Warhammer: The Worst Start There Is (40k) - Chapter 24: You Arrived Late

Wherever Guilliman went, victory followed. No enemy could stand in his way.

His colossal form was unstoppable, effortlessly destroying all abhorrent foes, and he proclaimed the arrival of the Imperium by treading upon the skulls of his enemies.

Armor of Fate and the Iron Cross energy field shielded Guilliman from all attacks, be it explosive or malevolent beams of molten light. All were deflected by the powerful force fields.

The terrible shocks and energies were either dissipated or redirected.

A Plague Marine fell to his merciless blade, his bloated body oozing foul-smelling mucus and blood teeming with maggots.

As he fell, a burst of golden flame erupted.

The putrid, foul-smelling blood burned on the battlefield, and the golden radiance was so brilliant that even the impure souls were completely purified by the Emperor’s will.

Seeing the arrival of the Primarch and his dominance, other Plague Marines roared with anger, attempting to rally and defeat the Primarch with their numbers.

The Honour Guard remained steadfast, never allowing the Primarch to be isolated and forced into a lone battle.

Wearing Terminator armor, they formed a protective circle around Guilliman.

To encircle the Primarch, they would have to go through them.

This foiled the plans of the Plague Marines before they even began.

Every member of the Honour Guard was an experienced Marine with extensive combat experience, and they wore massive and heavy Terminator armor.

Breaking through their defense to surround Guilliman would be a fool’s dream.

Even if they managed to barely breach the Honour Guard’s battle formation, the Plague Marines would likely suffer heavy casualties and be harvested by Guilliman at will. The plan to ambush and kill the Primarch was stillborn.

Traitors could only watch helplessly as the Primarch entered the fray like a tiger among sheep, mercilessly slaughtering their comrades.

Guilliman and the Honour Guard’s coordination was invincible; before them, the defense line the Plague Marines had labored to construct was as fragile as paper.

Under their relentless assault, Plague Marines continued to fall.

Under the might of the Primarch, the Plague Marines’ defense line kept shrinking, on the verge of total annihilation.

At this moment, Sicarius also arrived from the outskirts of the ruins, becoming the final straw that broke the enemy’s back.

He led a team to disrupt the enemy’s anti-air and long-range firepower, providing a safe landing point for the Star Realm troops, Titans, and other war units.

The addition of Sicarius and his team caused the Plague Marines to collapse even faster.

It has even evolved into a one-sided slaughter.

The Imperium is steadily gaining victory, and the chaos’s defeat is inevitable.

“Your time has come, traitor.” Sicarius, watching a Plague Marine attempting to block the loyalists with a grenade launcher as he rose from the trenches, wore an angry expression. His voice echoed from under his helmet, resounding all around. He ran across the battlefield, heading toward the Plague Marine who kept firing, his power sword humming.

Along the way, cultists were expertly cleared by his swordsmanship, their bodies, covered in cursed runes, shattered by the power sword.

The Plague Marine attempting to stop him swung empty, and Sicarius struck him in the leg with his sword.

With his thigh wounded, the Plague Marine lost his balance and knelt.

Sicarius used his other hand to press a grenade launcher against the enemy’s helmet and said, “Repent for your sins.” He then detonated the enemy’s head.

Surveying the battlefield, he quickly identified his next target. The enemy was firing a molten gun, and a loyal Space Marine’s upper body was directly melted, leaving only a half-burned torso.

Sicarius ran again, seeking vengeance for his fallen comrade.

Soon, the Plague Marine met the same fate, slain by Sicarius.

Sicarius didn’t pause; he continued to fight.

The battlefield became a showcase of this brave Marine’s swordsmanship, with no enemy escaping his expert swordplay.

His gaze was like the judgment of the Grim Reaper, and anyone he targeted was declared dead.

A Plague Marine was slashed by Guilliman, turning into a golden torch, writhing in agony on the ground.

With its last strength, it begged for the mercy of the benevolent Grandfather.

But in the face of the Emperor’s will, even the God of Plague had to step back. Its flesh and soul were destined to be completely incinerated.

“Sicarius, how’s it going on your end?” Guilliman asked on the communication channel.

“Everything is going smoothly, my Lord. The traitors are in retreat, victory is imminent,” Sicarius replied.

“Very good. Do not let your guard down. The traitors’ ritual is very sinister. Even I can sense the Warp boiling with endless malice. Clearly, they are summoning something,” Guilliman warned.

“Don’t worry, my Lord,” Sicarius replied through the communicator, and after a moment, he added, “I can see a tower built from piled bodies. The traitors are retracting their defenses, attempting to hold that position.”

“Eliminate them. Every heretic deserves to die. Also, destroy anything that looks abnormal,” Guilliman’s voice was heavy with power. “Have the aerial units provide you with some support. Smash through their defenses with an iron fist.”

The Imperium was advancing from all directions, and they were unstoppable.

Standing on a vantage point amid the ruins, Gurl could see this clearly and knew that he was losing.

The Imperium’s advance was much faster than he had anticipated.

“How much time does the ritual need?” Gurl asked his assistant in a raspy voice.

“It won’t be much longer; the Warp has already responded to us, but it still needs some preparation time,” the assistant replied.

Gurl turned to the battlefield, assessed the situation, and then shouted, “Release the plague bombs. Let them taste our power.”

Following Gurl’s command, plague engines, covered in flesh and blood, were pushed out by the Plague Marines.

Some bloated and grotesque plague beasts were stuffed into the cannon barrels of the plague engines and launched into the loyalist forces overhead. They exploded, and the putrid contamination rained down on the Imperium’s troops.

Many soldiers couldn’t evade in time, and the filth that splattered on their armor caused it to sizzle and emit a hissing sound.

The Honour Guard, wearing Terminator armor, fared relatively well, as the thickness of their Terminator armor and protective force fields shielded them.

The loyalist Space Marines in standard power armor had a harder time, with their armor structures being corroded by the toxic bacteria, and sparks sizzling from their suits. They moved unsteadily, and some emitted painful sounds.

Only Guilliman remained completely unaffected.

The corrupt filth hadn’t even touched him before it evaporated with a sizzling sound due to an invisible force field surrounding him.

This power wasn’t solely a result of his armor’s defense; it held a trace of mysterious energy that protected him from harm by the Warp’s filth.

“Severely injured brothers! fall back and receive healing from the battle priests! The others! find cover! Get those Titans over here and crush this trash!” Sicarius shouted, making temporary tactical arrangements.

The Plague Marines had just felt relieved at stopping the Imperium’s advance when, in the next moment, their bloated, decaying faces turned blank.

The earth shook as the Imperator-class Titans, known as the wrath of the gods, approached from afar. These colossal war machines were the most terrifying weapons on the battlefield.

Embedded with giant plasma reactors to power their building-sized cannons, a single shot from these Titans could crush any defensive line.

The Plague Marines were defeated before the Imperator-class Titans, and a beam of plasma, several meters wide, emitting deadly high temperatures, engulfed everything. Nothing could withstand such destruction, even if the Plague Marines were once the Emperor’s most outstanding creations, blessed by the God of Plague.

Yet, before the destructive beams, they were as insignificant as ants, obliterated by the relentless destruction.

Sicarius and his team advanced with the support of the Imperator-class Titans, launching their final assault along with other interstellar troops.

Guilliman’s progress was relatively quicker. Even without Titan support, he effortlessly broke through the enemy’s defensive line and saw the tower constructed from piled bodies.

The cultists gathered around the fleshy tower, their faces filled with fanatic excitement.

“It’s entropy, the great Grandfather. Praise him.”

“Oh, merciful Grandfather.”

“Wonderful life, wonderful.”

Amidst the excited, fully corrupted chaos cultists, Guilliman’s gaze fell on the leader of the rebellion atop the fleshy tower.

The leader wore a helmet with bull horns and a set of Devastator Centurion powered armor, which only emerged after the 36th millennium, during the age of heresy.

The renegade Space Marines were not only from ten thousand years ago but also some who had been oppressed by the Terra Council during these millennia, consumed by chaos, or coerced by the Ecclesiarchy.

Guilliman’s gaze burned with anger, and the golden flames on his Emperor’s sword flared even brighter.

Gurl, from his vantage point, watched the Primarch, his gaze smug.

“You’ve come late, Son of the False Emperor. This world belongs to Nurgle, to the benevolent Grandfather.”