some kind of forcefield, only it was green and it looked like it just ate their fire. Even the damned Volkite weapons weren't doing anything to the Orks and that was terrifying in and of itself.
Sure they did the burning thing and the ripping of flesh and whatnot, but they just regrew it all as if it were nothing.
Something would need to be done or they were going to lose their beachhead at this rate.
Even if he said that however, it wasn't like he was going to be able to do anything, and frak it all, he was probably going to die horribly at this rate.
Or fast. It wasn't as if being stomped on by a Titan sized Ork was going to be painful, he knew that much. He would be too busy being squished meat paste to feel any kind of pain.
Next however, came the other problem, the one that said that he was going to die before he was killed by the giant ones. He couldn't fight off the damned Orks that were trying to push forward on the ground. There were just too damned many of them all of them using the big Orks for cover. It was damned unfair is what it was and he was on the verge of just rushing them with a Bayonet or something because Goddamn it, he didn't want to die and not make a difference.
Frak.
Luft raised his lasgun to greet the oncoming horde, his eyes ready. He was probably going to die today and he was ready. The damned Orks were going to get what was coming for them.
Only a loud hammer boom resounded through the room.
What?
The sound was enough that it silenced everything for a moment as Luft stared at what was the sight of 2 massive beings, each one taller than even a Space Marine, each one looking dark as the darkest of nights, their eyes dark red.
Were those Primarchs? They certainly looked like it.
Only there were 6 of the giant Orks, what would they be able to do? They were still human sized.
"Brothers. Take care of the runts for me will you? I'll handle the big ones." Came a voice from what appeared to be out of nowhere. It… it looked like a portal to the Warp but instead out of it walked… Magnus the Red. Everyone knew who he was, he was the one that spoke for the Emperor, he was the one that was twice as tall as a Space Marine and was red.
He was one of the most famous Primarchs and… and he was amazing.
Luft stood still and looked at Magnus with awe in his eyes, the aura that Magnus just radiated out inspired all of those that were standing around him.
Out of the Warp walked out more beings, what looked like a man that wasn't even wearing Power Armour at all, but instead held what looked like a halberd in his hands, the size of the other 2 more regular sized Primarchs. Then came the 3 others, 3 other giants among men, these ones wearing Power Armour, these ones looking like they were ready to lay waste to the enemies of mankind.
Luft approved and from the roars around him, he could tell that the others approved as well, their morale recovering. As it should be, if the Primarchs were about to step foot on the world, it made sense that they would be welcomed.
As for Luft, he could only stare when the Primarchs went into action, the way that they just rushed forward, slamming their various weapons into the Orks. The way that the thunder hammers that the Primarchs in their Green Armour were using just exploded entire squads of Nobz with every swing, the way that one of the other Primarchs, the one with the grey armour was using what appeared to be a massive Volkite cannon attached to his Terminator armour and was just vaporizing everything in an arc in front of him.
To their right, the one with the halberd was just walking forward and tearing through the Orks, he didn't even try to dodge incoming attacks, his Halberd was just blocking the bullets, somehow deflecting lasers, and when he was finally close enough, he tore through their flesh as if there was no armour there at all.
Luft could only smile at the sight that was unfolding itself before him. The Orks were being crushed and it looked as if they were unable to do anything against the might of the Primarchs.
Luft cheered as he brought his lasgun up to his cheek again and started firing at them. If they were going to be saved, then at the very least they should be able to assist the Primarchs. Each and every one of them, Guardsman or Space Marine all strode forward, their weapons firing at the now disorganized Ork hordes. This level at the very least was going to be safe and once the Ork Titans had been wiped out, then they would be able to assist those on the other floors.
Luft for once was glad that he was where the action was heaviest, if he had been anywhere else then it was likely that he wouldn't be making it out of this alive. Not the greatest of silver linings but when you were an Imperial Guardsman, you took your blessings where you got them.
"Tis Angrone!" Came the shout to his left.
Luft raised his eyebrows at that, one of the Primarchs, a cloned one at that if it was called Angrone. Only he didn't see the significance, the Black Templars that were standing there however very clearly did as they rushed their way over, their blades held high and ready to assist the Primarch. The Templars waded into the Ork and as before, Luft could only marvel at the skill in which they were using their swords.
Give him a power sword and he wouldn't be able to do half of that.
As for the other Primarchs, they were holding their own and pushing back the Ork horde, Magnus on the other hand, was nowhere to be found.
Luft was considering that perhaps he was trying to find something and needed everyone else to keep the Ork at back for that. What it was he had no idea and he didn't presume to think about knowing the mind of a Primarch. That would probably only get him in trouble and he didn't want to piss off a Primarch. That was generally considered a suicidal maneuver.
Assuming the Primarch cared at all… he was after all just a single Guardsmen. He was so far beneath the Primarch's notice that he might as well not even count as a human.
Luft continued to fire at the Orks and marvel at the Primarchs at the same time. One of them was wearing what looked to be a pure white armour, only he was holding a sword that looked at least twice as long as he was. He was swinging it at the Orks and just pulverizing them with the sheer force of the blow and nothing else. It was terrifying and he looked as if he were just mowing grass on the wind, as if it didn't matter all.
That in itself was rather amazing, the fact that he was able to do that at all just reinforced just how different the Primarchs were from normal people.
The last one had wings… Sanguinius?
He hadn't noticed at all until the wings unfurled and he was diving at the Orks from the air in swooping attacks that took dozens of them with every single sweep. It was amazing. Scarily amazing.
Luft could only gape in awe at the grace the Primarch displayed and the way he just dominated the battlefield. The Orks were being forced to look upwards instead of focusing forward which made them easier targets for everyone else. Turning the tide of the battle he was.
As for the Ork Titans they were just trying to help, trying to swing their massive weapons, but the Primarchs were avoiding them, keeping them occupied but not having the decency to actually engage them. Blunting the entire momentum of the Ork attack and forcing it to grind to a steady halt under the combined might of the Primarchs and the survivors of the initial attacking force.
Only things changed further from there when Magnus reappeared.
In his hand he held what looked like one of those Ork Psykers, he wore one of the little metal things on his head that was supposed to work like an amplifier perhaps? Luft wasn't too sure but if he was in the hands of Magnus then he was clearly something of importance.
As for what he was going to do, well, Luft stopped and just watched. Magnus was floating in the air in front of the Ork Titans one hand holding the Ork and his other holding what looked to be a staff of some sort.
The staff was golden in colour, it being too far away to make out anything beyond the fact that it glowed with some kind of inner light.
As for whatever else that might be important, it looked to be very clear that there was going to be something big… but Luft couldn't tell. He was just a Guardsman, after all, all this warpery wasn't his field of expertise. Being able to kill them sure, but what they were going to do was another story.
As Magnus hung there with his own wings keeping him up, the Primarch just looked at the Orks in front of him and for some reason, they were just looking back at him.
Just what was going on?
Luft felt that he should say something, but some part of his mind, the one that descended from some very prudent primates told him to shut the frak up. Even the Ork horde had stopped as had the other Primarchs, all of them standing still as they looked up at the little play that Magnus was enacting.
And then one of the Ork Titans keeled over, his hands to his head, roaring with what was probably anger before his head exploded. The Ork in Magnus' left hand glowing with extreme amounts of green energy, the staff glowing an even brighter orange.
The destruction of the next few Orks followed, the Titans all roaring as their heads too exploded into a fine mist, grinning as he did whatever it was he did.
"And now the finale then," Magnus said, his head turning down to regard the masses of Orks below his feet.
With the Ork psyker still in his hand, Magnus concentrated and so began an immense howling as the Orks began to roar in anger… or pain… Luft couldn't tell. He did however, know that it was enough that heads started to explode. One. Two. Three. One Hundred.
The Orks just popping like little green pimples in the field, unable to do anything against whatever it was that Magnus was doing to them.
As for the rest of the attackers, they too had stopped firing, whatever this was, was too damned much for them.
The Orks were all dying and it looked as if Magnus was not taking no for an answer. He really was just the slightest bit ridiculous when looked on in that light.
There was a pause. What was he supposed to do now? All the Orks were going to die it looked like…
Maybe he could police the bodies?
Luft simply walked forward… it looked like it was time for the cleanup...
Cleanup of millions of Ork brains and bodies, that was going to definitely be something to enjoy, wasn't it?
He groaned slightly and considered that maybe dying in the battle would have gotten him out of this.
It was going to break his back, he just knew, the damned things were heavy.
That and the smell of burning Ork was never pleasant.