Chapter 417: Expedition Road: News From Dante

Vito roughly understood the situation of the Blood Angels, how they came to this hellhole, and how many battles and troubles they had experienced in the meantime. In general, they did a good job in Cadia.

Before the Battle of Cadia began, Grand Lord Creed was hit in all the edge fortress worlds of Cadia. The entire Cadia Defense Force suffered heavy losses after a betrayal civil war and the previous blocking battles. So the Grand Lord sent out a distress signal to all the Imperial Space Marines.

He creatively tied a dozen astropaths together, and through the intensity of the hit astropath, he broke through the interference of the warp storm and sent out the astropath for help. It must be said that this idea made Vito feel admired. He planned to try it the next time he encountered a warp storm or a warp shadow.

But as far as the situation at the time was concerned, the distress signal was indeed sent out. Although many astropaths were lost in the storm due to the intensity of the warp storm, there were still a few lucky ones who escaped the clutches of chaos and went to every corner of the empire.

Many imperial forces responded to the call, and the Space Wolves and the Black Templars were the first to bear the brunt. The former sent three Grand Companies to support Cadia, and the latter sent an expeditionary force of the size of a regiment. Vito already knew the story.

He raided the Blackstone Fortress with Sven Bloodhowl and his Grand Company, and witnessed the heroic sacrifice of the entire Grand Company and the return of their Wolf Lord Sven to the throne. However, their sacrifice did seem to be meaningful, because it took Abaddon longer to conquer Cadia due to the absence of the Blackstone Fortress.

This led to more imperial reinforcements crossing the storm and arriving in the Cadia sector during this period. Although Cadia's mother planet had fallen and the entire surface was destroyed in Abaddon's desperate collision with the Blackstone Fortress, the entire planet still existed tenaciously, and the Blackstone Obelisk on it did not seem to be completely destroyed.

The Cadia Defense Force may have perished along with their homeland, but Cadia still truly stands firm, not only because the main body of Cadia's home planet still exists, and the black stone buried beneath it still suppresses the Eye of Terror, but also because the entire Cadia sector is still built.

Due to the protracted battle on Cadia's home planet, Abaddon was forced to mobilize more troops to attack Cadia's home planet, causing him to slow down or even give up the attack on the surrounding galaxies, thus several key node worlds and dozens of fortress planets were preserved, which provided a gathering point for the arrival of the Empire's subsequent reinforcements.

Among the Emperor's armies that responded to the call for help and gathered in Cadia, there were companies of the Blood Angels. Before this, Chapter Master Dante had received news of Sanguinor from his dream. He conveyed the Emperor's call, calling on the entire Blood Angels Chapter to respond to the call and go north to welcome the Black Crusade.

When the call for help from the Lord of Creed came, Dante ordered the three companies of the regiment to rush to Cadia without hesitation. They were led by the Holy Blood Priest Owen Orr. The entire expeditionary fleet set out from Barr and arrived at the edge of Cadia after a long voyage, and then engaged in a series of fierce battles.

The Blood Angels initially assisted the Cadia Defense Army with the full strength of three companies, defending the key Mandeville Point system on the southwest side of Cadia, ensuring that subsequent imperial reinforcements could continue to enter, but with the fall of Cadia's mother planet, the Black Legion began a full-scale attack.

Many of the troops followed Abaddon to Terra, but there were still many Chaos warbands that stayed. They refused the unified order of the Warmaster and began to plunder and revel in the name of their own evil gods. The entire Cadia star region fell into chaos, and various Chaos warbands attacked everywhere, attacking those planets that were ignored and abandoned by Abaddon in previous battles.

As the entire sector fell into the chaos of war, the killing and death here also attracted more Chaos Demons and warbands to come here. Before that, the Space Wolves and the Black Templars, the two largest and most powerful expeditionary forces, left with the retreating troops of the Cadia home planet, and the entire sector fell into a serious shortage of Astartes.

Although according to Raphael, the Second Company of the Dark Angels had stayed in Cadia for a short time, they were led by Asmodai, and when Vito heard this, he felt that something was wrong.

As he expected, the Dark Angels suddenly left afterwards, without any reason or explanation. The entire Dark Angels company suddenly withdrew from the battle and disappeared in the Cadia sector, leaving the remaining Imperial forces to fight alone.

This almost led to the collapse of the Imperial defense line, but in the end, the Blood Angels turned the tide. Captain Orio was ordered to lead his company and boarded the Sword of Baal strike cruiser commanded by Captain Livia to the gap in the front line.

Vito had heard of this excellent female captain, mainly because she was beautiful. Yes, that's right. A strange focus, right? But that's Vito, isn't it? Get used to it, my old friend.

All in all, according to Raphael's description, it was a tragic week. The entire company was reduced by more than half, and only ninety people were left after the battle of the full company of two hundred people.

Countless battle brothers returned to the throne, but in the end, after paying such a painful price, the Blood Angels repelled the frenzy of the Khorne army led by Kabanha himself. They held the front line and vowed to never retreat, and finally won the victory in the name of the Emperor and Sanguinius.

But after that, they also lost contact with the main fleet of the regiment. After that, they led a small number of imperial navy and guards to fight in various places in Cadia, constantly exchanging fire with Chaos warbands, and rushing to any place that needed help as much as possible.

During this period, they experienced many battles, many of which were quite thrilling, but under the excellent command skills of Captain Livia and the bravery of the Blood Angels, they were finally safe and sound, and thus created countless glorious battles worthy of being remembered by future generations.

In fact, almost all battles are worth remembering. After the battle of Cadia's home planet, the warriors who continued to defend the northern gate of the empire and delay the huge Chaos army, their epic written with blood and tears, deserves to be remembered forever.

At first, Vito thought that they also received Walmart's signal for help, so they led the remaining company members to come to support, but the fact was not the case, at least not completely.

"We did receive the distress signal from here at first and came here to help, but we also received other news on the way." Raphael, the company chaplain who is good at speaking and has much better expression skills than his brothers, said so.

Almost all of the above stories were narrated by him. As mentioned, Raphael is very talented. As a chaplain, he is very good at his duties. He uses his excellent eloquence and literary accomplishment to boost morale and spread the great light of loyalty. Just as Vito remembered him many years ago, he did a good job.

"But on the way here, we finally received news from Chaplain Owen Orr. It was a star message from the expedition flagship "Tears of Holy Blood" of the regiment. Although the content was distorted by the warp and became confusing and unclear."

"It is a compliment to say that it is a riddle. It is simply a bunch of crazy talk." Cazaril protested on the side. He seemed to be alienated from his brothers after returning from the Black Templar. He kept a distance from several company officers beside him, whether intentionally or unintentionally.

Cazaril stood alone, like a lion living alone, but fortunately Raphael still stood with him, and the relationship between the two seemed to be close, although Cazaril was a little at a loss, after all, he had been away from his war group for a hundred years.

But Vito believed that with the help of Raphael, he would eventually integrate back into his war group smoothly. Now, Raphael was still by his side, and the priest nodded slightly and smiled as if in agreement.

Vito knew that Raphael was using his outstanding political talent to meet Cazaril's words, so that he would not appear to be isolated from other silent warriors, like an outsider.

"Indeed, that astropathic message was very twisted and weird, but fortunately we have the Sword of Baal, and with the hard work of Captain Livia's excellent astropath, it took us only a few days to decipher the meaning, at least the general correct meaning."

"Baal is calling all the Blood Angels to return to the home planet urgently." Captain Orio, who has always been taciturn, spoke up. He rarely participated in conversations, but once he spoke, he was extremely majestic. Although he was just a captain, his solemnity and inviolability were enough to make people mistake him for a chapter leader.

Even if there was indeed a chapter leader standing next to him, in front of the solemn and battle-tested Orio, Malakin looked more like an ordinary captain under his command. If they were not wearing power armor with different paint schemes, then it would definitely be the case.

"Not just us, Reverend Owen Orr has conveyed the order of Chapter Master Dante himself. He ordered all the expeditionary forces of the Blood Angels to immediately contact and summon all the Blood Angels sub-groups in the entire galaxy. In the name of the leader of the Holy Blood Brotherhood, all the sub-groups are required to urgently gather on Baal, without any mistakes."

The Holy Blood Brotherhood "does not exist" in the strict sense. After all, according to the regulations of the Holy Code and the Empire, any private alliances and secret societies between Space Marine Chapters are strictly prohibited. This is to avoid the recurrence of the Great Rebellion. After all, the rebellion began with the culture of Space Marine associations.

So this point was strictly prohibited and suppressed in the Empire in the future. Although similar organizations have been banned on the surface, in fact, this kind of Space Marine brotherhood derived from brotherly blood still exists widely. The Holy Blood Brotherhood is one of them. This kind of organization is usually a founding chapter, and it is concluded with all the separated sub-groups.

This is almost an open secret in the Empire. Everyone knows it, but no one dares to investigate it. Why? Think about it, if you are an Inquisitor or a High Lord, would you be crazy enough to cause trouble to a founding Chapter?

In addition to daily communication and connecting all the daughter chapters with the mother chapter, this kind of Brotherhood will also be responsible for establishing an emergency command center in wartime to coordinate the joint actions of several or even dozens of chapters, so Space Marines from the same bloodline can often act in tacit agreement and fight in unison.

At certain critical moments, when a huge crisis comes, the Brotherhood can also issue an emergency call to the daughter chapters across the galaxy, summoning all the sons of the Primarch to gather somewhere to form a temporary legion.

This urgent call has different names within each chapter, the most representative of which is the Final Wall Protocol during the Beast Wars. Dozens of Sons of Dorn Chapters gathered on Terra to defeat the Beast. The invasion once again achieved the same glorious feats on Ullanor as it did during the Great Crusade.

Among the sub-groups of the Blood Angels, this call is called.

"The Tears of Holy Blood order has been spread from Baal to the entire galaxy. As far as I know, all the sub-regiments that have received the order have begun emergency reconstruction. More than a dozen sub-regiments and their entire forces are gathering towards Baal. By then There will be tens of thousands of angelic sons gathered on Baal."

Raphael said this, and Vito frowned. He held his chin and thought for a while, "Dante will not issue such a recall order easily. Something must have happened to Baal."

"We don't know. Maybe the astrological language was distorted and the information was lost, or there was no information at all. But no matter what crisis Baal is about to face, we will rush to the sacred Baal."

"Then let's not waste time here! Baal is calling and all the brothers have set off. Why are we still wasting time here?"

Kazariel stepped forward, raised his fist, and said loudly, "We are here to inform the Weeper brothers. Now that they are with us, why don't we set off?"

He looked around at his brothers. They all looked at each other and said nothing. As Vito expected, Raphael immediately raised a hand to signal him.

"Of course we will return to Baal, Kazariel, but do you think you can explain all this to the Marshal and only return to Baal."

"Do you want to come together? My lord, if you can come to Bar, your morale will be boosted." Malakin said on the side. His words were full of respect. Vito looked at him and shook his head slightly after thinking for a moment. .

"I can't go. I'm sorry for my friends. Terra needs me more at this moment. But I also promise you that when I arrive on Terra, I will immediately lead my legion to rescue Baal. We will fight side by side in Baal. That won’t change and we’ll see each other again soon, I promise.”

Vito's words made the surrounding warriors a little frustrated. They all hoped to fight side by side with the legendary god who respected Sanguinius himself, but they could not refute Vito. Compared to Baal, Terra also Extraordinarily important, that was the Throne World, the place that all Astartes swore to defend with their lives.

Kazariel sighed secretly like the brothers around him, but Raphael beside him spoke again, "No one will doubt your courage, sir. Just as we went to Baal, your going to Terra must mean An equally important mission.”

"We have no right to ask you to give up such a heavy responsibility. It is your responsibility and no one can take it except you. Just as we will go to Baal, no one can take our place but us."

Raphael's words immediately dispelled the depressed mood and gave him an extraordinarily important sense of mission. The surrounding warriors wearing red and gold started talking to each other and nodded to each other.

Kazariel also raised his head and nodded to his brother priest, who also nodded gently in response. Next to the two of them, the tall Captain Oreo walked up. He stood tall in front of Vito, behind him He also looked up to him.

The company commander and Vito looked at each other under the watchful eyes of hundreds of Blood Angels and Lamenters. After a moment of slightly awkward silence, Captain Aureol stretched out a hand and held out the hand. His hand reached for Vito.

"Goodbye Baal." "Goodbye Baal."

Vito stretched out his hand and shook hands with the company commander. Although the handshake between Vito and the company commander without armor seemed particularly awkward, like a baby holding an adult's finger, this still could not prevent the surrounding people from bursting into cheers. Voice.

The Blood Angels and Lamenters warriors raised their arms and shouted, raising their bolters and power swords high. Brothers and brothers put their arms around each other's shoulders, cheering for the return of the Marshal and praising their mission. After some With high morale, Vito let go and nodded to everyone. He nodded to the people in front of him one by one.

Captain Oreo was the first to nod in response, followed by Malakin, Kazariel, and finally Vito and Raphael, who looked at each other and nodded in affirmation before turning and leaving. He was surrounded by soldiers on both sides. He left amidst cheers, and the others standing on the side of the battleship watched his figure go away until he and Lilith disappeared at the end of the deck.

In the warm atmosphere of the brothers of the two battle groups, Kazariel approached the company commander, his hand pressed on the power sword on his waist and approached the company commander, "Company Commander, should we set off now? "

Oreo was silent for a moment, then turned to look at the Sword of Baal beside him, "Captain Livia, set a course and take us back to Baal."

"As ordered by the company commander, we will set off immediately to return to Baal."