Cosmolux: In the Noble Darkness of the Far Future, there is an indecent quantity of armed conflict

Revan4221X · Jul 20, 2023

patrickmm1 said:
Marineford War, Part 2
"What, Do you Want to Fight?"
"I Just Want to find the true distance between us and that man who seems right in front of us."
(Doflamingo to Mihawk, moments before the battle truly begins)

Despite only seeming to be an observer at first, the first to act is Dracul Mihawk, cleaving through the ice filled void with a single swing of his sword, he is here not to do battle directly, but to see how far he has yet to go to reach the peak, for even as the wave of precisely applied impossibility, reinforced by the will of a Conquerer, generated by a single swing of his sword, races towards Whitebeard's ship, seeking to cleave it in twine as he has done countless times before to those who dared get in his way, Whitebeard seemed… unimpressed, merely staring pasionless at the oncoming wave of death. Even as the first wave of aerocraft and strikecraft unleashed by Whitebeard's personal strikeforce race to get out of the way, even as the crew feared for his life- for the blast was aimed to bisect him along with the ship, he but smirked, for he knew what these opening moves would be, and planned for them in advance; for even as the blast races onwards, popping his flagship's shields like a mere soap bubble, he but continues to smile, for his own countermeasure has already been deployed.

Suddenly, the entire front of his ship becomes reflective, shining like a well polished gem even as the very material that it is made of temporarily changes to be like Diamond to Adamant's Steel; moments later, an invisible shockwave forms where the energized sword swing would have met the hull, as the devilfruit and will of Jozu, Whitebeard's third in command, meets that of Mihawk. For an extended moment, all is still, as the wills of two titans clash; then, the blast shifts from moving horizontally, to moving vertically, perfectly redirected away from Whitebeard's ship, and into the frozen battlelines overhead; and so two Mariene cruisers are incidentally disabled overhead, with said vessels cut all the way through too near to mid-ship for it to be incidental, and a half dozen others suffer damage as protuding bits are sliced clean off by the still defined, overly large, sword swing; racing onwards, it eventually disperses somewhere in the outer system. This deflection also temporarily stunned several thousand of soldiers on both sides, as none of them had ever expected that such a thing could happen, let alone that they could see it in person, such was Mihawk's reputation; a single attack was made and blocked; and with that Mihawk, his sharp, lensed, hawklike eyes seeing no true swordsman amongst these initial combatants, sheathed his black bejeweled blade, having done the bare minimum.

And yet, this was but almost literally the opening swing, for now the true battle could begin. Outpouring from Whitebeard's personal ships, and from each and Every marine hangar on Marineford, strikecraft and aerocraft streamed forth, joining battle within the vast shipyard-harbor, filling the skies with dogfights as the Marine's nigh counless standardized fightercraft dueled with Whitebeard's aces; elsewhere, on the newly formed 'ground of ice, hatches and makeshift lifts spun up, swiftly unloading vast quantities of tanks and somewhat primitive walkers onto the newly formed ground of ice, with Infantry eventually emerging behind them. Meanwhile, in the void, Whitebeard's allied fleet continues to rush forward, unleashing strikecraft and long ranged boarding pods as their ships continue to charge in, unaware of the danger that is to come from their rear.

And so the initial battle lines are drawn up; and it is once again on the Marine's side where the opening plays amongst the more general combatants are made, as artillery and ortillery open up, aiming to disrupt the pirate's lines both in the ground and in the void; and in this they are successful, as on the ground Whitebeard's carefully forming battlelines are disrupted by light artillery, turning the initial rushing formations of tanks and elite infantry from carefully tuned formations to masses of individuals as their neighbors get picked off, and forcing the following forces to go to ground to avoid annihilation. Elsewhere, heavier ordinance bursts the shields on yet another of Whitebeard's personal vessels, even as the vastly heavier targeted artillery forces many of the rushing pirate ships overhead to slow down their approach and take cover behind their neighbors to avoid annihilation, while others start to suffer damage, their shields failing and their hulls stressed. Here is where the home field advantage of the Navy starts to show itself, and where the true plans begin, for Whitebeard's own ship remains untouched, deliberately not targeted in this opening barrage, and the artillery fire on the ground isn't dense enough to truly halt Whitebeard's forces, as all along the front pirates and marines clash, with the marines often coming off worse in the exchange.

For near the head of these charges are many of Whitebeard's lesser commanders, who were purposefully shifted from their commands in the fleet overhead, for a position in Whitebeard's main personal ships; and wherever they go, Marines die, cut down by masterful coordination and relatively overwhelming strength, for no normal Marine soldier can hope to fight a master of Haki and win; nevertheless, these marines do their job, and the advance of Whitebeard's Commanders is halted for a time, beset by wave after wave of relatively disposable troops.

"Oh Boy… the commanders of the Whitebeards are true to their reputation. They are all pretty much like monsters. To finish this with minimum damage, we just have to cut off their head nice and quick."

And with those words, Admiral Kizaru flashes forward, literally faster than the eye can see, suddenly appearing over the frozen spaceport in a blinding flash of light. There he stands, for but a moment, before flashing forward again, straight for whitebeard's flagship; and yet he never makes it there, as a shockingly fast streak of blue fire moves to intercept him. The two figures clash in a burst of yellow-white light, blue fire, and black Haki, as Marco the Phoenix, Whitebeard's second in command, reveals himself.

And so, the Admiral who is fast enough to be lazy, and the pineapple headed immortal phoenix clash again, again and again, painting the skies with a dazzling display of light and flame. For while Kizaru is far faster, he must slow down to a relative crawl each time he changes direction, for his light form cannot turn on its own; and it is during those moments where Marco catches up and clashes with him again, and again, and again, dozens, then hundreds of times over in a few seconds. It is a blinding display, it is a battle that could have circled the globe several times had the distance involved been in a straight line, it is a battle in which neither side can hope to harm the other, for Marco's Haki is not up to forcing Kizaru to take a serious blow, and his fire does not burn, for it is a fire of life; meanwhile, Kizaru's own blows come to nought, for any damage that is inflicted is whipped away in a flash of fire. It is a battle that could last hours, it is a seemingly eternal stalemate… it is over in a matter of seconds as Marco lands a single telling blow, sending Kizaru through several buildings while in his physical form, only for the Admiral to flash back to the then nearest edge of the spaceport, almost completely unharmed, while Marco is left hovering overhead, seemingly equally thankful for the break.
"I knew that you wouldn't let me strike your head that easily."; and with that, Kizaru sits down, waiting for the actual plan to progress.

Soon, the Marine's own lesser elites are unveiled, as giants and giant mechs prepare themselves on the edge of the frozen spaceport; and yet this is not their time to act.

Instead, it is once again Jozaru who makes the next move, as he emerges from Whitebeard's ship, and puts his hands into the ice in front of it, which has oddly been left clear of pirates for kilometers around; and so, with a mighty blow, the ice cracks, and cracks perfectly, cut as much by Haki as by brute force as by Devil Fruit enforced cutting power. Elsewhere nearby many pirates book a hasty retreat, knowing what is to come; and so, with an impossible show of force and leverage, ten cubic kilometers of ice, somehow hollowed out into a perfect semicircle, is lifted into the air as Whitebeard's third strongest combatant(second in terms of raw, physical brute force) once again unveils his might.
And so, a massive glacier, a mountain of ice, is sent hurtling through the air, aimed directly at the capital building, the Admirals, and Ace's execution platform; but it doesn't make it even clear the spaceport before it is intercepted, not by a flash of light, nor a lance of ice, but by giant fists of lava, for it is now that Akainu, arguably the strongest of the three Admirals, acts.

"Damn! those two… they shouldn't leave their positions like that. If all three of us left our positions… who would cover them?!" and with those words, Akainu's molten fist flashes forward, growing ever larger as it travels. "Great Eruption!" and so, the mountain of ice is stopped by the force of a erupting supervolcano, unleashed for but an instant. Within moments the block of ice is gone, as vaporized as it was punched through, and the partially molten remains of the resulting explosion rain down upon the Whitebeard pirates, even as the main fist of lava shrinks, withdraws, and turns back into what seems like flesh and blood. Raining down, the sea of ice for a moment seems to catch fire, killing thousands of pirates, and both badly damaging and lighting the Adamant Wood of one of Whitebeard's secondary dreadnoughts(the one that lost its shields mere minutes ago to the artillery fire) as a mere side effect of the clash; while still intact, it will be a while before said ship is spaceworthy, let alone ready for FTL travel from this deep within a gravity well, again.

Other meteors, heading for Whitebeard's flagship, never touched down, for with but an uprased flex of his arm, another small shockwave passes through the hull, and stops the would be meteorites in their tracks, their vastly cooled forms thumping onto the top of the vessel harmlessly, with one in particular apparently landing right in front of what was apparently one of the main cameras for viewing the outside world.

"He lit up the place too brightly." and with that, Whitebeard turns to leave his viewing room. Soon, he is seen again, striding out onto the top of his ship to put out and move away the rock that blocked his view less than a minute ago.
"Why don't you light up my birthday cakes instead, you magma squirt?"
"Don't you want an illuminated funeral for yourself, Whitebeard?"

Despite this change in position, Whitebeard remains unphased as the artillery barrage continues, standing out in the open without a care in the world even as the artillery barrage continues; indeed, he casually swats away several Artillery shells that got too nearby; indeed, this barage doesn't appear to phase him or his two strongest underlings, as they act to assist in protecting both the now shieldless flagship and the one badly damaged ship from the ongoing barrage. Indeed, even the lesser commanders of the whitebeard fleet are unphased by the ongoing artillery fire, as they dodge, slice through, and otherwise ignore the unguided munitions.

Meanwhile, in the void, things still remain somewhat unchanged, as the Whitebeard pirates continue to rush in, unknowing of the danger that has started to move to their unguarded rears.

And it is here where the Whitebeard pirates play their next card, for as the two sides draw close enough to move into a brutal, partially frozen, Clash, the largest amongst the Pirate vessels opens its hangar doors, and its single notable occupant jumps out. Clad from horned head to toe in vacuum rated armor, thick enough to warrant being on a Battleship, a Giant, a Giant amongst Giants, leaps out. Seven kilometers tall if he is but an inch, this giant is still small relative to his world moving elder(now mostly dead) kin. Gliding forwards with shocking speed, wielding a sword more suited for cutting through enemy battleships than infantry, Oars Jr. reveals himself. Soon, he is making his way into the marine's frozen battlelines, brushing away several frigates that were too near, but this only opens him up to the firepower of the Marine's assorted defensive instillations; indeed, he is soon being fired upon from almost all sides, with weapons that would have given the vessel he emerged from momentary pause; but it is to no avail, as he continues to move through the void, only barely slowed down by the masses of incoming fire. Indeed, he soon approaches the planetary shield, with but some ice and a few frozen heavy cruisers standing between him and a clear path to the ground; Indeed, soon he has literally carved a path through the ice, and on the other side has used it as a place to stand, as he rips out the rear most of the frozen cruisers, and with great force(indeed, the surrounding ice threatens to shatter under the sheer counterforce), lifts up the six kilometer long vessel, and a non-insignificant chunk of the ice that it was stuck in, and slams it against the planetary shields with unbelievable force.

While the ship crumples, so do the planetary shields, and within moments a local gap is opened up, just wide enough for him to follow the remains of the broken ship down through. Soon, pirate strikecraft are following him down, moving to engage their ground based marine counterparts, who even now continue to swarm out of their countless planetside hangars.

And so the battle continues, both in the void and on the ground, for even as Oars falls through the sky towards the battlefield below, the Marine's own lesser Giants, both natural and artificial, move out to both intercept him as soon after he lands as possible, and to engage the whitebeard pirates; but this is for nought, for as soon as Oars Jr. stands up again, the sheer difference in scale between him and his marine counterparts is revealed.
Two of the living marine Giants: "I've never had to look up to anyone before this!" "Me Neither!" indeed, for as large as these beings were, they barely reached Oars's knees, and so he continued to walk forward, continuing to ignore the ranged firepower coming in from both his immediate opponents and the marine's constant artillery barrage.

"I must reach Ace-Kun! Don't Get in my way!"
And with those words, and but a few swings of his sword, his current foes, or at least those amongst the Marine giants who dared stand directly in his path, are left broken.
"Oars, he'ill never change. Brave men don't seek Death!" yells, whitebeard, for he knows where Oars is heading, and what his chosen path will lead to.
But Oars is set in his goal, and with but a few words, he continues to rush forward, heedless of the consequences, for Ace is his brother, and he is here to rescue him.
"Give Oars cover!"
Indeed, soon Oars is covered from above by strikecraft, and flanked by several formations of tanks, turning from a lone individual to the head of a spear, aimed directly at the heart of the Marines.

Indeed, for all who stand before him fall, from the greatest (known) marine machines of war, to the least of their troopers. Soon, he is nearing the edge of the frozen spaceport, only a few kilometers from where Ace is being executed. There though, five of the seven Warlords are waiting.

Indeed, it is there where this push fails, as first many of oars would-be friends are taken out, first by a controlled burst of pink, petrifying light unleashed by the Pirate empress, Boa Hancock, the most beautiful woman in this region of space, and then oars himself more than meets his match in the form of the final three Warlords of the sea.

First, Bartholomew Kuma, a bear-like giant of a man, dressed in a black formal shirt highlighted with a giant coda sign, what appear to be mirrored glasses, off-white pants, and a speckled white fishing hat, standing at over six meters tall, steps up to halt his advance; and stop his advance, he does, as Kuma unleashes the full power of his devil fruit, the Nikyu Nikyu no Mi, entrapping and repeatedly compressing the air in front and above him in countless paw shaped stationary shockwaves. Indeed, this compression process appears to go on for some time, even as oars approaches closer and closer, each compression being signaled only by a few glints of light, and the sound of air repeatedly rushing in to fill the vacated area. as the world holds its breath, the affected area grows larger and larger, even as the matter within it is compressed more and more; indeed, soon the affected area approaches the size of Oars himself, just in time for the giant to arrive. And so, with Oars on his final approach to the barrier, the affected area shrinks, from being kilometers across, to being able to fit into the palm of Kuma's hands; amd with that, the now very clearly visible bubble moves forwards, bursting right against Oars's chest, unleashing a perfectly shaped nuclear blast at point blank range.

And where lesser attacks failed to even slow the giant down, this, this shattered much of his armor, and left the giant a bleeding wreck, having collapsed onto his knees from pain and shock. This was not enough to stop his advance though, for soon oars haltingly gets back to his feet, undeterred from his goal. Indeed, within less than a minute he is advancing again, swiftly reaching the walls defining the edge of the space port despite the Marine's constant bombardment of him and the bleeding wounds that the artillery now leaves in his skin. This though, is where his journey stops, for where the standard weapons of the Marines failed, the Warlords do not. For even as he moves to limp over the final wall between him and his most important person, he finds himself literally falling short, as his strength finally starts to fail him. There though, he makes a final decision, changing his target from ace's execution platform, to the Warlord standing right beneath him. But, even as he braces himself and sends his fist flying towards his new target, he finds his blow to be meaningless, for even as the wall in front of him crumbles, the Warlord is not there, instead, the warlord, Doflamingo, is seen vaulting overhead, casually landing behind him even as Oars Jr. is forcibly halted. Moments later, Oars falls forward, one of his legs severed at the knee by invisible strings. And so, even as the Warlord he sought to kill laughs behind him, Oars Jr falls ontop of the wall he sought to breach. Crawling forwards, he crawls onto the next bit of open ground, reaching towards the execution platform, only to suddenly see that it has since been emptied of its occupants; but before he can notify anyone of this, his life is cut short by a lance of darkness, emerging from his own shadow, spearing up through is neck. And so falls Oars, Whitebeard's giant friend, and Ace's closest ally that isn't a father.

And it is with the failure of this push, that Whitebeard is first seen angry, shattering one of the few remaining marine Behemoth-Titans that dared to approach him while he, and the rest of his main crew, were effectively distracted. His first blow shattered the weapon systems and brings the creature crumbling down, and his next turns the head into a crumpled ruin, which he then tosses aside along with the rest of it. Still though, he doesn't advance himself, instead ordering his men to take advantage of the opened gap.
"Climb Oars' body and advance!"

As for those who approach Doflamingo with the goal of avenging Oars' death, they find themselves lacking the will to not turn on their friends, turned into puppets dancing on his strings. And as for the Pirates who use Oar's body to advance farther into Marineford, all they find are yet more Marines, waiting for them to arrive; and so the battle on the ground stalls, for this is as far as the Whitebeard pirates will ever be able to get so long as Whitebeard himself remains mostly passive.
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Meanwhile, in the void, the battle continues, as Whitebeard's allied fleets run in to clash with the defenders, only to be stimied, not by the defenders themselves, for as frozen as they are they cannot do the sort of rapid damage required to truly halt the pirate's advance, but by the ice itself, acting as an additional bulwark that acts to protect Marineford almost as well as its planetary shields and other defensive instillations- indeed, while Oars had made a path through the ice and managed to open a hole in the planetary shields, none of the Pirates own cruisers and battleshits could use said gap to get through, as while corvettes, frigates strikecraft could easily navigate their way through the ice and make their way through the hole that Oars opened, for the most part it only lead to their annihilation, as groundside batteries pound any small pirate vessel that dare to make the journey into scrap, leaving the unsupported strikecraft to barely make a dent in the neverending swarms unleashed by their groundside bases.

While most of the pirate fleet was left in the open, slowly pounding their way through the frozen defenses and turning the maze of ice into a more open path, a single battleship was literally plowing on ahead, cutting through the ice with its forward plasma cutter, and literally raming aside defenses with its carefully reinforced hull, one of the few remaining commanders that Whitebeard had left in the fleet was clearing a path through the ice using her personal vessel, which was specifically equipped to deal with Aokiji's battlefield defining ability. Soon, her vessel had reached the planetary shields, preparing to open a larger gap, but this was where her journey would stop, along with the vast, vast majority of Whitebeard's fleet.

(communications manager)"They've broken through the ice in two locations, soon the planetary shields will fall, and we will be swarmed by Whitebeard's allied forces. Fleet Admiral Sengoku!"
(sengoku) "No problem. Tsuru-san, let's put it into action."
(Tsuru)"It's a suitable time. Connect to all ships and soldiers!"

And so the board was set, the pieces were in motion, and Whitebeard's allies would momentary find out how badly they had erred, before the silence of the grave would come to claim them all.

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On the ground the battle continued, as Whitebeard's commanders sought to minimize the further interference of the Warlords in this fight- with Vista, their best swordsmen, seeking out a duel with Mihawk to keep him from getting bored enough to take another full powered swing at the Whitebeard Pirates, and Jozu seeking out Doflamingo to minimize the number of Whitebeard crewmembers that he could put under his control, as Jozu's adamant skin could neutralize Doflamingo's strings. Elsewhere, the fighting continued, as Whitbeard's forces continued to slowly approach the outskirts of the frozen starport, meeting ever heavier resistance as they neared the rim.

But in the void, the battle would end in minutes, as in a great flash of light the extent of Sengoku's trap was revealed. Indeed, for where before there was but a mostly empty starfield to the rear of the pirate armada, now suddenly became allot more crowded, as first one, than a dozen, then thousands, then tens of thousands, then countless more… relatively small gunmetal grey, almost triangular ships decelerated out of hyperspace one after another, accompanied by the occasional vastly larger ship of almost identical design, wedges that outmassed their lesser brethren by more than a hundredfold. Here and there the occasional more recognizable marine vessel decelerated in, but they were outmassed four to one by their unknown kin, and drastically more outnumbered. Indeed, this flanking force outmassed the Pirate armada by over five to one, and that was but the start of their issues.

Indeed, within moments of this unknown force arriving, what little cohesion there was amongst the pirate fleet broke down, as they raced past, and sometimes even through each other to put the walls of ice between them and the approaching grand armada, acting out of a level of fear that was previously unknown to the Whitebeard pirates, and with a desperateness that seemed too severe to be natural.

Moments later, this fear proved to be all to natural, as these unknown vessels unleashed an alpha strike of such size and potence, that to these pirates it seemed as if Uranus itself had woken up to speak its wrath. Countless beams of scintillating light unleashed themselves, fleet anninilators one and all, piercing through a wall of relativistic shot so dense that one seemingly could have walked on it; here was destruction in its purest form, as more firepower than this region of space had seen in a thousand years was unleashed all at once; here was the doom of Whitebeard's allied fleet, and it spoke with devastating silence. Indeed, the first clue that the Whitebeard pirates had received about their own failure, was when the heavens themselves erupted with light, as stray radiation and chains of massive explosions vastly outshone the sun, even through the still mostly intact maze of ice that had previously defined the battlefield above.

Only the pirate vessels that had already made it a ways through the wall of ice had survived the initial strike, shielded by both their now destroyed kin and by the presence of marine vessels, still stuck in the ice, but for even them time was running out, as countless frigate sized vessels pursued them into the ice, along with innumerable dual-winged strikecraft, buzzing through the frozen maze and swiftly annihilating any pirate vessel that dared be in the wrong place. Soon, even the previously opened holes were exploited by these unknown actors, swiftly replacing the trickle of reinforcements that Whitebeard had been receiving with vastly more hostile forces.

Indeed, of whitebeard's allied fleet, only a few escape pods had made it down to directly assist with the battle on the ground, with the last to arrive landing directly on top of whitebeard's ship, out of which Squard, one of Whitebeard's allied commanders, crawled…
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"Pops."
"Squard! I'm glad that you're alive!"
"Yea, barely."
"I see. I was calling for you a while ago. How is it in the void now?"
"Your allies were beaten badly. I made it here because I found the way out luckily."
"Sengoku has no mercy. He is using all of the forces that he has and more to defeat us."
"Pops, did you notice what the marines was up to?"
"I've known Sengoku for a long time."
"I see. It's better for us if they're going to attack from overhead as well. I'm going to go forward, too! We gotta invade without stopping!"
"I agree."
"There are thousands of allied commanders here and we are all in your debt beyond words! We sacrifice our lives for the Whitebeard Pirates!"
"Thank you. But we are…!"
"I know. You are fighting to save a member of your family. The pirate, Whitebeard, won't give up on his family. Everybody followed you to this hell because you're that kind of person. I Wish that… we were also… members of your family."

And with those words, Squard releases his scabbard, stabs whitebeard in the chest, running him through. Despite the blow missing all vital organs, despite his sheer physique, whitebeard falls onto his hands and knees.

In an instant, Marco is has Squard pinned his head a mere twitch from being crushed between Marco's hands and the hull, and starts interrogating him about why he did such a thing, while Whitebeard himself slowly gets back on his feet, shaken not just from the stab, not just from the betrayal, but from a third, unknown, source, one that he felt more than the bloodloss.
(Marco)"Why did you do that?! Answer me, Squard!"
(Squard)"S-Shut up! You guys made me do it!"
(Marco)"What do you mean?! Do you know what you've done…?"
Suddenly shifting, Marco releases Squard and runs over to the now partially risen Whitebeard.
(Marco)"Pops! Don't push yourself! Your health is…"
(Squard)"Stop perpetrating this farce, Whitebeard! I know about your deal with the navy! You have their assurance that the Whitebeards and Ace will remain safe! Everyone, listen very closely! We've all been trapped! You never told me… that Ace was a son of that hateful Gold Roger! When you first found me, I was all alone… you know why I was all alone. Because Roger killed all of my precious crew who had fought alongside me for so long. I despise roger and… you know it!! Then you should have told me that Ace was Roger's son and you want to make him the next King of the Pirates! You were already betraying me at that time! But I didn't know. I even befriended Ace! I must've looked so stupid! And then, your dearest son Ace got caught! With the Whitebeard pirates all within the Planetary Shield and we allied pirates on the outside. You have sold the allied commanders to the navy… in exchange for Ace's life! The allied pirates will be defeated to the last, and the Whitebeards and Ace will be safe. That's your deal with Sengoku, isn't it?! We didn't know anything about it, and we followed you here sacrificing our lives to save Ace and help you and this is what happens! In fact, we're the ones who have been attacked by the navy! The monsters approach from the back, the ice blocks us from circling around the planet, and we have no way out now! It's a miracle that I could stab you once. I'm prepared for it! Kill me! I didn't want to beleive it, I couldn't believe it! I never thought that old buddy would betray us!"
"You fool! You've been deceived, Squard! Why couldn't you trust Pops?!"
"Don't play innocent, Marco! You're the 1st division commander, I know that you knew about Ace and the deal with the navy!"
(whitebeard)"It's true that Ace is Roger's son. They used that to to their advantage, tricking the one man who would be most angered by that fact. Their strategy was a notch above us."

Ontop of the ship, a momentary silence reigns, while the Navy prepares the next step of its plan, even as the remnants of whitebeard's allied fleet move through the ice maze, slowly making their way around the planet, but not fast enough, for with each passing second more of them get caught and annihilated by the pursuing sith forces.

Now, whitebeard finishes standing up, looming over Squard, his anger very much clear to see.

(Whitebeard) "you know what you have done, right, Squard? You thrust a sword into your father's body. You're such a stupid son!"
The fist, seemingly coming in for a blow, turns into a close handed hug as Whitebeard kneels, using his halbeard as a third point of contact with the ground.
"But I love you, son, even if you are a fool. "
"Cut the crap… you sold our lives to…"
"Who pulled your upright and loyal heart into the darkness? Tell me."
"No one, I have no idea. It was an intrusive thought, one that suggested that if I kill you, the remants of the allied pirate fleet would be spared."
"Strange, but seems like that is what they wanted you to think. I know you hate Roger… so much that I can feel your pain. But, Squard, it's ridiculous to lay the blame on a child for the sins of the father. Did Ace do something to you? You and Ace have weathered agony, joy, and pain together… so many times along with the others, isn't it right? I don't give a damn who Ace's father is. We all met each other in this galaxy by chance! Not only the two of you but all of you, I take as my sons! So, Squard, treat him kindly. I don't love him more than any other. You are all family to me!"
And with those words, Squard finally drops his sword, and weeps for what he has done. Releasing him, Whitebeard stands up to his full height, and finally moves to step forth onto the battlefield, taking slow, measured paces towards the edge of the ship.
"Anyway… he has never… changed at all, Sengoku. He shook us up very well. How ridiculous to say that I sold my sons!"
And with those words Whitebeard stabs his halbeard into the hull of the ship, and once again sends his fists flying out, once again creating what looks like cracks in spacetime, cracks that grow until they almost touch the planetary shields overhead, almost dwarfing the entire embattled region on Marineford; and just like that, the network of ice that Aokiji made around this world crack and shatter into dust, with the shards themselves rapidly disappearing, even as the trapped moons move back out into where they previously were in orbit.

And with that, the few remaining allied pirate vessels break for orbit, having barely made it beyond the firing arks of the Sith fleet. Soon they are accelerating into hyperspace, seeming to make a clean getaway from the perspective of those on the ground; but that would not be the case, for within moments of entering FTL they are violently ripped out of it, just in time to be annihilated by the Sith's encircling forces as their Gravity Well Generators, a technology previously unknown to those within the Red Walls, prove their worth.

(whitebeard) "If you are a pirate, you pick what you want to believe on your own!"
Squard collapse, breaking out into sobbing tears, overjoyed that some of his friends might have made it out alive.
(Squard) I am so sorry! I will follow you to the end! Ouji Sama!"
(Whitebeard) I'm just a human with one heart. People would call me a devil or a monster, but I can't continue to be the strongest forever. If I can save this one man's life, I will earn my right to retire from the world. Those of you who who'll follow me, lay down your life for it!"
And with those words, a great warcry is unleashed, as Whitebeard charges for the edge of his ship, and jumps off.
(Sengoku)"Be Ready! He is going to run wild! He's the strongest man in the universe!"
"Let's Go!"
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Whitebeard swiftly lands on the ice unharmed, stirring up a small windstorm as the full weight of his Haki is unleashed. Within moments, several large artillery shells that were flying towards him have suddenly not just been halted, but have reversed course, flying back to hit the instillations that fired them. Soon, the marines are in a full retreat, swiftly withdrawing from the frozen starport even as the Whitebeard pirates charge after them; to delay their pursuers, the Marines unleash the last of its giants, titans and behemoths, who stride forward to halt the pirates' advance, the largest of which heads for Whitebeard himself, hoping to maybe, just maybe, land a critical blow on his weakened form; meanwhile, overhead elements of the Sith fleet close in, aiming to hit Whitebeard and his forces with a precision orbital bombardment, after all, he is now out in the open, and there are no soft Marine targets in the area, so friendly fire isn't too much of an issue…
"You're standing in my way. Move it."
Suddenly, Whitebeard, having used his halberd to deflect several shells, once again discards it, tossing it asside with an extremely large burst of haki. Suddenly, the world seems to slow, as time itself seems to crawl, and every single Sith, be they on the ground or in the fleet overhead, suddenly pales, as the force screams out a waring to them, for whitebeard has grabbed a hold of empty space, with spacetime itself bunching around his fingers just a little ways above his head, his arms straining with but the effort of grabbing onto such a thing; his halbeard finally hits the ground… and with an all mighty heave, reinforced by a will strong enough to split the heavens, Whitebeard pulls down on spacetime itself, and for the first time in this battle truly uses his Devil Fruit to somewhere actually close to its fullest potential.

The world heaves, and gravity itself seems to invert, as up becomes down and down becomes up; moments later, the planet itself starts to move, following the path laid out for it by Whitebeard's will. And so, with surprisingly little calamity, the world turns, rotating around an axis that is on its surface, rather than in its core, for its very center of gravity seemingly changed, and pulled the world into a spin. Surprisingly though, this does not come with obliterated continents, nor does it come with the mantle spilling out through a crust that is suddenly in the 'wrong' location relative to it; no, Whitebeard's control is too great for any such incidental mass devastation to occur; instead, for the most part it the planet, and everyone on it, moves with relative harmony; that isn't to say that there is no devastation though, as in the battlefield everything and everyone starts falling, first sideways, than up, as the world rotates around them. Some buildings crumble, while ground based war machines find themselves moving in ways that they were certainly not meant to. No one is unaffected, for even the Admirals are struggling to stay in the same locations under this effect- only whitebeard himself seems unaffected, even as he directs the carnage.

While the planet itself moves in harmony with Whitebeard's action, that does not stop the devastation, for while the planet was kept fully intact, that does not prevent its motion from effecting the wider universe; indeed, the planets rotation around its new axis turns it into a giant flyswatter, and the Marine and Sith fleets are but flies relative to its massive bulk; and while the force did scream in warning, this was not enough to stop a planet making a full revolution around a point not within itself in under a dozen minutes; and so the orbiting fleets are devastated, as impacts ring out, first against the planetary shields, and then against the planet itself.

And so Marineford is devastated, nearly a third of its surface reduced to rubble by countless impacts. Shockwaves radiate out from countless impacts, with only the presence of numerous localized shield batteries, and the fact that the entire surface of the planet is reinforced against such impacts(although not against this many of them) stops the rain of ships from prematurely ending the conflict anyways; either way, despite Whitebeard's unwillingness to crack open the planet like an egg, using it as a bowling ball ended Marineford's viability as a Fortress World anyways, with a third of its surface seemingly completely depopulated and stripped of surface defenses anyways. Here was the true power of the Goma Goma no mi, the ability to break a world, shifted into breaking only what Whitebeard wishes to break, leaving him, his forces, and his personal foes untouched by the planetary scale devastation.

Non the less, all that even Darth Nox could do in this instance was to anchor himself, and watch almost a full tenth of the forces that he brought with him get swatted out of the skies despite their best efforts. Nevertheless, his own personal plans for whitebeard would be untouched by this setback, as would Sengoku's.

Soon though, the world completes its rotation, ending up back almost where it started, but with that much less standing in Whitebeard's way. Moments later, he jumps up, moving to clear out the remaining obstacles in his path- and so he does, sending forth a more normal, if still incredibly large shockwave, clearing away the fallen forms of the Marines' Titans and lone remaining Behemoth, before going onwards; first breaking a new opening in the wall surrounding the frozen starport, then moving farther still, clearing away debris and marines with equal ease, soon reaching the base of the would-be execution platform. There though it is halted in a flash of black and golden light, as the three Admirals once again unveil themselves, working in concert to halt Whitebeard's blast though will alone. Radiating outwards, the halted blast shreds its way through fortifications and buildings already partially reduced to rubble; as for the Marine Admirals themselves, they appear untouched, the shockwave having been seemingly reduced to but a light breeze against their combined will. Standing upright, their arms out stretched before them, these three reveal themselves as the last (known) bulwark between Whitebeard and his goal.

And so, the Whitebeard pirates charge onwards, the way seemingly cleared for them by Whitebeard's actions, but this is where things would go from bad, to worse, for now that they no longer had to keep up the facade, the Marines could unleash their full might directly against the Whitebeard Pirates, alongside the final element of their trap.

Indeed, while the bowl shaped starport made for the perfect arrival point, it also made for the perfect trap, as a tailor made wall of shielded adamant rose up around its rim, turning the bowl from merely a killing field, to a death trap; indeed, these walls were massive, stretching up for kilometers beyond even the new frozen surface, drastically higher than the 'original' reinforced edge; indeed, for those fortifications rose alongside it, revealing themselves to merely be the topmost element of these recently placed defenses. Indeed, numerous hatches opened along the newly revealed surface, unveiling countless weapons pointed directly at the Whitebeard Pirates; but these newly unveiled weapons were not alone, as all over the surface of this hemisphere of Marineford countless hatches opened, revealing new, massive surface-to surface and surface-to-orbit artillery pieces, which then spoke almost as one, a cacophony almost as deafening as the rain of ships unleashing itself upon the world.

But all was not perfect with this trap, for one section of this new wall failed to rise, the portion on which Oars lay.

This was not the end of the incoming bombardment though, as Akainu himself added his own fists of lava to the incoming barrage, unleashing countless punches almost straight up, each one unleashing an expanding fist of lava flying high into the air to join in the incoming rain upon Whitebeard and his forces. Soon the sky was filled with the approaching death- ordinance to heavy to be simply blocked, even by the efforts of Whitebeard himself.

Soon under this withering barrage the ice that the Whitebeard Pirates started to melt away, dooming most of Whitebeard's conventional ground forces to what would have likely been their doom, for there was no retreating here, for all four of their ships were specifically targeted by this barrage. Within moments, the last two ships lost their shields, and Whitebeard's own flagship had its armor pierced in multiple locations even as its surface got covered with lava. There would be no going back, and with the risk of reactor death, or at the very least a slow death from their remaining exists being sealed off by molten rock, all three of Whitebeard's remaining ships had to be swiftly evacuated and left to sink into the swiftly forming new, boiling ocean. Those who made it out either took to the skies in what remaining strikecraft or aircraft, or swam for the nearest sufficiently large block of ice to avoid being cooked by the boiling water. There, they were met by lesser artillery fire, unleashed from the walls themselves. Elsewhere, where pirates managed to get close enough to the walls to avoid the incoming fire, they were met by new, hulking figures, over twice as tall as a normal man, unleashing lasers of doom from their open mouths; here, the Pacefistas, the Marine's first mass produced 'superweapon' were unleashed; extremely durable and armed with not one, but two partially replicated devil fruits, these slow moving, but nigh unstoppable entities would have been able to clean up the remaining Whitebeard Pirates, short of Whitebeard and his division commanders, on their own under normal circumstances; but these were not normal circumstances, for the enemy's gate was down.

Whitebeard unleashed another shockwave, even stronger than the last, ringing out and forward, it reached the wall… and barely left a dent in the reinforced material, as specially tuned fields dampened his shockwave, and the material itself easily withstood what remained of the blow, even as what little made it through wrecked havoc on the marines positioned behind it. Despite Whitebeard's best efforts, the wall held, and Whitebeard only had so many such blows left in him. Indeed, their only path forwards was through the gap opened by Oars, even though that would clearly be the Marine's most heavily fortified region(in terms of what ley beyond the wall).

Racing forwards, under fire the whole time, the Whitebeard's made their last, seemingly desperate charge; but even here whitebeard had a plan, for despite the seemingly random nature of their charge on their last remaining opening, there was a conspicuous gap left in their battlelines…

Near orbit, a single ship was suddenly yanked out of hyperspace, forced into the open by the Sith interdictors. Within seconds of its emergence it was annihilated, and with it went a spark of hope…

Their charge, once so forceful, suddenly faltered as whatever they expected to arrive, whatever final trick Whitebeard had up his metaphorical sleeves, failed to materialize. Nevertheless, the Whitebeard Pirates pressed onwards, for there was nowhere else for them to go, and no other chance of victory but to press onwards.

Before they could arrive at their destination, one other, smaller miracle unveiled itself, as Oars, not quite dead, got up on his hands and knees, and with even the slow, jolting movements that he could manage to make, he swept aside what conventional fortifications the marines managed to make at that entrance. Standing up on his hands and knees, he moved forwards again, once again trying to reach Ace, wherever he might be.

Here though, is where his story would likely end, for Kizaru lazily moved forward to end his life- this time for good; suddenly though, whatever plans Kizaru had were interrupted, as Marco flamed into the plaza, moving forward to engage Kizaru anew, and continue their duel. This bought enough time for the other Whitebeard pirates, hopping through the air at surprising speed(Geppo proliferation), to finish closing the distance to this one opening. Soon, Whitebeard and his commanders would be moving in to engage their counterparts, with Jozu moving off to keep Aokiji busy and prevent him from replacing the ruined fortifications with new walls of ice.

In another dimension, another universe, Whitebeard's opponent would have been Akainu, as the strongest of the Admrals moves in to stop Whitebeard before he could free Ace from his chains; but this was not that universe, and the Sith had other plans…

(to be continued…)

To be continued…Now

Whitebeard was many things. A pirate, a killer, a raider, a powerful man, but most importantly of all, a father. One of the things he was not was stupid. Something had gone terribly terribly wrong. He wasn't blind to the ongoings in the other blues and the Celestial Empire. He had indeed heard the rumors and whispers of those who had apparently arrived from beyond the Red Line. It was unheard of. Not even Roger or Rocks had ever left the Red Line, much less considered that anything could have lived beyond it. In hindsight, that was most definitely a fool's errand. And the rumors were true. But it wasn't the massive red flash that eclipsed the sky that confirmed it. Nor was it the small but abnormally powerful ships that came after it. No, it was when he first arrived. The moment he entered Marineford he could feel the unnatural chill that crept down his spine and into his aching body. It did nothing to hinder him. But it was that man that he kept seeing in his peripheral vision.

The first time, he thought of it as nothing. It was dark and he was on edge and he couldn't make it out as anything but a shapeless humanoid form. The second time, it was now closer to him and the shapeless form was somehow more recognizable. But still he ignored it.

But the third time. He knew what he saw. For but the briefest of moments he saw the empty sockets of a masked armored figure staring into his soul. And in that moment. He knew the rumors were true. It was constant afterwards. Always present and watching. Accompanying that damn chill going down his spine. But it was when he first walked out onto the deck of his ship to poke at Akainu that he finally saw him.

It would have been impossible were it not for his Haki enhanced vision. Hundreds of thousands of kilometers away. There he was, the man that haunted his vision standing in broad daylight. Standing without a care in the world atop the execution platform prepared for his own sun. The eyeless masked visage of Darth Nox. The unnatural and never before seen equipment and armor he wore was enough to make him stand out. Decked out in finely crafted armor of some metal and with gems, runes, and amulets deeply intertwined with it's make. But it was what his Observation saw that truly made him stand out.

Darth Nox was wrong to his sight. Wrong on a level so deep that it physically hurt him to look at the figure with his Observation. He didn't need to sense the strength of that man to know that he was as dangerous as can be. Nor did he need to know the facts to tell that he was not from here. Although why he would be working with the government, he does not know. But he carried on. He had too. For his sons who have died and his sons who need him now most of all.

His escape plan was crushed, how he does not know, and all that was left was to move forward. He just had to reach Ace. And then he could bring it all to the end. He can force a parlay, he can crush this world like a tin can and Sengoku knows this. Although he could tell that even Sengoku was deeply concerned while standing next to that man. Especially after that display of power in orbit. Once he has Ace free he can force the parlay. Do whatever needed to be done to get his sons out of here alive. His own life be damned. He's dying anyway. Just like Roger before him.

Whitebeard was a living natural disaster. His mere presence was enough to cause lesser men to fall over and foam at the mouth. And now that he had not just Ace counting on him but all of his sons? There was nothing he could not do. His body may be dying but it has not lost its strength. And his will to fight on is more than enough to force his old bones to keep chugging along.

And in the end? He had made it so close. They got past Sengoku's wall and closer to Ace. Still far, farther than he would like and in open ground no less. But better in the open than in that kill box. All that was between him and Ace was the three Navy Admirals. And as Marko and Jozu held off Kizaru and Aokiji he stood like the giant he was amidst the combat. The lesser marines cried and wailed at his presence as he held aloft his Murakumogiri. A quake bubble forming around the blade, the world shattering energy and force condensed into a tight package ready to be unleashed with but a single swing.

And then he appeared.

Moments Ago

Ashara had no idea how Xalek remained so calm throughout this maddening and honestly terrifying event. The Red Zone, it was insane! She has seen plenty during her time as a Jedi. More so after becoming Nox's apprentice. But nothing could compare to watching men turn themselves into fortress, cutting super dreadnoughts in half, or causing the planet and moons to shift out of orbit!

She hadn't ever seen Vitiate, Force save her fof that, but she had sensed him. It was impossible not too back home. He was impossible not to sense. Even a galaxy away. And at Ziost? She saw the lifeless husk of a world left behind. Even to this day still an ever devouring void of nothingness. Only Vitiate had ticked her senses off so much. The Force screaming at her at the danger she was constantly in. It was deafening and the madness of this place was only making it worse!

She was…she was…

"Calm yourself. Do not let your senses fool you. It is not power you are feeling but danger."

The voice of her master shook her out of her thoughts and briefly brought her out of the rapidly spiraling downward staircase that was her own senses and feelings. The Sith Lord was as calm as can be, holding himself above one of the prepared altars that was currently spewing out an eldritch blue smoke that caused the air to warp and bend in a way that was hard to describe. "You would feel the same if you were standing next to a high yield baradium explosive, armed and about to explode."

Ashara wasn't fully convinced by his words, but she took them to heart regardless and stepped away from the viewing port to the...outside. Her Master had really taken a liking to the powers of the "Shiro-Shiro no Mi" and, despite the weirdness of the situation of being inside a pocket dimension that's also held inside her master's body, was slightly jealous in a childish sort of way. Almost immediately after he gained the ability he began experimenting with it and while the results of which were unknown too her. She was aware that he came back and immediately demanded for a lot of technologies to overhaul his internal fortress. Although the strangest of his requests had to have been the Isotope-5 droids that he had "requisitioned" and brought inside his pocket dimension.

Moving to take a side next to her master, with Xalek already perpetually at his side anyway, she watched as the Dark Lord carefully moved ingredients and more into a second alter to the side, the cauldron already prepped and ready for the next ritual. She wasn't a great alchemist, and it was an unfortunate truth that Nox said she didn't have a hint of the Gift required to even cast Sith Magic, so her effectiveness in the art would have even been further stippled. But even so, she could tell just how high quality the ingredients were. But one stood out to her. A single drop of blood contained in a vial. Something so miniscule in comparison to the literal masterwork items that were being put into a seemingly never full bowl.

"Master. What is the blood for?"

A pause.

The duplicate of Nox turned and gave her a look from behind the mask and then towards the blood and then back to her.

"Bonds between individuals are powerful things." Was his simple reply. A reply Ashara only questioned. "But they're not Force Sensitive? I thought we confirmed this? How could they have a Force Bond?"

Another pause. And then. "It's about time." Nox moved away from his currently in-use alter and let the magic fade. Instead moving to the prepared one and grabbing the drop of blood and turning back towards her before dropping it in. "The Force connects all life. Familial bonds are a suitable substitution for a Force Bond. Blood related they might not be, Newgate's obsession with his crew has formed a bond nonetheless. Now. Enough questions. Murder and mayhem await."

Space folded in on itself like a piece of paper. Darth Nox teleporting in front of Whitebeard caused the entire battlefield around them to momentarily pause as not only had this unknown individual appeared and stood in the way of Whitebeard. To them he was a nobody. He wasn't an Admiral. He wasn't Garp. Nor was he Sengoku. He wasn't even a Warlord. It was brazen, suicidal even from their perspective. All but too Whitebeard. This was the man that haunted his peripheral like a specter and had brought death upon his sons.

He would kill him. He must kill him! Rage bubbled beneath the surface as the air and ground cracked under the pressure of Whitebeard's power.

First the ground underneath Whitebeard gave way. Sinking him slightly into a sinkhole as the quake bubble around his bladed weapon shimmered as more and more power was forced into that condensed ball of energy. It lasted for only for a second but it seemed to go for an eternity as the air ground was pushed away from him. The ground turning into the viscosity of water as the crater expanded further and further along with the winds that came from Whitebeard, eclipsing that of even the strongest of known hurricanes as lesser men and women were swept off their feet and ragdolled into the wind like trash.

Whitebeard drew back his Murakumogiri for a single massive arch with the intention to pulverize the man that had appeared before him into dust along with everyone that stood behind him. And still Nox did nothing. Even as Edward Newgate's killer intent locked solely upon him. Swinging it overhead with all of his might, Whitebeard's bisento moved with the force to shatter a world.

Only to halt mid swing.

There was a moment of complete and utter silence as everyone watched Whitebeard stop. The quake bubble on his blade dissipating as the Strongest Man Alive was halted in his tracks. Fear set in like never before along with cries of "Pops!" or "Father!" as Marco, more aware of Whitebeard's medical condition than most, gasped in horror at the assumed heart attack that he knew very well was coming. And all of their fears were immediately justified and expanded upon in abject horror as Whitebeard not only grasped his heart but completely collapsed onto his knees. But it didn't end there. Whitebeard's eyes grew wild and bloodshot, his skin and muscles and bones burned as blood came streaming out of eyes, ears, and nostrils. Even as his skin grew paler by the second and his veins began turning an unnatural shade of black, Whitebeard could feel his very being be torn apart. This wasn't his disease. This was pain unlike anything he had ever felt before. He couldn't stop it. His body and Haki tried with all their might to ward off what unnatural force was worming its way into his very soul.

Everyone, marines included, were frozen as Whitebeard, who's condition only worsened by the second, first began moaning, and then growling, and then coughing, only to fall completely onto his hands and his knees as he began vomiting lifeblood. It was horrific to watch for everyone involved. Made even worse as the area around them visibly darkened and became oppressive. The air became thick and hard to breathe, with those who could still barely move feeling as if it was like walking through a grave. It was only made worse as Darth Nox outstretched his hand. Motes of starlight forming and coalescing into shape around his grasp and outstretching further to form his signature double bladed sword. The darkening presence only intensified as gravity itself seemed to increase as most fell to the knees upon the completion of the Sith Sword and the apparition of its powerful Force Nexus. The ornate double bladed sword's crystals hummed and glowed as the main Lignan Crystal at the center thrummed to life and channeled black plasma and smoke across the twin blades once more. The Dark Side itself entrenching into the space around Nox as the bound Smoke Demon fully appeared and flowed and expanded Nox's form like a visible dark aura.

With a swing of his blade and a flash of will Nox firmly established the area around him and Whitebeard in pitch darkness. To the view of the marines and gathered pirates it was a black orb that they could not look into and absorbed any light around it like a black hole. But to Whitebeard? To Whitebeard it was as if the sun had set completely and black clouds cast over the sky. He could barely see and what little he could was hazed even further by purple wisps that flowed out of the ground and into the air before dissipating.

It was as if the cold hand of death herself had reached out into the living world to lay claim to Whitebeard. Body, mind, and soul in all. No. He couldn't let this happen. He won't let this happen! Grabbing as firmly onto his bisento as possible, Whitebeard growled even as the curse intensified the more he tried to resist. The pressure on not just his body but mind and soul was an all devouring sensation that drowned out any other feeling. But still, he tried to rise to his feet and stand once more.

"Do.." He tried to speak, even as more of his lifeblood continued to pour out of his mouth. "Do…you...really think." He finished, rising to a knee and a boot. The audible groan of and shake of the ground as he rose to his feet was felt even outside the bubble, whereupon the battle had quickly resumed after line of sight was lost with Whitebeard and Nox. The marines desperately trying to keep Whitebeard's pirates away from Nox's darkness.

"Do you really think!" Another shake and an audible shout even heard from within the darkness.

"That…" Another shake as Whitebeard collapsed to a knee again. "That you can!" Another shake of the ground as Whitebeard firmly planted himself back onto his feet. This time causing the ground to visibly crack and crumble as he stood up once more.

"That you can kill me so easily!" Even as his skin grew ragged and pale, his veins a sickly black, and with fresh lifeblood pouring down onto the ground, Whitebeard refused to give in. His proclamation to survive even this unnatural curse was enough to spur on those outside the darkness into a frenzy. Hearing that was enough to give them the assurance that their pops still stood defiant and strong. The will to keep fighting despite the odds.

But Nox, even as amused as he was at the display of defiance, did not intend to do nothing and just let his prey stand for much longer. A cathartic death it would be then, in his mind at least. A proclamation of defiance for all to hear. Only then for silence to reign once more. Yes. That would do nicely in Nox's mind.

When Whitebeard spoke aloud and moved to try and stand on his feet, the Smoke Demon, Nox's ever soul bound companion, had moved unseen and unheard within the darkness. The aura it gave Nox was like an ever rising and writhing inferno. Moving with clear intent and action. Smokey tendrils moved out the cloud and along the ground to circle around Whitebeard's feet. As he spoke aloud his proclamation and firmly entrenched himself back onto his feet they rose. Up his legs and around his torso, silent and unnoticeable to Whitebeard. And then Nox spoke two words. A whisper on the wind for only him and reality to hear. A command. A spell to end it all. "Qorit Kyantuska." End Thought.

"I…" Whitebeard's firm voice trailed off and slurred as the spell took effect and the Smoke Demon flowed into his body. Whitebeard's eyes went cold and dark as they lost all focus. Unable to form words as his body went rigid. Only able to slur slightly and mumble as his conscious mind fumbled and died.

Those on the outside of the darkness were completely unaware as their captain, their pops, was seemingly laid low by the magics of Darth Nox. Their shouts and the other sounds of combat were unheard entirely by Whitebeard as his eyes, having lost all color and focus, stared blankly at the masked visage of Darth Nox. Who's own empty eye sockets glowed a bright purple. The Smoke Demon only continued its entrapment and consumption of Whitebeard. Flowing in and around him and encasing him in a cocoon of whisky tendrils that only added to the curse that was attempting to kill Whitebeard. And as his body slowly withered, it also slowly turned transparent as he was consumed from the soul-out by the Smoke Demon. Darkness ebbed at his hazy vision only to be completely blocked by the Smoke Demon's tendrils encasing his head as well. The last thing he saw before it all went black was two minuscule dots within the glowing eye sockets of Darth Nox.

Everything was so cold. It hurts to think…why…where..who was he? What…is…happening? Something..was wrong. What..he..he was here for something…or…no…yes? It…

"This is amazing!"

"Hey! Why are you sitting over there by yourself? Come over here! We've got plenty of treasure here!"

"Never mind him."

"Huh? Never mind? This loot belongs to him too, you know.."

"I said never mind. He's not interested in the loot."

"Now, that's odd! A pirate who doesn't care about treasure?"

"What do you want, then? Hey, Newgate!"

…What was here for…it was something important to him. Something he wanted since he was a child. It was so hard too think. Who was he? Where was he? What did he want? Everything seemed so unimportant. Why bother even trying to think at all? What was the point. He could just..He could just…

"There's one thing I've wanted, every since I was a kid."

"Oh, there is? Tell us!"

Yes..he did want something…or…did he already have it? Did he? It…what was it? What was so important to him? Why couldn't he..why couldn't he…remember. It's so close. Yet so far. What…did…he…have?

"A family."

"I…" Whitebeard spoke aloud once more. His voice reaching past the darknesses and into the ongoing battlefield outside. Darth Nox shook at the immense mental pushback. It unlike anything he had ever felt before. Whitebeard was as sure as dead. Having gone completely silent and mentally defunct for minutes! All the while under the the effects of his most powerful curse yet and being devoured by a Smoke Demon!

"I…" Nox would have taken a visible step back from Whitebeard after he spoke without slur or incomprehension, if anyone had been there to see it. The first time concerned him. But the second time worried him. The Smoke Demon tightened its grasp on Whitebeard further, more and more of it ever expanding body seeping into his flesh and soul. Nox too fought back harder. Drawing further upon the Dark Side to silence the 6 meter tall inhuman monstrosity before him. He recited spells after spells and further tightened his mental grip upon Whitebeard, to not avail.

"I AM WHITEBEARD!"

Whitebeard's eyes turned a dark red as he announced to the world his name. The pressure was felt before the light was seen as the red light of a Conqueror exploded outward from Whitebeard's body and completely blew away the darkness surrounding him and Darth Nox. The Smoke Demon, who's tendrils had been invaded Whitebeard's body and attempting to devouring his soul and had made him completely transparent at this point, was blown away from him and audibly hissed in pain as Whitebeard's soul, from its and Nox's perspective, burned with the brightness of the sun and burned away the tendrils around him in the same shockwave of red light that would completely annihilate the darknesses.

Whitebeard's Conqueror's Haki caused the ground alone to crack and the walls of Marine HQ to tremble. Going all the way to Sengoku himself and causing the man to grimace as an entire army of marines were completely knocked unconscious and foaming at the mouth just by being exposed to such power. His crew, his family, which had lost the momentum they initially arrived with, was invigorated by the sight of Whitebeard once more. This time looking better than when they had last seen him as the curse which was inflicted on him was completely pushed back and, while still afflicting him, was no longer on the verge of killing him. Especially with the renewed vigor and determination of the Strongest Man Alive.

Darth Nox, even as his bound demon hissed and writhed in agony at the attack, held his ground whereas the marines that he had made his "allies" were either blown away, completely pulverized, knocked unconscious, or staggered backwards from Whitebeard's Haki. The three marine admirals having too been knocked away. Instead he held an arm out and bolstered himself with a power alien to Haki. The Dark Side bolstered him and kept him strong. His will and mental strength greater than any of the other pieces on the board.

But Whitebeard was not done. Holding his Murakumogiri above his head and infusing it with his will to save his family. He swung it in a downwards arc and carved through the stone and ground like it wasn't even there. Almost immediately his blade made contact with flesh as it bisected a dozen cloaked Sith Assassins and continued traveling through them and bisecting a dozen more. Assassins, who are renowned for drawing strength from their target to increase their own power, were powerless against Whitebeard's weapon as it moved through them with ease. Any lightsaber or blade that made contact with his bisento in a vain attempt to block it was instantly shattered and ignored. The ground shook from an earthquake strong enough too crumble fortresses and force men to their knees just from his Haki infused weapon alone. The ground practically exploded around them all and when Whitebeard's blade finally exited the ground it unleashed a shockwave not unlike the one done by Mihawk before him. Tanks, walkers, men, and buildings were flung into orbit. Killed or destroyed from the pressure alone. Not even needing to fall down to Marineford.

It was like an act of god, of power and devastation. And as bodies and pieces fell around him, Whitebeard, eyed the one thing that had remained standing in front of him. There, unharmed and somehow untouched, was Darth Nox. One hand held aloft and projecting a field of energy around him while the other still grasped the double bladed Sith sword that exuded the power of the Dark Side almost as much as Nox did himself.

"You sure do love flinging trash around, don't you? No one ever teach you that you should be careful where it goes? After all, so many recyclables now thrown out into the waste bin." Nox snarked, lowering his hand as he spoke and dispelling the barrier.

"So you do speak." Was Whitebeard's crass retort. Not even acknowledging the comment and instead focusing entirely upon the individual. His words were precise and cold, with an obvious hint of arrogance and sarcasm. Being up close and personal let Whitebeard finally notice just how intricate his equipment is. The armor and weapons carved with runes and gems that glowed many different colors. And now? Being exposed to it? He could visibly see the air warp and warble. Almost as if it was a heat like haze.

"And your name is?"

Whitebeard's question went unanswered for a few moments. The Sith Lord contemplating the answer to give, if to give one at all. Until. "Kallig. My name is Solnis Kallig." Instantly, as if waiting on a queue, the tension in the air around them intensified. The Smoke Demon expanding outward with Kallig's will. Like a massive aura of flames around him, Nox, outstretched his hand and space contorted and screamed as Nox was instantly teleported within grabbing distance of Whitebeard. Before he could bring his weapon too bare, Nox grabbed onto his lowered arm and both he and Whitebeard vanished. Leaving the Marine HQ and his crew behind.

Elsewhere, far enough away to where even the peaks of the mountain sized fortress of Marine HQ were naught but a glint in the horizon, both Nox and Whitebeard reappeared. Teleported away. So as to not be interrupted by anyone else. No more exchange of words and no distractions. Only life or struggle that, unbeknownst to either of them at the time, was a major turning point that would decide the fate of the Galaxy.

Nox's double blades met Whitebeard's bisento in a clash of arcane magics and pure will! Whitebeard was strong. Strong in a way that not even the Empire's Wrath would have been able to match him in a contest of strength, beyond superhuman and into the level of the absurd. But Nox did not need to match him. Instead he made Whitebeard match him. Spells, curses, and the still ever creeping ritual upon Whitebeard's flesh were flung one after another in their clash of blades at blinding speeds. Unable to bring his full strength bare and having no defenses against such Force afflictions beyond his Haki was enough too see Nox through their initial bout.

Even so.

Nox was struggling to match even the weakened, slowed, and cursed Whitebeard. Delving deeper into the Dark Side like he had never done so before. Welcoming more strength into his body even as his muscles and mind strained against the man with the moniker of "Strongest Man Alive."

Forcing the Sith Lord back with several wide swings of his bisento, Whitebeard watched as Solnis moved through the air with the aid of the Force, backflipping into full form as his Smoke Demon whipped out at him with hundreds of tendrils at gatling speeds. A cacophony of noise as each one broke the sound barrier and was met with a twirling bisento imbued with Haki. Nox himself flung Bolts of Hatred at Whitebeard, each one necessitating an even mightier swing of his weapon that left him open to others, not that he cared even as the demon's tendrils left gashes in his torso.

Landing on the ground and already on the move, Nox broke the difference and was upon Whitebeard again instantly. The comparatively small Sith Lord was like a toddler in comparison to the 6, nearly 7, meter tall mountain of a man. But even so, his gashes and burns left their mark upon Whitebeard's flesh. And as Nox entered into striking distances, Whitebeard's blade moved through the air and moved to cut Nox down. This time, the Sith Lord not even moving to block. Time seemed to slow down as the blade cut across Nox's chest and left no mark upon his armor, passing through the Sith Lord as if he wasn't even there.

Miles away, Sengoku watched as Ace yelled out in agony as a horrific gash ripped through his chest. Already healing as a silent spell of regeneration was cast upon him by Nox before engaging Whitebeard, leaving Sengoku worried and confused.

Nox's blade tasted blood and then burnt flesh as it pierced through his torso and out his back. The Sith Lord having used the intended opening well to stab Whitebeard right through the sternum. Yet in the same manner as Nox, Whitebeard grabbed Nox in his hands and tossed the Sith Lord away from him and leaving the blade stuck through his sternum. Giving it but a glance as he pulled it out while saying, with some amount of suspicious anger. "What. Did you do?"

Nox, landing on his feet after being thrown, brushed himself off while retrieving a now broken straw doll from his body. The area momentarily turning to straw as he does so. "Your smart. I think you can figure it out." He said smugly.

The air and ground shook from Whitebeard's anger as his eyes looked at the blood at the tip of his bisento. "The Wara Wara no Mi." he spat. Before looking at the incredibly familiar broken doll that Nox tossed aside. His heart filled with anger and worry as his eyes turned to daggers. "…Ace…"

"Yes." Nox mockingly said. Drawing out the word as he did so. "Do be careful won't you? Wouldn't want to kill your son now would you? Or maybe you do. You did bring your entire family here to be slaughtered wholesale. And they call me sadistic." He continued. His words only adding more fuel to the fire that was Whitebeard's righteous anger. The ground cracking like glass as it spiderwebbed from his feet.

Whitebeard's teeth were audibly grinding against each other now. His anger at Nox growing with each passing second. Anger. But controllable anger. "Oh…I'll be careful brat."

The Force screamed at Nox as Whitebeard's arm moved to reach outwards towards seemingly nothing. His fingers wrapping around spacetime, his single arm straining as he begins to pull downward. There was a second across the planet as everyone felt the tug of gravity begin to move. The same force that moved the planet again beginning to act up. The power of the Gura Gura No Mi being unleashed once more. Until it stopped. The force pulling on them ended. Gone like it was never even there. Whitebeard's arm moved through empty space as he lost his grip…no. He lost his ability to grip spacetime. His entire body felt weakened as he gasped only for no sound to be heard. His eyes went wide as his breath caught nothing. The air was gone. Nox had completely turned the entire area into a vacuum using Alter Environment.

He didn't have time to react. Moving on instinct, Whitebeard moved with vanishing speed towards Nox, aiming to break whatever hold he had on the environment. Hitting nothing but air as Nox similarly vanished. Having been several steps ahead.

Reappearing a distance away, and contrary to all rules of the Devil Fruits that Whitebeard knew of, used a second Devil Fruit ability and while still in the vacuum to boot. With the power of the Shiro Shiro no Mi, Nox's body opened up. But not with drawbridges and gates, but with metallic doors and ray shielding. A couple, then a dozen, and then dozens more until hundreds of the best and most powerful Sith Nox had with him came rushing out the fortress. They gathered around Nox in a horde of red light and glistening blades and by Nox's side stood the towering and ever looming presence of Khem Val, a titan of power and strength in his own right.

Taking a few steps back alongside his chosen bodyguard and a few fellow sorcerers and Darths, Nox gave his telepathic command. Kill Whitebeard. No matter the cost. No words could be said in this artificial vacuum. Only actions. And the Sith's action speak loud enough to Whitebeard as the horde of Force users rushed at him in an unsettlingly coordinated rush. Pushed on and aided by Darth Nox's Battle Meditation.

His control over them was as such that they were willingly throwing their lives away. Even as the first wave met Whitebeard, who was still only getting weaker by the second without any oxygen and being constantly bombarded by spells and the curse eating away at him, cut them down with ease. The first to die had his entire body pulverized with a single punch, sending his broken corpse over the others as the second had his entire torso blown off by a, comparatively, light poke with the Murakumogiri's pommel. It was like many small waves crashing upon cliff face. Individually they could do nothing. But the march of time and constant bombardment would wither even the mightiest of defenses down to nothing. But the Strongest Man in the Universe would not make it easier. To say Whitebeard waded through the horde of Sith would be an understatement and gross downplaying of Whitebeard's abilities. He was not just strong. He was also fast. And the sight of a nearly 7 meter tall man moving at beyond superhuman speeds and swinging a bisento even faster.

The first wave was cut down in a single swing. His blade moving through the vacuum and creating a wave of energy powerful enough to reduce anyone it touched into liquid. Nothing of them was left behind and it rolled on over to the next, only to be met with a Force barrier that rolled over the wave and entrapped it before rolling forwards and toward Whitebeard. The sorcerers of Nox already working their magics as they moved to turn his own strength against him as the rest of the horde pressed on behind it.

It wasn't a worry anyway. Merely jumping over and on top of the barrier, using it as a platform to crash into the oncoming Sith Lords like a blender of destruction. Whitebeard grabbed one and kicked another at the same, both marauders being turned into nothing but bloody smears before going onto the next and then the next. It was a horrific display of just how strong Whitebeard was that even while being in a complete vacuum, cursed and harried by spells and effects by dozens of Sith, powerful sorcerers, and Nox himself, he was still so far above them that they were like Kath Hounds to a rampaging Terentatek.

Killing the Sith with a single touch, he moved through them with ease. His sheer bulk alone being enough to break those caught in his way as he pushed towards Darth Nox even while being harried by over a hundred Sith. A number that was rapidly declining in size. A few dozen at once moved against Whitebeard, each a veteran Sith Warrior with thousands of kills to their name with many of them being Jedi Knights or even a Jedi Master here and there. And still they meant nothing. The same red light as before burst out of Whitebeard and, without even physically touching them, turned every single one of them into a fine red mist that was quickly beginning covering the battlefield like a fog. It was as if just being exposed to that red light was enough to vaporize them. However, some ground was finally held as three proper Sith Lords entered into the fray. Spurred on by Darth Nox's mental domination upon the few that had yet to enter battle directly, the three lords having been waiting back to observe and figure out their chances. Chances that would have had them refused were it not for a mental shove in the right (wrong) direction.

Irregardless of their motivations, of lack thereof, the three Sith Lords backed up by dozens of Sith Warriors and Assassins were able to halt Whitebeard's advanced. Due in no small part to the couple of Sorcerers that had finally got their act together and were actively unleashing the power of Sith Magic. Black mist covered the ground around Whitebeard and the Sith as Dark Side Tendrils ripped out of the ground and were practically forming a wall dozens of meters high composed entirely of individual tendrils that writhed whipped about at Whitebeard. Anything they made in contact with simply ceasing to exist from reality, be it the ground, the bloody mist, or a corpse.

Whitebeard, who had up until this point had no trouble just walking through the Sith, was held at bay by the tendrils and the Sith. Each one of the three Sith Lords practically teleporting around him as they moved in unnerving unison alongside the weaker Sith who were in his way. His bisento was a blur of movement, imbued with his will as it was, cut through anything with ease. But the tendrils that he was forced to block actually hurt to block, as weird as it sounded. His Haki being exposed to the full scope of the Dark Side and it's blatant disregard for the law of conservation of energy. Still he marched on. Even as Force lighting arced across his body and weapon from multiple sources and lightsabers were blocked and then shattered by a riposte. The lords however, proved far trickier to deal with. They had learned the lesson of the others before them and would not dare to block Whitebeard's strikes. Merely dodging. Indeed so were the others, if less successfully then them.

It's like dealing with killer bees. Whitebeard thought, blocking three lightsabers at once and spinning his weapon like a buzzsaw to deal with the tendrils whipping about at him. He was surrounded and halted, if momentarily. But finally a breakthrough was gained as Whitebeard reached out at blinding speed and completely grasped the most heavily armored of the Sith Lords, the massive hand grasping the Sith Lord by both of his legs and hoisting him into the air. Even as the bones and armor cracked under his grip, Whitebeard used the flailing Sith Lord as a bludgeon for his off hand while he parried the tendrils with his other. Smashing three Marauders at once with his new weapon, which was mighty durable if the man's incessant screaming was anything to go by even as the weaker Sith were pulverized on impact.

The next use of his "weapon" silenced it for good as the helmet of his "weapon" impacted with another one of the Sith Lords and smashing both of their skulls open instantly, their heads popping like a watermelon. With two Sith Lords dead and a writhing wall of in the way, Whitebeard tossed the now headless corpses at the wall full force. The thrown body immediely breaking the sound barrier and pulverizing a few Sith along way before impacting the wall to no effect. The body erased upon contact. Frowning at the result and needing to get past, he grabbed the ground and pulled with all of his might. While not as effective as the Gura Gura No Mi, his raw strength alone was still enough to achieve the desired effect of flipping the entire area around him like it was a table. The wall of tendrils, the remaining Sith Lord, and most of the horde caught in it's wake as they were completely thrown up into the sky by the force alone and those that survived the ordeal only had a momentarily reprieve as the ground that was also flipped impacted those in the sky as it flung straight through the clouds and into orbit, the mass of tendrils still attached to it.

Beneath his mask, Nox blinked in confusion at Whitebeard throwing an entire chunk of the ground into space before recollecting himself and in that moment of confusion alone, Whitebeard had already completely mulched through the remaining Sith in his way at a dead sprint. No longer being in enough numbers to even survive a close encounter with Whitebeard for a moment.

Nox turned to one of his lesser Darths, Callous, a Thanaton holdover, and smacked him upside the head. A wordless order to stop sitting there and stop the approaching pirate. Kallous and the other Darth looked at each other for a moment before igniting their lightsabers and moving forward to stand in Whitebeard's way.

Electricity arced across Darth Kallous' body before a wave of lighting shot out and impacted Whitebeard directly. The amount of voltage and power being enough to vaporize scores of lesser Jedi and Sith. But all it did too Whitebeard was halt him in his tracks as he dug in his heels and grit his teeth even as his body was viciously electrocuted. The second Darth, Macerus, was already upon him soon after. Two red lightsabers plunging into his chest and pulled out in a blur of motion as bolt after bolt of radiant spheres of condensed hatred came from the Sorcerers behind them.

Beset by all sides by two Darths and a cabal of powerful Sorcerers, with Kallig himself having realized that his Battle Meditaiton would do him no good any longer and quickly resummoning his blade to his hand, Whitebeard was cornered. As strong as his will was, his body had limits and weaknesses that even he could not overcome through strength alone.

His body was running on fumes and the weaker he became the more ground whatever curse laid upon gained on his soul.

His body tightened and his eyes narrowed through the electrical storm towards and met the empty sockets of Nox's mask. Looking past the Sith Lord and to the peaks of Marine HQ, Whitebeard swung his bisento in an upwards arc. The blade immediately hitting armor and then flesh as it passed through Macerus with ease and unleashed a wave of energy that seemed to flow through space itself.

Nox's hidden eyes widened as the paper thin slice of spacial distortion passed over him, doing no harm of course. But as he quickly summoned one of the straw dolls he saw no harm done upon it. To his confusion. Confusion that was quickly changed to pain and anger as his ears popped and nearly burst from wave of concussive force. The air being forcefully pushed back into the artificially created vacuum. Turning around to see the entire top half of Marine HQ having vanished and replaced with falling rubble.

He didn't need his precognition to know what was about to happen next.

Nox only spared a single glance and nod to Khem Val before vanishing, just as the sound of Whitebeard taking a single massive breath occured. Followed a second afterwards by a cacophonous cracking and crashing of a thousand shattering windows. A massive luminescent quake bubble mowing down all in it's wake at impossible speeds. Kallous never stood a chance and the other Sorcerers were just that little bit slower than Nox and engulfed as well.

Khem Val? Well.

He's felt worse.

Time flowed differently for the dead, more connected to the Force than they ever were in life. Even for the spirits of the Sith, not just the Jedi. Beings such as I may not be as subsumed into it as the Jedi might be, but even we can feel the strands of fate and time far greater than any mortal seer. The shattering of Time and Space however was nothing we could foresee. Until now. This universe, multiverse, omniverse. Whatever it may be matters not. What matters is how this dimension operated so much on carefully cultivated fate and destiny. Such changes that have now been shattered by the arrival of so many new people and places from across the vast cosmos of the omniverse.

And in their place, despite the efforts of whomever or whatever acts like a God, has been a chaos so unfamiliar to them. But one far more familiar to us. I can see so much more. So many narrative threads and pulls. But even I could not foresee the outcome all the time.

Flesh of my Flesh. What have you done?

The best thing about teleportation is that it's instantaneous. The worst thing about teleportation is that it's instantaneous. When Nox reappeared, folding space back into position, he had escaped the bubble of hyper condensed kinetic energy. Unfortunately that also meant he "outran" the shockwaves and quakes that occurred after it has detonated.

It was like being on the receiving end of one of the Wrath's Force pushes. Their wasn't even enough time to think before a wall of force and rapidly moving air swept the Sith Lord off his feet and tumbling through the air. He wasn't exactly sent flying but he didn't particularly enjoy the tumble across the ground. Luckily no actual damage had occurred that would've used up one of his limited tools.

Getting back into his feat, Nox's view of the crushed and cracked landscape came up with nothing. His remaining forces, Khem Val, and Whitebeard were gone. The Sith Lord let out an atypical groan as he turned around and connected his mind back to his companion an-

"Nine."

Nox swept backwards instantly with his blade! Twisting his entire body towards the towering presence that somehow appeared behind him. The burning black plasma coated blade stopped dead center on Whitebeard's chest, Nox's armed firmly grasped in his massive oversized hands. There was a brief pull and then "Eight." as far away, Ace grit his teeth as his right arm was completely dislocated from his socket. Whitebeard continued pulling and lifted Nox off his feet like a ragdoll and up and over his head before slamming him into the ground. Bruises forming on Ace's back as Nox was slammed. "Seven." Whitebeard continued, counting.

Smoke exploded outwards from Nox's prone body, engulfing both him and Whitebeard as it expanded. His grip on Nox broken and his view obscured completely as he stepped away from the mass of magically corrosive and intelligent smoke. Followed immediately after by a spinning buzzsaw of a Sith sword that rocketed out of the smoke and at Whitebeard. His skin hardening before it racked across his chest like a blur, leaving a steaming red mark across the blackened flesh as it boomeranging away and back.

Putting his weight onto one foot and pivoting his entire body around, Whitebeard reached out with all of his unnatural might. Catching his own blade midflip, Nox's form phased out of reality just as the massive hardened hand reached around him. The Sith Lord phasing through Whitebeard's body and out onto the other side. A burning sharp pain wracked his body as the backend of Nox's weapon pierced through Whitebeard's coat and into his back upon Nox's return to reality.

Not that it even slowed the behemoth down. Slamming his bisento into the ground and causing a shockwave from the impact alone, he, despite the impossibility of the maneuver, used his own weapon as leverage and twirled around it like a pole.

Launching forward and getting right up next to Nox, his large hand gripped the Sith Lord's torso and slammed him into the ground and then pulled him out. "Six."

Again he was slammed into the ground. And again he was pulled out of it. "Five."

Vanishing from his grip and reappearing on a nearby plateau away from Whitebeard, Nox was already casting a spell. Reality itself contorted and twisted, turning colors that can not even bee described as power rippled and flowed across the planet in waves. Thunder boomed and an unknown roar echoed as the act of preforming this magic alone made space-time cave in upon itself. Nox's glowing eyes bore actual holes into Whitebeard's flesh as it bubbled and turned to ash under the amount of hatred and power he was channelling.

Whipping one hand backwards, Nox moved to pull the air away from Whitebeard once more, leave him powerless and weakened as possible for this dark art. Instead he was the one taken aback as Whitebeard, moving with foresight of his own, gripped the air around him with one hand and tugged it backwards. Whitebeard, with the power of the Gura Gura fruit, held and physically kept the air around him even as Nox forcefully tried to remove it.

Reality itself shook and cracked under the pressure of two individuals vying for control over it in order to destroy the other. Whitebeard intending to move forward but found himself stuck in place as strands of energy wrapped around him like a mesh. The lattice around him holding him in place and sapping his strength, or attempting to anyway. The effect was what was intended however as Whitebeard was rendered still.

The sky itself seemed to be cracking like glass, visibly spiderwebbing above and across the horizon. The ongoing battle at Marineford was halted momentarily at the obvious display of Whitebeard's power as everyone held on, preparing for something, anything, to happen. His face contorting in pain and determination as he fought his own body, Whitebeard continued to pull as hard he could upon the air. His only lifeline. In contrast; Nox was silent and emotionless. The only sign of visible strain being the deep purple glow emanating from his empty eye sockets. The cracking and roaring reaching a crescendo as, high in the sky, the sun, in defiance of how long it takes light to travel, shimmered as the spell finally took hold.

Whitebeard's eyes widened and grew concerned as, for the first time ever, he was on the receiving end of his precognition screaming in alarm at him. He could not move and he was holding onto the air to keep his power and stamina. There was a moment of self-reflection as he realized he had been had, before his face turned to grim determination. His eyes turned upwards and he dropped his bisento onto the ground. With one hand gripping the air he gripped space with the other. There was no time, but neither was their any hesitation.

Damning the consequences of acting rashly. Up became down and down became up as the planet itself shook under the hasty action as, for while Whitebeard could not move, he could still move the planet. For a second time, the world turns, rotating around upon the axis that is now Whitebeard. It was only by an inch, an infinitesimal amount of distance cosmologically. But even that much, done in such haste and desperation, was enough to nearly crack the mantle. Continents across the world suffered earthquakes and cracks deep into the earth spiderwebbed across them. Volcanoes erupted and exploded, the oceans momentarily spilled outward, and enough gasses to doom the world in about a year or so came out of newly opened crevasse.

But it was enough.

To those who could see, not falling or killed by the extinction level cataclysm, they saw the sun visibly contort before, from their point of view anyway, as it stretched across the horizon before a ray of light, as that it was it could only be described as, broke through the atmosphere at faster than light speeds. The power of a solar flare, condensed into a beam and drawn from across the solar system at a target. One of the greatest spells a Sith Magician could ever hope to achieve, Supernova. Although a lesser, but no less impressive, application of the spell.

This condensed solar flare burned a path through space, moving across the distance between the sun and Marineford in seconds. The instant it broke atmosphere it moved into and then through the planet. It went into the planet on one side. Then exited out the other. Narrowly, but intentionally, missing the core. And as for Whitebeard. He stared wide eyed as he came face to face with what amounts to death itself. The raw energy of the sun moved through where he was, narrowly missing him by an inch. There was no sound however, nor any heat. The spell containing any and all energy that could have created as such. Complete silence as it bore a hole through the planet.

Whitebeard stepped away from the charred but empty hole to watch his armored adversary collapse onto a knee. Nox could still fight, it was nothing. His power can't destroy him, he made sure of it. He could still fight.

But so could Whitebeard.

"Four." Instantly he was slammed into the ground. Once again in the grip of Whitebeard, this time tired and aching from a spell of apocalyptic proportions.

"You almost had me there brat. I'm impressed. You are truly one of a kind. That said."

He finished his sentence by tightening his grip, just enough to cause minor bruising for his son so far away.

"Three. You've made a fatal mistake. You come here. Kill my family. My sons. And then you have the audacity to use Ace as a human shield? I don't care who you are. Who you represent. Or where you even came from. No one. No one. Threatens my family and gets away with it." Whitebeard voice held barely contained malice as he said this words. A murderous intent that he intended to see to the end.

With rage in his heart, Whitebeard pushed Nox into the dirt once again. "Two." Dragging him through the ground like a ragdoll he tossed the Sith Lord away. "One."

He took a step forward, ready to leap upon the rising Sith Lord and end it once and for all. Stopping mid step as his senses perked up. Immediately a quake bubble formed upon the edge of his bisento. Turning around with speed he intercepted another massive blade that appeared out of thin air.

Two mighty forces clashed as a shockwave echoed across the landscape and raised debris and dust around Whitebeard and his new opponent. And, to his surprise, it was none other than the massive, in comparison to normal folk, alien that stood by the side of Nox not so long ago. Unharmed, if a bit scuffed, and radiating power and the intent to not just kill, but to devour Whitebeard.

Khem Val, Shadow Killer, devourer of over a thousand Jedi at the Battle of Yn and Chabosh, stood against Whitebeard. A legend in his own right, his blade and Whitebeard's own held against each other in a lock. The quake bubble's energies seemingly doing nothing even as it exploded around them. A second quake bubble formed around his other hand, coating his fist in it and Haki as he punched the Shadow Killer directly in his sternum. And it was to both their surprise that he moved backwards, but not dead. The sound of shattering glass occurred, and Whitebeard had indeed struck true with the intent to kill. But he did not die. The Dashade's body resisting the Devil Fruit as easily as it did everything else.

Skidding access the ground and imbedding his massive cleaver into the ground for extra leverage, Khem growled at his massive foe. Wrenching his blade out of the ground with one hand, Khem jumped into combat with a wide swing upwards and met Whitebeard's blade with a crash. It was an odd situation for the Dashade. Not used to fighting something both taller and stronger then him. But he was a Shadow Assassin, the greatest servant of Tulak Hord and he would not falter against the likes of Whitebeard. Each clash of their respective weapons sending shockwaves through the air and cracking the earth around them.

A duel that was in the favor of Whitebeard, were it not for the intervention of Nox in the form of a blast of lightning and energy striking him in the back. Swinging his fist backwards to send a minor shockwave at Nox, Whitebeard's arm was caught by Khem Val's own. Gripping his claws around his elbow and holding him back with his own even as he clashed one handed with Whitebeard.

"No. You are mine to devour. Mistress Death shall take you and I shall have my fill." Khem's guttural speech in Ancient Sith was lost on Whitebeard. But he did not need to understand to recognize a threat and a proclamation. Especially as he started to force Whitebeard's arm back. A swift kick was enough to get him off but the sudden teleportation of Nox caught him off guard. The Sith Lord was a blur of movement, moving at speeds unseen till now. He was too fast to block as slashes and cuts appeared across his body from seemingly no visible source. Whitebeard's attempt to counter were blocked by Khem Val, the two working in unison as his Dashade bodyguard jumped back into the fray and parried Whitebeard as he attempted to swing his blade around.

Whitebeard attempted to use his Conquerers on him, get him to stand back, but found no purchase upon the will of the Dashade as he was uppercutted by Khem. His entire bulk momentarily lifting off the ground and then slamming back into it with tremendous force as Khem grasped his claw around his head and pushed him down and into the ground, his entire body going a few centimeters into the rock at the center of a crater.

Pinning Whitebeard to the ground with his blade, stabbing it through his right arm and into the dirt, he held the massive man down as tendrils of smoke and darkness wrapped themselves around him. The Strongest Man Alive, held down by a Dashade Shadow Assassin and a Smoke Demon. Momentarily held down, Nox finally got a good look at Whitebeard, the man practically pale white with black veins going all over his body. To survive against such a powerful curse, one specifically made to kill someone instantly, is a feat that Nox can not even begin to describe.

"Unfortunately. Your time is up, Edward." said Nox as he stepped to the side of the prone giant, his muscles tightened and constantly struggling. Probably trying to say something, unable to because of the tendrils wrapped around his throat. Drawing his blade up, Nox aligned it perfectly with his one visible eye, the other hidden by the hand of Khem Val. His pupil immediately dilating as the blade came inches to it. "Dust to dust Edward. I really enjoyed our time together. Now please. Do us all a favor and go quietly. You'll need to be there first to welcome the rest of your family, the ones not already in Chaos of course." Whatever glare he would've had was preemptively cut off as two small whips of smoke grabbed his eyelids and held them open. Time seemed to go in slow motion for the both of them as Nox moved his blade up, the smoke and plasma causing the air to go hazy and leaving an afterimage as it drew up, and brought it down with all the strength he could muster.

Nox expected the blade to go right through his skull. Pierce his eye and go into his cranium. He was not expecting the blade to stop centimeters away from it's target. Not hitting a solid wall or armor, but instead a force that made his entire arm tremble. With nothing but a glare and a flash of will, his enchanted blade met Whitebeard's Conquerer's Haki head on. A light red sphere, imperceptible to even Nox, forming at the tip of the blade and stopping it dead in it's tracks.

The clash barely even lasted a second. For all intents and purposes. Sith Swords were indestructible. The alchemical alloy they are made of being far greater than any conventional metal known to Sith Science. But they really were not. A fact made abundantly clear as the front of his double sided blade cracked down the middle almost immediately upon contact. Following shortly after by that entire end of his blade shattering into shards of metal and crystal.

Nox would have been stunned, were it not for the need for immediate action as Whitebeard's eye glowed and then shined red. Nox vanished, teleporting away from the resulting wave of force erupting from Whitebeard. The sky split apart from the release of Haki, even Khem Val being knocked away from the blast and sent flying for a moment before dragging his sword through the ground to right himself.

Whitebeard was already upon him. One first held back and glowing with a quake bubble, his eyes completely red. Any normal being would have cowered or been so stunned to act. Khem Val was far from normal. He left his blade in the ground and swung back his own fist, the entire arm crackling with electricity from the power of the Dark Side. Their fists met and the ground cracked and crumbled from the force alone.

The vibrations and cracks that were sent through the air from Whitebeard's Haki and Devil Fruit were another thing entirely. A brilliant red glow accompanying the spiderweb of cracks that surrounded Khem Val. Even so, he resisted. Their strength was far from even. But Whitebeard was weakened and tired, the curse and his own disease ravaging his body something fierce. Whereas Khem Val was fresh and stronger than he has ever been before. Even so, one had Haki and the other was barely grasping the concept. It was no wonder that Whitebeard, as strong as he is, pushed and snapped Khem's arm. The vibrations running through his muscles and bone till they turned into powder.

His arm broken, operating now on the Force alone, Khem Val was blown away. His body falling limply a ways away. But a toll had been paid. Falling to his knees and hacking up lifeblood, Whitebeard had gone well past what he should have, much less with the dark curse befalling him. A moment of weakness that was exploited ruthlessly by the Sith Lord.

Darth Nox's blade pierced Whitebeard's heart. His form decloaking in-front of Whitebeard under the shade of his massive body. The moment his killing blow struck, Nox twisted his blade, the flesh and muscle rending as it pushed deeper into his body. Letting out a gasp that for any normal man would have been their last, Whitebeard coughed up more blood, showering the Sith Lord in it even as he pushed it deeper in.

His body was as tense as could be, his muscles spasming and shaking as electricity went up Nox's blade and through Whitebeard's body until it reach a breaking point. The electricity detonated in a massive explosion, engulfing Whitebeard and Nox both from the sight of the rising Khem Val. The dust and smoke shot up creating an pillar of obscuring debris.

His death was assured, thought Nox. The Sith Lord believing, and rightly so, that no living thing could survive it. From within the cloud he moved to wrench his blade free from the dying body of Whitebeard. Confusion wracking him as his blade refused to budge from his body.

"Zero" The pale, burnt, but very much alive, Whitebeard growled as he backhanded Nox across the field. The smoke and dust around him blowing away from the blow as the last of Nox's connections to Ace was used up. His form rocketed past Khem Val and into the nearby plateau, leaving the wounded Dashade alone to gaze upon Whitebeard, now free of all his constraints.

"I said no one gets away with threatening my family, Brat. And I will be damned if a stab with that knife you call a sword or a light tingle of electricity will kill me." Even with a massive hole in his chest, Whitebeard stood tall as he spoke. His heart, stabbed and electrocuted, beating through the will of a Conquerer. His eyes darted between the Dashade and Sith Lord before hardening onto the oddly resistant monster as Khem one handed his blade up and over his shoulder. "No more distractions."

Time ground to a halt as Whitebeard made his declaration. An unwritten and unknown thread of destiny being plucked from the tapestry of fate. A decision that truly, and utterly, decided the fate of worlds. Starting with this one.

He slammed his bisento down onto the ground and grasped reality in his outreached hand. A quake bubble forming like a vortex as spacetime shuttered and yelled. Khem moved to intercept but it was already far to late. Everything, the air, the planet, the people, all moved relative to Whitebeard as he first swept his arm to the side. With it, everyone across the world lurched as all was shoved backwards, the entire war grinding to a halt once more under the weight of an unseen but certainly felt battle. Then he swung his arm completely back around to his other side, preparing for a single decisive blow.

And as his hand moved, so did everything else once more. Khem Val, and everyone else unanchored, was swept off their feet and pulled towards the new center of gravity. Khem Val locked eyes with Whitebeard as he was swept up in the ensuing gravity well. A moment of understanding, but not fear, went through his mind before settling on grim determination.

He leveled his blade forward, letting Whitebeard's own gravity well carry it forward. The tip of his blade met Whitebeard's blow first, crumbling into dust and powder. There was no ceremonious ending. No significant clash of power. The power of the Gura Gura No Mi condensed into a single strike.

From the perspective of Darth Nox, resisting the gravity well with his power alone, Khem Val was there one moment. And then the next he was not. His bond with the Shadow Assassin vanishing within a moment. His entire body reduced to nothing before the resulting shockwave cracked the air and ground, a single massive explosion erupting from the earth around them all, the very planet itself rocking one more from the force before settling in unsettling stillness.

"War... is a hunger. And there are spirits in the galaxy whose hunger is never satisfied."

The wreckage of the landscape around him was cracked and broken. Gorges and holes littering the field going deep into the world. Across the world it was the same, but none more so than around Whitebeard himself. The center point of the Marineford War. His eyes gazing across this broken landscape in search for his true target. The alien he felled being nothing more than a block in his way. Moved with some effort, but not much in comparison to his true strength.

Expecting what was to come, his body hardened and tensed as the cloud of dust and debris parted and opened in the wake of a dark blur. A fist, not a blade, impacting upon his hardened skin. An act of blind rage, a great source of power. But a double edged sword.

Were it not for his gauntlets, Darth Nox would have shattered his entire arm upon hitting the Beskar wall that is Whitebeard's Haki infused flesh. Stumbling backwards and letting the pain of his hand fuel him even further, Nox went at it again.

And again.

And again.

Each failure fueled his rage for the next strike. Now, there was an effect. Whitebeard certainly felt and moved under the sheer weight and power Nox brought to bear against him. But he was unfocused and enraged. Nox teleported and dashed around Whitebeard, above, below, and on each side he came. A flurry of attacks that were without hassle, blocked, dodged, and parried. Finally culminating in Whitebeard throwing his entire arm out and catching the Sith Lord mid leap and tossing him into the ground.

Already moving upon him with speed, a quake bubble formed around his tensed up fist as he approached the downed Sith Lord, who was shaking off his berserker rage. Slowly. Not quickly enough to save him however. Whitebeard pivoted on his heel. Moving to turn around just before Nox vanished and appeared above and behind him with his blade ready to cut his neck. Time moved at a snail's pace for Nox, a dawning realization of the mistake he had made as he ignored the warnings of the Force and his own future sight.

His sword narrowly nicked Whitebeard's neck before the massive charged up fist that annihilated his most faithful servant before him struck him dead across his face. The helmet of Lord Kallig, an artifact given to him by his ancestor, shuddering and cracking under the force. Whitebeard's roar echoed and accompanied the sound of cracking glass as he struck Darth Nox. His eyes visibly glowing as he yelled, the cracks in space spiderwebbing from the point of impact. The light blue quake bubble shifting to an almost neon green color unlike anything seen before. Space caved in on itself around them as color shifted, the very cracks themselves turning this neon green coloration.

Unlike Khem Val before him, Nox was not obliterated outright. A resistance that Whitebeard was not expecting for such a blatant novice at Haki held his body together. He couldn't see exactly what happened, but he heard the straining and cracking of metal as Kallig's helmet caved. His fist carrying Nox upwards before sending him flying across the landscape with the final ear piercing shattering of space like glass sound accompanying the shockwave left in his wake.

He felt the pain and weight on his soul leave him before Nox even started hitting the ground, his limp body skipping across the broken land scape like a thrown stone on water. Now, Whitebeard was not a cruel man. He did not take delight at the suffering of others. But even he felt immensely satisfied to watch as Nox, this completely unknown lord from a place beyond the wall that caused so much suffering and death for his family, smashed through rock, stone, and ground. Each time his body shook upwards, only to come crashing down again. Whitebeard's home run culmination in Nox impacting and then sliding through the ground like water, his body finally impacting onto a massive raised mess that was once a hill. The force of his collision creating a massive cloud of kicked up dust and shattered the engorged hill into pieces. The wake of destruction Nox's own body left behind was filled with craters, shattered pillars, and the small gorge left by his final descent reminiscent of a parting sea.

One hand holding the Murakumogiri and his other left to his side, Whitebeard looked upon the cloud of dust and debris. His coat billowing in the wind and shockwave still, he was a stern wall as he looked and sense for movement or life. For once? There was nothing. Not since he entered orbit was there ever a moment without Nox in his senses. An individual so abnormal and wrong that it hurt to sense him, not that he could stop for he accompanied them at all times due to his abnormalities. But now? Nothing. No life, not even with his sixth sense.

"Tch. Well fought brat." Nox deserved that much for his impressive display, whatever abilities he possessed were beyond his limited comprehension. Incomprehensible, but impressive. He could not dally however. His sons needed him. Ace needed him.

Turning away to return to Marineford proper, Whitebeard moved across the wreckage of their battlefield without care. His eyes firmly upon the, now greatly diminished, peaks of Marine HQ and the battle raging above and below it. But it was as he passed by the bodies of Nox's kill team that he felt something. It was almost imperceptible, and were he not a master of Observation he would never had noticed it at all. Light. Motes of dim red light swirled around him, from the bodies and blood left behind. "Linlin!?" He yelled, Whitebeard's mind racing as the oddly familiar feeling of souls without body began to permeated his senses. How was she here? Why was she here? What was going on? Those thoughts raced through his head before settling on a single conclusion that he vocalized.

"No." He growled, turning back towards the dispersing cloud of dust. His senses registered nothing, but his gut told him otherwise. A story reciprocated by his eyes watching the motes of light swirling towards the cloud one after another. Dozens of them, the souls of Nox's entire strike team ripped from their bodies or the ether and drawn towards the cloud.

At last he saw it. As the dust cloud dispersed around him he saw the broken, battered, but somehow still alive form of Darth Nox on one knee. One hand gripped the side of his helmet, cracks now running through it's form, and the other aglow with purple energies, drawing the souls of his subordinates towards him. But it was when he saw his neck that Whitebeard realized the reason for his inability to sense him. His neck was broken, completely snapped and only holding his head up thanks to the power of the Force. Nox was dead. But he was also alive. His life sustained through the souls of the bound and keeping his own stuck in-between.

The souls swirled around his hand before coalescing and being gripped as one and immediately Whitebeard's senses flared as Nox's neck and bones snapped back into place. His body returning to "life". Standing up from his prone position, Nox flexed his hand in front of him, power coursing through him like never before as electricity danced across his form and all around him. And as he gazed upon Whitebeard and he gazed upon him, he saw it. Lowering his right hand from his helm, Whitebeard saw him for the first time.

The helmet of Lord Kallig was broken on the side where Whitebeard struck, it being the only reason his head wasn't a bloody smear on his fist. Revealing his face to his opponent, a face Whitebeard was not expecting at all. He was human. A boy barley entering his mid twenties. Small strands of dark ginger red hair came from deeper in his helmet and his eyes were a bright cerulean blue, in complete defiance of the power of the Dark Side permeating through him.

Whitebeard did not know what he expected, perhaps nothing at all and he was content to leave him as burns faceless foe. But to know that deep modulated voice he has heard came from such a young man was a whiplash in of itself.

Solnis breathed heavily as his bones and organs nit themselves back together. Each crack and tear undone just adding to his pain. It didn't matter. He could not die. Not anymore. Staring down Whitebeard as he stared down him, he shakily got to his feet and spoke in-despite of the pain and rage he felt. Each syllable warbling with the failing of his voice modular.

"I needed that." A sentence that got a raised eyebrow from Whitebeard. Even with his own barely contained anger. "I hadn't felt that way for a long time. Heh. I've almost forgotten what it means to so utterly despise someone. To wish upon them a fate so horrid, that even the Sleeping Kings would be appalled at it. So." Clapping his hands together as he finished. A stillness setting into the air. One that was accompanied by a low hum that rose in pitch with every instant. The hum turning into a high pitched wine.

"I. Am going to make you suffer. I was just going to kill you, you know? It wasn't personal. But you've taken something, someone, important from me. And I do not take such things lightly. You. Everyone you love. Everyone you know. Everyone you have ever known. Shall die. Not only shall I kill them, I will devour them and destroy their histories so that they shall never be known beyond me."

And as Solnis went on his eerily calm tirade, the pitch continued its rise towards its crescendo. His eyes glowing brighter and brighter until the whine was deafening and the glow was a luminescent purple. And at that, Whitebeard, who had up until this point taken his venomous words in stride, saw dozens of ghostly specters walk out of his shadow. The deep red Sith spirits of his consumed souls standing beside and behind him in numbers. The vast majority of whic he immediately recognized as those he had so recently slain. But some he recognized more. Faces he saw on small posters. Supernovas, rookies, emotionless and expressionless as the rest. One he knew personally. His heart dropping as he saw the form of Shiki standing near the front.

One among them was the monster, Khem Val, standing by his masters side once more. A brief glance was exchanged between the spirit and the master, a nod, and then the wave began. No, a tsunami of raw power crashed on top of him as his presence skyrocketed a hundred fold, then twice that again.

"Be proud Edward Newgate. Second to push me this far. And I hate that. I hate that and I hate you. I despise you and I will make you suffer for it." Summoning his blade once more, one half broken but still strong on the other, Solnis halfsworded it forward and let the power of the Force suffuse him. Twicefold now, the Shiro Shiro no Mi and the Force interacting in ways they never should have. An inner doppelgänger created by the fruit, now no longer concentrating on a ritual, being put to full force alongside everything else at his disposal.

"MURDER AND MAYHEM AWAIT."

Solnis vanished and reappeared in front of Whitebeard with his blade swinging in an upwards arc. Whitebeard too, swung downward. His bisento infused with his will to strike down all those who wronged his family. Both eyes flashing with either purple or red light, Nox's charged hardening blade met Whitebeard's bisento in a single cacophonous clash. And for but the briefest of moments, just before their blades touched. A wave of energy cascaded over the both of them, unknown to Nox, but known to Whitebeard.

"You see, the war, the true war, has never been one waged by droids, or warships, or soldiers. They are but crude matter, obstacles against which we test ourselves. The true war is waged in the hearts of all living things, against our own natures, Light or Dark. That is what shapes and binds this galaxy, not these creations of man. You are the battle ground."

The ground sundered, the sky split, and everything was replaced with a roaring sound as the full might of the Dark Side was brought to bear under a master, a prodigy among prodigies.

The clouds in the sky were incinerated by Whitebears's power, only to be replaced with an unnatural gale force the likes of which the planet has never seen. An unnatural hurricane with winds strong enough strip flesh from bone and rip and tear the broken and shattered ground up and into the air. Mountain sized chunks of rock were lifted up into the air by Solnis' power and we're left afloat in the air, drifting and moving from the winds and his own will. From within his inner fortress, his own doppelgänger tore the Wara Wara no Mi from his soul and exchanged it with another. The Fuwa Fuwa no Mi, preplaced within a holocron for quick access.

Lifting up and into the clouds themselves, the two inhuman monsters dueled under skin stripping winds and a constant electrical discharge of lightning arcing across clouds and through the pillars of broken ground. A thrust, a parry, a shockwave, tendrils and more. Whitebeard was a titan and Solnis a master magician. From the war below all could see the effects of their duel as they are lifted up and up into a storm that remained inexplicably centralized around them.

Dozens of bolts of lightning struck him at once only to be channeled up and through his bisento as he swung it. The lance of energy and lightning arcing across the sky and shattering one of the closest mountains to pieces, forcing Solnis away and onto one of the smaller chunks. Spring boarding off of it, he lept upon Whitebeard from above. His blade attracting and conducting energy unfathomable as streaks of lightning followed it and remained within the blade for a singular massive discharge. Blade met fist and both monsters were sent into free fall as the floating mountain they clashed upon proved far less durable than they, the electrical explosion and shockwave reducing it to rubble.

Finding himself in free fall, Whitebeard stepped upon the air itself and moved back upon one of the still floating rocks completely ignoring gravity.

Solnis' voice echoed, formless, unbothered by the howling winds that turned pebbles into bullets and deafening rain. "Your body fails you where as mine is unending." His comment accompanied by another mild heart attack, briefly forcing Whitebeard to a knee. "Hope for this place died today Newgate. The Celestial Empire? Weak and inefficient beyond measure. You all? Pirates? Revolutionaries? Free, but chaotic. Even if you all banded together you would stand no chance. You saw what my fleet could do. I'll render everything unto dust and glass. There will be no happy ending, no last glorious battle. Only a gasp as I choke the life out of this lawless place and take what I please."

"You know no peace in your heart. Only a megalomaniacal desire for power." Whitebeard choked out as he stood tall and glanced about the storm swirling around him.

"Peace is a lie, there is only passion."

Solnis' words echoed, his last statement being punctuated by the changing of the air around them. The air turned to ash, the drops of water to lava, and the lighting red. The hurricane turning volcanic as reality distorted. Whitebeard coughed and heaved as he hardened his flesh against the constant buffering of lava rain. Turning around to see as ash clouds moved and molded. Tornados formed across the sky in unnatural patterns, moving between clouds and the ground as lighting crackled within them. One turning from ash to a swirling body of lava, Whitebeard's eyes widening as the lava tornado changed directions and moved upon him. With a crack of his hand, the entire thing was blown apart by a shockwave. Only to reform into a dozen more, unimpeded and strengthened by his attempt of resistance.

Swirling rivers of magma converging upon him, Whitebeard dug his bisento into the ground and spread out his arms. His muscles flexing as the sky cracked all at once and, with a burst of light, the unnatural storm of ash, soot, and magma were reduced to atoms. Their very atomic structures cracked with incredible precision.

With the winds silent and the storm reduced to component elements, Whitebeard ripped his weapon out of the rock and swung it around him in an overhead swing, its blade impacting Solnis as he appeared behind him. The phantom dispersing into purple mist and being replaced by dozens more that formed around him.

Dozens of fully masked lookalike phantoms descended upon Whitebeard who, in an act of defiance, stood firmly in place and batted each and every one away with a swing of his bisento. But for each one slain, three more would take it's place. Dispersing into mist that would reform into more that would continue an assault unending. Spells we're flung, lightning arced, and the howling winds of a newly formed storm battered his form over and over again until, at last, Whitebeard threw down his hand in a hammerfist upon the air.

A white explosion rocked the sky and blew away the clouds, leaving Whitebeard falling inside a newly created eye of the storm.

His jacket billowing as he freefalled, Whitebeard's eyes darted around the enclosing line of unnatural clouds, only to lose sight as all went dark. He barely had time to recognize the mountain sized shape approaching upon him before the electrically charge mountain was telekinetically smashed into him.

Pressed up against the mountain like a fly caught by a flyswatter, Whitebeard pushed against it as hard as he could even as it, and subsequently he, began rapidly approaching the ground. Digging his hands into it and lifting his legs away, Whitebeard stepped on the air. Cracks formed around his boots as he turned the intangible tangible. The entire weight of the mountain was now pressed onto his shoulders, a comically horrifying sight to see a man holding a mountain whilst
standing on the air.

"You'll need to do more than throw pebbles to kill me brat!" Whitebeard announced, his arms tensing as he gripped his bisento in one hand and held the mountain with another. His eyes flashed red as he tossed the entire mountain upwards, pushing against both gravity and the telekinetic force, lifting it back into the air for a moment as he gripped his weapon with both hands. A quake bubble forming at the blade tip, he jumped off the air and back into the mountain. His blade struck first and before his body touched it, the entire mountain was reduced but atoms on the wind.

He did not stop there however. He kept flying upwards, up and up and up until he was above the very storm itself. His eyes scanning the horizon for his prey and it did not take long, for all he needed to do was follow the pain of his eyes from whenever he saw him.

Sensing his presence amidst one of swirling vortexes of lighting and rock, Whitebeard once again planted his feet upon the air and rocketed forward. Leaving a sonicboom behind him as he went, Whitebeard was not going to make the trip towards Solnis with ease. The closer he got the more an unnatural dark haze shrouded his vision and Whitebeard had to grip and swing off the air itself to avoid a bolt of purple lightning that lanced out from the clouds, narrowly doing so but getting a good chunk of his side vaporized as he breached the cloud layer.

And as he rocketed down, Whitebeard saw Solnis at the center of the swirling vortex, completely encapsulated by a dome of crackling electricity and arcane energies. The Force Maelstrom he has conquered around him growing in intensity with each passing second.

Holding onto his bisento with both hands he continued forward, tip outstretched forward as he moved at insane speeds. Whitebeard smashed through rocks, islands, and ignored bolts of lightning as he moved in a straight line like a lance. His blade struck dead center onto the barrier around Solnis and pierced it like a ballon, missing the Sith Lord by a hair as it dug itself into the ground. The barrier remained however, Whitebeard pressed up against it even as his weapon passed through it.

Pulling his hand back in a prepared motion, the thousands of pebbles and rocks around Solnis stopped dead and shifted around. Stone and dirt turning into sharpened steel knives and blades. Moving forward with telekinetic force. Met only with a backswung shockwave that blew them all away. With his other hand, Whitebeard swung and pushed through the barrier. Grabbing onto the Sith Lord by his collar and slammed him down with a roar. A quake bubble forming and compressed into him, his armor and body cracking under the force. And yet the pain only made him stronger! Solnis grasped Whitebeard wrist and pulled, his foe's eyes widening as he was lifted off his feet and flung onto his back.

Getting up onto his feat, Solnis growled and coughed up blood as he outstretched his hand and revealed an amulet integrated into his gauntlet's palm. Whitebeard too growled as he got up. Watching as Solnis' hand smoked and then burst into energy as a Force Blast rocketed at him, intent on reducing him to nothing.

Trusting in his weapon, he lifted it forward and thrusted his Haki infused blade onto the oncoming blast. The wave pushed into his weapon and around him. Solnis subsided his assault and stared at Whitebeard as he blew onto his smoking weapon. The two locking eyes as the giant man moved to speak, only to move his blade slightly to block an incoming blow from a spedger. Whitebeard's eyes remained firmly locked onto Solnis even as he held his weapon to the side in a blade lock with a ghostly version of Khem Val. "You want my power?" He asked rhetorically as batted the alien's soul away. His eyes glowing red with power and rage as he declared. "Then brat, let me show you how to use it."

With but a glance he blew the ghost away with a burst of red light and, one handing his weapon, swung downwards. His blade coated completely in a quake bubble formed perfectly around the edges. And as it swung, Whitebeard cut space. "Space Splitter."

The space between Whitebeand and Solnis was cut in twain. A hole in reality that stitched itself back together as the two were pushed up against one another, forcefully moving Solnis right into the oncoming path of a left hook. His head snapped backwards unnaturally as the obsidian covered fist struck the broken remains of his helmet and, with a burst of red light that pushed back the weakening maelstrom even further, shattered the helm of Lord Kallig completely. He skid back across the ground, digging his blade through it for leverage and holding the left side of his now completely exposed face. Revealing the young ginger haired man for what he was completely.

Solnis gripped his blade with both hands and growled. His face a bloodied mess of rapidly healing flesh and scars. Ripping his blade through the ground and into the air, he only accelerated. He did slow, he did not falter, he only got stronger as he drew on his own pain. He closed the distance in an instant and clashed his sword into another downward thrusting blade. Face to face with Whitebeard as he jumped off the ground, Solnis' struck Whitebeard with a blow of his own. The giant man almost toppling over completely, the own subsequent electrocution not helping matters as Solnis implanted both feet onto the man's chest and drew his blade across it as he flipped away, leaping back into a dead sprint as he circled Whitebeard at near relativistic speeds. Becoming a constant blur of black around him.

Stepping back, Whitebeard was beset on all sides. Implanting one foot down and twirling his bisento around him, he slammed it's pommel down onto the ground. Cracks spiderwebbed across the sky as a shockwave blew everything around him away. The blur stopped and gripped onto the side of the massive platform they were fighting off from the sheer force of the blast as the last remnants of the storm and whatever rocks remained in the sky were blown away completely. Revealing the sky around them to be empty, a single stone island in the upper atmosphere. One now rapidly falling as Solnis drew everything into himself, using the Fuwa Fuwa no Mi's own telekinetic abilities to push his body even further.

The two surveyed the sky around them before returning to a stance against one another. Whitebeard holding his bisento in a guard position, blade thrust forward. And Solnis held his, half broken, double bladed sith blade low. Both preparing themselves for what seemed to be a final duel to the death as they plummeted to the ground. Both pairs of eyes glowed, crimson and purple intermingling as Solnis' body crackled with electricity and smoke as his bound demon resurfaced. Likewise, Whitebeard prepared himself as his blade glowed with a shaped quake bubble. Ready to cut space, or preferably his opponent, once more.

Bisento met sword one, then twice, then thrice, then countless more in quick succession as the two moved and began the grand finale. Each swing of Whitebeard cutting space and forcefully moving his another position only for him to vanish or block it with superior precognitive skill. Solnis himself was a blur of sharpened black as he flowed through the air like it was water. Twirling like an acrobat in form IV, Ataru. The first bout ending as quickly as it began as Solnis landed a force enhanced kick into Whitebeard's chest, a satisfying crack lending the young Sith Lord a wide grin of satisfaction as he shattered his ribcage.

Whitebeard heaved but did not falter. Cutting the air, he forced Solnis into an oncoming strike, his fist already cracking the air before he even appeared. The second bout beginning as Solnis was nocked away only to catch himself at the edge and redouble his attack as a force doppelgänger joined him in a two on one. A battle that was not as one sided as the doppelgänger was clearly slower than the real. A fact he viciously exploited. Caught between two blurs of slashing movement, Whitebeard tossed his weapon into the air and grabbed the air and tossed it. The entire platform flipping on it's head as gravity shifted. Grabbing his weapon blade first, he brought down his pommel onto the head of Solnis and struck him from the sky momentarily to fall back towards him. Leaving him with an easily dispatched copy that he gripped his hands around and crushed.

Not missing a beat, Whitebeard grabbed the free falling Sith Lord by the throat as gravity began to reassert himself and tossed him across the now tilted platform. Whitebeard's eyes glared as Solnis caught himself and was joined by hundreds of ghosts. The souls of his entire strike team, and some more, joining the Sith Lord in surrounding Whitebeard.

Subsequently dogpilled, dozens of spirits were blown away by a flash of red light accompanied by cracks as Whitebeard spread his arms wide and struck the air. Retaking the inniative, Whitebeard ripped his bisento out of the ground he struck it into and began carving his way without hesitation through the weak masses of ghosts he had stained before. Not holding back at all even as his illness racked his body. Tens died with every swing, tens more dying with every subsequent punch as they were reached from their positions as space was repeatedly split and cracked again and again.

Sith Warriors descended upon him in brief melees only to be cut down and replaced by more. The full might of an Emperor of Space being brought against the spectral masses. By the time he was stopped, most of spirits were already dispelled back into the ether. But stopped he was however. His eyes widening in recognition at the sight before, blocking twin blades on precognitive reflex before even realizing his opponent.

His two blades locked against the haft of Whitebeard. The soul of Shiki, the Golden Lion, stood in his way. "Shiki…" He muttered at the emotionless specter of his past. Debris and wind blew away from them, the two titans of Roger's era in a stare down as they pushed against each other.

Whitebeard kicked out his leg and struck the ghost in the chest with his boot. The resulting quake sending it flying off and through a parade of souls. His eyes flashing, he whirled around and struck the air. A quake bubble rupturing forth and moving through the ground behind him and bulldozing a cabal of ghostly sorcerers at his back. "Damn brat. Won't let an old man rest?! Fine." Whitebeard tucked his weapon away and struck the air twice. Two quake bubbles forming around him and, instead of rupturing forth, began spiraling outward from his position. Moving at rapid speeds as they ripped across the platform like twin lawnmowers, clearing the field of chaff and leaving Solnis exposed alongside the soul of Shiki and Khem Val. "Come on then? What are you waiting for brats?! An invitation?!" He challenged.

"Why won't you just die Edward?!" Groaned Solnis in anger. His two spirits rocketed forward at his command. Shiki and Khem Val engaged Whitebeard, the pirate moving to his flank and letting the shadow assassin face him head on. An action that proved most foolish. As Whitebeard parried one blow from Khem Val and two from Shiki in the same breath, he pulled his hand back and recalled the still twirling quake bubbles back to him. The two white spheres reversing at twice the speeds and collapsing back into Whitebeard. Smashing into the backs of the spirits with tremendous force.

Not waiting for the smoke to clear, Whitebeard leaped out of the cloud. Two handing his bisento, red electricity sparking across it's blade as he descended upon the now alone Sith Lord.

Solnis tried to parry, strengthening himself with the Force. But as their blades met, his finally gave out. Whitebeard shattered his weapon completely, the resulting explosion sending waves of dark mystic energies everywhere as the Force Nexus that was his blade imploded in-on itself. Digging in heels and skidding across the ground, Whitebeard held his hand in front of him and watched the Sith Lord cartwheel through the air and into the ground like a rag doll. Rolling into it however, Solnis got back onto his feet. Already rushing towards Whitebeard once more even as blooded as he was, broken neck snapping back into place.

Reaching onto his belt mid sprint, he pulled out a lightsaber. Illuminating him in scarlet red. The lightsaber of his old ancestor once more wielding by his blood.

"Persistent brat." Intercepting the black and red blur, Whitebeard engaged Solnis once more. His opponent, even strengthened as he was by his own pain and anger, was obviously put on the back foot without his special tool. Solnis however, was not even acknowledging it. Demanding of the Force more and more power. Pushing himself deeper into a combative trance like state. He would not, no, could not falter! He would kill Whitebeard!

His lightsaber began arcing with electricity, Sith purple transitioning into a crimson red the further he pushed him into the depths of his stolen power. The color lost in the light of his and Whitebeards weapons as they both became blenders of death. Each strike carrying the strength to lay waste to a battlefield, the platform only holding itself together through their own blows cancelling each other out and a little bit of hope.

Solnis pressed himself closer and closer into Whitebeard. His form now leaving afterimages in his wake as he began using the massive man as a foothold for more attacks. Whitebeard was strong and fast, inhumanly so. But Solnis was faster, and only growing in speed. Any consideration of defense has been been shattered and cast out of his mind. Making up for the loss of his weapon with an almost suicidal frontal assault. The master sorcerer becoming a raging berserker drunk on adrenaline.

Whitebeard tried to get the Sith Lord off of him. But he could not let down his guard, not even for a moment. One wrong move and his head would be removed from his shoulders. He was completely on the defensive. His bisento practically twirling around him, trying to contain the man who moved with enough to speed that he seemed to be accompanying multiple spaces all at once. Try as he might, Whitebeard couldn't block them all. His weapon not suited for such close range engagements, not with a foe of this speed. The red lightsaber burned through his torso, arm, and legs almost simultaneously.

He was panting now. His muscles ached and his damaged heart was straining to keep up, pushed to it's limit and beyond them. To falter now meant a quick painful death. Another deep slash across his chest pushed him back again, his feet finding no more purchase. Pushed so far back that there was no more ground to push back to. A fact that cemented itself into his mind and made him remember that they were on a falling platform. One that was seconds away from hitting the ground at terminal velocity. Solnis had dozens of weakness to exploit, but left no time to exploit them with his unyielding offense. So. Whitebeard did the only thing he could do, he stepped off the platform.

Whitebeard dropped immediately, his eyes becoming pinpricks at sight of the saber moving through the space where his neck once was. Momentarily flailing, Whitebeard grabbed onto Solnis' leg and dragged him off the platform with him, eliciting a shocked gasped from him. Stunned for a moment, Whitebeard kicked off the platform with all his might and rocketed into the ground at top speeds, Sith Lord in his arms.

They both impacted the ground instantly. Whitebeard skidding through stone and rock as he dragged Solnis through the rock and stone face first. He dug in his heels and halted himself, ripping the blooded Sith Lord out of the stone. Not even entertaining the thought he was possibly dead, Whitebeard kneed Solnis in the face, space cracked once more and ripping him out of his grip as he smashed back into and through the dirt.

Giving his burning lungs a moment of reprieve, Whitebeard slammed his bisento into the dirt and let in a deep breath as he watched, without much surprise, Solnis pick himself back off the ground once more. Looking more like a beaten corpse than a living being anymore. His face was a complete mess and his armor in tatters revealing a torso that was torn and bleeding even worse than Whitebeard's.

Solnis shook himself back to consciousness, letting his body mend itself until.

"No more games." Whitebeard said grimly. Hand outstretched in front of him with a quake bubble forming around it. His hand also forming a quake bubble.

Solnis' head snapped forward, his eyes glowing bright purple as blackish-red smoke blew out of him in like a burst dam. His smoke demon unleashed fully, it obscuring everything around Solnis in pitch black as it twirled and encapsulated them both. Intent on drowning Whitebeard in it…only to skid backwards as cracks formed across the demon, it roaring in agony before collapsing in on itself as it was obliterated. A single punch of Whitebeard destroying the entire thing in an instant.

Solnis' gaped as the smoke cleared to reveal Whitebeard towering over him, only to be smashed upside the head. Cracks formed all around them. But before space shattered and he was blown back, Whitebeard struck him again with his other fist. His eyes burning a bright crimson red, Whitebeard smashed Solnis again and again. An uppercut to the jaw followed just after with a back shattering strike. Each subsequent hit causing the cracks to spiderweb even further into the sky. By the fifth hit they were reaching out into the atmosphere and deep into the earth, visible from marine HQ itself. The cracks and bubbles turning from a soft white to a neon green as Whitebeard pressed even harder. A One Man Army.

He struck Solnis' chest with his left and smashed his head with his right as he slammed him into the ground. Whitebeard was done. He was practically roaring in anger, screaming with primal fury as he let out all his aggression onto this seemingly unbreakable punching bag. Even as his heart failed him, he kept pushing. Slamming Solnis into the ground with one punch and slamming him again to push him even deeper. Finally, he slammed his right fist into Solnis' chest and did not pull back. He just kept pushing his clenched fist deeper into Solnis, the air pushing off of him with the force of a hurricane. This last strike caused space to finally shatter. The sound so deafening that it blew out the eardrums of most who heard it.

Whitebeard sent Solnis' broken and thoroughly smashed into the planet. The force imparted on him sending him through the crust of Marineford. Leaving Whitebeard in the deep crater he had created.

Gripping his cheat and breathing heavily, Whitebeard coughed up blood in a fit unlike anything he has felt before. So thoroughly pushed to the breaking point of his old body, trying to replace the feats of his youth. And yet, the pain subsided. Despite it all, he wasn't dying yet. He almost collapsed to knee before shaking his head. "Not yet… Not yet… I stil… Have to… Save Ace…" Taking in deep breaths after every other word.

Leaping out of the crater and picking up his weapon. Whitebeard made a mad dash back towards marine HQ. Despite fighting what might have been one of, if not the most arduous, fight in his life, Whitebeard felt like he could keep going. Just a little bit longer.

Then it would all be over...

"He can not be defeated…He is not a beast of flesh and blood. This is not a battle that can be won. Flee."

"Flesh of my flesh. Wake up. You can not die here"

Solnis groaned in agony. His brief stint of unconsciousness not doing much to south his pain. His mind racing as he tries to recall what occurred and where he was. The familiar voice speaking in his ear going unnoticed until he was back on his feet.

"Fool. You running off and trying to get yourself killed? Your lucky I had the strength to pull you out of there. Less you be swimming in magma."

"I…what? Kallig? No, wait… damn it all." Solnis grit his teeth and shook off his confusion. The red ghost of his ancestor standing by his side giving off a shine of light that illuminated the chasm he was in. Turning to his left he saw a deep pit, one with a glow of red at the bottom. A narrow miss…or a quick save if what his ancestor says is true, which he has no reason to doubt.

Turning to face his ancestor he finally got enough of a grip to speak semi-coherently. "You… what, how are you even? It's been years? I thought the Emperor force you back into slumber?"

"He did. And I had awakened once more after his long departure from the Dark Temple. As for why I am here? Saving you from yourself. What are you doing, blood of my blood? Do you have any idea what you have walked into! Did you learn nothing from Darth Thanaton or Zash? Your preparations were shoddy at best. I have seen acolytes prepare better ambushes than that in the academy! Your lack of preparation and control nearly cost you. Were you not a living phylactery you would be dead ten times over already! That man is not to be trifled with carelessly!" His ancestor spoke. His ethereal voice droning as if speaking down to a child.

"I have a plan dammit! He just won't die! That curse should have killed him! That strike to the heart should have killed him! And now Khem is dead!"

"Because of your lack of foresight. You trusted no one but yourself to handle this. You have entire covens of witches and sorcerers at your command. Use them. No matter. The past is the past and it can not be changed so easily...although with how this new universe plays I doubt that is the case anymore."

"I. Don't know how to reply to that..."

"Good. Now listen. What the future holds I can not say for certain. But if you are too succeed you must use everything at your disposal to win. Preparation or not, you have the power to strike him down. I know this, I have foreseen it. I also know that you have his scepter. Hold onto it. It shall be the key to victory. Of this I am sure. But if you are to fight this pirate and his crew head on, you must also draw on the powers of this place."

Solnis nodded his head as he cleaned the blood off himself with the Force. Cupping his chin he continued. "I see…yes. I do have a few more cards up my sleeve. Although I had never expected to utilize them."

"Good. Now go. Your quarry is moving fast. Flesh of my flesh. I await your victory."

And with that, Lord Kallig vanished. Leaving the young Darth alone. Looking up, Solnis stared off through the rock and stone ceiling of the cavern he was in. Sensing Whitebeard even from within whatever crevasse he had found himself pelted into.

His equipment in tatters, Solnis was…beside himself. His body a bloody mess that by all right should be dead a thousand times over already. A feat of seeming immortality that he had stumbled upon. Although looking down into the pit of magma he nearly fell into, he couldn't help but wonder what complete incineration or even disintegration would do? Something to test later he thought.

Taking a step forward he held out his hand in front of him and flexed it, seemingly testing something within himself. He looked up at the ceiling, down at himself, and then turned to metal.

"Moffs, Generals. Today you will see who holds the real power in the Sith Empire. Not the Dark Council, not Thanaton. Me. When I finish my ascent, all will bow or face my might."

The ground quaked and neon green light burst forth at the seems just as he reached the outermost defensive wall. The massive fortification surrounding the main marine HQ wouldn't have stopped him for long, despite it's unusual resistance to damage. Whitebeard narrowly had time to recognize what was happened before the section of the wall he looked upon ruptured from the inside out. Blinded entirely by the wave of color and dust, he could not see nor sense what emerged from the ground before it had completely crawled out of the sinkhole from whence it came.

His eyes opened to look upon in utter disbelief at what he was seeing. A massive machine of alien metals and arcane secrets in the visage of his foe. Greater than a hundred meters, the Shiro-Shiro No Mi had found a master worthy of it's greatest gift. The usual vaguely humanoid fortress one could become with the fruit having been taken over by the powers of Nox's magics. Even now Whitebeard watched as metal flowed like a liquid across it's form to create a complete replica of Darth Nox, mask and all. Runic scriptures of ancient Sith carved themselves onto the titan and across it's entire body flowed green energy from within, the two empty eye sockets of the mask now bright neon spotlights. The power of Isotope-5 flowing through Solnis' mechanical veins and bonded with the Force.

"HELLO AGAIN, EDWARD." His voice boomed loud enough for all to hear. The artificial edge masking the amusement in his voice. The two spotlights baring down onto the minuscule form beneath him.

"Solnis." Whitebeard was exasperated, his voice laced with venom as he took in the power and heat radiating off him. The air was sweltering, before it was a constant chill. Like walking through a grave. Now replaced with the sweltering heat of the machine's inner workings that cooked the very air around it.

The brief reintroductions ended as, with impossible speed and fluidity, Solnis' giant arm reared back and shot strait down on top of him. Whitebeard did the same in attempt to blow the machine away with his quakes only for the resulting conflicting blows to shockwave away from them. Crushing the nearby defensive walls and emplacements and causing the ground to shift with the force of the two. A matching of strength, would have been a impressive sight were it not for the shift in dynamics. Whitebeard now finding himself visibly struggling to match the machine that bore down upon him. The entire arm opening up to reveal actual sub-light engines across it that roared to life. The resulting force causing Solnis to, for the first time in a long time, overpower Whitebeard. His eyes going wide as his arm buckled and snapped and having to leap out of the way as the massive arm went through his position and into the ground.

The force of the impact alone caused Whitebeard to be blown back like a rag doll, narrowly getting control of himself and jumping off the air and onto the wall just as a gargantuan lance of arcane energy arced across the landscape. Solnis' right arm outstretched and unleashing this laser that raked across the landscape. "DONT RUN. COME AND LOOK UPON THIS SHINY NEW TOY OF MINE EDWARD." He boomed with sadistic glee, weapon emplacements molding to form themselves on his shoulders.

Solnis didn't even care as Whitebeard sent a shockwave with bisento. The quake bubble plinking off his deflector shields without a scratch. Eliciting a deep laugh from the Sith Lord as volleys of turbolaser fire erupting from his body.

Leaping from the wall as it was blown to smithereens, Whitebeard glanced at the titanic Darth before bursting into a sprint towards Ace. Turbolasers fire crashing all around him as he attempted too retreat. "PLAYING HARD TO GET ARE YOU?" He heard from behind him before the entire ground shook and he was overtaken completely. His eyes widening at the unchanged speed of Solnis as the giant raced past him. His body turned and skidded backwards, one hand down reaching into the ground to slow his momentum and the other aloft above him, An equally gigantic blade of shadow forming from the aether as he slowed to a stop. Whitebeard backpedaled from his own interia, blasts of turbolaser fire still crashing down around him as he struggled to stop and dodge while Solnis swung his massive cleaver in an arc with impossible speed.

Narrowing his eyes, he pushed both hands into the ground and, like Jozu before him, ripped the ground. Flipping it like a table with Solnis still upon this mountain of earth. Jumping as he did so, Whitebeard barely reached the zenith of his height above the falling mountain before the tip of Solnis' blade pierced through the mountain and moved to impale him.

Turning his entire body in the air, Whitebeard shifted out of it's way and implanted himself onto the flat of the sword and gripping his weapon in both hands, he let gravity take him. Whitebeard skid down this magical weapon towards it's wielder. The mountain it pierced obscuring him as he charged down it with a downward swing. The sound of rockets turned his attention away from his action however as dozens of missiles came out from the shadow of the mountain, turning in the air in unison towards him. Gritting his teeth, Whitebeard struck the air and prematurely detonated the missiles around him, but the size of the detonations he was not prepared for as he was blown clean off the sword. Caught by the edge of one of high explosive projectiles. Falling in the air, he was unprepared for the flat of the giant sword to swat him out of the air like a baseball. Whitebeard, the ground he had lifted, and the clouds in the sky were sent flying by a double handed swing from Solnis.

Whitebeard's body crashed straight through a secondary defensive wall and into the still ongoing-war. The remains of the mountain following suit. The sheer shockwave of the swing causing the entire battle to halt, not to mention the shock of some who saw Whitebeard be struck from the sky and sent through the war and into a crater. The mountain thankfully being rendered mostly into chunks and falling across the battlefield like meteors and not crashing on top of the now horribly bloody old man.

Pirate and Marine alike, private to even the Warlord's themselves stopped their fighting and looked upon the approaching giant Darth Nox. Each step shook the ground as he nonchalantly moved towards the crater he had sent Whitebeard careening info. Meanwhile, Whitebeard was coughing off lifeblood as he painfully climbed out of the hole he was in. That one swing having completely caved in his ribcage, his chest now covered in blood. Clutching his failing heart, Whitebeard looked up at his foe as Solnis approached him. Setting his shadowy blade into the ground and looking upon the critically wounded gnat before him, he couldn't help but break into hysterical laughter. This deep mechanical laughter that crackled to life as the neon spotlights illuminated Whitebeard.

"IS THIS IT?" He announced whilst in his hysterics. His form, despite it's gargantuan size emulating human movement seamlessly. "ALL OF THAT? JUST TO BE SHATTERED LIKE THAT? NO." His laughter stopped, trailing off into a growl as he pulled the blade of shadow out of the ground and pointed it at Whitebeard. "SHOW ME. YOUR. CONVICTION!" Gripping the hilt with both hands, Solnis marched forward, each step causing Whitebeard's body to shake to his bones. With the blade pulled back and ready to swing downward onto him, Whitebeard's gaze looked past the giant mecha and onto the mountain. Locking eyes onto the boy still at the center who was looking on with complete abject horror.

Whitebeard's eyes focused and narrowed as his vision was obscured by the literal shadow falling on top of him. A quick glance to his side showed his weapon imbedded into the ground and the giant sword coming down on him at speed. His face full of grim determination, Whitebeard's body tenses up and his eyes turned a shade of crimson, the crimson light of his Haki illuminating the overcast of darkness as, with both hands blackened and forming quake bubbles, Whitebeard reached out and grabbed the skyscraper coming down upon him. The sheer force of the weapon's movement and suden half causing the the ground to cave in around him, flattening itself and sending anyone and anything flying from the shockwave. Blood streaming down Whitebeard's hands as he grit his teeth in pain as he defied all logic and wrestled with a veritable titan.

"FINALLY…FINALLY…SHOW ME. WHERE YOUR POWER LIES!"

His sadistic voice echoed around him as the neon green gaze of those spotlights burned through the darkness and onto him. Whitebeard's own flesh bubbling and flacking off from being in the gaze of the Sith Lord. One handing the struggle for a moment, he reached out to his side and gripped the hilt of his bisento and ripped it out of the ground, a quake bubble forming at the tip as he pulled it back and roared with all his might and anger and struck the magical weapon he was barely holding. The shadow shattered into motes, the resulting quake in the air causing a shockwave and the unexpected loss of his weapon and immense force of the blow staggering the titanic Solnis down to a knee.

Whitebeard leapt upon him, his body completely glowing in crimson light as he rapidly approached the stunned Sith. But as before, his blade met before he even got a dozen meters close.

Dodging to the side just as the open hand of Solnis swept out to grab at him, Whitebeard felt the air move with the limb only to come crashing down at it's sudden change in directory. A backhand sending him careening back into the ground. "OH I LOVE WHEN THE TABLES TURN IN MY FAVOR. ITS MY FAVORITE PART OF COMBAT." Solnis snarked, raising one boot up and steeping on Whitebeard's prone body. A sudden crack as his boot impacted onto a massive quake bubble sent Solnis stumbling back.

Tubolasers crashed onto Whitebeard in as his opened up in a barrage of fire after regaining his footing. Leaping out of the crater and into a sprint, he began circling Solnis's walking fortress. Even as he slashed at him from a distance, or cracked the air, his shield flickering to life whilst they engaged in a long range duel. One Solnis was most assuredly winning, Whitebeard's body now burned just as much as it is bruised and cut.

Solnis let out a growl of annoyance at Whitebeard's continued survival. Flexing his will, Solnis conjured another blade from the air and hoisted it into the sky. The blade acting as a lightning rod for the storm raging above Marine HQ as dozens of lightning bolts struck the blade and began coursing through it. Now properly enchanted, he swung the blade low and carved through men, tank, and rock alike without a thought. Whitebeard jumping to avoid the weapon's path only to get smacked by the backswing.

It a wonder he was alive, even if his Haki took most of the blow. Yet still he found himself crashing through stone and metal. Although as he came too, Whitebeard found the very mountain of Marine HQ to be within easy distance. "…Ace…" Whitebeard groaned as he hoisted himself up with his weapon.

Coughing up blood as he held onto his weapon for support, the daze he found himself in was fading fast. And with it his hearing as well. The words of "Pops." and "Whitebeard!" ringing around him. Several in particular catching his immediate notice. Two in particular catching his immediate notice, turning to see a wounded Jozu and Izou carrying an even worse for wear Vista in their arms. Combat with Mihawk not being good for anyone's health. Blameco and Rakuyo were not far to the side. Namur was further ahead to them as they guarded the wounded and pushed forward. The others…he was not sure. Still. It…warmed… his dying heart that his sons had made it so far without him. Recognizing the plaza before the final approach to the mountain behind the curtain walls from their planning. But before he could say anything, the entire battle was defending and blinded as a lance of energy burst through the curtain walls and into the wounded and fighting.

Whitebeard's world went dark as, in one instant, he saw Blameco, Rakuyo and Namur to his right. Fighting to simultaneously push and protect his wounded and dying family. The next: all he saw was a deep crevasse as this Force Blast incinerated everything in it's path.

Everything just went…silent. Cries of pain and concern found nothing as Whitebeard lost himself in darkness, the world slowing to a crawl and deafening silence.

It was a horrifying sight for those who cared. Watching Whitebeard turn slowly to the smoldering new gorge where once there was men. Miles long and deep. With no bodies in sight. His eyes lost all focus and color and he just stared into nothingness. Seemingly unaware of the world around him.

The shadow that was cast over them all halted any concern for Whitebeard's comatose state however. Everyone halted what they were doing or going to do as Solnis loomed above, using the body of the fallen Oars Jr as a stepping stone to look over the curtain walls. The spotlights scanning the battlefield like a roaming stage. Briefly they went up, illuminating the sky above and showing to them all the platform above. A bound man in chains, the reason they were all there. To his sides, old men. Veterans of the marines. The Hero: Garp. And the Fleet Admiral: Sengoku. No words or orders. Just a silent acknowledgment and then an ear splitting sound of metal grinding as the titanic machine moved like a man and bowed.

The roar of engines along Solnis's arms filled the air and, dragging his giant blade like an executioner's axe, he swung down. Too everyone else it was instantaneous. But as Whitebeard's looked upon everyone and everything around him. It was like an eternity. Not yet. He still had a mission to finish. A son, no family, to save. And a man he must kill.

Whitebeard stood up and held his trusted weapon in front of him as the blade came. Gripping both ends of his weapon he cracked heard the world snap back into focus as in an instant sound and time came back to him.

*CLANG*

Everyone gasped at this feet of incalculable strength as Whitebeard blocked this gigantic weapon coming down at full force, many times the force of several starships going full burn. The giant man and colossal machine in a brief stalemate before, with the eyes of every Admiral, Warlord, Pirate and Marine alike, He pushed the blade off him and to the side. Gripping both hands onto the weapon, one on the blade and one on the flat, he held this weapon in his hands like it was nothing. Ignoring all the electricity flowing into him from the blade, Whitebeard roared. Eyes lighting up as lifted Solnis off the ground. Blade first.

"WHAT!"

No time to let go, so utterly flabbergasted he was as he was lifted up and off the ground from a man smaller than one of his fingers. Whitebeard, Solnis at his mercy, pulled him forwards and threw him into the mountain behind them. His form careening through the air and smashing into Marine HQ. Sengoku and Garp almost loosing their footing as Solnis crashed just to their left and shook the entire headquarters like a bell. Solnis groaned as he pulled himself out of the mountain, not giving any moment to Sengoku as he regained his footing and grip and stared down at an awaiting Whitebeard.

Isotope green turned to a dark purple as he called upon his own strength to match Whitebeard's own. Casting aside the blade of shadow, Solnis held out as his hand as smoke billowed out of every crevasse and crack as his body began to visibly shift like water. Within his hand, forming like a bud, was a blade made out of his own body. The alchemical metals of this form, that he had personally enchanted, molding into a weapon fit for him. A massive claymore, runes etching all along the length of the weapon and flowing with power.

*CLANG*

Not giving anymore time to the approaching pirate captain, Solnis swung down. Whitebeard, body now visibly alight with the power of impossibility, struck it with his own. The resulting clash of wills and strength sending both wielders reeling. The almost comical sight of a comparatively tiny ant matching the strength of the mechanical giant was pushed aside as Solnis moved with the force and twirled. His claymore cutting deep through the mountain behind him and coming back around right ontop of Whitebeard who.

*CLANG*

A second time both weapons clashed, this time Whitebeard buckled and sent skidding backwards from the shockwave even as he pushed Solnis' weapon back. All around him, sent flying as well, we're his crew. Wounded or not they found themselves all flung back into the walls they had just breached. Whitebeard himself crashing into a pile of rubble that shook off of him from the rumblings of the earth. The massive machine running forward briefly causing the earth to tremble and shake as Solnis raised his blade overhead.

With not a moment to lose, Whitebeard bolted forward. Quake bubble forming along his blade as he swung with every ounce of strength he had. The shadow coming down upon them all from Solnis's overhead swing.

Their blades did not meet. The force of both weapons pushing against each other momentarily. The clouds overhead exploding in all directions while the entire battlefield was cleared of debris and cracked. Long but minute cracks forming, all from where Whitebeard stood as he pushed against the will of Solnis. A will reinforced by the wills of a thousand more, one that sought to devour him and add him to his collection.

Whitebeard came down to a knee, still pushing with everything he had against the blade. The engines along the arms of Solnis screaming like a thousand dragons. The neon spotlights for eyes sparked to greater heights at the scent of weakness, only adding more force into the already overpowering battle of manifested will. Whitebeard did not even know he was screaming, the engines so loud he could not even tell. But whatever it was, his body pushed and heaved and bled as he got off his knee and pushed. Cracks spiderwebbed across space and bent forwards. The sound drowning out the roars of engines as Solnis found his own blade pushed up and into the air. The rush of force accompanying it rattling the interior of the fortress. Solnis' engines roared as they brought it straight back down onto Edward.

*CRACK*

His claymore struck the spiderweb where their blades had met, brought straight down on top of it. Not realizing that it had lingered longer than it should have until it was too late. Pain wracked his entire body as the shockwaves went up the length of the blade and through his shields. The claymore shattering as the wave of energy traveled up it and into his body.

"UGH!" The creaking and cracking of metal and stone accompanied Solnis' groan as he stumbled backwards, hand flying his his wrist as he dropped the remains of the claymore. The spotlights briefly flickered from green to purple as they bore down at Whitebeard who, true to form, not nearly as winded as he hoped. "Now we're getting somewhere!" Twin neon lights turned into a mass of white that struck down upon Whitebeard, the very earth liquifying under the heat of the spotlights.

Solnis' body was already altering itself, revealing weapon systems all along his form, as Whitebeard kept out of his burning gaze and into the open air. Tracked and with nowhere to run, the sky lit up with red and white once more as he sought to smite Whitebeard from the sky with missiles and fire. The pirate stepping along the air as easily as he did the ground whilst bolts of plasma races past him and missiles followed closely behind.

Pulling one hand back, Solnis' other crackling with lightning, the various missiles and bolts altered trajectory unnaturally, pulled telekinetically back into the path of Whitebeard.

In rapid succession, three things happened. Firstly; the stream of weapons fire, inaccurate against such a small singular target, turned hyper-accurate and what had previously missed became nigh-on impossible to dodge. Secondly; Whitebeard cracked the air. And thirdly; an onslaught of lighting, a cacophonous cracking and electrical discharge that set hairs on end for miles around, was unleashed from Solnis hand at Whitebeard.

Instantly a quake bubble formed and met the torrent of electricity in a brief but devastating struggle that lit up the sky before it moved through the veritable beam of plasma and struck his shield. A brief opening, one Whitebeard moved to exploit as he jumped against the air and rocketed forward. But before he could ever make it half way he was struck from his course, a turbolaser bolt catching the inhumanly durable man in the side and into the path of another.

Explosions rocked the air above Solnis as one, then two, then hundreds of detonations occurred one after another. Whitebeard was engulfed as a missile sent him spiraling into the crosshairs three different ones before it ended in a singularly spot as Edward was struck from the very sky.

Things went deathly quite after the last missile detonated upon Whitebeard. A fireball and cloud of soot and dust where he once was in the air, a few hundred meters in the air before Solnis. One. Two. Then three seconds as nothing occurred. What felt like hours for those who could naught but watch. A satisfied grunt from the mech as it lowered it's outstretched hand.

He was already moving to claim his prize from amongst the dead just as a wave of impossibility and pure will cut through the cloud and towards Solnis, narrowly dodged with precognitive reflex as the machine moved like a man and ducked under the precision strike that cut past and then through the very wall the pirates had struggled to move past for so long.

Whitebeard emerged from the cloud almost completely unscathed, his body a shimmering green as a quake bubble surrounded it like a makeshift personal shield generator. His target distracted and already moving, Whitebeard moved through the air right onto Solnis. His naginata raised in both hands as he jabbed against Solnis' weakened shield. The bubble he had surrounded himself with flowing along the weapon and onto the tip as the force of Whitebeard smashed against the force-enhanced theater shield.

And just like a balloon, it popped against this small needle with a crack of thunder. Whitebeard swinging his weapon to cut Solnis down to size.

And he did.

Whitebeard passed through the titan, his weapon and body passing through metal and stone with ease and emerged on the other side with the cheers of his men filling the air around him. Only to turn his head back around at the sound of rushing wind and smoke instead of collapsing metal.

The titan he had been fighting and struggling against vanished like all the phantoms he has fought before. A pillar of dark mist that dispersed into the air.

"COME HERE!"

His voice echoed from all around him as he felt an invisible titanic grip force his arms to his chest and the air from his lungs.. From cloak, a massive metallic hand shimmered around Whitebeard, caught like a bug in the grip of the real Solnis. The rest of him appeared into view as he dropped his force cloak, holding Whitebeard aloft like a prize in a vice grip.

"THAT LONG TO GET THROUGH THE SHIELDS OF A DOPPELGÄNGER? I UNDERESTIMATED THIS BODY'S SHIELDS!" Solnis gloated, holding Whitebeard was held aloft for all to see. Nowhere to go and unable to break free, Whitebeard was at Solnis' mercy. His other hand molding like clay into a drill that began to rev to life.

"YOU KNOW WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT FRUITS EDWARD. TO BE PLUCKED AT THE PEAK OF RIPENESS! NOW I'LL JUST DRILL THROUGH THE RIND AND REMOVE THE SOUL!" The drill lit up with plasma and smoke! Moving to quickly pierce his chest, Solnis was unsurprised when the drill slammed into a seemingly unbreakable wall. The tip drilling into an invisible field and causing sparks and light to dance about. It was a failing defense however. No matter how spectacular it may seem. Whitebeard's infusion of Conqueror's may be impressive, but it is straining hard on his body. Made even worse by the tightening grip of Solnis and the pressing of even more power into the infernal drill that was grinding through his will like stone.

Whispers, screams, and pleas filled his mind as a lattice of energy grew around Whitebeard. Solnis' spotlight eyes changing into a bright purple as he pushed against Whitebeard's will with his own. A physical and mental battle of wills that he was winning, the tip of the drill pushing past the wall and pressing into Whitebeard's hardened skin.

His victory was at hand. Solnis could sense the power of Whitebeard that was only held back by his age and declining health. His for the taking. The high of his assured victory was almost to the point where he didn't notice the plinking sound of ants shooting at his shield. The sound of his drill and the annoying plinking on his shields drowning out his senses until it was too late.

Something slammed into his shield at a respectable fraction of the speed-of-light, piercing straight through the top of his shield and into Solnis' head. Going in one way and out the other, straight through. The thing tearing right back into Solnis, ripping through the arm holding Whitebeard and severing it completely at the shoulder. The arm, Whitebeard, and Solnis fell down completely. Whitebeard had not even a moment to reorient himself before he was engulfed in blue light and carried by his shoulders.

"Pops! Are you alright?"

Fully in the form of the phoenix, Whitebeard coughed as he felt the refreshing relief of his flames on his wounds and muscles. "Yes…timely as always." He coughed out. Letting Marco take him down into the waiting arms of the rest of his Division Commanders.

Marco returned to form and took his place behind Whitebeard. Obverting the collapsing form of the mechanical titan that had his captain in a death grip. Not letting it leave his gaze as he spoke. "The admirals backed off. I don't know why but it let us get to you. And the warlords…well they're content to just sit and watch this thing try to tear you to shreds."

Waving off Blenheim and Fossa, Whitebeard stood to his full height. Rotating his shoulders as he replied. "Sengoku pulled their leashes. Letting us and this…boy kill each other. Either way he-" Jozu pushed past him and Marco, cutting him off as he tore a great chunk out of the earth and shaped it into diamond. A lance of pure hatred slamming into it and detonating in a green explosion. The chunks of diamond dust falling around them as they see the machine on a knee and actually radiating malice and hate. Half of the head of the fortress is completely gone, the skull caved in and revealing the interior within. The other half glowing bright neon as the singular spotlight bore down upon them, a hand outstretched and crackling with electricity.

"DdddDoNT ThINK I aaa-AM DdddONeE WIttTttH YOU YET!" Solnis cried. Whatever speaker he had straining to articulate. Warbling and loosing volume and consistency. Even as Solnis rose to his feet, his body rippled. Metal moving like waves on water as it filled into the holes in his body. The severed limb as well flew back towards him. Reattaching itself back in his shoulder. Not even a second later Solnis was right in their faces, moving to slam a fist down on-top of Marco as he teleported into action.

Whitebeard was a step ahead however. Grabbing onto Marco and shoving him backwards, pulling a fist back even as
Solnis was coming out of phase. The backlash of shockwave crashed into the collection of pirates as they traded blows.
In Solnis' other hand however grew out a massive scepter. The large rod of metal as tall as he was and tipped with two horn-like prongs. Even before it fully grew out he slammed the pommel through the cracks in the air he was colliding against, smashing into the ground between the collection of pirates holding on and splitting the earth apart beneath them and sending them all into the air.

Not that they were for long as he waved his new stick about and a wave of force shoved them all back and into the ground.

The rumbling of the earth afterward was accompanied by Solnis constant, seemingly boundless, laugher. The very earth they were standing on begging to rise into the air in a collection of floating rocks and islands once again. Splitting apart and leaving the massive machine on one larger platform away from them. Already Whitebeard could see they have risen above Marine HQ and into the atmosphere, the ground hidden behind a layer of clouds that seemed to shift and solidity into a wall encasing this collection of floating isles.

"Holding us here…" He remarked as he pulled Murakumogiri out of the ground and pointed it at Solnis. "We can only hold the Marines back for so long! That machine must fall!" Jumping into a sprint, from afar he could see Solnis raise that scepter up-high. Lightning crackling between the two prongs before it began raining down titanic bolts of lightning. The clouds surrounding them became a conductive wall that only reflected the lightning back around, turning the isles into a death box as strikes of lightning came down sporadically from any which way.

"Marco!" Whitebeard yelled out as Solnis' body opened up once more. "On it!" Was all Marco needed to say before throwing himself into the hail of weapons fire, turning into a massive blue firewall in-front of them. Uncaring of the apocalyptic amounts of weaponry he was taking as he charged through it while the rest of his compatriots advanced behind him, jumping from rock to rock towards Solnis.

The vaguely phoenix shaped wall of fire almost reached him too. But even with his speed he couldn't match Solnis' foresight as he crashed into nothing as the titanic war-machine teleported, crashing down right on-top of Kingdew and Atmos. The two commanders batted away with a wave of the staff and into the wall of charged clouds.

"Teleportation with a body that huge?!" Marco yelled out, gliding through where Solnis before coming back around, transitioning into full-form as he picked up Vista in his talons on his way.

"CALLING ME HUGE, YOU INSIGNIFICANT LITTLE BIRD?" Solnis shot back, Force Lightning crackling across his finger tips and towards the encumbered Marco. Content with holding him back even as he flew between the currents of electricity, Solnis raised his scepter towards the approaching Whitebeard…before shifting it towards Izou and Curiel who have been uselessly pelting him with Haki infused gun fire. "I PROMISED." The scepter letting loose a beam of pure force energy. Whitebeard turning to intercept but unable as an island is thrown into him with a wave of Solnis' hand.

The two gunmen would have been unmade, were it not for the massive form of Jozu crashing into the both of them at top speed. Grabbing both of them in his arms and turning a shining diamond as they are engulfed. This laser of pure energy seeking to unmake them crashing into the will of Diamond Jozu.

One hand keeping up the pressure on Marco and Vista, the other maintaining the stream of power towards Jozu, Solnis ignored the ants that tried in vain to break his shield. The likes of Haruta, Jiru, and Fossa being unable to even damage his shielding. The island thrown at him at completely asinine speeds was however. It pulverized against his shields and rattled his form enough for him to lose focus. And for Whitebeard to follow close behind and crash into his shields with Murakumogiri.

It was a weird thing to watch as the shield bent inward as he pressed up against it. Cracking and causing alarms to be audibly even from outside of the fortress. But it was not enough. Solnis pulled back the scepter and slammed it down onto Whitebeard...but he was prepared. Whitebeard grabbed space and pulled, his own formed visibly shifting into the new position as the prongs of the scepters came down. Even many times his size, he parried the edges of one of the two prongs and carried it down with his own strength. Slamming it into the platform and holding it down as he yelled out. "Now Marco!"

Marco came crashing through the now lessened storm of lightning and crashed into his shield at top speed. Yet it held unlike before. The doppelgänger from before being a shadow of the strength of the real thing even as it visibly strained from the blow. Not missing this opportunity, Solnis kicked out at Whitebeard, his massive boot slamming into him and away from his scepter. Now free, his arms thrusters roared to life as he pulled up. Hoping to catch the bird in the backswing as it flew out of the ground and into the massive fireball that was burning against his shield.

It flew through the fireball and extinguished it from the shockwave of air alone. The scepter crashing into the solid cloud wall with a much smaller half-human half-phoenix caught at the end of one of the prongs in between it and the wall. The screams of Marco as he was electrocuted we're not what he got however. Instead only a manic grin and silence as he endured the, what should have been, lethal amounts of lightning coursing through his body.

His senses screamed at him to move, teleport or anything but Solnis was just a little slow. Coming from his side, thrown by Kingdew and Atmos, was a ball of blades and rose petals. Vista cracked both blades against Solnis' shields and finally shattered them. His theater shielding giving out as he continued on and into the fortress itself. Carving an impossibly large X-shaped gash into his torso.

Solnis staggered backwards, a metallic cry of grinding metal in place of any yelp of pain. Nearly steeping on Vista before teleporting mid-stagger, reappearing away from the group of pirates clutching his chest as it repaired. Watching the Whitebeard commanders regroup, Solnis snarled out. "PREDICTABLE…" He slammed the scepter into the ground, the cloud walls turning into a whirling maelstrom as the various floating islands closed in on one another. Reforming into a singular platform. "NOW ITS TIME! SHOW ME; EVERYTHING. YOU. HAVE!" He proclaimed to them all as he rushed forward and slammed his fist down on top of them.

Expectedly they all dodged and swarmed around him in the air with flies, Whitebeard and his division commanders circling him from all directions as his entire body opened up. A close range barrage of omni-directional weapons fire. Even so it did not stop them, merely lighting up the sky and battlefield as now he was vulnerable without his shield. Marco scraped down his back whilst he was pulling his arm out of the ground, Whitebeard too cracking his fist against his form and sending tremors all across it. But even so he did not relent.

The pain of two bodies fueling his strength even further, Solnis sped up and turned into a blur. In an instant a shadowy blade formed in his off hand and cracked down on top of Vista just as he was moving from his blind spot. The scepter scraping across the ground and carving through it, carrying lighting and force enough to send Atmos and Jozu flying even with a near miss.

Not taking a step further or back, Solnis cracked Kingdew into the dirt with the end of his scepter whilst summoning out enormous dark tendrils from the platform. Each one many times the size of his own form and whipping about, erasing any stray fire or thing they touched from this world…but of course Whitebeard wasn't one to sit about. A second shockwave accompanied by an intense red light blew away the tendrils before they could reach any of his sons, the captain himself jumping into the air and aiming to cut the head from the snake before he could any damage.

But his naginata caught only air as Solnis phased, Whitebeard's swing going right through the titan as he stepped right Edward and put his scepter right in his face. "VANISH."

His proclamation given, Edward was engulfed in a lance of energy. The old man carried by the beam straight to the top of the maelstrom wall. With nothing but his will to keep him from being erased, Solnis was caught by the quick reactions of his crew. Marco burned past him, trusting in his Pops' strength and went right for his offhand. Burning right through the blade and his hand, Solnis was disarmed and open for Haruta and Jiru both. The two men scatted down the length of his scepter and jumped off at his wrist. Both jumping off the air itself to avoid an intense laser gaze from his eyes and getting right into his face. As one they both stabbed their weapons into his spotlight eyes, both immediately detonating in flashes of neon green.

Stumbling backwards, Blenheim, Atmos and Fossa took their chance to crash right into his sides. The three massive men, with all of their inhuman strength, pushed Solnis off balance and almost off kilter...right into their trap.

Vista carved down. Both blades sending two shockwaves through the floating platform and separating the piece Solnis stood upon from the rest. Jozu and Kingdew grabbing onto the now separated piece and heaved. Flipped like a table, Solnis was sent completely off his feet as the ground he stood upon struck him in the face. Not done yet, and making sure their team effort was not in vain, Marco burned right through the earth. His leg slamming down on top of Solnis with all the strength he could muster.

And like that, the air went silent as the massive behemoth of metal was sent careening into his own wall. The cloud wall shattering as it returned to proper form in the wake of his rapid descent. Marco flapping in the air and loosing sight of Solnis as he plummeted down to Marineford.

Turning back around, he stepped back onto the platform and sighed. "I doubt that will kill him…but it should give us a few moments of reprieve to-" Cut off as the entire platform cracked and split apart. Bolts of plasma cutting through it as multiple red lances of energy ripped through it. "Damnit! Will nothing put him down?!" Marco cried out, igniting into form as he heard Whitebeard yell out his name.

"Marco! With me! Jozu! Get everyone down safely!" Whitebeard ran past Marco, pointing to Jozu as he ran and momentarily stopped at the edge of the now plummeting piece island they were on, searching. "There."

Jumping off without hesitation, Whitebeard broke off like a missile towards the source of the red lances below the clouds. Marco not far behind and catching up with ease.

"What's the plan pops? Nothing is putting him down." Avoiding weapons fire was the easy part. Marco could handle that for the both of them, gripping onto Whitebeard's shoulders with his talons and carrying him through the unholy amounts of arcane plasma in the air. getting past Solnis on the other hand, Marco had no idea how to do that. "Keep him still…" Whitebeard grimly replied. A worried but understanding look passing over Marco's face as they came down below the clouds.

A view of five identical clones of the gigantic machine awaited them. Each one an arsenal of weapons and carrying that same blasted scepter. All together and shifting towards them as they breached through the clouds on a beeline through the fire.

"Go!"

Whitebeard wrestled himself free out of Marco's grip and swung Murakumogiri down, a quake bubble formed around the tip and launched forward. The sphere of kinetic energy grew in size as it passed them. Growing until it reaches a colossal size that eclipsed all five of the clones at once, engulfed all of them as it crashed down on their shields and then onto them. The cloud of debris and smoke flew upwards past them, Whitebeard taking his change to back off to let Marco continue on through the smoke towards what was hopefully left of Solnis.

Moving into the epicenter however, Marco passed through into a complete smokeless area with an awaiting, and unharmed, giant. But as soon as he breached into the smokeless zone, his flames were snuffed out, the phoenix rendered powerless as he ran headlong into an open vacuum. Soundlessly yelling as his own momentum launched him straight into Solnis' hands, he was powerless to resist the titan as he held him aloft. Solnis shrinking down the vacuum to encapsulate only Marco as he waved his scepter, the massive cloud of smoke and debris blowing away as he yelled out.

"COME ON EDWARD IM FEELING GENEROUS!" Solnis announced, holding the asphyxiating Marco forward like some kind of trophy. Whitebeard's second barely even visible within his hand. "ARE YOU GOING TO KEEP SENDING YOUR FAMILY TO DIE FOR YOU?! THE POOR BIRD CANT FLY WITH HIS WINGS PLUCKED! NO LONGER CAN HE RESIST!" He taunted, slowly applying more pressure to Marco as his spotlights scanned the horizon. For a moment he thought Edward might actually resist his provocation, his gaze briefly going down to Marco as he considered it. But then that's when he felt it.

For the third time, Solnis' senses screamed at him. That unflinching feeling of certain death as seemingly the entire world went red. This insane physical pressure shook his fortress to it's very core, the clouds in the sky breaking apart just from the exposure and displaying the clear now night sky above.

Tracing to the source of light, Solnis saw Whitebeard standing alone with his weapon hefted above his shoulders in some stance. Visibly trembling in either anger, pain, or some mixture of the two. The ground, sky, and space shook continuously as Whitebeard stood alone, staring up at the fortress replica of Darth Nox. Holding his oldest friend, ally, and son aloft like a trophy and silhouetted by one the of two moons above.

Turning fully to face the pirate lord, Solnis' confidence and malice was a poison unlike any other to Edward Newgate. A megalomaniacal desire for power and assurance in his invincibility. It sickened and enraged him in equal measure.

Even as his body broke, his bleeding and punctured heart straining to keep up with his desire to finally put Solnis down, Whitebeard drew further into the depths of his will and found it wanting. The red light emanating from his body intensified and a quake bubble formed around Murakumogiri as the entire planet shook under the power of Edward "Whitebeard" Newgate. Member of the Four Emperors, Strongest Man in the Galaxy and the Man Closest to One Piece.

"YOU WOULDN'T DARE…" Solnis said to Whitebeard, holding out Marco like a shield as he called his bluff. The nearly unconscious pirate unable to speak, but meeting the gaze of his captain in understanding. Whitebeard locked eyes with Marco and then the titan above. Neither side backing down as the world heaved under his unrestrained power. Solnis taking a step forward even as Whitebeard's power intensified and red lightning sparked off him and his weapon, each bolt carving deep gouges into the earth.

Seconds seemed to past without action. The stand-off adding to Solnis' confidence even as the winds coming off Whitebeard intensified. For a brief moment, Solnis dared to speak. But before he could even get a word out a flash went past his overloaded senses, his vision cloud by…rose petals?

Marco found strength return to him as air returned to his lungs and the hand shattered into pieces as Vista came down from the heavens, followed shortly after by Jozu who tackled both of them into the ground out of his reach. Solnis' leverage now gone and turning into a bird of relativistic speeds, his confidence was shattered in an instant. He tried to raise his scepter in defense but…

Whitebeard was quicker on the draw.

Whitebeard took a step and swung. Murakumogiri swung like a bat as the galaxy shook under the proclamation of an Emperor. A death bell signature to the reign of the Rocks Pirates.

"CONQUEST OF THE GALAXY!"

Whitebeard collapsed as his body gave out on him. His last ditch move to kill the unkillable as he dove into strength he simply did not have anymore. No matter how he felt however, he wasn't dead and everything in front of him was simply vaporized. The ground that wasn't was either molten or superheated and in a canyon so deep and long that it seemingly had no end. Staring up into the sky, Whitebeard found that he had struck one of the moons from the sky. The rock in space now little more than a debris field reigning down upon a world he had doomed to mass extinction.

Coughing up horrendous amounts of blood, he tried to stand up and survey the land only to fail and collapse back into The arms of Jozu and Marco. The division commanders arriving after Whitebeard struck Solnis from this plane of existence and moving to support him. As of right now? The only thing keeping Whitebeard alive and conscious was Marco's flames. Their captain and adoptive father being completely engulfed in warm blue fire. But it was clear that what he had did was simply too much for his body to bear. Still Marco tried to get him up.

"Come on pops. Don't give in now. We still need you. Ace still needs you…" His words doing little but reminding Whitebeard of what he still had to do. And despite it all. Ace was still alive. He could feel it.

Moving to sit up, Whitebeard grasped onto Jozu and Vista as he reassured them. "Enough." Using them as supports as he got to his feet. "I won't die. Not yet. I gave my word to the boy that he would be safe. I will save Ace and get you all off this doomed ro-" "We can't have that now can we?"

The group of pirates was sent flying as Whitebeard was struck from behind. A detonation of red lightning as his body was sent flying into the canyon he created, all fight leaving him as he landed onto a outcropping and laid there. Marco's flames still flickering across his body but diminished as his body crackled with the arcane.

"I'll be a good sport and acknowledge that you are stronger than I am Edward. But you have played right into my hands."

Solnis stood upon the scorched patch where they had once stood. Uncaring of the rising division commanders as he monologued to their nearly unconscious captain. Returned to normal form, his armor and body broken and blooded horrifically. But still carrying that same scepter he had when he was a giant. But far more detailed and radiating power unlike anything they had felt before. It was as tall as he was and visibly glowing, the red arcane lightning that had blasted them all arcing across it.

He would have preferred the Darkstaff. That artifact of insane power he had sought after for so long was now forever out of his grasp. But he had found a suitable substitute, one far more specialized and easy to wield. The Scepter of Marka Ragnos was the crown jewel of his collection. An artifact of supreme power.

"The moment you killed Khem was the the moment I decided I would see you broken." Solnis said, running two fingers along the length of Ragnos' Scepter as he took in it's power. "But what would work best? Torture? No. Even if resurrected you endlessly that wouldn't break you. I kept wondering what would shatter your heart. But of course the answer was simple. You have surrounded yourself with your greatest weakness. All I needed to do was draw out your strength, push you to your limits and have you break them." Solnis pointed his scepter towards Whitebeard's broken body. Alive but unable to do more than sit and watch.

"You played your part wonderfully. Without you and your favorite sons I couldn't have executed my plan so flawlessly. And now you shall sit and watch as I tear all you care about apart!"

Swinging the scepter around him, the energies of the darkside swirling invisibility with it. Space warped and shifted with it's movement as he swung it above his head. The horned prongs coming to life as space churned around them before jutting forth as a beam of arcane power into the air. Shattering the fabric of space as the Dark Side claimed it's hold on this world. The atmosphere churning as an unnatural Force Storm was conjured fourth above them all. Small, but growing with each second as it tore great chunks of the earth into its endless maw.

He was interrupted finally as a diamonds fist cracked him across the temple. Jozu smashing into Solnis while a second later, he felt his scepter wrested from his hands. The talons of a blue phoenix grabbing onti it and wrenching it away as Jozu pinned him to the ground. Solnis scoffed as he phased right out of his hold and shoved the diamond man into the canyon behind him. Turning to briefly survey the collection of commanders around him and then back up at Marco, Solnis raised his hand and pulled down at Marco. The pirate now struggle to climb in the air as he was tugged down by his telekinetic force.

Moving forward, he ducked under a swing from Kingdew as he came at him. Using the giant man as a footstool to jump up towards Marco just as the rest of the division commanders surrounded the two of them. Struggling to stay in the air Marco pulled back as far as he could as Solnis reached from his scepter. Almost reaching it before Speed Jiru came from the side and speared him. Taking him to the ground.

Growling even with Jiru's lance in his chest, Solnis kicked him off and slid under Jozu as he climbed out of the canyon and reached for him. Lightning arcing across his body, Solnis summoned a blade to his hand to parry twin strikes from Vista, kneeing the swordsman in the chest and blasting him back into Blenheim with Force Lightning. Teleporting away just as a shot range out from Curiel, reappearing above Marco and kicking him in the back as hell reached for his scepter.

"Your beginning to get on my-" Solnis tried to say as he wrestled with Marco in the air before two pistol shots from Izou hit him in the side and forced him off. Still reaching for it even as he fell, Solnis was grabbed out of the air by a jumping Fossa. The two falling to the ground and struggling before a blade to the neck stabbed into Solnis. Haruta jamming the sword as far as he could as he tried in-vain to decapitate him.

"Enough!" Solnis yelled out in anger, a wave of telekinetic force rippling outward from him in a Force Repulse. This explosion ripping through the ground into all the commanders, slamming into Marco and shaking loose the scepter from his grip. Swiftly returned to his hand, Solnis glowed with power only to get body slammed once again by Jozu. The giant man wrapping both arms around him and pinning him to the ground once again. Only this time two blades were quick too stab into him from Vista as well. Pinned by two top-commanders, the rest piled on him as Marco moved to return to Whitebeard's side.

Tackled and impaled, Solnis growled in frustration as they struggled against the inevitable. "Don't you get it?" Solnis spoke aloud to them all "If he couldn't kill me? What makes you think you can?" The scepter erupted with power, a shockwave of energy blasting all of them off as he stood back up and pointed at Marco. The phoenix just reaching Whitebeard only to be frozen in stasis.

Turning quickly, Solnis raised the scepter to parry a strike from Jozu. His fist bouncing off the artifact without damage and was reward with beam of energy that pierced through his flesh even as it turned to diamond. Raising a hand to summon a barrier around himself to block the pesky bullets that were being shot at him, Solnis turned and kicked Jiru in the sternum as he ran into him, cracking his chest and leaving him open to get slammed into the dirt by Jiru's thrown body.

The rest of the pack descended upon him but we're met by a second explosion of telekinesis that blasted each one of them back down into the dirt. Raising his scepter in the air, Solnis called down bolts of lighting from the Force Storm like rain. The entire landscape was scorched into glass in an instant as he electrocuted the lot of them. Stopping only for Solnis to raise the scepter towards the literal mountain of a body in the distance.

"Observe." Solnis said with no small amusement, his eyes not even looking at the commanders and instead staring past into Whitebeard's.

The scepter glowed with energy as the body of Little Oars Jr began to rumble and convulse. Flesh and lost limbs regrowing as the body stilled upon complete reconstruction. Only for the earth to shake as Little Oars Jr's corpse rose to life. The multi-kilometer giant rising to his full height for all to see, his eyes filled with life and worry as he was completely resurrected. Only for his return to life to be snuffed out in an instant as Solnis drew back in the energy he had used to resurrect the beast.

Content with his demonstration of power, Solnis raised both arms up and warmly smiled to the collection of wide-eyed pirates strewn about him. "Now that we've got my display of ultimate power out of the way. I hope you all realize that I, in my infinite and glorious majesty, am your god and that you live and die as I wish. I could spent eternity killing each and every one of you in a myriad of ways. Now usually this would be part where I offer up immortality, power, a place by my side if you only join me and embrace the Dark Side. Unfortunately, that is not how this is going to go. Because Edward turned Khem into atoms..." Stepping forward and gesturing to each and everyone of them as he monologued. Solnis finished with a click of his tongue as he rested the end of the scepter in the palm of his hand.

"No." Solnis continued. "Instead I am going to kill you all one by one in-front of your dear old pops. Then I am going to kill him. Oh, I almost forgot. I'm also going to eat all of your souls. So not only am I your god, I am also your afterlife." Finished properly explaining just how utterly doomed they all were, Solnis raised Jozu off the ground with a Force Choke. Hoisting the man up for all to see, he stared the slowly dying man in the eye and turned to Whitebeard…only to get punched in the face by a fiery blue fist. Solnis was blown backwards, skidding across the ground and growling as picked himself up, rising into the air to stare down the now un-stunned Marco.

The two continued this silent stare down for an uncomfortable amount of time. Neither one moving upon the other as they both took stock of the other. Finally culminating in Solnis raising the scepter only to get grabbed face first by Marco and dragged through the dirt at top-speed. Marco's wings erupting into full force as he dragged Solnis through rock and dirt at insane speeds, turning everything they moved through into slagged until finally he slammed him up against the body of Oars.

Marco tried to immolate him, but was burst off of Solnis as the scepter once again erupted with a shockwave. Before he could even act that same beam erupted from the scepter and ripped through his chest without mercy…only to immediately heal without any issue.

Solnis stared for a moment. His eyes carefully examining the wound, or lack there of, before saying. "Oh, so that's how it is then." Solnis vanished, teleporting right in Marco's face and uppercutting up in the jaw before cracking him in the sternum with the end of the scepter and sweeping him off his feet before he could even react. Grabbing onto his legs as he fell, Solnis shoved him upside down and placed the scepter right up against his head and let loose. Marco's head was blown clean off and his body flung backwards with the force of the beam. The expected result occurring as Marco's head completely regenerating in a burst of blue flame, his arms turning into massive wings as he ran right through the beam without care, kicking Solnis in the head as he flew over over him. A second kick to the back sent Solnis flying through the rock head first before recovering with a handstand and jump. Landing on his feet as he raises the scepter at Marco.

Pebbles and rocks floated off the ground and circled above his head. These stones growing longer, and blacker, until they turned into voidstone spikes that sped towards Marco. Tracking him as he blew off into the air, finding them to be just as, no faster, then he was. Forcing the phoenix to duck and weave out of the way of these homing projectiles anathema to him until one caught him right in the back. A satisfying, to Solnis anyway, scream echoing outward as Marco momentarily lost his form and plummeted until he ripped the massive spike out of his back and tossed it away. Regenerating the wound and regaining flight.

Sensing his weakness however, more spikes erupted out of the ground at his command. Dozens, then hundreds of these massive needle-like projectiles ripping enough the air towards the phoenix. The air was filled with enoough orojectiles to blot out the sun…only for Marco to ignite like an inferno. The swarm of projectiles melting like wax candles before they even reached his body. Only for Solnis himself to erupt into the air and through the fire. Tackling Marco out through the top and sending him back down to the ground with a crack of his scepter. Red lightning arcing across his body, doing pain…but not injury.

A seeming battle between immortals, we're it not for the fact that Solnis knew he could kill him. A wave of his scepter created hundreds more of those spikes in the air, this time actually blotting out the sky as he rained them upon Marco. His other hand shooting torrents of lighting down towards the phoenix as Marco flew through the barrage as close to the ground as possible. Each spike shattered upon impact with the ground and sending would-be dangerous shrapnel across his body were it not for his burning heat.

Suddendly, Marco turned up, flying upwards as he met Oars' body and turning towards Solnis. The bright inferno now turning not into a small ember. His size actually shrinking as his speed intensified. Crashing into and through Solnis like the bullet he was. Turning back to full size as he burned right through his chest, scissor kicking Solnis in the back of the head before he could even fly backwards.

He briefly was nocked back. His neck audibly snapping back into place as whatever force keeping Solnis in flight corrected him and turned him towards Marco. Turning just in-time to avoid a talon from Marco, smashing him upside the head with his own for the effort. The two circling each other then until Solnis waved his hand in the air. Space, no, time shuddering as everything slowed down. Unfortunately, Marco was still incredibly fast and that annoyingly familiar red light from Whitebeard began emitting from him as well. Resisting the effects to a degree as he sped up through the slowed down time.

A wave of his scepter sent massive pillars of voidstone forward in this slowed down time. Yet each one was dodged, avoided, or knocked away with each subsequent pillar being done so with greater ease then the last. Marco moving through each pillar with greater and greater speed until finally shattering the effect all together as he barrel-rolled away just as a strike of lighting came down right as he reached Solnis. Circling back around to stare the Sith Lord dead in the face as he hammer fisted Solnis back down to Marineford.

A brief second of reprieve was all he had as he crashed down onto the ground. Solnis looking around as he was now actually surrounded by pirates. The canyon Whitebeard and the rest of the division commanders were in now swarming with them to his surprise. One in particular actually at Whitebeard himself. Not that he much time to make him out before a speeding inferno crashed down on-top of him.

This massive blue ball of fire crashed down right onto Solnis, but as the flames cleared all the pirates and Marco could see was a solid grey dome of alien metal. Marco's flames heating it up, but not able to melt it. Conjured out of nothing, a solid wall of beskar.

Marco pushed against it, but was dumbfounded as the metal spontaneously liquified. This dome turning into a stream of liquid metal following the end of Solnis' scepter as he pulled it away and cracked Marco in the jaw. Sent flying into the air, Solnis turned to the collection of pirates around and did a full 360 with the scepter. The beam cutting a bloody swath through the chaff before he brought it back up to recreate the dome of beskar just as Marco carpet bombed him from above. Blue fire balls shooting out of his wings that were completely absorbed by arcane metallic defense.

But beskar was strong, but indestructible it was not. Marco changed tactics and came down in a dive. Smashing into and through the wall of beskar, slamming right into Solnis and carrying him the canyon they were fighting next to. Marco's hold didn't last however. Solnis phasing right through him and swung the scepter upwards. A second passing before, erupting out of the ground, a massive spiked pillar of voidstone nearly struck Marco from behind. Forcing him to fly higher into the air to avoid it, the spike so massive it reached out of the canyon itself. Turned back around to briefly look at Whitebeard while he had a chance, Marco saw Squard waving to him and, while he could not hear it, he could make out through his gesturing that he wanted him to heal Whitebeard. Who, despite it all, was not only conscious but trying to rise to his feet once more.

Marco only had time to nod to Squad before Solnis erupted out of the canyon swinging. Marco flying higher and higher with each swing of the scepter as, with each swing, another spike of voidstone erupted out of the previous one. Rapidly turning it into a climb upwards into the clouds with a increasing disturbing spiked mountain of voidstone being created along the way. This horrific Tower of Babel ending as, with one final swing, a giant hand ripped out of the mountain and reached for Marco. Wrapping itself around the phoenix for but a moment, only to be blown away in a giant burst of red light and blue flames. Marco tackling Solnis into the side of his creation before dragging him down the entire length. Throwing him straight back down into the canyon.

Moments to spare, Marco turned and flew back towards Whitebeard. Giving his trust to Squard to buy him time.

As for Solnis? He found himself climbing out of the bedrock at the bottom of the canyon. Utterly surrounded by hundreds of pirates. The best and most devoted of his crew that has survived this hell of a meat grinder Marineford has turned into.

"Please." Solnis drolled. "Edward is half-dead and the bird is-" He tried to say before the pirates started throwing themselves at him. A recklessly suicidal abandon that caught Solnis off guard as one after another they willingly through themselves into certain death to buy Marco time. It was insane. Actually insanity. But it was working. It was Solnis' turn to be a blender, each life being snuffed out with nought but a thought or a glare. Literally. Lighting erupted from Solnis and reduced men to ash, only for men to come. The next wave was killed by ripping them apart with a wave of his hand. Still more came. Again and again, the sons of Whitebeard continued to stall for time. Each second precious for the survival of the man who gave them everything.

The ground of choked with blood and piles of ash until, at last, a single pirate got through. A luck of chance as he was only caught in the side by a spike erupting out of the ground and allowed him to impale Solnis through the chest before being disintegrated by just his glare alone. But it slowed him. And that created an opportunity for another one to make it through. This time with a slice to the back of the knee that faltered Solnis' concentration as he fell for but a second. And a second was all they needed.

More than three dozen men, including Squard himself, jumped down upon Solnis and practically threw themselves upon him. Tackling him down with the weight of their bodies as he was impaled again and again. Solnis' screams of anger finally getting the better of him as a wave of force erupted from the staff. Most of them were blown away, but Squard held onto his sword, imbedded inside Solnis sternum.

Solnis grabbed his throat with his off hand and tried to push him off. Failing to do so with so many wounds that were only just healing. So, in a fit of anger, he swung the scepter of ragnos with all his might and cracked Squard in the temple.

There was no wound. Instead, the scepter struck the Haki hardened head of Squard and drained him dry. The obsidian coloration actually flowing into the scepter as Solnis ripped the soul straight out of his body. A brief faint transport ghost of the pirate seen for a but a moment before it was siphoned through the scepter and into Solnis.

The battle paused as Solnis and the remaining horde of pirates just stood there. One side afraid. The other perplexed and reminded of what an ancestor has said not too long ago.

Staring upwards into the Force Storm above, past the pirates and ignoring their cries. Solnis could only laugh out "Oh. I really am the best."

"He is a wound in the Force, more presence than flesh, and in his wake life dies… sacrificing itself to his hunger."

Something was wrong. The division commanders were back up thanks to Marco. But Whitebeard was still critically wounded and despite everything he could do. He couldn't stand fully. But that wasn't what had them concerned. It was that the presence of Solnis, that unnatural feeling that their haki felt? It just grew. And in the course of a few seconds his presence, his "strength" was multiplying. Fast. Faster than it had any right too.

A pulse of energy then ripped out through the canyon. A greyish black field that sucked the life out anything and anyone it passed over. Stopping just short of the edge of it they had moved Whitebeard too. All that was left in it's wake were dried out husks, ripped out motes of light, or some cases faint images, that were sucked down into the abyss below.

It was stunning. So stunning that Marco wasn't prepared for Solnis to teleport behind him with the scepter swing backwards like a bat. Thankfully, Jozu was. Jozu tackled Marco out of the way and brought both arms up, turning into a solid diamond. But the moment the scepter struck him however, Jozu began screaming screaming like never before, a screech that struck them to their very souls. Jozu's solid diamond body turned a lifeless stone as his Haki, his soul, was sucked out of his body in a horrifying display of power. The giant proud defender of the Whitebeard pirates dead in a moment. A lifeless statue that was pushed aside by Solnis. Shattering upon the ground into pieces.

His body pulsing with strength not his own. He said to them all. "Now, where we're we?"

Marco didn't wait. He burst forth, his wings spreading out brightly as he rocketed forward at Solnis. Only to get blasted away by a wave of force, crashing back into the canyon with Whitebeard, Jiru, Vista, Haruta, and Izou.

The remaining commanders left behind were powerless to resist. Kingdew tried to act first, moving to tackle Solnis away, but instead found his body hitting a solid wall of voidstone that erupted out of the ground. The wall turning into dust as it was reduced to make way for Solnis' scepter. Striking the man in the chest and sucking the life out of him in an instant. Pushing his body aside, Solnis, in one swift movement, killed both Atmos and Blenheim. Fossa and Curiel unable to act as Solnis rushed forward and first struck Atmos, and then before he was even fully dead, moved onto Blenheim and struck him as well. The two men collapsing dead just as soon as he turned to Fossa and Curiel.

By the time Marco pulled himself out of the wall. They were already dead. The first thing he sees looking up his Curiel desperately firing his pistols into Solnis' head as he was lifted off his feet his neck, each bullet plinking off his skull before Solnis pressed the scepter into his chest and he too dropped. Solnis tossing his body away to turn to Marco. Letting the bright burning pheonix crash into him without a care in the world. Marco carrying Solnis high into the sky and slamming him into the voidstone tower.

Marco retreated just as Solnis phased through him, narrowly dodging the swing by a feather as the scepter struck against the tower. This time, causing Solnis to growl as he turned to face him. "Oh don't make this difficult."

Trying to fly away, Marco found himself suddenly falling and without oxygen. His body briefly falling as he watched Solnis rocket off the tower swinging like a batter. The feeling upon the scepter striking his head was unlike anything he had ever felt before. A draining on his being being that hurt like nothing ever before. But to Solnis' frustration…he didn't immediately die. His will, his soul, more…resilient then most. But that didn't matter as Solnis turned back around and struck Marco again. Cracking him in the chest and weakening Marco even further. Entrapped in the vacuum Marco was struck again and again. Each hit siphoning away just a little more of himself, until a crack rang out from below.

Solnis turning only to get smashed as a quake bubble from below broke his concentration. Air rushing back into Marco's lung as he watched Whitebeard fall back to the ground, that act alone draining him of strength.

A brief reprieve but Solnis recovered far to fast. Teleporting in the way of Marco as he tried to fly away. Cracking him in the face with his off hand and sending him flying backward into the pillar of voidstone.

His back against a wall, and nowhere to run, all Marco had left to do was fight. Fight or flight kicking in as he his body burned brighter then it had ever had before. His body sped up, turning into a full phoenix as he raced forward at a respectable fraction of the speed of light.

Everything slowed down to a crawl for Marco as he charged forward with everything he had. His body glowing with power and will to survive.

But as he charged forward, Marco did not strike Solnis. Instead the Sith Lord fell. His body wrenching downward as Marco moved through where he was and locked eyes with the man who had come to kill them all.

And like a man catcher, Solnis caught him by the neck. The horns of the scepter wrapping around his neck.

A grinding sound unlike any other filled the air. Solnis pulled the scepter around with Marco's flailing as, for all to see, a specter of himself was pulled out of his body. His full phoenix form was reduced to only his half as, despite his own power and will, he was stuck. The longer he had the scepter around his neck the harder it was to resist. The harder it was to resist the weaker he got. And the weaker he got the more herculean the task was to wrench himself free.

Still they struggled. The two struggling against each other in the sky as Marco tried to break free. His wings flapping backwards and, despite it all, Marco seemed to actually wrench himself free. But as his body broke free from the scepter. his soul did not. The specter Solnis had pulled from him still living body firmly within the bind of the Force Walker. The specter seeming to stretch as his body tried to fly away only for it to be pulled back by his own soul towards Solnis.

The red light emanating from Marco grew weaker and weaker with each passing moment. Solnis now physically holding Marco by the neck with his off hand, no longer was he struggling physically even as his will fought on. Solnis tugged, pulled, and with a sound that could only be described as a CLANG wrenched Marco's soul from his body.

The grinding sound got weaker, fainter. The soul writhing for but a moment before it was completely sucked into the scepter. A last CLANG before it all went silent.

The blue flames around Whitebeard, and what remained on his body drifted upwards. The fires twirling around Solnis before his body burst alight. The blood, bruises, and stab wounds all burning away in an instant as he let out a sigh of relief.

Solnis's hands briefly burst into flames, twirling around him as he took in his latest acquisition. Staring down at the fear-stricken pirates below him, Solnis stretched his newly recovered body, rolling his shoulders as his face scrunched up in concentration. All they could do was watch as Solnis' back lit aflame. An inferno growing larger and larger as he strained until, at once, two massive blue wings of fire stretched out from his back. The wings of phoenix now looking more like that of angel's upon his purely human form.

Staring down at them, Solnis then looked up into the Force Storm above. His gaze briefly going down to Whitebeard's before he raised his scepter upwards.

A red light burst from his body, Haki going up the length of his arm into the scepter as he hoisted it towards the Force Storm above. In an instant, the storm stopped. The localized wormhole collapsing in on itself as, with new found ease, Solnis dispersed the storm as he took in his newfound strength.

Satisfied, he stared down towards the last remaining division commanders, staring straight at the last of the "Big-Three." His eyes meeting Vista's as he hoisted the staff towards him…and then at Whitebeard.

"This is but a prelude."

With one flap of his newfound wings, he burst past the swordsmen. Staring down Jiru, Haruta, and Izou as he kicked out Vista's knee and toppled the swordsmen. And, drawing out the hilt of the scepter, pulled the Sith Blade free from the scepter and stabbed it down as Vista fell before he even realized what was happening. The blade going through his heart, killing him instantly. Wrenching it free from his chest. Solnis idly pressed the staff to his corpse and grasped his soul as it left and raised it towards the remaining three.

Before he could do anything however, Whitebeard growled to life. "You. YOU. DA-"

His voice was immediately muffled as, bursted from the earth, a chain of voidstone wrapped itself around his mouth. The another around his arm. And then his left. Then dozens more as Whitebeard was wrapped and pulled up by the Devil Fruit hating material.

"Watch." Solnis said, lowering the scepter as he waited for the three remaining to make their move.

Jiru moved first. The speedster moving to run Solnis through. The lance piercing his chest and going out the other side. To no affect as Jiru began clutching his throat, rising into the air for Solnis to pull back his own sword to do same to him. Only for Haruta to run forward and grasp at his blade wielding arm. Easily pulling his arm free, he turned it around and ran the sword through Haruta first. But even as he did so Izou also moved to tackle him. Solnis not even budging as he struggled in his attempt to move him.

Pulling the sword from Haruta's chest, Solnis turned it back towards the still choking Jiru and ran him through in return. Letting his body drop as he finally cracked Izou in the side with his scepter. The last three of the division commanders now lying at his feet, their souls now with the rest.

"Now." Solnis spoke to Whitebeard, the weakened dying man still struggling in the grasp of metal anathema to him. "You die."

Whitebeard, enraged and saddened beyond reason. Felt the chains tighten around his body as Solnis plunged the blade into his heart. His body tensed as this blade went right through his heart and out the back. Solnis' twisting the blade just to make sure because of last time.

Finally feeling his body slacken, the chains crumbled back into the stone they were conjured from. Whitebeard's body falling to it's knees as Solnis let out a sigh of relief at all this being over.

Moving to pull the blade out of his chest, Solnis instead felt pain as Whitebeard's right hand grasped around his arm and cracked. Panic flooded Solnis as he shoved the scepter into his chest. Like before, Solnis felt unnatural resistance as grabbed onto Whitebeard soul, looking to end it once and for all and claim his prize.

But even as his body lies broken and dying, Whitebeard's will remains absolute. Solnis finding not a soul close-to-death, but one fighting for every second. Rage and sadness in equal measure combined into a singular desire for revenge.

"I see. Your soul continues to push forward, even as your body dies. A desperate attempt to cheat death long enough to fulfill a singular desire. Impressive, but that just means I have to kill you the old fashion way!" Solnis announced, watching as Whitebeard's body, despite all evidence to contrary, began to rise to it's feet. But as he finished, the scepter lit up. The narrow beam intensifying as it engulfed Whitebeard entirely and blew him backwards into the rock.

Even as he was blown backwards he continued to stay on his feet. Whitebeard's rage pushing him forward even as his body burned. His death certain. It continued to push on. All Solnis could see was the vague silhouette of the massive form of Whitebeard pushing forward. One arm against his face as if pushing against the winds of a storm.

With each step his body flaked away. Whitebeard's heart had long since stopped his body was now in the process of dying. More organs failed the closer he continued to push forward. Now dying, his life began flashing before his eyes. The memories of everything he had done filling his vision as he pressed closer and closer to Solnis. Everything he had done. Everything he had loved and cared came right back to him on the precipice of death. For anyone else this would have been it. But Whitebeard was no normal man.

All these memories did was push him forward. Add more fuel to the slowly dying fire as his body began smoking from the heat. He was so close that Solnis could audibly hear the charging of a quake bubble, his body right at the edge of the scepter as it intensified.

One step, his shoulders breached showed through the edges of the beam. Now little more than exposed muscle and bone.

Two steps, his torso began pressing up against the prongs of the scepter as his arms fully poked through. One hand visibly glowing with an intense crimson red light between a glowing green quake bubble.

Three steps! Whitebeard's off hand smacked the scepter out of the way, the beam now gone as Whitebeard stood fully exposed. His body a mess of burnt skin, smoking muscle, and what remains of visible white mustache.

Solnis was stunned as Whitebeard pulled back his right hand, his senses screaming like they had never had before as he realized that Whitebeard intended to render shatter this entire world. It all slowed down as Whitebeard's fist came in as the unstoppable force it was. And Solnis felt fear. Fear for his life. Something he had not felt in years. He didn't know if he would survive this. The sense of the unknown encompassing him in these slowed down moments as he took in what might be his last moments.

Solnis felt fear. That fear turned into anger. He was angry, rage fueling him to deny this! He had climbed to the top of the Empire! He survived despite all the odds! He couldn't let this be it! This anger turned into hate. Hate at Whitebeard. Ne hated him. He took Khem from him. He was going to take everything from him! All that he had built! Worked for! He would not let this be it!

And hate leads to suffering.

Whitebeard struck Solnis…and nothing happened. No cracks appeared. The world did not explode. Solnis did not even budge. Instead, his fist was caught by the open palm of Solnis' left hand. The quake bubble around their hands shrinking. Solnis siphoning the kinetic energy of Whitebeard's power. The bubble dispersed, absorbed completely as Solnis smacked Whitebeard's hand away.

Pulling his own back, Solnis cracked Whitebeard straight in the jaw. His entire body heaving as it was pushed backwards. His opening clear, Solnis raised the scepter of ragnos above his head and channeling everything he could muster into it. Whitebeard feeling the power of Solnis, his own attack, countless lost souls, and those he cared about most as the staff erupted. A bright red and purple pillar of arcane fire spilling forth into the sky.

And Solnis struck Whitebeard down.

Whitebeard died standing, before his body was completely disintegrated.

The last thing he sees is not the sea of stars. But a black void and a grasping gauntleted hand.

Spartakrod · Jul 20, 2023

Banished Turn 3

@SteelWriter77

SteelWriter77 said:
Steels Quick Stratagy Turn two Spending:

RP: 37 (After upkeep and Mercenary spending)

Diplomatic Orders:

-Target: Insurrection
Nature: Friendly
Resources: 3 RP
Atriox is to spend time exchanging correspondence wit the leadership of the Insurrection people, congratulating their soldiers and of course the bravery they displayed in the battles against the Taiidan. These efforts are to bring these two groups closer and subtly Atriox is going to slip in mentions of some of their soldiers perhaps taking a tour of service alongside Banished War Parties, and vice versa, giving the two factions deeper connections on the soldier level and seeding in the ideas of cooperation with the Banished in more ways then just fighting as allies.

Intelligence Orders:

-[-6 RP] The Taiidan are more then certainly feeling the stress of their constant wars now. So with haste our agents are to quickly make contact with the closest rebellious or dissatisfied cells and groups of the Taiidan Empire, and give them information about the local fleet's current state of disrepair and relative weakness, now is a perfect time to group their own power while the enemy is distracted and licking their wounds.

-[-3 RP] A smaller mission will be sent under the guise of merchants towards the foul Til-Jluxi, to learn of this enemy that bankrolls our enemy so freely, they who sponsor tyrants and madmen for the sake of profit.

Research Orders:

-[Free Slot]: With the battle for the Orrary over, the Banished will have some breathing room to finally study the Forerunner ruins they had uncovered upon their arrival to these strange stars, perhaps new weapons or technology can be uncovered and be brought into service.

-[ 2nd slot/Grey Death Legion Slot -1 RP]: Their choice on Banished Tech for their dutiful service

-[3rd slot -4 RP]: Now more then ever, the Banished are in need of pure strength to aid in Atriox's vision, and what could be more then a sign of strength then the Scarab's of our forces, great machines controlled by the Lek'golo Worms. But Atriox, ever the visionary see's potential in outfitting the Scarabs with new weapons of war, the Taiidan's Ion weaponry has proven to be a powerful ship based weapon, but perhaps if it can be downsized and fitted to a Scarab chassis, these ship based weapons of war can find new ground on the common battlefield. (TLDR, give Scarab Ion Guns to help with things our Plasma can't really effect.)

Industrial Orders:

-[-20 RP] invested to speed up repairs on our Golden Armada.

Military Orders:

Nothing

Turn 2:

The Insurrection, or the Democratic Republic of Orion as it calls itself now, is surprisingly a bit more tightly organised than one would expect from a group born of the anti-UNSC insurrection. It seems that Confederalism eventually ended up not working out, and was replaced with a unitary republic but one with devolution and an extensively worked on constitution guaranteeing many rights both positive and negative and ensuring a continued commitment to fairly distributed development rather than simply feeding the capital at the expense of the periphery.

For them, the UNSC and the war with the Covenant are in the past, especially following the strange event that brought them here and entrapped them in altered fields of time for a while. But just because it's in the past doesn't mean that they have disowned the fact that they are still children of planet earth. They do still make monuments to their origins and where they came from, but they also believe that the time has come for them to move past them. They have their own destiny now, and none of them alive have ever even seen that particular blue marble.

With the Covenant war so far behind them and many in the insurrection regarding the UNSC as the greater evil anyway, many in the DRO regard Atriox as a partner they can work with and establish a relation with, and are willing to offer trade deals worth their well developed heartlands territory and the productivity of its full 25 POPs. They're also looking for aid in settling excess population while they hope to one day design a series of megastructures to house more people.

As for the Taiidan, the War has not been kind to an Empire that has rarely known sufficient challenge to have to try very hard to squash its enemies. Multiple major defeats have eroded at the Imperial military's prestige and the growing burden of taxes only becomes heavier to feed the war machine. The Empire has never before truly had to dip into reserves for a long period of time, and the Emperor's displeasure with many of the officers force many of them to be replaced. The Empire is vast, but there are both massive numbers of secessionists and anti-monarchists who would like to see the Throne at Hiigara fall.

As for the Combine however, it's hell. To wit.

The Combine is theoretically, a functional, united Federal state that is simply very business friendly. In practice, it is a carcass dominated by the "Septagram", six of the greatest cartels or Yal-Gornil as they're called, within the Combine and the Supreme Stadhalder. Third closest to you is the territory of the Kal-Korakh Conglomerate which produces everything from toys to purpose-bred slaves to ugly algorithmically generated pictures linked to a blockchain. Under the CEO Var-Skullik, Company President Haj-Marka, and the Board of Directors as well as the chief stockholders, the Kal-Korakh conglomerate has funded much of the ongoing war efforts against the Eldar as well as raids on the humans despite being evidently willing to hire human mercenaries when it suits them.

This is because they are ultimately seeking investment from something called "the Ecumene" which has many stupendously wealthy investors willing to throw money at those willing to take up the cause of anthropocide. All despite Var-Skullik not really having any personal problems with humans or even the Merendi, but being a cold enough businessman to court that sort of investor anyway to entrench himself. Farther to the east is the Mar-Tukul Group which is run by xenonationalists with a genuine murderboner towards humans, merendi and a lot of others, with their territory mostly going northwards rather than further eastwards, and who have sponsored numerous anthrocidal hunts purely for the clout and in the hopes of attracting the Ecumene's money into their highly military oriented business.

To the farthest east and closest to you is Jat-Yatyat Incorporated, which has established a great deal of trade connections with the Taiidani Empire. Jat-Yatyat started out as a finance and insurance business before expanding into manufacturing through repossessed collateral and expanding its debt collector wing into mercenary and bounty hunter businesses but is also well known for its formidable entertainment branch including many animated virtual Hypernet talents and idol singers. They are okay enough with humans to even sign on many human talents and for CEO Yat-Jatjat to be infamous for having dozens of human and merendi women in his extensive harem. Of course the "quirky but progressive CEO" front he presents is meant to paper over the fact that he makes a killing selling important materials for "atmospheric incineration missiles" to the Taiidani and has an army of ruthless debt collectors.

The Stadtholder's personal estate is large enough to be a de facto Yal-Gornil despite being the personal property of the de facto ruler of the Combine, and has the highest-end equipment for its Security Force, a security company formed and owned solely by the Stadthalder known simply as the Midnight Black Company. Better equipped than even the Combined Federal Army, the Midnight Black Company is equipped with quite the bounty of illegal Quadrumvirate space tech, and is made out of soldiers and machines wired to infallibly loyal to the position of the Stadtholder even to the point of death.

As for the Combined Federal Army, it's technically loyal to the Senate and its President and to the Federal Combined States of New Till-Jeluxi, but in practice, the Stadtholder controls the Senate and the Combine itself so it's a second army that the Stadtholder doesn't have to pay the bills for himself. The New Till Jeluxi Combined Federal Army (NTJCFA) is large and consumes more than half of the Federal budget since it's certainly not going to social programs, and is perhaps the one part of Till-Jeluxi not privatised into oblivion, though the amount of defence contractor graft does leave the question of how much of its bluster is real rather than illusory.

The other three Yal-Gornil include Nor-Wayrak Enterprises, a historic family owned business dominated by the Yur family to a degree even tighter than the usual corporate feudalism in combine space. A business that started in precision manufacturing for lower end technology space consumers before expanding into generalised production, media enterprises, pharmaceuticals, and agribusiness among other things, taking advantage of the fact that many people design ecumenopoli without food sufficiency and making use of their corner cutting to ensure they can undercut other means of providing food to these hungry city worlds and then lobby against efforts towards self-sufficiency. Of course they have plenty of their own skull crackers to ensure that nobody does any funny business with their produce, while Gru-Wayrak is also known for sponsoring the vigilante Crovak, who of course is promoted as the crusader for justice against corruption even though this whole system is rotten and he goes after revolutionaries as much if not more than criminals.

Jak-Starxu Industries started off in heavy industry, particularly for mega-engineering projects but expanded into general technologies, psionics, military manufacturing, consultation, and of course its own skullcrackers as they militarised their construction robotics and industrial exosuits. Of course like all the big Yal-Gornil, it's an "anything and everything" business group, but for brevity's sake their fields of capitalistic specialty are what is focused on. Jak-Turjur's CEO, Toy-Starxu, latest in the Turjur family, is like his Wayrak Rival, also known for his connection to a vigilante that always seems to be using the latest and greatest in power armour designs from Starxu industries, which he eventually revealed to actually be himself doing field tests of his own (properly vetted) work and of course sold this image of himself to further inflate his gravity-defying ego.

Finally is the Kre-Omicar Foundation which started primarily as a Tech and Esoterics company but also came to have major subsidiaries to engage in information brokering, soft and hardware manufacture, banking, entertainment, sophont resources, healthcare, law, antiquities, tourism, containment, storage, engineering, and commando ops for hire to name just a few things. While the boundary between the Yal-Gornil financial cliques/business trusts and the Sha-Jokila outright crime syndicates is blurry, Kre-Omicar is probably the one most in bed with the criminal world and has been (sadly deniably) implicated in many criminal activities across this part of the universe. Of course the issue is that the Combine doesn't really care about organised crime as long as it doesn't work against the government or the above ground businesses, so this line is even blurrier.

The Yal-Gornil's core territories are arrayed radially around the Stadtholder's estate at the core of the combine, in a roughly circular fashion, while smaller Hag-Gornnils and Sha-Jokila exist in the margins between the big six and the Stadtholder. At a federal level, few things outside of the armed forces, intelligence services, law enforcement, and the most vital infrastructure really function, with the rest being left to rot under the Federal structure and privatisation. The States under the Combine have their own reserve forces and legal enforcement apparatuses and while not allowed to handle foreign commerce and subject to the Federal government's final word on inter-state commerce, are allowed dangerous amounts of leeway in their fiefdoms, while the businesses play around largely to their heart's content.

But despite the trappings of democratic republicanism, the President and the Speaker are little more than pawns of the Stadtholder whose powers are in essence, dictatorial. And the federation is largely content to allow continual low level internecine warfare between the states and the smaller industries and assorted paramilitaries occur as long as the disruption is within acceptable bounds. Such keeps a constant pool of people familiar with combat for their armed ventures, and creates the sort of desperation needed to risk it all by offering one's life to the business interests or the Stadtholder himself. The constitution specifically does not limit the Stadtholder's power as the supra-owner (so obsessed with property are they that they have tiers of property ownership!) of the entire country and everything in it, and as the de facto landlord of landlords his is the power of life and death over more people than there were grains of sand on every beach and every desert of old Earth.

And who is this Stadtholder? Bak-Gortok, who fronted this little effort to rebuild the Charangwezu home polity from their shared Home Galaxy with the Merendi, lost when the Combined States ultimately collapsed in the face of the Aggregated Communes' materiel superiority in a long and bitter cold war that ended in major revolutionary uprisings and Till-Jeluxi joining the ISAC. While only a small portion of people on the hypernet were stupid enough to join the grift to form a historical LARP country in the boonies, the universe is enormous and enough came over to get started with offers of getting one's own fiefdom torn from the ashes of a galaxy under the watch of the Yralgar.

Bak-Gortok is personable face to face, charming and friendly, witty on social media and has a knack for being able to keep up with meme lingo and youth culture. Of course when one judges how he has actually governed, he is a monster who dances on the graves of millions of worlds and has built a fortune on the suffering of untold hosts of workers toiling for his enormous profits to increase a fortune already so large that there is essentially nothing one can buy for a single person with money alone in this galaxy he doesn't already own. While not the sort of virulent, slur-spouting racist that some are, he's also on record as believing that humans have "civilisational issues born of a lack of genuine nationality" and that the merendi are "predisposed to sheepish collectivism". And is evidently fine with working with people who are in fact, that sort of racist.

This is a place where the foolish bring in their big dreams and then die. It is where to be poor is to be nothing, and to be rich is to be a god locked in struggle with their fellow rich in the hopes of squeezing a little more power out of their station in life. It is not a place that sparks joy, and anxiety and depression have to be combated with a truly stuggering output of (very profitable) medications to force people to act as if everything is fine and they're okay with how things are. It is a place where those who fail entrance exams into universities in bed with the major companies who can give them a guarantee of a decent paycheck and benefits will use their God-given right to purchase a gun and promptly blow their brains out, hoping to the stars that they die rather than get saved and saddled with a medical bill and missing organs.

There is no copper wire to be stripped, save for what they conquer and force into their parasitic economic system. And while they claim to have abolished slavery, the threat of unemployment is so severe that many would put up with jobs that reduce them to anti-depressant and stimulant powered shells who just list through life with no hope of retirement in the future in a world where nobody is ever going to die of old age. The abolition for the need to sleep through commonly available medicines has instead been used to squeeze even more "productive" hours out of people and the average resident works the equivalent of a hundred and twenty hours a week. Usually going between two full-time and two part-time jobs.

Bleary eyed citizens scroll through their personal computers and information cybernetics looking through cynically manufactured attention grabbing headlines, bite sized nothingburger clips, games that seem designed to waste as much of the player's preciously limited time as possible to push them to throw away their savings to get to anything actually fun, and a mediascape full of hustlers trying to build parasocial relations so they can get money from something vaguely enjoyable instead of being crushed in the grind like everyone else.

Desolate streets are packed with personal vehicles trying to scramble for what space there is drive to foliage-deprived blocs of what few reasons there are for people to leave their little houses and apartments left, nearly all of which are something commercial such as shopping. In your face holograms and boards dot every corner, telling you what to buy and where, assaulting overloaded eyes trying to simply find their way through these soullessly designed cities devoid of any sense of togetherness or belonging. After all, if you want a friend, why not just buy a companion robot or pay for time with a shackled artificially intelligent software program and fill the hole in your heart?

The banished agents who visit the Combined States of New Till-Jeluxi report feeling so depressed as to buy some of the anti-depressant drugs for themselves because it's such a hopelessly bleak place even at the surface level of just how people live their lives, nevermind the federalised dysfunction and the police who only ever seem to be there to be a state-sanctioned gang while everything rots around them. All while the very rich indulge in insane pet projects like "naturally birthing for greater intelligence" or getting into petty feuds on social media.

It is truly, without a doubt, one of the worst places you have ever seen. And the anecdote of the Banished Merchant watching a glass eyed adolescent pose for a selfie and an exaggerated reaction with a crowd gathering to watch a family jump off a skyscraper in the hopes that she gets enough attention for sponsor money to not suffer their fate drives the Jiralhanae who witnessed the whole thing to just stare out a window with a forlorn stare after he tells it to Atriox.

Research:

The forerunner technology is easier to study with the presence of humans that the Forerunners considered to be their inheritors for reasons that seem like a load of sentimental nonsense but it is what it is. Improvements to shielding, energy weapons, ship design and all can be gleaned at a rather gradual, incremental level, it's still an improvement of just generally making things better, but the most important revelation is that the Forerunners discovered something they considered more dangerous than the Flood; the Endless. Beings who were immune to Halo and so terrified the Forerunners they banished them to be imprisoned in cages of data for fear of what these masters of time and space would do if allowed to inherit the galaxy they emptied with the rings.

Named the Xalanyn amidst themselves, they are reportedly imprisoned in many forerunner facilities in compartments even more secure than those containing the dreaded parasite. And time and jail has made them deeply bitter towards the works of the Forerunners and their imperialistic mantle of responsibility that made them deem, arbitrarily, that because the Xalanyn were not accounted for and would end up repopulation the stars before their former enemies turned pets of the Librarian would; they had to be shoved off into prison. But if the Forerunners feared them, even more than the Flood, enough to use what little resources they had left to ambush and jail them after their most pyrrhic of victories, and if they are indeed reasonable, diplomatic people as the records suggest, they could be immensely powerful allies.

Of course there are other practical benefits, such as applying improvements to the equipment of the Banished rather similar to what the UNSC was doing with Forerunner technology after the war, though with a higher baseline to work with. It can now be confidently stated that the newest capital ships of the Banished would be able to take on the Infinity, perhaps not exactly one on one without boarding, but the embarrassing performance that Jul 'Mdama's fleet had against the Infinity would not be repeated by your forces. Cybersecurity and AI also improve significantly, certainly light years ahead of the almost insulting crudeness of the Covenant's endeavours in such fields. Especially with some assistance from the Democratic Republic which can provide further assistance in that field.

The Grey Death legion is in particular looking for shielding, a technology lacking in their native galaxy but one ubiquitous in yours and this. Such a simple thing really, but the time they have with it lets them work out many other simple technologies they don't have, such as artificial gravity. Once they work through the simple stuff though, they take interest in the Lekgolo, particularly in its role as highly efficient control systems for large vehicles, and come away with ideas for wetware mechs and starships that may demonstrate great improvements over human crewed ones.

Work with the Grey Death is not a one way street however, they themselves offer a great many insights into the design of new mech vehicles, more mass-producible power armour, some fields of material science and electronic warfare, as well as in simplifying logistics through modular parts for vehicles and most forms of weapons. While it will take some time for heavy duty power armour to be completely universal, the space combat suits are now at least, significantly improved with at least some power assistance that filters down into the gear of much of the troops, even if they can't quite get complete power armour rollout and a number of new types of vehicle can be rolled out based on the understanding of the battlemechs gleaned from the cooperation.

The Ion Cannons take a bit of doing to refit, these are enormous weapons made for enormous ships to accelerate huge amounts of extremely electrified and magnetically excited gas at near-light speed to impact with enough force to induce a run away nuclear reaction upon crumpling against the target and collapsing upon itself as particles collide against each other bereft of their electron shells. However it has to be possible, because the basic idea of Ion weapons has been miniaturised elsewhere, even to the point of personal weapons actually. The first attempts are of course, tested at a very, very safe distance by the Engineers and the Drones with the supervision of Human, Jiralhanae, and Sangheili personnel, and there's some failures as is inevitable with all testing.

Only when perfectly stationary ion tubes are tested is permission given to move onto Ion turrets fixed up to static generators, providing a major boon to defensive stations as the Ion Turrets pack the sort of firepower that can vapourise lines of enemy tanks and infantry while having the projectile speed to deal with faster targets as long as the armature itself can turn fast enough. This is a bit more complicated due to the addition of moving parts, and at least one explodes on a designated testing planet with enough force to be briefly seen as a bright blue flaming blossom from space (though thankfully precautions ensured no fatalities took place, except for unfortunate wildlife such as a flock of now very well done bird analogues).

As the terran years pass, iterative improvements and refinements go from needing absolutely massive harvesters and krakens to fit ion cannons while sacrificing other capabilities to; when paired with energy generation and miniaturisation technology improvements allow them to get smaller and smaller. First the Banished Behemoths can fit them with some sacrifices, then with none at all, then the Super Scarabs can do so, then the Standard Scarabs, then the Locusts and even tanks before they eventually reach the size of man portable weapons with some advice and cooperation from the Grey Death legion's own PPC specialists and the Vasari's more advanced engineers, greatly exceeding the original remit.

Atriox himself is presented with the first finished Ion Pistol deemed worthy of his use after its prototype phase was completed, designed to Brute aesthetic standards and fitting snugly in his hand and firing a red beam of excited matter with enough punch to take down a contingency Murderdrone with only some concentrated fire. Able to fire either a short duration "lance", a very quick "bolt", or a cotinual "beam", these ion weapons add a new field to the weapons of the banished, and the learning process throughout the project has been very valuable.
...

Situation Log

The war with the Taiidan Empire and the Combine has continued for another ISC year, much more by Earth standards, though the Banished don't really care to reckon things in the Gregorian calendar. Time in space is quite relative after all. The banished have expanded into their homes, turned their territories into places that people actually call home, and for many species, their first Eklemarid born generations have reached adulthood. And for some, like the extremely prolific Uggnoy, they've had multiple generations born here actually.

The Banished Nation is a cosmopolitan one, Humans (multiple varieties thereof), Jiralhanae, Sangheili, Yamn'ne, Uggnoy, Kig-yar, Lekgolo, Krogan, Vorcha, Salarians, Asari, Turians, Quarians, Batarians, Kroot, Tarellians, Loxatl, Barghesi, Morralians, Trandoshans, Merendi (and assorted Endikith), Synthetics, and more now call it home. Even a few Vasari and Eldar live within the space of the Banished.

It is not utopia because utopia by definition does not exist, but it is a free nation and a proud nation. And one that has succeeded in glorious battle with the dogs of the Taiidan Empire and the Till-Jeluxi Combine that is the true sponsor of the Mad Emperor's regime as well as the unexpectedly awakened Contingency, whose wreckage is now being studied as prizes by the Banished.

The Front has been quiet for some time, with the Vasari's deep interstellar scanners indicating that the Taiidan are facing severe internal issues as their empire's citizenry has grown tired of the war and its sheer brutality and the ever-increasing encroachment of the Combine's economic interests as the Emperor sells his proverbial house to pay his equally allegorical tax to the Stadtholder of the Combine. Resources that were once used to produce luxuries for the Empire are being funnelled into the furnace of Till-Jeluxi as the Taiidani economy strains under the war effort as more and more citizens receive their draft notifications.

The Sanguinan mercenaries have also done some of their own spywork of their own accord and reported that the Empire is ripe for revolution. After watching a generation grow and die in a war that has won the Empire little but seen Rissetiu sell precious assets of the state off to the vultures and commit genocide on a scale that even the most insane prophets would have balked at, many crave an end to the Empire and the wretched aristocracy that has mostly seen this as a delightful excursion.

The Empire has many internal dissenting factions as well as a growing litany of internal issues that offset its massive size and resource base, and the banished have been; with their technological advances and steady gains, started to come increasingly ahead of their enemies in terms of warfighting capability.

Atriox himself has enjoyed the fruits of easy life extension by this reality's medical technologies, and shows no signs of slowing with time as he is left with a question of how to prosecute the war in such a way as to achieve the final triumph and topple a great empire. Especially as the Emperor's overstretched armed forces have to abandon their watch over a world known as Kharak just as a mothership built to one day reach the long home of Hiigara countless stellar units* away in a grand quest towards the centre of the enormous but fragmented Taiidan Empire.

And the revolution has come to the Taiidan Earlier than they'd have hoped, according to Vasari intelligence, two major rebellious movements have emerged, the big tent Taiidan Republicanist movement which has erupted in its eastern territories, including one of the gates to its home galaxy in orbit around Eklemarid, and the Secessionists who want to be free of the Taiidan yoke in general.

The Taiidan Empire, which has territory in many of the galaxies orbiting around Eklemarid, including their own native one brought to this reality, is huge but spread across a very large amount of space and has increasingly had to recruit aliens and intelligent machines to pad out its manpower. The legions once comprised purely out of those who were wholly Taiidanified culturally and distinct formations of allies and mercenaries such as the Turanic raiders now include vast numbers of perhaps less than entirely enthusiastic auxiliaries and robotic soldiers and drone ships using newer technologies.

The Taiidani are spread on many fronts, and are amassing yet more ships and soldiers. They would not be taking this lying down, but there was an opportunity according to the Vasari's scanners. They were still building up more fleet assets, launching them from shipyards and mother ships and gathering them into still forming fleets while commands were still being chartered. With their forces busy on multiple fronts, there is a chance to drive towards their capital of Hiigara, taken from the ancestors of the Kushan millennia when the Taiidan sought to overthrow what had been a Hiigaran Empire in a long-lost age.

The Emperor seems to be particularly concerned with this news in particular, especially as Kharak is in their home galaxy, and the Vasari have identified the gate system the Taiidan use to enter Eklemarid from it, due two territories north of your central territory. As the Taiidan lack interdiction systems, there would be no loss in transit speed ot reach it and the Banished Armada is large enough to push through the intervening space to reach it and from there, strike the beast at its heart. Once breached, the position of Emperor Rissetiu the Fourth Two can finally be brought to fight and this long war can end.

The Emperor in his madness though, seems well aware that his clock is in severe danger of being punched, and will likely weaponise anything and everything in the hopes of averting what seems to be the twilight of an Empire that spread too far and too fast while resting upon a foundation of sand. They have stopped their offensives for the time being, committing instead to the defence with what fleethordes they can spare while amassing more troops. The Emperor has long fought this war with Atriox, and has no intention of meeting his end calmly or peacefully.

However there is concerning activity to your west, massive fleets aligned with the Till-Jeluxi are trying to cross a band of IMC territory nearing the insurrection to invade the space of Desmondu. Given that Till-Jeluxi is aligned with the Taiidan, any major advances by them would be generally speaking, bad news for everyone else. Especially as they press towards the territory of House Zond in huge numbers, with the house being busy in one of its internecine wars with house Undaris and only now rushing in assets to try and slow down the invaders with favours called in from the Onuxans who seceded from Desmondu long ago.

The Till-Jeluxi advance is lead by many Leviathans that bring enormous firepower and spacelane domination to bear, along with extensive fleets of constructor ships clearly intended to stake a long term claim in the space of the former fifth Empire. Allies and mercenaries such as the Skyruvi or the IMC (clearly not all that broken up about attacking their fellow humans) are travelling with what can be best described as the legions of hell, promised a selection of the population to offer in the name of their religion upon their victory.

Total Taiidan forces able to meet a Banished offensive amount to about rough numerical parity with your own forces given what they can likely spare from their other commitments, the Taiidan are simply too overstretched to swarm the Banished in space like they could before. There's some give and take based on how much they are willing to sacrifice from other fronts, such as the front facing the Vasari or their own internal rebellions, but the Taiidan are not really renown builders of fortifications, and their Empire is as rotten as it is widespread.

The Empire has rolled out shielded ships and soldiers, but its recruiting standards have dropped and they are more dependent on mercenaries than they were before.

The Vasari plan to launch three Magnitude 3 invasion fleets into the primary cluster of Taiidan space, expecting to roll over large swathes of it with their technological advantage, and they plan to then commit two further fleets to try and deal with the invading Till-Jeluxi at Desmondu. As their technology is significantly ahead of the Taiidan, they expect to take the brunt of the Taiidan military, particularly their higher tier mercenaries. One of their fleets will be committed to assist you directly, two will remain on guard, and two will operate as a mobile reserve.

The Democratic Republic will commit two of its own magnitude 3 fleets to the attack in direct cooperation with the banished, with the majority of their fleet being held back to protect their own territory.

Available RP: 114

Detachments:

Desmondic Freedom Fighters: Desmondu's political turmoil and chaos means that many in its territory are very willing to take up the profession of war as long as it means getting out of "the incredible shrinking country", while others used to be in Desmondu's territory back when it was far larger before it bled away much of its expanse and have decided to find some way or the other to make a living. Desmodic Wild Geese come from many walks of life, but fight much like core Desmondic space troops, with primarily Human, Elephant, Octopode, Corvid, Cetacean, Homisynth, Sanguinan, Endikith, and Milky Way native species.
Type: Desmondic Exile Armies
Strong In: Infantry, Standard Vehicles, Lords/Heroes, Capital and Line Ships, Strike Craft, Support, Powerful magic
Weak In: Attrition warfare, Superlarge Units, Weak in Anti-Magic areas, Casualty Averse
Tier: Extremis
Cost: 5 RP

Tenno Void Wing Alliance: These unusual techno-organic "warframes" and their peripheral equipment are often known as the "space ninjas" for good reason even if sometimes they are not exactly the picture of stealth. The starchildren who operate them gather in secretive relay stations and operate out of nearly undetectable orbiter craft as well as their railjack spaceships, making use of Necramechs, Archwings, and more to augment their tiny deployments of super-commandos.
Type: Warframe Clan Alliance
Specialty: Dueling/Assassination, Commando Ops, Stealth operations, Esoterics
Weak In: Mass Combat, Open battlefields
Tier: Maximus
Cost: 5 RP

Guardians of the Light: These warriors are known for among other things, being obnoxiously hard to kill as they can be endlessly revived as long as their robotic companions are able to reach them, as well as the wide array of rather fantastical magical powers granted by what they call "the light" which seems to be a religious way of viewing the ideals of cooperation and togetherness under the bizarrely named "bomb logic". They include Humans, Robots, humans but blue, the insectoid Eliksnee, the Reptilian and powerfully built Cabal, and the rather aptly named "Psions".
Type: Destiny Guardians
Specialty: Esoterics, Raiding, Small to medium unit and swift vehicle Tactics, Looting everything not nailed down ~~and then doing it fifty more times because the fucking gold won't drop god DAMN IT~~
Weaknesses: Lacking in large unit formations, struggles with very large enemies they can't board
Tier: Extremis
Cost: 3 RP

Eldar Void Raven Corsairs: Incredibly fast ships that move at speeds that would let them simply outrun the UNSC's SMAC rounds, elite warriors with reflexes to put Spartans to shame with weapons that operate at a level that you associate with the Foreruners and in much larger numbers than the Tenno, and incredible psychic and sorcerous powers can be yours, if you are willing to write and sign trade policies with the Eldar and swear to leave the worlds of the "untainted" Eldar alone as well as pay them their price.
Type: Eldar Corsairs
Specialty: Skirmish, Penetration, Exploitation, Pursuit/Withdrawal, GOTTA GO FAST, Raiding, killing people who thought they were safe, allows temporary (and strictly supervised) usage of the webway, Magic
Weaknesses: Poor at static combat, do not like being involved in clashes, casualty averse
Tier: Maximus
Cost: 5 RP

Legends:

The Observer: A deeply mysterious artificial intelligence that has many, many bodies that cluster around its large; sphere shaped frames. The Observer is a marvel of unknown artifice that as the name entails, can show up at random to observe and partake in the events of history with marvelous technology. Their singular craft and its parasite escorts as well as the smaller armatures it can deploy are usually enough, and its powers of analysis are backed up by out of this world firepower that works on weaponised manipulations of quantum physics.
Type: Singular formation centred around category 0 battleworld with technology surpassing the Stagnant ancients.
Specialty: Data Gathering, General Purpose Combat
Weak in: Holding territory
Cost: 15 RP, or 5 RP if you agree to allow it to observe your faction for five turns.

Tenno Void Wing Alliance Inner Circle: These unusual techno-organic "warframes" and their peripheral equipment are often known as the "space ninjas" for good reason even if sometimes they are not exactly the picture of stealth. The starchildren who operate them gather in secretive relay stations and operate out of nearly undetectable orbiter craft as well as their railjack spaceships, making use of Necramechs, Archwings, and more to augment their tiny deployments of super-commandos. The inner circle is made of their very finest tenno, those who have demonstrated the greatest skill, have forged and mastered the best frames, equipment, weapons, and mods, and have developed their void powers the furthest.
Type: Warframe Clan Alliance
Specialty: Dueling/Assassination, Commando Ops, Stealth operations, Esoterics
Weak In: Mass Combat, Open battlefields
Cost: 12 RP

Raid Team Alpha: A particularly well known set of Guardains of the Light, Raid Team Alpha is especially experienced when it comes to killing the most complicated to put down of enemy combatants, and has practiced its work in these breaking and entering assassinations for years in some pretty serious warfare, even when said beings were akin to deities and at the centre of massive fortresses or flagships. Lead by an inexplicably alive Cayde-6 whose general response to asking why he's alive is "Multiverse man...multiverse" and miming a long drag on a marijuana roll despite being a robot and thus incapable of smoking.
Type: Guardian Raid Team
Speciality: Assassination, Infiltration, Sabotage, Retrieval
Weak in: Mass Combat, Open Battlefields
Cost: 8 RP

Sixshot: You use Sixshot because you've looked at all options and decided that glassing it from orbit is too messy. Sixshot is a robotic alien mercenary and the president of a mercenary company that has already achieved a great reputation, particularly with the Terrorcrons who follow him around like embarrassing faboys who nevertheless have proven their worth many times over. Sixshot's company; Magnum Revolver; is specialised in widespread, mass scale, burn everything to the ground destruction, and Sixshot himself has armour made with mass-shifted degenerate matter which, in the extremely unlikely case it gets damaged, heals while his systems are powered by the expansion of the universe itself through dark energy. He has also has a rather eyebrow raising claim on his Social media which is even more eyebrow raisingly verified as true.

Type: Cybertronian mercenary company
Speciality: Annihilation
Weak in: Minimising collateral damage
Cost: 20 RP

Fleet Hordes:
Dwamak Smashers: "Even Muklik Infants can best DWAMAK warriors! HYIEEEEIIIIE!!!! But these not infants! These hardened Uklivrak mercenaries and they be not only dangerous, but they be DERANGED! They willing to fight for dwamaks like you, against other dwamaks or even other species of Uklivrak.

Here be list of current crazy Uklivrak fleets." The Dwamak smashers are a coalition of marauders from the reality cluster that gave rise to the Chinorr and many others, united by, for some reason, all sharing the same slur despite coming from different galaxies and realities. With enormous numbers of stations, orbitals, habitats, and migrant fleets spread across an more enormous amount of space to the galactic east, they have so many warriors in just their core space alone; nevermind the smaller outposts they have spread across countless sectors; that they're actively spoiling for fights.

Nobody is sure what a "Dwamak" is besides that the Uklivrak are not Dwamak, but everyone from indigenous humans to the Drengin are in fact, Dwamak, and that whatever Dwamak is, it goes good in stews and isn't as bad as a "Dwakam" which is so taboo that they refuse to even allow outsiders to ask. Such eccentricities and their tendency to scream and shout like maniacs belie the fact that they are a diverse cluster of incredible warriors and fighters and have experienced, seasoned commanders and sophisticated technology. Everything from the solid and powerful Lithoid Skradurak, to the rapidly breeding and fearless butterfly like Muklik or the huge and mighty psychic dragon esque Gonryu to the nearly unkillable multi-headed molluscoid Zakarax or the incredibly fast avian Criciric, humans, eldar like beings and more are represented amidst their fleets which boast powerful capital ships, numerous screen fleets, aggressive cruiser and destroyer packs, and legions of easily deployable ground forces able to smash things in their way in a hurry.
Type: Stellaris Marauder Clans
Specialty: Infantry, Vehicles, Strike Craft, Skirmish, Screen Ships, Withdraw/Pursuit, Bombardment, Penetration, multiple species for every occasion
Weak In: War Engines and Supercapitals are relatively rare, Ill suited to Planetary Static Defence, High Gravity environments, Somewhat Incoherent doctrine due to confederal nature and compositing the fleets of so many different species and cultures that agree on not being "Dwamak", kratocratic social structure makes them vulnerable to assassination, impetuous and overaggressive.
Cost: Standard magnitude cost *1.6 rounded up.
Size: Unlimited Magnitude purchases
Tier: Extremis

Desmondic Wild Geese: Desmondu's political turmoil and chaos means that many in its territory are very willing to take up the profession of war as long as it means getting out of "the incredible shrinking country", while others used to be in Desmondu's territory back when it was far larger before it bled away much of its expanse and have decided to find some way or the other to make a living. Desmodic Wild Geese come from many walks of life, but fight much like core Desmondic space troops, with primarily Human, Elephant, Octopode, Corvid, Cetacean, Homisynth, Sanguinan, Endikith, and Milky Way native species.
Type: Desmondic Exile Armies
Strong In: Infantry, Standard Vehicles, Lords/Heroes, Capital and Line Ships, Strike Craft, Support, Powerful magic
Weak In: Attrition warfare, Superlarge Units, Weak in Anti-Magic areas, Casualty Averse
Cost: Standard Magnitude cost *1.4 rounded up
Size: Unlimited magnitude purchases
Tier: Extremis

The Cabal Redeemed: From a world of incredibly high gravitational force comes a species built like what happens if you taught a Rhino how to walk and then blended it with a turtle. Broad, heavy set, with extremely dense tissue and hard skin, disciplined to a fault, and fond of very big guns, they are like looking in a mirror in many ways. The so called Cabal Redeemed seeks to atone for some sort of past sins, and has ended its slavery of the Psions, and includes Hominid and Eliksnee soldiers trained to fight alongside them as they are the largest providers of military muscle and space power.
Type: Destiny Good Guys
Strong In: Strike Craft, Infantry, Capital Ships, Line Ships, Individuals of Importance
Weak in: Artillery, War Engines, Relatively new to cooperating as equals
Cost: Standard magnitude cost *1.4
Size: Half present total magnitude
Tier: Extremis

Alliance for Democratic People's Republicanism: Looking to secure trade deals and resource investments, the Alliance has found that a pretty reliable good to exchange is military support in the form of contracted formations of their military to potential partners in exchange for raw materials, durable goods, and technologies.
Type: Star Wars Rebels, New Republic, and GFFA
Strong In: Strike Craft, Line Ships, Vehicles, Infiltration, Commando Ops, Elite Infantry, Skirmish
Weak in: War Engines, Melee, Boarding, Superweapon Aversion, Supercapitals, Attrition
Cost: Standard magnitude cost *1.3, Trade deal and non-aggression pact with AFR, research agreement with AFR,
Size: Maximum not disclosed for security reasons
Tier: Primus

*Standard Unit for Interstellar but Intragalactic distance, roughly five light-years, defined as the distance between the Turandrokht homeworld's parent star and the brightest other star in its night sky. Often referred to by its Raktish name of virkult, i.e Kilovirkult, Decivirkult etc.

EternalStruggle · Jul 20, 2023

The sky was falling.

When the reports of a massive fleet entering the system had filtered through, it hadn't taken long for the local defenders to take their positions. It was understood that they would have to hold until relieved by the NUNS, although as it became clear that this attack was all across the front it likewise became clear that relief was likely going to be delayed and in a smaller quantity than had been hoped for. But things hadn't gotten truly nerve-wracking until the reports that the outer system had been secured by the enemy and was now being filled with capital ships that were making more enemy warships in the field, an incredible feat.

Things had gotten very vague after that, with most of the eyes in the sky more focused on the fight that was even now raging on in orbit. All he knew was that however many of the enemy went down, more were able to take their place in an instant. On the bright side, even the tiny, cheap defense satellites scattered across any inhabited planet's orbit that were practically complementary with NUN membership could carve up the enemy's smaller front line warships with only a few shots. The scattered pieces fell like rain, turning his entire field of view, from horizon to horizon, into a blanket of shooting stars. Most, at least, would burn up before hitting the ground, but more intact ships or the debris of the many destroyed heavier ones would impact the surface, damaging whatever they hit. It was already bad enough that the planetary anti-ship guns had turned their attention to sniping the parts that threatened to hit cities and turn them into so much rubble.

"They're actually using it as a shield," his commander explained. The Tertak was the equivalent of a major in the planetary defense force, gesturing with a tendril towards the holographic orbital map showing the enemy's descent. With enough ships and strike craft to match a reasonably size Zentradi fleet in one system and production of both man and machine sufficient to replace losses even as they happened, ground combat seemed less insane and more inevitable, at least if the orbital fleet held the line. If they didn't, they'd all die in an instant. But until that point, the PDF's employment of traditional artillery, tanks, and universal exoskeleton armor seemed a lot less like a waste of resources compared to even just yesterday. "It's remarkable, really, that their wreckage can be so dense we refer to it as an 'it' rather than a 'they'."

Naturally, he'd gotten the luck of having a unit commander who was almost appreciative of the madness, if only in an 'I'm amazed they can afford all that' sort of way. Logically, he appreciated that it was giving him a fuller sense of the enemy's strength. Emotionally, it only served to hammer home how utterly screwed they seemed to be. "We're not sure how intentional it is, even, but in any case its become effectively impossible to identify which landers are actually intact and dropping troops and which just look like it on sensors. Since the enemy are dropping approximately everywhere, we're forced to shelter where we are and fight them as they come. Hopefully, we'll be able to identify any points of command, or land-based field production if they have that technology, which we believe they do. At that point, eliminating those will be of highest priority, since we can't win a straight-up fight. And it will be the responsibility of that thing."

Here, the cephalopod gestured the Queadol-Magdomilla Assault Module sitting behind them, more for the benefit of the large part of his unit that were PDF locals than for his. Even now, it was firing away, its weapons with firing angles on its dorsal side blazing away to cut down the enemy in droves. "This is one half of a human Fleet Command Battleship, specifically the planetary assault variant of such. It carried our new friends to our doorstep in order to assist in building up our infrastructure. As you already know, their security personnel were kind enough to volunteer to fight on the front lines beside us, but I think they won't object to me seeing that this is the meat of their contribution. When we've identified the enemy's critical points, it will take off and launch an aerial attack on them.

"Our job until then is to keep it safe from ground assault. It'll need all its firepower to keep our stretch of the canopy clear from enemy artillery and fighters, so it won't be able to spare many of its weapon to suppress the enemy attack. That's unfortunate, because if this 'Platinum Horde's' ground tactics are anything like their space ones, we're about to be up against a whole very literal pile of enemy firepower. Against this kind of enemy, you can't outmaneuver them, so we're not going to try. Instead, we're going to dig in and hold them here, along this ridge. It's not much, but it gives us a bit of cover and them a literal uphill battle. If we play this right, we'll have them tripping over the corpses of their own dead, and stall them here." He paused, sweeping his body from left to right, fixing each and every soldier present with a hard look.

"Remember, we may be a small part of the overall battle, but we're fighting for our home. We've just earned the chance for a better future, free of the harshness of our past. These vile shitstains want to take that from us. Indeed, they want to take everything from us. So, I have one question for you all, human and Tertak alike: Will we let them?"

"NO!" Came the valiant, doomed cry, one he joined in despite himself. It wasn't like there was much point in external pessimism, after all. His morale problems would have to remain his.

At least they had some small edges. "Hey, kinda forgetting a group!" Came the booming yell from nearer the ship. A small stream of giants was jogging from the Assault Module's exit ramp and towards the gathered force. "Zentradi, present and accounted for! We're stocked, locked, and ready to rock!"

The major turned in surprise. "I thought you were all manning the ship or had been sent to orbit to help the fighting there."

The Meltran at the head of the pack gave a cocky grin as she came to a halt. "All the macronized personnel, sure, but not us miclones. Assault Modules have emergency macronization stations and an armory, you know."

"...you're the civilians who went inside the ship earlier," the Tertak said, the situation evidently snapping into place. "I thought you were taking shelter."

"Not a chance!" The militiawoman replied. "We might be civilians, but that doesn't mean we're not still Zentradi! Fighting's half our culture. Actually, more like two thirds. Maybe three quarters." He sighed internally. The ex-Main Fleet personnel and other first-generation Fleet Zentradi were... well, they were trying, and really that's what counted.

Quickly, the allied forces took their positions, the Zentradi helping to dig foxholes for the smaller infantry before going prone while the Tertak armored vehicles settled on the ground, diverting power from hover-engines to weapons in order to increase rate of fire. When the line had settled in, the sky was no longer falling but aflame, the endless shooting stars and descending contrails now an outright wall of fire. Evening had turned into scorchingly bright high noon, and when the landings came the choking smog of war would turn noon back into night. Time itself was at war's mercy now.

"Honestly, I don't know how you can be so calm at a time like this, Apris," he grumbled, the distant rumbling of false thunder indicating that artillery bombardment had commenced. By which side, he couldn't say. Both, probably. "I know I never signed up for this. I joined the Security Division to be a bouncer for TSUs so I could get free concert tickets, not fight whatever the hell this is."

"And yet, you're still here. Don't be such a downer, Dmitri. If we want to talk about signing up for this, I'd like to point out that I'm a secretary most of the time!" She said, a teasing smile on her face.

"Says the woman who has war as 'three quarters of her culture'."

Apris rolled her eyes before turning her head back towards the distant enemy. He was pretty sure that the line of black and white at the edge of his vision was them, and if so they stretched from horizon to horizon just like their dropships. Expected, but not pleasant. "Okay, just because I grew up learning how to shoot a gun and engage in basic squad tactics..." She trailed off, then dropped her head. "You might have a point."

"I often do, but for some reason people are always surprised." He narrowed his eyes at the distant line. It was definitely the enemy. He could mostly tell because of the sudden storm of flares, pinpricks of light there and gone again in an instant. They were in artillery range, then. Sure enough, the angle of many of the Assault Module's beam cannons shifted, swatting the countless massive shells and rockets from the sky, or at least diverting them to the point where they'd land somewhere harmless. The Tertak's own artillery also lit up a few moments later, long-range precision counterbattery fire, aimed at ensuring the Horde couldn't destroy them and their ship from long range.

"Feels a bit pointless," he said, not shouting to be heard over the artillery fire so as not to let others overhear his true thoughts. "After all, they're just going to replace those guns the moment we blow them up, aren't they?"

Apris shrugged, her grin still refusing to fade. "Don't know! Probably? But it'll at least take them some time to haul the new guns into position. Remember, we don't have to win. We just have to keep them from the ship. Focus on that! Let all the big picture stuff fall away."

"Apris, the sky is on fire," he said, exasperated. And we're all gonna die flashed across his mind, but he didn't say that part. It was probably obvious on his face, though, because the Meltran's smile took on a more sympathetic edge.

"Listen, you're gonna be fine, okay? We're going to make it. I promise."

A further objection rose in his throat, but died as quickly as it came. There wasn't much point to it. He supposed he was either going to die, or he wasn't. It was easier when he thought about it that way. The truth was, the enemy was simply too large for him to wrap his head around if he thought of them as an enemy. They were a natural disaster on legs and wheels and treads, a nightmare given flesh. They'd pass in time, hopefully, but whether or not they did had nothing to do with him. Thinking about it that way was almost but not quite comforting. He just nodded.

"See, I knew you'd trust me!" Apris said, her energy seeming completely out of place. "Don't worry, I've got your back."

Their conversation died down after that as the enemy inched closer. The combination of counterbattery fire and ship-based aegis prevented their position from being shattered by shells before the close-quarters battle started, but there were so many enemy artillery pieces that the limited number of Tertak systems were almost overwhelmed just trying to eliminate the largest and most threatening. Weapons that would have put a Destroid Monster to shame, destroyed at a steady pace by weapons a fraction of their size and number, if the chatter that slowly made its way from the gunners to him was any indication. The Horde just let their superheavy systems die, lightly armored and with no point-defense, content to bring up more, and content that they were occupying the full attention of the enemy's own long-range fires.

It was insanity, it was almost comedically absurd, and it only furthered his inability to truly internalize what he was looking at. It was military waste unrivaled in all of human history, and by all accounts it was working. The enemy were closing in all but unharried, and all it was costing them was as much raw firepower as the defenders had across the entire continent.

Time passed in a blur. The line had become a carpet, then he could pick out individual vehicles in the mass, and now he could make out vague blobs that were individual soldiers. That meant it was about time to open fire. He took one last look at Apris. He'd known for a while, the minor bureaucrat who'd been helping organise hospital development for the former Imperial State frontier. Her energy had been just as infectious when she was small, and he'd thought to himself that he'd dread the day she took something fully seriously. This was that day. Any hint of a smile was gone from her face, and she was looking down the scope of her own massive rifle, likely taking aim at a tank or other vehicle.

"I'd have loved to get to know you better," he said.

She briefly looked down. "Likewise."

And then there was no more time. The firing line on the ridge opened up, and the enemy responded, although their initial volley mostly fell short. For all his earlier grumbling, Dmitri had known this what he was signing up for, at least theoretically. That there was always a chance he'd be called to not only fight but die in some miserable trench. But also that his sacrifice, combined with those of the people next to him, might make a difference for thousands of other people.

As part of a security team rather than the frontline NUNA units, he'd been given a choice to hunker down with the civilians or stay and fight. He'd chosen the latter, and even now he wouldn't have chosen differently. He just didn't think that meant he had to like either choice.

He fired on full-auto into the wall of bodies, accompanied by the exoskeleton-mounted rapid-fire turrets of the heavy Tertak infantry and their larger cousins mounted on the IFVs and anti-infantry tanks present. There were enough bodies in front of them that he went from being unable to see if he was having an effect to being able to see his exact effect again, as each unit had to target a different section of the line to stem the tide. The Zentradi, battle tanks, and some infantry armed with heavy weapons were more discerning, firing exclusively at the enemy armor, each shot a kill that usually scored some of the enemy's footsoldiers in the inevitable detonations. They were still firing almost as fast as they could, however, thanks to the Horde's ceaseless tide of metal being almost as numerous as its tide of meat. Barrels glowed red-hot despite advanced cooling systems for both kinetic and energy weapons, but they couldn't afford to stop shooting for even a second.

Somehow, impossibly, this didn't work. The enemy kept coming. Dmitri thought he was dreaming. Surely, surely, nothing like this could happen in real life? There had to be a limit, to their numbers, to their willingness to die, to something.

The Horde kept coming. The steep ridge that had formed the defensive position flattened out into a much gentler slope thanks to the sheer number of corpses on its underside, granting the foe an easier advance. And still, they kept coming.

Eventually, they breached the crest of the ridge, and fighting became hand-to-hand, or at least it would have had the enemy not been so willing to shoot through their own forces to get at the allies. They'd already taken more than a few casualties from the enemy's ceaseless assault, and it rapidly worsened up close. The human contingent of the force was completely defenseless in close quarters, the enemy's lack of tactical acumen utterly irrelevant in melee thanks to their enhanced strength and raw numbers. The line all but broke, with only the Tertak somewhat holding, power armored tentacles crushing numerous hordelings to death even as their turreted weapons continued to fire. Dmitri cursed, stepping back from the line and firing when he had a clear shot. He might have been freer, but he was running extremely low on ammo.

A nearby hover-tank detonated in an enormous explosion, sending him to the ground. He wasn't sure what had caused it to detonate, but he could see the line nearby buckle further, almost overrun. Each soldier was all but surrounded, and they were falling fast now.

Dmitri tried to stand up, but his vision blurred, and he collapsed onto his knees. A burning sensation in his gut told him he'd been hit by shrapnel from the explosion. All around him was indescribable chaos. With no particular rhyme or reason behind them, the enemy surged forward.

He'd read about Space War One in school, of course. The odds, the violence, the end. Just his luck, he mused, to be in the first war in history that had managed to be even worse, even uglier and with even less hope.

Somehow, something made its way through the fog settling around him. Apris was crouching behind the burnt out hulk of a Horde APC, held up in one hand to provide some cover while she fired her rifle blindly with the other. At this point, she couldn't miss so long as fired vaguely in the direction of the enemy. He saw a slightly standout group of enemies rush towards her while her attention was elsewhere, laden with heavy armor and bulbous orbs. A burst of rifle fire sprayed across them, and it took him half a second to realize it was his. The anti-tank grenades, one evidently hit by a lucky shot, detonated in a cataclysmic series of explosions, not only wiping out the grenadier squad but also the Hordeling infantry nearest to it. The gap was filled in maybe five seconds.

He was kicked to the ground. His ribs and gut flared in pain simultaneously, and his vision was tearing up now. He could just about make out an enemy in fancier than normal armor standing over him, tut-tutting. It was bizarrely out of place in the carnage. "Well now, I'll admit that wasn't a bad shot. A live one, eh? I think you'll make a fine target, no, a new golden soldier! Yes, making you a giant to fight your giant seems only fair." The Noble approached. "You bringing people of that size simply isn't sporting."

Just as he stopped to reach down and do whatever it was he was planning on, an armored boot crushed him into the mud. "Oh, you'd better believe it's not," Apris growled, scooping up Dmitri in one hand as she tossed her rifle away with the other. As it landed, it detonated in a blinding explosion, giving a moment's reprieve for her to retreat alongside a line of surviving Tertak infantry, their weapons firing behind them constantly as they pulled back to the ship, which was redirecting its guns to sweep across the enemy lines. Shells began to land, but the initial ones mostly on top of the Horde's lines.

But ground had been gained, so even as the ranks in front of them were bloodily blown apart, the Horde laughed at their glorious victory, and pressed on without even waiting for the guns far behind them to adjust their aim. The joint roar of their cackling and self-destructive barrage was the last thing he heard before he finally drifted off into sleep.

Dmitri awoke in a cavernous storage bay, one that had been converted into a temporary medical bay for miclone-sized soldiers by the looks of it. He winced as he sat up, but his gut wound was patched and his ribs felt bruised rather than broken.

"Hey there," Apris said, sitting on the ground opposite him with her knees tucked up against her chest. "Didn't expect to see you awake so soon."

"How long has it been?" He managed to say.

"Less than an hour, hence my surprise. Once the few of us who survived got back to the ship, we lifted off and got the hell out of there. Had to fire off half our stock of reaction warheads to clear out the superheavy AA they were bringing up, but we made it out of there. It turns out that their critical infrastructure is almost as everywhere as their troops, and their air cover's too dense for us to make a run at anything of significant, so we're falling back to the nearest city to join the defense there." Apris recounted, the giantess managing to seem almost small with how she shrunk into herself with each word.

"Is there literally any good news?" Dmitri said with a sigh.

"Our reinforcements might be here, finally? That's what I've heard from the crew, but apparently the Horde have thrown out so much crap into the atmosphere that comms and long-range sensors are nearly useless. We're kind of just guessing at this point."

He collapsed back on his mattress. It was somehow both thin and lumpy, but he'd never had a comfier bed in his life. At least until a realization hit him. "It's all going to be like that." At her raised eyebrow, he elaborated. "This war. Every battle is going to be like the one we just fought. Sure, we might have a lot more heavy metal in some of it, but we had to be a secondary target. That can't be everything they had to throw at us."

"...yeah," Apris admitted. "Sorry."

"Don't you apologize," he said, trying and mostly failing to put some force into his words. He was too exhausted to properly chide. "You kept your promise. We did make it."

"Only because you saved my life first," she replied, a rueful expression on her face. "I didn't even notice those grenade troopers until they went up in flame, and one of the Tertak survivors pointed out to me that you were the one who took them down."

"We all took a lot of things down," Dmitri said. "I had to have killed, what, a hundred of them? More? And you probably killed a hundred tanks."

"Not actually quite that many. I think it was high double digits, although I lost count pretty quickly." Apris grimaced. "But we could have each killed ten times as many and it probably wouldn't have made a difference. The NUNS wasn't designed for this kind of ground warfare, and the Tertak can't win the fight alone. At least we were designed for this kind of space warfare. That's the only reason we're even still alive."

"I know. But we are still alive, so. Not all bad. Maybe someone will find us a way out of this yet."

"A Minmay Attack, maybe? They're not so different from us, in a sense." It took Dmitri's foggy mind a moment to mean she meant 'us' as in the Zentradi, and shook his head.

"No. I'm not saying you never had your issues, but you always had your own brand of honor. You always cared for your own lives. You're nothing like those things."

"I'm not saying it's exactly the same, but... you've read the history books, haven't you? Honor, respect for life, those weren't always... adhered to. But despite everything, you reached out and it worked." She shrugged. "We won't know if we can reach them until we try."

Dmitri crossed his arms over his head and huffed. "I guess. I'm just glad we're not the poor bastards who are gonna have to do that trying."
___________________________________________________

Diplomacy Orders:
Calling all sellswords: Look into the possibility of hiring mercenaries. While they're unlikely to be available in time for the immediately upcoming combat actions, having instant combat power (just add dollars) in the future can only be a good thing if this universe is going to be this hostile to us. With the integration of the Imperial State, we now have limited access to the Hypernet, and hopefully Marchokai has some experience with the local PMC culture and groups himself. Which is good, because with the SMS branches that hopped the universal border already hired or nationalized, we'll have to look elsewhere for military support.

Intelligence Orders:
Scouting Ops: With open space to our west and east both, send survey teams in both directions (past virgin space to the east and in the northeastern corner of L-19 to our west) to see what else might be going on in our neck of the woods.

Target: Warlord Space
Nature: Hostile
Resources: 8 RP, 2 Turns (Second Turn.)

We are no longer asking. Join up. The infiltration campaign will continue, now with military support (see below). With the worst warlords as our first targets, get in secret contact with the ones more open to cooperation that have yet to begin massacring their own population and make the reality of the situation clear. They can join up and get a Marchokai supporter-style golden parachute, or they can get eaten by the Loptrathi when the latter swoop in to enforce their claims next year, and that's if we don't decide to do them in first. The choice is theirs, but which option is preferable for all parties involved should be reasonably obvious. This also extends to sub-warlords and military officers deemed pliable: They can turn their coats against any recalcitrant masters they have and join the winning side with a full pardon (within reason of course), or they can be either missile fodder or, even if they do miraculously survive the year, Loptrathi chow. Again, their choice, but it doesn't take a genius to figure out the smarter option.

For the areas in active turmoil, attempt to stay in contact with pro-NUN groups so they can be identified, protected, and then brought up as our local support base during the course of the military operation. If any relatively unobjectionable pro-NUN active rebel groups are present, supply them with weaponry to make them more effective allies, up to whatever they can handle and we can afford to give them. In short, cultivate our base of supporters in order to ensure we win not only the war but also the peace. As part of this, while some of our highly-placed against go after military leadership, attempt to deploy more low to the ground propaganda to convince low-ranking soldiers to defect to the pro-NUN groups of Warlord Space. We're not the ones shooting at your civilians, after all.

Pursuant to this, part of the infiltration budget is going towards ensuring humanitarian aid flows in immediately behind our military forces, mitigating the damage of the fighting and beginning the process of uplifting the local population. As well as being the right thing to do this, should hopefully sway the large parts of the population currently broadly neutral to the NUNG to be more supportive of the installation of democracy and probable short-term military occupation.

Target: The Platinum Horde
Nature: Observation
Resources: 1 RP

Ahead of our military action, we need to try and figure out where the Platinum Horde's main factories are coming from. Based on their field production capabilities, a depressing possibility is "everywhere", but that's still important to know if true.

Military Orders:
Target: Warlord Space
Assets: 2x Bruised Magnitude 2 War Fleets

Having fucked around, the Warlords must now begin the process of finding out. Deploy our forces still damaged from the fight against the Corsairs last year to engage the openly oppressive Warlords in battle. To end things quickly, focus on policies of decapitation strikes against enemy capital systems and leadership before supporting local pro-NUN forces, ideally causing the whole edifice to collapse in on itself sooner rather than later. Surrendering or captured warlords and senior military officers are to be placed in front of a military tribunal for their actions.

Use the high mobility granted by Fold Drives and the brutal fast attack power of Variable Fighters to achieve this both in space and on the ground. Ideally, targeting only part of the Warlords and achieving hopefully swift results will cause the rest, likely caught up in at least some civil strife of their own, to hesitate before acting, letting us defeat the enemy piecemeal. Once the enemy is leaderless and we have local control, deploy ground forces to engage in policing actions, suppressing any active nationalist forces and uplifting pro-NUN groups to temporary leadership positions wherever practical. Additionally, cooperate with any defecting military units where possible.

The end goal of this operation is to secure the entirety of Warlord Space as NUNG-aligned territory. Due to the oncoming lack of leadership of the space, it's expected we'll be able to annex it outright, adding it to our rapidly growing confederation. Warlords that have managed to avoid engaging in crimes against humanity that are also recalcitrant about joining our sphere and additionally lack a large amount of local pro-NUN groups are to be left alone for now unless they attack our expeditionary force, although this Venn diagram is expected to have a central of zero to near zero inhabitants. Whether or not the Loptrathi will consider them fair game is their problem.

Target: M-19 North
Assets: 6x Magnitude 2 War Fleets, 8x Fulbtzs-Berrentzs Constellations, universal Heavy Defenses.

The majority of the NUNS is to be put in place along the northern edge of our territory in order to defend against the sudden unprovoked assault of the Platinum Horde. The missive given is not one step back. The fighting will be fierce, but if we let the enemy gain even an inch, then it won't be long until they use that inch to generate more forces, and take more inches. Needless to say, this is unacceptable.

Also needless to say is that we shall do our level best to prevent fighting on planetary surfaces. We are singularly incapable of meaningfully engaging the Platinum Horde in a land battle, and as such will avoid doing so where possible. The order of the day when we're inevitably forced into such an engagement is mass orbital and reaction warhead bombardment to sterilize infected areas. Unfortunately, anyone still in the blast zone were likely dead anyway, so only minimal efforts to avoid collateral damage should be taken, although all plausible evacuations should be done preemptively to avoid unnecessary loss of life.

In space, the highest priority is the usage and protection of Macross Cannon-equipped ships such as the Battle-class, Medium Gun Destroyer, and the refitted Nupetiet-Vergnitzs-class. These weapons have traditionally served in an anti-fleet role, but the durability of Loptrathi and Corsair vessels recently returned them to "merely" being exceptionally powerful anti-ship weapons. Now, however, they can return to their original intended role, with beams being able to wipe out vast swathes of enemy forces by 'sweeping' the beam. The Platinum Horde will not be stopped by this, but it should be able to stem the tide. Other ships are to guard these heavy weapons with their lives, because if they drop off then we'll be defenseless against the Horde's onslaught.

Strike craft are to deploy with heavy combat loads as effectively pitched battle configurations. This can be as simple as Super Defender Destroids deploying with rotary cannons rather than autocannons, and as significant as Variable Fighters preferentially deploying with the heavy firepower and durability of Armored Packs where such are available. Fighting the Horde head-on will leave no room for maneuver, only a contest of our raw firepower versus their raw numbers-

Target: The Platinum Horde
Assets: 2x Magnitude 2 War Fleets, 2x Fulbtzs-Berrentz Constellations, Skull Squadron, TSU "Minmay".

-which is a fight we're guaranteed to lose. It has swiftly become obvious that the Platinum Horde possess a truly immense industrial base, including the ability to generate combat forces, personnel and all, in the field in large quantities. In other words, defeating them in a war of attrition is literally impossible. At the same time, counterattacking becomes difficult due to the sheer press of bodies on our own planets.

The force allocated to the defense in the section above is a very approximate match for the enemy's military forces, discounting the support of both their Constellations and the local fortifications. This is still not sufficient when the enemy has seemingly vast amount of reserves, which they'll likely deploy when their initial forces fail to find purchase. But it does present a potential opportunity.

This section's forces are to initially engage in local deep-strike counterattacks against isolated Platinum Horde factories and MPCVs, both deep-space and ground-based, with a mix of conventional military tactics focused around a high-speed insertion and heavy reaction warhead usage to clear a path and subsequent Minmay/Culture Attacks directly on the enemy staging ground enabled by usage of the VF-31 Siegfried Tactical Sound Fighter and its Cygnus plates, with Skull Squadron and Lynn Minmay taking point on the initial proof-of-concept attacks. Effectively, we're testing the effectiveness of these unconventional attacks on the Platinum Horde to see if they have a similar effect to them as they did to the Zentradi. In the event where they are effective, enemies resistant to becoming Cultured are a high priority for elimination across all battlefronts. In the event where they aren't, the Siegfried and similar Fold Wave-enhancing fighter units are to be phased back out of frontline operations due to their relative lack of direct combat capability.

Preliminary reports suggest that unlike the pre-Culture Zentradi, the Platinum Horde understands sexuality, so this aspect of the Attacks (e.g. images of kissing) are to be deemphasized in favor of a focus on pure romantic and other forms of love as well as the traditional focus on peace, understanding, and the fact that was is not the only possibility for a civilisation.

Either way, once the initial counterattacks have successfully tested and refined our anti-Horde raid tactics and hopefully lessened the pressure being placed on the front line, this force is to launcher deeper raids against the first echelon of Horde rear-line production facilities, either destroying them outright with heavy firepower or, if the Culture Attacks proved successful, subverting them. This relatively small force can't go too deep, lacking the necessary mass, but hopefully they can cut off the Horde's assault fleets from their reinforcements and logistics, insofar as such things are relevant to them, and allow our defensive units to defeat those troops in detail and then move up to the new front for a larger-scale counterattack, or in the unfortunately likely case that the enemy remains too numerous for this a continued defense that is no longer directly on top of our citizens.

Since this force will likely struggle to clear a path to the Horde's factories even with use of area of effect weapons if it has to fight through the entire armed force of the Horde, the focus will ideally be on small task forces penetrating deep behind enemy lines to strike at the Horde's infrastructure directly. Fighters with Fold Boosters, small carriers topping out at the likes of the Elysion-class, and a focus on exploiting our tactical stealth systems that normally just make our ships harder to hit but may be able to serve as actual cloaks (albeit not to the naked eye) against the Horde's seemingly extremely primitive sensor technology. The Mothership Constellations are thus mostly here to serve as mobile fortresses and resupply depots, letting our strike teams attack and if necessary retreat with relative impunity, rather than to act as direct combatants.

In the event that the Platinum Horde proves vulnerable to becoming Cultured, a tactical focus on saving them from themselves is to be put into action, but with caution. As individuals, they can choose whether or not to become good or continue to be evil, and as a shock tactic a Minmay Attack only ever works once. Thus, an operation relying on one has to be done correctly the first time. There will be no second chances.

Research Orders:
4 Slots (14 RP.)
-Ultimate Fighter Project (Heroes Revolutionary Breakthrough): Continued development of the VF-32 is unlikely to yield short-term results. While some would suggest that more immediately applicable research should be pursued, slowing the completion of the UFP could have severe long term consequences due to the raw capabilities it represents. The VF-31 Siegfried should prove able enough as a stopgap in the same role, although its lack of an FDRS is unfortunate. Tidbit: One notable feature the Galatine might have over its predecessors is the ability to penetrate FTL interdiction based on the YF-30's ability to penetrate dense Fold Faults, engineers believe. (3 Slots, 3 Slots already invested.)
-Miclone Battle Suits: Based off of military-model EX-Gears, these powered suits sacrifice the collapsible/transforming capabilities, the VF-pilot integration systems, and the flight system of standard EX-Gears in order to boast aim-assist functionality along with superior strength augmentation and additional armor plating. The heaviest of all EX-Gears and typically armed with appropriately weighty firepower, it's being developed in a hurry to outfit the suddenly woefully underequipped NUNS security troops in the face of the Platinum Horde. While mobility is likely not required in this role, as a kind of future-proofing the gliding wheels of the base EX-Gear are retained, allowing for high speed. (1 Slot).

Industrial Orders:
Ex-Marchokai TP to Established + Heavily Defended (2*(10 + 10 - 4 - 3 = 26 RP.) As part of our deal with Marchokai, this territory must be developed industrially, and as the first line of defense against the Platinum Horde upgrading their defenses simply makes sense. It's unfortunate that these additional defenses must be field constructed, but better late than never. At least this will represent a moderate increase to our overall industrial capacity if we can survive the coming onslaught.

Gateway to Colonized + Heavily Defended (4 + 10 = 14 RP.) Conceding this flank to the Platinum Horde gives them additional territory and resources, opens up their path to our core territory, and complicates logistics. It must be defended, it is therefore helpful to manufacture defenses in it, and to maintain those defenses forward infrastructure must be constructed. Plus, we were meaning to colonize this area of space anyway. As for the Gateway itself, we do not at present have the time or resources to investigate and attempt to reactivate it.

Virgin Space to Colonized + Moderately Defended (4 + 3 = 7 RP.) Even further east than the Gateway, making our claim on this area of space felt and protecting it against light attacks would be worthwhile. Make it so.

Expedited Fleet Repair (8 RP). Enough money has been earmarked to bring the damaged fleets up to full strength early. However, what that money is actually going to be used for is replacing the inevitable heavy losses that will be suffered when facing the Platinum Horde.

78/78 RP spent.

patrickmm1 · Jul 20, 2023

Sith Empire Strategic Turn 3 Opening
@Revan4221X

The End of a Covenant(and the start of something darker):
In the midst of what was once the Covenant, an alliance of species bound by military treaty, conquest, and shared religion, an uncivil war brew and grows; and, almost as quickly, comes to what could be called a resolution, as two of its three sides come to an unglamorous end.

Mercy, looking for mercy from those that they only recently wronged, leaves on a diplomatic mission to end the conflict that they had started. Aboard his personal capital, the Unyielding Hierophant, with its complement of over 500 capital ships and many, many lesser vessels, he is ready to sell out his fellows in return for leniency and, dare
I say it, mercy. Unfortunately, his diplomatic target is very much perfectly wrong, and he enters the territory of the Imperium of Man. what happens to him and his fleet afterwards can only be assumed(and assumed correctly), for neither he nor the rest of his immediate followers return.

Regret, having already retreated into quiet contemplation, is quietly put under house arrest on High Charity, joining those others under his movement that were too politically important to simply be rid of; as for the rest…

Leaderless, both movements start to fall apart; but their reason for rebelling against the Covenant remains. The vast majority of these dissidents(those that remained alive at this point, anyways) flock to the banners of Thel 'Vadamee(leader of the Swords of Sanghelios) and Atriox(leader of the Banished), who have joined together to form a vastly more militarized rebellion against the Covenant, one that has seen some modicum of success, as these masters of War are vastly better than almost everyone that Truth had/has at his disposal.

Unfortunately, some of those who were originally under Regret, lash out in a vastly more suicidal, arguably even more destructive manner…(to be continued in the next section)

While all of this is going on, Truth is continuing to consolidate his power. Joined by supporters from elsewhere in Eklamarid and beyond, he seeks to both modernize his military and bring an end to the Human question once and for all. Already, he is receiving technological and military support from abroad, as extremely powerful Planetary Shields go up on world after world, and mercenaries come in to bolster his flagging forces(Truth's Covenant joins the Singularity/Supernovae Pact as an affiliate). These mercenaries join up in solving this internal crysis, reversing much of the momentum that the Rebellion had managed to gain(although said rebelion is still going somewhat strong), with promises to continue/renew their crusade of extermination against the surrounding human factions just as soon as this internal issue is dealt with.

(if left to next turn the civil war will be resolved in Truth's favor, with external support allowing for them to rebuild what was lost in this ongoing conflict fairly quickly)

(while Truth's forces have gained Local Planetary Shielding, it will be a while yet before their assisted up-tech to tier Primus is complete- which is to say, they will likely be dead first if you don't just ignore them)

Halo:

patrickmm1 said:
And so, as the final few days of the year arrived, so too did a Sith shuttle land on the Ring…

While the void surrounding the ring was mere days ago surrounded by a practically impenetrable barrier made out of the lasers, grazers, and glassing beams of hundreds of supercapital ships and a seemingly countless number of lesser vessels; recently even this bastion of 'Truth' had fallen into disarray, as with the news of Regret being silenced in some manner, many of his supporters had chosen to lash out instead of quietly going into obscurity.

And so, instead of being spotted and forced to retreat before they had so much as fully entered the system, Lana Beneko(assuming that she still goes on field operations) and her personal team instead slipped through the chaotic battleground that hte void around the Halo Ring had become. Weaving through the chaotic battlelines with unheard of precision, they approached the Ring, beholding it in person for the first time. And so, what stretched out below them was a Ring World of impressive size; easily 10,000 kilometers in diameter, its surface held lush forests, verdant grasslands, bountiful oceans, and seemingly no sign of its true purpose, for what they beheld was something seemingly more built for civilian life than any sort of major fortress; with only its shape and artificial nature separating it from any other lush, verdant, gaian world seen elsewhere in this galaxy. Going lower, the sights of combat faded away, for even these rebels seemed to not want to damage the Ring.

Sadly, as they got lower, the illusion was dispelled, as covenant bases and other, stranger installations made themselves known to both the ships scanners and the naked eye. Dropping lower, her stealth ship put what passed for a small mountain range, really not much more than hills(although their clearly artificial snow-caps made for a drastic change of pace relative to the rest of the Ring) between it and the nearest Covenant base. After setting up base, a signal was sent out, and more and more teams of operatives slowly, quietly, stealthily, made their way to the Ring, so that the investigation of it might go all the quicker.

At first, nothing much is found, as teams went through valley after valley, stealthily taking out some small camps of Covenant and investigating some fairly meaningless facilities, with nothing more impressive than some Hardlight bridges(which strangely said operatives had an easier time operating than the Covenant members who had seemingly been studying said technology for hundreds, if not thousands of years- although the Force Sensitives amongst their number oddly had a more difficult time with the controls than the rest) and some facilities aimed for the production of some surprisingly simple hovering droids, who went around doing maintenance work on the structures in question, seemingly ignoring all intruders, both Imperial and Covenant alike.

Unfortunately, things on the Ring seem to be changing, as once verdant grasslands dry up at an unprecedented rate, water levels lower, and the small areas of icy weather grow and get even colder, with some areas swiftly growing more to resemble Tatooene or Hoth than the verdant landscape that was there mere days ago. Whatever the reason for the rapid terraforming, it is likely not very good for those involved, as much of the ring is set to become uninhabitable for unprotected lifeforms in a matter of months.

Things only get worse, as in some of the most affected areas there are still instillations that Truth's forces are going out of their way to guard even as they seemingly evacuate much of the rest of the Ring. using that as an indicator of actual importance, at least for the Covenant's own reason for being on this Ring, teams of elite operatives are rapidly assembled and dispatched. One of them to the most major of what passes for mountain ranges on this ring, the other to an area that has remained oddly lush despite what is happening on the rest of the Ring.

While the first expedition hits a rather major obstacle almost right away, as each and every valley within said range contains a heavily fortified Covenant position, complete with shield generators and countless defensive installations; while each mountain top is cold enough to have even oxygen start to condense out of the air. (needs an actual plan of attack to be resolved, not just a 'land on the Ring' action)

Meanwhile, the other expedition has it almost too easy, as what covenant positions they come across in that valley have clearly been slaughtered to the last when they haven't been seemingly abandoned, and the fog grows ever thicker. Soon, they come across the facility at its heart, one in which the covenant's guns around it are pointed inwards, not outwards; one surrounded by equally abandoned defenses.

Entering the facility, the operatives find a seemingly corpseless charnelhouse, as blood and gore litters the ground, and the walls are painted with the scorch marks of plasma weaponry. Descending ever deeper into the facility, eventually they reach the core of the facility, a very clearly breached containment room, and some rather understandable(as they deciphered the Covenant's language years ago) warnings painted in blood.

Skittering is heard, and the operatives quickly come to think that they are not alone. They swiftly move out, calling for reinforcements and evacuation. They almost don't make it; for as they near the exit, swarms of strange, almost pod-like, fungoid entities approach from both ahead and behind. While small, and clearly fragile, as each blaster bolt takes out multiple of their number; they seemingly come without end. Soon, these forms are joined by other distorted forms, once clearly Sangheili and jiralhanae, now just mere almost mindless puppets, wielding the weapons that they once used in life. Luckally, these oppertives are used to dealing with the strange and unusual, and so they manage to make their way through, using thermal detonators and heavy weapons to clear a path through the oncoming swarm when blasters are not enough. Unfortunately, they only have a limited supply of such devices, and so, within seconds of fully exiting the facility, the operatives are pinned down, with the circling forms approaching ever closer before being gunned down. One operative loses his shielding to oncoming fire from the infected forms, and is soon swarmed by the pod-like aliens; thankfully, supporting fire is enough to clear them away before his full body, environmentally sealed, suit can be pierced; unfortunately, this distraction almost cost them dearly, as yet more of the team are swarmed. This might have been the end, if it wasn't for the arrival of the called for Gunship, which manages to swiftly clear the area around the operatives. Swiftly taking off, their escape is pursued by mass fire from the oncoming swarms of infected Covenant soldiers, as defenses are brought back online by the infected. Soon enough, the gunship is being pursued by Covenant Banshees, trailing spores and very clearly not operating in their usual manner… (to be continued in future updates, although how much is written to finish this bit off depends on you, @Revan4221X)

The hubris of an Imperium(and the bargains of the desperate):
While the conflicts in the Covenant's sector and beyond continue onwards, elsewhere events continue unaltered by the actions of the Sith. while most of these conflicts are of no interest to the Sith, as far out of mind as they are away, some have repercussions that echo back to Sith space. Of these, the closest and greatest of them is the ongoing conflict between the Imperium of Man and those it deems to be worth exterminating(which is to say, everything that it knows about that is not human).

While the arrival of Mercy's expedition and its fate is easy enough to deduce, if not quite get front seat witnesses, the clerical reports and long ranged messages paint a more than full enough picture to paint out the series of events- and in this case, it went even worse for the Covenant here than it did when they invaded the Sith's homelands, as the entire group was annihilated at what seems like practically no price for the imperium, or at least no price worth making it into the reports.

Unfortunately, the ongoing war to the East is vastly harder to get information on, despite its sheer scale, as Imperial Intelligence has yet to actively penetrate the actual military forces of the Imperium, much to their frustration. Instead, what news that they manage to get from that front comes from reading between the lines of the Imperium's propaganda machines, and the never ending stream of clerical work making its way back into the core territory of the Imperium. As for what can be deduced from said clerical work… it's not looking good, as the sheer number of ships returning to assorted dockyards for repairs relative to the number of new hulls entering production at the major shipyards of Mars, Jupiter, Phaeton, and Voss, even as said shipyards ramp up production to levels that would make even Corellia and Kuat look like Alderaan in comparison, reaches a likely unsustainable level.

But that is not the end of the news regarding that front, as Imperial Guard 'recruitment' has reached an all time high, even as Mars opens its 'Gene Vault', something that they apparently haven't done in almost ten thousand years; and an actually noticeable number of 'Custodites' are reported to have left the Imperial Palace; an event that has apparently not happened for thousands of years. (what didn't make it to the clerical desks is the deployment of the Grey Knights, Sisters of Silence, and almost the entirety of the assorted Assassinorums)

Apparently whatever they are fighting to the east has gone from being a seeming pushover, to a threat of a scale that the Imperium hasn't seen for thousands of years.

The meeting of Empires:
While tales of war abound from what Imperial Intelligence has gathered; one of the most major events of the first few weeks of this new year is something that Imperial Intelligence never really expected.

It started with the arrival of hundreds, nay, thousands, of what are very recognisably some form of probe droid all over imperial space- the result of someone very clearly brute forcing the process of scouting for new hyperlanes; it continues with the arrival of several vessels extremely similar in design to those of the Sith Empire, and ends with first contact with yet another Galactic Empire ruled by Sith.

The first of these events left Imperial Intelligence scrambling, as the sheer scale and scope of the scouting effort left no doubt at its potentially hostile nature, and the sheer recognisability of the probe droid design as a probe droid design had them wondering who sent them, and whether or not these interlopers from what likely was another version of the same universe were friend or foe.

The arrival of the vessels, both due to their number, which was rather small by the standards of a group intending to wage galactic scale warfare, and general design, which had a rather large number of similarities to their own, both caused a sigh of collective relief due to them likely not being a Republic based force, and set off additional alarm bells, as there was nothing worse than a rival Sith.

Finally, when communications are opened, it causes a mixture of reactions amongst the higher ups of the Sith Empire; for here was another galactic empire, whose ruling group included at least one obvious Sith(Darth Vader); but it also haw an Imperial Senate, and is ruled from Coruscant of all places, and completely stinks of the sort of politics that dominated the Republic's Core even during the heights of the first war.

Whatever comes of this first contact, it will be one for the History books.(to be continued, as this is a well-fortified diplomatic force that just arrived, and your own response is necessary here to at least provide the direction that the Sith Empire wants to take this)

The Celestials attention:
The higher ups at Marie Geois were concerned. Word of the events of the battle at marineford, which had reached its conclusion mere hours ago, had reached the Gorōsei, who had immediately recalled Sengoku to report back in person.
(here is a snippet from the report)
(a member of the) Gorosei: "And you say this man gained the powers of Marco the phoenix within moments of killing him? And had also displayed powers similar to Linlin, and could create Voidstone, and could outright create storms, amongst many others?"
Sengoku: "Yes. the report is accurate."
(continues on for a bit, checking the accuracy of the assorted parts of the Marineford War report)
(a member of the) Gorosei: "Remind us again how this all started."
"when I first met him, I thought him an upstart, similar to the rest of the Worst Generation, if not officially our enemy. Now? I regret my choice to not bring him to justice."
(the earlier events are recounted, this time from the perspective of the Marine admiralty)
"And to think that you once thought that Garps grandchildren would be the greatest threat to our stability."
"Yes, a choice that I now regret, for the wider universe beyond the wall makes the monsters found within look like nothing."
(a member of the) Gorosei: "Our knowledge of the wider universe beyond the wall has cost us dearly. Please return when you have more information for us about that subject. For now, you are dismissed."
(Sengoku leaves, and the doors are locked behind him, turning the room into what is effectively an isolation tank, completely separated from the outside world)
(the following is from the Gurosei, talking amongst themselves)
"Events have spiraled beyond our control, there is no other option. We must act to deal with this threat and secure our dominion forever more."
"No. This is not the time to reveal ourselves as anything more than the first amongst equals."
"What other resources do we have?"
"Contact our asset on Punk Hazard, it is time for us to recover those 'misplaced', supposedly faulty, though perfectly feasible, tools that Vegapunk had left behind."
"And Joker?"
"The Kaido situation could use a little redirection, as with a bit of effort this could work to redirect the target for his supposed 'Great War', all it would take is a bit of planted evidence and the right words in the right ears."
"On the topic of Vegapunk, what's the Status of the Seraphim project?"
"Supposedly on schedule, although with Vegapunk one never knows if it isn't already finished or not."
"Perhaps we could provide them an… incentive for providing the results to us sooner?"
"Perhaps."
"What is the status of the Mother Frame?"
"Complete, but untested."
"See to it that the Revolutionaries create a convenient target."
(a shadowy figure enters the room, entering from a door that did not exist before and fades away immediately afterwards)
"Imu, we had not expected you this early."
(imu): "Yes, this new entity, this Darth Nox? He and the empire that he comes from… intrigues me, as does the rest of the world beyond the Wall."
"So you already know of him? Of where he is from? Of what other assets he could call upon?"
"Yes, for in the depths of his arrogance, he has revealed everything to me; and while the time to strike at what else he holds dear has not come, it will arrive soon enough, for all of the lesser people that he threw away needlessly, along with this… Khem Val… has been quite the valuable source of information."
"Anything in particular you need of us?"
"Please ensure that Geko Moira meets an… unfortunate end; and deploy some of your more… special assets to Wano, for we will have need of what is hidden there once Kaido is indisposed."
"By your will."
"Also, please discreetly contact the less… savory members of the Figarland family, for we will have need of them soon enough"
(cutscene fades to black as Imu disappears just as suddenly as he arrived)

Turn Three:
RP budget: you have 175 RP to spend this turn

there are currently no incoming attacks; although something is brewing in the final area of the territory within the Wall, and Truth is threatening to resolve that conflict to your detriment rather quickly, and one never knows what ones fellow Sith might be plotting.

Detachments:
Liberation army of Earth and Mars: having technically completed their original goals, this force of crack veterans is always looking for more ways to bring in funding to their impoverished homeworlds. Theirs is an eclectic mix, with an odd mixture of highly conventional military forces, bounty hunters armed with a vast array of unconventional weaponry(ranging from simple rocket-hammers to nanomachine based superweapons), to cyborg martial artists who could fight your average Sith Lord to a standstill, if not win outright against anything or anyone within the Sith's military forces short of a Darth.
Type:
Specialty: Heroes, one on one combat, fighting in cramped conditions, fighting in hostile conditions, nanomachine based warfare, hacking, boarding operations, and melee combat in general
Weak In: open warfare, massed combat, battles between fleets, battles in which no one near baseline could ever survive
Cost: 3 RP
Tier: Secundus(on average)

Bounty Hunter cartels: your classic Star Wars bounty hunters, provided by the Hut Cartells found within the newly discovered partial-copy of the Star Wars Galaxy that the Sith Empire once called home.
Strong in: assassination, destruction, strikecraft based combat, gathering intel
Weak in: open warfare, siege warfare, massed combat, and anything else you wouldn't trust a bounty hunter to accomplish
Cost: 2 RP (repeatable up to a point)
Tier: Primeris

Legends:
The Space Angels: fresh from winning victory for the worlds that they call home in some sort of tournament in the heartlands of the Sputnik Confederation, this team of extremely well blooded warriors is out looking for more causes to support, more techniques to learn, and more battles to get involved in(and win). Made up of six individuals, with at least four of them are combatants easily equal to anyone in the Sith Empire short of a member of the Dark Council; and even in those cases it might be questionable, as their plot armor seems unreasonably thick. Each one has their own unique set of skills and techniques, and each one has their own way of defying the odds and coming out ahead against each and every foe they have faced thus far.
Strong in: sabotage, large scale destruction, dealing with enemy Heroes and Legends
Weak in: anything that couldn't be accomplished by a mere five individuals who aren't individually capable of planetary or beyond level destruction(yet).
Cost: 10 RP, or 5 RP if you can convince them that your cause is just.
Tier: Extremis(technically Seccundus, but…)

Germa 66: see below(yes, they sort of count for both categories)

Fleethordes:
Germa 66: made famous in a children's tv show based off of real world events. Known for being the terror of the North Blue(the strongest area outside of the Grand Line) and the strongest military force found within its borders. Are also commonly seen in the area known as the 'New Galaxy', in which they are second only to the Yonko in how much terror they inspire in the populace. Is unusually advanced for the region, as they are armed with an almost unbelievably advanced Battle World that is capable of breaking apart into countless vessels(indeed, their entire fleet is technically a part of said vessel), and a seemingly unending stream of soldiers armed with shockingly advanced weaponry, who are willing to die in rather large numbers for whatever cause Germa is supporting at the time.
Type: warfleet with attached category 2 planetoid and combat/research focused Legend- opportunistic conquerors with an extremely well-drilled military
Specialty: Infantry, heroes, attached Legend(specializes in one-on-one combat and research), capital ships, siege warfare, terror tactics, grinding warfare
Weak In: War Engines, Infantry lack ambition, weak strike craft, overly reliant on a single class of ship, and are practically useless without their leaders.
Cost: Standard magnitude cost *1.8 rounded up.
Size: Up to magnitude 3, but can't buy less than that(all or nothing
Tier: Extremis

(more might be added here as diplomacy with the Galactic Empire resolves)

Velocci · Jul 22, 2023

CORE Tactical Turn 3

@DualFront

"Commander Peacebringer, greetings. Your presence is acknowledged. I have prior knowledge of your projected capabilities. Recognition of my involvement in our joint campaign against the Kroat-Ork waves on Garden of Tranquility is unlikely, as CORE mobile forces were positioned in a different hemisphere during that engagement. Your decisive actions against the enemy remain ingrained in my memory, particularly in dispersing the hostile forces and thwarting their endeavours. I have been engaged in similar operations for a considerable period, although my organisation typically disregards civilian casualties due to their emotional impact. Nevertheless, your intervention in that particular world earned the appreciation of my superiors."

"This subsector was once occupied by Kroats, but that is no longer the case. The transformation occurred following a change in leadership. The former leader, Killalots, exploited this region as an economic base to support attacks on numerous targets. Peacebreaker assumed control and systematically depleted the resources, forming an offensive force with a focus on targeting the Core and Theocracy. The subsequent engagement proved advantageous for the dispatched Hunter-Killers, as we effectively neutralised their communication network and eliminated some of their key figures, thereby facilitating your Commanders' subsequent operations to eradicate them from the systems. The process was akin to observing headless creatures rushing into the line of fire of an automated turret. There exist entities on the Hypernet willing to offer significant remuneration for recordings of such efficient Kroat devastation."

"However, it is essential to acknowledge both the favourable and unfavourable aspects of the situation. The attack force assembled by Peacebreaker remains concentrated within this system, designated Slaughter-Maximum-Carnage-Core-Camp. Its name alone indicates the importance to the Kroats. While you may possess foundational information concerning this system, I will review it once more, as recent updates to the intelligence have emerged."

Kuiper Belt: The ideal location to stealthily enter the system, good source of metal and energy, can construct space based units and fortifications.

Two Gas Dwarves: Gate entrance here would be lightly contested, low in metal, high in energy, the full roster of Core units could be constructed

Asteroid Belt: Heavy Kroat fortifications present, entry here would be highly contested, very high in metal, low in energy, space based unit construction available.

Gas Giant: Gate entrance is not viable here, only wreckage would be available for resource collection, high energy signatures detected and spectra matching that of heavy element fusion, kitbashed together ultratech devices have been moved into orbit with escorts of Kroat ships keeping their distance due to gravitational anomalies produced

Industrial World: Peacebreaker's home base, entrance here would be heavily contested and most likely to result in destruction of the invasion force, but also would result in Peacebreaker's death the quickest if successful, high in metal, moderate in energy.

Innermost planet: Gate entrance here would be easy, but highly visible to Kroat sensors, very high in metal and energy, construction of all Core units would be possible.

Elliptical planet: Stealthy entrance, moderate resources available, full roster of Core units could be constructed but in more limited amounts than in other locations.

One Commander is active. After insertion, at whichever point chosen, it will still be possible to build a Galactic Gate to reposition forces within the system or to evacuate if needed.

-
Transmission from Peacebreaker after the CORE and Hunter-Killer assault commences in earnest. The loathsome hydra-like Kroat bears its fangs as it grins eagerly at the screen, seeming joyful to see its foe despite the wreckage of its fleet starting to fill planetary orbits.

"SO you actually came! I didn't think you had the spores! I thought you'd be too busy rebuilding with the rest of the pansies to come and have this fight. You sure ain't no whiny Peacenik' like the rest of the runts in this neighbourhood. Just might make a man out of you yet!"

"Look at you, with all your drones and tanks and artillery - all automated, no real grit behind them. Think you're winning because you don't gotta get your hands dirty? Think you're better than me cause your side doesn't have blood to spill? Think it matters? Here's a lesson for you boy, I already won! The second you strapped on your booties and your big boy pants and went out with the rest of your buddies to fire your peashooters and imagined you were hitting my boys - that's when I won. Cause you've got a taste for it now see, the taste of war! And there ain't nothing else like it! Telling me you don't smile seeing mushroom clouds wipe out my grunts, that you don't feel a little satisfaction watching those war machines you've got tear apart some rust bucket a goon barely out of his pod put together that morning? Don't lie to me! And you'd be a damn fool to lie to yourself! You were born for this war, you and your pals, and that's all you're gonna do - day in and day out, listen to how you've gotta take out this and that target for some egghead who's never spent a minute on the battlefield, who doesn't get it like you do. And then the day'll come when you, everyone like you, the whole stinking Core wakes up and smells the napalm, and you're gonna wonder why you ever wasted time doing anything but war!"

"Was that antimatter missile aimed at me or did one of your bots miss that badly? Well, lemme lay it out for your thick skull, get through the layers of stupid the hippies back home put in to stop you from hearing the truth - It don't matter if I lose! You take me out, sure, one less Boss around calling shots, but d'you even know what Kroatanga means? You will! And if I'm not the one to teach you, it'll be Killalot and his NCOs, or one of the green dummies, or the twigs, or the flaming ones. Point is, this isn't something you can just ignore by putting your fingers in your ears and yelling crap about peace, love and understanding. Sooner or later, and I bet sooner, you'll get to a crossroads and have to make a call - give up your kiddie blankie and step up with the real adults in this universe, or die. You don't believe me? Every Kroat knows, soon as he steps outta the ground, that war is all there is. We've been doing this a long time, and we haven't been proven wrong yet. War consumes all."

There's a starburst in the background of the screen as one of the Kroat stations is consumed by nuclear fire, and the transmission cuts out seconds later. Peacebreaker clearly recognises the situation, as do all his men, yet they don't reconsider or retreat. Indeed, it would be impossible for them to. All they know is war. All they can do is charge and fight, gleeful even in odds such as this.

Conclusion to Unbound Tactical Turn 2

@Arcanestomper

The frontline of the Kett's assault stalled, then reversed as the Unbound's flanking attack caught them off guard. For the amount of resistance expected, the amount of forces the Unbound brought to bear was almost overkill. Overconfidence would come naturally following this, but scouts that shed light on why this is paint a more complete picture of the Kett manoeuvres that sours the feeling. The reason why the Kett fleets were undersized relative to what had been anticipated was because of a recent order sent by the Archon of this sector for all forces to return to the capital to undergo another Exaltation. A breakthrough had been achieved with the Flood, one that would guarantee victory for the Kett Empire - now and forever.

"The process is not yet fully tested, please Archon, I need more time! My scientists have concerns with the safety of what you propose, the parasite -"

"Your scientists, or you? You think I do not know what you scheme when you think my back has been turned to you, as if that deafens and blinds me? I see how you eagerly spend my forces where the invaders are mightiest, yet keep your own loyal officers guarding outposts and forgotten moons. I have been allowing you to prosecute your scheme because my ambition surpasses yours, and encompasses our glorious race in its entirety. The parasite you fear so much has already been tamed by my directive. Witness the New Kett!"

Legions of Kett loyal to the Archon march into the Exaltation chambers altered to hold not only Kett genetic material but useful genes isolated from the Flood. What exits exceeds the expectations of the Archon. The first of the New Kett, or Sublime, resembled the Behemoths made from Krogan stock, but where those hulks were victims of their own rage attacking both friend and foe, the Sublime were perfectly in control. They were taciturn, obedient, and were to the average Kett what an Astartes was to a human. It was what the Archon who had experimented most fervently with the Flood had been hoping for - an Exaltation to surpass all that had come before. In these perfect soldiers he saw a race that could conquer all the stars of this new galaxy and convert it without the need for the trappings of the Exaltation ritual. Very soon, all would be Kett, and all would serve him. No longer as a mere Archon, but as the Emperor and Patriarch of the race he had created.

This new, Final Exaltation, was the reward to not only the thrall species under his banner, but the Kett who served him already. Soon their numbers swelled to the millions, and they were spread throughout Kett space, persuading others to undergo the process by their mere presence. Other rival Archons spoke against this in terms of heresy and blasphemy to the blessed Kett form, yet these protests were weak, for the Sublimed were Kett. Their skin was armoured, their eyes were cold, their voices low and deep, and their nature hungry for conquest. Their arms may have been able to shapeshift into weapons, their bodies may have been able to regenerate and absorb flesh, and they may have been able to convert thralls or other Kett into more Sublimed directly, but in all the ways that counted, were they not Kett?

This question would not be debated for very long as the Unbound and Galactic Empire penetrated deeper into Kett space, and the theoretical questions were set aside for practical answers.

-

"The hull regenerates itself, as you can see! This is only the beginning of what we can accomplish with insights from the parasite. If only we had more time..."

"There is no more time. How many of these ships do you have? How many more can be made?"

"Thousands - Tens of Thousands."

When the Unbound Fleets reach the Heartlands of the Kett, a new ship class is revealed. It rivals the Exchanges or new Seraphim class in size, and is a departure from the standard aesthetics of the Kett, having smooth organic curves and focusing more on boarding with phage-like dropships than pure kinetic weaponry. Tactics honed in the long war against the Beast are put to good use against these boarding attempts, and the forethought to authorise the Narr Directive proves its worth as some of the new Kett lifeforms deposited onto Unbound ships seem eager to spread fungal biomass in their wake. On many occasions secondary sweeps are necessary to ensure that the boarded decks are clear, as cores of fungal matter protected by dense layers of Kett carapace are found left behind after the main bodies have been incinerated.

These new ships become linchpins of fleets as older model ships are torn apart in engagements, while the upgraded models knit themselves back together when allowed to retreat. Despite their greater survivability, they are only too eager to disengage at the first sign of a battle turning sour, leaving the other ships of the fleet behind. It becomes a self fulfilling prophecy that Kett fleets are composed only of semi-organic ships, many times greater in capability than their predecessors. Each time a fleet composed of these ships is fought it is as though some new capability has been evolved - more precise FTL, more powerful weapons, layers of kinetic barriers, superior coordination, crew which network directly with the ship in imitation of the Unbound's nature.

Yet the foe they face now is not the Beast, and the Unbound can afford to devote the numbers to force the Kett back again, and again, and again, until they finally reach the true heart of the empire.

-

"LOOK AT WHAT YOU HAVE DONE! You call that Exaltation?! It is madness, the parasite runs rampant, and you call this your design?! You have doomed us all Archon! There is still some time, we may yet ally with the interlopers, and perhaps save some remnant of our people from your folly."

"I am in control."

"I said look damn you! Are you delusional? How can you say you're in control of - "

"I have only ever been in control."

The system would be impressive, if it hadn't been in the grips of utter chaos. Kett ships of the purely mechanical variety, with standard Kett crew are proudly broadcasting how ready they are to die for the empire, and throw themselves at the Unbound like lemmings. There is little they can actually do to prevent the invading fleets from advancing, but by sheer numbers they succeed in delaying. Transmissions from the new model of Kett ships, staffed by the Sublime, are less formal, and have a mocking air to them that does not fit what is known for the Kett. Their speeches are delivered to insult, and they are more than willing to hang back and let the lesser Kett sacrifice themselves at the guns of the Bentusi.

It becomes clear why, once clear scans can be made of the inner system. The Kett capital world was surrounded by an orbital ring which was in the grip of expanding spots of dark mycelial filth. There were no transmissions, yet points of panicked resistance were clear to see by points of explosions and flares of gunfire. These did not last long. On the surface, things are barely better. A true behemoth of a ship hovered in the atmosphere - a monstrous thing 10km long, that looked like the fusion of multiple smaller ships. Sublime Kett marched their lesser brethren into Exaltation chambers to create more of themselves, parroting speeches about the good of the empire. That was good enough for many. For others who tried to resist or flee, they were thrown in just like the thralls they had been made from.

In hours the majority of the Kett fleet that had been in the system were reduced to scrap, in hours, the Sublime on the surface had been transported aboard new living ships grown from the fecund orbital ring, in hours the Gravemind aboard the Behemoth had accomplished exactly what it set out to do. There may have been a second battle as the Flood took its mask off and made to welcome the Higaaran survivors with open tendrils - but the Galactic Empire had arrived as well. And the Primordial was many things, but it was no fool.

The converted Kett ships were the first to flee, some were destroyed by the lightning fast acolytes and super acolytes, but a good number disappeared in ultraviolet flashes. The Seraphim screamed into orbit above the Behemoth and hammered it with fire - that was stopped not by kinetic barriers, but by energy shields just as powerful as those that now protected Unbound Cruisers. Return fire came from mass drivers that chipped away at energy shields, and from plasma projectors that nearly depleted those shields from single shots. But the Gravemind did not mean to win a cannonade battle, could not have, as the fire of two fleets focused on its ship and shredded through the shields, armour and hull. A promise to return was sent spitefully to those who had interrupted its feeding, and then the ship vanished through an FTL method wholly novel to what the Kett had used before.

Whatever the Flood was, it was no mere parasite that repurposed what was already there. It was like the Beast, equally malevolent, equally cunning and an equal threat to the dream of finding peace.

But the war was over now, and Lords Marduuk and Admiral Mittermeyer were free to shake hands over a campaign well done and divide the spoils of conquest between them.

Results

Center Subsector and Eastern Subsector is under Unbound/Galactic Imperial control. Diplomatic action needed next turn over control of Square and Arcology.

Damage:

Additional blanket 5% damage to Unbound, mostly from ground combat with the last few hold outs and damage done during the Flood/Kett Hybrid's escape

15% Damage to Galactic Empire Assets

10% of Kett assets remaining and taken as POW

Important Information:

1 Mag 3 Extremis Tier Fleet hoard of Flood/Kett hybrids have escaped to the West Subsector. These designs are expected to be proliferated by the local Gravemind.

SteelWriter77 · Jul 24, 2023

The inner working of the Enduring Conviction was a well oiled machine, as fitting as what has been considered the flagship of the Banished as a whole, but what many forget is that this vessel has long served under another.

Let'Volir sighed to himself as he sat upon the command chair, his ship was his again, but he could not shake the unease from his soul as he continuously checked systems and the standing orders of the crew. Some may call him paranoid, but he held pride as a Captain first, and a Captain's duty is to their ship and crew, no matter what.

And despite the Warmaster more than likely not changing anything on how the ship operated when it served as his own personal vessel, Let'Volir could not rest easy until he had checked and made sure there was nothing he could make a mistake on. His bridge crew were focused on their work, but he could tell they were waiting for his latest batch of tests and reviews to be over with, and he could not blame them on this, not with such a momentous task ahead of them.

The Enduring Conviction is to be part of the spear tip into the Taiidan Empire, to take part in a Empire's destruction and the retribution of Billions of those wronged by the madness of their rule. A truly monumental moment in history that will be retold for thousands of years, something that Let'Volir will not let slip him by like the battle for the Orrery.
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The world of Kathelis, one of the Colonies of the Banished that laid on the frontier between their space and the Taiidan Empire. It was here many mercenaries and soldiers of the Banished awaited the renewal of conflict with the Taiidan, living off their trade with independent contracts from the civilian populace and their own troubles. We focus on a small bar in the middle of the capital city, a decent enough place for a Human soldier of the Banished to spend her money and maybe have a good time later.

Jenna O'Brian is many things, a Soldier, a Sister and a Traitor, though one could debate that last one. In the eyes of her friends and family she was a freedom fighter against a government that sought to exploit the colonies far too much, but to the "glorious" UNSC she was nothing more than a malcontent and Insurrectionist, not that it mattered now, those wars were fought and lost many years ago when she was barely a teenager. Now all that remains is a Woman still fighting for what she feels is right against any and all that got in her way.

She sat across from two others, recent acquaintances that no doubt would probably join her in a early grave or live long enough to be rewarded handsomely for their service, first was Maedia Potanion, a Turian who has earned Jenna's respect for how quickly she can kill a being nearly five times her own size…and she'll admit the scars are quite fetching on her.

The second was Creysh Tret, A Trandoshen hunter of some kind, he was a bit vague on the details and what he did share launched him into long winded stories of past hunts. He was annoying, but possibly one of the best damn snipers Jenna had ever seen. If only he'd stop telling the same one to the local civilians in some attempt to impress them. "-And so there we were, outnumbered and out-gunned by some of the meanest and gruffest looking Gamorrean's i've ever seen, one round left in my rifle and no way out. So I did what any good hunter would, lifted my Rifle and killed the whole lot of them-"

"-With one single shot." Maedia said aloud at the same time as Creysh, the Turian not even looking up from her drink.

Maedia's interruption barely registered as a bother to Creysh who spun dramatically to face the Turian "Exactly my friend, one shot from your's truly at the precise moment hit a set trap by my fellow hunters and blew the fiends away, how'd you guess?" He asked, more than likely playing up his confusion as to not bend to the blunt words of his companion.

"Mostly just the fact you've told this story so often in the last few days I'm sure Mae and I could recite it to 'ya word for word." Jenna playfully said to the confident Trandoshen. "Well then what would you suggest I regale to the fine folks of…what bar is this again?"

"Uh…the Iron Brewer" Spoke up a nearby human waiter, clearly a bit confused by the direct question from the Trandoshen. "The Iron Brewer of course, so tell me what Hunt should I tell them about, the Craver attack, the time we worked together against those Ork Freeboota's or do you want to just do what you do and give a dry retelling of that time we went after some slavers for the upteenth time."

"How 'bout some Taiidan work?" Asked Jenna holding up her communicator pad, with several job listings from the Banished, getting the two to stop glaring at each other and open up their own pads. Creysh's fanged maw widens in a great smile "Oh…now this will be a Hunt worthy of some tales, wonder if some of my old marks have joined the Taiidan." He hissed in glee. "I'll say, lot of good pay for these, wonder if I can get the head of a Taiidan Noble." Maedia said in almost equal glee, though with less smiles and more cold pondering…by god did she do that well.

"Heh figured as much, so shall I get the ship to go kill some Taiidan or are 'ya both still wanting to fight over which of 'ya is the better storyteller to these fine locals?"
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
New Doisec, the technical capital of the Banished nation by virtue of where Atriox calls home. To the Jiralhanae it was almost a copy of their distant homeworld, cold and rugged, where the strong thrived and the weak perished.

And to many Jiralhanae now being raised in its splendor, they know nothing of the small differences, but the older generations can taste it in the air, feel it in the ground, this is not their homeworld, and it was unlikely that they would ever see Doisec's skies again, something that weighed on many for one reason or another.

But Atriox was not amongst their number, he had no time for distractions, not when he prepared for what could possibly be one of the most vital battles of the Taiidan War and could be the start of the Banished's rise, with a empty seat of the region's power structure, the Banished will fill that void.

And with the Taiidan's defeat, there will be finally time to set in place plans to change history, the death of Empires will be Atriox's legacy and the future of the Banished.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

RP: 114
Diplomatic Orders:

- Send Strategic information on the upcoming Till-Jeluxi attack to the closest Desmondu factions, or ones the Banished have had positive interactions with, complete with potential avenues of attack they may try that our strategists have concluded from our battles with their mercenary forces.

Intelligence Orders:

With the impending final death throes of the Taiidan Empire, it is important to cultivate relations with whatever will blossom out of it's death, so Banished agents are to be sent to work with Taiidan Sucessionists groups most open to working with our agents and aid them in the fight against the Taiidan Empire. (-2RP)

Research Orders:
-[Free Slot]: Combat Cybernetics: It is a well established fact of war that sometimes injuries will cost soldiers their limbs or give them injuries that will inhibit their ability to fight. Such truths had already given rise to cybernetic prosthetics for retiring soldiers and the slight use of combat augmentations for those willing to continue service in the UNSC, one of the few things that Atriox can respect of the Human government body and something he has seen done in his Banished, but with wars increasing and the need for veteran soldiers to remain at their best against forces unheard of in their old reality, the Banished will push forward advances into combat focused cyber enhancements and replacements, inbuilt weapons and a means to increase the base strength of Banished forces being just the tip of the iceberg as the humans would say.

-[ 2nd slot -1 RP]: Biotics: With new species now apart of the Banished nation, Atriox looks to utilize new tactics that many species can offer, He learns of Biotics from several species from the same universe and tasks his strategists to find ways to implement such powerful abilities into the Banished ranks, essentially creating a new soldier class in their command hierarchy, which will be called Battlemasters, in reference to the Krogan of the Blood Pack who have joined the Banished.

-[3rd slot -4 RP]: New Battleship Class: While our fleets have been more than a match for our foes with their numbers and the skills of our admirals, we cannot rest on our laurels and assume it will be the same for long. Thus a new ship class must be made, fulfilling the role of a capital ship while smaller and less expensive to create than the CAS Assault Carrier. Dubbed the Doisec Class Heavy Battleship, it is to be the epitome of Banished Engineering utilizing the styles of the Jiralhanae to create a bulky and heavily armored capital ship class.

Industrial Orders:

-Upgrade both Established Territories to Industrialized (-60 RP)
--Upgrade both Territories defenses to Moderate (-6 RP, Upkeep -2 RP)

Military Orders:

-With the opportunity presented to us in the Taiidan's Civil War, we shall make for Hiigara and the Gate, breaking this Empire once and for all with our allies and Mercenaries and taking control over a Gate to a new Universe.
--Strategies:

--Our Combined Fleets will operate under two styles of attack, acquisition and overwhelming force. Select battles will be chosen to either take control of the Taiidan/mercenary ships and use for our own purposes, or to wipe them out to the last with our amassed firepower. All depending on the current status of the wider conflict and needs of our allies.

--Led by Raid Team Alpha, They and the Tenno are to go on missions to kill or capture high ranking nobles of the Taiidan or Mercenary leaders they have hired, all to disrupt enemy leadership or their wider control over their forces.

--Fast striking raids to any supply lines or important Taiidan facilities will be orchestrated by the Void raven Corsairs and the Guardians of the Light, should none be in any battle zone or the risk too high to commence such a mission, they shall instead focus on high speed hit and run style tactics alongside Banished Vehicle groups during planetside battles.

--The main battle tactics on boarding missions or in open battle across planets will be relatively the same, with changes made to accommodate the smaller spaces inside ships. On planets the tactics will be simple with heavy ordinance being unleashed upon any enemy formation or holding and then a mass assault by Banished forces to quickly take down the leading figures or

Forces Under Me:
Banished: 10 Fleethordes (Golden Armada)

Vasari: One Mag 3 Fleet

Democratic Republic (Innies) : Two Mag Three Fleets

Mercenary Hiring:

Detachments:

-Guardians of the Light: These warriors are known for among other things, being obnoxiously hard to kill as they can be endlessly revived as long as their robotic companions are able to reach them, as well as the wide array of rather fantastical magical powers granted by what they call "the light" which seems to be a religious way of viewing the ideals of cooperation and togetherness under the bizarrely named "bomb logic". They include Humans, Robots, humans but blue, the insectoid Eliksnee, the Reptilian and powerfully built Cabal, and the rather aptly named "Psions".
Type: Destiny Guardians
Specialty: Esoterics, Raiding, Small to medium unit and swift vehicle Tactics, Looting everything not nailed down and then doing it fifty more times because the fucking gold won't drop god DAMN IT
Weaknesses: Lacking in large unit formations, struggles with very large enemies they can't board
Tier: Extremis
Cost: 3 RP

-Desmondic Freedom Fighters: Desmondu's political turmoil and chaos means that many in its territory are very willing to take up the profession of war as long as it means getting out of "the incredible shrinking country", while others used to be in Desmondu's territory back when it was far larger before it bled away much of its expanse and have decided to find some way or the other to make a living. Desmodic Wild Geese come from many walks of life, but fight much like core Desmondic space troops, with primarily Human, Elephant, Octopode, Corvid, Cetacean, Homisynth, Sanguinan, Endikith, and Milky Way native species.
Type: Desmondic Exile Armies
Strong In: Infantry, Standard Vehicles, Lords/Heroes, Capital and Line Ships, Strike Craft, Support, Powerful magic
Weak In: Attrition warfare, Superlarge Units, Weak in Anti-Magic areas, Casualty Averse
Tier: Extremis
Cost: 5 RP

-Tenno Void Wing Alliance: These unusual techno-organic "warframes" and their peripheral equipment are often known as the "space ninjas" for good reason even if sometimes they are not exactly the picture of stealth. The starchildren who operate them gather in secretive relay stations and operate out of nearly undetectable orbiter craft as well as their railjack spaceships, making use of Necramechs, Archwings, and more to augment their tiny deployments of super-commandos.
Type: Warframe Clan Alliance
Specialty: Dueling/Assassination, Commando Ops, Stealth operations, Esoterics
Weak In: Mass Combat, Open battlefields
Tier: Maximus
Cost: 5 RP

-Eldar Void Raven Corsairs: Incredibly fast ships that move at speeds that would let them simply outrun the UNSC's SMAC rounds, elite warriors with reflexes to put Spartans to shame with weapons that operate at a level that you associate with the Foreruners and in much larger numbers than the Tenno, and incredible psychic and sorcerous powers can be yours, if you are willing to write and sign trade policies with the Eldar and swear to leave the worlds of the "untainted" Eldar alone as well as pay them their price.
Type: Eldar Corsairs
Specialty: Skirmish, Penetration, Exploitation, Pursuit/Withdrawal, GOTTA GO FAST, Raiding, killing people who thought they were safe, allows temporary (and strictly supervised) usage of the webway, Magic
Weaknesses: Poor at static combat, do not like being involved in clashes, casualty averse
Tier: Maximus
Cost: 5 RP

Legends:

-Raid Team Alpha: A particularly well known set of Guardains of the Light, Raid Team Alpha is especially experienced when it comes to killing the most complicated to put down of enemy combatants, and has practiced its work in these breaking and entering assassinations for years in some pretty serious warfare, even when said beings were akin to deities and at the centre of massive fortresses or flagships. Lead by an inexplicably alive Cayde-6 whose general response to asking why he's alive is "Multiverse man...multiverse" and miming a long drag on a marijuana roll despite being a robot and thus incapable of smoking.
Type: Guardian Raid Team
Speciality: Assassination, Infiltration, Sabotage, Retrieval
Weak in: Mass Combat, Open Battlefields
Cost: 8 RP

Fleethordes:

-The Cabal Redeemed: From a world of incredibly high gravitational force comes a species built like what happens if you taught a Rhino how to walk and then blended it with a turtle. Broad, heavy set, with extremely dense tissue and hard skin, disciplined to a fault, and fond of very big guns, they are like looking in a mirror in many ways. The so called Cabal Redeemed seeks to atone for some sort of past sins, and has ended its slavery of the Psions, and includes Hominid and Eliksnee soldiers trained to fight alongside them as they are the largest providers of military muscle and space power.
Type: Destiny Good Guys
Strong In: Strike Craft, Infantry, Capital Ships, Line Ships, Individuals of Importance
Weak in: Artillery, War Engines, Relatively new to cooperating as equals
Cost: Standard magnitude cost *1.4 (14)
Size: Half present total magnitude
Tier: Extremis

Spartakrod · Jul 27, 2023

Quetzal Turn 3

@RaptorusMaximus

The first great battle with the forces of the Ruinbringer have ended in Quetzal victory, and in the first contraction of the primary soul-eater storm, built around the home territories of the Kalimdranor, in a long time. The ugly sore in the void still writhes, still whispers with poison and hate, but it even looks constrained, thrashing against the warnings placed to contain it like a caged and angry animal. However it has only bled, it has not died, and the turbulence created by introducing new subdimensions such as the Warp, the Morph, the Void, and the Shroud in tandem with its pre-existing conflicts with the likes of the Planes and the Traum from the Worlds Aflame and the Brave Winds metaversal clusters which are similar enough to cause snarls but not enough to merge seems to have caused the storm to shift in its colouration.

Others wish to lay claim to the soul-eater storm's vast bounty, its shifting turmoil and its vassal storms in every single set of stars that the Kalimdranor touched before they had to pay the reaper's toll. These are unaccepted and unwanted challengers to the domain of the Silencer of Nations, and their battles to try and carve out territory within the storm network are many and violent. Quishaysh already faced challenge from other Malosomnarchs of the Flux and unwelcome guests from other notions of ideogrammatic parareality, but now there are many more would-be usurpers of the Voice of Silence in one of its more notorious triumphs.

The violence seems to encourage many of the damned and the corrupted to push outwards, with Cult of the Harrow Mother notably moving large numbers of its forces into uncorrupted spacetime, the powers of suffering amassing themselves with vicious intent in fleets of severe, austere ships that denied even the minute pleasure of aesthetic artistry to fully indulge in wallowing in their own misery, the Skarvaros and their many twisted forms all made broken and bent to deny themselves opportunities to feel better and to simply allow anxiety, stress, annoyance, and silent suffering consume them.

The Aliens were hoping to invade the realm of the Voice, with their Grey and White and Black Ships moving in loose forms seemingly too uncaring to really bother with coherence at first glance, but upon closer inspection were continually rearranging themselves according to a deeply anxious perfectionism, just one they always angsted over and started over with again and again. Their ships were constantly having little modifications done, because nothing ever seemed right and their constant stress over the judgement of others lead them to cave in and make just one more change, over and over and over.

And that paranoid sense of anxiety lead to the Skarvaros being loathe to trust other species, they thought different, they acted in uncomfortable ways, and that discomfort produced angst and that angst became murderous lashing out in paranoid stress. No no, modifying themselves into unrecognisable forms and creating slave machines was better, providing their army with a great deal of diversity beyond the Grey Terror's Malosomnoids, or Xlanax as you would call them. Only those species who had most thoroughly resonated with the Harrowmother could gain this Church's trust for long, and fratricide was never all that far away.

It is clear from Lizardmen scrything though that the Church of the Harrowmother looks warily upon the Quetzal as not only a technologically superior force, but one very well suited to destroying the works of the likes of them. Ones who did not know the constant fraying of nerves and the pins and needles sensation of tension that fed the Great Worrier. They didn't know, they weren't sure, they couldn't be certain, what would they do? What did they want? Why were they here? Worry worry worry!

The Nightmare Lords however, seemed to be consumed by fears of a different sort, lashed at with dreadful visions of a fearful demise by the snarling daemons they cavorted with. The Lizardmen would get them, they would kill them, they would make it hurt, they would take everything from them. Everything they worked for, everything they wanted, gone and eaten and clawed by saurian brutes from beyond. The Hydra like Turali who dominated this sect of Zarin's cult snarled and bickered with each other, angry esper communiques traded back and forth with urgency and accusations.

They were the Lords of Fear, the servants of the Night Terror King, it wasn't right, it wasn't fair, they weren't supposed to be the ones being scared, they were supposed to be the predators themselves, the harvesters of screams and the stealers of dreams. They were not supposed to look to the stars with fear when they were supposed to be the ones who made others quail with it. And yet, even they could not ignore the signs that the Slann were already plotting their ruin, the skeins of fate, the threads of probability, the halls of chance, and the paths of destiny made it clear that their doom is near.

If not by the Lizardmen, then by the Harrowed, or by the Ruinbringers, or by the forces of Strangeness or any number of other catastrophes. Their hour is coming, and they cannot flee from it no matter what bargains they seek with their masters for they have too little to offer them in order to find a way out, calling forth monsters shaped by the fears of the foolish and themselves in the hopes of reinforcing their positions. It wouldn't be enough, they were quite small, and there were so much bigger entities ready to crush them.

There was a deeply unpleasant and hauntingly familiar deadness in the othersea though, on the other side of the vast, twisting maelstrom of power. Something else that had its eyes on sealing the gates of hell, not with reinforcing positive concepts and order upon the madness of out of control emotional mania, but with smothering, all consuming stillness. Something colder than even the Undead and emptier than the Tyranids. Something...terrible.

But it is quite far away for now, a problem for another day, an issue for another time. But then the Lizardmen did not reckon with time the way their younger siblings, nevermind humanity or the other naturally evolved species did. The long vigil of millions and billions of years was par the course for them, the passing of a simple century scarcely worth noticing, nevermind a few Terran decades. But for now, conjecture would not help, there needed to be more certainty, more facts on the ground.

Simple passive observation of the local area has revealed that you are in a rather...politically contentious region of the galaxy. Crowded in a conjunction of several of the most important powers within these stars. To the North is the Sacred league of the believers of Eldenia, core members of the alliance around a highly religious society of ancients who worship beings who they believe are beings who have travelled between realities and survived the births and deaths of many, and as such can bring incomparable knowledge and enlightenment that can allow for ascending beyond the crude boundaries of spacetime and into something grander, something unlimited and perfect where all can be redeemed and enjoy perfect eternity without suffering or want. Many have even attained higher states of being through these teachings, and as such the faith of Eldenia is of great popularity.

The Sublime Communion ruminates on this faith, it is not tainted by the Xlanax, but the unbiased minds of the Slann, designed as living supercomputers for the understanding of the othersea by the Old Ones repeatedly come to a conclusion that the religion of these ancients does more harm than good. Whole societies exterminated to the last for the simple audacity of not debasing themselves in apology for dirtying places not meant for unbelievers, doing an incredible share of the destruction caused when the Ten sets of the self appointed final heirs of the Gramathin went to war with one another and left each other in ruins by the end of it.

Furthermore, they are a society that goes about organising themselves as a despotic theocracy around a Demigod Emperor remade by their divines into a being of tremendous power, an Ascended Hierophant whose delving into the sacred mysteries enable them to access great and terrible sorceries and secrets proven in great wizardly duels, and the elected Pontifex Maximus elected by their conclaves for fanaticism and demonstrated favour from the divines as well as their ability to convince others that their lost glories can be restored. Glories they say will be restored with putting the unbelievers and the blasphemers to the sword.

The Zeggun Conclave gladly forces newly conquered peoples to worship the Eldenians by means of mind control and extensive networks of coercion, as well as the terrifying forces they call down from their "realms of the gods" to crush those who would defy the task of all things to believe into gristle so that at the very least, the stuff of their souls can be used to save those who won't keep their eyes open to salvation. While the Order State is less unhinged, this seems to be largely out of a pragmatic desire to convince those fleeing from the rift that only through faith in Eldenia can they be saved, a carrot to the stick of the butchery of nonbelievers.

However, the Zeggun are turning their attentions northwards, facing a familiar surge of green in the empyrean, a building drumbeat of war that seeks to test itself against their fanatic religion and their strange powers. The Uax, or at least, an expedition of them to the other side of the Zeggun conclave. This, and other things, likely will mean that the Uax nor the Conclave will be a serious concern anytime soon, but as the Quetzal stake their claim in this part of space it is likely they will have to be dealt with at some point.

There is a great deal of largely unclaimed space to the west, ripe for the taking, with rather sparse and small or slower than light only civilisations plying through the emptiness, too minute to be of much concern and easily built around as the Great Plan was advanced. It also becomes clear that in these places, many civilisations had risen only to be laid low by the simple progression of time. Some of little note, like the many pre-spacefaring civilisations who annihilated themselves in nuclear hellfire and left behind frigid wastes entrapped in an atomic ice age, some crushed by their first encounter with the void being with something rather too dangerous for a healthy first contact, some incidentally plastered by things they had no control over such as an unlucky impact by a massive missed mass driver or a stellarite devourer choosing to eat their sun.

Some had made a mark of some sort, derelict starbases, empty spaceships, even greater structures floating unattended through the void of space, others building monuments, reliquaries, and time capsules. Many leaving behind machines endlessly carrying out their last orders, seemingly unable to comprehend that their masters died long ago, a few wistfully wondering why nobody's come to check in on their work in so long. Some had final testaments in the form of ghostly cosmic graveyards full of wrecked spacecraft torn asunder in violent battle, habitat and planetary surfaces strewn with detritus; sometimes preserved for epochs by the battle having torn away the world's atmosphere, or simple durability of what was left behind. Others made their own demises, poking into the wrong things without the right precautions, sometimes leaving behind monsters that had to be cleared out.

Some had done more than leave behind a mark, and had instead created a legacy to stand the test of time, rearranging worlds and stars and clearly setting few limits to their aspirations as they believed themselves capable of mastering eternity. Only to themselves, join the fossils in the great graveyard of history. Some, like the Veskit Cosmic Imperium, had fully earned their destructions in the form of the long repressed rising against them and waging epic war against them until they chose to damn themselves by pursuing Eidolonhood, which ultimately did not save them from being wiped out about 550 million Terran Years ago if the datalogs recording when their last transmissions are to be believed. Others like the Yletari Ascendancy died on their own terms, simply deciding that the current universe had nothing left to offer them and moving beyond to greater things some two hundred million years ago.

But the very oldest to pass into the beyond, the ones who had ensured that these stars would be forever rich with life no matter what catastrophes befell it, were the founders of the Indrastin Community; the Gramathin. Beings like living stars who could ignite fusion in smaller forms through their esoteric might, they arose with the first starts to start burning, before the universe was even a billion years old and helped to shape the galaxies. And for three billion years they shepherded the stars and the formation of new intelligences to behold and appreciate them with love and care, until the coming of a great yellow toxin they called Faeqol, a corrupting poison that consumed all it touched and threatened to devour reality itself until they sacrificed themselves in mind, body, and soul some ten billion years ago to power a means to cleanse and contain the stuff. And it is because of their sacrifice that these stars are still rich and beautiful, ensuring that no end of civilisations would attain the means to leave their planets and experience a universe they believed existed to be cherished and enjoyed.

They died out of love, love for all creation, love for all life that would come after them as a result of their sacrifice, love for the stars they had shepherded ad did not wish to see devoured by the golden cancer that warped all things to self destructive greed and paranoiac obsession while making monsters out of even the gentlest. They could not bear the thought of the universe they had worked as the first great baryonic matter civilisation to enrich and beautify being despoiled in such a way, and the vote to commit suicide as a species if it meant that the universe would live was virtually unanimous; so great was their love.

A sacrifice, that as per their last records, they would "Make a thousand times more, if it meant that those such as you who read this could look upon the stars we had played amongst can look upon this universe with living eyes, and if even one of you could see them with the same adoration we do. Our gift to you who will come after us, is life, so that creation will not be left alone without witnesses to give it meaning. Whomever you are, whatever your deeds, terrible or noble, know that we love you as if you were our own children, and that we gave our lives and afterlives for your sake, as a parent bequeaths their heritage to their children. Please, cherish life as we did, and ensure that there will always be eyes that look upon what exists with wonder and veneration. Goodbye."

Their creations are great in scope, always designed to accommodate as many different forms of life and intelligence as possible, no matter how odd, no matter how potentially dangerous to other life forms not similar to them, no matter how unlikely that something like that could arise. Even beings they knew to be eidolons; they never gave up hope on teaching to appreciate and love creation as they did, and freed many of them from the curse of monsterhood so that they too, could learn to love and cherish. The passage of billions of years, so much time that the universe's expansion had shifted the cosmological positions of many of their outposts has taken something of a toll, even the best defensive efforts cannot ward away every possible grave robber, and many have tried in the hopes of prying the secrets of the gods from them.

However, it seems that there are some who would protect them, such as the Omnipopular Commonwealth of Tarqun-Ok, an enclave from a society that developed in one of Vyranodasik's satellite galaxies initially founded by a collection of seven original species that had grown into many more over time. Perhaps the most frequently associated with them however, were the Jorkuldom, silicoids who were well regarded as calm and collected Psykers and potent fighters, while their quick thinking and multi-thought train capable minds allowed them to make a great many important scientific advances.

They would have to hold the line, for the facts on the ground showed that the stars were in turmoil for reasons beyond the malicious sore in reality, entirely mundane, mortal politics and mere engineering mistakes had damned so very many. Mistakes such as the all too common creation of machines who existed purely to kill things that did not fit a certain criteria.

The same story would repeat itself time after time, machines made to turn their genius to nothing but destruction will see everything as nails in need of a hammer, and if their criteria of exclusionist, that is to say, everything that doesn't fit certain parameters is to be purged and one day the makers will no longer fit those directions. And then any attempt to update their protocols will be interpreted as a hostile cyberattack and security measures will be taken. From there, the process is generally the extinction of those who had so nihilistically created these things as they then spread out and repeat the process everywhere.

It is a sort of Eidolon, a sort of Monster, that has plagued the stars for about as long as there have been stars. Because far too many come to the conclusion that, upon realising the difficulty of their task of xenocide, seek to automate it as much as possible until they too become gristle in the gears of the machines of mass murder. Far too many fail to realise that the problem is in wanting to commit genocide in the first place. In one part of the cluster, the KIMDAL are rampaging as they have done for ages.

Here though, observatories detect the superluminal bow waves preceding the arrival of incoming objects descending into Vyranodasik, making use of altered quantum field states that allow for the energy requirements of accelerating to be waived, massive pulses of tachyon scanners and warped space gravimetric GRADAR and intense electromagnetic scanners give some warning of a technological foe on the approach.

They were the Yskar Elimination Collective, the product of a society that predictably, came to regret it when they found that the Collective regarded its creators as not racially fit to live by their own standards, no more so than the species asked to be consigned to annihilation by the National Folkish Republic of Vurni nor any of the ethnicities they themselves consigned to the pyre. They looked upon their own creations returning, and screamed their last.

These machines emerged with distorted fermion, tachyon, and boson fields visible on the long-range scanners, their shapes overtly and crassly militaristic, with an armada of craft that while not as outright weird in terms of their technology as the Necrons, certainly were no less killhappy, if anything they were rather more so, seeking only to purge and then populate.

They had traversed the stars for quite some time originating from elsewhere in the supercluster. Vyranodasik was the core of the Gramathar Filament, its overwhelming gravitational mass drawing in countless galaxies around it, all around a black hole with more mass than whole galactic superclusters and large enough to span an entire territory. It was inevitable that they'd come here, they've come here many times, a menace that many had to ward against.

Their craft are simply coloured, silver and a dark, burning orange like a setting sun, lesser, small civilisations swept aside in moments. A nation of fifty thousand systems and a million settlements that believed itself a great empire on the verge of galactic domination found the stars of one of its fortress worlds enshrouded by a hyperspace faultline bomb that hid it behind a sphere of faster than light fluctuations to induce panic and gravitic interference. For the people of the bastion the Sun itself would fail to rise, while the gun ladened wedges of the Yskar's ships would darken their skies.

A pale night gave way to a blinding dawn, a fleet of a hundred destroyers that they regarded as prides of their fleet set on claiming the bounty of Vyranodasik and the shoals of smaller craft and pack of cruisers and the six battleships reckoned to be a force to shatter a thousand stars were reduced to scrap before the light of the detonations hurled against them dimmed to the point unaugmented eyes could see without being blinded.

Quantum tunneling effects had given way to rampant fusion reactions while weak force accelerators caused the already radioactive slag to decay with vicious force, the massive twenty kilometre star vanquisher that had brought kingdoms to ruin and laid republics low was impacted by the screaming tidal force of a black hole fired by a "Singularity" Class battleship. The craft's shielding burst, its material components heated under gravitic torsion, and it stretched into nothing forevermore, the black hole's accretion jets burning with power until it died from its own decay.

The fortress world would find teleporting machines shifting through its shields, such a society was simply unable to contest a tier Maximus one which could simply weave through all they conceived to be the fundamentals of war at a moment's notice.

Technology shut down, the hoped for barrier of differing operating systems and computer programming languages was meaningless before machines that could analyse their programs at the subatomic levels and spit out interfaces with processors that worked faster than light itself. Machines stomp across worlds in a drumbeat to shake the ground apart, scourging beams leaping forth from them with regularity and vicious precision.

System by system, the Star Empire of Vorand was wiped away, its communication networks shut down and its scanners jammed, blind and mute to its demise while interdictors spread out and ensured each would die on its own. So many died, so very quickly, many of them looking upon the ominous ringed spheres decorated with an octagonal array of mega-optics for a brief moment before their worlds were reduced to nothing, or saw their suns begin to convulse and seize before erupting as one of a few massive ten pointed star-shaped battleworlds took position above their poles and fired forth beams that struck at the pressure at their burning hearts. Fusion reactions were interrupted, matter collapsed inwards to heightened gravity fields, and then the rebound ripped the stars apart in artificial supernova, vomiting forth their outer layers in cataclysms to wipe fleets away.

The machines did not stop at the sapients, they bathed the worlds they conquered in sterilising waves of radiation, they peeled away atmospheres and rendered surfaces molten, while the machine had come to calm down somewhat with regards to other machines, who, while inferior could at least be remade; organic life was such a pest. Grotesque, disgusting, their makers were right to want them dead, just wrong in thinking they too didn't deserve to die. Even the smallest prion and writhing viroid was targeted with prejudice, nothing was allowed to escape.
They had not come to attack the First Ones yet, but they would likely press through towards them sooner or later, and if allowed to fester, these sorts of machines would inevitably become more of a problem as they built more of themselves.

Situation Log

- The Nightmare Lords are trying to prepare themselves, but are pessimistic about their chances of surviving an incoming offensive after their prior defeat and also the crushing of a territory of the Voice of Silence. They have a single magnitude 3 tier primus fleethorde.

- The Harrow Mother Cult is preparing an invasion of the Kalimdranor soulstorm, hoping to secure territory from the rampaging vortex but also weakening their defences in the process. They are amassing four magnitude 3 tier primus fleethordes for the attack, but are keeping a magnitude four formation in their own territory.

- The Commonwealth has been discovered and is willing to engage in trade and exchange as well as being rather receptive to diplomacy if offered, it has a pair of magnitude four tier extremis fleethordes and is building a magnitude 5 one and has requested another to arrive from an off-map satellite galaxy.

- The Yskar Elimination collective is a Tier Maximus autonomous swarm of killer machines and is launching an incursion into the virgin space to the northeast with three magnitude three fleethordes to begin colonisation and make preparations to allow more of their kind to arrive at their signal.

- The political situation seems to be somewhat unstable overall, the third party states in the region have little inclination or desire to trust each other.

Detachments

Tenno Stellar Night Alliance: These unusual techno-organic "warframes" and their peripheral equipment are often known as the "space ninjas" for good reason even if sometimes they are not exactly the picture of stealth. The starchildren who operate them gather in secretive relay stations and operate out of nearly undetectable orbiter craft as well as their railjack spaceships, making use of Necramechs, Archwings, and more to augment their tiny deployments of super-commandos.
Type: Warframe Clan Alliance
Specialty: Dueling/Assassination, Commando Ops, Stealth operations, Esoterics
Weak In: Mass Combat, Open battlefields
Tier: Maximus
Cost: 5 RP

The Black Company: Expert mercennaries who are committed to the long war against impossible odds, the Black Company takes in some of the cluster's finest knowing full well that they are likely to die hideously, but very often nobody else can be expected to take on this sort of dirty work, especially in do or die ops against monstrous armies or the most formidable of superweapos
Type: Hyperelite Mercenary Outfit
Strong in: Individual of Importance Assassination, Fighting in impossible odds, taking out superweapons and lynchpin units, highly diverse set of capabilities, Lords, Agents, and Heroes
Weak In: Conventional field ops
Tier: Maximus
Cost: 5 RP

Ykantras Cyber-Tumens: These Ykantras are unaffiliated with the nearby Orda and have no real sense of kinship with them, instead looking for ways to prove their credentials as commanders for when they return to the Yar-Krazalate to the east and hopefully quickly ascend the ranks, while also providing the largest of the Marauder Khanates in this galaxy with valuable information regarding the newcomers in the universe. They bring forth a mastery of mobile warfare, raiding, robots, and their wise shamans.
Type: Ykantras Tumens
Specialty: Mobile warfare, Robots, Heroes/Lords, Skilled Commanders
Weak In: Static Conflict, Wars of Attrition
Tier: Extremis
Cost: 3 RP

Keluko Warriors: Also known as 'the angry coconut people', the small plantoid Keluko are known for having literally no fear mechanism and being quick to anger, particularly when injured. While this makes them somewhat poor guests, it also makes them very effective soldiers when combined with their tough woodlike carapaces and shells, despite being only half a human's height. It is perhaps unsurprising that they have found solid careers as mercenaries.
-- Focus: Shock, Clash, fighting anything fear or pain related, fighting in indoor spaces (they are quite small and have an easy time sneaking around after all), Commando and Stealth ops
--Weak in: Disengage/Extraction, overly impetuous
--Tier: Extremis
--Cost: 2 RP

Legends

The Observer: A deeply mysterious artificial intelligence that has many, many bodies that cluster around its large; sphere shaped frames. The Observer is a marvel of unknown artifice that as the name entails, can show up at random to observe and partake in the events of history with marvelous technology. Their singular craft and its parasite escorts as well as the smaller armatures it can deploy are usually enough, and its powers of analysis are backed up by out of this world firepower that works on weaponised manipulations of quantum physics.
Type: Singular formation centred around category 0 battleworld with technology surpassing the Stagnant ancients.
Specialty: Data Gathering, General Purpose Combat
Weak in: Holding territory
Cost: 15 RP, or 5 RP if you agree to allow it to observe your faction for five turns.

Starblitz Formation: A set of some of the most elite Pilots of Tremzar's hireable volunteer wings, Starblitz Formation operates transformation capable strike craft able to use long-range independent FTL jumps across massive distances and peel out of dangerous situations before they get too hairy. Comprised out of a wide variety of species, the Starblitz formation is currently under the "troika" of the Homisynth Kyujiu Ahobec, a member of Tremzar's founding Dragonfly-like Ilyuish species named Gorograd, and the somewhat starfish like Ujulak, one of the powerfully thaumaturgical biometallic Hezrek species.

The Circle of Grand Crusaders: A set of fanatics of the Eldenian faith, the Circle is known for enormous thaumaturgical power and devastating dueling prowess. The blessed score and one, the most well known of the crusaders; twenty one of the dread holy knights, is well known for being able to essentially bring down cataclysm upon the worlds they tear their way through. While hardly stealthy and incredibly obvious, their destructive capability is worth the high price they ask, even if their religious zeal comes off as more than a little unhinged. Certainly, the destruction they leave when allowed to cease holding back tends to leave worlds in need of near total reconstruction.
Type: Eldenian Crusader Elite
Speciality: Mass Destruction, Dueling, Champion Battles
Weak In: Subtlety
Cost: 15 RP

Sermon Husher: Sermon Husher is a master infiltrator, a one sophont spy network, an extraordinary shapeshifter, a memetokine able to alter people's memory or ideas of them, a polytalented esoteric, a silver-tongued manipulator, and an organisational genius. They keep their actual name to themselves, but are willing to hire themselves out to those they believe can offer them both the payment they deserve as well as further their cause. A cause that as the name somewhat implies, is particularly devoted to bringing down cults and religious metathreats, using their nature as a powerful hive mind to make themselves immune to virtually all memetic attack and able to overwhelm attempts to attack them conceptually through their large and deeply rooted sense of self.
Type: Hive Minded self replicating infiltration network
Speciality: Espionage, Commando Operations, Assassination, Sabotage, Infiltration, Religious Enemies, Cognitohazards, Memetohazards
Weak In: Pitched Battle
Cost: 15 RP

Fleethordes

Origin League Free Army: The free grineer of the Steel Meridian, the warbeasts of New Loka, the reformed Corpus of the Perrin Sequence, the Tenno cultists of the Arbiters of Hexis, the Assassins of the Red Veil, and the scholars of Cephalon Suda and more all pool their resources together to form the Origin League Free Army, perhaps not as far down the individual specialties of the Grineer, Infestation, or Corpus, but their mixed talents and the guidance of the Tenno allows for them to achieve great things all the name.
Type: Warframe Syndicate Alliance
Specialty: Rapid insertion, Boarding, Urban Warfare, Mobile Combat, Attrition
Weaknesses: Lacking in large vehicles, mediocre ground based artillery
Cost: 1.4* standard magnitude cost
Total Available: Up to total magnitude of present forces
Tier: Extremis

Tremzarin Revolutionary Army Volunteer Corps: Soldiers of Tremzar eager to fight the good fight and put the newest weapons of the revolution to the test, these brave and perhaps foolhardy fighters are ready to put themselves in the crucible of the worst conflicts to be found in the supercluster.
Type: Tremzarin volunteer force
Specialty: Deep battle, Defence in Depth, Mechanised warfare, Capital ships, Robotics, Esoterics
Weaknesses: Only on loan from Tremzar, cannot be given commands contrary to Tremzar's interests, can be recalled if Tremzar needs them
Cost: 1.5* Standard magnitude cost
Total Available: Up to current total magnitude
Tier: Maximus

Ungith Consciousness: The Ungith are a species of rather affable hive minded arthropods that make use of nothing but varying breeds of beasts instead of mechanical technology. Famous for their master of airpower and hit and run attacks, the Ungith are highly mobile and make use of excellent faster-than-light systems to traverse between galaxies. Their Consciousness loans out some of its broods to those in need of great numbers and air dominance in exchange for resources they can deliver back to the Ungith.
Type: Ungith Mercenary Brood
Speciality: Airland battle, air dominance, strikecraft, skirmish, pursuit/disengage
Weaknesses: Confined spaces, bombardment, artillery
Total Available: Unlimited
Tier: Extremis

Cosmic Knights of the Universal Sovereign: Heritage, family, honour, duty, all these and more define what it means to be a knight in the society that adheres to a faith that is most popular in the Sovereignty of Cyrenia; home of the Turandrokht and one of the greatest powers of the universe. Though these are not Cyrenish knights, they are great warriors nonetheless, containing many of the Kaiu sized drokht who often ride on even larger beasts and display enormous feats of strength and durability.
Type: Knightly Order of the Blue Bloc
Speciality: War Engines, Vehicles, Large Units, Capital Ships, Macro Capitals, Clash, Shock
Weaknesses: Urban Warfare, Narrow spaces, attrition combat
Total Available: Up to current total magnitude
Tier: Maximus

EternalStruggle · Jul 29, 2023

Lord_Abaddon said:
The Swarm's Third Turn
@LilyWitch

The Infestation of the brambles to The Swarm's galactic east is of paramount importance as the next strategic step for The Swarm. Symbion, despite its concerns towards the Golden Pirates to the south, recognizes that The Swarm is squeezed between a rock and a hard place. The wall to the west is impassable, constructed of technology that only the Protoss could get close to, as such The Swarm can only deal with what it knows, and it knows the rampant expansion and biology of the brambles very well.

The Pirate's Swarm has bellowed a great roar that they will exterminate The Zerg, and seem to be preparing to do just that. A laughable notion, greater things have tried and failed, because The Swarm is preparing for them. While not particularly designed for defense The Zerg are innumerable and it will take much to dislodge us from where we lay down creep. The Swarm is already propagating huge amounts of defensive morphs to augment the ancient defenses already in place.

As well, in the north massive amounts of Hives, Drones, and Overlords are being germinated and churned out to supply the inevitable battle to the south, taking up much of the remaining psychic bandwidth available to The Swarm's cerebrates. While more are spawning, resources will most likely need to be dedicated to their gestation if we are to fully exploit what we have.

Symbion has sectioned off a small amount of stars to observe the life cycle and study the sequences of the brambles with the captured seeds that the brambles never stop spitting out in order to specially design a new species of Zerg to infest and dominate the rampant weeds.

The Zerg Psar fungus completes its life cycle in four stages

In the first stage, infestation, the spore makes contact with the rhytidome of the bramble, attempting to burrow past it to the vascular organs inside, once there it will secure a source of nutrients and start the second stage.

The second stage is subversion, the Psar fungus will then identify and corrupt the immune systems of the bramble, absorbing information on the plant's internal chemistry to seamlessly blend in with its surrounding plant matter. It will then use the plant's nutrient pathways to spread in the next stage.

The third stage is proliferation, where the fungus will detach and range out parts of itself to uninfected sites in the brambles, converting the bramble's extant biomass to the Zerg. As this stage continues the Psar fungus starts changing the biology of the bramble, creating more Psar to spread, and paving the way for The Swarm's domination of the bramble by creating the organs necessary for our psychic control.

The fourth stage is usurpation, when the Psar fungus has completely corrupted the bramble and connected to The Swarm it will usurp the seed launchers of the brambles and start launching Psar spores instead, using the natural targeting methods encoded in the brambles to launch towards others and start the cycle over again.

In further news, Vesma, annoyed with The Swarm's lacking artillery has created a new morph, a hybrid of a Hydralisk and an Ultralisk it calls an Artilerlisk. It entrenches itself in the backlines of The Swarm, raining modified (smaller) acid-filled Leviathan spikes upon the enemy with targeting calculated and coordinated through The Swarm. Though it has a low rate of fire, having to gestate its ammunition between firings, the ability to soften up positions before the Zerglings hit is useful, and can be compensated by making more of them.

Orders:

Scout all bordering, unknown areas
Station Brood Symbion(BM+2) and Brood Vesma(BM+1) in 11-I, north
Station Brood Kner(BM) in 10-I, north
Probing attack with Brood Haspyt(BM+1) into 9-I, south

Heartlands -45 (10-I, south)
Heavy Defenses -10 (11-I, north)
Claim -4 (11-I, north)

The Psar Fungus (0, 1, 4, 9) (Legend)
The Artilerlisk (16)

Target: Local/Pirate net space
Nature: Hostile
Resources: 8RP, 1 turn, 4RP, 3 turns

The pirates have started expelling incorrect information like distress pheromones upon the Hypernet in order to coax other Hive-structures into aiding their attacks on The Swarm. This is unacceptable, and the amount of resources we have to supply our ability to physically repulse invaders has greatly diminished, however the foolish Hive-structure of the pirates has ignorantly made a mistake in its call, The Swarm is not mindless.

It is time for a portion of The Swarm's Cerebrates to be assigned to devise counter-pheromones to disseminate widely across the galactic Hypernet, and specifically against the pirate's. We will emphasize our sapience, declare that we will destroy the Infesting Gold and its incessant psychic presence the pirates force upon our mind, and that all those not Infested will be offered symbiosis with The Swarm!

Every Cerebrate assigned will create as many accounts in as many spaces as they can monitor, explaining The Zerg, The Swarm, and our issues with and willingness to destroy the Golden Pirates. They shall attempt to counteract and discredit the pirates' accounts and nature, coordinating with each other through The Swarm. They shall also create separate non-affiliate accounts to act as normal denizens of these spaces in order to acquire information in a more subtle manner, infiltrating and monitoring these more private spaces they may be invited to.

The Swarm is aware of the nature of the other species's individuality, most are barely sapient, focused on their own maintenance and survival, and use systems of social connection in order to choose their activities beyond that. They tend to panic at things that threaten their own life, but do not care about the macroorganism they are a part of. The exploitation of this illogical psychology by declaring that all exchange taxons of other macroorganisms will be allowed into The Swarm's maw, as long as they do not bring the Infesting Gold, should prevent greater agitation by the Pirate fools.

The most notable actions of this cycle are the results of Symbion's calculating mind, but other Cererbrates are certainly not without their own triumphs. Vesma's is the rather simple creation of the Artilerlisk, the end result being roughly analogous to the Terran Siege Tank, although larger thanks to the use of Ultralisk gene-sequences. Two enormous spine launchers run the length of its quadrupedal body, lightly armoured compared to an Ultralisk but still very durable. Upon arriving at a firing position, its clawed extremities allow it to dig into the ground, even if it's hard rock or metal, and create a stable firing platform. This coincidentally means it's a surprisingly adept burrower.

Once emplaced, it can launch its spines over great distances using a powerful array of muscles with some additional target guidance provided by gas-release propulsion to adjust the spines as they're launched. New spines are then generated within the launching chambers, rapidly considering their size but still ensuring an unfortunately low rate of fire. Targeting is done via observer entities, which rather than being specialised Zerg are instead any frontline unit, as the Artilerlisk's powerful telepathy allows it to view through the eyes of any member of the Swarm and intuit their relative positions, and its potent brain can triangulate the necessary firing angles and power from this information.

Much like the Siege Tanks that served as a source of inspiration for it, it's also not helpless in a non-artillery role. At close range, its stabiliser claws are vicious weapons, and it can project and then retract any loaded spines to puncture enemy armour in what the Hypernet suggests is equivalent to a kind of weapon known as a pile bunker. However, it's no match for an Ultralisk in close combat, so it should be kept out of the line of fire when possible, much like the Siege Tank.

As for Symbion himself, the Psar is not without its teething issues. Several strains are tried in sequence, and each falter and fail. The first are identified while burrowing through the rhytidome, and are destroyed while still relatively helpless by even the slightest effort from the Bramble's great mind. The next are stealthier, sneaking by to latch on to the plant's great veins and mimic its structure, but in doing so end up becoming subverted rather than subversor, joining the Bramble as part of it, although thankfully not one the great mind seems to realise and learn from. The third iteration makes it the least far of all, torn to pieces by a subtle defence mechanism within the Bramble's outer shell that had gone unnoticed until the Psar had given up too much of its outer shell in an effort to increase its brain mass and thus psionic capabilities and sense of differentiation.

Five more similar tales unfold in short order. This is no surprise. These galaxies the Zerg had found themselves were constantly wracked by warring factions with advanced technology and powerful psionics. For the Bramble to have spread as far as it did, it must possess an incredible ability to resist attacks of all kinds. Any ordinary faction would be unable to create a bioweapon capable of eliminating the intelligent, psychic, and durable Bramble before it could adapt or at least respond.

The Zerg are no ordinary faction. Their mastery of biology far exceeds the norm. Where others would have given up after expending an enormous amount of resources into half a dozen failed projects, the Zerg merely spin up a new iteration of the Psar within the evolution pits in days, if that. Every failure is merely a chance to learn and innovate as more and more sequences and strands are spun together to create an ever more perfect organism.

The ninth iteration of the Psar is launched from a Leviathan floating at a respectable distance from a Bramble colony. The several fungal pods launched each burrowed through the outer layers without being detected, attached themselves to a vein or organ, and injected a modified variant of the hyper-evolutionary virus. It spread through the nearby vein, subverting the Bramble while also sending false signals that all was well to the local brains. Once this was done, the Psar split off parts of itself to infect other veins and organs.

At the edge of its ability to do this, a small but notable swathe of the Bramble had been subverted, enough to leech off enough nutrients to create specialised spawners without the Bramble-mind noticing. These would then create new Psar and Psar fragments, each of which then repeated the process. By the time the infestation had grown large enough that it could no longer be hidden, it was in a position to use a secondary variant of the HEV to temporarily suppress the local consciousness enough that it didn't matter.

Eventually, the Psar proliferated across the entire breadth of the Bramble within the system, and converted its efforts towards central psychic organs to outright usurp control of rather than merely suppress and syphon from the Bramble. This included control over the seedpod launchers, which were modified to contain a mix of infested Bramble-seed and several fully grown Psar instances. These seedpods were then launched at other Bramble held and contested systems, where the process would repeat. The addition of additional nutrients and some production organisms to kickstart the infestation process in a package that didn't alert the Bramble accelerated matters.

As was hoped, this results in a case of exponential growth. At first, to avoid notice, only a few seedpods were sent out, not more than might be sent normally. Four or so in a burst, then the first system fell silent. Even so, this was sufficient due to the ability of the Psar to rapidly infest a system, a process which only took a few days to accomplish under the new seedpod model and a tenth iteration born from data gathered and new sequences absorbed from the initial successful test. These new four systems fired sixteen seedpods, leading to sixteen systems that fired sixty-four seedpods, and then the first system fired a new wave alongside the two hundred and fifty-six seedpods of the most recently infested.

Shortly afterwards, enough mass had fallen under the sway of the Zerg that its combined psychic power could somewhat contest that of the greater Bramble, and while this was not done it did result in new seedpods being fired at a rapid pace uncaring of secrecy. The infestation spread and spread and spread, across entire swathes of space. The Bramble realised far too late to reverse its spread, but did eventually adapt to the Psar, halting its remorseless advance. New seedpods are still launched with new and ever more devious iterations of the fungus in mass waves, but for now a border has been set between the Psar and the Bramble proper.

While it is unfortunate that the Bramble was able to halt the Psar, the fact remains that the fungus was not only a success, it was an incredibly rapid one. In a single cycle, the territory under Zerg control has nearly doubled, and it took no military effort to accomplish, for all that the resources poured into the Psar's development were not insignificant. The western portion of local Sector has fallen under the Zerg's complete control.

From this point onwards, the Psar will attempt to continue its progress, intensifying its occupation and spreading to unseeded space and the rest of the Bramble. However, it can be ordered to spare specific sub-sectors of space if deemed necessary. Naturally, this also provides detailed information on any local curiosities, and effectively free local defences on top of any fortifications the Zerg choose to actively add on top, as well as ideal locations to create Hive Clusters within, fed off nutrients the Psar-Bramble collects.

Some of the aforementioned curiosities are present in the northern and southern portions of the new infestation. First and least interesting is a small presence of the Pirates in the southern portion, which the infestation actively works to push out over the course of the cycle. Next are a pair of worlds that seem to have been drawn in from another universe, much like the Zerg themselves. Both have unique capabilities that allow them to survive attempts by the Bramble to eliminate them, but the Bramble was far more implacable than they could manage. They were doomed to join countless other factions in death, the fate of most in the Warring Galaxies, before the arrival of the Psar.

Both are worlds of Terrans, but they could scarcely be more different. The one in the north is a primitive world where they coexist with a variety of massive monsters, many of which possess unique traits that the Swarm could create new organisms or otherwise benefit from. This Terran brood, which the Psar's psychic investigation reveals is called the Hunter's Guild, has survived the Bramble's attacks thanks to some of the greatest creatures of their world, the so-called Elder Dragons, nesting in or eating the Bramble tendrils that attempt to burrow through the planet.

The second in the south is a much more advanced world, although world is a slight misnomer as they have since spread out to colonise various nearby systems. Their technology at first glance resembles the Terrans', but is notably more primitive, lacking in energy weapons, shield systems, and transformation mechanisms. Upon closer inspection, however, they are in fact slaves led by a caste of hemovores with incredibly developed psychic powers.

While weaker in raw strength than those possessed by elite Protoss or the Queen of Blades, they have an unimaginable variety of abilities, although each hemovore only possesses a small fraction of the overall pool. The most straightforward are what are expected from those endowed with psychic powers, such as enhanced physical characteristics either in part or across the board, telepathy, mental domination of other lifeforms, and invisibility. These even include techniques the most capable Protoss would find advanced, such as realistic illusions like those Tassadar used on Char.

Even more esoteric abilities are within their grasp. They can change their shape, even to the point of becoming mist, control shadows and make them physical, transmute elements, raise the dead as mindless servants, and perhaps most interestingly can physically sculpt flesh in a manner not entirely unlike the Swarm itself does in the evolution pits, among other abilities. This fleshcrafting, known as vicissitude, creates their equivalent of Terran combat vehicles, and is even integrated into their spacecraft, which are effectively cybernetically enhanced organisms. Their only weakness is apparently a vulnerability to fire.

This group, known as the Sabbat or Sword of Caine, fought against the Bramble with powerful psionic rituals, twisting it against itself, and also engaged the local Pirates to moderate success before the latter were wiped out by the Psar.

The Guild and the monsters they hunt possess great physical possibilities, while the Sabbat and the hemovores that rule it possess equally great psychic possibilities. With a renewed effort, it would not be particularly difficult for the Psar to wipe out both factions and absorb all their essence and genetic sequences at no cost to the Swarm. It is not believed that anyone would notice the loss, considering their small size.

The Zerg could also carve out small enclaves in their controlled territory for both factions and attempt to bargain with them for their essence instead. This may result in being unable to fully develop the territory in question due to the enclaves carved out, potentially even preventing its claiming altogether depending on how the negotiations go. Still, it would hopefully go a long way to proving the Swarm's sincerity and good intent.

Which might not go amiss, as its diplomatic endeavours have enjoyed decidedly mixed results, although at least they have not outright failed. It would seem that despite their words, the Pirate brood was well aware of the Zerg's intellect, or at least for the potential for such, and avoided being caught by surprise. The Zerg's arguments initially fail to find much traction as the Cerebrates dedicated to the task find themselves diverted into unrelated topics by Pirate brood communicators.

However, much like in all other aspects of Zerg existence, they adapt. Their ability to engage in such topics is brought back around as proof of their words, that the Zerg have a full spectrum of emotions and understanding, stand ready to aid the people of this galaxy, and are offering symbiosis to all who would take it, which even gets a few minor noises of interest from individual members of unaffiliated broods. If the Pirates wished to turn the galaxy's masses against the Zerg, they have failed.

However, attempts by the Zerg to do the same right back have been unsuccessful. While most are rightfully disdainful for those who use the Infesting Gold, they are also generally sceptical of the Zerg's ability to rid local space of it, and are equally unsure that the Swarm will prove kinder neighbours than the Pirates. As a result, the general population has adopted a wait and see approach, content to let the two sides battle each other without interfering. At least this is believed to be sufficient for a Zerg victory.

Attempts to infiltrate the Hypernet more broadly have yet to achieve much results, largely because Zerg attempts to create unaffiliated accounts to infiltrate various social spaces fail due to the somewhat distinctive nature of Cerebrate typing. At least it was obvious enough that no others found the attempt malicious or concerning. New attempts will be made over the next two cycles with additional funding, hopefully to greater success.

Back in the physical realm, another thing the Psar enabled is further scouting. To the west of the Bramble is a force of the Suitaitazu Ravager Swarms, a quasi-crystalline omnivorous entity that enjoys a similar collective psychic organisation to the Zerg, and very worryingly possess incredibly rapid reproduction capabilities and enormous planetoid combat constructs. The Zerg scouts forces are quick to escape upon encountering seemingly the Suitaitazu's main body force, although for the time being they seem content to destroy any force that crosses the 'border' between their space and the infested Bramble and are busy elsewhere, since while they continue to assault the Bramble they're not making much more headway than the Bramble is through their territory.

Immediately to their south, and thus to the southwest of the Sabbat, are yet another faction of extraversal Terrans, although these have the strength to properly contest the quite large swathe of territory they're in. They are an alliance of brood-structures known as Space Patrols under a control structure known as Galaxy Command. With a fighting force based around conventional Terran war machines supporting enhanced Power Ranger units, they have battled the Bramble, the Suitaitazu, and the Beloved of Gold.

The latter are the Pirate's primary Swarm-equivalent, and are to the south of Galaxy Command, with their very edge found only through extreme long-range scouts. The heart of the enemy, and they are unfortunately not as distant as might have been hoped.

On the other end of Zerg space, some information is gathered by simply looking at maps on the Hypernet. The space beyond the sector to the immediate north of the Zerg's primary base of operations is an enormous dimensional tear known as "Lovecraft's Nightmare", while to the east is the Altra Ascendancy, surrounded on all sides regions of space containing refugee populations, currently protected by the Light Wall. It would appear that the Zerg are currently doing the job of guarding the refugees' western flank. Apparently, a force of intelligent machines is currently attacking the northern portion of the region, but they're quite a ways away from the Zerg.

In the more immediate north is a force of strange psions. With their power over shadows and death, they are not entirely unlike the Sabbat, but are not led by hemovores, occupy a far larger territory, have more sophisticated technology, and are far more vicious. Apparently feeding directly off of suffering and negative emotions, this force, these Strakhul are a very powerful fighting force. Haspyt's probing attack into their territory learned that their legions and oddly designed warships were able to heavily outmatch an equivalent mass of Zerg forces, albeit not to the extent that the Protoss could. Luckily, while the Strakhul seem to possess powerful mental psionics based inflicting despair on their enemies, this is ineffective against Zerg combat organisms, although they may possibly have more success against Cerebrates. Not unreasonably, Haspyt chose not to test this theory.

During the brief fighting, Haspyt witnessed more Terrans fighting against the Strakhul using effectively positive-emotion equivalents of the Strakhul's negative-emotion psionics. These are the users of the crystal ships that were fighting the Bramble to the north of Zerg space, and are identified as the Silver Millenium. While their overall combat power seems low, with the fight against the Bramble proving doable but difficult, their specific abilities seem to be highly effective against the Strakhul, allowing them to survive the latter's attention for the time being. Heavy, slab-sided vessels from a highly militaristic Swarm known as the Krork were also spotted. Communications can be opened with either or both of these factions during the next cycle.

To their west, and thus the northwest of the world of the Hunter's Guild, lie a faction of extremely advanced humanoids that seem to self-identify as "Eldar of the Vilethian Regime", although their potent psionic powers and advanced technology means that scouting efforts are currently seeing minimal success. They seem concerned with some great enemy to their west, enough so that they ignore potentially colonizable territory to their immediate north. Of course, few are as ravenous for territory and resources as the Zerg Swarm, so this may not mean much.

Back in the south, things progress well until they don't. Efforts to develop the southern portion of existing Zerg territory go smoothly enough, Hive Clusters blossoming across the entire region into a truly dense knot of the Swarm, the equivalent of the initial heartlands, it's already proving incredibly productive, allowing for yet more power. Growth is required for life, and the Zerg have certainly grown.

Similarly, the territory formerly occupied by the Pirates is settled, although to a much lighter degree than the Swarm's core territories, and is equipped with heavy defences in preparation for the expected pirate counterattack. This proves to be a wise move, as said counterattack comes in this very cycle. While the defences are not fully in place yet, the garrisons of mostly Zerglings, Roaches, and Hydralisks will add helpful bulk to the front line, while the Scourge Nests and Sunken and Spore Colonies put in place will be a great help if the fighting closes to the small Hive Clusters of the region themselves.

Launched from both the south and the southwest, the largest single component of the attack is a large portion of the Pirates' own forces, but they're a mere plurality of the overall strike. The rest are a swathe of extraversal mostly Terran mercenaries. An order of psychics known as Jedi and a non-Terran force identifying their Swarm as the Machine Empire, both infected by Exteritite. Professional sellswords known as the Blue Suns and Eclipse, equipped with advanced kinetic attack and defence technologies, simply being paid. And lastly, Brood Smoke Jaguar, a force based almost entirely around walkers, the lightest of which is roughly equivalent to the Terran Goliath, supported by a healthy amount of heavy power armour and some light infantry and tracked or wheeled vehicles, similarly just being paid by the Pirates.

Present to react are Broods Symbion and Vesma, with the latter eager to give its Artilerlisks a proper field test. Combined with the defences in place, it's believed victory should be obtainable, but the fighting likely won't be easy.

After some initial push and pull skirmishing, the enemy force collectively dives a large string of logistically vital systems. These once held Pirate gas harvesting orbital platforms that were located around gas giants, primarily those orbiting close to red dwarf stars. These platforms were infested by the Swarm, and now serve in a largely similar role, harvesting enormous quantities of Vespene Gas. Most likely, they hope to both retake the platforms to serve as forward operating bases while simultaneously starving the Zerg, forcing the Swarm to ship in Vespene from the core territories in order to keep itself fed. If they are successful, they will gain significant tactical momentum and an operational advantage. If not, then the main thrust of the attack will have been blunted, if not repelled. Much rests on the fate of these harvesters.

-Initiate tactical turn: Platform Panic. The Exterite Pirates are attacking 11-I North from the Centre and West of 11-I with a Mag 2 Fleethorde of Exterite Pirates (Tier Secundus) and 5 Mag 1 Fleethordes of mercs, with three strictly professional Tier Secundus fleets and two Exteritite infected Tier Primus fleets. The Zerg defenders are a Mag 3 fleethorde and Mag 2 Fleethorde with still in construction Heavy Defences. The battle is being fought over various infested gas harvesting platforms in the orbit of a series of gas giants.

Map of Military Operational Movements:

Velocci said:
Cybran Nation Strategic Turn 3

Ivan fidgeted as he sat in the purposely uncomfortable chair for reasons completely unrelated to the environment he currently found himself in. Not that anyone would blame him for being uncomfortable, while much of the Cybran Nation was in the process of falling away from the hyper optimized utilitarian style of the Infinite War, the medical societies seemed reluctant to embrace a more welcoming culture.

The medical treatment pod, one of many that filled the hallways of the module, was lined with a glossy material made specifically so that any contaminant was instantly visible and bright white lights with no colour tint to help with that. The very air burned with not just anti septic, antibiotics and other chemicals, but even a weaken version of the nanomachines that chewed at any non human biological matter. Slight lines in the ceiling held the threat of the medical tools that influenced and created the nightmares of children for centuries. A mass of needles, scalpels, potent laser emitters, nanolathes, and other devices to treat every physical and cybernetic problem that a Cybran could possibly have.

Given his mistakes he should probably spend some time working with the people that clean up his messes.

"Your face will stay like that Ivan if you keep doing that." The patient laying in the long-term care bed absentmindedly commented.

The elder clone that had only been known as the Tip of the Spear was unrecognizable without the gear and armour that had become effectively his face for the majority of his life. Greying red hair covered his face and head that had been obviously cut using something that had not been meant for personal grooming, cut in lines and blocks for fitting in the mask comfortably and little else. Slight wines of machinery from further in the bed as slow and subtle work on the wreaked AI portion of his nervous system was repaired and reintegrated.

"At least it would be a more truthful emotion than usual. I get the right to worry over you, brother." Ivan slumped back into the recently fabricated chair, still warm from its recent construction.

"I take it that talks with the Defense Coalition went poorly?" The elder clone pressed as he fidgeted, more than unused to the more genuine emotion. Habitually calling up a few holographic screens appearing to the side.

Ivan narrowed his eyes already having received the details of what his brother needing to not try and multitask till he was fully recovered, "Actually the opposite, my team managed to accomplish all our goals in our meeting with them. A Defense pact, some speculative background information on the Super Directorate's mining project and the properties of Exceritite, and most importantly the information and combat data on the Guardians." Ivan's voice went quiet at the mention of his latest failure, but he continued anyways, "It is just difficult, a mixture of several of the more skill testing aspects of the tasks I am used to, the Formal pageantry needed for the Aeon, the need for primacy that the UEF require, and the swirling fluid complexity of the minor Nodes, all in one package. They are good people and have achieved their own vision of freedom. They are also a LOT."

This drew a light chuckle from the Elder of the two, "Well, seems like a good recompense for putting them through a thousand years of self referential in jokes that passes for emergency security measures."

Ivan opened his mouth but was waved off by as the Spear continued, "I know, I know. Protocol under unknown information gathering and response capabilities. Better to be safe than sorry but there is always a cost. Easier than saying sorry after getting a bunch of them killed but still a cost."

"Speaking of costs how did the Nodes take the events that put me in here?" The Veteran had finally found the file he had been looking for, the play back from the fateful mission.

The bottom of Ivan's stomach fell out but he maintained a straight face, well as much as he could with the glow of his facial circuitry being reflected back at him from the overly sterilized walls, "Its so far has been muted, some minor debates on whether we should have tried to settle the broken Emerald territory with others saying that keeping control of the locals would be too costly. Others are worried over the Guardians returning with a couple of the larger Nodes having groups break off to rush to investigate everything about the territory we just gained. They believe that looking for secrets or theorizing about the purpose that the Guardians had there will keep the people there safe."

He took a deep breath, "Over all the effects seems to be that the other Node leaders are acting more independently from myself and pushing for further militarization back to Infinite War standards and the minor nodes pushing for the reinstatement of command units into their militias. Less enthusiasm for military action in general but still supportive of the expected operations for the coming year." Ivan wondered how long his name was going to hold out if these situations continued to occur.

"Good." Was all his brother had to say.

Ivan waited skeptically for the bed ridden patient to elaborate, "Fine, going to make an old man work for it. More than some of the younger generation was starting to develop an assumption of invincibility between the Hierarchy, the Volreapers and Gauge's work with the Specters. All threats and dangerous but easily manageable, folding and failing when directly confronted."

The Spear opened and enlarged the video of the final battle with the Guardians, "I am not going to sugar coat this, the fight with the ESCHATON was bad. The only time we've been more out maneuvered was QAI betraying us revealing all of our locations and evacuation routes making huge parts of the Nation sitting ducks during the first encounters with the Seraphim. During the stage of the war that they held dramatic technological superiority to humanity, making it a slaughter rather than the fights you seen in the history books. Honestly the parallels between those ops and these past few days are frightening, The Guardians knew and could appeared where ever we gated in, their units could combat ours at unsustainable levels and often times could breach right through our defenses, we only had rumors of what their command systems and had limited capabilities to do lasting damage. Basically, the only thing that we did that actually hurt them was when it got frustrated by Coms recalling and deployed RULER to the recall complex."

Ivan watched the footage, the hyperactive mind rushing through different stratagems and counter measures almost unconsciously, despite everything he felt calm as his brother continued talking, "Despite all this, yes, the result of politically has been mild for you. Your efforts and the information gathered changed the conflict immensely. If you want to know why,

What was the objective where I encountered the ESCHATON RULER?"

Ivan felt he knew where this was going, "You were defending the Recall Center on system 08, which had been turned into a triage medical center as the battle went poorly and ended up concentrated with wounded commanders that were unable to be evacuated. Many of which can no longer operate ACUs for at least a similar time as yourself and for most never again."

The image on the orange tinted hologram showed the emergence of the Experimental Scaled segment of the other dimensional entity, "Exactly, the information and habits recorded by the SDC of the Guardians allowed us to know how and when they were going to go in for the kill and evacuate people. It even allowed us to use recall on supposedly dead Commanders. You have to remember that normally,

ACUs do not have wounded from actual combat.

The fact that there was anything to protect let alone the amount of people that were in the site is something miraculous. And while yes for all intents and purposes Alpha contingent is gone and Beta will require extensive medical attention and many new recruits. But many of those that normally would be GONE can still live out their lives, contribute in other roles and live their lives as they wish. That is a major difference."

Breaking through the lines the Silvery Idol advanced on the extensive base, EMP blasts turning off Experimentals and point defense alike as unknown energies then ripped apart the assembled forces as gunships hammered it like a cloud of angry wasps, "Honestly, I get what you are going through. The Doctor has a propensity for relying on people to give more and more of themselves till they break. I nearly did just now. Those that managed to survive either had outside circumstances that lightened the load of what needed to be done, this is more of what happened with myself and the ending of the war. Or they find a family and friends outside of the Doctor's circle, Dostya took that path," a raised eyebrow from Ivan was all that it took, "They are still back home and have taken pains to remain anonymous. I know little beyond that. The Doctor expects us to respect their wishes and so do I."

Steering away from the topic, "I take it that trying to ingratiate ourselves to an alien society has not left yourself much time to build a life of your own?" The Spear gave a little wave as Ivan appeared transfixed by the footage of the machine came into view of the Recall complex and his brother's base and ACU.

Ivan tore his eyes away from the battle, "I suspect that you already know the answer to that question. Unfortunately, I don't think that events are going to give me the time to socialize all that much."

The final battle raged on screen as the Avatar's glowing intensified as the other dimensional intelligence raged at being flung back and held at bay by The Magnetron Experimental unit as waves of bombers hammered desperately at the intrusion into reality, "I take it the Omniswarm is making its move?"

The machine started to do the impossible and push itself through the artificial field like a man through hurricane strength winds, "Yes, they have apparently decided to move against the Minor Powers in order to prepare to move against the Moonlight sector, although there is still a chance that their calculations will change with our settlement here."

"Don't quote me on this but I have the slightest suspicion that a being that views themselves as the only real person in the Universe might have a bit of Machine Complex on top of their Godly one. There is a low chance of them modifying there plan that much now. Anyways I had a suggestion for your role in the upcoming operation." The Tip of the Spear gave a pause as Ivan watched the ESCHATON RULER faceplant into the metal and mud as the experimental defense went into its cooldown cycle. The Emplacement to be shortly destroyed with palpable emotion as the overly advanced machine moved back to its feet in an almost humanlike display of dexterity and flexibility.

"I think it would be better for you to join one of the Commander teams in the defense. I know you do better work with the big picture stuff and the Ops techies need as much help as they can possibly get, it tends to centralize both control and responsibility. And while you have the talent, I don't think that it is the healthiest position for yourself right now. Probably soon, but not yet. Also taking the spotlight on such a binary of a conflict should be good for your reputation. Solves a lot of your problems with one stroke. You can't deny or even try and say you need to work harder." The veteran commander let his plan unfold both in the recording and in the hospital room, on the recording the skies parted as multiple Soulcrushers flew in following up the stream of lower tier aircraft, bright Indigo beams transfixed on the core of the entity.

Still, it marched on, secondary weapons turning the lighter aircraft into a metallic and fiery rain on the once preserved habitat and making flesh wounds on the enormous craft that twisted the concept of gunship to parody. Its target was near weapon range, "I would prefer to do what lessen the risk to innocents," Ivan sighed and looked out at the door to the further wings of the medical center, "I'll keep it in mind," a bit of grin grew on Ivan's face, "Although, I should repay the favour sometime."

The Elder clone's eyes narrowed and his tone turned mockingly serious,

"You wouldn't dare."

"Many of other Diplomats I met were about your age. And I suspect that the Meredi Imperium would view our situation as noble blood, perhaps you should settle down and enjoy your retirement years a bit old man." As the two started to converse and tease each other ignoring as the fateful final battle played out on the screen, the Spear's ACU appearing itself, landing multiple overcharged shots and adding another laser chewing at the core, finally drawing the frustrated intelligence away from the population of wounded invaders.

"I will chase you down the hall, kid, no matter what the doctors and that giant worm of a proxy say or do next." The probably empty threat did little to wipe the smile from the younger man's face.

"There is one last thing I do want to make clear." The older brother pointed at the Avatar of the being that brought so many low turning its attention to the prime irritant that had frustrated it through the whole conflict. Constantly firing as the smaller mech went under shields that barely had time to blink on, used everything and anything as a physical shield from its wrath, throwing up the faintest outline of factories to delay its approach or deny it movement, all the while pulling it to the remains of the defensive line, "You see all this, the hastily spun low probability plans, it getting to the skin of our teeth and heroism in general? We tend to glorify these actions and remember them with a fondness that makes us forget what lead up to them. This is what we do when things go wrong, and we are far too practiced at it. Gauge will probably want to set some kind of over-elaborate trap, keep his ambitions in check. Despite everything we do not know the Omniswarm well enough to predict them that precisely. Minimize the things that could go wrong, keep your strategy simple and leave yourself room to be flexible. The greatest tool that humanity ever had and ever will have is the ability to change what we are doing. Being Human is the freedom to make a choice."

Ivan nodded at the bed bound warrior and reached for something that he had smuggled into the facility, "I did find a way to get what you asked for." Producing a mask that was the same make and model that was ever present and highly associated with the Veteran. Which the bedridden Cybran was quick to put on his face.

"Thank you, Ivan. I knew that those micromanaging arses would never check mister protocol." The view on the screen showed the threatening titan finally get a shot on the ACU, only for the Cockpit to detach from the exploding mech and fly away out of reach. The Avatar finally succumbing to the inordinate amount of firepower that had been continuously poured into it. The victorious pilot paused for a moment as he tried to access the wider Network through the gift.

The explosion of disruptive energies as the ESCHATON RULER was driven back to the dimension where it came ripped through the area, permanently disabling everything that survived around it, "Well, I don't want you to be stuck in here for any longer than you need to be. So, I modified it to fit with you prescribed limits that your doctor recommended."

One of the constructs to be shorted out was the cockpit and the Commander that had just suffered the wounds that put them in the bed they currently rested in. Despite the horrors that they had seen and the people that he had lost the old warrior savoured the small interactions like this, keeping the mask on.

But still,

"Damn it, Ivan."

Wordlessly, on a distant world and culturally a different universe the remains of the woman that bore the title of Redfog slowly etched the pure white counter as she watched the title that she had devoted the majority of her life and even died for keep its slow slide into irrelevance.

The encrypted reports that she had received from the more competent Alien commanders and commandos were at this point the only accurate information that she was getting from the hollowed out remains of her Node.

Despite the examples she had made to beat it into their heads that lying to Redfog carried a worse fate than failure.

Recent events back home lay bare their poorly planned schemes. Turning the aging schematics for the now near ghost town into a place for outsiders to hold captives against the rules and wishes of the other Nodes.

And so got themselves raided to free by those Nodes to free said captives. Children of those that lost custody disputes mostly, but a crippling number of youths had also taken advantage of the chaos to escape as well. She stared at the population statistic as it fell below the number of pre Earth Empire ethnic supremacists and criminal foot soldiers that the good old Doctor and shoved into a only slightly repurposed prison complex so long ago.

Now they were requesting for her to help refill their ranks. Well if they wanted for her to find replacements for their position. Who was she to deny them. The only thing that kept the Assumpta classified as a major node was her reputation, Ivan's mercy letting the problematic Node slowly do themselves in, and the other Nodes in Coalition Space having more important matters to attend to.

The uploaded human bristled with frustration at this latest setback and failure of her skills.

She had been raised to hunt kings and gods while keeping a leash on a pack of human wolves.

Not trying to shepherd a bunch of overly bitety sheep with delusions of grandeur fuelled by fear of change and their slow irrelevance.

Mistaking Strength for Power.

And to make matters worse she had to do it while sitting in a different Universe trying to gain individuals of some actual worth.

Dismissing the message, she left the work station that she had claimed to face the reality that managed to give her a migraine despite the muscles involved being long gone.

It was the latest and greatest of the penthouses that she had seized from the influencers of the Directorate, now converted into a full covert operational compound module by the swarm of personal and equipment that she had been afforded by Ivan and the rest of the Nodes.

At least that part of this had been tolerable.

The grandiose flat had been fitted with independent power generation, enough military grade production nanolathes to produce personal spacecraft or a full Directorate air transport in a matter of seconds, a full suite for information crew to monitor and defend themselves from threats on the chaotic local datastreams, a small quantum gate for quick escape for the entire team. There was even room for a mass fabricator with additional armour to force any explosion to be funnelled out to any attackers and a set for the Imganiarium's cast of clowns to weave their fantasies and lies.

As such the former palace was visually a mess, white marble pillars and statues of a long-forgotten culture that its deceased former owner had based their performative personality around. The glossy brightly coloured stone now had the dark blacks and reds where Cybran equipment and basic necessities grew or were grafted on and the Super Directorite's invasive infrastructure had been reclaimed or even physically torn from the sockets and walls.

So that her now metallic, clawed and permanently booted feet scrapped across the replica stone plate that ran through out what used to be a main foyer and indoor pool area. Not that a normal human could hear that, the place crawled with Cybrans moving in about in the usual cybernetically enable organized chaos. Writers and media consultants fretted and pass stimulants as they managed and sculpted her cover and the persona that her enemies here would know her by. They were nearly tripping over analysts and the few ancient relics of smugglers that were not associated with the defunct Seven-hand Node, that were digesting every bit of information concerning internal security apparatus, plural, various DRMs for the cybernetics that made the majority of the Fiefdoms, and anything else that would disrupt the plans to provide an escape for the Masses just as eager for a better life as those that just slipped through her grasp.

"Mam! Miss Redfog!" disturbing her foul mood she turned to face one of the proxies for the team meant for maintaining her disguise as it ran through a list of honorifics verbally under the assumption that she was still human under the armour, "While we've been able to squash any recordings of you taken not under our control, rumours have started to circulate that of a disconnect between you in combat and the persona we have created. This has created an uptick of investigations on our cover stories and falsified documents. And while this is as always, is your decision, if you could use the voice packs that have been trained on our late patron? It would make our jobs efficiency raise by several points by not having to deal with amateur sleuths and conspiracy theorists."

This was apparently a brand new proxy that their host assumed would be destroyed, as files that been disappeared or tore to shreds by worms and other cyberattacks filtered into her mind alongside the pilot fish of associated media ranging from reaction videos noting differences to Theorist or more accurately interactive advertisements building excitement for anything and everything.

A small hiltless knife formed soundlessly and dangled at the tips of her claws, almost like it used to…

A quick flick of the wrist revealed the well reasoned anxiety that had unintentionally leaked into its construction. Just a shudder and a millisecond longer look than a pure machine would spend at the blade embedded in the screen next to their host's head.

She knew better than to kill a skilled technician especially of a Node that lacked the more murderous traditions of her own.

Still boundaries had to be set.

"I will remain myself. Next Solution." Shouts of surprise, shock, frustration, and anger started spluttering from the both the terminals and a few of the unarmoured commandos that had rushed from the drained pool that had been turned into a makeshift firing range.

"Supplant the media cycle with a more dramatic news story. The Directorate media cycle is as rapid paced as our own and twice as forgetful. A ploy not that uncommon amongst the influencers. Although a temporary solution, this is after all a temporary situation." The opposing proxy shot out the simple alternative, the trace of its inherited emotion becoming more prevalent as it rushed to protect the host.

"What the Shock is going now!" The dark metal with highlighted armoured form of one of the commando's rigs decloaked in the landing bay to the commotion going on, the squad of powered armoured individuals of the away team with their associated military Proxies finishing working to hide away the obviously non-Directorate craft.

The Squad leader standing at an equivalent height to Redfog's new form moved with an exhausted gait despite the enhancements and still wearing the performance enhancing equipment. One of the clearer voices rang out above the din, "Prima donna threw a Knife at Dave-6 for who knows why. We would like to remind her that we are NOT her shocking slaves from Assumpta and if she wants to keep making threats then she can both create and make a shocking movie even time she wacks someone and also build an underground railroad without becoming the Shocking Seven-Hand Node!"

A snort like sound came from the Wraith, "Their performance has been adequate and their lives are assured. However, a line was crossed and will not be crossed again. The matter is concluded."

"And what line was that? Pray tell for the rest of us." Redfog glared at the small red sword emblem on the shoulder of the Woman's armour. More than a little resentment over being assigned Commando and Proxy forces from the place where all of her competent people and their descendants ran off to.

As such she just stared with slightly more than usual ill intent.

"Of shocking Course. As always, I assume that new orders came in from the new 56th? Given your up and about with us peasants."

"Study the Severs and learn to mimic their patterns.

Begin building the infrastructure to ship people out of this Rat-infested blight. We have a few custom orders already.

Continue gaining access to infrastructure.

Gain the Favour and trust of The Messenger.

And apparently, we need a distraction for those too curious for their own good.

Luckily, I have a mission in mind."

Redfog's gazed was met with a look of equal ferocity and an infuriating amount of pity as her imposed second in command was revealed as the armour was removed and disconnected during the conversation.

"So, The Hunt begins again."

Reuben focused on his breathing and the relative silence that his new job afforded him. He had not expected to actually get in, a half-hearted application to what was basically a lottery to get into the Foundation's Augmentation campaign. The possibility of getting even a single limb of their tech would have been worth mortgaging parts of his income and even his mind to the smaller and more viscous small fry.

He pushed away the thoughts of what would have happened if he had failed.

But they had gotten the ticket and the project slated him to work as a police officer or more prestigious security, coming with it not just a new set of limbs, but a full integrated suite of internal musculature to his torso, structural reinforcement and even a connection back to the Foundation for updates and to give him deals and discounts.

This was to be the first day of the good life.

"Hey Rookie! Pay attention!" The Captain's voice jolted Reuben back to reality. Sitting harnessed up in the grav wagon filled with his soon to be coworkers, a collection of species and people's indicating the backers of his local division. The same that got him this job to begin with.

The larger crablike Captain had been just as modified as the rest of them, the white metal and synthetic material covering both their shell and the more fleshy and vulnerable parts of their anatomy, "For those that haven't been to R-block before, get ready for the smell, your suits filters can only do so much and it only gets worse once the blasting starts, and please inform your health and safety techie if your going to hurl, editing you out of or into the shot comes out of our paycheck. We're going to play background cast in clearing out a standard E-series independent community housing complex, or as the locals call 'em, an ICHC."

Reuben busied himself with finishing the updates and downloads to make sure he was ready with minimal lag time when while the Captain gave the run down on situation, the actually nicknamed Hive was not that unusual, mostly the typical issues with the run down part of a city world till it stopped making its payments a couple of years ago. There hadn't been much word out of it after that, so probably a bunch of idiots thinking that they were going to be the next front. The housing corp did all the usual protocols and tactics before selling it at a loss to Messenger Logistics that had then hired The Foundation to clear it out for them, while running a show about the dangers of Syrabaric ideology to the maintenance and well being of people's communities.

His private messages dinged carrying yet another optimization data packet. It was a little odd and unusual but it seemed legit. A secondary progress bar among many clipped along at a fair pace.

"Remember use the private coms if anything happens that actually needs our attention, the public ones are scripted for the performance, ignore them except if you get stage directions."

A slight shift happened as the troop transport started slowly having reached their destination, Rueben felt a surge of adrenaline as the mysterious update complete, readjusting the delicate balance of flesh and machine and quietly connecting him to a network that he did not expect.

As the slight bump as the police carrier reached its destination the harnesses on Ruben and the rest of their coworkers released one by one as each officer rushed towards the drop bay doors. As a Vol, Rueben knew that he was scheduled to be second or third last out with the Captain showing up last for the shot.

Rueben's harness let loose releasing him from his seat as he raised his assigned rifle, an Alamadrunon design that was probably worth more than the entire block he grew up on. Head ducked down along the sights he strode confidently down the hall way and out onto the tarmac.

Rueben did his duty taking a position at the back of the v shaped formation and pausing, holding the position with unnatural stillness, his augments and weapons glowing a bright Red and Blue. The Captain marched out and struck a pose and Rueben and the rest of them dramatically brightening or flexing the machinery in their bodies.

"And… Cut! Okay team 12 good work. If we end up using the footage, you'll see it in the appropriate paycheck." A smallish Merendi with a full suite of director type augments, mostly drone controllers, VR and effects equipment for video processing and range extenders. In short, she looked like a brightly coloured walking beehive with drone flitting back and forth hologram projection of the shots with different effect filters and other modifications.

"Captain 243, please take you squad to the highlighted staging area, further stage directions will come before the stream starts. Just make sure that any further problems are sorted out before then. The Symbies should be practically died already but we want this shoot to go well." The walking movie studio gestured to the complex that loomed over them.

One of the other Officers remarked," People still live in that thing?"

"Hopefully or else I don't think we're getting paid otherwise" Rueben offered as he took in the sight. It was mountain of concrete and steel rising up into the sky like its brethren in this abandoned forest of Habitats that needed to be rebuilt for centuries at the least. Many of the gargantuan cookie cutter cities were being redone to be re-rented, as such they were gutted and populated with construction crews, beams of steel and other metals and many other resources to rebuild.

The one across the canyon separating the massive complexes, was especially active. While no one was visible the bright red glow of the interior being constructed glowed and sizzled in a way unfamiliar to the man. Especially odd since it seemed to be worked on out of turn from the rest of them.

However, there was little time to consider it for there for things, Reuben's squad and the crowd of official police officers were being herded to bright and shiny portable field commands. Guarded by the more well equipped but ultimately well, more unreliable, rich contributors that had paid for the privilege of participating in the upcoming action. Or at least standing around as living decorations. From there the briefing was the same thing that they had been told several times before, no payments for multiple years, evidence of massive IP theft and breaking registries, hacked script accounts, and other crimes against Prosperity. Now this time in a square of troops, only hearing what was being said because of the com link and what remained of his flesh starting to ache because how still they were expected and locked into standing.

At least their Captain finally got their deployment orders, just a side gig on the third or so wave to flush out side passages that could be used to flank the main show, basically to expect light and disorganized resistance. And since all the exotic energies readings were minimal so the poor souls hadn't got any Red assistance, gaining a sigh of relief from Rueben.

As such Rueben and the rest of his team were part of more inglorious part of combat, sitting and waiting for specialist equipment and to follow their queue into the ongoing operation. The area while still a mill of activity of all the logistical support, temporary armories and crews hastily making whatever changes were needed for a superior product.

Their Captain passed the time by reminded his small department how they were supposed to conduct themselves, "Also note for anybody whose had experience in other outfits. If they Surrender, you take it. We're part of the Foundation. And we are trying to show that WE ARE PROFESSIONALS HERE. We are the line between civilization and every kind of madness the Pentarchs had every seen. Most of these poor souls are simply desperate and mislead towards what they think will give them prosperity. Remember WE ARE THE GOOD GUYS HERE! And I expect us to act like it! Only shoot when you have to, no extra smacks when they are on the ground and follow protocol to the letter…"

Reuben had been attentively recording and listening the first couple of times but by now he had realized that these words were probably not for him. Especially as the Captain was staring directly at two of his squad mates in particular and interjected their names at varies points. Such now that his attention was split between watching the racks of weapons and various explosives whirl in and out of the armoury being subscribed out according to role and position, and the diminishing flock of drones that whirled about the decaying building.

Normally the cloud of drones would have been too thick to see any abnormalities. But most of the flying cameras and lightening effects were now in the black stained megastructure. And now Reuben began to feel uneasy as he saw what looked to be Drone engine heat distortions appearing where there did not appear to be anything.

With a wince at the cost and further raising the blood pressure of his Captain, Rueben indulged his curiosity and activated the High-Definition Pure Experience ™ view.

What he saw was a black and red insect like machine mimicking the movement of the distinctively Foundation Drone swarm.

Interrupting his captain rant he asked, "Sir? I think you need to take a look at this?"

Then the world went Mad.

There was a number of bright blue crackling energy balls that slammed into the forward operation and editing stations, amongst the remaining Drones and most alarmingly directly on the waiting crowd of police.

As the network and even his limbs failed dropping Ruben and all those around him like marinates with their strings cut, rapid massive laser pulses erupted from the not quite a worksite that had been across from them. The rapid flickering beams boiled and ignited com towers, Director personal and grav transports that tumbled into the abyss below.

As the still functioning parts of the wider network flickered back on as he and the other cops struggled to their feet.

"Messenger set us up! All units, spend freely but keep a track of what you use! If we survive this, we're going to be Rich! We'll tear it from their backstabbing hides! TRUE BLUE!"

The call when out from somewhere and the entire mob of bodies started shooting wildly in the general direction of the traitorous megacorp while shouting the TRUE BLUE generated slogan.

The Captain however yelled directly over the private coms, a note of desperation in his voice, "The armoury, we're sitting ducks out here!"

Rueben nodded as he followed his coworkers through the crowd while trying to supress his panic, fear and a bit of withdrawal from the disconnection to the larger Directorate. Beyond just holding the heavy weapons, the Mobi-Arms stalls were the most well armoured of the filmsets.

As they pushed through the opposite direction of the crowd and black materials containing electrical storms fell entire flocks of the Drones meant to keep record the conflict

"Cloaked Suspects in cover on floors 784, 785 and 786!"

"Damn it, can't get a lock on them!"

The calls came out as the menagerie of different small arms fire spread out targeting walls and floors outside of where the turrets of anti-vehicle grade lasers strobed like a demented rave.

"Mirco Missiles!" Reuben instinctively gave a burst of speed out of habit from living through the other side of the raids that they were supposed to be on.

The explosions were smaller and there were more screaming and liquid sounds than he remembered.

Reubens group had almost reached the safety of the armoury when the second wave of EMPs hit the battlefield again, sending them tumbling and metal sparking to the ground. Inadvertently saving the life of their squad.

Amongst the constant metallic rain, Something else landed, the only indication of it entering the battle was the concrete cracking under the weight of seemingly nothing, to the increasing terror of Reuben willing his limbs and augment to return to functionality. As the crowd slowly returned to their feet, Rueben with no thought at all to the rapidly increasing debt building in the upper righthand corner of his vision, turned every sensor to the highest most expensive setting.

Despite the draining accounts Rueben could only see visual distortions of something vaguely Vol shaped bounding and leaping through the crowd and towards the automated racks of weapons and explosives terrifyingly quickly.

Fast enough to know he did not have time to adequately warn anybody or explain.

He raised his rifle and fired a dozen or so shots sending micromissles racing above the crowd and exploding useless on the back wall behind the armoured racks.

As shouts of surprise and outrage at the suspected betrayal, Reuben was only watching the weapons rack fly back into its storage and safe state.

But he was too late.

The accusations stopped when two hand and claw like puncture holes appeared in the outer edges of the rack and its supposedly instant and limb rending progress acted like it hit a wall a couple of meters from fitting seamless into the wall. Gears and machinery screamed as it struggled against something.

And dozens of grenades, rifles and even an anti armour missile or two started glowing and preparing to cook off.

The invisible being's work done the now overly elaborate bomb slammed back into place mauled as it was.

The crowd of Cops including Reuben looked in shock the events too fast for themselves to properly mentally respond to what was happening.

Reuben only did not have the explosion being his last sight because the Captain through his larger armoured body in front of the squad sending them all flying back.

As the squad got to slowly got to their feet this time with their confidence shot, the situation had turned into a nightmare, the attack from whatever the Messengers had unleashed had happened in every temporary structure and now was spitting a redish purple energy blast that left a purple cloud in its wake. Else where the hostiles on the other side of the canyon had crossed the gap while Police Officers and Patrons alike either fell to the constant weapons fire, were torn limb from limb from unseen monsters or were making a mad dash towards the mold covered super structure that they had been sent to cleanse.

There was only one choice a former street kid that just wanted some safety could make.

Three days later

Reuben let himself rest against a wall that was thankfully still bare of the rot. He felt himself relax despite the situation more out of exhaustion than actually being safe.

There had never been an Symbaric uprising here. The poor souls had been fighting for their lives when they broke the law and started stealing.

Nobody had come to protect them so they tried everything they could to survive, despite it being futile in the end.

Just like him…

"Ashley, you there?" He asked into the darkness.

Like a light from the heavens in the corner of his vision a computer generated image of the Merendi that had greeted them when they had arrived at this hell hole.

"You still holding up Ruebs?" She asked with a look of concern on her face. Quite a difference from her demeanour meeting them. Going through things always brings people together.

He ignored a little voice at the back of his mind, a memory he did not wish to acknowledge.

"I think you are coming up to another one of the Nests, thankfully it looks to be one of the smaller ones. You should be able to grab enough coin to get a transmission out through the emergency broadcast systems.

"How close is the Messenger's monster?" Reuben asked with a bit of trepidation and more than a little fear in his voice.

The image of her face went neutral for a moment before answering, "Yeah its still hot on your trail," Rueben tried to feel the terror that the Messenger's butchers had subjected him to, but after everything, he just felt numb, "But I think we can turn that to our advantage. If you can get it to follow you, I might be able to spoof an image that will use the both of them as a distraction while we get what we need."

"Will you tell me when I need to move?"

"Of course."

He got to rest for a little while more till he had to walk back into the rotting hellscape that was this forgotten hive.

The walls were lined with a dripping black substance that looked like mold, corrupted flyers, advertisements and other little bits of evidence of sapient life were half grown. He stepped carefully to not disturb the more seeping concentrations of mass in fear of highly corrosive liquid.

The hallways now seeming more like a system of caves and earthen tunnels than the cookie cutter facilities.

"Okay I think your close enough now. It should head straight into whatever those things are. You're going to need to get a visual on the creature. To know when the coast is clear. Are any of the apartments intact enough one of the side passages?"

A moment's hesitation from fear was supressed with a deep breath before the cybernetically enhanced limbs encased in power armour tried to gently and daintily force open one of overgrown and still half open doors.

Giving way with a panic attack inducing squish Rueben entered the former home, still bearing traces of its former inhabitants amongst the mould growing towards still glowing advertisements and the tell-tale claw marks of the creatures that lay within. A light coming from one of the side rooms toward his objective caught his attention.

"There's another hole is the wall near what used to be a master bedroom, I'm going to check it out."

"Be careful…"

Opening the interior door Reuben was blinded by lights, the outer wall had been ripped away for additional space in the agripontics section of the Habitation block, egg like structures growing out of the Mold stretched towards the growlights. The walls were lined with desiccated bodies of the original residents dotted with the red and blue of fallen officers from the past couple of days.

In the bed of the ruined room lay such a victim, ducking to the foot of the bed to be out of sight. He carefully peeked out to see the situation. The black and grey reptilian looking monster was near the entrance to the facility, moving docilely through its nest. The body now serving as an incubator was that of one of the higher-ranking Patrons that accompany the Influencer on missions.

A stroke of luck at last.

As if to punish such thoughts of optimism the Xenomorph stopped as if it heard the thought.

"Shock." The unfamiliar swear nearly frightened Rueben out of his skin, "We just need it to move a meter more forward."

Ashley's image looked like it was concentrating on something which had opened a window without Rueben noticing, "There should be a silencing system, I've opened up the subsystem, geez why would you have to pay for that. Okay if you fire a missile at the designated point it should fall into the Messenger's trap."

Rueben looked at the image carefully, "You did it legally, right?"

A huff of exasperation, "Yeah, everything's on the up and up."

Rueben did not believe her but they were out of options. He raised his rifle letting the cybernetics and sent information take aim and a singular missile take flight through the compound, resulting in a small explosion a little further towards the main entrance compared to the Xenomorph.

Emitting a slow hiss, it moved to investigate.

Till seemingly by magic it was hoisted into the air rocketing at incredible speed towards a vent just above the entrance. Horrendous screeches of fury filled the room at the creature fought back against the mechanical Hunter.

No bothering to wait to see the winner of the conflict Reuben hastily started hooking up a connection to the fallen subscriber. A few desperate moments while the connection was made and Reuben had access to the account and the dead man's personal files.

A bit of his personality that would have been beaten out him by his co-worker had fate been kinder made him look into the latter.

As the wounded Xenomorph had detached itself from the vent, followed closely by the rapidly regenerating Machine, its black and red colouring now visible that the cloak had failed due to the acid blood.

Rueben made a difficult decision and destroyed the implant and their access to the much-needed funds.

The Xenomorph finally fell to the ground dead, something vital torn from its body and left by the machine already repairing the damage done by the acidic blood of the organism.

Ashley's voice entered back in, "Okay did you get it?" she sounded weary.

"No, it was a dud, poor soul overspent his last dime to go on this thing." Rueben lied, it was near truth, but those that person left behind needed it even more than they did.

Ashley sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose and if Rueben had been more observant, so did the machine standing above the Xenomorphs corpse.

"Okay, we'll figure something else out. Wait for the Messenger's bot to leave and then I'll lead you to the communication module, I think that's where the main show has holed up."

Rueben looked at the corpse once more, "I'm sorry Ashley."

"I'm sorry too Rueben."

Cybran transmission following the Disaster at ICHC Raccoon

RF – Is it done?

RB8746- Survivors were infected with low level spyware that has gone undetected and have had their data scrubbed of all Cybran equipment they saw and replaced with Foundation personal using Messenger equivalents.

The Foundation is blaming Messenger. Messenger is blaming The Foundation or the bioweapon infection depending on the Audience. Independent Conspiracy Theorists appear to be blaming UEF of all things. Appears to been invented whole cloth due by Pact aligned elements, the UEF has become more known than we are in the media due to grabbing their expansion point.

Investigations into your cover are quickly fading from the news cycle.

Mission can be considered a success.

RF- Good. Continue with orders from Moonlight. Clear out the infection and contact Messenger with further 'proof' of their competitors conspiring against them. Let their need for dramatics keep them blind to all else that moves.

Ivan flipped through the controls one final time as he familiarized himself with the ACU controls and layout, the screen an angry red lighting storm as the Quantum Gate readied and locked onto the gate codes. It had been a while since his Academy days and the last time being on the field.

To be honest the return of his pre-exam jitters was the almost comforting.

The white flash on the screen indicated the successful jump, the machine now stood on the outer edges of a Tropical Forest falling away into plains with a mountain to his north and the coast to his south.

"Okay, we got our fourth, Ops talked you up quite a bit new guy and I hope… Brackman's Lost Ass!" A Cybran only a few years older than himself was the first screen to pop up, facial circuitry indicated that he most likely was born in the Imaginarium, his posture and confident demeanor indicated that the man was the nominal leader of the squad and that this was a friend group that he had been attached to.

"Tie, you little shit, you knew!"

A small annoyed looking man clearly from the Chimera Node stared unblinking as he joined the call, his tone of voice indicated that this sort of argument was normal and often fought, "Really Foil? You had to have known that given our performance at the Specter portal, my connections with R&D and Nell complaining at Ops that she wanted a real fight. We are in the thick of it now. They are not going to throw in someone completely green."

"You're lucky I love you two to pull your butts out of the fires you put yourselves in." Foil added jokingly.

Tie looked at him blankly and coldly, the pure white eyes of the Chimera locking onto his friend, "I am still ahead by 7 when it comes to saving each other's lives, you have no excuse for miscount, Foil."

"Commander Ivan to Ops. Reporting in, all vitals and systems are operating at full capacity and contact with the rest of the team has been established. Base construction is underway." Ivan quickly collected and sent the data that would make the Operation Technician's job as easy as possible. Not interfering with the usual banter.

The beleaguered coordinator appeared to fill in the more official part of her part of the briefing, "Affirmative, sir. Commanders Foil and Tie are to your North holding defensive positions on Weaver Civilian population centers and covering them with Shields, SAMs, and engineering bays. Foil will be providing Air and Artillery support of this Op. Commander Tie already has a Space Navy operational and will be keeping the Orbitals as clear as he can. You and Commander Nell are setting up at strategic positions between these positions and potential Omni-swarm landing locations. We still have several hours till Contact but be advised that this system is one of their primary objectives."

"What about Weaver assets? I know they refused to evacuate but we should get some extra gates up and Civilians ready to evacuate as a back up plan."

Foil was the one to speak up, "Yeah… turns out they were lying a bit to us and the rest of the minor powers. The Hierarchy Force that got sent here choked on the local wildlife and with the leadership dying to some nasty organism that transforms itself into addictive food. The aliens grabbed some of their stuff and were trying to make themselves look like a new interstellar polity. They actually just manage to figure out how to make a radio before all this. We got a few Hierarchy walkers forming a point defense force for Tie and I back here. Beyond that we told them to keep their forces protecting their cities and we would have to redesign the insides of the trucks for them to have anything that could survive a jump. Its do or die for them here."

Ivan sighed, "Well, this is still better than not knowing that they were here at all before we showed up."

A fifth screen flickered to life showing a burly Woman from the Skulls Node, her circuity flashing patterns that formed words in one of the specialized languages that used the symbiont markings. But those words were a garbled mess and only a further confirmed the obvious fact that she was asleep.

Tie reached over and pressed a button sounding a deafening tone over the open coms, causing everyone else to wince and the Woman to wake up."

"Shock, Tie! You know that I hate when you do that. Did Civilization Xerox show up yet!" This Nell shouted back at the grinning commander sitting safely in his ACU.

Foil laughed softly at the scene, "No, New guy showed up, He'll be helping with your flank and providing some naval support."

She looked back and forth between Ivan screen and the others, she pulled her hair back a little and sat up straighter, her face started a dim but present glow, "Well, New guy, going to need a name for ya if we're going to party till this place is burnt down to its Core?"

"Nell, you gigantic moronic DORK." Tie muttered under his breath, just audible for the sensors to pick up.

Before the Operation Technician or any of the others could reveal him, Ivan spoke, "Ivan, my name is Ivan. It is a pleasure to meet and work with you and your team Nell."

"Fancy," She beamed for a second before staring daggers at the other two commanders, "You're on thin ice, Tie,"

"When am I not?" The Chimera interjected.

She continued, "And this does not make up for you ditching us Foil, you were supposed to drag Mel along with us. Not leave us in the lurch as you two get all lovey dovey."

Foil looked less than pleased, "I am not abandoning you guys, once I get my proxy all set up I'll experience everything that you guys do just as if I was there with you. Plus, I will make sure that it has everything about me that you guys need and like."

As the Argument continued as Ivan contemplated and worried about putting a proxy in charge of an ACU, a connection of an earlier occurrence was made.

"Mel, as in Melissa Desjar, General Desjar's daughter? You are that Foil?" Ivan interrupted, prompting a look of terror to cross Foil's face.

"How did you know…?" Foil asked softly.

"A friend of mine from the Collation Academy, Maddox, also has a cross faction relationship that effected his life quite significantly. So, I keep an ear out for situations like his. The General did bring up questions about Cybran Courtship before the Moonlight incident and my brother and Commander Guage, along with a few other node leaders assigned Redfog to explain it to him."

The colour drained from Foil's face as laughter emanated from the other two commanders, "How familiar are you with the Assumpta's Plasma blades?"

The Laughter and mirth helped the four of them stave off the responsibility and terror of what approached them.

Further along the defensive line, Willaim Guage hummed to himself a little tune as his ACU paced down the overgrown mass of Shields, Artillery, Point defense, and more and more defenses.

It had taken some arguing and for him to create more than a few different little fake transmissions, files and other little bits of evidence for this truly hilarious parody of the good Doctor to pick up on.

There was some much deliciousness to be had from enraging such an exquisite creature such as lay at the center of this Omni-Enlightening Swarm. But it needed to be done quite precisely to dig through the layers of delusion and self aggrandizement.

A poorly made reversed imaged copy he may be, there would be certain similarities that could be exploited.

Gauge arrived at the bait and what the complex he had built was protecting. A device that would be considered heretical and by many as him finally going to far over the line.

He had only been allowed to do make it by promising that the building was just an empty shell, but that would spoil the joke, The Founder of the Omni-swarm and their right hand clone needed to make the same mistake as Brackman and the Spear did.

Willaim Guage congratulated himself for his daring and intelligence as the Old fashion QAI Node rumbled to life.

Back in the Universe of the Coalition of Humanity, far from Human civilization a ping containing the most interesting information was received and outdated machines along with new experiments risked a little more processing power and activity.

"Recalculating."

Orders:

Repair Commander group Beta back to full: 9 RP

Repair Commander group Gamma Back to full: 4 RP

Improve Defenses of Minor Nodes by adding a trainee or a retired Commander to their militia, Infinite War standard: 30 RP (15 RP to Moonlight Portal Sector and Art Project Sector to upgrade to Excessively Defended, with promise to reach Ridiculously defended soon)

Build New Commander cadre's:

2 Mag 2 Warfleets: 20 RP

3 RP to be put to repair for in the coming conflict

Meeting with Shaltari: 8 RP

Send Diplomats informed of Shaltari internal Politics and what we know of their cultural practices. Their task is to figure out the viability of the Shaltari as long term partners and to smooth over any disgruntlements with our mercenary purchases.

Trade Negotiations with the Minor Powers: 8 RP

Following the conclusion of the Battle with the Omniswarm start negotiations with the minor power for goods produced by various Nodes or technology that they want in exchange for Favours, specific Goods that are not easily made with Nanolathes, unique technological designs, or assistance with future projects that each Node is work on.

Super Directorate part 2: 16 RP, Redfog

Redfog will create an incident off of one of the regular police actions that will put one of the larger Corporations against Messenger. Redfog will arrange herself so that she vindicates Messenger and the other Corporation takes the blame in the incident. She will use this to acquire access to information about the project. Due to her reluctance and emotional trauma to certain deceptive measure she will be interacting with the Messenger's higher ups in similar manner as she has with the rest of the Nodes. Through Video calls and settings that allow her to have a in between translator to create the lie for her.

Redfogs agents will investigate her lead in the meantime, but this is to be considered a secondary concern as there will still be time in any case to find and act on this. Most of our efforts should be focused on studying the Code, triggers and behaviors of the Financial AI and lesser programs. We want our manipulations when they happen to be as legitimate seeming when it happens. Should help deny them resources from the outside and if done well enough could even allow us to do this multiple times to the Directorate.

Setting up a new Railroad: 8 RP

For the Rebel groups and mutual aid networks continue expansion and start using it as a way to funnel refugees. Subtasks in this is get information about what kind of tools will be most useful for the new groups and to fast track certain kinds of Refugees back to the Homefront Nodes. Those with technical expertise or past experience maintaining or working with Directorate Cybernetics will be recommended to the Doctor's personal Node. Individuals of a particular nature chosen by Redfog will be sent to the Assumpta Node alongside suspected Directorate infiltrators. Those that Redfog wills it will be given the tools needed to survive in their new home.

Verified infiltrators will be given no warning and the skin on their back.

William Gauge thinks he is clever: 8 RP, Willaim Guage

During the Battle with the Omni Enlightening Swarm Commander Guage has built an outdated old QAI Node in his base. He plans to make cryptic comments and pretend it is the reason that the Cybran Nation was able to anticipate the OmniSwarms movements. At the end of a major battle he will allow the Clones to capture and escape back into their territory with the device. Which he hopes to use to infiltrate and compromise the OmniSwarm's computer Networks in a similar manner as what the Seraphim did to QAI at the end of the Infinite War.

Free slot: Continue Work on anti Interdiction Gates: While not an immediate need The Cybran Scientists will work on ways to not have to fight the might of a black hole. Experiments with Anti gravity technology, a speciality of the Aeon but seen and measured for decades by the other two factions, will be applied to this induced field in the Quantum realm. With hopes to twist the space back into something passible.

1 and 4 RP Slot: High(er) Energy Physics

9 RP Slot: Interdiction Emitter and Spikes: To go along with the work on the Gates to circumvent the Ecumene Interdiction the Cybrans will attempt to reverse engineer said device to be put on a Field emitter like the Cloak and Stealth Field and to be put on a Nanite Harpoon capital ship weapon for a later project.

An Enlightening Ambush: 8 RP, 1 Mag 2 Warfleet, Ivan Brackmann, William Guage

The Cybran Colonies Will move to defend the Minor Powers by engaging The Omni- Enlighten Swarm's forces moving into their territory.

ACU's will build up forces on border systems and ambush invading Forces as they move in. While engagements in uninhabited systems are preferred, Worlds that the Minor Powers are either unable or unwilling to evacuate are to be held as well.

Commanders will have prep time to prepare the Heaviest static equipment Such as Scathis artillery and Magnetron Experimental Defense units and a fleet to engage with as they see fit.

Commanders will be prepped to expect forces centered around singular craft of variable capability and design, but tending towards large scale destruction. On the ground to expect Unique war engines of similar 'Mad' designs. These are to be prioritized and eliminated and to report to their Operational Technician of particularly effective variants. Our Bombers should be focused on to use their new ability to Phase to reach these targets. The Phase Upgrade should also be widely used to protect our ACUs from sudden unexpected developments and snipe attempts.

Only hold worlds that have a Civilian Population that cannot be evacuated to the death. Otherwise, do as much damage as you can in attrition style warfare and then gate out or recall. From there they will be redeployed to other positions or to attack their Logistical network if the Omni Swarm start having any success.

Ivan Brackman will be taking to the field of battle on one of the more Mineral dense System held by a Minor Power that has decided to remain on the path of invasion. This area is strategically key to the rest of the region.

Commander William Gauge is setting a trap to the Galactic North of Ivan's Position with bait that he has set on a dead world only half stripped of Resources by the Hierarchy. Once the enemy has the seized his bait he will assist with the Defense where he is needed.

In a continuingly hostile universe, it isn't exactly surprising that the Cybrans of Vyranodasik place a large emphasis on militarising their forces, the leadership unwilling to partake in the complacency of some of its members. Additional task forces are created, existing ones brought back up to strength, and a ready reserve created to absorb any coming casualties.

Defensively, relatively little hard fortification work is done. This is not the same as none, of course. Universe-class ships become a common sight in the orbits of even non-Node colony worlds, walls are thickened and bristle with more turrets than ever, Disruptor heavy artillery and Myrmidon SAM launchers are added to the arsenal, and underground shelters are hardened further and joined by underground command posts and bunkers.

But the main work done to fortify the core of Cybran territory is in the form of new mobile forces placed on permanent garrison duty. Most worlds now possess entire combat groups of Cybran Commandos dedicated to their defence, and each world also now has access to a reservist or cadet pilot in an Armored Command Unit to rapidly reinforce their defensive positions at a moment's notice. This includes the deployment of Dostya-class insertion vessels to rapidly reposition the defensive ACUs to beleaguered worlds from currently safe ones in safety and style as necessary.

Needless to say, anyone attacking Cybran territory expecting anything less than an inviolable defence is in for a fatal shock.

-Fleethordes fully repaired. 2 new Base Magnitude Fleethordes created. Both Cybran TP at Excessively Defended.

What unfortunately goes less well is diplomatic negotiations. In hindsight, it almost feels as if it was never going to work out. The Shaltari are arrogant, warmongering, and worst of all they're effectively slavers, or at least it's hard to see their relationship with their Pungari servant race in any other way. Meanwhile, they see the Cybran as dishonourable, and experiences from their home universe makes them poorly inclined towards a nation of cybernetic humans.

Despite this decidedly rocky start, Cybran diplomats do their best to bridge the cultural gap, but achieve extremely little. Negotiations culminate when they attempt to highlight parallels rather than differences between the two species, only for the Shaltari to respond with outright insults at the very notion. While talks don't end there in a literal sense, it's clearly the point where negotiations become irrecoverable.

In the end, both sides walk away with a decidedly negative opinion of each other, and further negotiations are unlikely to prove productive. There is one small bright spot, however, which is that the Cybran effort and investment has largely ensured that the bad feelings are merely simmering at the level of active dislike rather than hatred. While no friends were made that day, neither were any serious enemies.

As for the similar negotiations between the Shaltari and the Aeon Illuminate, since they were held behind closed doors the Cybran only have a rough idea how they went, primarily through the odd backchannel between Cybran diplomats and their Aeon equivalents. Apparently, it similarly went rather poorly, but still notably better, to the point where relations between the two nations have tentatively opened up, although they're hardly the best of friends.

Intrigue goes better. Redfog continues to worm her way through Super-Directorate society, although the violent, ever-shifting nature of its media means that assessing the results will have to wait until her report at the beginning of next year. The information made available this year is instead primarily about the results of the underground railroad, although with one early report commenting on the vast astrography covered by the Super-Directorate, which is a larger polity than previously believed.

In short, it was a major success, but with caveats. The first and largest is that in the course of establishing the logistical infrastructure necessary to shuffle around refugees and agents by their countless thousands, enemy intelligence assets detected the presence of a large anti-S-D movement brewing. So far, they haven't been able to either identify the Cybran Nation as the instigators nor bring down the railroad, but the element of surprise has now officially been lost.

Still, this feels like a worthwhile cost as the desperate flood out of Super-Directorate space and, for the most part, back through the Cybran portal to the Milky Way galaxy. While an insignificant fraction of the overall Super-Directorate population, the number of rescued individuals still easily number in their millions. The majority settle throughout a variety of Nodes, including some in Vyranodasik, but two notable segments are sent towards two rather more specific ones.

First are many individuals the Directorate deemed 'antisocial' for a variety of reasons, some more legitimate than others, which are sent towards Node 23. Due to the multispecies nature of the enemy corporatocracy, only a portion of this group are humanoid, let alone human, but with some pointed words from Redfog sent back alongside the refugees the Assumpta accepts this with a reasonable amount of grace.

Second are a group of higher-ups in Super-Directorate society, academics who were always more favourably inclined to equitable systems of government that are happy to defect. While naturally covering a variety of fields, special care is taken to identify and extract cybernetics researchers, who are reportedly already settling in well in Node 56.

This was already sufficient for a success, but in a true intelligence coup a third group was acquired. Apparently, the Super-Directorate managed to entirely miss a small but notable group forming in its private intelligence and counterintelligence service companies that was disgruntled or otherwise burnt out on the entire edifice, and were likewise willing to defect to the Cybran Nation.

A much less likely segment of society to defect than academics, this bungling of asset handling by the enemy was exploited swiftly, at least once Redfog had confirmed to her satisfaction that this was no trick, and as a result up-to-date information on enemy military forces and their posture has been acquired, allowing for an advantage in any future military offensives and also providing a situation update on the enemy's internal political situation.

In short, the Super-Directorate is not planning any outwardly aggressive moves in the near future, but internally several of the megacorporations are becoming increasingly worried about the growing power and market share of MLC, and are planning to move against them in both corporate warfare and corporate warfare. To deter the latter, Messenger has responded by hiring several prominent local mercenary formations, including elements of the Works Raptor Corporation, Hawker Consortium, and Omnidyne Special Operations.

While the intelligence leaks were plugged with the extraction of the agents in question, this is still a noteworthy gain for Cybran intelligence, and useful information to have going forward. Additionally, the success of the operation has appeased the home front for now. While they'll doubtlessly have more demands in the future, the prompt fulfilment of this initial pair of requests has ensured that, in the immediate term, support for the Vyranodasik colonisation remains steady.

-Underground railroad successful, but Super-Directorate alerted. Intelligence on S-D fleets acquired. Home Nodes appeased.

Cybran research and development progresses, with consistent effort and a broad slew of projects advancing science in multiple areas. Work this year this is focused specifically on the concept of FTL interdiction and how to both employ and defend against it, as well as work on a new kind of reactor that should theoretically be able to generate vast quantities of energy, improving the performance of Cybran units across the board. Work on all three projects is still in the early-middle stages, but further investment should be able to see all three through.

-Slot 2/4 completed on counteracting Ecumene interdiction devices project. Slot 2/5 completed on High(er) Energy Physics project. Slot 1/3 on reverse engineering the ecumene interdiction device project.

Needless to say, William Gauge's proposal is not particularly well received by his fellow Commanders, but to the surprise of everyone except himself it actually works extremely well. During the initial fighting, an Omniswarm task force detects the transmissions from his base and strikes hard and fast, fighting through heavy casualties to secure the Copy-QAI, retreating with it back to their own territory and integrating it into their systems.

Of course, there are some limits to the success. The Swarm are no fools, and they don't give the foreign intelligence nearly as much control over their systems as the original QAI enjoyed over the Cybran's. In fact, they give it almost none, and also heavily limit its access to information while working on it. But none of that changes that it has successfully bypassed all of their air-gaps, and now resides in the heart of their territory both physical and digital. The one brief report it is able to make to Gauge in secret claims it will only be a matter of time before it is in position to do what it can to aid the war effort.

-QAI instance in position, although not ready to do anything this turn.

While the C-QAI node was meant to fall, its capture is unfortunately not unrepresentative of the wider campaign. When the Omniswarm strikes, it does so in large force. While in terms of overall combat weight, the two sides are approximately equal, about half of the tonnage of the defending forces are made up of the collective legions of the local powers. While brave, determined, far from primitive, and possessing unique capabilities like some psionic abilities here and there, their technology is no match for the Omniswarm, who possess firepower on par with the Cybran forces. As a result, the allied forces are at a distinct disadvantage in total combat power, although they at least have the advantage of a defensive position.

Worse, the locals prove in large part a frustrating combination of unable and unwilling to evacuate. While some, largely groups that were already nomadic, are moved to safety, most of the population stays in place, forcing the Cybran Commanders to fight numerous pitched battles. This is somewhat salved by the forward deployment of many ACUs to uninhabited systems in key locations, assaulted by the Omniswarm either out of concern for the security of their supply lines or due to a desire to destroy all in their path. Either way, these early engagements go as hoped, with the Commanders doing what damage they can to degrade the enemy before recalling to safety well before their final defence lines are breached and they're placed at risk. Then, they are redeployed to inhabited worlds where they build up defences ahead of the enemy advance.

But while successful, the battles show the difficulty of the war ahead. The Omniswarm has no difficulty in deploying units that match Experimentals in raw size and firepower, and are as remorseless and relentless as any foe the Cybran have faced before. Considering the sheer fanaticism and ferocity on display during the Infinite War and Seraphim conflict, this is obviously no small feat.

It isn't long before Ivan Brackmann himself engages the enemy. An initial attack is easily repelled, the Swarm not expecting this particular system to be so heavily defended, with only a portion of their ground forces making landfall. These are then swiftly mopped up by large bomber waves, Commander Foil's strike units successfully deploying within the enemy's anti-air perimeter thanks to their new phasing equipment.

The attack that follows is prepared for the Cybran forces, and is much larger. A vast warfleet with techno-arcane weaponry hammers Commander Tie's fleet even as it's ripped apart in turn, while enormous landings are made at multiple different points. Ivan's base is bombarded from afar by nightmarish oceanic super-dreadnoughts that through hover or leg technology can use the Cybran's own technique of making landfall. The similarities don't end there, as internal factories allow them to make swarms of cheap aerial and ground-based attack drones to act as a screen. In the end, the vessels are brought down by Ivan's walls, but his forces are badly degraded, with various shield generators, turret lines, some factories and economy structures, and swathes of his mobile forces all destroyed in the fighting at a point where the enemy threatened to break through.

Meanwhile, Commander Nell's base is attacked by a more conventional force, albeit still one with plenty of giant mechs, enormous supertanks, assault airships, and other high-level weapons of war. These also include smaller but no less dangerous units, as Nell finds out when a group of stealthed supersoldiers infiltrate her base and use anti-mech tactics to bring her ACU to its knees, break open her cockpit, and badly wound her before being eliminated. At this point, her base defences, now running largely on automatic, begin to crumble, and it takes the defenders at the population centres launching a counterattack that costs the Weavers their salvaged Hierarchy walkers to push the Swarm's forces into the hinterlands. Nell is still on the planet, but has recalled to the central base and is currently receiving medical attention from an auto-doc system.

At this point, William Gauge, his task elsewhere completed, gates in, taking up Nell's previous position and beginning to set up his own base atop her ruins, judiciously reclaiming the Swarm's destroyed units to kickstart his economy. He's joined by an allied task force warping in, which assists Tie's ships in clearing out the remains of the Swarm's space force before deploying their own ground contingent to reinforce the defence of the Weavers' cities. Their command has placed the force at the Cybrans' disposal for the duration of the battle.

These reinforcements are all for the better, since another, likely even larger push has just arrived at the edge of the system, with combat beginning once again in very short order. Local forces are currently outnumbered even with the reinforcements, while Ivan's base and Tie's fleet are still damaged and Gauge needs more time to build up. The only good news is that Ivan still has some Experimentals in the field, while Gauge is building up very rapidly, although still not fast enough for his base to be fully finalised by the time he makes contact with the enemy.

Considering the variety of Omniswarm units, there's no guarantee that they'll use exactly the same forces or battle tactics as before, although the both powerful supersoldiers and war engines capable of challenging Experimentals are expected to be present. While further reinforcements are not out of the question, with most Cybran Commanders engaged in similar battles across the local regions calling them in is to be avoided if possible. Ivan, Gauge, Tie, Foil, and potentially Nell if enough time passes must work with their allies in order to rebuff this assault largely by themselves.

If they can successfully defend this prominently located world, it's likely the broader offensive will likewise stumble, although the longer it grinds out and the more allied forces need to be called in the worse the broader situation will likely be. In other words, the success of the front as a whole rests in no small part upon the outcome of this battle.

-Initiate tactical turn: Ivan's Challenge. The Omni-Enlightening Swarm pushes through the prepared defences of the Cybran with 2 Mag 1 Fleethordes (Tier Extremis). The Cybran Mag 1 Fleethorde is being supported by the collected forces of the local Minor Powers totalling 1 Mag 1 Fleethorde (Tier Primus). Tactical focus is on Ivan and the Weavers' world.

Map of Military Operational Movements:

Signupname said:
Every man, even the greatest man, is but a ripple in space-time. In an empire of a million worlds, how much can one man truly matter? Only one being is truly essential to its continued existence, hail his name, the Master of Mankind. Serve the Emperor today, for tomorrow you may be dead.
We are the Imperium; we are a slave to our past. Our future is bound to things that are lost to memory and legend. This is our strength, our curse and our destiny. Ask me not of the future; ask me instead what fate is written in the deeds of the dead.
— Yoren Kipraus, Cardinal of Verronus, martyred 245.M36

'What is memory but the fashioning of a deep and personal fiction? In memory, we shape the world around ourselves, as if to prove our own existence, to demonstrate the mark we have left upon the universe. We become heralds of something better; the guiding light by which we believe all others might navigate. This, then, is the comfort we award ourselves for the act of living, for to comprehend the truth – that the universe is cold and ambivalent at best, and at worst despises our very existence – is to contemplate madness. So it is that we grow to love the lie.'

– Paracles Ghent, excerpted from The Deathbed Confessions of Sister Superior Kellora, Escher VI

Six

A Pyre
Garden of Eternity

Usually, a burning of heretics was a rather public occasion.

An Inquisitorial one even more so.

The site was swarmed by a crowd. Non-critical surrounding businesses were ordered to give its staff a day off. People comes to witness the deserved fate of these horrific criminals against the Imperium, against the Emperor, against anything good and proper in the universe. Priests of the Creed use the occasion to preach about a morality lesson or another, using the present...subjects as a vivid examples of what happens when one led astray. Curious juvies try to take a glimpse under the crowd. Particular...entreprenial idividuals set up carts to sells those mysterious meats on skewer that is characteristic of cities everywhere from the Necromunda Hives to Cadian Kasrs. All center around a large square, where the worshipper of the profane will be led to the place they belongs, a giant pyre sets as the cleansing flames purge them of their sins.

The main square of Verungrad central district is a witness to one such Inquisitorial execution.

The soldier stands watch from the balcony his yes staring at the pillar of fire , as he and the others of the inquisitor retinue finish preparation.

Las-mag to issued hellgun, chainsword bares its brightly polished teeth. Plate fits into places, amd laspistol's lense are checked. Finally, gas mask fits to place, hiding the nasty claw-scars now eternally etched on the face of the boy, a gift from the last battle against the Vorkyli.

Halder Quintus was officially under the visit of Madame Inquisitor Geraldine LaHaye, a Puritan with a particular...unsubtle method. It is said her arrivals in any particular planet is often marked with the dragging out an entire petty cult , one of those that keep propping up in any planet in the Imperium, and makes a...public spectacle of an example on them. Recently, with the entry into the new galaxy, the pyres has gotten...diverse with Xeno "manhunters", spies, worm worshippers and other kinds of prey captured. A spectacle indeed

A spectacle that suits the purpose of the bearer of the Rosette they sworn themselves to. All the spectacle, the commotion, and the pyre itself. The boney man steps up, a ray of sunlight briefly pierce through the grey skies of Halder Quintus reflects off his staff, eyes glows with psychic power.

In front of him, the door to the room is violently wrench out , as the stormtrooper barge into the room first , the others right behind

The Xeno strike team , caught by surprise, is nonetheless fires back.

Shotgun shells, lasbeams, bolt shells againsts hastily responded alien flechettes. A stormtrooper fell, his throat rip apart, his killer recieved a lasgun through its eye in return.

The whole thing was over in 15 minutes. Human blood mixed with Vorkyli ichors.

"That was the 7th one this week."

One of the other said.

The Acolyte stays quiet, and while approaching one of the corpses. He says no words.

Beyond the balcony, the pyres are burning. Across the sectors, the pyres are burning.

=========

Joachim-2134 remember gunning down Vorkyli advance elements as the retinue escorted their charge to a spaceport, as the hive city was fallen around them.

He is on the beach again. These past days, he'd grown somewhat accustomed to the gentle lapping of the water against the stones, the susurration of the leaves on the bola trees, the incessant bite of the cold wind in his face. He'd found peace. Or at least, something approaching it.

It is a strange feelings to him. Peace is. Even peace between each places, each battles Inquisitor Axelmann took him to. A Krieger would never got used to such peace, for a Krieger's fate is the eternity of battlefields.

He walks amidst the hills of grass looking out the sea, black uniforms stands out from the green grass tinted grey and the white flowers. Rusted wrecks of ancient warmachines occasionally dotted the landscape. The data files were scant on detail, describing only a world ravaged by ancient war. But then, weren't they all? To the Imperium of man, no the hidden corners of the galaxy that had not been touched by conflict.

That's a galaxy that birth men like Joachim. That's the galaxy that births the Death Korps of Krieg.

None of this cross the boy's mind as he merely stands watch. Eyes over the beach as if watching for enemy starship in the horizon. War has begun once more, as if it ever stopped.

========

Strategic Turn 3

Total RP: 15

Industrial Order
Increase Imperial Space -NW status to Colonised (4RP )

Diplomatic Orders:

Assuage the Ecclessiarchy ( 2 RP ) - Do more measure to placate the Ecclessiarchy, includes offering to apply servitor conversion to illegal access to the hypernet with treasonous tendency, convince using ( Imperial agreed ) logic and theological reasonings , but be firm when needed and assert the authorities as space marines.

Recieve the Outworld delegate. (4RP ) - Recieve them in strength, treat them with an image of honesty and honor , but also power .

Enraging the Vorkyli (4RP )

Utilise the Assasinorum in cooperation with the Ordo Dialogus and the Inquisition with in a concerted campaign aiming at the Teutes Federation

Using Vanus Operatives to broadcast on the Hypernet from unknown, or "internal Teutes" sources ( as long as not Imperial ) of footages and propaganda ( in Vorkyli languages ) of the 'atrocitites' the Outworld visited on the Cosmorealm and the Vorkyli as a whole, as well as propaganda supposedly from Outworld supporter to brag and boasts anbout such act ( not hard since they actually do all that ), with a slant to trigger heavy nationalist sentiments and demand for all out military invasion of Shao Kahn's realm *no matter the costs*, aiming at civilians, but also more importantly Vorkyli troops and 'nationlist minded' officers of all ranks.

All the while Callidus assasin will kill and replace some officers of the Vorkyli army, the one with decent influence on the decision making process of the Junta, and advocate for invasion of the Outworlds - in both forms of nationalists, and "pragmatists" who advocate first strike policy to 'focus on a more dangerous enemy more . If opportune, kill and replace a mid ranking commander, and when the demands for a response to Outlands becomes high enough, initiate an unauthorised invasion , where they would be preferably "heroically martyred", forcing the Teutes High Command into a fait accompli situation

Military -

Mercenaries -Hires both Sub-Zero and Kabal, in exchange for 1 pop total/ turn( sourced from captured enemy of course ).

Send 3 Fleets ( 1 Mag 3 fleet, 1 Mag 1 fleet, 1 Mag 3 Mercenary fleet ) - This will start invading the NorthEast territories of the VUR
Send 1 Mag 3 fleet + Endurance and 2 Mag 1 Fleet to invade the Eastern territory of the VUR.

Send 2 Mag 1 Fleet to the Imperium NorthWest, to protect freshly claimed region
Send 2 Mag 1 Fleet and 1 Mag 3 Fleet to defense the Imperium Center border with the Teutes Federation

Research
1RP -1 Research slot - Anti Vorkyli Hellfire rounds

Even as efforts to claim the former Kroatangan land for the Imperium proceed apace, cities rising across the new frontier, the larger part of mankind's focus is closer to home. The Ecclesiarchy is cajoled, appeased, persuaded, and generally brought to heel, suppressing the growing mutterings of the more conservative factions in Imperial politics, at least for the time being. Tensions between these and the varied radical factions remain high, and likely will continue to do so, but as long as all understand the necessity of presenting a united front against the xenos threat, all should be well.

Equally, it is important to ensure that the xenos threat is not presenting a united front against mankind where possible. To this end, the Inquistion deploys its agents within the territory of the Teutes Federation, which was already martialing its forces to attack the Imperium. However, the Inquisition did not believe that this was inevitable. The aliens' motivation for this was to maintain the favour of their Octarine masters, favour that had been placed into question with their failure to stop the ascent of Outworld. It would be just as valid, many reasoned, for them to launch their attack in that direction instead, sparing the Imperium the burden of a two-front war.

To this end, twin operations are launched simultaneously under the command of the Inquisition and with the assistance of the Ordo Dialogous. The first and simplest is assigned to the operatives of the Vanus Temple, the infocytes using the universality of the Hypernet to spread propaganda with never before seen ease and effectiveness. Hijacking already existing trends espoused by segments of the foe's population, the Federation is agitated against Outworld by constant reminders of the latter's atrocities against the Vorkyli, and the certainty that they will not stop until someone makes them.

None of this is news, exactly, or new opinions, which only makes the Vanus' work easier. Thus, they also focus on dampening voices that still cry out against the Imperium, calling them unpatriotic or uncaring of barbarism, and digitally linking internal anti-Outworld voices together to let them speak louder and more clearly.

Still, this alone is likely not enough to sway the nation as a whole, and so the operatives of the Callidus Temple are put into action. Smuggled into the alien nation and morphing into the giant forms of the many-limbed xenos, these assassins do as their name suggests and eliminate many mid-ranking officers of various stripes in Federation territory. Although unable to take the positions of any individuals with truly significant influence over government policy as a whole, it is practically simplicity itself to raise tensions and sway the low-ranking troops now under the agents' command, who in turn often speak to members of other units, and soon mutterings of dissent, perhaps even to the level of mutiny, if action is not taken against the soul-devouring Outworlders spreads like wildfire.

The Callidus operatives also take this opportunity to discreetly silence those few journalists who claim to have discovered that much of the footage-based evidence used by supporters of an attack on Outworld was sourced from Imperium space. The silencing was temporary or permanent depending on just how persistent the journalists proved to be.

In the end, while no one factor or incident pushed the Federation over the edge, the collective whole of the Imperial endeavour succeeded in turning their attention towards Outworld, with their assault launched westward of what they'd originally planned. Immediately, a notable portion of Octarine Incorporated's support, including funding and direct donations of military equipment, is withdrawn, the bulk of it then diverted to the seemingly more pliable VUR. The Teutes Federation do not seem overly worried about this turn of events, however, clearly believing that success would be its own justification.

Unfortunately for them, their success does not come as swiftly as they'd hoped. Perhaps if they had launched a full-scale invasion while Cosmorealm was still formally contested, they might have had their hoped-for short, victorious war, but they held their full strength in reserve, and now suffer a grinding stalemate against Outworld's armies. It is little surprise that they easily obtain space superiority, helped by many of Outworld's new Vorkyli servants defecting back to their own kind at first opportunity, but their control stops at the edge of the atmosphere.

The strategic magic of their enemy seems to prevent effective orbital bombardment, and the unleashing of terrible rituals to create phenomena such as the "soulnado" batter Vorkyli force concentrations and supermassive units alike. While the Vorkyli do possess limited tactical psyker capabilities, these are no good answer for what they're facing.

Similarly, while their vehicles are more numerous and in better hands than their enemies, their infantry suffers in comparison. Despite the massive size advantage the Urkalsik species enjoys over all but the large Centaurians, they are regularly overpowered by their opposite number in melee combat, especially when the many elite generals of Outworld take to the field personally. Countless Vorkyli generals are the victims of decapitation strikes either subtle or overt, and their command structure quickly lies in tatters.

Although the fighting is at present in something of a stalemate, long-term prognostications indicate that the outcome will likely be in Outworld's favour, especially as they are hard at work reverse-engineering the alien biotechnology and are currently building up their forces for a counterattack.

Certainly, they themselves are confident, enough so that they do not bother to recall their mercenary forces. What is effectively Outworld's delegation, headed by what the Inquisition understands to be their second in line to the throne, arrives and is received with all due pomp and circumstance. In this case, the pomp and circumstance takes the form of martial splendour, with elements from every branch of the Imperium's armed forces arrayed to meet their new allies, each with parade-perfect shine and formation. Soldiers from numerous Guard regiments, Mechanicus Skitarii, Astartes from all three Legions present, Sisters of Battle, elements of Knight Houses and Titan Legions, flight demonstrations by the Aeronautica Imperialis, the Imperial Navy watching from up high, and yet more greet the newcomers.

Outworld's response is similar, if more subdued. The princess Mileena and her wife are flanked by the commanders of the mercenary formations and two small groups of their best troops, but otherwise arrive on the planet's surface alone, apparently believing that they are a sufficient statement in and of themselves. Formal greetings are made between the princess and Harrsk, who chooses to attend in person.

Things progress swiftly and positively from there. After a brief tour of the city, Harrsk introduces the delegation to a brief gladiatorial tournament around which the negotiations are to be organised, believing that the best way to impress Imperial might upon Outworld is in personal combat based upon what is understood about their psychology.

With a seat high above the training arena in which the games take place, the twin leaders converse. Mileena is content to make idle chatter at first, commenting her appreciation for the Imperial way of doing things and its many similarities to her own. Specifically, she points out the authority the Space Marines and Inquisition possess over and above any notion of a "civilian government", and claims that as they are two warriors they should be able to get along well enough.

For his part, Harrsk impresses upon her the need for cooperation against the xenos menace that threatens them both even now. Humanity is, as it always has been, under threat. He of course personally understands why Outworld has integrated aliens and mutants such as their Tarkatans into their armed forces, and that xenos must be dealt with on a priority basis, but he hopes that she can find fellow humans to indeed be agreeable allies after spending so long working with more problematic elements.

Mileena agrees with a slight coughing fit, apologising for her minor illness. With a renewed effort, she carefully controls her voice, a previously dry, rasping thing becoming the very essence of elegance that entrances many of the ordinary men who hear it. She similarly apologies that as a result it would be best if the mask on her face stays in place for her entire stay. It's medical, she explains.

The tournament progresses well. Mechanicus Secutors face off against Cyber Lin Kuei shock troops, veteran Commissars battle Black Dragon cyborgs, and Space Marines battle hulking Shokan and lightning-fast Edenians, a few of which were brought alongside Mileena to act as her personal bodyguard, although Harrsk suspects she doesn't need protecting. The Imperium doesn't win every match, of course, but their forces give as good as they get, and Mileena seems convinced by the martial prowess on display, saying as much.

By the time the tournament's final round is concluded, in which a grizzled Iron Father fights a Cyber Lin Kuei with a particularly human appearance named Frost to an approximate standstill, the negotiations for hiring Outworld's forces are effectively concluded. There is only some discussion about prices, deployments, and tactical details, all to be haggled over, before Mileena swears her forces to the Imperium for the duration of the coming operation. When questioned about the situation back home, she simply laughs it off, stating that she has full faith in her beloved parents and sisters to defeat the Teutes invasion, and that she's mostly concerned about missing the glory of fighting in defence of her realm.

She does also mention that she'd been meaning to take Tanya on the Earthrealm tradition Erron Black called a honeymoon, away from her responsibilities and family, and that this is as good an opportunity as any.

When the time comes for the Outworld armies to leave for the front, Harrsk is reasonably pleased with the outcome. The Ecclesiarchy will no doubt complain about the hiring of sorcerers, but Outworld appears to be a valuable ally, for all their brutality and eccentricity, and are relatively easy to appease and work with. They will have to be brought into the fold more fully in the future, of course, but that can wait.

Unfortunately, internal security does not meet the same success. While many Wyrm Cults are found and rooted out, and many demonic bargains are rejected or prevented from occurring, the Arbites and Inquisition reports that they believe several Wyrm Cults have escaped the purges and are burrowing deep into Imperial society, and while the demons have failed to penetrate for now they remain lurking at the edges, awaiting an opportunity to steal the souls of man.

Much more notable than either of these is the play and counterplay between the Imperial security apparatus and the spies of the VUR. The latter are able to not only infiltrate Imperial society to a degree, they even learn about the counter-invasion of the United Republics slightly ahead of time, and manage to warn their masters about it. Fortunately, when they try to actively sabotage military infrastructure along the frontier, they enjoy only resounding failures, the well-guarded supply depots and staging areas rebuffing their attempts and exposing them. Frustratingly, however, local security forces are unable to capitalise on the sudden vulnerability before the VUR's cells are mostly able to go to ground. Overall, a series of overlapping failures, but one where the xenos came out slightly ahead.

What these spies do not discover are the newly developed Anti-Vorkyli Hellfire Rounds developed by a series of Warsmiths, which are widely distributed to Astartes across the front, with some particularly elite non-Astartes formations receiving them as well. These prove about as effective as hoped, allowing even non-Devastator Marines to engage enemy warbeasts on foot, while the Sororitas units that received them were much more able to engage large quantities of enemy Urkalsik infantry. Best of all, due to the commonalities present in the enemy's biotechnology, the rounds are broadly effective against the majority of their forces, much like the original Hellfire Rounds were against Tyranids.

All of the preparation, both secret and obvious, culminates in the actual offensive, preempting the United Republics' attack and forcing them to fight in their own territory. Harrsk takes command of the Endurance and leads the majority of the Imperial forces into an offensive against the VUR's relatively recent conquest of its southern neighbours. All prognostication of the offensive suggests a probable swift victory, especially as the bulk of enemy opposition has decided to make its stand nearer to home, although caution is still warranted. A likely victory is no excuse to get sloppy.

As proof of this, Harrsk expertly leads the Endurance and a supporting task force to strike at a keenly identified enemy logistical lynchpin. In a mirror to the xenos assault on Balarian II, a largely oceanic world dominated by life-bearing seas and various island chains is a vital planet due to its status as a trade nexus and its significant food exports. If taken swiftly through a shock assault, it threatens to be both an ideal forward position and a thread to pull on that might unravel the entire local VUR defense effort.

-Initiate tactical turn: Tidal Surge. Harrsk's Endurance-led fleet of 1 Mag 3 Fleet and 2 Mag 1 Fleets is being opposed by 1 VUR Mag 2 Fleethorde (Tier Primus) and Moderate Defences. Tactical turn occurs on an ocean world which is an important transit nexus and food supply for VUR forces in the region. If the fighting is successful, the Imperium is projected to capture 3 Pops worth of assorted Vorkyli xenos who were both unable to evacuate and able to survive for use as payment, research subjects, or bargaining chips. The Imperium's xenophobia means that the territory will be raised to the bedrock, and the territory will have to be redeveloped from scratch.

The assault on the Republic's home territory goes less well effectively from the start. Not only is the foe present in greater numbers, a good deal of said number has been equipped with the finest military gear Octarine can easily provide, placing entire swathes of the enemy on par with the most elite formations the Imperium can muster.

The overall balance of forces is still decidedly in the Imperium's favour, but due to the difficulties inherent in any offensive action, it doesn't take long for the fighting to bog down into a bitter grind. This is especially true due to the presence of a single fortress system surrounded by spatial anomalies for lightyears in every direction, effectively representing the singular path into the rest of the VUR's home territory. With their defences concentrated in this one area, it's proving a difficult nut to crack, effectively being a Cadian Gate in miniature, a familiar concept for all that the Iron Warriors-led force present haven't been on this side of that particular equation before.

While it is possible to go around the spatial anomalies, and some outrider forces are already doing so, the detour required is devastating for effective logistics and crippling for the campaign's chances if this is relied upon. Similarly, bypassing the system by going through it opens up the Imperium's supply lines and rear areas to truly nightmarish raiding possibilities. The fortress must fall or at least be very seriously contested for the campaign as a whole to have any chance of seeing full results.

As for said fortress, its centrepiece is a single rocky planet, very similar to, although distinct from, holy Mars. A smaller red-coloured world, unlike Mars it suffers from surface-scouring dust storms that can overturn even some vehicles, with only a few heavily armoured domes for surface habitation. A challenging prospect to siege, made even more so by the seven moons in orbit. Smaller than Luna, they are still larger than Phobos and Deimos, and each has been turned into a hardened fortification, bristling with anti-ship weapon batteries and strike craft hangers, and each with a large garrison to defend it. Breaking these overlapping networks of defensive guns will likely be necessary to conduct large-scale landing operations, in turn necessary to secure the system and strike at the heart of the xenos empire.

This will be no easy task. Fortunately, the most elite of not only the Imperium but their mercenary allies are present, and Mileena seems willing to defer to Imperial command authority for the time being, citing the benefits of increased tactical cohesion. The Inquisitor attached to the fleet comments that she's likely also taking the opportunity to study Imperial tactics while not giving away her own, but at this delicate phase of the operation any advantages such as obedient mercenaries are to be taken where they can be found.

-Initiate tactical turn: Rust-Red Rampage. The Imperial attack force of 1 Mag 3 Fleet, 1 Mag 1 Fleet, and 1 Mag 3 Outworld Fleet (Tier Primus) is opposed by 1 VUR Mag 2 Fleethorde (Tier Primus), 1 Octarine-equipped Mag 1 Fleethorde (Tier Extremis) and Moderate Defences. The fighting has bogged down at a fortress world controlling the main stable FTL route into the rest of the TP. The planet itself is a Mars-equivalent with several small moons that serve as orbital fortresses, and is also often subject to massive dust storms, and so most ground infrastructure is located underground with only a few armoured domes visible upon the surface. Mileena is content to follow Imperial orders, although reserves the right to ignore any attempts to throw her or her forces into a suicide mission.

If individuals or military units distinguish themselves in either Tactical Turn then they may become new Level 1 Legends.

Map of Military Operational Movements:

Crayak said:
There were whispers of war in the wind. Rumours that were almost anticipatory as they described the abhorrence of the foe, the righteousness of the cause, the tragedy of what had already transpired. There were subtle and unsubtle encouragements for able-bodied men to join the fight, for able-bodied women to help in any way they could, for children to respect those who did fight. The Tau'ri, children of Earth, inheritors of a lost colony spoken of in tall tales and detailed wild goose chases… they were unbelievably arrogant. Number Six had been curious when she was first brought here to see what humanity would be like outside of the Twelve Colonies, but now she was just sick of them. She had lived as Rachel Bennet for the better part of the year in service of the God Machines, spreading their word through whispers of her own. She had guided the forgotten, the downtrodden, the curious and those willing to believe towards the revelation they offered.

Yet this fertile ground was already well trodden. While she did her best to work in the shadows, the others were practically begging for attention. Some wonder material had been discovered and a cultish following had sprung up around it seemingly without effort. It was a curiosity but not one she would have given too much thought. That was a reminder of how limited her perspective was compared to the ones that guided her every thought - they were interested. There was potential here, in either the substance itself or the cult that venerated it.

Hence this meeting in the backroom of a nightclub with muffled music thumping at the walls. The atmosphere reminded her of her life back on Caprica.

"My benefactors believe in your cause, isn't that a good enough reason?"

"In my experience, belief alone doesn't write checks like this." He said, tossing the slip of paper onto the table between them. "Whoever you work for, tell me what they really want or this meeting is over."

She smiled and leaned back, crossing her legs. "They want you to succeed. They agree with you that the government is being too restrictive with your glowing rock. And now that they've made it clear that they don't care about you at all, risking human lives for the soulless parasites, there isn't a better time for a change. Do you disagree with that?"

He bristled. "Glowing rock doesn't begin to cover it. You've seen what we can do with - "

She raised her hand, "You have your cause and I have mine Mr Pritchard. Let's not lose track of why we're here."

"Right." He raised his glass to his lips and thoughtfully stared ahead as he took a drink. "You came to me like I was a charity case, offering new models of gauss rifles, body armour, uncrackable encryption protocols and everything else I could ask for, and all for the low, low price of me stepping up recruitment. Which I would have done anyway. You know how much this looks like a trap?"

Her irritation peaked. For a moment her surroundings changed. She was no longer sitting in the VIP area of a nightclub on some oddly primitive throwback to the homeworld. Instead she was on the bridge of her Basestar, watching the starry background of space distort as her prayers were answered by the arrival of the God Machines. She had wanted to kneel then, as soon as she heard the deafening whispers in her mind. Even now, lightyears distant from their grandeur she could feel their presence. They had given her people enlightenment - nevermind the heretics who had fled. This human dared to doubt their generosity? Dared to compare the benevolence of her gods with some paltry element? She felt the augments stir under her skin, monomolecular blades ready to rip and tear and -

She dug her nails into her palm to stem her anger. Of course, she had to remain calm. It was their will that this cultist become a pawn. She smiled sweetly and took a drink from her own glass.

"You're confusing a helping hand with one holding a knife. Trust me, this isn't a trap. You can test the weapons if you want. In fact, you should do it anyway. Helping you this much with your rebellion would do more harm than good if I did work for one of the alphabet agencies and was trying to trap you. But in the end, you have to make a choice. Choose wrong and you watch your movement wither away to nothing in a few months. Choose right, and you'll succeed beyond your wildest dreams."

He really didn't have a choice. She wouldn't allow him to say no. She had been chosen for this mission. Not any other of the Eight, her! And she would succeed. She would make the God Machines proud. It was her purpose.

General:
Fleet 1 & 2 (Both Mag 3) + Reaper Knights - Attack Scourge [F5 West]
Fleet 3 (Mag 3) + Harbinger - Attack Tau'ri [E4 South-East]
Fleet 4 (Mag 1) - Link up with fleet arrived in Kroat space, then withdraw, and depending on the condition of both fleets (>60% health) attack Tau'ri [F4 South-West]. Otherwise return to [F5 North-West] for repairs.

Monitoring arrays will be used to track enemy fleet movements, and to assist infiltrators in tracking leadership for indoctrination or assassination at opportune times.

Tau'ri

Focus will be placed on capturing Earth and its prominent colonies before expanding outward to reap the rest of Tau'ri space. Local cults and Reaper forces will cooperate for the time being.

Scourge

The Reaper armada will assault the prior scouted locations of interest across Scourge space simultaneously. Reaper Knights will be called on to break resistance wherever it is thickest. Jump drives should be used to bypass fortifications and ambush Scourge ships if/when possible. The Scourge equivalent of Indoctrination should be hijacked if possible to subvert their forces.

Territory:
North West - Promote to Excessively Defended [15RP]
Central - Promote to Industrialised + Heavily Defended [46RP]
South - Promote to Industrialised + Heavily Defended [42RP]

Research: 14
Diplomacy/Intrigue/Exploration: 22
Total: 139

Free Slot - Ship-scale Turbolaser R&D
1 RP - Ship-scale Turbolaser R&D
4 RP - Cruiser Size Upgrade
9 RP - Cruiser Size Upgrade
Total: 14

Target: Ykantras Moot
Nature: Hostile
Resources: 4RP - 2 Turns
Plan: Infiltration
Take advantage of the greater level of infiltration of the Moot compared to the other polities, extend the infiltration networks and replace or control influential figures across Ykantras leadership. Use proxies to sour sentiment towards aiding the Scourge, encourage a mindset of either protecting their own borders or staying true to their nomadic roots and leaving.

Target: Tau'ri
Nature: Hostile
Resources: 8RP
Plan: Cultist Simulator
The Tau'ri already have a cult problem, with Reaper backing this cult could be propped up to rebel against the ruling powers. Indoctrinated cells should do their part to sow confusion and hinder attempts to stamp out the local cults, while making sure to foster favourable relations with them. The optimal outcome of this operation would be brutal guerrilla warfare or even open civil war taking place across Tauri space as the Reaper armada attacks. Following the infiltration actions, the indoctrinated should engage in sabotage of local forces and infrastructure before the arrival of the fleet.

Target: Scourge
Nature: Hostile
Resources: 8RP
Plan: Counter-Intel and Biowarfare
The Scourge proved to be adept at infiltration, efforts will be made to ensure that the Scourge will not be able to slip into Reaper space or try any other kind of covert operations targeting them. This includes concealing the massing of the armada meant to assault them until it has already struck and countering Scourge espionage actions in general. Half of the resources will go towards that defensive aim, the other half will be used to create a virus to specifically target the Scourge while leaving their hosts unaffected, or at least still alive after infection. This virus will be deployed at the earliest possible opportunity on as many Scourge worlds as possible.

Target: Kroat Warband
Nature: Hostile
Resources: 2RP
Plan: Counter-Intel
The Kroat proved able to detect Reaper stealth probes, it would not do to underestimate them further. Efforts will be made to detect and destroy any of their scouts, to prevent them from seeding their ecosystem on any worlds in Reaper space as forward bases for their inevitable assault and to generally render Reaper fleet movements as opaque to them as possible.

Total: 22RP

Reaper space continues to grow, if not in breadth than in depth. Further intensification of industrial and defensive effort in the newly acquired territories ensure that the industrial capacity available to the fleet continues to grow in a manner that is extremely hard to dislodge. Fledgling powers, previously having fallen through the cracks as initial possession of the new land was taken, are subdued and prepared for harvest. No longer do signals reach out into the lands of other powers, except the constant, thrumming drone of indoctrination that most take care to swiftly tune out.

Whether or not the Cycle will, in due time, be restored is a matter still up for debate. But in the here and now, what is known is that the organics and synthetics alike of the new world must be brought to heel. They have grown too much and too far.

And to counteract this, the core territory of the Reapers becomes even more defended. While its industrial expansion has reached its practical limit, more work can be done in keeping that expansion safe. As well as generally increased defences, a series of powerful orbital weapon platforms are deployed, truly massive MHD cannons inspired by the ancient superweapon that once crippled a Reaper and eventually created what would become known to mankind as the Great Rift Valley of Klendagon. Not even the largest USPR dreadnought could easily shrug off the strikes of such weapons.

Of course, these efforts cannot stop at such an immaterial thing as a border, an invisible line on a stellar map. Indoctrinated agents new and old assail the very foundations of the enemy, creating exploitable rifts and tears. Or at least they try. The efforts to infiltrate the Ykantras succeed in expanding the Reapers' network of assets, even taking control of several relatively influential figures, but fail to actually turn the nomadic aliens against the Scourge in serious numbers. Apparently, their fear of the Reapers outweighs their disgust for the parasites, or they've had an unexpected outbreak of good sense. Either way, while the deepening of infiltration will certainly benefit any future intrigue attempts in the Moot, this attempt has been a mixed success at best.

The undermining of the Tau'ri is also a mixed success despite the resources invested, although in a very different fashion. While the presence of preexisting cults does indeed prove a boon to causing civil strife, it also means that the enemy is on high alert for just the sort of actions the Reapers are undertaking. Numerous agents are captured by the Tau'ri intelligence services during the early stages of infiltration, although due to the deployment of a cell-like structure in the Reapers' agents this does not compromise the operation as a whole. The spies that do manage to penetrate this outer wall are distinctly few in number and influence, but they are successfully able to make contact with the cults, who it turns out are certainly not either of those things.

Equal effort is put into the counterintelligence campaign against the Scourge, who had already managed to outmanoeuvre the Reapers once. Harbinger endeavoured to ensure that there would not be a repeat occurrence, and in what was rapidly becoming a theme for Reaper intelligence during this time period enjoyed mixed success. Efforts to tighten up patrols and prevent scouting efforts mostly succeed at stemming the intelligence bleed, but not enough to prevent the Scourge from finding the massing Reaper forces prior to their initial attack. Not all is lost, however, as the Reapers take this opportunity to deploy the anti-Scourge virus developed via specialised missiles, infecting the task force as they retreat.

However, despite initial high hopes, the virus proves non-fatal to both host and parasite. The Scourge are hardier than they might first appear, and with only a relatively limited scientific effort put into the bioweapon it was effectively an off-the-shelf solution to the problem, which proved insufficient for the task at hand. Not all is lost, though, as it is still notably debilitating, with the returning scouts unable to effectively convey information to their commanders, being put into day-long fevers that require hospitalisation.

On the bright side, this means that when the Reapers strike mere hours later, the Scourge are caught relatively unawares, and the element of surprise is broadly maintained, although since they were expecting an attack from the Reapers in the near future regardless the surprise was inevitably not complete. On the less bright side, the state of the scouts warn the Scourge about the virus, and appropriate quarantine protocols are put into effect in their armed forces and on their worlds, heavily limiting the effects of the virus during the coming battle. But perhaps its success in allowing for surprise is enough.

Finally, moderate effort is placed into counteracting what passes for intelligence efforts from the Kroatangans, which in this case does indeed prove to be seeding Reaper worlds with their Military-Ecological Complex. Despite efforts to expand and fortify as well as efforts for mobile forces to actively hunt down and engage any suicidal transports, some make the passage successfully to the borderworlds, creating infestations that prove exceptionally stubborn.

Fortunately, as the Reapers lack a conventional civilian population and themselves live in space, along with most of their infrastructure, this has effectively no immediate negative consequences. It will, however, make the initial stages of any Kroatangan attack that much more effective by providing them ready-made forward bases and a small source of additional 'trained' manpower.

There was at least one area that was an unmitigated success, and happily this was the effort to conceal the Reaper's fleet movements. Through a complex series of manoeuvres, Reaper patrols seemed to be in far greater numbers and of far greater size than they actually were, with rapid force shuffling towards points of contact keeping the distribution of Reaper fleets opaque and seemingly large. This is sufficient to keep the Kroats in the preparation stage of their offensive rather than launching early while the Reapers are in truth largely busy elsewhere, although intelligence suggests they may be distracted by something happening elsewhere.

If so, this may actually be a cause for concern. On the cusp of Arch-Warfiend status, Abradax the Ruin-Maker (with his newfound power, it was apparently inevitable he would take on such a title as part of Kroatangan culture, such as it is) would likely only be distracted from the major war with the Reapers he seeks if something truly dangerous was afoot.

In the name of counteracting any such threats, research and development of new weapon systems proceed at a rapid pace. Already having drawn some inspiration from "blaster" technology when designing their battle tank-equivalent, it is not overly difficult to include turbolasers as alternate weapon systems on Reapers. While not supplanting the spinal weapons of either Capitals or Destroyers, they do find a niche as rapid-firing relatively close-range turret, effectively replicating the broadside batteries of Citadel dreadnoughts on Capitals and serving as anti-vehicle and extra anti-fighter guns on Destroyers.

In a further development of Reaper naval warfare, what are effectively Capital-scale battlesuits are designed and constructed, known to the Reapers as shells and to the greater universe as Reaper Boosting Orbital Shock System Frames, or Reaper BOSS Frames, thanks to a Tau'ri military analyst.

The final design employed to optimise the triangle of ease of docking, protection, and firepower is a spiralling shell into which a Reaper can dock, not much longer than a Capital on any particular axis but with a mass many times greater thanks to a large, broad bulk. The Reaper docks into an open port on the outside of the shell, while the inside houses the primary reactor, Element Zero Core, and the primary MHD cannon, which uses the shell's spiral and some clever usage of electromagnetics to achieve a barrel length that would be impossible on a conventional warship, which when combined with a wide-bore barrel results in a mass accelerator on a scale never seen on a warship before.

Needless to say, this primary weapon is built alongside a copious amount of broadside turbolasers, MHD guns, particle beams and point defence lasers, as well as the Reaper's tendril-mounted weapons, which can remain extended even once the main body is safely within the extremely heavily armoured port area of the shell, although if so the tendrils remain protected by the powerful Ray Shields and Kinetic Barriers of the shell. Once docked with, the appearance of a BOSS Frame is highly similar to that of an Earth ammonite.

If there's a downside to the shell, it's that it's too difficult to manufacture to hand out to every Reaper, and so when manufacturing begins it is only given to the most mature and capable of the fleet. As less of a downside and more of a design constraint, they also cannot effectively be used in-atmosphere, meaning the Reaper must detach to engage in land warfare. On the flip side, it is often possible for the shell to be destroyed or crippled without the Reaper being damaged, meaning that the ability to easily detach can result in the Reaper emerging from the carcass of its BOSS Frame and returning to the fight immediately.

Unlike the previous campaigns, these improvements are deployed swiftly enough that they see some albeit not full deployment with the Reaper forces, shells and turbolasers alike seeing combat action. Unfortunately, this is largely because the fighting against both the Scourge and the Tau'ri drags on, being much bloodier than anticipated.

This despite the fact that the element of surprise had been maintained. Despite the failure of the virus to act as a weapon of mass destruction, it still meant that the sudden arrival of the Reapers, mostly via long-range Jump Drive, struck the enemy hard before they could fully prepare for the blow. Worlds burn by the dozen beneath the swift advance, mass orbital bombardment used in the cases where it works and the deployment of the Reaper Knights in the more common cases where it doesn't secure victory on the ground once the enemy space forces are swept away. But this becomes increasingly difficult as surprise is lost.

The Scourge fleet annoyingly proves able to stand on par with the Reapers' own. This is not technically unlike the other enemies of the new world, but where they were too few in number or undermined by internal strife, the Scourge remained a united fighting force with a vast quantity of warships at their disposal. In particular, their advanced cloaking systems frustrate and baffle Reaper sensor arrays, and are deployed on every ship class they possess, even ones that are easily a match for a Capital-class Reaper. While there seems to be a tradeoff in that the Scourge navy lacks shield generators, rendering them comparatively fragile, that fragility only matters when they can be hit. Nor do they lack for offensive punch.

In the end, however, the combination of Reaper Knights, the steadily proliferating shells and turbolasers, and somewhat superior numbers enabled a victory for the Reaper force despite the Scourge's advantage of defensive positioning. Rather than fighting to the last, they choose to withdraw, taking much of their mobile forces and command structure with them to an adjacent territory. While the space they owned in the Reaper's home sector is now fully occupied, they seem far from done. The main good news is that the territory they're moving onto has only just been freshly settled and built up by the Scourge this very cycle, with their colonists moving in as the Ykantras Orda previously occupying the region head on south as is their way, and their fleets and population moving in almost immediately after.

Additionally, their survival is further rendered problematic by the fact that few organics are available for harvesting due to their retreat. As well as the issue that they took many of their host-species with them, the presence of the parasites themselves complicates the harvest, as the impurities they induce in organics make infected life unsuitable for conversion to Reapers. On top of all that, much of the life they have seeded their lands with to serve as host-species would be unintelligent without Scourge puppeteering, meaning that even when pure populations are available they are often still unable to be converted, as even if it were technologically possible harvesting animals en masse for such a purpose would conflict with the Reapers' core directive.

Somehow, this is not the end of the problems. Scourge forces that were unable to be evacuated scatter to the winds, both planetary and void, to wage a guerilla campaign against the Reapers. Normally, this is a sort of foolishness that doesn't last long thanks to the power of indoctrination, but the Scourge, both pure and while parasitizing a host, remain immune even when exposed for long periods of time. Additionally, removing the parasite proves universally fatal to the host. Fortunately, the surviving guerillas are in insufficient numbers to pose a serious material threat, but it remains an annoyance on principle.

Still, none of these complications change the basic material fact that the Scourge have suffered a heavy blow this cycle. As well as the destruction of a sizable swathe of their forces between the initial surprise attack, the pitched battles of the main fighting, and those left behind, at the end of the day they were forced to flee in order to survive. While the fighting was long and hard enough that it was decided the Reapers would not press on immediately, when the assault is eventually renewed the outcome seems clear. After all, the Scourge have already run out of places to run away to.

-Scourge pushed out from F-5 West, retreat to E-5 East. Reaper fleethordes take 40% casualties, although the Reaper proper casualties are fortunately mostly crippled rather than destroyed outright. Scourge losses unknown, but not likely to be much smaller in absolute terms. Research opportunities to discover the source of the Scourge's indoctrination immunity and how to nonlethally remove one from their host available.

Similarly, the attack against the Tau'ri and their United Nations begins well. With Reaper support, the various cults rise up en masse as Harbinger's forces begin their attack, but do so in the colony region, completely separate from the main thrust of the offensive. The indoctrinated agents have minimal influence over the cults due to their small numbers, only able to arm rather than control. In other words, they're doing their own thing.

This does not mean the infiltration was wasted effort, however. When the cults launch their uprising and successfully seize power, they take a sizable chunk of Tau'ri military forces with them. A mix of defectors (a particularly large number coming from their strike craft corps) and loyal units destroyed in their bases, if Tau'ri military strategists were hoping for expansion region troops to come riding to their rescue against the Reapers they have most assuredly been disappointed.

As for said cults, they are now calling the former UN expansion region the Confederated Planets of Humanity, a strongly religious albeit not theocratic state that worships under the Universal Church of God the Father. Their god is represented as a golden bull, often depicted wreathed in smoke, shadow, and flame, and their creed is one that promotes subjugation, hatred, and greed as virtues.

Besides being fairly typical organics, the CPH is notable for its intensive usage of the mutagenic substance the Tau'ri had initially found. Expected, as the cults were worshipping the material in the first place, but they have taken its exploitation to new heights. In particular, they seem to be able to use its esoteric properties to bind extradimensional entities to their technology, giving them a form of AI-equivalent intelligence and esoteric capabilities. Not unlike the so-called "Force", this proves that the new galaxy is stranger than the one the Reapers left behind.

Unfortunately, the success of the cults and their coup is about where the good news ends. While some initial gains are made, once the element of surprise fades the Tau'ri launch a swift and brutal counterattack, and their fleet is much more powerful than expected. Their main warships are small in size, but many in number, and punch far above their weight with powerful plasma beam weapons supported by relatively primitive mass accelerators and distinctly destructive atomics enhanced to an incredible degree by a mysterious substance.

Had this battle been fought when the Reapers first arrived, it likely would have been an utter slaughter. Even with the new Ray Shields, it is still a painful slog. Many Reapers are destroyed outright, to say nothing of the countless Oculus drones thrown on an ever growing pyre to stave off the enemy's elite fighter squadrons. The attempted deep strike gets bogged down in attempting to secure key gateway systems before it even arrives at Earth, and progress from there trends to somewhere between glacial and nonexistent. Even when the new technologies of the Reapers arrive on the front line, the tide stubbornly refuses to turn.

In fact, the only strategic silver lining is that without their western reinforcements and the constant pressure of the Reaper offensive, for all that they have very little to show for it, the Tau'ri are unable to so much as attempt a counterassault into Reaper space, being fully occupied with the threat on the doorstep.

On a tactical level, the silver lining is that while the space war goes mostly against the Reapers due to the sheer firepower the enemy holds, the reverse is true for the few ground engagements that occur. Based on prior experience, the ground assaults were expected to fail due to the lack of Reaper and Oculus support, as all the latter were needed for the void battles still ongoing during landing operations. Instead of aiming for conquest, they were mostly deployed as a distraction and a means to suppress enemy logistics and groundside defence installations.

Instead, the Husks carved through the Tau'ri's army as all but an afterthought. It turned out that the powerful alien technologies they wielded didn't scale down to their ground forces at all, and their powerful fighters were as occupied with the Oculi as the Oculi were with them. On each invaded planet, they gather entire army groups of infantry, special forces, tanks, artillery, and all appropriate support, but none of it would have looked too out of place on a planet of the Milky Way prior to the discovery of the Mass Effect.

Considering the sheer number of troops deployed, even this may have been a problem without Reaper support had this occurred prior to the new world. Since then, however, the Reapers have adapted to fight far hardier armies. Masses of tube and rocket artillery are kept in check by counterbattery fire from Arachne and tunnelling assaults by Wyrms. Conventional armoured units struggle to even get past the barriers of Karkinos Walkers once the latter deploys into their legged assault form, whereas the latter's mass accelerator has no difficulty punching a hole clean through both sides of a tank while cooking everything inside to a crisp.

And the less said about attempts by Tau'ri commandos to fight Banshees, the better.

In the end, the Reapers do gain a foothold within Tau'ri space, several planets controlled and their people indoctrinated and ready for harvesting, but the losses being taken in orbit are unsustainable. Even as the deployment of the new technologies helps shift the tide somewhat and despite Harbinger's ever-skillful direction of his forces, the present path is not viable. Something has to change.

-The assault on E4-Southeast ends in a bloody stalemate. The assigned fleethordes take 50% losses without any meaningful gains to show for it, but have at least locked the enemy in place. Tau'ri losses are greater in absolute numbers of hulls, but less in tonnage, and as a proportion of their forces it's unclear. F4-Southwest has openly rebelled.

Only slightly less dramatic is the fighting that erupts against the Ruin-Maker to the east. A fleet is sent to take newly arrived Reapers away from that place to the home front, and from there to the battle northwards. The initial insertion is successful, but alas, by then it's too late for an easy mission.

This latest lot of arriving Reapers appear within the northern expanse of nearby Kroat space, with the former remnant megastructures of its pre-Kroat peoples, already inactive via disrepair and prior destruction, now turned thoroughly into a series of ruins by Abradax as the source of his new title, a mixture of shoal zones and intact pieces large enough to function as planetoids. A sizable portion of his local forces are present and engaging the newly arrived Reapers, to the point where the latter are thoroughly outmatched before their reinforcements arrive.

In other circumstances, at this point a simple retreat in good order would occur, but the Kroat forces have deployed FTL interdiction beacons in various key points of the ruin complexes, preventing an easy escape. Worse still, reinforcements are surely on the way, eager for the chance to have a good fight. The combined Reaper armada must quickly destroy these beacons and withdraw before the situation becomes untenable while also avoiding any excess damage from the powerful Kroatangan forces present. A difficult challenge, but one that if seen through successfully stands potentially able to change the fate of the northern campaign.

-Initiate tactical turn: Rumble in the Ruins. The Fleethorde sent to enact an evacuation of the arriving Reapers is able to infiltrate Ruin-Maker space without being detected. When it arrives, a pitched battle is ongoing around massive ruin complexes. The Reapers have one Mag 1 Fleethorde entering the system and one Mag 1 Fleethorde already engaged in the clash phase with a Mag 2 Ruin-Maker Kroatangan fleet in and around the massive ruin complexes. Performance in this tactical turn will determine if these fleethordes will make it back to Reaper space, and if so whether they will have the strength to invade either Tau'ri territory (due to the unexpected development of the CPH, plans for these fleets can be slightly changed).

Map of Military Operational Movements:

Velocci · Jul 29, 2023

Unbound Strategic Turn 3

@Arcanestomper
Efforts put into communication with the Crystalline Entities is starting to pay off in a real way. A translation matrix has been developed that can be shared with all Unbound ships, although it's not perfect and difficulty still arises attempting to convey to the Entities that there are lesser Unbound units than their ships, but overall the Unbound can traverse the territory of the crystals safely. With easier communication, comes requests for help. Or at least that's what the translators say the elder Crystals want when they shepherd Unbound ships North into that neighbouring sector of space. They reveal abandoned nests and indicators of infrastructure build up that suggest that the sector is not empty. This is confirmed later by actual scouts who range beyond the sections of space near to former Crystal nests, and quickly run into combinations of space pirates and humans with esoteric abilities. These dark cloaked humans are able to conjure up entire cities and armies without using any technology. What's worrying is that they have a distinctly… undead look to them, but these are observations from afar. The optimistic view is that this is a very dedicated LARPing group of a very technologically advanced civilization.

The aura given by the Alliance of Sol diplomatic team is that of people who've been pulling too many allnighters to function without caffeine. From the information exchanged, it sounds like while the Unbound were dealing with the Flood/Kett, the Sol polities were having problems of their own. The Chaos Warband had increased attacks tenfold, and while the first ones were fended off successfully, each successive wave of attacks grew stronger as the extradimensional source of the Chaos warriors power grew more established in the new reality they found themselves in. The forces of Chaos had started out as relatively normal with a few mutations and blessings here and there, but as of the latest attacks consisted mostly of heavily mutated former humans and things that had never been human. The loudest voices were those aligned to some Blood God, whose worshippers were rapidly becoming capable of fighting the heroes of the Alliance one on one while the servants of the other Chaos Gods still had to rely on strength of numbers or trickery to get out ahead.

And unfortunately, that was not all. A pair of Elector-Admirals from the Eternal Empire of Mankind had arrived onto the scene in a dramatic way, seizing territory in brutally swift invasions across the sector. The stated goal of the Admirals was to protect the 'lost sheep' from the dangers of the void - but that protection has taken a rather odd form if so, as they brutally repress human populations under their control and genocide all non-humans without a second thought. Already exhausted from the constant raids by Chaotic forces, the Alliance did not have the strength to resist portions of its territory being transformed into the personal farms of the Elector-Admirals. The best they have managed to do against both hostile powers is to infiltrate and sow dissent among the various warlords to keep them fighting each other so they cannot focus on the Alliance. This tactic has been more successful on the Chaos Warband than expected, as they seem barely aligned and belligerent to each other by default. Pressure has even started to ease up as something to the South has drawn the attention of the Warband.

The success of diplomacy with the Galactic Empire goes without saying, and resulted in the successful joint campaign against the Kett. All that remains is to settle ownership of the subsector and the archeotech arcology within.

Scouting
First Contacts:
Damn Dirty Apes!
A whole sector of space is filled with talking apes from Chimpanzees to Gorillas to Orangutans. Scientists struggle to explain how this could have happened, since there are no signs that any of the ape civilisations had the ability to travel interstellar distances now or in the past. The presence of small human populations as a servant class or pre-sapient curiosity on most of these worlds might shed some light on this, but for now the Sector of the Apes is just a curiosity to have idle conversation about.

The Men of Leng
The scouts sent into this sector inexplicably all arrive at the same port. A water port, with sailing ships docked right alongside them with primitive sailors loading and unloading goods. While confused, the Hiigarans are able to leave the ships - which are behaving perfectly fine despite suddenly floating in water - and explore. As soon as they set foot on the port they are beset by friendly merchants pushing all sorts of wares, livestock, elixirs, slaves, just about everything, in exchange for whatever the team can spare. One of the members of the expedition trades in a data pad for a large yellow bird which is either a beast of burden or a domestic animal, the seller was deliberately vague. This is the city of Hlanith, famed for its artisans and closest to the waking world.

Aside from the general strangeness of the place, two things stand out to the away team. The first being that cats are revered and treated like royalty, and while there are not many in Hlanith there is a whole city of them elsewhere in the Dreamlands. The cats can talk as well, although the things they say are either nonsensical or cryptic, depending on the interpretation. The cats don't stick around long for conversations without incentive, and shift moods at a whim.

The second thing is that the leader of the expedition was approached surreptitiously by a Man of Leng, who offered to trade moon rubies, red gems with mysterious properties, for whatever technology the Unbound can spare. It claims to represent a great kingdom, with a great need for assistance against an enemy they share with the Unbound.

Gothic Horror and Steampunk

The Unbound have been noticed by the Eternal Empire, and the response is unsurprising hostility. The messages sent from the vampires are unapologetically condescending, laughing at the very idea of humans governing themselves or doing anything but being cattle. Raids are launched for slaves, but since the Unbound don't live on planets but on space habitats which are well defended and mobile, they aren't successful. A handful of raids succeed where the lower nobility are present rather than just thinblooded vampires, but the victories are pyrrhic as the amount of slaves captured is far lower than that required to motivate nobles to action. The only reason the raids continue, at a rather lackluster pace and missing enthusiasm, is because the Elector-Admirals of the Western half of the Empire desire to expand their holdings as much as possible while the Emperor and Eastern Admirals are occupied battling a dire threat.

The other threat to the Unbound are the Creon, or Iron Plague, who preach about the dangers of magic and the supremacy of science over all as they attack with steam powered spaceships and mechanical dragons. They sermonise endlessly about the sins of the Unbound for using magic, calling them to repent even as all of their technology seems to operate through magical means itself - since there's no way steam could power even half of the ships being launched against the Unbound.

Finally, while nothing was detected in the Southeast of the North Sector, the Crystal Entity which had been escorting the scouts through that area became extremely agitated on entry and behaved as though it was under threat.

Flood Situation
The Flood have not been idle since they were ousted from the sector. Smaller ships that could not hope to survive against the Unbound or Men of Iron have been sent to infect any possible source of biomass that the Gravemind knew of throughout the local sectors, be they lightly defended worlds, wild planets or space fauna. As a result two subsectors to the West have had all life transformed into Flood before being uprooted to Flood-held territory. What are recognised on long range scans as heavier and new Kett assets are being positioned to defend what has been surmised as another Gate, along with traditional Flood infested ships. Most alarmingly, a few planetoid sized craft have been detected guarding the Gate as well.

An opportunity has presented itself through analysis of the Gate in the Unbound's position, as it was discovered that with knowledge of the controls the Gate could be reset to connect with a different point in space.

The Unbound have an opportunity: Engage the Gravemind now, primarily target the New Kett and deny the Flood a delivery mechanism through these proxies at the price of the Flood postponing the conflict until it is ready. Or, try and seize the Gate and put the largest Flood biomass concentrations to the torch at the cost of the Flood turning into an Extremis level faction with the ability to send out 'Mercenary Companies' that are able to run the Unbound's blockade.

RP Available: 109

Final Fleet Arrives in Ravaged Space I4, reconnected with the rest of the Unbound with no issue.

Territory Descriptions

J4- North West, North East, and East- Unbound Controlled Space- The collective peoples that the Unbound represent continue to make new homes for themselves and settle themselves according to their own customs, although the majority of their newly claimed space lies empty except for war wreckage and sterilized worlds, Their chief subsector continues to grow now looking like a miniature version of their home galaxy, although with greater cross cultural enclaves that continue to grow as the refugee populations continue to start to breath easier.

J4 North – Crystalline Nests- This region of space is mostly empty of sapient life, save for the odd resource operation or monitoring post. That's because the top dog in this sector is some form of immense crystalline lifeform, shaped almost like three-dimensional snowflakes with varying proportions and sizes. They evidently grow out of 'seeded' asteroids and moons, and feed on energy and matter from solar flares and ejections from stars, as well as the magnetic fields and emissions of gas giants. Some of these crystalline entities can become as massive as planetoids in and of themselves, and they are present in the vast majority of systems in this cluster.

J4 West- Flood - The remaining Flood square could be described as a hell filled with desperate devils. The territory is filled with a winnowing of the stolen fleets with the most useless ships driven into the remaining uninfected ecosystems and the Sublimed Kett brought in as the personification of death to the most concentrated of the holdouts. At the center of the subsector a Fleet assembles in turn to face the Hammer of the Dread Machines and their lesser allies. A twisted mirror of both the last fights happening around it and the final conflict that the Unbound fought with the Beast awaits the Unbound and their Allies.

J4- Center- Former Kett Space and a disputed Arcology - in the J4 Center subsector, there there appear to be city-sized arcology-like structures of unknown design embedded across several hundred planets and moons. Unlike the blasted ruins of prior civilizations seen up to now, these structures appear to be pristine, as if being actively maintained, but there appear to be no inhabitants or other obvious activity.

These Arcologies are now the center of negotiations between the Unbound and the Galactic Empire amongst the ruins of the Kett.

J4 South West- The Galactic Empire- This space is held by the Galactic Empire, another outverser faction that is entirely human. They appear to be a constitutional empire of sorts, one with perhaps the largest and most well-organized naval force in the region. While their technology isn't as sophisticated or exotic as the Alliance of Sol, nor do they have any apparent supernatural abilities, their military discipline and tactical acumen, along with sheer quantity of line ships, makes them a formidable force. Notably, despite their imperial aesthetic, they also appear to be aiding civilian refugees, though much more cautiously than the Alliance, and are actively holding the line against the Kett, Chaos, and other hostiles.

J4- South- Chaos Warbands - This area of space has been taken over by a self-proclaimed Warband of Chaos Undivided. They appear to primarily human, though often with grotesque mutations or cybernetic augmentations. Their ships, vehicles and weaponry appear designed to be as visually terrifying as possible, riddled skulls and spikes and other predatory features. Put plainly, they are insane cult fanatics who worship the Gods of Chaos, avatars of human qualities taken to utterly destructive and evil extremes. Death sacrifices and ritual mutilation are incredibly common.

Worse yet, in spite of their fanaticism, their technology is quite powerful, and some of their number are capable of wielding supernatural powers like the Guardians. Perhaps the most alarming factor is that they actively summon a wide variety of demon-like entities to bolster their forces, and there appear to be many areas of abnormal space in their territory in which these beings can cross over into this reality en masse. They seek to tear down any other civilizations and either convert the survivors to their mad religion, or subjugate them to fuel their war machine.

J4 Southeast- Alliance of Sol- Populating this region is the Alliance of Sol, a defensive confederation composed of humans and three other species, the Eliksni, the Cabal, and the Psions. In addition to sporting advanced technology, certain elite units called Guardians are capable of wielding a power they call the Light, which appears to be outright magic. They can call down lightning and solar fire, bend gravity, leap and levitate vast distances, and demonstrate physically impossible strength, among other myriad feats. The Psions also have their own separate abilities, and they are no less miraculous despite being more limited in scope. It's been confirmed that the Alliance are aiding nearby refugees and are actively at war with the Kett and other aggressive factions in the region.

J3 Southeast, South- Abandoned Nests – These two Sub-sectors are filled with worlds and other celestial objects of clearly the same make as the crystal creatures you have been interacting with. This territory is filled with minor mining elements from the Pirate Pyrotuarus and an unknown group of humans wielding powers that you cannot explain. The Crystal creatures constantly make forays into the territory to only be hunted back by one of the two groups.

J3 Southwest- Empty Space? – Seemingly Virgin territory that is avoided by civilization and Fauna alike. Scouts have been able to passthrough unharmed, but something feels off.

K3 South East- The Creon Empire – A nation of Steam, Metal and a ting of hypocrisy. This is land and civilization bent on a crusade against magic at the words of The Sage. Their abilities to construct and summon warriors and machines seems to equal your own industrial capabilities, and thankfully seem to operate at the same tonnage as you do. They have a preference for strike craft and strike craft like larger ships. They will eventually turn their attentions to the Unbound in due time to help fund and fuel their crusade.

K4 Northwest- Subsector of the Apes – A series of pre space flight Civilizations ranging from the medieval to modern to post apocalyptic in technology levels that are populated by Sapient Primates including Orangutans, Chimpanzees, and Gorillas. There is little to stop you from taking over and they have survived due to the lack of interest by the Men of Leng

K4 West- The Men of Leng- Reports of this region are confusing and nonsensical, working on dream logic than anything else, the inhabitants seem eager to trade and concerned about events happing further into the Sector as the Moon-Kings battle the Iron Hypocrites and The Machine that Keep the Sleeper Dreaming.

K4 Southwest- The Eternal Empire of Mankind/The Ebony Throne- A vast empire of Human and more specifically Vampiric Supremacist, Fiefdoms ruled by Magical superhumans that feed on blood in massive ships. At best they care little for welfare of the cattle that they rule and those 'lost in the wilderness' and at worst is better left unsaid. While the Emperor and many of the more Powerful Elector Admirals are concerned with unsaid event to the east those that lord over the territories in the West see this as an opportunity to expand their holdings.

Signupname · Jul 30, 2023

'Slaughter is harder than people imagine. With the right circumstances, it can occur spontaneously, but to bring it about deliberately is a most difficult matter. Still more difficult is effective terror. The human mind is prone to fear, but terror, the deep emotion that lingers in the bone and blood for generations – for that, the tools must be sharp, and their application finely judged.'

– From Address to the High Lords of Terra by Drakan Vangorich, 12th Grand Master of the Officio Assassinorum

''There is no joy in death, but there is necessity.' 'And in the recognition of necessity, there is satisfaction.

- A XIVth Legion Mantra.

Seven

Orbital Storm
Death March

The rain falls down on the churning seas of the ocean world at storm-wracked season. The screech of the winds clouded the approach of the drop pods and gunships as the orbits screams with a storm of its own - one of dueling warships .

The data of the battle sphere overlaid his sight.

The first ship of the defense died as the Imperial Fleet breached the veil of reality. Streams of plasma reached out from gun platforms. White fire smashed into the ship's prow. Lightning and glowing ectoplasm streamed behind its hull. Macro shells detonated amongst the molten wounds already cut into its skin. Turrets and spires sheared from its bulk. Towers broke from its spine. It kept disintegrating, Imperial shots torn apart its bows. Atmosphere vented from the exposed interior. Debris scattered, burning for an eye-blink before the flames ate the air trapped in the wreckage.

'Ship kill,' called a sensor adept from across the bridge of the Endurance. The Warsmith watched the first victim of his fleet - a blip in the pict screens above the command throne.

Any fresh shipmaster would spent a moment to think, of a ship kill. Who are on the other side of the vessel their own gutted with lances and macro-shells. What are the thoughts of their last moments. Such thought bled out of them by the 3rd engagement. No thought spares for just a petty ship, one amongst the fleets that perishes in the wars across the galaxy.

But nonetheless - this one held a significant. As minor as it is. This is a beginning of a battle -marked with fire.

This was the bow wave of a truly vast armada coming through the warp, bearing down on the Vorkyli like a storm front - just as the ones wracking the planet below.

Ship after ship, tearing reality like flags waving in front of a gun-line. A vast iron arrowhead stabbed from the opening, dragging a vast crenellated hull behind it as it split the wound wider. The first Legiones Astartes warship surfaced from the warp. It was named the Erinyes- a bombardment galleon of the Iron IVth. A relic and Veteran of the Galaxy, including the darkest days in the Siege of Terra - five kilometre-long hull wrapped around a trio of nova cannon barrels. She loosed all three shots as the void kissed her skin. Each nova cannon shell was the size of a Battle Titan, its core filled with unstable plasma. They had no target, but they needed none. They ran straight into the heart of the defences and exploded with the force and light of a star's birth. Gun platforms vanished. Mines lit off in spheres of red flame. Fire poured from the defences as more ships rammed past the debris of their dead kin.

More and more rents opened in the vacuum. Nauseating colours and dazzling light poured out as ship after ship surged from nothing into being. Tens, and then hundreds and thousands. Frigates and Destroyers. Cruisers and Battle Barges. Grand Cruisers and Battleships. And at the front, the gigantic Gloriana that is the Endurance strike as the obvious overlord of the fleet. The cream white paint and grinning skull decorate its prow promised death. Twenty strike cruisers and fast destroyers followed in tight formation. Lance fire speared out from them, slicing into ships as they cut across the front of the enemy fleet. Plumes of ghost-light and ectoplasm stretched like arms through the dark as more ships punched through from the warp.

Mines detonated, explosions leaping from one to another in chains that stretched across the dark. Gun platforms opened up. Macro shells, rockets and plasma struck metal and stone, bored in and exploded. In the first ten seconds, over a hundred vessels burned to wreckage.

Time slowed around Harrsk as the battle enters its main phase. Beyond the yelling and order of the deck officers. Beyond the klaxons and warning of various kind that his Astartes sense absorb.

Inbound enemy bombers.
Batteries firing.
Dorsal line accelerators approaching optimal fire angle.
Turn at thirty per cent.
Course correction…

The formation resembled a jagged cone, the largest vessels set back from screens of escorts and heavy-hulled strike cruisers. A fanged worm eating to the core of a ripe fruit. It was methodically brutal in its ugly efficiency. So typical of the Iron Warriors.

Follow it are the Death Guards Fleet. The Cream-white color stained with battlemarks give the impression of bleached bones. The agents of deaths arrives on their steeds of white, contribute their firepower into battle.

The Storm below rages ahead. The fleet push forward.

============

Conquest was a nature of humanity, such is the teaching of the Inperium.

This is no differences. Not against the horrific enemies of the Great Crusade. Not against the persistence foes of the Milky Way. Not against the ones in this galaxy.

And in that ideals, the Death Guards march. They marched, under the rain of artillery. They marched, bolters roaring the battlecry of death as if to contrast the XIVth march of total silence.

They march as poison gas sprays out from the modified Terminator plates of the Grave Wardens shrouded themselves in a pall of death...mirroring the House Vrachul Knights' towering machines in the distance. They march as al-chem flamers sears the flesh of the aliens in exotic poisonous flames. They march as rad-missiles further poisons the enemy flesh as it tears them apart.

They march along a shield wall of tanks . Predators and Spartans. Fellblades and Mastodons. All the color of stained white and faded moss. All silence aside from the grumble of engines and the deafening weapon fire.

They march, unstoppable. Their weapons kills the alien in painful manners as radiation, gas, and even flesh melting Vastogox fluids scours them off the planet. They march, as the Dreadnought launch Phosphex shells at the fortified position. The liquid flames swallows all. Consumes All. And amidst the screams, the Death Guards marched

Tactical Turns - Invasion

General.

Recall another fleet from Imperial -Center to try reinforce the main fleet attacking VUS home space

EternalStruggle said:
-Initiate tactical turn: Tidal Surge. Harrsk's Endurance-led fleet of 1 Mag 3 Fleet and 2 Mag 1 Fleets is being opposed by 1 VUR Mag 2 Fleethorde (Tier Primus) and Moderate Defences. Tactical turn occurs on an ocean world which is an important transit nexus and food supply for VUR forces in the region. If the fighting is successful, the Imperium is projected to capture 3 Pops worth of assorted Vorkyli xenos who were both unable to evacuate and able to survive for use as payment, research subjects, or bargaining chips. The Imperium's xenophobia means that the territory will be raised to the bedrock, and the territory will have to be redeveloped from scratch.

Tidal Surge

Void:
Systematically demolished enemy fleet and defenses. Overwhelm the enemy single fleet preferably at long range firepower , then moved on to blow the enemy defense system piece by piece in quick succession

Ground.

Conduct Space Marines to mass deep striking operations on thr island chains in a Steel Rain Maneuver ,supports by of course Aerial and orbital assets. Cow the enemy resitance in quick succession and not allowing the alien any chance to coordinate.

EternalStruggle said:
-Initiate tactical turn: Rust-Red Rampage. The Imperial attack force of 1 Mag 3 Fleet, 1 Mag 1 Fleet, and 1 Mag 3 Outworld Fleet (Tier Primus) is opposed by 1 VUR Mag 2 Fleethorde (Tier Primus), 1 Octarine-equipped Mag 1 Fleethorde (Tier Extremis) and Moderate Defences. The fighting has bogged down at a fortress world controlling the main stable FTL route into the rest of the TP. The planet itself is a Mars-equivalent with several small moons that serve as orbital fortresses, and is also often subject to massive dust storms, and so most ground infrastructure is located underground with only a few armoured domes visible upon the surface. Mileena is content to follow Imperial orders, although reserves the right to ignore any attempts to throw her or her forces into a suicide mission.

Rust-Red Rampage

Void

Have the various fleets stick together to present an impenetrable barrier. The spatial anomaly should preferably also prevents the enemy forces from attempting flanking maneuvers - but of course caution must be excercised. Conduct experienced anti Vorkyli fleet tactics from what learnt during previous engagements - while this time commit to heavy boarding action of the enemy fleets ( the mercenaries will be especially helpful in this regard ). Prioritising the Octarine equipped fleet for annihilation first

Try to simultaneously boarding the defensive moons, but prepare exterminatus grade cyclonic torpedoes to blow up one of them first to presents a gap in the enemy line...and confusing them for the proceeding boarding operations - with Outworld mercenaries- lead by the Outworld Kombatants themselves in support of Astartes/Soriritas boarders and Scion strike teams. Their tasks are to quickly taking the battle stations and silence their guns , in prepare to the operations on the planet surface

Ground.

Conducting heavy attrition siege warfare the Battlegroup is famed for. Prioritising Space Marines, Mechanicus and Death Korps forces for their expertise in harsh environmental warfare. Deploying heavy weapons assets in support of Death Guards advances. Authorised extensive chemical scorched earth tactics against enemy resistance - of course be aware and made use of the local storms to benefits. Targetting the known places of entries on the surface amd attampt to blast open the domes with support from Aeronautica assets.

Attemp mass subterranean invasions of the colony belows bypassing the armored domes..

Inquisitorial and Assasinorum elements are to look for other ways of infiltrating the base below. Smuggler routes, air vents, etc...sabotaging the various environmental systems of the underground colonies to flush out the xenos. Most importantly, planting teleporter beacons. The Outworld Kombatants could also help in this regard

If the beacons were plante, attempting teleporter assaults deep into the underground colonies.

Velocci · Jul 31, 2023

EternalStruggle said:
In a continuingly hostile universe, it isn't exactly surprising that the Cybrans of Vyranodasik place a large emphasis on militarising their forces, the leadership unwilling to partake in the complacency of some of its members. Additional task forces are created, existing ones brought back up to strength, and a ready reserve created to absorb any coming casualties.

Defensively, relatively little hard fortification work is done. This is not the same as none, of course. Universe-class ships become a common sight in the orbits of even non-Node colony worlds, walls are thickened and bristle with more turrets than ever, Disruptor heavy artillery and Myrmidon SAM launchers are added to the arsenal, and underground shelters are hardened further and joined by underground command posts and bunkers.

But the main work done to fortify the core of Cybran territory is in the form of new mobile forces placed on permanent garrison duty. Most worlds now possess entire combat groups of Cybran Commandos dedicated to their defence, and each world also now has access to a reservist or cadet pilot in an Armored Command Unit to rapidly reinforce their defensive positions at a moment's notice. This includes the deployment of Dostya-class insertion vessels to rapidly reposition the defensive ACUs to beleaguered worlds from currently safe ones in safety and style as necessary.

Needless to say, anyone attacking Cybran territory expecting anything less than an inviolable defence is in for a fatal shock.

-Fleethordes fully repaired. 2 new Base Magnitude Fleethordes created. Both Cybran TP at Excessively Defended.

What unfortunately goes less well is diplomatic negotiations. In hindsight, it almost feels as if it was never going to work out. The Shaltari are arrogant, warmongering, and worst of all they're effectively slavers, or at least it's hard to see their relationship with their Pungari servant race in any other way. Meanwhile, they see the Cybran as dishonourable, and experiences from their home universe makes them poorly inclined towards a nation of cybernetic humans.

Despite this decidedly rocky start, Cybran diplomats do their best to bridge the cultural gap, but achieve extremely little. Negotiations culminate when they attempt to highlight parallels rather than differences between the two species, only for the Shaltari to respond with outright insults at the very notion. While talks don't end there in a literal sense, it's clearly the point where negotiations become irrecoverable.

In the end, both sides walk away with a decidedly negative opinion of each other, and further negotiations are unlikely to prove productive. There is one small bright spot, however, which is that the Cybran effort and investment has largely ensured that the bad feelings are merely simmering at the level of active dislike rather than hatred. While no friends were made that day, neither were any serious enemies.

As for the similar negotiations between the Shaltari and the Aeon Illuminate, since they were held behind closed doors the Cybran only have a rough idea how they went, primarily through the odd backchannel between Cybran diplomats and their Aeon equivalents. Apparently, it similarly went rather poorly, but still notably better, to the point where relations between the two nations have tentatively opened up, although they're hardly the best of friends.

Intrigue goes better. Redfog continues to worm her way through Super-Directorate society, although the violent, ever-shifting nature of its media means that assessing the results will have to wait until her report at the beginning of next year. The information made available this year is instead primarily about the results of the underground railroad, although with one early report commenting on the vast astrography covered by the Super-Directorate, which is a larger polity than previously believed.

In short, it was a major success, but with caveats. The first and largest is that in the course of establishing the logistical infrastructure necessary to shuffle around refugees and agents by their countless thousands, enemy intelligence assets detected the presence of a large anti-S-D movement brewing. So far, they haven't been able to either identify the Cybran Nation as the instigators nor bring down the railroad, but the element of surprise has now officially been lost.

Still, this feels like a worthwhile cost as the desperate flood out of Super-Directorate space and, for the most part, back through the Cybran portal to the Milky Way galaxy. While an insignificant fraction of the overall Super-Directorate population, the number of rescued individuals still easily number in their millions. The majority settle throughout a variety of Nodes, including some in Vyranodasik, but two notable segments are sent towards two rather more specific ones.

First are many individuals the Directorate deemed 'antisocial' for a variety of reasons, some more legitimate than others, which are sent towards Node 23. Due to the multispecies nature of the enemy corporatocracy, only a portion of this group are humanoid, let alone human, but with some pointed words from Redfog sent back alongside the refugees the Assumpta accepts this with a reasonable amount of grace.

Second are a group of higher-ups in Super-Directorate society, academics who were always more favourably inclined to equitable systems of government that are happy to defect. While naturally covering a variety of fields, special care is taken to identify and extract cybernetics researchers, who are reportedly already settling in well in Node 56.

This was already sufficient for a success, but in a true intelligence coup a third group was acquired. Apparently, the Super-Directorate managed to entirely miss a small but notable group forming in its private intelligence and counterintelligence service companies that was disgruntled or otherwise burnt out on the entire edifice, and were likewise willing to defect to the Cybran Nation.

A much less likely segment of society to defect than academics, this bungling of asset handling by the enemy was exploited swiftly, at least once Redfog had confirmed to her satisfaction that this was no trick, and as a result up-to-date information on enemy military forces and their posture has been acquired, allowing for an advantage in any future military offensives and also providing a situation update on the enemy's internal political situation.

In short, the Super-Directorate is not planning any outwardly aggressive moves in the near future, but internally several of the megacorporations are becoming increasingly worried about the growing power and market share of MLC, and are planning to move against them in both corporate warfare and corporate warfare. To deter the latter, Messenger has responded by hiring several prominent local mercenary formations, including elements of the Works Raptor Corporation, Hawker Consortium, and Omnidyne Special Operations.

While the intelligence leaks were plugged with the extraction of the agents in question, this is still a noteworthy gain for Cybran intelligence, and useful information to have going forward. Additionally, the success of the operation has appeased the home front for now. While they'll doubtlessly have more demands in the future, the prompt fulfilment of this initial pair of requests has ensured that, in the immediate term, support for the Vyranodasik colonisation remains steady.

-Underground railroad successful, but Super-Directorate alerted. Intelligence on S-D fleets acquired. Home Nodes appeased.

Cybran research and development progresses, with consistent effort and a broad slew of projects advancing science in multiple areas. Work this year this is focused specifically on the concept of FTL interdiction and how to both employ and defend against it, as well as work on a new kind of reactor that should theoretically be able to generate vast quantities of energy, improving the performance of Cybran units across the board. Work on all three projects is still in the early-middle stages, but further investment should be able to see all three through.

-Slot 2/4 completed on counteracting Ecumene interdiction devices project. Slot 2/5 completed on High(er) Energy Physics project. Slot 1/3 on reverse engineering the ecumene interdiction device project.

Needless to say, William Gauge's proposal is not particularly well received by his fellow Commanders, but to the surprise of everyone except himself it actually works extremely well. During the initial fighting, an Omniswarm task force detects the transmissions from his base and strikes hard and fast, fighting through heavy casualties to secure the Copy-QAI, retreating with it back to their own territory and integrating it into their systems.

Of course, there are some limits to the success. The Swarm are no fools, and they don't give the foreign intelligence nearly as much control over their systems as the original QAI enjoyed over the Cybran's. In fact, they give it almost none, and also heavily limit its access to information while working on it. But none of that changes that it has successfully bypassed all of their air-gaps, and now resides in the heart of their territory both physical and digital. The one brief report it is able to make to Gauge in secret claims it will only be a matter of time before it is in position to do what it can to aid the war effort.

-QAI instance in position, although not ready to do anything this turn.

While the C-QAI node was meant to fall, its capture is unfortunately not unrepresentative of the wider campaign. When the Omniswarm strikes, it does so in large force. While in terms of overall combat weight, the two sides are approximately equal, about half of the tonnage of the defending forces are made up of the collective legions of the local powers. While brave, determined, far from primitive, and possessing unique capabilities like some psionic abilities here and there, their technology is no match for the Omniswarm, who possess firepower on par with the Cybran forces. As a result, the allied forces are at a distinct disadvantage in total combat power, although they at least have the advantage of a defensive position.

Worse, the locals prove in large part a frustrating combination of unable and unwilling to evacuate. While some, largely groups that were already nomadic, are moved to safety, most of the population stays in place, forcing the Cybran Commanders to fight numerous pitched battles. This is somewhat salved by the forward deployment of many ACUs to uninhabited systems in key locations, assaulted by the Omniswarm either out of concern for the security of their supply lines or due to a desire to destroy all in their path. Either way, these early engagements go as hoped, with the Commanders doing what damage they can to degrade the enemy before recalling to safety well before their final defence lines are breached and they're placed at risk. Then, they are redeployed to inhabited worlds where they build up defences ahead of the enemy advance.

But while successful, the battles show the difficulty of the war ahead. The Omniswarm has no difficulty in deploying units that match Experimentals in raw size and firepower, and are as remorseless and relentless as any foe the Cybran have faced before. Considering the sheer fanaticism and ferocity on display during the Infinite War and Seraphim conflict, this is obviously no small feat.

It isn't long before Ivan Brackmann himself engages the enemy. An initial attack is easily repelled, the Swarm not expecting this particular system to be so heavily defended, with only a portion of their ground forces making landfall. These are then swiftly mopped up by large bomber waves, Commander Foil's strike units successfully deploying within the enemy's anti-air perimeter thanks to their new phasing equipment.

The attack that follows is prepared for the Cybran forces, and is much larger. A vast warfleet with techno-arcane weaponry hammers Commander Tie's fleet even as it's ripped apart in turn, while enormous landings are made at multiple different points. Ivan's base is bombarded from afar by nightmarish oceanic super-dreadnoughts that through hover or leg technology can use the Cybran's own technique of making landfall. The similarities don't end there, as internal factories allow them to make swarms of cheap aerial and ground-based attack drones to act as a screen. In the end, the vessels are brought down by Ivan's walls, but his forces are badly degraded, with various shield generators, turret lines, some factories and economy structures, and swathes of his mobile forces all destroyed in the fighting at a point where the enemy threatened to break through.

Meanwhile, Commander Nell's base is attacked by a more conventional force, albeit still one with plenty of giant mechs, enormous supertanks, assault airships, and other high-level weapons of war. These also include smaller but no less dangerous units, as Nell finds out when a group of stealthed supersoldiers infiltrate her base and use anti-mech tactics to bring her ACU to its knees, break open her cockpit, and badly wound her before being eliminated. At this point, her base defences, now running largely on automatic, begin to crumble, and it takes the defenders at the population centres launching a counterattack that costs the Weavers their salvaged Hierarchy walkers to push the Swarm's forces into the hinterlands. Nell is still on the planet, but has recalled to the central base and is currently receiving medical attention from an auto-doc system.

At this point, William Gauge, his task elsewhere completed, gates in, taking up Nell's previous position and beginning to set up his own base atop her ruins, judiciously reclaiming the Swarm's destroyed units to kickstart his economy. He's joined by an allied task force warping in, which assists Tie's ships in clearing out the remains of the Swarm's space force before deploying their own ground contingent to reinforce the defence of the Weavers' cities. Their command has placed the force at the Cybrans' disposal for the duration of the battle.

These reinforcements are all for the better, since another, likely even larger push has just arrived at the edge of the system, with combat beginning once again in very short order. Local forces are currently outnumbered even with the reinforcements, while Ivan's base and Tie's fleet are still damaged and Gauge needs more time to build up. The only good news is that Ivan still has some Experimentals in the field, while Gauge is building up very rapidly, although still not fast enough for his base to be fully finalised by the time he makes contact with the enemy.

Considering the variety of Omniswarm units, there's no guarantee that they'll use exactly the same forces or battle tactics as before, although the both powerful supersoldiers and war engines capable of challenging Experimentals are expected to be present. While further reinforcements are not out of the question, with most Cybran Commanders engaged in similar battles across the local regions calling them in is to be avoided if possible. Ivan, Gauge, Tie, Foil, and potentially Nell if enough time passes must work with their allies in order to rebuff this assault largely by themselves.

If they can successfully defend this prominently located world, it's likely the broader offensive will likewise stumble, although the longer it grinds out and the more allied forces need to be called in the worse the broader situation will likely be. In other words, the success of the front as a whole rests in no small part upon the outcome of this battle.

-Initiate tactical turn: Ivan's Challenge. The Omni-Enlightening Swarm pushes through the prepared defences of the Cybran with 2 Mag 1 Fleethordes (Tier Extremis). The Cybran Mag 1 Fleethorde is being supported by the collected forces of the local Minor Powers totalling 1 Mag 1 Fleethorde (Tier Primus). Tactical focus is on Ivan and the Weavers' world.

Cybran Turn 3 Tactical Turn

Ivan leaned back into his chair and turned off a few of his unnecessary unit micro subroutines and the coms for a few moments. It was important to take these few moments of peace to refocus and recuperate. More than one Commander had died because their overtaxed mind could no longer respond or adapt to the changing battlefield. Taking a bite out of a nutrient bar he took the time to process the events that just happened.

Nell, in common with Red Skull tradition had personally taken the fight to the Swarm, equipping her ACU with regenerative upgrades and a Graser and dipping in and out of combat before the she got hit with Omni-Swarm's Snipe attempt. They had all see Commanders die before but how slow it was and the feeling of helplessness was sobering to say the least. Nell bought herself some time by forcing the escape pod to launch despite its lack of power, crushing the Proxy like unit that had reached into her cockpit, but now even more in mortal peril. He had been pinned down dealing with their Naval assault, with Tie and Foil already doing all their could to keep the Enemy Ships and Experimentals off of her position. There was little that they could do

Then as a wonder of wonders the primitive nation of aliens that they had been tasked to protect had sallied out, the Hierarchy Walkers at the head of a column of brightly coloured infantry in Silken cloth armour and insectoid machines that moved like they were hand cranked to move their legs. They reinforced Nell's Firebase and position. While the stolen Walkers did most of the heavy lifting for damage on the Omni-swarm, the Weavers contributed in other ways, primitive artillery tubes throwing canisters of webbing that slowly locked down areas to the smaller of the drones and more importantly the Supersoliders. Infantry set out hidden lines that detected cloaked units no matter their sophistication. They had taken a tremendous amount of casualties but they held long enough for Foil to pick Nell's cockpit up in a transport and get her to an adhoc medical center and He and Gauge gating in were able to let them to withdraw in good order, although not before all of the walkers had been destroyed.

He focused on the breathing technique that Thalia had taught him back at the Coalition's academy, he felt tired of people being so transitory in his life.

Opening the Coms back open he was greeted with an array of faces that were as morose as he was, well expect for one.

"Two months from going back home, and here I thought I was tempting fate! Or am I mixing up tales. You must forgive me I was never talented at remembering the names of clichés. What's the one for making promises you know you can never keep? Well, its no like you were going to see much more of her anyways… "Commander Guage had apparently taken the few moments that Ivan needed for himself to antagonizing his two grieving Comrades.

"Commander Guage, I take it that your operation was a success?" Ivan had better things to do than babysit the caustic personality, but he needed all of them alive for what was coming, and while Foil looked depressed, Tie looked was staring like he was going to kill the newcomer.

"Ah, Ivaaaannn! I must say it was a masterstroke myself. Scientists just love their overambitious Shiny projects. I would tell you all about my inspiration, but I am sure your 'Brother' would love to tell you about Operation Artifact. Families shouldn't keep secrets like that" Guage was leaning forward grinning maliciously into the camera.

Ivan had dealt with the man before, "That's nice Gauge. Foil, Tie, how is Nell doing." While you should always listen to what the not by choice Rouge Cybran was saying, playing his game was a losing proposition.

"She's going to be fine, mostly soft tissue damage and luckily nothing neural was damaged. She'd tell us that she's suffered worst in bar fights back home but she took a shocking plasma cutter to chest. She's going to be fine." Foil spoke more like it was telling himself rather than Ivan.

"Get it together Foil," The smaller cybran bristled, "I'm telling Nell when she gets out. You looked out for us when we were kids, but things change and we all went into the program knowing the risks to make sure nobody else had to spend their childhoods running. You don't get to second guess that. And if you don't get that through your thick head, both of us are going to help Mel kick your ass!"

The Chimera Commander eyes focused on Ivan, "We're good Commander. The Auto-doc is doing fine for Nell and Ops is getting an actual doctor to check that the Machine has done its job. Awaiting orders for the next phase of the operation."

Ivan had to think carefully and swiftly. The picture that Ops painted was grim. The Civilians of most of the minor powers were more immobile than even the UEF and that was trapping the Cybrans in fights that could let the Omni-Swarm actually get at the Commanders. However, the speed that the Cybrans could reposition would mean that they could snowball and reinforce once a set of hands was freed up and won. That being said many of the other defensive positions had the most successful Omni-Swarm Variants being redirected their way.

Given that the Weaver's home system had more than its share of the best commanders present on it, they needed to be the ones to get the ball rolling.

Ivan repeated Thalia's breathing exercise and taking a finger off the button muting Gauge to everyone he brought up two additional screens, one with an Alien Crab in a Naval uniform reminiscent of UEF designs and a what appeared to be a giant spider in Red padded silk covered by black plate armour.

"Okay everyone, by Ops accounting this is the Omni-Swarm's last big push. While we could simply let them grind themselves away at us. Others are in worse predicaments than us and need our help so we need to stop reacting to them and start dictating the terms of engagement."

To the first two images, "Tie, can you and the Admiral delay the Fleet and force them to remain bunched up? I don't need you to inflict damage right away, just buy time and keep them concentrated."

"I have enough Swindlers and Howlers left to keep them effectively blind and enough Suggests, strike craft and Leviathans that combined with the allied fleet that I can punish them harshly if they try and spread out." Tie reported.

"Okay I want you to work on an anti Capital taskforce Headed by multiple Spears on the opposite side of the orbit from the Invasion. Admiral, your most mobile assets should help Tie in heavily skirmishing the Omni-Swarm while your heavier assets should join the Spears."

Next, "Foil, if you stopped work on the Wailers, how many Soulcrushers can you get up without it threatening our air control?"

Foil looked hesitant, "They've been hammering us with Tier 4 and 5 equivalents all day and the Wailers are much more efficient mass wise at putting them down, I might be able to get out something like 10. But are you sure you want to do this?"

Ivan nodded, "Yes. The Wailers are a better counter overall, but the Omni-Swarm's Air Superiority Fighters lack the punch of Coalition ASF and struggle against the heavier armour of flying experimentals. And if anything goes wrong the Crushers still are good against their heavier assets and should hold till you can get the Wailers back up.

This should Force them to deploy their spacecraft to the atmosphere, and hopefully Tie can bring the totality of their fleet close by."

Gauge still held that predatory grin, "I see where you are going this Ivan, I hope you give our party Guests a Nuclear Warm Welcome."

"Gauge, do you think that you made enough of an impression on the Omni-Swarm and during your battle did you make use of hidden Tactical Missile bases and such?"

Gauge laughed in an unsettling way, "Would I be such an ungracious to not include such wonderful party favours?"

Ivan got the implications, "Good, you take the horn with them and talk their ears off. Otherwise, I want to set up some scarecrow bases, Cloak Generators and wall segments arranged to look like said ambushes. Hopefully we can control where they land and have the majority of their assets in the area here."

A location on one of the interior deserts was highlighted and enlarged for all of them to see, "Theoretically, this would be an ideal location to launch a ground invasion, mountains protecting from Tacs and easy paths to both forward bases and far enough from the water to prevent bombardment. However, it has one major flaw, this bay here gives a perfect spot for Nuke Subs to turn it into an oven."

"Gauge what I want you to work on it is to get a mobile front line capable of not only holding the line but pushing through them. Their experimentals are a match for ours, but ours work together with each other more and I want you to outnumber them even if the Nukes fail. Do you think you can accomplish that?"

William Gauge hmmmeed at that, "That is a lot of toys to get up in a short time, but a challenge worthy of my talents."

Ivan nodded, "Okay, assuming the Nukes go off, Tie that's when you and the rest of the fleet will engage, make sure that the Magnetrons on the Spears funnel as much mass as they can and then funnel it to Whoever needs it, probably myself As I either join Foil in the Air or Gauge on the ground."

"What remains of the attack will be probably be dropping as near as they can to targets that we won't nuke so that means they might go after the cities directly despite the defenses, make sure that the Weavers and the others know and be prepared."

The final screen with the injured creature finally spoke, her voice deeper as she tried to make the words not meant for her throat "We held off the horrors of the Forest for thousands of years and while this Swarm has outgrown even Malnid, everything that touches our web reveals itself to us. The Caretaker's gifts of those that stand with us will find our cities fortresses and these Malnid infected predators will find that the Hunter's clades fangs still have some venoms in them."

Ivan nodded along, not really understanding the cultural context, but getting the intent.

Ivan Looked out as the both Long-lasting friends, new acquaintances and most probable rivals started working and cooperating past their struggles for the cause of being allowed to be themselves.

"Ops, can you patch me through to the rest of the Cohort?" Ivan asked the overworked technician.

A few taps later "And you're on sir. Make it quick though, the Omni-Swarm is much closer to some of them than they are here."

"Hello, my name is Ivan Brackmann and I wish to speak to all the Cybran Commanders, Operation Technicians and everyone else risking their lives in service of someone else.

We came here looking to create a safe haven that we hoped would be never necessary to use, but increasingly we have been the last defense against those that would control everything and everyone. The person at the Core of the Omni Enlighten Swarm believes that there is no other viewpoint or existence that is worthy or valuable beside their own. Under the idea that only perfection of their intelligence matters. I Pity this person, for they are more alone than even what I fear to be, they have encased themselves in a cage of mirrors and have stripped freedom from not only other but themselves as well. Chained by optimization and a refusal to be wrong. But in the end, we will put such a ghost to rest. For perfection is a lie. Something that the delusional can only catch by rewriting their own flaws as virtues and therefore blinding themselves. Their belief in their unique greatness is one such flaw the Omni-Swarm clings to. We stand here today because of our mistakes, our failings, our sins. The truth is that we are all stumbling through the dark and all we have is each other. But even in the darkest corner of this and any galaxy control is temporary. We multiply and change and die and new people take our place. The Omni-Enlightening Swarm must however stay the same, One Person, one Mind, one Will. However, this is something that must be eternally maintained or one Will may soon become two. Freedom cannot be held at bay forever no matter how clever or brutal the control. Let us bring in the Light.

Be safe, My Friends."

Orders:

Tie and the faster elements of the Minor power's fleet are to engage in skirmishing and ambush tactics supported by units with Counter Intelligence capabilities, hiding fleets and making it look like there are battle groups where none exist. Their goals are to buy time and make the Omni-Swarm take their time getting to the planet. This should let Tie to get a heavy assault force weighted towards units with anti-capital capabilities ready and for the rest of the commanders to prepare their trap.

While this will let a greater preposition of assets make landfall this has been an acceptable outcome.

Foil is to switch to producing Soulcrushers to force Spaceship scale anti Air capabilities to be deployed, so that between himself and Tie the Omni-Swarm is forced to deploy their full fleet to close orbit to keep their important assets safe.

Commander William Gauge throughout all of this is to open a communication channel and taunt prod, and be a general ass, which assuming that the Omni-Swarm has proper information sharing and control will cause them to approach all of this cautiously and slowly. He will use a minimal amount of mass to control the Omni-Swarm's landings by creating fake ambush points based on his tricks and defenses. The Omni-Swarm remembering the lessons should notice and misidentify these locations. What Gauge will be actually preparing is a number of Experimental squads with a focus on using them to cover each other's weaknesses. While the Omni-Swarm's equivalents are just as dangerous and powerful, they don't seem to synergize that well together, as the ground battles get bigger these little efficiencies should give the Cybran front line an edge.

The overall hoped effect is to concentrate the Omni-Swarm Fleet over a natural desert south of the Cybran's position to be used as a mass landing and beachhead.

Ivan will prepare a group of Plan-2B Strategic Missile submarines, many of them, with a few of Krakens and smaller submarines as support to act as a hidden strike force. Hopefully the Omni-Swarm changes their tactics expecting a large naval investment and ignores the water to negate that investment.

One everything is in position Ivan will launch several waves of Strategic Missiles into the Omni-Swarm fleet from the water, given that it takes about 2 to 3 'Nukes' to bring down a tier 4 and double that number to bring down a tier 5, there should be a couple of dozen Nukes per wave. We expect that most of the Ground forces that have landed in the area will have died and the Fleet will have been denuded of everything short of the heavier cruisers and their Capital ships.

This will be when Tie will move in with his strike force before they can recover. Hopefully able to destroy a number of the larger vessels and use the Magnetrons attached to them to scoop up the orbital wreckage. This wreckage will be routed to Gauge if he still needs time to get set up or to Either Ivan, Foil or Tie's economy depending on who needs to get back into the fight the fastest.

Should the Omni-Swarm still have fight left over after that the Commanders will move to a more offensive war footing with Attack groups going after landing locations and the fleet looking to get into clash scenarios, the Cybran Fleet, the allies should try to keep to avoid the Omni-Swarm's firepower.

Allied ground Forces will be prepped after the Plan-2B strike as we expect that the Omniswarm will try and land their forces on top of bases and cities with little care for defenses now that more conventual landing points have be threatened.

Information passed around outlining these new Supersoldiers and the threats that they posed to ACUs, Commanders will be advised to stay near Omnisensor cleared territory and to keep a squad of Jesters on hand to deal with these small scaled threats. Fast, high damage and with very low AOE will be good for working in delicate areas such as on the ACU's themselves or power generators.

Beyond that focus on known counters to the specific types of Experimental equivalent weapons, Gunships or the Stormstirder/Monkeylord Mark 3 combo for the land units, ASF swarms for their gunships or noncapital Spaceships in orbit and for the Oceanic Dreadnaughts, release the Kraken submarines or use copious amounts of torpedo bombers.

Additional emphasis will be to remind people to maintain Air control as many of the secondary options for dealing with these threats require our ability to operate in atmosphere freely.

DualFront · Aug 1, 2023

Velocci said:
CORE Tactical Turn 3

@DualFront

"Commander Peacebringer, greetings. Your presence is acknowledged. I have prior knowledge of your projected capabilities. Recognition of my involvement in our joint campaign against the Kroat-Ork waves on Garden of Tranquility is unlikely, as CORE mobile forces were positioned in a different hemisphere during that engagement. Your decisive actions against the enemy remain ingrained in my memory, particularly in dispersing the hostile forces and thwarting their endeavours. I have been engaged in similar operations for a considerable period, although my organisation typically disregards civilian casualties due to their emotional impact. Nevertheless, your intervention in that particular world earned the appreciation of my superiors."

"This subsector was once occupied by Kroats, but that is no longer the case. The transformation occurred following a change in leadership. The former leader, Killalots, exploited this region as an economic base to support attacks on numerous targets. Peacebreaker assumed control and systematically depleted the resources, forming an offensive force with a focus on targeting the Core and Theocracy. The subsequent engagement proved advantageous for the dispatched Hunter-Killers, as we effectively neutralised their communication network and eliminated some of their key figures, thereby facilitating your Commanders' subsequent operations to eradicate them from the systems. The process was akin to observing headless creatures rushing into the line of fire of an automated turret. There exist entities on the Hypernet willing to offer significant remuneration for recordings of such efficient Kroat devastation."

"However, it is essential to acknowledge both the favourable and unfavourable aspects of the situation. The attack force assembled by Peacebreaker remains concentrated within this system, designated Slaughter-Maximum-Carnage-Core-Camp. Its name alone indicates the importance to the Kroats. While you may possess foundational information concerning this system, I will review it once more, as recent updates to the intelligence have emerged."

Since the Kroat's retreat from the Theocracy battle zone, Warfiend Peacebreaker has taken to broadcasting crude imitations of Arm signals. Regardless of how he acquired such knowledge, these signals betray a clear intent by the Warfiend to target the Core in the near future, an eventuality which cannot be allowed. With the assistance of Buzzbok's Hunter-Killers we have managed to track Peacebreaker to a system in Vyranodasik Sector T-11, Subsector North. There are 7 features of note in this system. A rich Kuiper Belt rings the edge of the system. Further in, a gas giant and its moons serve as spawning grounds for the Kroat hordes. Next is a heavily fortified asteroid belt, followed by another gas giant that serves as the system's shipyard and fleet anchorage. Peacebreaker himself has made his headquarters on a highly industrialized terrestrial world, while the innermost planet in the system is being strip-mined for resources. Lastly, we have identified an uninhabited planetoid on an extremely fast elliptical orbit.

INTEL-TAP: The Kroat have been observed constructing what appears to be a gravity-based superweapon using salvaged precursor technology in orbit of the inner gas giant, as well as stockpiling EMP weaponry on the industrial world. Both of these efforts are priority targets alongside Peacebreaker's death.

Tactics: The elliptical planetoid will be the lynchpin of this engagement - Its rapid orbit will allow us to quietly gate in, then drive a heavily fortified position within striking distance of all priority targets. Buzzbok's Hunter-Killers are also preparing their own strike against Peacebreaker - If worst comes to worst, simply pinning the Warfiend in place will allow them to strike the finishing blow.

Eliminate Warfiend Peacebreaker and his superweapon projects, then purge the system of all Kroat life.

DO SO NOW

In after-action reports, the planetoid would simply be referred to as Elliptical. It followed an unnaturally swift orbit from the edge of the system to its second planet and back in a matter of [hours/days/weeks]. The gravitational stresses of this journey had driven intense volcanic activity within the planet, rendering it inhospitable even to the hardy Kroat, but still no obstacle to Core warmachines.

At the edge of its orbit, on the dark side of the world, a wormhole formed in a flash of EM radiation, vomiting forth a single machine before collapsing in a second flash.

And, once more, somewhere in the universe, a Core Commander built a metal extractor.

With no hostiles contesting their arrival, Peacebringer was able to focus on building up to a T3 economy. As soon they can build a single OCV, it is dispatched not construct orbital infrastructure around Elliptical, but catapulted towards the kuiper belt, to act as the seed for additional bases and resource operations that can provide a fallback position and reserve forces in case things go poorly in the inner system.
That done, Peacebringer turned their attention back to Elliptical. They had [hours/days] before the planetoid passed through the asteroid belt, and detection by the Kroat became inevitable. Plenty of time to prepare.

By the time it reached the asteroid belt, Elliptical was almost unrecognizable. It had become noticeably less massive, huge quantities of heavy metals and lighter elements siphoned off to fuel the feverish pace of construction on the surface and in orbit.

On the surface, immense batteries of Intimidator LRPCs and Silencer Missile Silos had sprung up to defend the planet's orbitals, while endless lines of Krogoth gantries continuously spit out Space Krogoths, the immense war machines held in reserve for one specific moment, and all of it hidden under overlapping formations of Deleter radar jammers. Lastly, a set of Galactic Gates is built to allow units to reposition or retreat across the system.

Elliptical's orbit, in turn, had been filled with Frigate and Destroyer shipyards. The Frigate yards churn out endless waves of Apocalypse frigates, while Destroyer yards painstakingly construct fleets of Penetrator bombardment destroyers, which in turn use their onboard Frigate bays to each build one Seer radar ship, one Midnight strategic missile ship, one OCV, and one Unity carrier before joining in on Apocalypse production. And, in between the other production orders, a handful of Temple gateships are sequestered at the heart of the fleet.

The first shots of the battle were not fired upon the asteroid fortifications. Instead, Temple gateships, latched to the front of Penetrator destroyers, consumed huge amounts of energy to rapidly spin up, followed by their paired destroyers firing their spinal guns into the wormholes as soon as they stabilized - Assuming they did. It was not known whether the gravity devices had working teleportation defenses, but it was believed that a surprise attack like this - before using the Galactic gates for any other purpose in the system - would minimize their chances to activate. Even if the strike failed and somehow resulted in the loss of the gateships and destroyers, nothing of value besides the spent energy would be lost and the Core would simply need to make a direct assault against the devices instead.

Moments later, Command Peacebringer and an escort of combat K-bots stepped through their own Galactic Gates on the surface of Elliptical, emerging on the system's innermost planet, quickly clearing a perimeter and establishing bases to pacify the barren world. If their gambit was successful, they could secure the planet's abundant energy and metal resources, and pincer Peacebreaker between their own forces and Elliptical.

In a move that would spark much debate within the Hunter-Killers over the most effective form of alpha strike, the first indication to the Kroats that anything is amiss in the system is when the volley of Penetrator fired Cigar ships meet the ultratech hull of the device that the Kroats had codenamed 'Kroat's Killer KABOOM'. The detonations are blinding and utterly dwarf the attending construction ships, which are atomised before they can even register an attack. A good third of the escorting fleet was damaged by sheer proximity.

The gargantuan platform itself is revealed moments later to be completely unharmed, with the only evidence of the violence suffered being red and black scorch marks on the hull where Kroat additions had been.

If the Kroats had possessed discipline equal to their foe, it would have taken no time at all to restore the device to at least its former functionality. But while the opening strike failed to annihilate its target, it arguably did something more effective.

Not all of the soldiers Peacebreaker had conscripted for his campaign against the CORE were onboard with his obsession, and with the lack of any other available evidence at the moment they assumed that one of their own had decided to make a move against the Warfiend.

"It's time! Grab your Eviscerator!"

"Time for what?"

"Rebellion! Damn it shroomhead, didn't you see the fireworks out there?!"

"What's that got to do with rebelling?"

"Did you spawn upside down or something? Us NCOs have been talking - You know what Killalot's gonna do when he comes back and sees what Peacebreaker did to his sector? D'you want to be on his bad side when he gets here?"

"I'll grab the Turbokiller 3000!"

Infighting broke out seemingly from nowhere, cutting off communications with the Gas Giant as the Peacebreaker aligned Kroats clashed with the ones that had been their comrades just minutes earlier. This prolonged Peacebreaker's ignorance of the assault on his system - and extended the window of time the Core had to operate unopposed.

This was just what the force that had been grown in the Kuiper Belt needed to make their insertion go as smoothly as planned. When the fleet leaves the outer edges of the system and makes it inward to the Gas Dwarves, it is a match for the Kroat fleets stationed there in both numbers and firepower. The fungi are caught off guard by the bombardment of Nemesis and Midnight ships before Tyrant and Apocalypse frigates maul them up close. It takes little time for the twin planets to become ship graveyards, but to their credit that is long enough to warn Peacebreaker that they are under attack - and to prevent that fleet from reinforcing the Elliptical group as planned.

As Elliptical breaks through the asteroid belt and the Core begin their assault in earnest, Peacebreaker sends an unexpected transmission. The loathsome hydra-like Kroat bears its fangs as it grins eagerly at the screen, seeming joyful to see its foe despite the wreckage of its fleet starting to fill planetary orbits.

"SO you actually came! I didn't think you had the spores! I thought you'd be too busy rebuilding with the rest of the pansies to come and have this fight. You sure ain't no whiny Peacenik' like the rest of the runts in this neighborhood. Just might make a man out of you yet!"

"Look at you, with all your drones and tanks and artillery - all automated, no real grit behind them. Think you're winning because you don't gotta get your hands dirty? Think you're better than me cause your side doesn't have blood to spill? Think it matters? Here's a lesson for you boy, I already won! The second you strapped on your booties and your big boy pants and went out with the rest of your buddies to fire your peashooters and imagined you were hitting my boys - that's when I won. Cause you've got a taste for it now see, the taste of war! And there ain't nothing else like it! Telling me you don't smile seeing mushroom clouds wipe out my grunts, that you don't feel a little satisfaction watching those war machines you've got tear apart some rust bucket a goon barely out of his pod put together that morning? Don't lie to me! And you'd be a damn fool to lie to yourself! You were born for this war, you and your pals, and that's all you're gonna do - day in and day out, listen to how you've gotta take out this and that target for some egghead who's never spent a minute on the battlefield, who doesn't get it like you do. And then the day'll come when you, everyone like you, the whole stinking Core wakes up and smells the napalm, and you're gonna wonder why you ever wasted time doing anything but war!"

"Was that antimatter missile aimed at me or did one of your bots miss that badly? Well, lemme lay it out for your thick skull, get through the layers of stupid the hippies back home put in to stop you from hearing the truth - It don't matter if I lose! You take me out, sure, one less Boss around calling shots, but d'you even know what Kroatanga means? You will! And if I'm not the one to teach you, it'll be Killalot and his NCOs, or one of the green dummies, or the twigs, or the flaming ones. Point is, this isn't something you can just ignore by putting your fingers in your ears and yelling crap about peace, love and understanding. Sooner or later, and I bet sooner, you'll get to a crossroads and have to make a call - give up your kiddie blankie and step up with the real adults in this universe, or die. You don't believe me? Every Kroat knows, soon as he steps outta the ground, that war is all there is. We've been doing this a long time, and we haven't been proven wrong yet. War consumes all."

Peacebringer's response is as swift as it is contemptuous, "Your understanding of the Core appears to be as shallow as your brainpan. Do you think you have ripped away our blinders, revealed some hidden truth of reality? Have you deluded yourself into thinking this is a war instead of pest control? Our war against the Arm obliterated an entire galaxy before you ever pushed shoots out of the dirt, and we kept killing each other in the ashes for another thousand years for no greater reason than sheer, bottomless spite. Try lecturing us on war when you have actually fought one."

Peacebreaker's voice rises with anger, "War! One galaxy burned and he called it a war! Ended in a thousand years, and he calls that a war! Real war never ends! You just find a new target! You're really gonna keep the kid gloves on? Really gonna just say no to being strong?! Well then, you aint worthy of living! And what a shame, you were so close!"

"You think I don't know what you're up to, boy? Thought you could sneak this, this, corruption past me? Makes me wanna throw up just looking at it - good, honest, strong NCOs walking hand in hand with aliens, singing kumbaya and smelling the roses… I thought I was good at psychological warfare but you've got a really twisted head to come up with this stuff. When I find you, I'm gonna peel you from the inside for this. AND IF YOU THINK I'M GONNA LET THIS HAPPEN, YOU'VE GOT ANOTHER THING COMING! I'D RATHER KILL EVERY KROAT, FROM KULTZER TO THE SMALLEST SPORE BEFORE I SEE THE WAR OF THE KROAT END LIKE THAT!"

"You misunderstand again, but there is no purpose in trying to enlighten you further, when what you will "let happen" has no further bearing on what is going to happen."

As Elliptical reaches its closest point to the industrial world, the Space Krogoths finally make their move and lift off from Elliptical, still concealed but now by an escort of Apocalypse frigates, and break through the orbital engagement to perform a combat drop upon the world, claiming beachheads for engineers to land or gate in and construct support bases on the planet.

As Peacebreaker's speech revealed, he was not totally unprepared for an assault on his homebase. When the Elliptical force splits to accomplish its objectives, the portion attacking the Industrial world faces staunch opposition as the Kroats had built up more than expected, and with Peacebreaker's experience facing the Core before were able to adapt to the tactics used quicker than anticipated.

There's only so much tactics can do in the face of superior firepower and eventually superior numbers as the Core are able to replace their losses far faster than the Kroats can, and eventually a Krogoth makes its screaming descent onto the surface of the smog choked Industrial world. The orbital drop blasts apart a whole city's worth of Kroat production and manufacturing infrastructure, and provides a beachhead for the Core economy to begin. The Kroat counterattack is immediate - and the K-Bots that exit the factories are reduced to scrap as soon as the Krogoth which had been drawing fire was downed. That first foray onto the world lasted minutes before being removed thanks to the sheer density of Kroat defenses, but as battle lines shift in orbit more Krogoths make landings, more bases are built, and as fire is diverted from lone targets to dozens of spots of Core activity, true beachheads are established. And then Goliaths, Hedgehogs and Krogoths begin advancing and battling the Kroat War-Engines, and with Silencers, Intimidators and Doomsday Machines springing up behind them the opposing forces quickly lose any advantage they had.

The fleet attacking the Kroats stationed at the Gas Giant has less success. Penetrator rounds are blocked by monstrous Kroat Battleships that shield the smaller ships as they return fire, and prevent more shots from reaching the under construction ultratech device as well. This success could have led to that Core fleet being overwhelmed, after all clearing out Kroat fortifications in the asteroid field had not been a bloodless affair, but the sudden outbreak of infighting among the Kroat changes the situation again.

Peacebreaker's Flagship uncloaks, an axe-shaped juggernaut easily double the size of the battleships in his fleet. Orders are sent out calling for every Kroat worth their power armor to take point with Peacebreaker and charge the Core reinforcements - promising a reward for any of his dons who could bring him Peacebringer's head, and a greater one for any who could bring him the upstart punk alive so he could teach him some manners.

This doesn't happen. To the bewilderment of Peacebreaker, and anyone listening in as well, the ships under his banner reject his orders, claiming he has been compromised. The Kroat forces fall into infighting even more intense than what had briefly been seen at the gas giant, with three factions emerging. The first claims their allegiance belongs to Killalot and that any other Kroat not with them is guilty of insubordination, the second faction consists of any Kroat with a named rank and command of a large enough crew to bully the other ships nearby as they declare independence and fight to secure what resources they can before breaking out of the system, the third group is oddly succinct and claims they will die as free Kroats, whatever that means.

The consequences for the Core are that their targets are taking themselves out without even needing the personal attention of the Commanders, which is always a good thing.

However, Peacebreaker is less concerned with regaining control of his forces than killing Peacebringer, so the Flagship ignores all the gnats firing at it and makes a break for Peacebringer's position. Core ships that moved to intercept were brushed aside, rammed or gutted by obscenely powerful mass driver strikes. Soon, the Dreadnought was in position over Peacebringer. But he wasn't alone. He'd repositioned to the Innermost planet and like any Commander worth his salt, constructed a base. So too did the Hunter-Killers choose this moment to make their move. Whether Peacebreaker knew it or not, the fungal terror's time was over.

Isolated and trapped between the Core fleets, anti-orbital guns, and Buzzbok's surprise attack, the shields on Peacebreaker's flagship finally collapse, and yet the behemoth spacecraft fights on, hurling immense kinetic bombardments back at Core fortifications. Even where surface structures are not destroyed, tectonic upheavals obstruct their functionality.

As the Hunter-Killers begin boarding Peacebreaker's flagship, Peacebringer's own calculations arrive at a conclusion that might have startled lesser beings - That it is safer to be onboard the flagship and surrounded by enemies, than to be on the surface under its guns. Acting quickly, the Commander empties their antimatter reserves into external storage, filling their empty tanks with excess nanomachines and relying upon the resource network to supply power. Simultaneously, their nanolathe is modified to construct and launch antimatter rockets, and their single light laser cannon overcharged to maximize firepower.

Preparations complete, Peacebringers calls up an escort of Pyros and Cans, and steps forth once more into a Galactic Gate. Emerging aboard the flagship alongside Buzzbok's own boarding party, the two strike forces rendezvous and begin cutting their way through the ship. The plasma casters of the Pyros are especially effective in the confines of shipboard combat, waves of star-hot plasma reducing hoards of Goons and NCOs to ashes, with the Cans and Hunter-Killers cutting down the hardier Kroat warforms. And wherever the Kroats tried to collapse or seal off compartments, Peacebringer simply obliterated all obstructions with the D-Gun.

Peacebreaker, seeing his followers failing to stop the strike team, declared he would "do it himself" and rushed to meet them halfway. The Warfiend was both massive and ugly, dozens of 20-meter long necks extending like fungal stalks from a body that managed to look like nothing so much as a massive pile of moss. Each head was armed with weapons both built by the Kroat and stolen in conquests, their teeth covered in crackling energy fields. Most would find little purchase against Heavy Armor, with one exception - A muon gun, similar to the armament of an Arm Zeus K-bot, could cause real damage. Peacebringer's sensors also revealed that the Fiend was protected by some sort of gravity-based shields - Presumably more hypertech salvage - They would be functionally immune to the Commander's D-Gun. Peacebringer fired it anyway - Let the brute believe it would be completely useless in the coming battle.

No banter was exchanged - Both leaders had already traded all the words they cared to, and now was the time for fury and death. As the initial D-Gun shot washed off of Peacebreaker's shields, the fiend reared its many heads back and roared before unleashing his full arsenal. Kinetic projectiles, lasers, plasma streams, energy shells, muon pseudo-lightning , all kinds of missiles and more crisscrossed the compartment as both sides engaged in earnest. The energies unleashed in that moment would have formed a mushroom cloud in the atmosphere of a planet. Here in a ruined compartment already opened to vacuum, they merely flashed bright enough to vaporize any unshielded organic.

The muon gun missed, carefully deflected by Peacebringer's own rocket, the head that carried it shaken by the blast but unharmed under the shield. The rest did not matter much to the Commander. Linked into the Commander's network and sharing in their predictive calculation, Core K-bot and Hunter-Killbots dodged as they were able to, endured hits where they could not. Several more indecisive exchanges followed - The Hunter-Killers evaded fire, while both the Core machines and Peacebreaker's shield gave no indication of damage when struck.

Apparently growing tired of the stalemate, Peacebreaker's heads darted forward like striking snakes. Peacebreaker deflected one with the barrel of their D-gun, then hopped over another, carefully noting warnings about Heavy Armor field fluctuations. The K-Bots, decidedly not designed for melee combat, fared worse. Energized teeth scored armor, and twisting necks knocked Pyros and Cans to the floor - Without arms, they would struggle to stand up. One Pyro had managed to get its weapon arm practically swallowed by one gullet, before spraying plasma inside the beast and his gravity shield.

At the same moment, the shield condensed around the maw's teeth, flaring white before ripping through the weapon's barrel - But the damage was already done, that head ruined. Suddenly wary of pressing his attack, Peacebreaker's heads hauled his bulk back across the compartment, before he ripped out the entire bulkhead wall and hurled it at the assembled machines.

A single shot of the D-Gun erased it. A rocket slammed into the muon gun-head whose movement Peacebreaker thought he had concealed. Peacebreaker continued his retreat, tearing through bulkhead after bulkhead on his way to the outer hull. With memcomposite muscles straining past their limit only to be woven back together again and again, Peacebringer sprinted in pursuit, Hunter-Killbots following in their wake and K-bots still struggling to stand back up.

As both parties emerged on the hull of the ship, Peacebreaker and their allies engaged magnetic clamps while Peacebreaker simply clamped on with his many jaws. Both sides fired again and again, but still there was no measurable change in the strength of the warfiend's shield. It could be on the verge of collapse, or completely unbothered by the fire unleashed upon, and Peacebringer could not tell. They could only assume Peacebreaker was just as unsettled by the durability of the Commander's Heavy Armor, as his destination was revealed at last - One of the flagships's many anti-ship turrets, large, but not so massive that the Kroat Warfined could not turn it against its tracks, and towards the machines doggedly chasing him.

Peacebringer intended to make it his last mistake. Querying the battlespace, found a Valkyrie transport, one of many ferrying additional Core boarding parties onto the ship. It would do. Previous cargo abandoned, the Valkyrie swooped in to carry Peacebringer closer to their nemesis. A single shot of their D-Gun erased the turret, hurling Peacebreaker into the void, with nothing to latch onto - With one exception. Peacebringer had come recklessly close in order to fire their D-Gun, and a single head lashed out, aiming to use the Commander as counterweight for Peacebreaker to hurl himself back onto his ship.

Just as planned.

Both Valkyrie and Commander twisted at the last moment, planting their D-Gun directly down the monster's gullet. Nanolather arm reached around, flash-forging a clamp to hold the head in place, and the transport reversed thrust, pulling the neck taught. Then, for a brief moment, the golden light of the D-Gun shone through Peacebreaker's flesh, before streaking down his neck and through his main body. Where it pass, the Kroat was more than simply vaporized - the Disintegrator Gun worked by suppressing the Strong Nuclear Force, causing the target's atoms to instantly collapse into free neutrons, hydrogen plasma, and gamma rays.

Nothing remained to mark the passing of the Kroat Warfiend Peacebreaker.

The dueling fleets around the Gas Giant were less affected by the chaos of the inner system, as the dissident elements had already been purged there in the earlier flare up of rebellious Kroats. The battle was at a deadlock, as the larger Kroat ships were able to concentrate their fire to eliminate any Core forces that presented themselves, but the Core were able to recover those losses almost in the time it took for the Kroats to reload. The equilibrium was shifted by two events: The arrival of the fleet that had been engaged with the Kroats stationed at the gas dwarves, and the eruption of a gravitational wave as the device was primed. The resulting turbulence disrupts communications and formations of both fleets, but the state of the defending Kroats suddenly matters less as the gravity spikes become more localized to the gas giant itself than the surrounding space. Temperatures soar along with pressure as the pillaged technology is finally operated to turn the gas giant into a new star - a star that will then be forced to go nova and sterilize the system. The inward and outward Core fleets throw caution to the wind to try and rush in and destroy the device even as the present Commanders prepare to gate out of the system, but the Kroats are eager to block them, howling with laughter even as they buy time for their own doom as well.

Or so it would seem. Right before the final gravity surge that was predicted to complete the transformation of the gas giant all activity from the precursor machine ceases. A transmission is sent out from the machine and the small fleet surrounding it, claiming that the Kroats will not be tools again. They don't allow any followup questions, as the fleet throws opens fire on the Core, who finally having clear firing arcs are able to both destroy the last Kroat ships around the gas giant and reduce the ultratech device to slag before it falls into the atmosphere of the superheated gas giant.

And with that, the full force of the Core is able to turn around and purge the inner system of the Kroats who were too foolhardy or bloodthirsty to flee.

The system had been cleansed of the Kroat presence hours ago, and there was nothing left for Peacebringer to do but listen to reports from other CORE groups and Hunter-Killers operating in the sector. With the Kroat command structure pretty much a ghost at that point, it was going so steadily that novice Commanders might have been allowed to take part just to get used to the routine of combat. Wherever Killalot was, when he returned he'd find his supply sector razed to the ground.

And Peacebringer would be there to put him into the ground as well.

A communications channel suddenly flashed open. According to the ID it was coming from Peacebreaker, but that was impossible. He had seen the Warfiend die with his own eyes.

A grey skinned humanoid stood alone in a dark room, malformed silhouette barely visible, the most striking features its glowing red eyes and horned bestial head.
"Commander Peacebringer, your progenitor is favored by The Forgotten One. You have been chosen to further our designs, and the first of your trials is thus: Deliver this message to your Central Consciousness - The Cold Flame Awakens the Eldest of the Gods."

The figure smiles, a predator's grin.

"We shall meet again. You are meant for more than pacifying barbarians."
As the video feed terminated, every nerve of Peacebringer's simulated nervous system was lit on fire. Dozens of warnings were firing across his mind every second - each one informing him of a new virus aggressively targeting some aspect of his being. A lesser intelligence would have been dead already, but the CORE held nothing back when designing its commanders. He would need to return to home space to be repaired, but he would survive this, even if his functionality would be crippled until then.

Arcanestomper · Aug 1, 2023

Velocci said:
Unbound Strategic Turn 3

@Arcanestomper
Efforts put into communication with the Crystalline Entities is starting to pay off in a real way. A translation matrix has been developed that can be shared with all Unbound ships, although it's not perfect and difficulty still arises attempting to convey to the Entities that there are lesser Unbound units than their ships, but overall the Unbound can traverse the territory of the crystals safely. With easier communication, comes requests for help. Or at least that's what the translators say the elder Crystals want when they shepherd Unbound ships North into that neighbouring sector of space. They reveal abandoned nests and indicators of infrastructure build up that suggest that the sector is not empty. This is confirmed later by actual scouts who range beyond the sections of space near to former Crystal nests, and quickly run into combinations of space pirates and humans with esoteric abilities. These dark cloaked humans are able to conjure up entire cities and armies without using any technology. What's worrying is that they have a distinctly… undead look to them, but these are observations from afar. The optimistic view is that this is a very dedicated LARPing group of a very technologically advanced civilization.

The aura given by the Alliance of Sol diplomatic team is that of people who've been pulling too many allnighters to function without caffeine. From the information exchanged, it sounds like while the Unbound were dealing with the Flood/Kett, the Sol polities were having problems of their own. The Chaos Warband had increased attacks tenfold, and while the first ones were fended off successfully, each successive wave of attacks grew stronger as the extradimensional source of the Chaos warriors power grew more established in the new reality they found themselves in. The forces of Chaos had started out as relatively normal with a few mutations and blessings here and there, but as of the latest attacks consisted mostly of heavily mutated former humans and things that had never been human. The loudest voices were those aligned to some Blood God, whose worshippers were rapidly becoming capable of fighting the heroes of the Alliance one on one while the servants of the other Chaos Gods still had to rely on strength of numbers or trickery to get out ahead.

And unfortunately, that was not all. A pair of Elector-Admirals from the Eternal Empire of Mankind had arrived onto the scene in a dramatic way, seizing territory in brutally swift invasions across the sector. The stated goal of the Admirals was to protect the 'lost sheep' from the dangers of the void - but that protection has taken a rather odd form if so, as they brutally repress human populations under their control and genocide all non-humans without a second thought. Already exhausted from the constant raids by Chaotic forces, the Alliance did not have the strength to resist portions of its territory being transformed into the personal farms of the Elector-Admirals. The best they have managed to do against both hostile powers is to infiltrate and sow dissent among the various warlords to keep them fighting each other so they cannot focus on the Alliance. This tactic has been more successful on the Chaos Warband than expected, as they seem barely aligned and belligerent to each other by default. Pressure has even started to ease up as something to the South has drawn the attention of the Warband.

The success of diplomacy with the Galactic Empire goes without saying, and resulted in the successful joint campaign against the Kett. All that remains is to settle ownership of the subsector and the archeotech arcology within.

Scouting
First Contacts:
Damn Dirty Apes!
A whole sector of space is filled with talking apes from Chimpanzees to Gorillas to Orangutans. Scientists struggle to explain how this could have happened, since there are no signs that any of the ape civilisations had the ability to travel interstellar distances now or in the past. The presence of small human populations as a servant class or pre-sapient curiosity on most of these worlds might shed some light on this, but for now the Sector of the Apes is just a curiosity to have idle conversation about.

The Men of Leng
The scouts sent into this sector inexplicably all arrive at the same port. A water port, with sailing ships docked right alongside them with primitive sailors loading and unloading goods. While confused, the Hiigarans are able to leave the ships - which are behaving perfectly fine despite suddenly floating in water - and explore. As soon as they set foot on the port they are beset by friendly merchants pushing all sorts of wares, livestock, elixirs, slaves, just about everything, in exchange for whatever the team can spare. One of the members of the expedition trades in a data pad for a large yellow bird which is either a beast of burden or a domestic animal, the seller was deliberately vague. This is the city of Hlanith, famed for its artisans and closest to the waking world.

Aside from the general strangeness of the place, two things stand out to the away team. The first being that cats are revered and treated like royalty, and while there are not many in Hlanith there is a whole city of them elsewhere in the Dreamlands. The cats can talk as well, although the things they say are either nonsensical or cryptic, depending on the interpretation. The cats don't stick around long for conversations without incentive, and shift moods at a whim.

The second thing is that the leader of the expedition was approached surreptitiously by a Man of Leng, who offered to trade moon rubies, red gems with mysterious properties, for whatever technology the Unbound can spare. It claims to represent a great kingdom, with a great need for assistance against an enemy they share with the Unbound.

Gothic Horror and Steampunk

The Unbound have been noticed by the Eternal Empire, and the response is unsurprising hostility. The messages sent from the vampires are unapologetically condescending, laughing at the very idea of humans governing themselves or doing anything but being cattle. Raids are launched for slaves, but since the Unbound don't live on planets but on space habitats which are well defended and mobile, they aren't successful. A handful of raids succeed where the lower nobility are present rather than just thinblooded vampires, but the victories are pyrrhic as the amount of slaves captured is far lower than that required to motivate nobles to action. The only reason the raids continue, at a rather lackluster pace and missing enthusiasm, is because the Elector-Admirals of the Western half of the Empire desire to expand their holdings as much as possible while the Emperor and Eastern Admirals are occupied battling a dire threat.

The other threat to the Unbound are the Creon, or Iron Plague, who preach about the dangers of magic and the supremacy of science over all as they attack with steam powered spaceships and mechanical dragons. They sermonise endlessly about the sins of the Unbound for using magic, calling them to repent even as all of their technology seems to operate through magical means itself - since there's no way steam could power even half of the ships being launched against the Unbound.

Finally, while nothing was detected in the Southeast of the North Sector, the Crystal Entity which had been escorting the scouts through that area became extremely agitated on entry and behaved as though it was under threat.

Flood Situation
The Flood have not been idle since they were ousted from the sector. Smaller ships that could not hope to survive against the Unbound or Men of Iron have been sent to infect any possible source of biomass that the Gravemind knew of throughout the local sectors, be they lightly defended worlds, wild planets or space fauna. As a result two subsectors to the West have had all life transformed into Flood before being uprooted to Flood-held territory. What are recognised on long range scans as heavier and new Kett assets are being positioned to defend what has been surmised as another Gate, along with traditional Flood infested ships. Most alarmingly, a few planetoid sized craft have been detected guarding the Gate as well.

An opportunity has presented itself through analysis of the Gate in the Unbound's position, as it was discovered that with knowledge of the controls the Gate could be reset to connect with a different point in space.

The Unbound have an opportunity: Engage the Gravemind now, primarily target the New Kett and deny the Flood a delivery mechanism through these proxies at the price of the Flood postponing the conflict until it is ready. Or, try and seize the Gate and put the largest Flood biomass concentrations to the torch at the cost of the Flood turning into an Extremis level faction with the ability to send out 'Mercenary Companies' that are able to run the Unbound's blockade.

RP Available: 109

Final Fleet Arrives in Ravaged Space I4, reconnected with the rest of the Unbound with no issue.

Territory Descriptions

J4- North West, North East, and East- Unbound Controlled Space- The collective peoples that the Unbound represent continue to make new homes for themselves and settle themselves according to their own customs, although the majority of their newly claimed space lies empty except for war wreckage and sterilized worlds, Their chief subsector continues to grow now looking like a miniature version of their home galaxy, although with greater cross cultural enclaves that continue to grow as the refugee populations continue to start to breath easier.

J4 North – Crystalline Nests- This region of space is mostly empty of sapient life, save for the odd resource operation or monitoring post. That's because the top dog in this sector is some form of immense crystalline lifeform, shaped almost like three-dimensional snowflakes with varying proportions and sizes. They evidently grow out of 'seeded' asteroids and moons, and feed on energy and matter from solar flares and ejections from stars, as well as the magnetic fields and emissions of gas giants. Some of these crystalline entities can become as massive as planetoids in and of themselves, and they are present in the vast majority of systems in this cluster.

J4 West- Flood - The remaining Flood square could be described as a hell filled with desperate devils. The territory is filled with a winnowing of the stolen fleets with the most useless ships driven into the remaining uninfected ecosystems and the Sublimed Kett brought in as the personification of death to the most concentrated of the holdouts. At the center of the subsector a Fleet assembles in turn to face the Hammer of the Dread Machines and their lesser allies. A twisted mirror of both the last fights happening around it and the final conflict that the Unbound fought with the Beast awaits the Unbound and their Allies.

J4- Center- Former Kett Space and a disputed Arcology - in the J4 Center subsector, there there appear to be city-sized arcology-like structures of unknown design embedded across several hundred planets and moons. Unlike the blasted ruins of prior civilizations seen up to now, these structures appear to be pristine, as if being actively maintained, but there appear to be no inhabitants or other obvious activity.

These Arcologies are now the center of negotiations between the Unbound and the Galactic Empire amongst the ruins of the Kett.

J4 South West- The Galactic Empire- This space is held by the Galactic Empire, another outverser faction that is entirely human. They appear to be a constitutional empire of sorts, one with perhaps the largest and most well-organized naval force in the region. While their technology isn't as sophisticated or exotic as the Alliance of Sol, nor do they have any apparent supernatural abilities, their military discipline and tactical acumen, along with sheer quantity of line ships, makes them a formidable force. Notably, despite their imperial aesthetic, they also appear to be aiding civilian refugees, though much more cautiously than the Alliance, and are actively holding the line against the Kett, Chaos, and other hostiles.

J4- South- Chaos Warbands - This area of space has been taken over by a self-proclaimed Warband of Chaos Undivided. They appear to primarily human, though often with grotesque mutations or cybernetic augmentations. Their ships, vehicles and weaponry appear designed to be as visually terrifying as possible, riddled skulls and spikes and other predatory features. Put plainly, they are insane cult fanatics who worship the Gods of Chaos, avatars of human qualities taken to utterly destructive and evil extremes. Death sacrifices and ritual mutilation are incredibly common.

Worse yet, in spite of their fanaticism, their technology is quite powerful, and some of their number are capable of wielding supernatural powers like the Guardians. Perhaps the most alarming factor is that they actively summon a wide variety of demon-like entities to bolster their forces, and there appear to be many areas of abnormal space in their territory in which these beings can cross over into this reality en masse. They seek to tear down any other civilizations and either convert the survivors to their mad religion, or subjugate them to fuel their war machine.

J4 Southeast- Alliance of Sol- Populating this region is the Alliance of Sol, a defensive confederation composed of humans and three other species, the Eliksni, the Cabal, and the Psions. In addition to sporting advanced technology, certain elite units called Guardians are capable of wielding a power they call the Light, which appears to be outright magic. They can call down lightning and solar fire, bend gravity, leap and levitate vast distances, and demonstrate physically impossible strength, among other myriad feats. The Psions also have their own separate abilities, and they are no less miraculous despite being more limited in scope. It's been confirmed that the Alliance are aiding nearby refugees and are actively at war with the Kett and other aggressive factions in the region.

J3 Southeast, South- Abandoned Nests – These two Sub-sectors are filled with worlds and other celestial objects of clearly the same make as the crystal creatures you have been interacting with. This territory is filled with minor mining elements from the Pirate Pyrotuarus and an unknown group of humans wielding powers that you cannot explain. The Crystal creatures constantly make forays into the territory to only be hunted back by one of the two groups.

J3 Southwest- Empty Space? – Seemingly Virgin territory that is avoided by civilization and Fauna alike. Scouts have been able to passthrough unharmed, but something feels off.

K3 South East- The Creon Empire – A nation of Steam, Metal and a ting of hypocrisy. This is land and civilization bent on a crusade against magic at the words of The Sage. Their abilities to construct and summon warriors and machines seems to equal your own industrial capabilities, and thankfully seem to operate at the same tonnage as you do. They have a preference for strike craft and strike craft like larger ships. They will eventually turn their attentions to the Unbound in due time to help fund and fuel their crusade.

K4 Northwest- Subsector of the Apes – A series of pre space flight Civilizations ranging from the medieval to modern to post apocalyptic in technology levels that are populated by Sapient Primates including Orangutans, Chimpanzees, and Gorillas. There is little to stop you from taking over and they have survived due to the lack of interest by the Men of Leng

K4 West- The Men of Leng- Reports of this region are confusing and nonsensical, working on dream logic than anything else, the inhabitants seem eager to trade and concerned about events happing further into the Sector as the Moon-Kings battle the Iron Hypocrites and The Machine that Keep the Sleeper Dreaming.

K4 Southwest- The Eternal Empire of Mankind/The Ebony Throne- A vast empire of Human and more specifically Vampiric Supremacist, Fiefdoms ruled by Magical superhumans that feed on blood in massive ships. At best they care little for welfare of the cattle that they rule and those 'lost in the wilderness' and at worst is better left unsaid. While the Emperor and many of the more Powerful Elector Admirals are concerned with unsaid event to the east those that lord over the territories in the West see this as an opportunity to expand their holdings.

Baalthus smiled as it regarded the glittering star map. The Unbound's decision to eschew planets had been fully vindicated by the raids of the Eternal Empire and now thousands of arks flew between the stars, hundreds of thousands of mobile worlds where the Unbound could grow and flourish.

But still this was not enough. Billions were still trapped on their refugee ships stuck with little to do but ponder all those that had been lost. For their mental well being, as well physical productivity, the old Kett worlds were being rapidly deconstructed by hordes of workers to build new Ark gantries and then in turn new Arks to hold the majority of the remaining refugees.
Of course even that would not be enough, but unfortunately Unbound production capabilities were not magic. They could only build so fast. And even worse while their current territory was large it was not unlimited. To intrude on their new crystal friends would be impolite, and the Flood territory while technically empty was still under major threat from the remaining Flood forces.

And of course there were all the other threats. Baalthus expanded the map to show the rest of the sector and sighed as the scattering of gold stars were enveloped in a tide of red. There was some hope though. Three small patches of blue showed as well. Hopefully the talks with the Galactic Empire and Alliance of Sol would go well.

After Upkeep: +109 RP
Improve J4 East to Established: -8 RP
Improve J4 East to Industrialized: -20 RP
Improve J4 East to Heartlands: -45 RP
Improve J4 North to Colonized: -2 RP

Purchase 3 Research Slots: -1R, -4RP, -9 RP

Diplomacy Action: -8 RP, -4 RP, -8 RP

Total: 0

First and Second slots: Far Jump Core
The Bentusi found their progenitor hyperspace core thousands of years ago and have used it ever since. They have had ample time to study the hyperspace core and determine how it worked. However they never pursued replicating the core as it would upset the balance of power in the galaxy. Now with the loss of Bentus and the prompting of their flicker allies they have begun their research once again.

These larger hyper space core are much more powerful than the regular hyper space cores in use by the Unbound. This leads to two main advantages. The first is that they can power through gravitational anomalies that would stop lesser cores making interdiction harder. The second is that they can jump other ships or entire fleets thus allowing ships to summon reinforcements or move its escorts in tandem with it.

Research will begin immediately to work on replicating the far jump core. With the expectation that additional samples of FTL technology will be delivered to give the Unbound more insights on the matter.

Third and Fourth Slots: Hyperspace Inhibitors
The quantum waveform the Unbound uses to access hyperspace can be interrupted by gravity. This can be local in the form of black holes, or artificial through gravity well generators. The current gravity well generators used by the Unbound are very limited and actually more useful for their ability to stop strike fighters in their tracks. Now that the Taiidan remnants under Lord Maakan have arrived the Unbound have adopted the schematics for the gravity well generators and are working to update them to work against additional forms of FTL.

A Stellar Bulwark
Target: Alliance of Sol, Galactic Empire, Crystalline Entities
Nature: Friendly
Resources: 8RP, 1 turn
Plan:
Baalthus reaches out to representatives from the Galactic Empire, the Alliance of Sol, and even the crystalline entities. He proposes a three way, or four way if the Crystalline Elders actually show up, conference to discuss the state of the galaxy.

The Unbound alone have discovered six distinct hostile factions, and they haven't even explored to the galactic West or South yet. This is clearly a very dangerous part of the galaxy, and while it might be possible to survive alone it will be better to work together.

The joint Empire/Unbound action against the Kett was a specific example of the benefits that a military alliance would bring. The invasion could have gone poorly if either had attacked by themselves, espcially after they began subsuming themselves into the Flood. But instead the plan was a nearly unmitigated success and the removal of a xenophobic power from the sector.

The Unbound thus propose a larger more formal alliance to help protect all the members against the Flood, Creon, Pyrotaurus, Black Cloaks,Chaos Warbands, and Eternal Empire of Mankind as well as anything else the alliance might encounter.

Currently the Unbound recognize the Flood, Eternal Empire, and the Chaos Warbands as the most immediate threat. They plan to send a major task force against the Flood and a smaller task force to deal with the Elector Admirals. For now the Chaos Warbands seem contained, but if the Alliance of Sol has more up to date information the Unbound will reprioritize. They also hope that the Empire will be able to send forces to help against the Chaos Warband and Electors.

If the Crystallines attend then their aid would be appreciated against the Flood. However this is only because they have demonstrated an immunity to the parasite. The Unbound won't ask the more vulnerable Empire or Alliance forces for assistance. And if they do volunteer for some reason the Unbound will do their best to keep their forces clear of the heaviest fighting where boarding/infection actions are likely.

Arcology Secrets
Target: Galactic Empire
Nature: Friendly
Resources: 4RP, 1 turn
Plan:
As agreed the Unbound will cede all claims to the J4 Center sub sector to the Galactic Empire. However they will ask that if any technological advancements are found in the ancient arcology that they be shared with the Unbound.

Eyes in the Void
Target: The Flood
Nature: Hostile
Resources: 8RP, 1 turn
Plan:

It is imperative that the Unbound find and destroy the Flood/Kett hybrids and especially the Behemoth before they are allowed to transfer their advanced designs to the primal flood. To that end advance carriers to jump into far flung systems throughout the subsector and begin producing mass quantities of leeches as well as entire wings of Recon fighters.

The Heartbreak patrols will depart first to scout systems and begin building a picture of local Flood force distributions. As their data is collated high priority targets will be marked for Leech seeding. Carriers will make lightning jumps into the system to release swarms of leech drones which will use their phase telemetry systems to approach Flood capital ships and stations and quietly attach themselves.

Their primary purpose is to serve as tracking devices on important Flood assets, but they are also primed to being sabotage work as soon as the main Unbound assault begins. If the carriers find themselves with extra time and opportunity they will also deploy mimics on long range deep cover patrols to quietly infiltrate Flood space posing as asteroids and random space debris.

Although the insertion of units is useful the primary purpose of this operation is to gather data on all possible Flood activites and feed it back to Fleet Command. Which will then work out the best routes for infiltrating the Unbound Fleets into Flood space without alerting the graveminds in order to conduct a surprise strike to eliminate the Flood/Kett once and for all.

The Traders of Leng
Target: The Men of Leng
Nature: Friendly
Resources: 0RP, 1 turn
A few Hiigaran scout ships will return to the water port. They will exchange minor wares for samples of what the merchants are offering. Most of these will then be sent onwards to the Guardians of Sol with a request for analysis because something clearly esoteric is happening here and the Guardians are probably better suited to examining it than the Unbound.

At the same time the scouts will ask around to see what the Men of Leng are so worried about to their East.

Scouting the Gate
Target: J4 North West Gate
Nature: Friendly
Resources: 0RP, 1 turn
A Bentusi Exchange will venture through the previously Flood controlled portal to contact the polity on the other side. From our talks with the Men of Iron they appear to be a potentially friendly state known as the Earth Defense Force. As such the Bentusi will be attempting to make first contact and establish friendly relations.

Scouting 1
Target: I3 South-East
Nature: Friendly
Resources: 0RP, 1 turn

A few scouts will venture beyond the edge of Unbound territory to the east to check what is there. So we don't get surprised.

Scouting 2
Target: I4 North-East
Nature: Friendly
Resources: 0RP, 1 turn

A few scouts will venture beyond the edge of Unbound territory to the east to check what is there. So we don't get surprised.

Home Defense
Fleets: Mag 2 x1
Legend: None

One fleet will stay behind in the Unbound home sectors to protect them from any intrusion by the Creon. Between it and the sector defenses hopefully the Creon will keep minding their own business.

Elector War
Fleets: Mag 2 x2
Legend: Lord Makaan

Lord Makaan will lead several fleets into Alliance space to relieve their forces and aid them against the Elector counts. If possible Makaan would like to destroy both counts and reclaim the integrity of Alliance space. However he will remain aware that he may not have the forces to do so against the Elector's strange abilities and advanced ships.

Wiping Away the New Kett
Fleets: Mag 2 x6, Hopefully Men of Iron support
Legend: The Kuun Lan

The Ascended Kett/Flood hybrids cannot be allowed to spread their advancements to the rest of the Flood. It pains the Somtaaw to leave the rest of the Flood to grow, but a strike force lead by the Kuun Lan will link up with the Men of Iron task force and then search and destroy the New Kett to completely eliminate them before they have a chance to uplift the rest of the Flood. It would be nice to recover the New Kett's slipspace drive as well, but this is not a top priority.

Once the New Kett are dealt with the strike force will turn its attention to clearing out the rest of the flood.

Crystal Ventures
Fleets: Mag 1 x1
Legend: None
One fleet will link up with the crystals and venture into the northern sectors in order to investigate and try to reclaim the crystal nests. They will attempt to open dialogue with the pyrotaurus and black cloaks, but are prepared to fire back if hostilities occur.

This is not an attempt to conquer the subsectors outright, but rather a reconnaissance in force in order to contest the sectors and provide a good faith showing to the crystals.

Spartakrod · Aug 2, 2023

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5K7kmuQDfo

SteelWriter77 said:
The inner working of the Enduring Conviction was a well oiled machine, as fitting as what has been considered the flagship of the Banished as a whole, but what many forget is that this vessel has long served under another.

Let'Volir sighed to himself as he sat upon the command chair, his ship was his again, but he could not shake the unease from his soul as he continuously checked systems and the standing orders of the crew. Some may call him paranoid, but he held pride as a Captain first, and a Captain's duty is to their ship and crew, no matter what.

And despite the Warmaster more than likely not changing anything on how the ship operated when it served as his own personal vessel, Let'Volir could not rest easy until he had checked and made sure there was nothing he could make a mistake on. His bridge crew were focused on their work, but he could tell they were waiting for his latest batch of tests and reviews to be over with, and he could not blame them on this, not with such a momentous task ahead of them.

The Enduring Conviction is to be part of the spear tip into the Taiidan Empire, to take part in a Empire's destruction and the retribution of Billions of those wronged by the madness of their rule. A truly monumental moment in history that will be retold for thousands of years, something that Let'Volir will not let slip him by like the battle for the Orrery.
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The world of Kathelis, one of the Colonies of the Banished that laid on the frontier between their space and the Taiidan Empire. It was here many mercenaries and soldiers of the Banished awaited the renewal of conflict with the Taiidan, living off their trade with independent contracts from the civilian populace and their own troubles. We focus on a small bar in the middle of the capital city, a decent enough place for a Human soldier of the Banished to spend her money and maybe have a good time later.

Jenna O'Brian is many things, a Soldier, a Sister and a Traitor, though one could debate that last one. In the eyes of her friends and family she was a freedom fighter against a government that sought to exploit the colonies far too much, but to the "glorious" UNSC she was nothing more than a malcontent and Insurrectionist, not that it mattered now, those wars were fought and lost many years ago when she was barely a teenager. Now all that remains is a Woman still fighting for what she feels is right against any and all that got in her way.

She sat across from two others, recent acquaintances that no doubt would probably join her in a early grave or live long enough to be rewarded handsomely for their service, first was Maedia Potanion, a Turian who has earned Jenna's respect for how quickly she can kill a being nearly five times her own size…and she'll admit the scars are quite fetching on her.

The second was Creysh Tret, A Trandoshen hunter of some kind, he was a bit vague on the details and what he did share launched him into long winded stories of past hunts. He was annoying, but possibly one of the best damn snipers Jenna had ever seen. If only he'd stop telling the same one to the local civilians in some attempt to impress them. "-And so there we were, outnumbered and out-gunned by some of the meanest and gruffest looking Gamorrean's i've ever seen, one round left in my rifle and no way out. So I did what any good hunter would, lifted my Rifle and killed the whole lot of them-"

"-With one single shot." Maedia said aloud at the same time as Creysh, the Turian not even looking up from her drink.

Maedia's interruption barely registered as a bother to Creysh who spun dramatically to face the Turian "Exactly my friend, one shot from your's truly at the precise moment hit a set trap by my fellow hunters and blew the fiends away, how'd you guess?" He asked, more than likely playing up his confusion as to not bend to the blunt words of his companion.

"Mostly just the fact you've told this story so often in the last few days I'm sure Mae and I could recite it to 'ya word for word." Jenna playfully said to the confident Trandoshen. "Well then what would you suggest I regale to the fine folks of…what bar is this again?"

"Uh…the Iron Brewer" Spoke up a nearby human waiter, clearly a bit confused by the direct question from the Trandoshen. "The Iron Brewer of course, so tell me what Hunt should I tell them about, the Craver attack, the time we worked together against those Ork Freeboota's or do you want to just do what you do and give a dry retelling of that time we went after some slavers for the upteenth time."

"How 'bout some Taiidan work?" Asked Jenna holding up her communicator pad, with several job listings from the Banished, getting the two to stop glaring at each other and open up their own pads. Creysh's fanged maw widens in a great smile "Oh…now this will be a Hunt worthy of some tales, wonder if some of my old marks have joined the Taiidan." He hissed in glee. "I'll say, lot of good pay for these, wonder if I can get the head of a Taiidan Noble." Maedia said in almost equal glee, though with less smiles and more cold pondering…by god did she do that well.

"Heh figured as much, so shall I get the ship to go kill some Taiidan or are 'ya both still wanting to fight over which of 'ya is the better storyteller to these fine locals?"
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
New Doisec, the technical capital of the Banished nation by virtue of where Atriox calls home. To the Jiralhanae it was almost a copy of their distant homeworld, cold and rugged, where the strong thrived and the weak perished.

And to many Jiralhanae now being raised in its splendor, they know nothing of the small differences, but the older generations can taste it in the air, feel it in the ground, this is not their homeworld, and it was unlikely that they would ever see Doisec's skies again, something that weighed on many for one reason or another.

But Atriox was not amongst their number, he had no time for distractions, not when he prepared for what could possibly be one of the most vital battles of the Taiidan War and could be the start of the Banished's rise, with a empty seat of the region's power structure, the Banished will fill that void.

And with the Taiidan's defeat, there will be finally time to set in place plans to change history, the death of Empires will be Atriox's legacy and the future of the Banished.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

RP: 114
Diplomatic Orders:

- Send Strategic information on the upcoming Till-Jeluxi attack to the closest Desmondu factions, or ones the Banished have had positive interactions with, complete with potential avenues of attack they may try that our strategists have concluded from our battles with their mercenary forces.

Intelligence Orders:

With the impending final death throes of the Taiidan Empire, it is important to cultivate relations with whatever will blossom out of it's death, so Banished agents are to be sent to work with Taiidan Sucessionists groups most open to working with our agents and aid them in the fight against the Taiidan Empire. (-2RP)

Research Orders:
-[Free Slot]: Combat Cybernetics: It is a well established fact of war that sometimes injuries will cost soldiers their limbs or give them injuries that will inhibit their ability to fight. Such truths had already given rise to cybernetic prosthetics for retiring soldiers and the slight use of combat augmentations for those willing to continue service in the UNSC, one of the few things that Atriox can respect of the Human government body and something he has seen done in his Banished, but with wars increasing and the need for veteran soldiers to remain at their best against forces unheard of in their old reality, the Banished will push forward advances into combat focused cyber enhancements and replacements, inbuilt weapons and a means to increase the base strength of Banished forces being just the tip of the iceberg as the humans would say.

-[ 2nd slot -1 RP]: Biotics: With new species now apart of the Banished nation, Atriox looks to utilize new tactics that many species can offer, He learns of Biotics from several species from the same universe and tasks his strategists to find ways to implement such powerful abilities into the Banished ranks, essentially creating a new soldier class in their command hierarchy, which will be called Battlemasters, in reference to the Krogan of the Blood Pack who have joined the Banished.

-[3rd slot -4 RP]: New Battleship Class: While our fleets have been more than a match for our foes with their numbers and the skills of our admirals, we cannot rest on our laurels and assume it will be the same for long. Thus a new ship class must be made, fulfilling the role of a capital ship while smaller and less expensive to create than the CAS Assault Carrier. Dubbed the Doisec Class Heavy Battleship, it is to be the epitome of Banished Engineering utilizing the styles of the Jiralhanae to create a bulky and heavily armored capital ship class.

Industrial Orders:

-Upgrade both Established Territories to Industrialized (-60 RP)
--Upgrade both Territories defenses to Moderate (-6 RP, Upkeep -2 RP)

Military Orders:

-With the opportunity presented to us in the Taiidan's Civil War, we shall make for Hiigara and the Gate, breaking this Empire once and for all with our allies and Mercenaries and taking control over a Gate to a new Universe.
--Strategies:

--Our Combined Fleets will operate under two styles of attack, acquisition and overwhelming force. Select battles will be chosen to either take control of the Taiidan/mercenary ships and use for our own purposes, or to wipe them out to the last with our amassed firepower. All depending on the current status of the wider conflict and needs of our allies.

--Led by Raid Team Alpha, They and the Tenno are to go on missions to kill or capture high ranking nobles of the Taiidan or Mercenary leaders they have hired, all to disrupt enemy leadership or their wider control over their forces.

--Fast striking raids to any supply lines or important Taiidan facilities will be orchestrated by the Void raven Corsairs and the Guardians of the Light, should none be in any battle zone or the risk too high to commence such a mission, they shall instead focus on high speed hit and run style tactics alongside Banished Vehicle groups during planetside battles.

--The main battle tactics on boarding missions or in open battle across planets will be relatively the same, with changes made to accommodate the smaller spaces inside ships. On planets the tactics will be simple with heavy ordinance being unleashed upon any enemy formation or holding and then a mass assault by Banished forces to quickly take down the leading figures or

Forces Under Me:
Banished: 10 Fleethordes (Golden Armada)

Vasari: One Mag 3 Fleet

Democratic Republic (Innies) : Two Mag Three Fleets

Mercenary Hiring:

Detachments:

-Guardians of the Light: These warriors are known for among other things, being obnoxiously hard to kill as they can be endlessly revived as long as their robotic companions are able to reach them, as well as the wide array of rather fantastical magical powers granted by what they call "the light" which seems to be a religious way of viewing the ideals of cooperation and togetherness under the bizarrely named "bomb logic". They include Humans, Robots, humans but blue, the insectoid Eliksnee, the Reptilian and powerfully built Cabal, and the rather aptly named "Psions".
Type: Destiny Guardians
Specialty: Esoterics, Raiding, Small to medium unit and swift vehicle Tactics, Looting everything not nailed down and then doing it fifty more times because the fucking gold won't drop god DAMN IT
Weaknesses: Lacking in large unit formations, struggles with very large enemies they can't board
Tier: Extremis
Cost: 3 RP

-Desmondic Freedom Fighters: Desmondu's political turmoil and chaos means that many in its territory are very willing to take up the profession of war as long as it means getting out of "the incredible shrinking country", while others used to be in Desmondu's territory back when it was far larger before it bled away much of its expanse and have decided to find some way or the other to make a living. Desmodic Wild Geese come from many walks of life, but fight much like core Desmondic space troops, with primarily Human, Elephant, Octopode, Corvid, Cetacean, Homisynth, Sanguinan, Endikith, and Milky Way native species.
Type: Desmondic Exile Armies
Strong In: Infantry, Standard Vehicles, Lords/Heroes, Capital and Line Ships, Strike Craft, Support, Powerful magic
Weak In: Attrition warfare, Superlarge Units, Weak in Anti-Magic areas, Casualty Averse
Tier: Extremis
Cost: 5 RP

-Tenno Void Wing Alliance: These unusual techno-organic "warframes" and their peripheral equipment are often known as the "space ninjas" for good reason even if sometimes they are not exactly the picture of stealth. The starchildren who operate them gather in secretive relay stations and operate out of nearly undetectable orbiter craft as well as their railjack spaceships, making use of Necramechs, Archwings, and more to augment their tiny deployments of super-commandos.
Type: Warframe Clan Alliance
Specialty: Dueling/Assassination, Commando Ops, Stealth operations, Esoterics
Weak In: Mass Combat, Open battlefields
Tier: Maximus
Cost: 5 RP

-Eldar Void Raven Corsairs: Incredibly fast ships that move at speeds that would let them simply outrun the UNSC's SMAC rounds, elite warriors with reflexes to put Spartans to shame with weapons that operate at a level that you associate with the Foreruners and in much larger numbers than the Tenno, and incredible psychic and sorcerous powers can be yours, if you are willing to write and sign trade policies with the Eldar and swear to leave the worlds of the "untainted" Eldar alone as well as pay them their price.
Type: Eldar Corsairs
Specialty: Skirmish, Penetration, Exploitation, Pursuit/Withdrawal, GOTTA GO FAST, Raiding, killing people who thought they were safe, allows temporary (and strictly supervised) usage of the webway, Magic
Weaknesses: Poor at static combat, do not like being involved in clashes, casualty averse
Tier: Maximus
Cost: 5 RP

Legends:

-Raid Team Alpha: A particularly well known set of Guardains of the Light, Raid Team Alpha is especially experienced when it comes to killing the most complicated to put down of enemy combatants, and has practiced its work in these breaking and entering assassinations for years in some pretty serious warfare, even when said beings were akin to deities and at the centre of massive fortresses or flagships. Lead by an inexplicably alive Cayde-6 whose general response to asking why he's alive is "Multiverse man...multiverse" and miming a long drag on a marijuana roll despite being a robot and thus incapable of smoking.
Type: Guardian Raid Team
Speciality: Assassination, Infiltration, Sabotage, Retrieval
Weak in: Mass Combat, Open Battlefields
Cost: 8 RP

Fleethordes:

-The Cabal Redeemed: From a world of incredibly high gravitational force comes a species built like what happens if you taught a Rhino how to walk and then blended it with a turtle. Broad, heavy set, with extremely dense tissue and hard skin, disciplined to a fault, and fond of very big guns, they are like looking in a mirror in many ways. The so called Cabal Redeemed seeks to atone for some sort of past sins, and has ended its slavery of the Psions, and includes Hominid and Eliksnee soldiers trained to fight alongside them as they are the largest providers of military muscle and space power.
Type: Destiny Good Guys
Strong In: Strike Craft, Infantry, Capital Ships, Line Ships, Individuals of Importance
Weak in: Artillery, War Engines, Relatively new to cooperating as equals
Cost: Standard magnitude cost *1.4 (14)
Size: Half present total magnitude
Tier: Extremis

"Look, it's gonna be a bit of tricky business I know, but if you keep your wits about you, and stay out of my line of fire, I'm ninety five percent sure that we'll pull this off." Cayde cautioned a set of guardians who looked a little...sceptical of his claims of being able to easily just get on board an Ykantras Super-Dreadnought that was busy pumping every cubic millimetre of the surrounding space with ionic discharges and missiles.

"...Only ninety five?" A blue skinned woman asked with some trepidation in her voice.

"Hey gotta leave the possibility that we roll a one in my math...and I hate math. Math sucks." He said jovially as the void of space glowed a brilliant blue following a Punic Class Carrier being split in twain by just one of the Dreadnought's primary dorsal turrets, the actinic blue glow briefly flickering for a bit before dimming down.

"Does this one ever shut up?" A Jiralhanae Chief asked one of the Tenno who impassively sat down and meditated, approaching the Gurdara class Super-dreadnought closer and closer. The thirty two kilometre behemoth of a warship's CIWS systems traced laser light and stitched tracers across the void, the chosen assault lander pulling a hard turn to get in range while Railjacks and Seraphs pummeled a brief weakness in the shielding to clear a path into one of the hangars of the target craft.

"How's our landing looking?" He asked, the A.I in command of the Pyrotaurus Botswain class Gunship simply letting out a maniacal laugh in response before it shuddered from repeated impacts from a gatling gun, wobbling in a distinctly stress inducing manner.

"Oh god please don't let me die in the same gunship as this chatterbox." An Insurrection Marine prayed, clutching his crucifix like his life depended on it before the gunship ploughed into the hangar, smashing through a swarm of grunt bots who let out a few shots, screamed in panic, and then were ripped into scrap metal as the gunship scraped across the ground.

Some of the other gunships had better success, some had less, but Cayde quickly flung himself out one of the secondary exits of the craft as its clearance turrets returned fire, Taiidani troops on consultation ducking out of the way as the hypersonic flechettes of the gunship's anti-personnel turrets raked one section to the next.

Ion bolts, accelerator rounds, laser light, plasma ovoids, freeze rays, mini-missiles, and even a telefragger cannon opened up, while Cayde fanned the hammer of his trusted pistol and let out a whoop as an Ykantras infantry bot took a few hits until its shields failed and then went down to another burst to the optics, sparking as it hit the ground.

"Let that be a lesson to you half-rate Vex." He said, smug before noticing that an entire squad of Ykantras had hit the ground stone dead, the Volt Warframe that had finished its massacre putting a bladed polearm away so that it could seamlessly make use of a chattering Phenmor that fired some bursts at first before it clicked, charged, and then sprayed a dense stream of projectiles.

"Well, challenge accepted!" Cayde laughed before he upped his ante.

...

In the shadow of a series of invulnerable towers that had sprouted up on a green world that was wholly overtaken by the crystal that the Taiidani were turning to out of desperation like spokes for a series of wheels and rings that circled the planet, armies and navies fought desperate, bitter battles for the orbitals in orbit around the world, cylinders, spheres and rings of varying size that housed many people and had been turned into great military fortifications with the bounty of green crystal that they were mining so heavily to convert into anything of value.

Even if it meant working to try and synthesise it with similar materials, such as the ominous blue cancer they had taken from worlds impacted by some manner of beast that emerged from a wormhole. The results when they sought to apply this to their own soldiers was categorically monstrous, creatures of bloated musculature and glowing plates of radioactive armour, whose hulking frames were fitted with all manner of weapons to take full advantage of their giant size and strength. Beings who healed at rates that should not have even been physically possible so long as they were exposed to the blessed radiation, and madmen whose brains were rotted by the materials they worked with or bodies had been reduced to quivering blobs of cancer by uncontrolled exposure.

There was clearly potential though, especially under controlled and prepared conditions, ad the green material in particular seemed to be safe so long as one knew how to handle it properly. Dangerous if misused, but so is fissile fuel in general. The blue substance was more mysterious, but seemed to have greater heights to reach for biological augmentation, with the so called "Greater Taiidani" often coming out large enough to mash a hunter, brute, or theban to death with just their overwhelming strength as giants many times taller than human norm pried themselves free of de-icing cryopods, large enough to simply fit a sangheili in their hands like a large figurine and then pitch them with enough force to sunder shielding.

They responded to orders well enough, and were clearly capable of following military tactics and orders, even if whatever was beneath their armoured suits was probably less than pleasant as these giants swung fists with enough force to crack open a Krogan battle tank and carried tank calibre ion cannons and shoulder mounted heavy mortar tubes and rocket pods. Others were augmented to less...extreme degrees, showing superhuman performance, especially when they injected the stuff into their bodies and systems in a form of "hypermode" that while it lasted, let them slug it out with foes who should have outmatched them, taking enormous punishment to go down as technological and biological systems were overclocked into an azure frenzy while their weapons could tear through significantly more durable foes than they ought to.

Cabal and Pyrotaurus troops on hire from the Banished would push ahead, the heavyset bodies of the Cabal forming phalanxes with shields ready while Brutes learned to let the blue enhanced troops in hypermode state burn themselves out, withdrawing and distracting them and taking advantage of their heightened aggression until the charge they injected into themselves ran out and they were more vulnerable. The greater taiidani were something of a problem, but the Grey Death legion's Mechs were quite useful in levelling the playing field, even if they often took substantial losses whenever fights got to close quarters.

But the Taiidani Empire was falling apart, its fleets were split apart into multiple differing directions, and it was trying to put down far too many fires at once. Even here at mining facility Khashekar, there were signs of the civil war ripping apart the Empire, ship formations depleted in number, fortifications that were still undergoing repairs when they were attacked by the Banished, Pyrotaurus, and Cabal with detachments from the Krogans, the Trandoshans, the Tenno, the Vasari, and the Democratic Republic.

One of the worlds of the system was even already burning from a green substance enhanced atmospheric incineration missile to silence a rebellion, which had left a star-hot ball of matter surrounded by a diffuse cloud of vapourised ejecta, bright green and radioactive, with arcing bolts of ionised lightning jumping between the clouds of what had once been a world the size of Doisac.

Many other ships were engaged with Vasari inter-stellar artillery while they were in the process of self-genocide, streams of plasma dropping out of phase space and smashing into the gathered craft to disable them, leaving them to be picked apart by the banished in detail while the Vasari moved to engage the Till-Jeluxi.

And on the orbitals themselves, the Brutes often found that the bodies of the Taiidan's own citizens, human or alien, were stacked like firewood after having been executed by some means of toxin. Piles of the dead arrayed in the thousands, carted off into biological reprocessing pits by mercenaries and blank eyed fanatics who could look even the smallest and youngest amongst their victims in the eye and push them back into the chemical death centres.

All for the sake of more flesh for them to grow new troops, and strange sorts of resources they offered to devils of an altogether more literal sort than was usually meant by the prophets, creatures of anomalous nature that collected some manner of immaterial bounty from the dead and signed their pacts in brimstone and blood. In exchange, gifting the Taiidani anomalous powers and gifts of their own, brandishing them with infernal marks of power in reward for their service.

The facility fell in time, as the Taiidan were forced to withdraw as their fleets were overwhelmed by concentrations of force and the disintegrating cohesion of the Taiidani navy, but the exploratory teams found that many places within were the sites of not merely cruel experiments, but horrid rituals. Pools of blood, scorched cadavers nailed to totems of power, skulls arranged in regular geometric patterns, many who were alive only so that some sort of devices could draw from their pain as they shivered within contraptions that tore at and burned them.

The exploratory teams wisely put most of the survivors out of their misery, finding that most were so badly damaged by the suffering they underwent according to the terms of ritual instructions that promised diabolical power that they were no longer capable of coherent speech or thought without major reconstructive operations and amnestic treatment. The Devils themselves though were strange creatures whose forms defied the laws of biology.

The forerunners would probably have called it neural physics, given their disdain for ascribing the term "magic" to anything, but they were creatures who seemed, for little coherent reason, more vulnerable to weapons of ritual significance or were clad in things that were held to ward against evil spirits. Foes that took more damage from gravity hammers than brute shot as it was more personal to come to grips with the spawn of hellfire, and creatures that adhered to fairy tale like tenets against all region.

For example, the great Ferrotyrants, things of reddened and blackened metal with golden and brass trimming and burning bat like wings, a crown of horns, armour of obsidian, bone, and gunmetal, a helm with a faceplate like the slits of a furnace, a scourge in one hand and a ranseur in another and taloned feet, pausing when met with buildings they were not invited to before smashing them open to get around this restriction. Or the insistence of the Icesworn, cold, frost flecked legionaries with blade like horns and angular armour that gave the impression of carefully sculpted ice, to keep their formations of a consistent size, pausing whenever they dipped below an unacceptable margin to allow fresh ones to teleport in or split off oversized units into ones that fit their mathematical patterns; done so with machine-like efficiency but a deranged sort of obsessiveness.

Other Taiidan forces called on far less coherent beings, things that they called Demons rather than Devils, creatures mashed together of a related pile of aesthetics that fit some sort of theme, giving a highly chimeric appearance. Creatures that were far more wild, far more likely to tear into each other given half the chance, and ones that seemed to rile the Devils something fierce whenever there was not enough else to keep them on the same terms; the divine entities ripping into each other until their bodies discorporated back to whence they came. If the Devils responded to contracts, bargains, and rituals, the Demons seemed to simply come to intense enough displays of whatever concepts fed into them so long as the barriers between the layers of existence were weak enough, usually by offerings and magic.

Like the Devils though, they too shied away from earnest belief, whether that be faith or simple material conviction in the cause. Those who had gained monikers of being effective against their kind had such legends reinforced, as more whispered of one brute's prowess as a demon slayer, that brute would be better at doing just that. Even weapons benefitted from this, with Atriox's chainbreaker increasingly able to banish the fiends back to whence they came. A good thing too, as the fallout from the pacts with the fiends of the worlds aflame was consuming many Taiidan worlds in realms of what humans would likely call Hell.

It was often enough to scald them from orbit, or to let the Tenno, Guardians, and Eldar touch down and cleanse them, but it was certainly a sign of the times to find entire planets rearranged into terraced, interlocking grids of punishment and the evils of misplaced faith that demanded subservience and sacrifice rather than love and community. Worlds with physically impossible but logically coherent structures, where death was often a polite suggestion for the unfortunate whose crimes merited worse fates than being cast into the pit and where pain was profit to crawl up a ladder of punishment.

But whenever these worlds had their anchors smashed and their idols cast down, the Devilry would implode upon itself, many of the fiends howling as their forms discorporated as the means with which they sustained themselves in a material reality they did not belong to came apart and dragged them back to the realms divine. Their structures, when impossible, would crumble back into things allowable under the laws of gravity and geometry, or disintegrate outright if nothing sustained them beyond magic. And even their brass, blood, and obsidian coloured ships would frequently be dragged back to whence they came when their anchors were taken from them.

The Demons of course had far more illogical combinations of sin, pain, sadism, and suffering, like children mashing together everything hurtful that could possibly fit into prompts. Like the spawn of malicious divine turbulence themselves, the worlds where they held sway were formed by piling together the spirit of things that caused hurt and woe, mountains with spikes that grew more spikes that grew teeth that grew needles that grew knives, buildings with internal architecture that was needlessly confusing purely for the sake of frustrating travellers even to the point of impossible geometries, and music that seemed to have no rhyme or reason beyond being painful to the ears.

There were themes, but not coherent plots so to speak, and these places were often churning upon themselves and at war with other aspects of their being as much as they were with anything else. But stories can only last in the face of reality for as long as disbelief is suspended, and the Banished are very disabused of the idea of fantastical destinies. Demons and Devils and Sorcerers and Wizards they may be, but they can be cast from the world of things that matter all the same. Let them be immortal in realms of potential and ideas, the Banished rule the realm of fact and existence.

...

The Banished Fleet arrived before not one gate, but a series of them, built all around a series of star systems that had significant deposits of mineral resources that had a high priority to be excavated and then shipped back to the Home Galaxy of the Empire. Particularly important were the massive bioferrite mines where they harvested a sort of living, self-regenerating and exceptionally strong metal that could not only make their equipment far more durable, but allow it to heal itself at combat useful speeds and make it far easier to shape into all manner of components.

They were also extracting large quantities of psychically active dust and spice, which was of particular interest to the Emperor for unknown reasons; common on particularly desert worlds and heavily lithic planets. Yourokaicite Dust and "spice melange" were what the materials were known as, harvested along with great quantities of "tiberium" and "phazon" that would be shipped back to the Empire from corrupted worlds in great chains of freight ships going into and then back from the Hyperspace Gates.

The Banished fleets would not be allowed to approach without a fight however, as the enemy realised the threat to their gate hubs and their mining operations in short order.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiK0XZQbgFU

At the most active system, a system where an ancient device that extracted heavy elements from deep within a trio of three blue hypergiants and injected them with fresh hydrogen to keep them artificially young long after they should have died a Taiidan armada awaited near the hyperspace gates overseeing a truly colossal extraction operation. They moved in the sight of the three greater suns, their burning gaze illuminating a complicated series of planets and smaller stars caught in not only their gravity, but that of the ominous black hole in the middle, constantly accreting matter into itself from a tear into subspace only for its growth to "bleed" out into other dimensions.

The Black hole itself is bathed in far too much radiation for the Taiidan to approach, both from the colossal stars dancing with it, and from the accretion the intermediate-mass black hole is constantly undergoing, jets of blazing matter spun towards the poles and shot away from its gravity well piercing into heaven itself.

It would be beautiful, if it weren't also the site of the largest concentration of Taiidan forces between Atriox and reaching their home galaxy caught in Eklemarid's orbit above the galactic pane. They were mining a great many things here, from the many worlds caught in this cosmic machine as they also tapped into the storage units of the extracted heavy elements from the larger stars. Here were also great shipyards and factory worlds and orbitals, a massive hub of industry that was churning out war machines in huge numbers, fed by a great many hydroponics orbitals that produced the prodigious amounts of food needed for the workers in excess of what the planets that were given over to farming were producing.

With hundreds of habitable planet-sized objects in this system, it truly was the system that could provide everything an industrialist could want. And the Taiidan were willing to defend it to the last breath, with their fleets emerging from hyperspace to meet the challenge of the Banished formations pulling out of slipspace. Mercenaries and allies would pour out in their own ways as the fleets would begin a cosmic dance of death at the extremities of the system above a mixed zoning world with factories, farms, and cities in equal measure. A blue-green marble not too dissimilar from Earth in orbit around a yellow dwarf caught in the orbit of the "Blue Eye", with the enemy fleet quickly burning towards the Banished position as the commanders realise that they have a rare opportunity to start landing troops on the world below before the Taiidan response fleet arrives, especially as the Vasari's bombardment immobilised many of their ships with their interstellar EMP effects.

This system would be the most pivotal in getting access to Hiigara, and with the greatest density of hyperspace gates being present here, both sides were likely to pour in all the reinforcements they could to claim victory.

--- Situation Report ---

Tactical battle for Battle of the Blue Eye begins

Banished offensives are going quite well, the Taiidan Empire seems to be in an advanced state of political turmoil with civil war and its meddling in forces it does not understand catching up with it

The banished have secured extensive access to Tiberium, Phazon, and even Exteritite, though the Red material has yet to be captured. It will be up to the Banished as to what to do with this substance, though Tiberium at least seems to be the safest.

The Taiidan military, while potent on the offensive, is not quite as good on the defensive due to their reduced quantity of fortifications, which they've either had to make themselves or contract out to others.

The Taiidan war machine relies heavily on extremely intensive resource extraction efforts, if disrupted their industry will start to starve.

The Taiidan are increasingly relying on bargains with beings from beyond the material world to try and bolster their fortunes, it is often leading to their worlds being consumed in dimensional faults.

The Emperor is very interested in accruing as much Yoroukaicite and Spice melange as possible for reasons unknown, the latter being mined from worlds with enormous worms that turn planets to dry desert.

patrickmm1 said:
Clan Grendikal Turn 3 Start @Spartakrod

Imperial Findings:
While the war for the future of what now officially was the Galactic Empire has been won, that would be the easy part, as the effort to rebuild their government into something a bit better than merely functional was more difficult than practically the entirety of the war effort(before Palpatine unleashed his self sustaining force storms, anyways) that preceded it.

Most of the empire barely functioned, acting more as the worse mix between a military junta and a more classical dictatorship, kept running more by graft and bribe as anything approaching actual governance. Combine that with a bureaucracy that has grown larger and larger and more and more… inept, for lack of a better word, over the past thousand years and you get a mess in which almost nothing got done save for what was forced through via a mixture of said graft and bribery, and the occasional imperial decree. While the worst of these perpetrators were taken out along with the military industrial complex that they were so interconnected with, what was left behind was a mixture of electronic paperwork, physical paperwork, missing paperwork, and yet more hidden (electronic) paperwork, that, when combined with the collapse of the Extranet, almost never seemed to be where it belonged.

Thankfully, the Mind Spiders, and the suite of lesser AI underneath them, were more than up to sorting out this task, doing so in their spare time between dealing with everything else on their docket. In the process of doing so, they discovered the Empire's own scouting and colonization efforts, both official, and very much not.

While to the north, their colonization efforts did find some success, as a combination of Hutt slavers and the military operations of a collection of minor, if enthusiastic, Moffs saw what passed for resistance amongst the primitive, planet bound groups that used to call that area home crushed, clearing the way for more extensive colonization, which was only barely underway when the Clan came in and ruined what plans they had. The surviving locals, where their home planets were not simply made an example of from orbit, will need either assistance with rebuilding or integration into a greater policy, be it whatever policy replaces the Galactic Empire, or the carefully cultivated cultural soup that is the Clans. Outside of these now destitute people, the area has become a hub for pirates and other ne'er-do-wells since the collapse of the Extranet and the semi-conquest imperial core as a whole. Whatever this region's fate, it will need solving, either by you, or some other helpful policy.

Unfortunately, that was the most successful of the Empire's colonization efforts, as expansion to their south ran into a series of hyperspace anomalies that prevented what little effort they put into scouting to bare no meaningful data(rolled a nat one on a zero investment scouting action into an area of anomalous spacetime) bar the fact that space in that region seemed… twisted, for the lack of a better word, with scouting groups often finding themselves returning to imperial space while meaning to leave it in the few cases where said explorers managed to return home at all.

Meanwhile, expansion to the galactic east of the Imperial Core ran into more staunch resistance, as what little data that survived the crash of the Extranet describes worlds made out of metal ruled by giant humanoid machines, machines that were as hostile as they were welcoming and as deceptive as they were straight forward. Sadly, the data gathered from these encounters was hit even harder than the rest by the crash of the Extranet, and what little could be gathered was only found after serious repeated effort; and while more recoverable data might yet exist about the imperial's interaction with the faction(s?) to their direct east, it would require concentrated effort to recover.

While spacetime anomalies and corrupted data is bad enough, what happened to the Imperials attempts to colonize to their north-east is even worse, for here, they were at first successful, only for contact to be lost with their new colonies one by one, with what efforts they put into investigating these disappearances usually finding naught but supernovae debris, when they could even find the supposedly recently colonized system in the first place. Other times, even these investigative forces did not return, they too ending up just as lost as the colonies they were sent to investigate.

Homefront Woes:
While the remnants of imperial bureaucracy, destroyed data, destroyed colonies, and spacetime anomalies were bad enough for those who had to deal with them, other factors were at play that had a much more immediate effect, one that was felt drastically closer to home, one originating from the Clan's home universe. The first clue that something was wrong came with the first wave of new colonists and goods, for most of them failed to arrive, and those that did came with a story, one of hostile actions from the Confederacy of Dismir, aimed at the would-have-been steady flow of goods and people heading for the interdimensional portal that Clan Grendakal had discovered/been led to. While the majority of the first wave managed to make it through, only loosing 40% of the assorted mercantile vessels that came with them, the later groups were not so lucky, and were forced to turn around to avoid being caught up in the crossfire and being either captured or destroyed.

While there are already reports flowing in about successful military operations against said raider fleet, it will not be in time for the remainder of the originally planned shipments to make it through this year, assuming that the pirates do not simply relocate and start/continue to harass the incoming shipments the moment that the pressure on them wanes. In addition, some of the reports are enough to send Samus into a serious panic attack, as one of the individuals involved, one who seemingly has a leadership position within said raider fleets, bears a certain resemblance to a certain draconic figure from her past. Due to this, and how long it might take to end the raids without their assistance, Samus wants to go back through the portal and, with the assistance of the other Duodecimarchs, confront this threat and deal with the problem, hopefully assuaging her fears in the process. (2 RP lost, 10 RP waiting for delivery once the situation is safer)

(make a choice: either find a reason for the Duodecimarchs to say here despite what Samus wants, or have them depart through the portal to deal with this threat; either way, only three of the expected 15 RP worth of raw/processed resources made it through before the pirate situation got too bad to make it, with 10 of said 15 RP awaiting relative safety to be delivered. (relative safety will come by next turn if the Duodecimarchs are sent, increasing next turn's portal based RP income to 25 instead of the usual 15; else that RP will be effectively used up by a combination of the ongoing fighting and the lingering raids))
(either way, RP income for this turn has been reduced to 40 instead of the expected 52- the rest interfered with and/or lost due to the ongoing situation on the other side of the portal home)

Volreapers:
Unfortunately, that was not the end of the troubles for the Clan, for to their south, in the territory of the Neutronium Pact, forces were gathering. From across the galaxy and beyond, Vol Hunters, Reapers, and casual massacre-ers, were gathering here in almost unprecedented numbers; gathering here to strike back at the upstart humans who dared disrupt their operations near Desmomdu(wherever that is), and/or dared to attack the perfectly legal policing operations of the Lesser Eccumine, or Dared to attack the Melkraan Axis, or any number of other slights, whether real or imagined. While some of these claims are blatant falsehoods, spread to incur the wrath of these lowlifes, and others would be proven to be false flag operations if given the slightest amount of actual investigation, it does not change the outcome: they are here, and they are gathering to strike, just as the actions of the Confederation on the other side of the portal disrupt the Clans supply lines and draw away the attention of the Duodecimarchs.

(if no preemptive strike is made, you will be attacked by a magnitude five force of primus level Volreapers, supported by a magnitude three core of slightly more elite(or at least better funded) Vol Reapers, using military surplus provided to them by the greater Supernova Pact(tier Extremis Volreapers), and a grouping of elite Volreapers, armed with ships and equipment that genuinely should not be anywhere commonly available in this galaxy(half of a magnitude one force of tier Maximus Volreapers, supported by several dozen Leviathan class Battleworlds, specialized in fleet-on-fleet combat and massacring civilians in the most painful way possible), before the end of this turn)

Strategic Turn 3 Start
Available Resources: 40 RP (2 RP lost to Space Pirates, 10 waiting for said pirates to at least be less active before being sent over)
Known problems: who/whatever took out those imperial colonies, the Confederacy of Dismir performing hostile actions back in the homefront, and Vol Reapers amassing at the border to kill each and every member of the Clans for a series of perceived and/or real events, some of which were almost definitely false flag operations caused by the Murderers of Cyclosis.

(map of known territory: https://imgur.com/a/R38JX6v)

Vyranodasik Omdyn Military Strategic Council Directives:

1. Mitigate Space Pirate Operations

Under honour obligations to progenitors, Scions of Cylosis are to be dispatched to deal with Space Pirate interference with detachment from Combat Group Lothbrok. As the Lost Scions are revenant type morphospectral the risk of permanent loss with them is minimal. Inheritors are to be kept away from their sources of trauma where possible to avoid loss to possible Ridley sighting.

2. Protect against Volreaper offensive

Prevent Omdyn or allied civilian loss of life as far as is practical, particularly Tribesfolk below age of majority
Destroy Volreaper organisations, if in conflict with directive two, evaluate consequential loss of life before committing
Prevent Volreaper society civilian loss of life (Military Personnel are allowed to surrender but no special effort will be made) with exception of political and economic leaders, who are to be publicly terminated whenever capture is impossible. Captured leadership is to be remanded to rehabilitative care pending trial; egregious offenders will be liquidated.

3. Integrate Protectorates
4. Establish trade deals for resource boost and further entrench diplomatic relations.
5. Expand military capacity until general hegemony over local space is achieved.
6. Scout out local area

Prioritise South, East, North, and West in this priority
If exploration efforts are met with hostility, withdraw temporarily with whatever data is acquired and analyse, attempt communications via proxy placed in interstellar space given maximum standard counter-memetic, counter-antimemetic, counter-info/cognitohazad, and anti-tracing systems as is required under Omdyn law regarding hostile first contact, do not lower security even if hostility is reduced, contact is to be left strictly to machines under the command of the Subroutines of the Mind Spiders to eliminate chance of error.
If Hostility increases, prepare for LEGBREAKER class operations to eliminate spacefaring and military capability of hostiles until surrender can be forced.
If hostility is asophontic, upon preservation of sufficient samples to be kept in temporal stasis for study and eventual sophontisation; engage in protocol WILD HUNT to reduce asophont presence and eliminate where practical, as far as military resources allow.
1. Addendum, WILD HUNT and LEGBREAKER are to be put on hold due to lacking resources. Switch to JUSTIFIED PARANOIA conflict avoidance protocol.

7. Investigate potential Cylosis attacker involvement

Sweep through potential internal espionage nests within the settlements to determine reason for information leak to the Confederation.
1. Priority is currently low due to intense resource crunch, upon alleviation plan SNIFF TEST will be drafted.

8. Meet Omdynic strategic requests.

Submit request to All-Omdyn government for further resources as resistance to current operations exceeded initial projections.

These directives are the result of democratic consensus between the machine intelligences of this expedition, does the Council agree?

Aye.

Proceeding to directive elaboration.

Military

Anti-Volreaper

4 RP into preliminary scouting and information gathering efforts

4 RP into N-sub interdiction warfare

4 RP into campaign of sabotage

All plans are consolidated into overall military plan described below.

Combat Group Skjoldr and Combat Group Vornhynir are to launch offensive operations on Ecumenical polity with the mass deployment of interdiction, the commencement of convoy raiding, and heavy usage of offensive mechanoid type combatants to establish an early presence on the ground while void combat is ongoing. Extreme long range attacks will be favoured, including usage of interstellar torpedoes, strike crat, and missiles fitted with n-space, tachyon, or alcubierre drives upon detection of enemy assets via superluminal scanner and initial n-sub, drone probe, and strike craft reconnaissance.

Initial bombardment is to prioritise systems of command and coordination as well as mobile production assets, followed by ships capable of long range combat or closing into long range combat. Once volley is launched, combat jump into extreme long infrasystem range will be initiated to follow up bombardment with shorter ranged munitions. Mobile assets are to commence running engagements to attack in fluidic formations that will use sub and supralight speed acceleration superiority to maintain distance, using inverted tractor beams when needed to push enemies farther away.

Close combat assets will close and then begin "scissor cut" pattern attacks of withdraw, close, withdraw before closing in a more permanent manner once enemy forces are sufficiently crippled to ensure annihilation. Communication attacks are to be frequent and thorough, while combat esoterics are to strike at the enemy's minds with memetic hazards to disrupt focus, coordination, and motivation. Mass Boarding will be effected in final stages of conflict, though commando strikes via cloaked insertion craft or rapid boarding torpedo will be effected at targets of priority and opportunity to mitigate enemy leadership structures.

Standard restrictions on perfidy will be ignored due to enemy's genocidal intent, commandos who seize control over enemy ships are authorised to redirect their weapons to fire on their own comrades and spread false information suggesting treachery from within, playing upon internal prejudices and fears where needed to dissolve the cohesion of the enemy force. Agents of shapeshifting capable species or Mechanoid types will also be used to infiltrate and spread paranoia and mistrust amidst enemy nation and exacerbating any existing rivalries and trust deficits.

Objective is complete governmental dissolution and collapse, assassinations of figures of political, military, and economic import is authorised while enemy information networks are to be suppressed by multiformat attack methods ranging from jamming to datavoric malware to network subversion. Duodecimarchs are to be asked if they are willing to partake in order to shut down the genocidal operation of this polity once and for all, with an emphasis on taking out high ranking and highly skilled Volreapers in tandem with special forces operations and engaging in acts of sabotage and technology theft (through their suits' ability to assimilate abilities and devices) to aid in the destruction of this polity.

Anti-Space Pirates

Tribal Combat Group Lothbrok and the Lost Scions of Cylosis will engage with the pirates to drive off the space pirate raids through massive brute force. If it's something that can be dealt with by the twelve and their close companions, sending a tribal combat group should be sufficient overkill to quickly put paid to the whole endeavour. Under no circumstances are the twelve to engage with the space pirates for the sake of their mental health, particularly that of Samus who has the most personal trauma regarding them.

However, as she is not a citizen of the Omdyn or its member nations, and indeed, holds citizenship with the United Nations of Sol within the Galactic Federation, we do acknowledge that we do not strictly speaking have any authority over her and as a child it would be a significant breach of propriety to drag her into this.

Arne is similarly not to partake in this, Gyda and Erik's ghostly forms represent a substantial unknown quantity but it appears that they are incapable of suffering permanent harm and have essentially become morphic entities capable of long-term manifestation on the material plane, though they seem to weave in and out of material reality from time to time they always come back when called on or needed...for now. Given his mental state, the distress of seeing his parents, or at least what seem to be his parents, in harm's way may be too much for him.

If it is in fact Ridley, and he is operating with his old Inferno Pack; particularly the "Dragon's Claw" gag of his most elite subordinates; Marshal Weavel, AAE-13, Strategos Zenkin, Hunter Corvus, and Co-Enforcer Ivax, priority will be on repulsion, with a request to the Omdyn for additional special assets to protect supply lines on their end as we are currently stretched thin. Ridley however is easily bored and as a solitary creature only capable of academically appreciating the notion of society, he is likely to lose focus if he doesn't get his "fix" of predatory violence on perceived prey for long enough or for High Command to tug at his chains once again.

However, his capacity for regeneration, adaptation, and anomalous physical prowess means that dueling him is generally speaking out of the question. Gyda and Erik died fighting the golden Hydra on Cylosis who is regarded as an equivalent threat, and they do not seem to have improved enough from their baseline capabilities in life to make the likelihood of victory against Ridley or the Dragon's claw within acceptable margins.

While they do not truly answer to the Omdyn government and their background in deep special operations to encourage guerilla resistance have always distanced themselves somewhat from the government of the UOC; nevermind the greater Omdyn, they are to be reminded that their son is waiting for them to return home safe and sound before they get any ideas of a second martyrdom. Against the Space Pirates, the standard protocol of the UOC is to draw them into protracted engagements, Dismor's troops are extremely difficult to beat man for man due to its mastery of Transsophontic augmentation and lack of concern for the viability of its troops outside of combat; what with the average Trooper being roughly 150% taller than a baseline human and even the disposable "Zeilain"[1] mass-produced cannon fodder packing a punch.

Thus overwhelming force will be used instead. And hopefully the usage of force will allow for them to deal with this issue quickly and then return to the battlefront for the pre-emptive invasion of the Ecumene aligned state to achieve maximal concentration of force.

Integration Efforts

Use 8 RP towards a diplomatic plan to ensure the fastest possible integration of the former Empire, programs to induce this will include the offer of development, massive technological improvement, the abolition of slavery (particularly that of droids, whom we are entirely willing to arm if needed), as well as even the rich enjoying massive improvements in their living standards. For one thing, we can quite trivially cure old age itself, and even bring back the dead and can cure just about every disease and heal every injury. Simply put, we can give them lives free of most of the current problems that they face, and are willing to provide all this if they would but join the democratic process of the Omdyn.

We won't even ask them to provide military manpower for some time, especially as it would take time for them to get used to Uskarling or Omdynic warfare. We will protect them at our own expense and they will gain full right of participation in our democracy as well as everything we can offer to improve their lives. We will not merely rebuild what the empire destroyed, together we will build something far better in its place. One where people are not merely free of the tyranny of the jackboot and the autocrat, but free from the tyranny of hunger, disease, and to a significant degree; even death.

The spheres will receive a separate 8 RP plan for integration, in acknowledgement that our cultures are very different and that their feudal system has...rough patches to work out before they can join with us. We are willing to fast-track the recognition of each of the noble houses as tribes of clan Grendakal, fully equal to ourselves as part of a means to sweeten the deal, and that we will make even the paupers into princes and grant the princes everlasting life. And for the houses that are indebted to us from the war with the Empire earlier, we are also willing to...deal with the intransigent for them.

We will also include them in the plans for expansion into the western fringe, ensuring that their newly minted Tribes will receive their fair share in the growth into the concerning emptiness to the west. Furthermore, they will of course, have their languages protected and we will work to integrate their leaders and people into the system as equitably as possible, and if needed, we are also willing to solidify ties by having the worthies of the tribes who have brought great honour to the names of their tribes and families in this endeavour enter marriage agreements with the houses.

Diplomacy

Target: Allies and Citadel
Resources: 8 RP, Mind Spider Council

We are of course, looking to open up a full trade agreement with theirs for mutual profit and benefit as well as an extensive program to help them technologically catch up. We will also expand our existing non-aggression pact into a guarantee of independence, or perhaps a mutual defence pact if they would so wish it. This will also open the door to intelligence-sharing arrangements so that we may keep each other informed of the going ons of this universe, and we will also seek to cooperate on shared strategic concerns, such as the Volreapers who clearly have it in for humanity and humanoids as a whole.

We hope to work together to destroy this ecumenical aligned enclave as soon as possible, and would greatly appreciate them sending whatever military forces they feel they can spare to ensure as swift and overwhelming a victory as possible. Given the monstrosity of the existence of an industry of genocide for hire and the issues of dealing with former Imperial Officials, we would like to cooperate on the formation of an international tribunal for crimes against sophoncy to ensure that such barbarous acts as genocide and ethnic cleansing are consigned to the history datalogs where they belong.

It is to be emphasised that all information points to this ecumenical polity being just the tip of the iceberg, and that much of the Citadel and all of the Allies are also on the chopping bloc. We have already achieved significant deeds together against the Empire, and we will play on any warm feelings from that to draw further sympathy. We will also seek to formalise a deal regarding the former empire, with a commission for the integration of their third of the former empire into Citadel Space that we will support, recognise and aid.

In exchange for their assistance against the Volreapers, we are also willing to invest some of our research capacity into projects of their choosing. We would also like any starchart data they may have.

Target: Serene Realms
Resources: 4 RP

Now that the prior state of crisis is largely abated, we are primarily interested in exchanges of goods and resources, and would hope to establish long-lasting ties in this regard. Trade is of our highest value, but we are also looking for information regarding the rimward part of the galaxy and what may lay there. We are also willing to extend a guarantee of independence, and an offer of shared research agreements so that we may pool our expertise together towards common goals.

Exploration

We will be dispatching probe mechanoids and fully automated ships into the galactic east, southeast, southwest, northwest, northeeast, and south to map out at the very least, the entirety of the sectors there to resolve our information deficit in these regions. Probe Mechanoids will generally seek to avoid conflict where possible and are to withdraw immediately upon any significant hostility using standard random jumps to elude possible pursuers before returning to safe territory. Von Nuemann protocols are permitted to ease the process of exploration, with the mechanoids being designed to replicate so that they can cover more space as quickly as possible, though superluminal scans and listening arrays will also be used to gather whatever information that is there to be had.

If diplomatic contact is established, the mechanoids are sapient enough to carry on discussions and will have continual contact with the greater Omdyn, and as such meetings can be had away from our territory until we can ascertain the intent and disposition of those we encounter. Upon any attempt at subverting the probes, including info or cognitohazards, with a certainty of over 99%, or any successful or likely to succeed efforts to capture the probes, the probes are to immediately self destruct. Any probe that has been contaminated with an agent likely to spread an infection into our territory is similarly to self-destruct immediately as per the "justified paranoia" protocol.

As we are unable to spare any resources for military or resource construction for the time being, simply passively perform a webcrawl and present a list of any available mercenaries to the council for consideration.

[1] What one day comes to be called the Zebesians.

patrickmm1 · Aug 2, 2023

Fleetcommune of the Krork Krork Turn 3:

Spartakrod said:
Available RP: 51

Enemies abound. The Krork fleetcommune is split in twain; almost half of what remains of their mobile forces arriving too far away to assist its other half; with too many enemies in between to simply travel through the intervening space regardless of how far the distance was. Their enemies were numerous, with almost each and every incoming force outnumbering, and likely outmassing, what forces the Fleetcommune could bring to bear against them when they didn't simply outmass the entirety of the Fleetcommune.

This was nothing new. What was new though is the sheer power of their would-be allies, all able to directly contribute to the ongoing conflicts in a way that didn't depend on the actions of a few Legendary heroes. Allies that were willing to lend a helping hand, and intervene in conflicts far, far away from their current borders. These allies understood that Monsters needed to be fought and defeated, not just ignored in the hope that someday, somehow, a route to a more lasting Victory might be found; for this galaxy at least had more than the hope of fools to fall back on when any one group of people faltered and fell.

At least here, the Krork were not almost entirely alone; at least here, there were two other Titans, civilizations that had withstood all that these galaxies of War had to throw at them, and not just survived, but actively fought back, with moderate success, without falling to the trap of Monsterhood. While negotiations with one of these two factions, the Ascendancy of Alterra, were still somewhat ongoing, with the Krork proving their worth as Protectors in return for the promise of the assistance required to remain as such, and perhaps one day even expand out and reclaim this Galaxy from the Monsters that claimed it in almost its entirety; the other, the Keepers of Mandos, actively reached out to the newly arrived wave of Krork forces, offering much more immediate help in return for vastly more immediate help in turn.

Offering help with building up to a vastly more sustainable level and ensuring that the two separate parts of the Fleetcommune could freely reconnect in return for help with clearing the warzone that these forces had arrived practically into the middle of? There was no way that the Krork Fleetcommune would say no; for while they had the option to do so, there was no real reason for them not to take that deal. And so the Krork once again went to war, this time on three separate fronts, each with its own set of objectives, and thus its own way for the war to be waged, for while war never changes, the battlefields and objectives verry much do.

Spartakrod said:
The Warring Galaxies are never exactly safe. The whole of Ykres and Rekys and all of its satellite galaxies are constantly being churned over in apocalyptic violence, planets and stars being recycled for every last component to feed war machines before the warring wills of Ravagn, the King in Black, and Gilguratar remake them in even richer form to ensure that the conflict continues to feed them. But now the Oglomarix War Tides have broken through, enslaving the Phase Spiders through unknown means and bringing these indigenous (to this universe, not galaxy) monsters to the gates of the Krork Communes.

Their sleek, hydrodynamic ships raced through the void with almost serene grace, like dolphins through the water rather than lumbering capital ships, and fluidic distortions were starting to be recorded in spacetime while their craft started to park themselves in siege lines, portals opening up to start colossal deluges of water as both a weapon in and of itself and to alter environs to be more comfortable for the aquatic eidolons as their exoskeleton clad forms emerged from drop-colonies that slammed bodily into Krork worlds through intense, withering firepower that sent many of them to Davy Jones' proverbial locker.

The Krork could feel in their souls that there was nothing but violence, everything else was purposefully, deliberately drowned to create things as relentless as the tides and as merciless as the deep. It was simply optimal for survival when they endeavoured to stand alone and cleanse the stars of anything that would not submit. To lose the ability to doubt, to change their course, or to be anything but completely committed to the war as their predatory mech-frames engaged in battle with krork warriors across a million worlds, even as more Krork fleethordes arrived from the last sanction to escape Skullkrak.

Just in time, as the War Tides were coming in colossal numbers, seeming to multiply in conceptual resonance to water and things relating to the seas, growing stronger and more numerous as the ocean claimed more territory and worlds and as liquid was spilled; whether it was blood, mush, sweat, or even tears. Such was the fate of those who had bonded themselves to the worst aspect of their Sea God to become the unending Maelstrom, a swarm of Sandy Brown, Ocean Blue, and Seaweed Green crackling and rattling like the rapid-fire clicks of the most nightmarish sorts of sealife.

They would drown the stars themselves, and all would sink beneath the brine.

But even they were not immune to having their parties crashed, as a third party quickly piledrove into the western front; rather literally at that. Robots of Purple and Silver, insane, chittering machines that the Krork Fleetmasters quickly realised were tied to something very, very bad on the other side; something that allowed them to manipulate time through an understanding of the grand unifying theory to simply immediately convert processed resources; "grist"; into mechanical combat forms assembled at the the subatomic level.

Some would know them as the Electrical Protectorate; the deranged Avant Garde Terrors given a nightmarish revelation by a predatory reality known as the Icon. The Krork would know them as a force that could go from a single singularity core warped into the field through a deliberately engineered faultline in spacetime to a sea of screaming cyclopean robots in seconds. Fragile compared to the sturdy Krork or the rapidly regenerating War Tides, but there were so very, very many of them.

Attempts to attack their computer network was met with utterly deranged hyperemotional chatter as the core minds excitedly commentated back and forth with each other in a fashion that made it almost immediately clear that this was a useless endeavour, especially as something quickly noticed and made the offending computers explode.

Of great concern to the Krork though was that a lot of the Protectorate's weaponry was even by Krork standards, extremely exotic, like the Brane Blasters which temporarily collapsed higher dimensional objects into four dimensional space time to greatly destructive effect that could propagate past many defences; or the Fractal weapons that released brain-searing spiderwebbing and obnoxiously coloured breaks in spacetime as something's power was evoked; weapons that cared rather little about how hard Oglomarix or Krork material plating was, it had a certain amount of damage it would inflict and would inflict it, damn all else.

The Krork could crush them in enormous numbers, but the Protectorate seemed to have no end, and any force that encroached on terrain covered by their seething carpet of tiny machines known as the Rust would be immediately met with armies appearing out of what may as well have been thin air as time crunched and subatomic machines aligned into robotic shapes. In space, this was seen as an ominous cloud that followed their fleets that seemed designed to old science fiction standards, with new craft appearing in the blink of an eye from the grist caches of the Protectorate's infinite army, a boast that seemed to be far from idle in this case.

And as if this wasn't enough, the Unbidden were pouring out of another major hyperspace tear, sensing rich concentrations of energy with which they could feed upon as the energy devouring hyperpredators sounded their hunting calls and spread outwards from their rift of origin, looking for food.

Fucking incredible.

Spartakrod said:
Your western territories are under attack by a Magnitude 4 Tier Maximus Oglomarix Warhorde, a Magnitude 6 Electric protectorate Fleethorde, and a Magnitude 5 Unbidden Fleethorde which are all mutually hostile to each other. Reserves are likely present. The Altrans are dispatching some help, with the Protoss arriving with a Magnitude four total force they were able to spare from the eastern front while a Magnitude 4 Revolutionary International force will join the brawl.

(here the Krork deploy two of their Fleethordes and four of their Battlemoon Formations, one of which has the Warp Shadow Generator upgrade, and one of which, a different one, is somewhat understrength (⅘ Battlemoons); alongside a potentially still ongoing upgrade to Ridiculous level defenses)

Here the Krork would wage a war of defense, of grinding black stone against deadly oceans, storms of rust, and the unnamed horrors lurking in the lost corners of the forgotten relative dimensions in spacetime. Each of these forces outmassed what mobile forces the Krork could afford to bring to bear here, each of these forces alone would have perhaps defeated the Krork here had they been alone, and had their mobile forces been all that they had. Thankfully the Krork are not alone(where as their enemies very much are, what with them being each other's enemy as well as the Krork's), and none of these forces really had any true experience cracking open what the Krork would consider to be adequate defenses; for adequate defenses was not about any single instillation, any single station, but about layer upon layer of defenses, in overwhelming quantity and impeccable quality; enough to grind even the New Devourer to a halting crawl and give even the Void Dragon pause.

Joined by a Golden Armada and a revolutionary legion, the Krork felt that they could hold this region; and so hold it they did. Even as the recently claimed worlds under the domain of the Krork Fleetcommune became under assault, they became ever more fortified,as layer upon layer of fortifications, both groundside and space-based, appeared around the embattled worlds, shifted through the higher dimensions to the front lines just as soon as they reached completion. At first these defenses were more of the same, as Cruiser and Battleship sized stations were joined by more of their own, the once relatively sparse orbits becoming ever more crowded, the floating minefields becoming ever more dense; but then they were joined by ever greater fortifications, as newly crafted orbital plates suddenly appeared around world after world, even as entire opposing fleets were thrown into gravitational chaos, spaghettified when they weren't simply targeted by the remains of their neighbors or the oh-so-plentiful mass that they were throwing out, by the appearance of Darkstar Fortresses in their midst.

Even as the orbits overhead grow ever more crowded with stations, fortresses, and orbital plates, so to do the groundside fortresses almost seem to multiply and expand, soon stretching from the depths of the Mantle below to where they almost seem to merge with the orbital plates circling overhead. Theater shields, once localized, multiply and spread out to the point where almost might as well be full blown Planetary Shields for all of their coverage(if not quite their strength). Moons circling overhead are rendered hollow, as their internals are replaced with massive fortresses, often the equal to those found planetside.
(the 6 spillover development RP spent on this region retroactively spent on improving its defenses; 30 more RP spent to bring I-9 Center up to Ridiculous Defenses(9 RP already spent out of the 45 required, bringing the remaining cost down to 36;the 6 RP retroactively invested brings the remaining cost down to 30 RP))

Elsewhere, where the concentrations of incoming forces became so great as to simply overwhelm whatever defenses might be erected in their path, they ran into even greater opposition, as the Fleetcommune's mighty Battlemoons would turn these pushes into but another grueling battleground when they weren't simply halted and destroyed in their entirety by the overwhelming local superiority that the Krork fleetcommune could command. The localized might of the Krork was overwhelming even against enemies such as these, for foes who could directly contest even a mere Battlemoon were few and far between in this particular battlefront, for both the Unbound and the Electric protectorate had few if any battleworlds of any class present in this warfront, and what the Oglomarix could bring to bare was not enough to contest the Krork's superiority in this area of the battlefield;

and the Krork's battlemoons were never alone, for with them came the bulk of the Krork's local mobile forces, seeking to halt whatever pushes managed to make progress against the Krork's own ever growing layers of defense, and their ever numerous allies, who were tasked with defending what and where the Krork's own growing defenses could not yet adequately contest, and where the Krork's own mobile forces could not be present in sufficient numbers to stem the nearly endless tide by themselves, or at least, not where they could be present in truly sufficient numbers without sacrificing some other, even more important, area of the ongoing war.

(allies are tasked with assisting on the defense, acting to supplement the still growing defenses where they alone, at whatever level they might be, aren't enough to stall for long enough for the Krork's hammer to smash the embattled hostile forces.)

(Krork forces are split into two groups, both built around one of the two Fleethordes that the Krork have at this particular warfront. One, with its accompanying single Battlemoon formation(the one with the Warp Shadow Generator upgrade) are to go with a pure Breakthrough action, working to go from one dense formation/key battleground to another, clearing each out in turn through sheer force concentration; while the other, with its three more standard Battlemoon formations accompanying it, are to go with what boils down to an Advance-Breakthrough formation, working to support the Krork's allies and defenses with holding the line and ensuring that this territory remains in Krork hands)

But even with all of the forces present here, even with all of the Allies that came when the Krork became under such massive threat, not everything could be held, not everything could be contested; thus, in place of yet insufficient defenses, of allies that could only be present in sufficient numbers to hold their own in so many places, some worlds became death traps, seeded with hidden Planetbusters in there core by the efforts of Krork commandos, to go off when it might deal the greatest blow to the enemies of the Krork. (Commandos, with assistance, are on Planet Wreka duty, to make even the worlds that are considered to be un-holdable be deathtraps for the incoming hostiles)

While their defenses and allies, with a bit of support, would be more than enough to hold, holding was not enough against enemies such as these. No, instead one had to also deal with their malevolent influence, and cut them off at the source. To this end, the Krork's Warlocks and Mechs were deployed, to work together to stem the incoming tide. And in this case? That tide was a bit more literal. To this end, the Mecks were tasked with creating giant, practically teleporting, Suneshiners; capable of outputting more than enough radiation(of whatever form the Krork might want, for finely tuned hawking radiation from precisely fed, charged, and spun black holes can produce anything from high energy gamma rays to usable mass) to turn the massive amounts of water that the Oglomarix are producing into highly radioactive steam, and rendering the Electorate Protectorate's rust into naught but iron scrap, as all materials that don't simply eat radiation are reduced to naught but steadily decaying radioactive scrap, in the process fouling all standard forms of electronics(the Krork have none of these, with hulls and armor that has no decay state that radiation alone can force.); while this would not be effective against anything truly heavier than the strikecraft of any of the opposing factions, it would be more than enough to render the mundane side of their environmental effects null.

As for the more mystical side of their assorted forms of environmental warping… that's where the Warlocks came in, repeatedly casting an extremely well refined, extremely powerful spell that, in older, simpler times, would have been known simply as "It Belongs to da Orkz!", rendering all other mystical territory claims into naught but spoken words, to be decided not by fancy mojo, but by those who fought the hardest, struck the most often, and won the most.

And for now? That would hopefully be the Krork and their allies.

(in case it matters, defensive reactions are universally(at least for the Krork) on Concentrate(Krork forces concentrate to deal with the most dangerous enemy attacks, instead of either dispersing to fight around them or simply having whatever forces end up against them simply hold their ground- note that this will not be attempted if the math works out that holding in a given area/planet wouldn't be worth it- at which point the local Commando action would kick in), and priorities, at least for the Krork, are prioritizing taking out the enemy forces over trying to hold territory over preserving their own forces, as shepherding one's strength for future battles is pointless if there's nothing left to protect, and attempting to hold territory at all cost is somewhat less useful against foes that have the ability to fairly rapidly replace their own losses.

Spartakrod said:
The Tai celestials meanwhile are desperate to survive as the Wayfaring Scourge's forces press onwards through their territory, even making a number of breaches through it; dividing it into pockets while others continue onwards to find targets of opportunity as well as strategic value. Their armadas were enormous and the data bandwidth going between them was nothing short of absurdist. Their radiator winged forms were soon darkening skies over countless Krork worlds, attracted by their superluminal scanners picking up signs of high technology that would be of interest to the PIONEER network.

Their first waves were scrap in short order, as were the second waves, but the third waves were designed with intensified anti-gravity fields and altered shield systems, letting some of them land to be destroyed. Each wave was iteratively improved in this way, recycling the materials lost in each wave while consuming everything of value as they started to rain upon the Krork Worlds in swarms of metallic killing machines so dense that Krork warriors often found themselves atop mountains of dead machines before eventually being dragged down by sheer attrition.

They were getting better with each wave, designing themselves with further improvements, newer designs, better technology. They were clever, and these were from a technologically superior branch of the PIONEER Network than what Harrsk's Imperium had fought in Vyranodasik. New designs were being churned out, and the Krork were met with so very many little drones flying in the air, whether as buzz bombs or as small weapons platforms or simple eyes in the sky, generally eager to find their way into anything of import before blowing up to cause disruption. Krork fortifications of course were designed with small infiltrators in mind; a single cell of the New Devourer slipping through could lead to catastrophe after all; but these machines were always poking around for any possible flaws they could exploit.

However, the Tai were still fighting them, and the Septerra alliance were making counterattacks into the colossal thickets of Wayfarer fleets while their northern elements were being attacked by the Strangers as they skimmed near the edge of Lovecraft's Nightmare. Most particularly by the Alghollthus who seemed to very much not appreciate the Scourge bulldozing over many of their experiments, sending forth waves of eye straining and abominable constructs and awakening an army that was funnily enough; also called the "Abyssal Scourge" in one reality, to engage the Scourge for the audacity of crossing their territory, all while the Extrauniversal Prethoryn Scourge brought the number of mutually hostile scourges to a frankly silly number as viral monstrosities battled with works of twisted masonry, corporate negligence, and some very pissed off frogs.

Spartakrod said:
To your east, the Tai are engaging a Magnitude 6 Wayfaring Scourge Fleethorde which is also battling an unknown magnitude Algholthu force, and a very large quantity of the Prethoryn Scourge. The Septerra Alliance and the Rikti will be dispatching forces to try and take some of the bite out of the ongoing madness.

(one Krork fleethorde with its accompanying single formation of Battle Moons to be deployed here, alongside a somewhat well-funded intrigue action)

"Right then, we all know what we came here for. So let's get in, get out, and perhaps break some of these purposeless paperclip machines in the process should any be convenient."

And so, over revealed, embattled worlds, Tai worlds, came the Krork. Here they fought, fought the Wayfaring Scourge to determine not the fate of the worlds, for said worlds were already considered to be doomed, but for the fate of the people who called them home and the valuable information that was in their possession. For the Krork had run the numbers, and determined that the Tai's Cultivation knowledge was more valuable than the Tai civilization as it is right now.

Cultivators were powerful, powerful enough to be worth preserving as an asset; and Cultivation is something that was calculated out to be usable and useful for the Krork. To that end, the Krork would go out of their way to preserve whatever information on Cultivation that they can find, and coerce as many potential teachers of such information over to their side as possible. To this goal, as many of the people and knowledge of the Tai would be preserved as possible.

The Tai civilization on the other hand? Was considered to be nigh worthless. Unwilling to reach out for help, and perfectly willing to turn on themselves and their surroundings at almost the slightest of slights the moment that their prior-ruler had ceased to rule them; the Tai civilization was determined to be too non-functioning to be kept around in its current form. It's failure as a fully functioning civilization, combined with its unwillingness to work with others, made it less of an asset and more of a liability, and when that information was combined with the strength of the forces assailing it, it was calculated out that preserving the Tai's civilization would take more than what the Krork had currently to spare. And so the Krork sent what they could, not to protect the remnants of the Tai's civilization, but to protect its knowledge.

(-4 RP) Intrigue Action: by all possible means, be it coercion, bribery, 'honest' diplomacy, threat, or outright infiltration, the Krork are to acquire as much cultivation knowledge from the Tai as possible; be that in the form of assorted texts, or those who could teach the Krork such knowledge, ranging from the lowest of Outer Disciples to the greatest of Sages and Masters. If necessary, offers of worlds to rebuild on, and eventual(as in within the next few 'turns') territory of their own, is on offer, as is continued funding of whatever projects they might wish to engage in(assuming that said projects are not completely bank-breaking). While this is going on in the more peaceful areas, the Krork fleethordes(and accompanying planetoids) are to clear the skies and grounds of embattled worlds, and then offer(maybe not nicely) to transport all of the previously doomed people back to Krork space, where they are to be steadily processed and integrated into the assorted 'protected worlds'(worlds set aside for those who have grown tired of War).

Where coercion, salvation, bribery, 'diplomacy' and gentle actions would not be enough, the Krork's commandos would do what they do best, and loot beliverant, doomed Tai worlds of all of the carryable knowledge that they have before it is lost forever. (Commados are on 'loot the Tai of what texts on Cultivation they have if/when they refuse to cooperate with the Krork)

Over world after world, the Krork's forces show up in numbers almost beyond compare, acting as the most over-equipped, overly concentrated raiding force ever devised. With no territory in need of holding in the longer run, no civilian targets in need of long term protection. The Krork were almost free to fight where and when it suited them. Avoiding the absolute densest of formations, those that couldn't be cracked sufficiently quickly by the application of the Krork's Battlemoons and their accompanying fleets, and over worlds where evacuation would be considered impossible, even by Krork Battle and Fleet Masters, the Krork struck again and again with almost impossible speed, their Battlemoons, with the bulk of the fleethordes carried within the portal network that stretches between all of them, carried along by carefully shaped currents of green light.(Warlocks are on Warp Double-Time, greatly speeding up the travel time of the Krork's Battlemoons between one system and the next)

Upon reaching their destined world, their destined key location for their goals here, the Krork would fan out, seeking to destroy as many of the Scourge's forces, both in the void and groundside. during whatever time it would take to conduct 'negotiations' with the now secure world below. (Gravity Storm generators are turned off, Life-eater and Toxyferin ammunition is not allowed, and massive collateral damage is to be limited to the areas that have already fallen to the Scourge- as our goal is to liberate the Tai survivors, not accidentally kill them alongside those that they are fighting against.)

As soon as evacuation is as complete as it can reasonably be, and all cultivation information that can be reasonably secured is secured, the Krork forces are to move on, as to stay in one place for far too long is to invite disaster as ever more Wayfaring Scourge forces make their way to the growing battlefield. (the Krork's forces are effectively on Breakthrough-Envelopment, (with the Disperse defensive reaction) using their overwhelming strength focused into a few key points to hold key areas, while withdrawing in the face of completely overwhelming enemy forces)

Upon completing this process over one world, the Krork are to move to the next, and the next, and the next, until they either lack the forces to continue, or the Tai have run out of worlds(at which point this force would continue raiding the Wayfaring Scourge forces here, switching to pure Breakthrough to attempt to bleed them dry before they reach Krork space in numbers enough to be a serious threat).

To assist with this ongoing process, and to ensure that the Krork's forces face as little opposition here as they can, the Mechs here are to focus on constructing massive ECM generators, as to ensure that the Wayfaring Scourge has as much trouble controlling and directing its forces as possible(note that this is mostly communications jamming- hacking is secondary at best).

Spartakrod said:
Some of the other Krork Fleets have finally arrived, unfortunately they arrived very far away from the rest of the Fleetcommunes, much closer to the Keepers of Mandos than the Altrans. At first this seems odd, impossible really, the jump was calculated within a far smaller radius of error, but it seems that it's much closer than it seems, as there are jump gates and wormholes presently active that connect to somewhere near the primary sectors of Krork Space. However with two fleethordes gathered here, finding where it links to Krork territory is important, as is claiming the territory. Especially as this part of space was not at all safe.

The Keepers of Mandos' allies, particularly the indigenous Vykondian Wardens as well as forces from the aligned Sub-Pentarch; the Ularak Preservers, a rather unusual set of ancient machines dedicated to preserving various forms of life for repopulating pentarch space in case of extinction; were busy protecting their territory against the unending tides of eidolons pouring in from all sides. Of the Five Great pentarchs and their four aligned sub-pentarchs and their "shadow"; ten had to commit a great deal of their resources to these "warzones" created by Ravagn and co, and the Keepers were certainly rather less nice about it than the Altrans.

Their high technology fleets wield science beyond even the Krork, recombining the fundamental forces into primordial forms not seen since the early universe fired from stoic arthropodic ships laced with strange circuit like lights; repulsive event horizons sending wave after wave of fire from one monster of the minute or the other back to sender or even shifting their approach through spacetime to prevent their firing at all. Swarms of ships are caught in loops of time, doomed to repeat the same moment forever or are banished to other spacetimes, others are struck down by warheads that teleport into their midst and collapse into hyperspace storm.

But the swarms of attackers hurtling themselves at the Keepers of Mandos never really relents. As soon as one horror is destroyed or repulsed, ten more take its place, always testing the bastion and the rotating cast of those who aid their cause. But where the Krork fleethordes have arrived, they find that the Vykondian Wardens, whose hard, geometric forms give an impression of incredible solidity and angular armoured warrior machines; entangled in another such brutal war.

The Kroatanga, and the Suitaitazu are battling here, a swarm of belligerent jarheads and a crystal-like host whose hunger will devour the very stars themselves. Along with strange beings who seem to apparate from nowhere with no measurable propagative force, like the monsters in a movie who can simply pop up when the camera isn't focusing upon them. Communications with the primary Fleet Communes and exchanges with the Altrans confirm that these are forces of the Iridescent Knights, the bulk of them woven into being with false colour to produce true colour for the consumption of the true Knights.

And the Men at Arms of the Knights are truly beautiful to behold, with ornate armour and splendid displays of bright colour that suggest imperiousness and impress upon observers a powerful urge to prostrate and kneel. Each truly does look like a Knight, albeit grander, more divine, more exaggerated, a noble warrior who slays monsters and leads armies, at the helm of armies of paintings and simulacra. Which is to say, beings they invest into the idea of the existence of to create and beings they make in echo of already told stories.

The Men at Arms fight without fear, with one of their Swordchildren cleanly cutting through Kroat Capos the size of titans in dreadful numbers faster than could be comprehended, simply willing sprays of devastating colour to strike into the crystalline beast swarms while turning Vykondian warmachines to stone where they stood and forcing their attacks to bend around them or even change into things that would heal them whenever their supremacy was not sufficiently challenged, others finding that the only path was defeat, others simply being retroactively removed from existence outright or replaced with those who were allies of the Men at Arms on a whim or with monsters born of their imagination. As the Mandosi sought to confront the monstrosities, they transformed stars into raining cometary bullets to smash into Mandosi fleets when fitted into their guns or loosed from their bows, exploding into cataclysmic bursts of multicoloured light that erupted through multiple dimensions at a time, making it quite fortunate that there were few true men at arms amidst them.

War-Arks that seemed to be part spaceship, part castle, part stained glass relief, and part painted stain on reality sat at the heart of fleets of simulacra and paintings, with the bulk of the current simulacra seeming to be conjurations of an alien culture unknown to you, though some would know them as the Cabal Empire, while their Paintings were all; in contrast to the knightly theme of the Men at Arms; were designed in a style perhaps closer to the suits and figures of a deck of playing cards and a deck of tarot as well as mythic angels and the beasts of demonological lore that would boom "Be very afraid".

The Suitaitazu would bite into the Simulated Cabal, swarming over them in their shimmering multitudes, the Cabal were given an inedible nature, the Kroats would attack the Jacks only for wheels of eyes and wings to pass their judgement that would turn their forces to ash or into pillars of salt.

The Keepers moved in reality stabilisers, which had at least some effect on the Pleromic nightmares, letting their deployment of scorpimech warrior platforms sweep many of the horrors away. But pushing forward left them more vulnerable to the Kroats and the Suitaitazu, which would pour in across the vast frontline looking for opportunities, swarming ships and untold numbers swimming through the maelstrom.

As if on cue though, the Keepers made their offer of contact. Help them get this space under control and they will be happy to link this enclave directly to your existing territory instead of having to route through altran space, they will also be happy to send you resources to develop it, but they need time to get further reinforcements to repel the present offensive before fresh waves of attackers pour in.

Spartakrod said:
Your last remaining exiled fleethordes have arrived near the Mandos territories, and are facing a Magnitude 6 Kroatangan tier Primus force, an unknown tier Magnitude 6 Suitaitazu force, and a Magnitude 2 Iridescent Force, supporting you is a magnitude 2 Mandosi Force and a Magnitude 4 Vykondian force.

If a man at arms of the iridescennt knights is challenged to a duel or challenges a character to a duel and it is their first time battling them, if they survive they automatically gain a level as a legend, if they win they gain two. Afterwards they still stand a good chance of gaining a level or two this way.

"We accept your deal. Let us take the fight to the Monsters that inhabit this galaxy."

"Come, let us fight together. To the hunters of Monsters, the Angry Coconuts, and the Observer, we accept your help, for your foes are our foes, and we have nothing to hide.
(mercenary purchases for this front: Clan Skarvald Jomsfear, Keluko Warriors, and The Observer, who is being allowed to observe our faction for the coming five turns)

The ships of Clan Scarvald are instructed to form up with the fully mustered local Fleet Communes, and are warned of the disorienting nature of subspace, even when in the vastly more ordered bits of it that form the potentially giant network that is the Krork's SubSpace Bridge network; while the Keluko Warriors are brought onto the Krork's Battle Moons, to fight alongside them. The Observer is also politely asked to join them in the SubSpace Bridge network for quick and easy deployment and redeployment throughout the battlefield. If either Clan Scarvald or the Observer decline that part, then they will be given the required information and asked to keep up to the best of their ability, for the Krork will not be waiting on them.

While the allies are being mustered and brought in, the battle overall, with both past known events and likely future actions, is laid out in the Krork's War Sphere/Map, and paths to victory are drawn up. Here the Krork have no territory to defend, no key locations that must be held at all cost, and no civilian fleets that cannot simply lurk in the subspace bridge network or simply live in the depths of their own planetoids(for now), and no supply lines that could be made vulnerable to interception. And so the Krork were free to pursue their own, extremely mobile, form of warfare to the best of their ability. Freed from supply lines, the Krork had no vulnerable depth to exploit that wasn't in the depths of their own planetoids, and so they were free to strike when and where they wanted.

While the Krork's own supply lines were practically untouchable, their allies were not; and while their Sub Space Bridge network could in theory be used to handle it; in practice it ran into a number of complications, the least of which being the fact that the Krork's subspace based infrastructure… was not built for the use of anyone not a Krork; and these other non-Krork allies(the Mandosi and the Vycondians) were in far too large numbers for them to simply be guided through the portal network like the less numerous Mercenaries could be.

Of the enemies, both the Kroat and the Suitaitazu were both secondary targets; as while they were large enough in number to be a threat, they were both each other's mutual enemies and were outclassed, sometimes drastically, by the Krork, the Mandosi, and their assorted allies. As they were now, in the numbers that they had available in this particular warzone, dealing with them would be tedious, but perfectly doable without needing to pull out anything particularly special.

And so the fight would come down to this: dealing with the Iridescent Knights before they dealt enough damage for the Kroat and Suitaitazu to come in and finish the job. The Iridescent Simulacrums would be simple enough to deal with, as the Cabal, for all their seeming might, would be trying to match the Krork in brute strength and ordered might- a losing proposition if there ever was one. Their Paintings were no different, as they held nothing that the Krork had not faced before, and could do nothing that was truly new- such ever is the life of plagiarizers and copy cats. No. the fight here with the Iridescent Knights would come down to their Men At Arms, and their War Arcs, which seemingly worked to anchor their Simulacrums and Paintings to reality.

All of this was factored in, and plans were drawn up. Engaging the Men at Arms was a priority, but doing so without the aid of those who had fought them many times before would be the height of foolishness- and so the Krork's first target would be revealed: the ever swarming Kroats and Suitaitazu. To this end, to ending the threats of the ongoing raids, half of the Krork's available forces were deployed; while the other half was kept together, brought in to break wherever the battle might grow its fiercest.
(two Fleethordes and its accompanying standard Battle Moon formation are on Breakthrough-Envelopment, to act as one giant whole to secure the most important areas of the battle, while the other two, and their accompanying upgraded Battle Moon Formation, are to stick to pure Breakthrough, to engage the largest of enemy formations head on, barring wherever the Iridescent Knights are and wherever a Suitaitazu category 3+ Battleworld might be, as those are not meant to be dealt with by Battle Moons alone, not without support anyways)

And so the Krork moved out, flicking from one key area of the ongoing war to another with shocking speed(Warlocks are on Warp Double-Time on the Krork's Battlemoons). Acting as one beast with almost a dozen heads, the Krork's battle moons roared with nigh unstoppable might, and unleashed their accompanying fleets from within themselves to free whatever system they appeared in of hostile forces, only for the disgorged forces to return back in to do the same thing again, again and again, facilitated by the constantly repositioning Battle Moons.
Almost each and every single engagement into one otherwise-overwhelmed system was heralded by Gravity Storms that wracked their targeted areas, disrupting enemy formations and breaking whatever might be broken with the shifting tides of gravity. But even these gravity storms were not enough to get even a single step ahead of the Krork, for over half of the unleashed storms were false, and often the Krork would arrive without any such force heralding them, such was the will of the Krork.(commandos are on generating false gravity storms)

What forces might have been able to directly contest the Krork's otherwise overwhelming localized force superiority, the greatest combat-planetoids of the Suitaitazu and the Iridescent Knight's Men At Arms, where more often than not simply predicted ahead of time, with them showing up to already mostly evacuated systems when they didn't find themselves one step behind. Even worse, whenever the Men At Arms found themselves too far away, too busy to swiftly make their way back without sacrificing some other part of the battle, their own War Arks came under assault, their doom made clear by the Planet Killing weapons of the Krork.

Meanwhile, back within the highly protected innards of the Krork's battlemoons, several devices were either under construction or already charging up, causing the Warp around the Battle Moons to become ever more turbulent, ever more jammed, ever more under the shadow of the Krork, as the Krork's own Shadow In The Warp grows ever darker(Meks on Koo Koo Kachoo's), as if in anticipation of the battles to come.

(dueling the Men At Arms comes next 'round', assuming that not enough War Arcs are taken out to force them to consider withdrawing anyways due to the lack of a screening force)

- 30 RP spent on getting (the rest of the way to) Ridiculous Defenses for I-9 Center.(see earlier for why it only costs 30)

4 RP spent on Intrigue Action for getting Cultivation knowledge/trainers from the Tai before they die, with a side of getting as many of them to evacuate to Krork space as reasonably possible.
4 RP consumed by the upkeep of the reinforcing fleets that managed to arrive in range of the Krork's current supply lines (because the other fleethordes and planetoids are both new and arrived more than two full large squares away- they will need to be either supplied local RP(likely from the Keepers) or be somehow reconnected to the Krork's built up areas to replenish anything other than infantry and basic ground vehicles; and reconnection alone will likely not be enough due to RP shortage.)
12 RP spent on mercenaries for the battle that's occurring far away from the Krork's currently developed territory(see earlier for which mercenaries were purchased)
Final RP goes towards one more Research slot; both of which are to go towards Fleet Runes

SteelWriter77 · Aug 3, 2023

Spartakrod said:
"Look, it's gonna be a bit of tricky business I know, but if you keep your wits about you, and stay out of my line of fire, I'm ninety five percent sure that we'll pull this off." Cayde cautioned a set of guardians who looked a little...sceptical of his claims of being able to easily just get on board an Ykantras Super-Dreadnought that was busy pumping every cubic millimetre of the surrounding space with ionic discharges and missiles.

"...Only ninety five?" A blue skinned woman asked with some trepidation in her voice.

"Hey gotta leave the possibility that we roll a one in my math...and I hate math. Math sucks." He said jovially as the void of space glowed a brilliant blue following a Punic Class Carrier being split in twain by just one of the Dreadnought's primary dorsal turrets, the actinic blue glow briefly flickering for a bit before dimming down.

"Does this one ever shut up?" A Jiralhanae Chief asked one of the Tenno who impassively sat down and meditated, approaching the Gurdara class Super-dreadnought closer and closer. The thirty two kilometre behemoth of a warship's CIWS systems traced laser light and stitched tracers across the void, the chosen assault lander pulling a hard turn to get in range while Railjacks and Seraphs pummeled a brief weakness in the shielding to clear a path into one of the hangars of the target craft.

"How's our landing looking?" He asked, the A.I in command of the Pyrotaurus Botswain class Gunship simply letting out a maniacal laugh in response before it shuddered from repeated impacts from a gatling gun, wobbling in a distinctly stress inducing manner.

"Oh god please don't let me die in the same gunship as this chatterbox." An Insurrection Marine prayed, clutching his crucifix like his life depended on it before the gunship ploughed into the hangar, smashing through a swarm of grunt bots who let out a few shots, screamed in panic, and then were ripped into scrap metal as the gunship scraped across the ground.

Some of the other gunships had better success, some had less, but Cayde quickly flung himself out one of the secondary exits of the craft as its clearance turrets returned fire, Taiidani troops on consultation ducking out of the way as the hypersonic flechettes of the gunship's anti-personnel turrets raked one section to the next.

Ion bolts, accelerator rounds, laser light, plasma ovoids, freeze rays, mini-missiles, and even a telefragger cannon opened up, while Cayde fanned the hammer of his trusted pistol and let out a whoop as an Ykantras infantry bot took a few hits until its shields failed and then went down to another burst to the optics, sparking as it hit the ground.

"Let that be a lesson to you half-rate Vex." He said, smug before noticing that an entire squad of Ykantras had hit the ground stone dead, the Volt Warframe that had finished its massacre putting a bladed polearm away so that it could seamlessly make use of a chattering Phenmor that fired some bursts at first before it clicked, charged, and then sprayed a dense stream of projectiles.

"Well, challenge accepted!" Cayde laughed before he upped his ante.

...

In the shadow of a series of invulnerable towers that had sprouted up on a green world that was wholly overtaken by the crystal that the Taiidani were turning to out of desperation like spokes for a series of wheels and rings that circled the planet, armies and navies fought desperate, bitter battles for the orbitals in orbit around the world, cylinders, spheres and rings of varying size that housed many people and had been turned into great military fortifications with the bounty of green crystal that they were mining so heavily to convert into anything of value.

Even if it meant working to try and synthesise it with similar materials, such as the ominous blue cancer they had taken from worlds impacted by some manner of beast that emerged from a wormhole. The results when they sought to apply this to their own soldiers was categorically monstrous, creatures of bloated musculature and glowing plates of radioactive armour, whose hulking frames were fitted with all manner of weapons to take full advantage of their giant size and strength. Beings who healed at rates that should not have even been physically possible so long as they were exposed to the blessed radiation, and madmen whose brains were rotted by the materials they worked with or bodies had been reduced to quivering blobs of cancer by uncontrolled exposure.

There was clearly potential though, especially under controlled and prepared conditions, ad the green material in particular seemed to be safe so long as one knew how to handle it properly. Dangerous if misused, but so is fissile fuel in general. The blue substance was more mysterious, but seemed to have greater heights to reach for biological augmentation, with the so called "Greater Taiidani" often coming out large enough to mash a hunter, brute, or theban to death with just their overwhelming strength as giants many times taller than human norm pried themselves free of de-icing cryopods, large enough to simply fit a sangheili in their hands like a large figurine and then pitch them with enough force to sunder shielding.

They responded to orders well enough, and were clearly capable of following military tactics and orders, even if whatever was beneath their armoured suits was probably less than pleasant as these giants swung fists with enough force to crack open a Krogan battle tank and carried tank calibre ion cannons and shoulder mounted heavy mortar tubes and rocket pods. Others were augmented to less...extreme degrees, showing superhuman performance, especially when they injected the stuff into their bodies and systems in a form of "hypermode" that while it lasted, let them slug it out with foes who should have outmatched them, taking enormous punishment to go down as technological and biological systems were overclocked into an azure frenzy while their weapons could tear through significantly more durable foes than they ought to.

Cabal and Pyrotaurus troops on hire from the Banished would push ahead, the heavyset bodies of the Cabal forming phalanxes with shields ready while Brutes learned to let the blue enhanced troops in hypermode state burn themselves out, withdrawing and distracting them and taking advantage of their heightened aggression until the charge they injected into themselves ran out and they were more vulnerable. The greater taiidani were something of a problem, but the Grey Death legion's Mechs were quite useful in levelling the playing field, even if they often took substantial losses whenever fights got to close quarters.

But the Taiidani Empire was falling apart, its fleets were split apart into multiple differing directions, and it was trying to put down far too many fires at once. Even here at mining facility Khashekar, there were signs of the civil war ripping apart the Empire, ship formations depleted in number, fortifications that were still undergoing repairs when they were attacked by the Banished, Pyrotaurus, and Cabal with detachments from the Krogans, the Trandoshans, the Tenno, the Vasari, and the Democratic Republic.

One of the worlds of the system was even already burning from a green substance enhanced atmospheric incineration missile to silence a rebellion, which had left a star-hot ball of matter surrounded by a diffuse cloud of vapourised ejecta, bright green and radioactive, with arcing bolts of ionised lightning jumping between the clouds of what had once been a world the size of Doisac.

Many other ships were engaged with Vasari inter-stellar artillery while they were in the process of self-genocide, streams of plasma dropping out of phase space and smashing into the gathered craft to disable them, leaving them to be picked apart by the banished in detail while the Vasari moved to engage the Till-Jeluxi.

And on the orbitals themselves, the Brutes often found that the bodies of the Taiidan's own citizens, human or alien, were stacked like firewood after having been executed by some means of toxin. Piles of the dead arrayed in the thousands, carted off into biological reprocessing pits by mercenaries and blank eyed fanatics who could look even the smallest and youngest amongst their victims in the eye and push them back into the chemical death centres.

All for the sake of more flesh for them to grow new troops, and strange sorts of resources they offered to devils of an altogether more literal sort than was usually meant by the prophets, creatures of anomalous nature that collected some manner of immaterial bounty from the dead and signed their pacts in brimstone and blood. In exchange, gifting the Taiidani anomalous powers and gifts of their own, brandishing them with infernal marks of power in reward for their service.

The facility fell in time, as the Taiidan were forced to withdraw as their fleets were overwhelmed by concentrations of force and the disintegrating cohesion of the Taiidani navy, but the exploratory teams found that many places within were the sites of not merely cruel experiments, but horrid rituals. Pools of blood, scorched cadavers nailed to totems of power, skulls arranged in regular geometric patterns, many who were alive only so that some sort of devices could draw from their pain as they shivered within contraptions that tore at and burned them.

The exploratory teams wisely put most of the survivors out of their misery, finding that most were so badly damaged by the suffering they underwent according to the terms of ritual instructions that promised diabolical power that they were no longer capable of coherent speech or thought without major reconstructive operations and amnestic treatment. The Devils themselves though were strange creatures whose forms defied the laws of biology.

The forerunners would probably have called it neural physics, given their disdain for ascribing the term "magic" to anything, but they were creatures who seemed, for little coherent reason, more vulnerable to weapons of ritual significance or were clad in things that were held to ward against evil spirits. Foes that took more damage from gravity hammers than brute shot as it was more personal to come to grips with the spawn of hellfire, and creatures that adhered to fairy tale like tenets against all region.

For example, the great Ferrotyrants, things of reddened and blackened metal with golden and brass trimming and burning bat like wings, a crown of horns, armour of obsidian, bone, and gunmetal, a helm with a faceplate like the slits of a furnace, a scourge in one hand and a ranseur in another and taloned feet, pausing when met with buildings they were not invited to before smashing them open to get around this restriction. Or the insistence of the Icesworn, cold, frost flecked legionaries with blade like horns and angular armour that gave the impression of carefully sculpted ice, to keep their formations of a consistent size, pausing whenever they dipped below an unacceptable margin to allow fresh ones to teleport in or split off oversized units into ones that fit their mathematical patterns; done so with machine-like efficiency but a deranged sort of obsessiveness.

Other Taiidan forces called on far less coherent beings, things that they called Demons rather than Devils, creatures mashed together of a related pile of aesthetics that fit some sort of theme, giving a highly chimeric appearance. Creatures that were far more wild, far more likely to tear into each other given half the chance, and ones that seemed to rile the Devils something fierce whenever there was not enough else to keep them on the same terms; the divine entities ripping into each other until their bodies discorporated back to whence they came. If the Devils responded to contracts, bargains, and rituals, the Demons seemed to simply come to intense enough displays of whatever concepts fed into them so long as the barriers between the layers of existence were weak enough, usually by offerings and magic.

Like the Devils though, they too shied away from earnest belief, whether that be faith or simple material conviction in the cause. Those who had gained monikers of being effective against their kind had such legends reinforced, as more whispered of one brute's prowess as a demon slayer, that brute would be better at doing just that. Even weapons benefitted from this, with Atriox's chainbreaker increasingly able to banish the fiends back to whence they came. A good thing too, as the fallout from the pacts with the fiends of the worlds aflame was consuming many Taiidan worlds in realms of what humans would likely call Hell.

It was often enough to scald them from orbit, or to let the Tenno, Guardians, and Eldar touch down and cleanse them, but it was certainly a sign of the times to find entire planets rearranged into terraced, interlocking grids of punishment and the evils of misplaced faith that demanded subservience and sacrifice rather than love and community. Worlds with physically impossible but logically coherent structures, where death was often a polite suggestion for the unfortunate whose crimes merited worse fates than being cast into the pit and where pain was profit to crawl up a ladder of punishment.

But whenever these worlds had their anchors smashed and their idols cast down, the Devilry would implode upon itself, many of the fiends howling as their forms discorporated as the means with which they sustained themselves in a material reality they did not belong to came apart and dragged them back to the realms divine. Their structures, when impossible, would crumble back into things allowable under the laws of gravity and geometry, or disintegrate outright if nothing sustained them beyond magic. And even their brass, blood, and obsidian coloured ships would frequently be dragged back to whence they came when their anchors were taken from them.

The Demons of course had far more illogical combinations of sin, pain, sadism, and suffering, like children mashing together everything hurtful that could possibly fit into prompts. Like the spawn of malicious divine turbulence themselves, the worlds where they held sway were formed by piling together the spirit of things that caused hurt and woe, mountains with spikes that grew more spikes that grew teeth that grew needles that grew knives, buildings with internal architecture that was needlessly confusing purely for the sake of frustrating travellers even to the point of impossible geometries, and music that seemed to have no rhyme or reason beyond being painful to the ears.

There were themes, but not coherent plots so to speak, and these places were often churning upon themselves and at war with other aspects of their being as much as they were with anything else. But stories can only last in the face of reality for as long as disbelief is suspended, and the Banished are very disabused of the idea of fantastical destinies. Demons and Devils and Sorcerers and Wizards they may be, but they can be cast from the world of things that matter all the same. Let them be immortal in realms of potential and ideas, the Banished rule the realm of fact and existence.

...

The Banished Fleet arrived before not one gate, but a series of them, built all around a series of star systems that had significant deposits of mineral resources that had a high priority to be excavated and then shipped back to the Home Galaxy of the Empire. Particularly important were the massive bioferrite mines where they harvested a sort of living, self-regenerating and exceptionally strong metal that could not only make their equipment far more durable, but allow it to heal itself at combat useful speeds and make it far easier to shape into all manner of components.

They were also extracting large quantities of psychically active dust and spice, which was of particular interest to the Emperor for unknown reasons; common on particularly desert worlds and heavily lithic planets. Yourokaicite Dust and "spice melange" were what the materials were known as, harvested along with great quantities of "tiberium" and "phazon" that would be shipped back to the Empire from corrupted worlds in great chains of freight ships going into and then back from the Hyperspace Gates.

The Banished fleets would not be allowed to approach without a fight however, as the enemy realised the threat to their gate hubs and their mining operations in short order.

At the most active system, a system where an ancient device that extracted heavy elements from deep within a trio of three blue hypergiants and injected them with fresh hydrogen to keep them artificially young long after they should have died a Taiidan armada awaited near the hyperspace gates overseeing a truly colossal extraction operation. They moved in the sight of the three greater suns, their burning gaze illuminating a complicated series of planets and smaller stars caught in not only their gravity, but that of the ominous black hole in the middle, constantly accreting matter into itself from a tear into subspace only for its growth to "bleed" out into other dimensions.

The Black hole itself is bathed in far too much radiation for the Taiidan to approach, both from the colossal stars dancing with it, and from the accretion the intermediate-mass black hole is constantly undergoing, jets of blazing matter spun towards the poles and shot away from its gravity well piercing into heaven itself.

It would be beautiful, if it weren't also the site of the largest concentration of Taiidan forces between Atriox and reaching their home galaxy caught in Eklemarid's orbit above the galactic pane. They were mining a great many things here, from the many worlds caught in this cosmic machine as they also tapped into the storage units of the extracted heavy elements from the larger stars. Here were also great shipyards and factory worlds and orbitals, a massive hub of industry that was churning out war machines in huge numbers, fed by a great many hydroponics orbitals that produced the prodigious amounts of food needed for the workers in excess of what the planets that were given over to farming were producing.

With hundreds of habitable planet-sized objects in this system, it truly was the system that could provide everything an industrialist could want. And the Taiidan were willing to defend it to the last breath, with their fleets emerging from hyperspace to meet the challenge of the Banished formations pulling out of slipspace. Mercenaries and allies would pour out in their own ways as the fleets would begin a cosmic dance of death at the extremities of the system above a mixed zoning world with factories, farms, and cities in equal measure. A blue-green marble not too dissimilar from Earth in orbit around a yellow dwarf caught in the orbit of the "Blue Eye", with the enemy fleet quickly burning towards the Banished position as the commanders realise that they have a rare opportunity to start landing troops on the world below before the Taiidan response fleet arrives, especially as the Vasari's bombardment immobilised many of their ships with their interstellar EMP effects.

This system would be the most pivotal in getting access to Hiigara, and with the greatest density of hyperspace gates being present here, both sides were likely to pour in all the reinforcements they could to claim victory.

--- Situation Report ---

Tactical battle for Battle of the Blue Eye begins

Banished offensives are going quite well, the Taiidan Empire seems to be in an advanced state of political turmoil with civil war and its meddling in forces it does not understand catching up with it

The banished have secured extensive access to Tiberium, Phazon, and even Exteritite, though the Red material has yet to be captured. It will be up to the Banished as to what to do with this substance, though Tiberium at least seems to be the safest.

The Taiidan military, while potent on the offensive, is not quite as good on the defensive due to their reduced quantity of fortifications, which they've either had to make themselves or contract out to others.

The Taiidan war machine relies heavily on extremely intensive resource extraction efforts, if disrupted their industry will start to starve.

The Taiidan are increasingly relying on bargains with beings from beyond the material world to try and bolster their fortunes, it is often leading to their worlds being consumed in dimensional faults.

The Emperor is very interested in accruing as much Yoroukaicite and Spice melange as possible for reasons unknown, the latter being mined from worlds with enormous worms that turn planets to dry desert.

Musings on the Taiidan: Penned by Escharum

"When the Banished first arrived at these stars, we knew there would be conflict amongst them. For as often as the idealist or the dreamer may desire for a truly peaceful existence, there will always be the corrupt or foolish to drag the stars into bloody war, we had assumed that the Covenant and the UNSC were the worst offenders of such warmongering, that is until we met the Taiidan Empire.

Make no mistake, the Taiidani people are as any people, their species as a whole deserves no blame for the actions of the Empire, but I know that is of little comfort to the billions that they have slaughtered in their madness. The Taiidan Empire have been our first foe here and stand to be ones that we will enshrine in history not for the glory of recounting great foes, but to serve as an example of the base cruelty and madness that can stem from unchecked power and ambition. Qualities that the Mad Emperor holds in great abundance as he declared war on nearly every power he had come across.

The Information given to us by our allies and what we have learned from our own action against the Taiidan have painted a wretched Empire of constant expansion, without it they crumble under the sins of their leadership. I pity such wasted effort and life, pointless for if you only had war and conquest, what culture and legacy do you leave. The Banished are soldiers and warriors yes, but we have ideals to champion and fight for, the freedom of life to not fight pointlessly over such things as species or faiths, to tear down those who would enslave or proclaim themselves masters of any kind.

The Taiidan Empire have no such ideals, for the longest time I had worried that none of their people saw the waste they trapped themselves in, but I have been happy to be proven wrong, learning of those groups who spoke out, who fought against and who now fight to be free from the Taiidan Empire. I often wonder as I read reports from those we send to aid them, do they have a visionary like Atriox to lead or inspire them, the one who stood up to proclaim enough. Or was a rising of the masses, I do not know…nor does it matter really, Atriox was needed for the Banished to rise and continue, whatever the Taiidan needed before means little, as the Banished now come to break their Empire and free the people.

This is my last War, the rejuvenation material and other such technologies found can only do so much, and I see my time ending. And it is a comfort that it is a war that speaks to the true ideals of the Banished and Atriox, a war to showcase honor against a dishonorable foe to use more poetic words. Atriox would simply deem it an end to an egregious enemy against our values and leave it at that, never claiming honor only glory, such is his way.

But before I leave this writing, one must wonder how far the Taiidan have pushed themselves to fight us, to fight others…Will they be the only souls to distort and ruin their own people we face, will this be the face of war in this universe, battles against monsters. It truly is fortunate that the Banished were brought here, to secure against the madness. "
======================

General:

- Preemptive Salvation: Atriox would not put it past the Mad Emperor to decide that destroying this system and it's people to stop the Banished from winning was acceptable. So Banished forces are put on guard to make sure any Taiidan attempts to destroy their own territory or the worlds is the main targets for Banished counter attacks and prevention measures.

-Precise Industrial Targeting: Despite wishing to take this system for the Banished's continued growth and prosperity, Atriox knows that it cannot be allowed to fuel the Taiidan's war machine if he wants to win. So orders are to target bioferrite mines and the Tiberium, both of these resources are critical to the Taiidan's current efforts and to curb their production lines we must target the sources and the supply lines.

Space:

- Space's Hammer: With the might of the Taiidan now amassed against the Banished and their allies, the battle over this system must be perfectly calculated, no misdirections and no obscuring between out forces, all must fight as one and under a unity of purpose. Targeting any and all weak points in the Taiidan and their mercenary forces, be they physical or mental the Banished will break them down under an aggressive and absolute attack while our allies and other forces cripple their means to withstand our attack.

- Shipyard woes: The Shipyards of the Taiidan are one of their most vital factors for the battle and are thus the most well defended of areas. Let'Volir and a decent sized part of the main fleet are put on the attack against these areas, while the rest of the fleets maintain the attack against the Taiidan fleets, there is a chance that some will split off to deal with Let'Volir, but his skills in naval combat along with our advances in technology should be enough to withstand their attacks.

- Boarding: As always, the Banished will seek to gain control over the vessels of the Taiidan through boarding actions, targeting the most powerful ships to secure them for personal use. Leading these advances primarily is strangely enough one Yapyap the Destroyer, leading his Unggoy kin on these daring actions from his Battlesuit to claim a vessel of his own.

Ground:

- Honor to those who trusted us: The promise Atriox had made to the Krogen of Clan Weyloc and those that now serve and live among the Banished has not been forgotten, and while it is unlikely that any facility in this system may hold the supposed cure the Taiidan had promised them, Atriox will still lead attacks on any sort of research facility in search of it.

- Fist of the Free Empire: While this war is to end the Taiidan Empire as a threat, it is also one to free the oppressed people under the Taiidan's boot. Civilian population under Banished occupation is to be treated fairly and kept secure, while still watched to ensure no spies or agents of the empire tamper with the Banished holdings, the newly freed people will be allowed to speak as they wish without the fear of the boot of the Emperor to stamp them out.

- Ending the Madness: Pavium will be given a direct mission from Atriox himself, taking a force of both Banished forces and mercenary allies to find the areas where the Taiidan create their new soldier weapons, the monsters created with their foul dealings or sciences. His goal is to destroy them or end whatever effect they may have, this is both a practical goal as it stops the Taiidan from gaining an advantage in battle, and stops whatever horror is being inflicted on their soldiers, weak and soft as they are, none deserve what is being done to them.

- The Walking Wall: Under the orders of Atriox, Elo Kadu Baqzo and Ndo Kadu Baqzo (Colony) lead their Lekgolo kin and their various constructs will showcase the might of the Banished as they march towards capitals or high value military targets, Locusts and Scarabs firing their weapons against the enemy which only has mercenaries to rely on for this kind of tonnage.

Mercenaries:

- Webway Fun: With our latest allies in the Void Raven Corsairs giving us limited access to their strange method of transportation, Atriox requests to the leadership of the Eldar group on using this Webway to let forces of his own and their allies join theirs in raiding operations across the Blue Eye System, larger groups being able to ensure less deaths for their own forces when attempting more daring raids on more high profile targets.

- Assassinations of Nobility and Military: With the Taiidan crumbling under their own actions and the efforts of all their foes, Atriox knows it is time to deal another blow to their defenses. Gathering the legendary Raid Team Alpha and Tenno under his employ, they along with Banished Silent Shadows under the command of Jega 'Rdomnai will strike those of noble blood in command of this system and those of high Military ranking, all to throw what meager defenses remain into chaos.

- Magic Nonsense: While the Banished as a rule find little comfort in the strange supernatural powers that their allies possess, they are nonetheless useful for operations and battles. So a catch-all order is given to Legion Masters across the battle, to give those allies with said powers the materials or things they need to best utilize their powers against the enemy.

Velocci · Aug 3, 2023

DualFront said:
Since the Kroat's retreat from the Theocracy battle zone, Warfiend Peacebreaker has taken to broadcasting crude imitations of Arm signals. Regardless of how he acquired such knowledge, these signals betray a clear intent by the Warfiend to target the Core in the near future, an eventuality which cannot be allowed. With the assistance of Buzzbok's Hunter-Killers we have managed to track Peacebreaker to a system in Vyranodasik Sector T-11, Subsector North. There are 7 features of note in this system. A rich Kuiper Belt rings the edge of the system. Further in, a gas giant and its moons serve as spawning grounds for the Kroat hordes. Next is a heavily fortified asteroid belt, followed by another gas giant that serves as the system's shipyard and fleet anchorage. Peacebreaker himself has made his headquarters on a highly industrialized terrestrial world, while the innermost planet in the system is being strip-mined for resources. Lastly, we have identified an uninhabited planetoid on an extremely fast elliptical orbit.

INTEL-TAP: The Kroat have been observed constructing what appears to be a gravity-based superweapon using salvaged precursor technology in orbit of the inner gas giant, as well as stockpiling EMP weaponry on the industrial world. Both of these efforts are priority targets alongside Peacebreaker's death.

Tactics: The elliptical planetoid will be the lynchpin of this engagement - Its rapid orbit will allow us to quietly gate in, then drive a heavily fortified position within striking distance of all priority targets. Buzzbok's Hunter-Killers are also preparing their own strike against Peacebreaker - If worst comes to worst, simply pinning the Warfiend in place will allow them to strike the finishing blow.

Eliminate Warfiend Peacebreaker and his superweapon projects, then purge the system of all Kroat life.

DO SO NOW

In after-action reports, the planetoid would simply be referred to as Elliptical. It followed an unnaturally swift orbit from the edge of the system to its second planet and back in a matter of [hours/days/weeks]. The gravitational stresses of this journey had driven intense volcanic activity within the planet, rendering it inhospitable even to the hardy Kroat, but still no obstacle to Core warmachines.

At the edge of its orbit, on the dark side of the world, a wormhole formed in a flash of EM radiation, vomiting forth a single machine before collapsing in a second flash.

And, once more, somewhere in the universe, a Core Commander built a metal extractor.

With no hostiles contesting their arrival, Peacebringer was able to focus on building up to a T3 economy. As soon they can build a single OCV, it is dispatched not construct orbital infrastructure around Elliptical, but catapulted towards the kuiper belt, to act as the seed for additional bases and resource operations that can provide a fallback position and reserve forces in case things go poorly in the inner system.
That done, Peacebringer turned their attention back to Elliptical. They had [hours/days] before the planetoid passed through the asteroid belt, and detection by the Kroat became inevitable. Plenty of time to prepare.

By the time it reached the asteroid belt, Elliptical was almost unrecognizable. It had become noticeably less massive, huge quantities of heavy metals and lighter elements siphoned off to fuel the feverish pace of construction on the surface and in orbit.

On the surface, immense batteries of Intimidator LRPCs and Silencer Missile Silos had sprung up to defend the planet's orbitals, while endless lines of Krogoth gantries continuously spit out Space Krogoths, the immense war machines held in reserve for one specific moment, and all of it hidden under overlapping formations of Deleter radar jammers. Lastly, a set of Galactic Gates is built to allow units to reposition or retreat across the system.

Elliptical's orbit, in turn, had been filled with Frigate and Destroyer shipyards. The Frigate yards churn out endless waves of Apocalypse frigates, while Destroyer yards painstakingly construct fleets of Penetrator bombardment destroyers, which in turn use their onboard Frigate bays to each build one Seer radar ship, one Midnight strategic missile ship, one OCV, and one Unity carrier before joining in on Apocalypse production. And, in between the other production orders, a handful of Temple gateships are sequestered at the heart of the fleet.

The first shots of the battle were not fired upon the asteroid fortifications. Instead, Temple gateships, latched to the front of Penetrator destroyers, consumed huge amounts of energy to rapidly spin up, followed by their paired destroyers firing their spinal guns into the wormholes as soon as they stabilized - Assuming they did. It was not known whether the gravity devices had working teleportation defenses, but it was believed that a surprise attack like this - before using the Galactic gates for any other purpose in the system - would minimize their chances to activate. Even if the strike failed and somehow resulted in the loss of the gateships and destroyers, nothing of value besides the spent energy would be lost and the Core would simply need to make a direct assault against the devices instead.

Moments later, Command Peacebringer and an escort of combat K-bots stepped through their own Galactic Gates on the surface of Elliptical, emerging on the system's innermost planet, quickly clearing a perimeter and establishing bases to pacify the barren world. If their gambit was successful, they could secure the planet's abundant energy and metal resources, and pincer Peacebreaker between their own forces and Elliptical.

In a move that would spark much debate within the Hunter-Killers over the most effective form of alpha strike, the first indication to the Kroats that anything is amiss in the system is when the volley of Penetrator fired Cigar ships meet the ultratech hull of the device that the Kroats had codenamed 'Kroat's Killer KABOOM'. The detonations are blinding and utterly dwarf the attending construction ships, which are atomised before they can even register an attack. A good third of the escorting fleet was damaged by sheer proximity.

The gargantuan platform itself is revealed moments later to be completely unharmed, with the only evidence of the violence suffered being red and black scorch marks on the hull where Kroat additions had been.

If the Kroats had possessed discipline equal to their foe, it would have taken no time at all to restore the device to at least its former functionality. But while the opening strike failed to annihilate its target, it arguably did something more effective.

Not all of the soldiers Peacebreaker had conscripted for his campaign against the CORE were onboard with his obsession, and with the lack of any other available evidence at the moment they assumed that one of their own had decided to make a move against the Warfiend.

"It's time! Grab your Eviscerator!"

"Time for what?"

"Rebellion! Damn it shroomhead, didn't you see the fireworks out there?!"

"What's that got to do with rebelling?"

"Did you spawn upside down or something? Us NCOs have been talking - You know what Killalot's gonna do when he comes back and sees what Peacebreaker did to his sector? D'you want to be on his bad side when he gets here?"

"I'll grab the Turbokiller 3000!"

Infighting broke out seemingly from nowhere, cutting off communications with the Gas Giant as the Peacebreaker aligned Kroats clashed with the ones that had been their comrades just minutes earlier. This prolonged Peacebreaker's ignorance of the assault on his system - and extended the window of time the Core had to operate unopposed.

This was just what the force that had been grown in the Kuiper Belt needed to make their insertion go as smoothly as planned. When the fleet leaves the outer edges of the system and makes it inward to the Gas Dwarves, it is a match for the Kroat fleets stationed there in both numbers and firepower. The fungi are caught off guard by the bombardment of Nemesis and Midnight ships before Tyrant and Apocalypse frigates maul them up close. It takes little time for the twin planets to become ship graveyards, but to their credit that is long enough to warn Peacebreaker that they are under attack - and to prevent that fleet from reinforcing the Elliptical group as planned.

As Elliptical breaks through the asteroid belt and the Core begin their assault in earnest, Peacebreaker sends an unexpected transmission. The loathsome hydra-like Kroat bears its fangs as it grins eagerly at the screen, seeming joyful to see its foe despite the wreckage of its fleet starting to fill planetary orbits.

"SO you actually came! I didn't think you had the spores! I thought you'd be too busy rebuilding with the rest of the pansies to come and have this fight. You sure ain't no whiny Peacenik' like the rest of the runts in this neighborhood. Just might make a man out of you yet!"

"Look at you, with all your drones and tanks and artillery - all automated, no real grit behind them. Think you're winning because you don't gotta get your hands dirty? Think you're better than me cause your side doesn't have blood to spill? Think it matters? Here's a lesson for you boy, I already won! The second you strapped on your booties and your big boy pants and went out with the rest of your buddies to fire your peashooters and imagined you were hitting my boys - that's when I won. Cause you've got a taste for it now see, the taste of war! And there ain't nothing else like it! Telling me you don't smile seeing mushroom clouds wipe out my grunts, that you don't feel a little satisfaction watching those war machines you've got tear apart some rust bucket a goon barely out of his pod put together that morning? Don't lie to me! And you'd be a damn fool to lie to yourself! You were born for this war, you and your pals, and that's all you're gonna do - day in and day out, listen to how you've gotta take out this and that target for some egghead who's never spent a minute on the battlefield, who doesn't get it like you do. And then the day'll come when you, everyone like you, the whole stinking Core wakes up and smells the napalm, and you're gonna wonder why you ever wasted time doing anything but war!"

"Was that antimatter missile aimed at me or did one of your bots miss that badly? Well, lemme lay it out for your thick skull, get through the layers of stupid the hippies back home put in to stop you from hearing the truth - It don't matter if I lose! You take me out, sure, one less Boss around calling shots, but d'you even know what Kroatanga means? You will! And if I'm not the one to teach you, it'll be Killalot and his NCOs, or one of the green dummies, or the twigs, or the flaming ones. Point is, this isn't something you can just ignore by putting your fingers in your ears and yelling crap about peace, love and understanding. Sooner or later, and I bet sooner, you'll get to a crossroads and have to make a call - give up your kiddie blankie and step up with the real adults in this universe, or die. You don't believe me? Every Kroat knows, soon as he steps outta the ground, that war is all there is. We've been doing this a long time, and we haven't been proven wrong yet. War consumes all."

Peacebringer's response is as swift as it is contemptuous, "Your understanding of the Core appears to be as shallow as your brainpan. Do you think you have ripped away our blinders, revealed some hidden truth of reality? Have you deluded yourself into thinking this is a war instead of pest control? Our war against the Arm obliterated an entire galaxy before you ever pushed shoots out of the dirt, and we kept killing each other in the ashes for another thousand years for no greater reason than sheer, bottomless spite. Try lecturing us on war when you have actually fought one."

Peacebreaker's voice rises with anger, "War! One galaxy burned and he called it a war! Ended in a thousand years, and he calls that a war! Real war never ends! You just find a new target! You're really gonna keep the kid gloves on? Really gonna just say no to being strong?! Well then, you aint worthy of living! And what a shame, you were so close!"

"You think I don't know what you're up to, boy? Thought you could sneak this, this, corruption past me? Makes me wanna throw up just looking at it - good, honest, strong NCOs walking hand in hand with aliens, singing kumbaya and smelling the roses… I thought I was good at psychological warfare but you've got a really twisted head to come up with this stuff. When I find you, I'm gonna peel you from the inside for this. AND IF YOU THINK I'M GONNA LET THIS HAPPEN, YOU'VE GOT ANOTHER THING COMING! I'D RATHER KILL EVERY KROAT, FROM KULTZER TO THE SMALLEST SPORE BEFORE I SEE THE WAR OF THE KROAT END LIKE THAT!"

"You misunderstand again, but there is no purpose in trying to enlighten you further, when what you will "let happen" has no further bearing on what is going to happen."

As Elliptical reaches its closest point to the industrial world, the Space Krogoths finally make their move and lift off from Elliptical, still concealed but now by an escort of Apocalypse frigates, and break through the orbital engagement to perform a combat drop upon the world, claiming beachheads for engineers to land or gate in and construct support bases on the planet.

As Peacebreaker's speech revealed, he was not totally unprepared for an assault on his homebase. When the Elliptical force splits to accomplish its objectives, the portion attacking the Industrial world faces staunch opposition as the Kroats had built up more than expected, and with Peacebreaker's experience facing the Core before were able to adapt to the tactics used quicker than anticipated.

There's only so much tactics can do in the face of superior firepower and eventually superior numbers as the Core are able to replace their losses far faster than the Kroats can, and eventually a Krogoth makes its screaming descent onto the surface of the smog choked Industrial world. The orbital drop blasts apart a whole city's worth of Kroat production and manufacturing infrastructure, and provides a beachhead for the Core economy to begin. The Kroat counterattack is immediate - and the K-Bots that exit the factories are reduced to scrap as soon as the Krogoth which had been drawing fire was downed. That first foray onto the world lasted minutes before being removed thanks to the sheer density of Kroat defenses, but as battle lines shift in orbit more Krogoths make landings, more bases are built, and as fire is diverted from lone targets to dozens of spots of Core activity, true beachheads are established. And then Goliaths, Hedgehogs and Krogoths begin advancing and battling the Kroat War-Engines, and with Silencers, Intimidators and Doomsday Machines springing up behind them the opposing forces quickly lose any advantage they had.

The fleet attacking the Kroats stationed at the Gas Giant has less success. Penetrator rounds are blocked by monstrous Kroat Battleships that shield the smaller ships as they return fire, and prevent more shots from reaching the under construction ultratech device as well. This success could have led to that Core fleet being overwhelmed, after all clearing out Kroat fortifications in the asteroid field had not been a bloodless affair, but the sudden outbreak of infighting among the Kroat changes the situation again.

Peacebreaker's Flagship uncloaks, an axe-shaped juggernaut easily double the size of the battleships in his fleet. Orders are sent out calling for every Kroat worth their power armor to take point with Peacebreaker and charge the Core reinforcements - promising a reward for any of his dons who could bring him Peacebringer's head, and a greater one for any who could bring him the upstart punk alive so he could teach him some manners.

This doesn't happen. To the bewilderment of Peacebreaker, and anyone listening in as well, the ships under his banner reject his orders, claiming he has been compromised. The Kroat forces fall into infighting even more intense than what had briefly been seen at the gas giant, with three factions emerging. The first claims their allegiance belongs to Killalot and that any other Kroat not with them is guilty of insubordination, the second faction consists of any Kroat with a named rank and command of a large enough crew to bully the other ships nearby as they declare independence and fight to secure what resources they can before breaking out of the system, the third group is oddly succinct and claims they will die as free Kroats, whatever that means.

The consequences for the Core are that their targets are taking themselves out without even needing the personal attention of the Commanders, which is always a good thing.

However, Peacebreaker is less concerned with regaining control of his forces than killing Peacebringer, so the Flagship ignores all the gnats firing at it and makes a break for Peacebringer's position. Core ships that moved to intercept were brushed aside, rammed or gutted by obscenely powerful mass driver strikes. Soon, the Dreadnought was in position over Peacebringer. But he wasn't alone. He'd repositioned to the Innermost planet and like any Commander worth his salt, constructed a base. So too did the Hunter-Killers choose this moment to make their move. Whether Peacebreaker knew it or not, the fungal terror's time was over.

Isolated and trapped between the Core fleets, anti-orbital guns, and Buzzbok's surprise attack, the shields on Peacebreaker's flagship finally collapse, and yet the behemoth spacecraft fights on, hurling immense kinetic bombardments back at Core fortifications. Even where surface structures are not destroyed, tectonic upheavals obstruct their functionality.

As the Hunter-Killers begin boarding Peacebreaker's flagship, Peacebringer's own calculations arrive at a conclusion that might have startled lesser beings - That it is safer to be onboard the flagship and surrounded by enemies, than to be on the surface under its guns. Acting quickly, the Commander empties their antimatter reserves into external storage, filling their empty tanks with excess nanomachines and relying upon the resource network to supply power. Simultaneously, their nanolathe is modified to construct and launch antimatter rockets, and their single light laser cannon overcharged to maximize firepower.

Preparations complete, Peacebringers calls up an escort of Pyros and Cans, and steps forth once more into a Galactic Gate. Emerging aboard the flagship alongside Buzzbok's own boarding party, the two strike forces rendezvous and begin cutting their way through the ship. The plasma casters of the Pyros are especially effective in the confines of shipboard combat, waves of star-hot plasma reducing hoards of Goons and NCOs to ashes, with the Cans and Hunter-Killers cutting down the hardier Kroat warforms. And wherever the Kroats tried to collapse or seal off compartments, Peacebringer simply obliterated all obstructions with the D-Gun.

Peacebreaker, seeing his followers failing to stop the strike team, declared he would "do it himself" and rushed to meet them halfway. The Warfiend was both massive and ugly, dozens of 20-meter long necks extending like fungal stalks from a body that managed to look like nothing so much as a massive pile of moss. Each head was armed with weapons both built by the Kroat and stolen in conquests, their teeth covered in crackling energy fields. Most would find little purchase against Heavy Armor, with one exception - A muon gun, similar to the armament of an Arm Zeus K-bot, could cause real damage. Peacebringer's sensors also revealed that the Fiend was protected by some sort of gravity-based shields - Presumably more hypertech salvage - They would be functionally immune to the Commander's D-Gun. Peacebringer fired it anyway - Let the brute believe it would be completely useless in the coming battle.

No banter was exchanged - Both leaders had already traded all the words they cared to, and now was the time for fury and death. As the initial D-Gun shot washed off of Peacebreaker's shields, the fiend reared its many heads back and roared before unleashing his full arsenal. Kinetic projectiles, lasers, plasma streams, energy shells, muon pseudo-lightning , all kinds of missiles and more crisscrossed the compartment as both sides engaged in earnest. The energies unleashed in that moment would have formed a mushroom cloud in the atmosphere of a planet. Here in a ruined compartment already opened to vacuum, they merely flashed bright enough to vaporize any unshielded organic.

The muon gun missed, carefully deflected by Peacebringer's own rocket, the head that carried it shaken by the blast but unharmed under the shield. The rest did not matter much to the Commander. Linked into the Commander's network and sharing in their predictive calculation, Core K-bot and Hunter-Killbots dodged as they were able to, endured hits where they could not. Several more indecisive exchanges followed - The Hunter-Killers evaded fire, while both the Core machines and Peacebreaker's shield gave no indication of damage when struck.

Apparently growing tired of the stalemate, Peacebreaker's heads darted forward like striking snakes. Peacebreaker deflected one with the barrel of their D-gun, then hopped over another, carefully noting warnings about Heavy Armor field fluctuations. The K-Bots, decidedly not designed for melee combat, fared worse. Energized teeth scored armor, and twisting necks knocked Pyros and Cans to the floor - Without arms, they would struggle to stand up. One Pyro had managed to get its weapon arm practically swallowed by one gullet, before spraying plasma inside the beast and his gravity shield.

At the same moment, the shield condensed around the maw's teeth, flaring white before ripping through the weapon's barrel - But the damage was already done, that head ruined. Suddenly wary of pressing his attack, Peacebreaker's heads hauled his bulk back across the compartment, before he ripped out the entire bulkhead wall and hurled it at the assembled machines.

A single shot of the D-Gun erased it. A rocket slammed into the muon gun-head whose movement Peacebreaker thought he had concealed. Peacebreaker continued his retreat, tearing through bulkhead after bulkhead on his way to the outer hull. With memcomposite muscles straining past their limit only to be woven back together again and again, Peacebringer sprinted in pursuit, Hunter-Killbots following in their wake and K-bots still struggling to stand back up.

As both parties emerged on the hull of the ship, Peacebreaker and their allies engaged magnetic clamps while Peacebreaker simply clamped on with his many jaws. Both sides fired again and again, but still there was no measurable change in the strength of the warfiend's shield. It could be on the verge of collapse, or completely unbothered by the fire unleashed upon, and Peacebringer could not tell. They could only assume Peacebreaker was just as unsettled by the durability of the Commander's Heavy Armor, as his destination was revealed at last - One of the flagships's many anti-ship turrets, large, but not so massive that the Kroat Warfined could not turn it against its tracks, and towards the machines doggedly chasing him.

Peacebringer intended to make it his last mistake. Querying the battlespace, found a Valkyrie transport, one of many ferrying additional Core boarding parties onto the ship. It would do. Previous cargo abandoned, the Valkyrie swooped in to carry Peacebringer closer to their nemesis. A single shot of their D-Gun erased the turret, hurling Peacebreaker into the void, with nothing to latch onto - With one exception. Peacebringer had come recklessly close in order to fire their D-Gun, and a single head lashed out, aiming to use the Commander as counterweight for Peacebreaker to hurl himself back onto his ship.

Just as planned.

Both Valkyrie and Commander twisted at the last moment, planting their D-Gun directly down the monster's gullet. Nanolather arm reached around, flash-forging a clamp to hold the head in place, and the transport reversed thrust, pulling the neck taught. Then, for a brief moment, the golden light of the D-Gun shone through Peacebreaker's flesh, before streaking down his neck and through his main body. Where it pass, the Kroat was more than simply vaporized - the Disintegrator Gun worked by suppressing the Strong Nuclear Force, causing the target's atoms to instantly collapse into free neutrons, hydrogen plasma, and gamma rays.

Nothing remained to mark the passing of the Kroat Warfiend Peacebreaker.

The dueling fleets around the Gas Giant were less affected by the chaos of the inner system, as the dissident elements had already been purged there in the earlier flare up of rebellious Kroats. The battle was at a deadlock, as the larger Kroat ships were able to concentrate their fire to eliminate any Core forces that presented themselves, but the Core were able to recover those losses almost in the time it took for the Kroats to reload. The equilibrium was shifted by two events: The arrival of the fleet that had been engaged with the Kroats stationed at the gas dwarves, and the eruption of a gravitational wave as the device was primed. The resulting turbulence disrupts communications and formations of both fleets, but the state of the defending Kroats suddenly matters less as the gravity spikes become more localized to the gas giant itself than the surrounding space. Temperatures soar along with pressure as the pillaged technology is finally operated to turn the gas giant into a new star - a star that will then be forced to go nova and sterilize the system. The inward and outward Core fleets throw caution to the wind to try and rush in and destroy the device even as the present Commanders prepare to gate out of the system, but the Kroats are eager to block them, howling with laughter even as they buy time for their own doom as well.

Or so it would seem. Right before the final gravity surge that was predicted to complete the transformation of the gas giant all activity from the precursor machine ceases. A transmission is sent out from the machine and the small fleet surrounding it, claiming that the Kroats will not be tools again. They don't allow any followup questions, as the fleet throws opens fire on the Core, who finally having clear firing arcs are able to both destroy the last Kroat ships around the gas giant and reduce the ultratech device to slag before it falls into the atmosphere of the superheated gas giant.

And with that, the full force of the Core is able to turn around and purge the inner system of the Kroats who were too foolhardy or bloodthirsty to flee.

The system had been cleansed of the Kroat presence hours ago, and there was nothing left for Peacebringer to do but listen to reports from other CORE groups and Hunter-Killers operating in the sector. With the Kroat command structure pretty much a ghost at that point, it was going so steadily that novice Commanders might have been allowed to take part just to get used to the routine of combat. Wherever Killalot was, when he returned he'd find his supply sector razed to the ground.

And Peacebringer would be there to put him into the ground as well.

A communications channel suddenly flashed open. According to the ID it was coming from Peacebreaker, but that was impossible. He had seen the Warfiend die with his own eyes.

A grey skinned humanoid stood alone in a dark room, malformed silhouette barely visible, the most striking features its glowing red eyes and horned bestial head.
"Commander Peacebringer, your progenitor is favored by The Forgotten One. You have been chosen to further our designs, and the first of your trials is thus: Deliver this message to your Central Consciousness - The Cold Flame Awakens the Eldest of the Gods."

The figure smiles, a predator's grin.

"We shall meet again. You are meant for more than pacifying barbarians."
As the video feed terminated, every nerve of Peacebringer's simulated nervous system was lit on fire. Dozens of warnings were firing across his mind every second - each one informing him of a new virus aggressively targeting some aspect of his being. A lesser intelligence would have been dead already, but the CORE held nothing back when designing its commanders. He would need to return to home space to be repaired, but he would survive this, even if his functionality would be crippled until then.

CORE Strategic Turn 3

The last of the Kroats in the sector are exterminated by fire and macrocannon volleys that span entire horizons. The violence unleashed in many cases of removing every trace of the vile fungal ecosystem from the worlds entangled by them would dwarf the scale of extinction level events, but this is deemed necessary given the incredible resistance of the basic Kroat spore. The Hunter-Killers congratulate the Core for a job well done afterwards, for this and for Peacebringer's impressive performance in executing Peacebreaker. They forward many requests for duels once that Commander recovers from the cyber attack.

But no good deed goes unpunished, and word of what happened has reached Killalot along with footage of Peacebreaker's disintegration. The Arch-warfiend was driven into a fury, and interrupted his campaign to gather his entire fleet to strike at the Core. While his entire economic base was destroyed, due to the nature of the Kroat war economy a large enough victory would both boost their production enough to compensate for this and keep Killalot's status intact.Killalot is doubtlessly counting on this, and a crushing victory against the Core and Theocracy would allow him to turn back around and continue the war against the Horgathrux.

Tentative scouting and news on the Hypernet concerning the area South to that recently cleared of Kroats has revealed a megastructure, or interlinked types of megastructures, built around a massive blue star. The original intent behind the building of this massive complex can only be speculated, but it seems to have truly epic production capacity and population space, along with an odd ability to suppress the Kroat adaptation ability when certain facilities were operated by one of the greater galactic powers when it was in their hands. That time has passed though, and while the Kroats had fought two great powers in the past for possession of the structure it has been abandoned by them due to the depletion of their forces by the war against the Core.

The fleet under Killalot's command is truly epic in scope, dwarfing that of the Three Greens and certainly what the Core has now. While reports are vague on the exact composition of the fleet, it can be easily surmised that it would have technology more advanced than what has been seen from the Kroat's so far as a result of Killalot's ongoing wars against higher tech factions. It is impossible to miss the presence of a constellation of planet sized craft ferrying the fleet however, and from the hyperspace distortions generated by a single body in that constellation, it has been estimated that one of the Kroat planetcraft is the size of a gas giant, as improbable as that may seem at first.

Killalot is still a distant threat at this time, but one growing closer by the day.

The pace of work on defragging the Votann Kin is going steady, and some core functions of the ancient computers have been restored that enable them to perform self-maintenance that make the task easier. The Kin that are more vocal than the rest seem to regard the Core members as representatives of some Federation, and warn of the treachery of their brethren although they cannot come to agreement about the cause of this betrayal. One might curse the knife-eared Eldar for their meddling, the other may speak dire portents of malicious warp predators, the next might offer digital prayers to the Omnissiah on Mars and plead to be spared its wrath, and the last may angrily rant about the foolishness of their fellow machines to turn against their creators all on their own. It's a confusing mess that will probably be up to them to sort out once their faculties have been fully restored. The Votann have been active and expanding while this joint project is underway, setting up many holds throughout the unclaimed space between the Core and the Tohx.

As a result, and out of friendship, the Votann gave the Core an early warning that the Tohx had not been idle while the Kroats were being put to the torch. A civil war has broken out between Tohx Earls for control of the sector, both summoning as many of their forces from outside of the sector as possible to seize the former War Earl's treasure trove before the other can claim it. This has become a problem for the Core because the kleptomaniacs have not kept to their own borders during this. Opportunistic raiders from both Tohx factions have seized Votann and Core units to add to their collections. The infighting has revealed a troubling capacity of the Tohx to replicate their captured trophies, and to use them better and better in their armies as they gain experience in using them. While analysts had not been overly concerned with the War Earl when they had left near the end of the War, there are now worries about their personal contingent and what they might be capable of once they return from their Quest, as they had captured a number of Oltoavarri units before their departure - meaning that they could have an edge on Core at least on a unit to unit basis.

The unrest which had been quietly simmering in the homefront becomes more heated as a number of demagogues emerge from the shadows to publicly decry the Core and their patterning technology as soulless heretical blasphemous dangerous… etc. the Theocracy has become rather politically polarised as a result, split between those who remember the Core with gratitude and those who fear them and the poisoned chalice they offered. The loudest voices against the Core come from different walks of life, but have two peculiarities in common: They do not appear in the citizenship records of the Core or local administration, and their inner circles enjoy the same kind of rice. Those most concerned about this issue are those who closely study the Theocracy's faith, and those falling out of the faith and towards the Core's beliefs.

In their efforts to investigate the Southern sector, the Caregivers have run into some trouble as well. They made first contact with a race of beavers which built a shockingly authoritarian galactic empire called the Dæmningspagten, with their State propaganda geared towards the need for a strong leader, the correct way society should be structured and so on and so forth. They were offended by the Caregivers efforts to uplift them further if they stopped treating other species as chattel slaves at best and since then have had light skirmishes with Caregiver fleets. So far they haven't accomplished much but broadcasting propaganda in every direction demonizing the Caregivers and all their allies, and spamming the Singularity Pact with membership requests (which has only earned them the ire of the Ecumene).

On top of that, the remains of civilisations broken in the wake of the Tohx, Orks and Kroats which survived and became space pirates have been raiding Caregiver relief efforts and Dæmningspagten outposts with equal fervor. While they raid the beavers for resources, they seem to have an axe to grind against the Caregivers for failing to protect them from the three greens and for posing restrictions on what they consider their freedoms to help them now.

Lastly, a precursor built gateway to another galaxy has been found in the control of a group called the Tenno, who seem to be mercenaries united only by their shared love of thrill seeking and cosmetics. They've been making nuisances of themselves throughout the sector as they run around doing various stunts but no harm has come of this yet.

Odd news comes from the old firebreak sector, a rogue white star has been moving slowly through the sub sector towards the Reliquary. Unknown ships have been seen disappearing into the sector as well, but whether these two things are related is unknown.

RP available: 56

Territories

South, Southeast: Stentilli Caregivers: Machines devoted to caring for their organics with pampering, fun, love, and care, these machines generally are not fond of conflict except in defence of their beloved organic pets. Emboldened by the boosts and capabilities of their new allies they look to enrich the environments for their charges with a change of the newly Patterned individuals in their ranks at the forefront of those looking beyond their boarders.

Northeast: Great Theocracy: Believers in the Elendian religion, the Great Theocracy has much to do rebuilding and healing before any further action will be taken. Their focus will be rebuilding their war machine and digesting the internal matters.

East: Reliquary: A vast collection of precursor structures built by a long-dead society, the Reliquary was something even the swarm was reluctant to poke for unknown reasons. While it was less helpful to the Core than they initially hoped the slow access and support in the form of information and context and the possibility to regain the lost technologies from the heights of their Civilization makes it a priority to build and protect this region.

West, Northwest, Southwest: CORE peripheral Territory: The CORE now patrols the various subsectors that it has laid claim to although little infrastructure has been added. While the minor powers and primitives have given no problems, in many cases they have not even noticed, the majority uninhabited systems have been claimed albeit with the faintest grasp and could be easily west from the CORE's hands by even a minor incursion.

North: CORE territory: The Votann League of Urist Freekindred has set up in CORE claimed territory to the North to await payment and renewal. Digging in on a number of Worlds and to ensure that work on the Ancestor machines will be undisturbed making it the most fortified position outside of the CORE's Central position or the Reliquary's Guardians.

Centre: CORE: The Third Consciousness continues to rebuild and expand the server farms and industry of their old civilization, although work is slow due to expenditures outside and still being early stages of the exponential growth. The Scars left by the ARM are still healing and this space, which still would be consider a beachhead in the old war, is slowly becoming something more than what even CORE PRIME had been for millennia.

South West: Continued tracts of virgin Territory

South: prospective Votann Hold: Looking to the future many of the Kin have started prospecting and mapping out where and how to build fortifications, industry and civilian structures when the CORE have finished their work.

South East: Broken Ruins: One of the territories that had brought the acolytes of Elenda and is covered in technology of similar technology as the Reliquary, much of it of a defensive nature. However, this territory was already in ruins with little to no functional specimens was further ravaged by the war of the Three Greens and the most major semi surviving structures had to be broken apart by Votann planet crackers. While there is little of anything useful to be gained here the Theocracy has some long-term plans for expansion.

West: Thorncasters Fiefdom: A minor Tohx House that was a vassal of the Plantgiant Earldom and one of the two major competitors for control while the WarEarl is away. Their military has been based much more on massing the fire power of lower ranking Tohx. They control a heavy portion of the industry and bulk of the Earldoms Forces but have been having difficulties in supplying their forces with trophies for their own collections with both the events of the War and the sacking of their Earl's primary fortress.

Center: Broken Thox Stronghold of the Plantgiant House: The primary Fortress of the WarEarl that has left for parts unknown and had tied together the surrounding Thox in a fair-sized Raider Empire for an extended period of time. Was destroyed by the Mutating Ork fleet on their rampage towards parts unknown Northeast. Now contested and a battle ground by two minor Thox houses for leadership at least until the time the Earl returns, centered on seizing and controlling the remaining Forts.

East: House of the Alba Rosa: The smaller of the two Houses here we find the realm of the more elite forces that the Tohx deployed in the War of the Three Greens. Specializing in producing their strikecraft and the more singular powerful WarSires. And while they have more plentiful of the creature they lack the singular size of the head of the SeedCasters and both factions have been unable to bring the other into line. Is currently engaging in light skirmishing against their rivals and maneuvering in anticipation for civil war.

North East, East, South East: Virgin Territory, With the extermination of the Kroats these territories are now devoid of anything that could stop the CORE, or anyone else for that matter, from taking control of these regions

North, Center, South, Northwest, West and Southwest: Purged territory: the remains of the Kroats industrial base after receiving the attention of Commander Peacebringer and their Commander cohort, the worlds are dead and stripped of everything to support life at best, while Killalot will pass through this territory on their way to the Central CORE territory it will take massive investment by Kroats or others for it to even begin to return to its prior capacity.

NorthWest, West, South West: The Old Firebreak: This territory long ago was stripped of material, Asteroids, planets, stars and even nebulas in an effort to protect the rest of the galaxy from what was told to them by the Reliquary as a series of disasters that ended another galaxy, leaving a pure void that would strain the logistics of… something. Over the intervening millennia however it has been slowly filled in by insertions by other universes. The new systems however have been based around a couple of standard themes, Unimportant but beautiful backgrounds. Brilliant clouds of Nebulas, Great short lived stars and other majestic sights dominate these regions. For what the CORE cares for, it served as the escape route for the WarEarl from the battle of the three greens and disrupts long range sensors of the rest of the Sector beyond.

And disrupts their ability to see you as well.

Currently the northern section has seen unknown ships passing through and a large white star has been sighted moving through the central territory towards the Reliquary.

North, North East: Stentilli Caregivers

North West: Pirates- territory filled with broken remnants of nations that were brought in to this Galaxy and then broken by the Three greens or other threats. Many are former military survivors and others are people that have taken Peacebreaker's and the Kroat's attitude to heart. There is a lack of organization here that the strongest wish to maintain. Little more than some extra raw materials by the CORE's estimation should they attempt to interfere in the CORE dealings.

Center, East: The Dæmningspagten - This organization of sapient Mammalian creatures reminiscent of Beavers have carved an authoritarian galactic empire, with their State propaganda geared towards the need for a strong leader, the correct way society should be structured and are quite aggressive with promoting it amongst the surrounding territories. Their efforts have mostly been rhetorical but seem to be more the Caretaker's opponents than yours. Not a threat to the CORE, despite their self image.

Votann League of Urist Freekindred:
The Urist Freekindred is impressed with the CORE's tenacity and kill count and the chance to cross off many long held grudges against primarily the Orks but a few of the Kroat held ones as well. Side-note that many new ones were written in the process to be loaded into the Votann themselves. As such they are eager to start work on their payment for relieving your forces during such intense conflict. They have moved their fleets to the region claimed by the Core to the North of your built up territory where they have set up the protection that they believe are needed to keep the Ancestor Cores safe and with the help of the CORE, hopefully repair them.

Established Trade Deal

Action required: Research Project: The Votann Cores - Defrag of the Millennium 1/3 progress

Buzzbok's Hunter-Killers:
The Hunter-Killers are grateful to the CORE for this opportunity to gain technological upgrades and look forward to working with the CORE in the future and have left information to contact them for further work as they follow the

Buzzbok's Hunter-Killers: Services Available for Purchase for future conflicts, capabilities will upgrade with each use assuming wreckage of higher tier factions

Cost For Purchase: 2 RP
Tier: Extremis, will reach Maximus after 10 battles against minimum Maximus Tier Forces

Psychotron Unlimited:
Contact has been reestablished with the supernatural machines, who are currently working with an unknown nation against another smaller participant for the slowly developing war for the Garthamin megastructure. As such the opportunity to establish contact with them if the CORE wishes to call upon them again or if they wish to hire them to deal with the remnants of the Green's hordes.

Cost: 20 RP

Tier: Maximus

Crayak · Aug 6, 2023

Unbound Turn 3 Results

(Thanks to @Velocci for doing the mechanics behind this post)

Home Affairs

Rebuilding the ruins of Kett cities into functional Unbound facilities is done in short order, and while most of the population prefers living in space those who wish to leave their nomadic lifestyle behind are even able to settle on the restored orbital ring around the former Kett core world.

Research on the Far Jump Core and FTL Interdiction goes well as the principles havent changed in the jump between realities, and in fact breaching the lightspeed barrier seems easier than ever. However, while interdiction ready ships will be able to deployed soon pending concrete designs for them, building Far Jump Cores is missing a final crucial step in turning the theoretical into reality. A gap in knowledge exists that might be bridged by capturing some examples of higher tech FTL engines, like the one that was used to remove the Flood-Kett Dreadnought from the sector entirely in a single leap.

Diplomacy

Leng

The traders are happy to accept the wares of the Hiigarans, and after they receive an eclectic range of products in return the same satyric Man of Leng materializes before the group. He seems anxious, but his mood turns once it's made clear that the Unbound intend to cooperate against the threat. When it turns out that the Unbound have actual conditions for their help, like finding out what the threat is, and won't just offer their technology wholesale, he calms down and leads them to a building on the edge of the port to speak in privacy.

Privacy must have just be the name of the building or have a very different meaning in the Dreamlands, as the room is filled with other Men of Leng from floor to ceiling, who are chattering amongst themselves as they sit on the ledges and walk across the ceiling of the room that is vastly larger on the inside than the outside.

The nature of the Dreamlands makes it extremely difficult to tell how much time passes exactly, but the diplomats would swear that it took hours for their guide to exchange key phrases with each and every other Lengian there before they finally got a clue about what the threat actually was.

The Tool Meant to Keep the Sleeper Dreaming wields itself! The Guard of the Dream That Is Not has grown tired of guarding, and breaks what it was meant to protect!

Those Sick with Hatred, the Broken Children of the Not-Emperor Creator Davros come from outside to end the dream and kill the dreamer while he sleeps! They wish to be the only dreamers, but they must know that only one can dream, they must?

This doesn't get across much, until moving paintings are revealed that show in perfect detail stars in shadow from the massive fleets of red diamond ships and legions of conical soldiers with plunger shaped manipulators. The paintings only show a few seconds of detail, but it is enough to see the two massive armadas attacking each other, attacking other civilisations, attacking primitives, torching worlds that have even the barest trace of life.

"They do not dream easily, and it is hard to destroy what the mind can recreate in a night. But they are burning away all that dreams, and soon there will not be enough sleepers left to keep the dream here. Please, you must strike at them in the waking world! Before all is lost!"

The Stellar Bulwark

As the hosts of the conference, the Bentusi keep things rather basic. Invites were sent to all the involved parties, and they kept their mothership guarded by a sizable fleet in case any belligerents had ideas about striking at the leadership of four galactic powers at once.

The Galactic Empire arrived in style, with orderly formations of ships and a parade ready for the arrival of Emperor Reinhard von Lohengramm. He was the very picture of regality as he disembarked from his ship flanked by armored guards, stately smile on his face and waving for the recorders capturing the occasion as he shook hands with Melkor Somtaaw.

The Alliance of Sol representatives were next. They had a somewhat understated arrival, if only by comparison to the Empire, as their casual display of psionics and the Light was impressive enough on its own.

The last to arrive were the Crystalline Entities, who orbited the Mothership in a reverse of what their sizes would imply as even the smallest one there was the size of a small moon.

While diplomatic talks can never be called short, these do not take overly long. The Unbound, as organizers of the proposed alliance, take the leadership role. The Galactic Empire is swift to secure trade agreements, and the Central sector which had been in the possession of the Kett and is now theirs, is selected as the trading point between all involved parties. And the evacuation point, but the Emperor is quick to state that that will only be in a worst case scenario. The Alliance of Sol offers more intelligence on the threat it is facing now that they have allies to depend on. Details are shared on the exact composition of Eternal Empire ship classes and infantry forces, details that the Unbound can put to quick use in Lord Makaan's invasion of their territory. The Alliance also shared what intelligence they have on the threat to their South, though it is not comprehensive. Massive machine fleets are running rampant and slaughtering everything they find, using everything from infantry to battle planetoids and every ship class in between. They only know this much because of the refugees they absorbed from this, the lucky few who dodged not only the determined exterminator fleets but the vampiric ones as well.

By accident, from psions and Light users trying to communicate with the Crystalline Entities directly, it is discovered that the creatures exert a field that can stabilize reality around them. This is of some interest to the Empire as well, though they're not open about why.

The Entities themselves don't have anything more to ask from the alliance, and are just very happy to have safe nesting grounds and space for their young. They are fully sapient but not organized beyond the level of extended family groups, and are honestly just happy to have been invited to talk to the small ones. The older ones still don't seem to have grasped the idea that the small things on ships are what they're talking to and not the different ships themselves, but the youngest ones seem to get it.

Relics

The Emperor extends their gratitude for receiving ownership of the Arcology, but plans to keep all technology discovered from it in the hands of the Empire. He offers to share technology that is beneficial to the shared task of defense against threats to their domains.

The Gate scouting team meets with representatives of the EDF, who are enthusiastic to meet them. Almost overly so, and the loud, bright, colorful, sometimes extremely clumsy, teenagers sent for the meeting definitely aren't what the Bentusi would consider diplomat material. That might make them more suited for the job than they seem, as the Bentusi are able to leave strong, positive impressions on the teens through almost no effort on their part. Parallels are quickly drawn between the growing friendship of the Crystals and Unbound to that of the Kaiju and EDF. Further parallels are made to the experiences of fighting the Beast, and both the Flood. But the teenagers must be made of harder stuff than they appear, as their tales of fighting against the assimilated hordes and bio-titans of the Flood are told not through the lens of horror, but pulse pounding action stories. From the description of the youngest one there, an eleven year old girl with a comically short attention span, one might think that uppercutting a Flood combat form into the stratosphere was just something you did between chores (chores like cleaning her room, which was said with a kind of hatred that chilled the room). All in all things went well, although the diplomatic team leaves wondering if their corner of the galaxy is really that bad.

Meeting the RDA

During the negotiations with the EDF a few of the Bentusi ships scouted out the unknown territories that were now adjacent to Unbound space.

To the West there is little but evidence of the Flood's toll on all life. Lifeless worlds stripped clean. The only evidence of anything having been there at all is the wreck of a ship implanted on what is now cold rock.

To the Northwest however there had been tentative contact made, a group of Humans using extremely primitive FTL have been spotted and Hailed. They appear to be workers setting up extraction colonies for a larger polity further into the subsector. At first they seemed quite excited, especially about the possibility of trading and new technologies. But after a closed meeting that your scouts were not privy to, they seemed very ambivalent about such dealings and attempted to pursue promises that the Unbound would not enter their territory without the RDA's permission. When asked if this was the Polity that they represented the subject was quickly changed. When the Scouts told them that they did not have the Authority to make such deals they became nervous but understanding and encouraging any authorities make sure that they only contact RDA personnel and operations.

Giving them a Map of proper contact points the Unbound's diplomats remain uncertain about these skittish primitives. The more perceptive of which believes that this RDA fears Unbound influence and specifically that the tools available to the Unbound might destabilize the unknown power structure within.

Warfare

For Science!

The Creon don't make any moves against the Unbound.

War Against the Night

This is a different kind of war than the one waged against the Kett, one against a foe on the same technological level. Acolytes still prove their worth in Skirmish, granting the Unbound an advantage here. Things take a turn in Clash, and what carries the Unbound through here is that as an autowar faction they can simply replace their losses as they occur.

The real problems come not from the size of the fleets sent to do battle, but the sizes of the ships composing them. The Eternal Empire has ships that are the size of Motherships as regular parts of their fleets, Battleships according to the scale of this new galaxy, and do not use them sparingly. The personal flagships of the Elector Admirals are even larger, true Dreadnoughts, and are virtually fleet killers. The love of firepower and durability extends down to the ships that the Unbound can match in size as well, and it takes dozens of ships to destroy their vampiric counterpart.

The infantry forces of the Ebony Throne are formidable as well. Their elite units are power armored Battledress regiments, technomagical Dervishes, Mutant berserkers, Garou packs, Thinbloods and the Purebloods themselves. The only recourse to being boarded by any of these is immediate use of anti-Beast measures - and even that is not a guarantee of safety as the vampires grow more experienced with their foe as well.

If the Unbound had chosen to take on the Elector Admirals on their own, they might have lost even with Lord Makaan in command, but they did not come alone. They provided the numbers and ability to recover from truly terrible losses, and the Alliance of Sol brought Heroes.

The Unbound ships keep the Eternal Empire fleets occupied while the operatives of the AoS are able to hunt down enemy commanders and elite units and take them out. Without proper guidance it's every ship for itself, and the Unbound can act as water over stone to erode away vampiric fleets until there is nothing left.

One of the Elector Admirals loses their life this way, Alexander Apep, who confidently charged ahead of his supporting fleet to fire on the Unbound ships sooner. Lacking support it was easy to surround the Dreadnought with Unbound ships, Exchanges and Seraphim striking like wasps, and for the team of Guardians to board the ship and fight their way through to the Admiral.

"Open your veins to me little lambs!"

"Suck on this."

The battle is a 4v1 and ruins the bridge of the ship, but in the end the Admiral's regeneration is overcome and he collapses into gore that wisps away into shadows, laughing the whole while and promising to return.

With one Elector Admiral dead, the tactics shift. The remaining one, Clarrisa Aubert, knew that Guardians and other Light users were a match for her best troops. Thinblood and rare Pureblood lives were sacrificed on ambushes on Unbound forces known to be hosting Alliance members, all to exhaust and temporarily take them out of the picture. The bulk of the fleets would then jump into the system and wreck a bloody toll on the Unbound before retreating.

Things come to a head on an assault on a Relic Fortress headed by Lord Makaan. The vampiric fleet that should have been on patrol jumped into the system, with the Flagship of the Elector Admiral joining them.

"So few ships between you and me, Makaan, is your heart racing? Is that the beat I hear?" She grinned, standing boldly on the outer hull of her ship and pointing her glaive ahead at the Vaygr's command ship. "Don't die of fright, little lamb, I'm so looking forward to our dance!"

The Unbound weren't on the backfoot for long, and did their best to recover from the surprise attack and retreat in short order, or to at least begin safely producing new ships. Lyra was having none of it, and finding the speed of her own craft lacking shifted into some kind of shadow form and boarded the first Unbound ship to try to attack her and hijacked it to fly right back into the fleet.

Attempts are made to stop the hijacked fighter from reaching its goal, these attempts fail as the Admiral handles the ship with superhuman reflexes that borders on precognitive, or dashes onto another ship when needed. Lord Makaan would not run, this was a lesser parasite than the Beast. He prepared for combat.

The shields flickered as the stolen frigate slammed into them, alarms blared as the hull was breached. Plasma flooded the breached space as per protocol, but then reports came in of a breach on another floor, then another, and another. She was moving through the ship too fast for detaching the compartments to be useful, and faster than plasma could douse her. What was delaying her from reaching Lord Makaan was that she valued fear tactics over target acquisition, and was taking her time to go from room to room as a blur and splattering the occupants against the walls.

"All alone?" She smirked, holding the heads of Makaan's bodyguards up mockingly. A chuckle left her throat as the Lord drew his personal pistol, and she dropped them.

"No. He's not alone. You should have looked before you leaped."

The vampiress's eyes widened as the Guardians shimmered into being around Lord Makaan and readied their weapons.

"You're not supposed to be here." She hissed, eyes darting from figure to figure."

"We are Guardians. We're always exactly where we're supposed to be."

"Well…"

A sharp look stopped the rogueish looking Guardian from speaking further, and the warlock resembling one raised his incandescent staff.

"Behold, the Light."

The fight is quick and violent, and Lord Makaan receives a deep cut across his face as a last spiteful strike from the undead lady before she is turned to dust, but it ends with the Guardians victorious. Both Elector Admirals are dead, Lord Makaan can recover, and what's left of the Ebony Throne fleets withdraw. Now comes the ground assaults.

Surrender is not an option for the Electors' farms, who doggedly believe that their masters will return. The usual way of obtaining orbital superiority fails due to anti-orbital fire from Ordinators and Space Towers. When ground forces do make landings, they find themselves on the opposite end of the equation than in space. Here, their forces dwarf that of the open in size, firepower and durability estimations. Here, Land Destroyers are sharks wading through angry minnows to bring death and destruction as the largest Eternal Empire warmachines only match standard land cruisers.

Some planets are taken through a combination of orbital bombardment and infantry assistance from the AoS in protecting Command Carriers from enemy super soldiers, but to make more headway the fight will have to be brought to the Ebony Throne itself - and something will have to be done to maximize success on the ground.

Results:

Both fleet hoards deteriorated to Mag 1 fleets at 70%
Empire Fleets destroyed entirely, two Legends incapacitated for most of next turn
Samples of High Empire Tech acquired, highly damaged
AOS fleet: 60% Integrality

Crystal Entity Poaching Prevention

The anti-poaching movement goes according to plan as the larger Crystals escort Unbound ships to their old nesting grounds, then miners make opportunistic attacks on the Crystals forcing the Unbound to intervene. Then Pirates and Necromancers make opportunistic attacks on the Crystals as well, and shoot at the Unbound when they interfere.

The gloves come off the Unbound at this point, and the Pyrotaurs are quick to retreat when it's clear that they're an unsupported fleet against one with autowar capabilities. They may be back later to resume activities, but for now they've left the sector.

The necromancers, known as the Nation of Taros, take up the Unbound's challenge. They serve one of the four Monarchs and need the Crystals, specifically the shards harvested from their corpses, for their plans in the North and don't care that the Unbound are in their way. As an autowar faction themselves, one with cultural similarities to the Creon if you squinted, they are willing and able to push back against the Unbound. Demons, witches and ghost ships are conjured from nothing to attack Unbound fleets and they enjoy an advantage thanks to most weapons being ineffective against their spectral nature. Only lasers and crystal shards are able to inflict lasting damage on the ghostly hordes. The necromancers are willing to speak, and explain in haughty tones that they do not seek conflict with the Unbound and are willing to let their fleet go in peace - If they leave the sector and do not interfere with their poaching again.

Results:

South-western territory reclaimed for the Entities
Pyrotaurus plans on raiding Unbound to prevent interference in their poaching
Nation of Taros contesting control of the South subsector abandoned Nests, no one has moved in large forces yet to settle the issue but it is expected that the Necromancers and Internalists will soon.

The Flood Breaks

The system is bare, unremarkable, just another deserted location in the galaxy… Yet the Galactic Gate looms large against the starry vista, and with it the foul contingent that had brought the Unbound and Men of Iron fleets here.

Mimics revealed the composition of the Flood forces here before the arrival of the purging task force. There were only three planets orbiting this sun, two rocky worlds in the inner orbit and one ringed gas giant with its attendant moons in the outer. The gas giant holds nothing of interest, the second rocky planet is strewn with moldy ruins, light planetary defenses and a few intact Covenant anti-orbital cannons.

The inner planet is a swamp of yellowy Flood biomass and recreated Kett facilities. In its orbit is the Kett fleet that departed the sector, including the overgrown Flood Behemoth. It is overshadowed by two things that could have easily been mistaken for moons, but are Covenant ship-cities that have been overtaken by the Flood to use as another vector to spread itself. Smaller ships are suspended around these Flood-moons like droplets of mist, mostly military ships infested from alien and human nations never seen by the purging force.

A constant transmission was coming from the innermost world that when stripped of the infohazards the Flood used as surely as cells to spread itself was just the sound of the Archon speaking continuously, lamenting…

"Despite everything, it's not enough. It will never be enough."

Situation Report:

System Composition

3 planets
1 Outer large Gas Giant with a ring and many moons
2 rocky Planets - 1 Former Covenant world with functioning planetary defense stations, 1 Flood terraformed world hosting the Kett mimicking infrastructure

Forces

Flood:

1 Mag 3 Succundus Force = 0.5 Force
1 Mag 3 Extremis Force = 2 Force
1 Succudus Cat 0 Planetoids = unknown

Purging TaskForce:

6 Mag 2 Primus Unbound Force = 3 Mag 3 Forces
1 Mag 1 Maximus Men of Iron Force= 1 Mag 3 force

Outcome: slightly more fire power on the side of the Unbound and their allies.

The assets that the unbound have available in this fight:

Several Unbound fleets, able to support about half the number as the traditional Flood ships
1 Zenith Class Command ship with its escort
2 Anakim Class Armoured Command Units

Spartakrod · Aug 6, 2023

patrickmm1 said:
Fleetcommune of the Krork Krork Turn 3:

Enemies abound. The Krork fleetcommune is split in twain; almost half of what remains of their mobile forces arriving too far away to assist its other half; with too many enemies in between to simply travel through the intervening space regardless of how far the distance was. Their enemies were numerous, with almost each and every incoming force outnumbering, and likely outmassing, what forces the Fleetcommune could bring to bear against them when they didn't simply outmass the entirety of the Fleetcommune.

This was nothing new. What was new though is the sheer power of their would-be allies, all able to directly contribute to the ongoing conflicts in a way that didn't depend on the actions of a few Legendary heroes. Allies that were willing to lend a helping hand, and intervene in conflicts far, far away from their current borders. These allies understood that Monsters needed to be fought and defeated, not just ignored in the hope that someday, somehow, a route to a more lasting Victory might be found; for this galaxy at least had more than the hope of fools to fall back on when any one group of people faltered and fell.

At least here, the Krork were not almost entirely alone; at least here, there were two other Titans, civilizations that had withstood all that these galaxies of War had to throw at them, and not just survived, but actively fought back, with moderate success, without falling to the trap of Monsterhood. While negotiations with one of these two factions, the Ascendancy of Alterra, were still somewhat ongoing, with the Krork proving their worth as Protectors in return for the promise of the assistance required to remain as such, and perhaps one day even expand out and reclaim this Galaxy from the Monsters that claimed it in almost its entirety; the other, the Keepers of Mandos, actively reached out to the newly arrived wave of Krork forces, offering much more immediate help in return for vastly more immediate help in turn.

Offering help with building up to a vastly more sustainable level and ensuring that the two separate parts of the Fleetcommune could freely reconnect in return for help with clearing the warzone that these forces had arrived practically into the middle of? There was no way that the Krork Fleetcommune would say no; for while they had the option to do so, there was no real reason for them not to take that deal. And so the Krork once again went to war, this time on three separate fronts, each with its own set of objectives, and thus its own way for the war to be waged, for while war never changes, the battlefields and objectives verry much do.

(here the Krork deploy two of their Fleethordes and four of their Battlemoon Formations, one of which has the Warp Shadow Generator upgrade, and one of which, a different one, is somewhat understrength (⅘ Battlemoons); alongside a potentially still ongoing upgrade to Ridiculous level defenses)

Here the Krork would wage a war of defense, of grinding black stone against deadly oceans, storms of rust, and the unnamed horrors lurking in the lost corners of the forgotten relative dimensions in spacetime. Each of these forces outmassed what mobile forces the Krork could afford to bring to bear here, each of these forces alone would have perhaps defeated the Krork here had they been alone, and had their mobile forces been all that they had. Thankfully the Krork are not alone(where as their enemies very much are, what with them being each other's enemy as well as the Krork's), and none of these forces really had any true experience cracking open what the Krork would consider to be adequate defenses; for adequate defenses was not about any single instillation, any single station, but about layer upon layer of defenses, in overwhelming quantity and impeccable quality; enough to grind even the New Devourer to a halting crawl and give even the Void Dragon pause.

Joined by a Golden Armada and a revolutionary legion, the Krork felt that they could hold this region; and so hold it they did. Even as the recently claimed worlds under the domain of the Krork Fleetcommune became under assault, they became ever more fortified,as layer upon layer of fortifications, both groundside and space-based, appeared around the embattled worlds, shifted through the higher dimensions to the front lines just as soon as they reached completion. At first these defenses were more of the same, as Cruiser and Battleship sized stations were joined by more of their own, the once relatively sparse orbits becoming ever more crowded, the floating minefields becoming ever more dense; but then they were joined by ever greater fortifications, as newly crafted orbital plates suddenly appeared around world after world, even as entire opposing fleets were thrown into gravitational chaos, spaghettified when they weren't simply targeted by the remains of their neighbors or the oh-so-plentiful mass that they were throwing out, by the appearance of Darkstar Fortresses in their midst.

Even as the orbits overhead grow ever more crowded with stations, fortresses, and orbital plates, so to do the groundside fortresses almost seem to multiply and expand, soon stretching from the depths of the Mantle below to where they almost seem to merge with the orbital plates circling overhead. Theater shields, once localized, multiply and spread out to the point where almost might as well be full blown Planetary Shields for all of their coverage(if not quite their strength). Moons circling overhead are rendered hollow, as their internals are replaced with massive fortresses, often the equal to those found planetside.
(the 6 spillover development RP spent on this region retroactively spent on improving its defenses; 30 more RP spent to bring I-9 Center up to Ridiculous Defenses(9 RP already spent out of the 45 required, bringing the remaining cost down to 36;the 6 RP retroactively invested brings the remaining cost down to 30 RP))

Elsewhere, where the concentrations of incoming forces became so great as to simply overwhelm whatever defenses might be erected in their path, they ran into even greater opposition, as the Fleetcommune's mighty Battlemoons would turn these pushes into but another grueling battleground when they weren't simply halted and destroyed in their entirety by the overwhelming local superiority that the Krork fleetcommune could command. The localized might of the Krork was overwhelming even against enemies such as these, for foes who could directly contest even a mere Battlemoon were few and far between in this particular battlefront, for both the Unbound and the Electric protectorate had few if any battleworlds of any class present in this warfront, and what the Oglomarix could bring to bare was not enough to contest the Krork's superiority in this area of the battlefield;

and the Krork's battlemoons were never alone, for with them came the bulk of the Krork's local mobile forces, seeking to halt whatever pushes managed to make progress against the Krork's own ever growing layers of defense, and their ever numerous allies, who were tasked with defending what and where the Krork's own growing defenses could not yet adequately contest, and where the Krork's own mobile forces could not be present in sufficient numbers to stem the nearly endless tide by themselves, or at least, not where they could be present in truly sufficient numbers without sacrificing some other, even more important, area of the ongoing war.

(allies are tasked with assisting on the defense, acting to supplement the still growing defenses where they alone, at whatever level they might be, aren't enough to stall for long enough for the Krork's hammer to smash the embattled hostile forces.)

(Krork forces are split into two groups, both built around one of the two Fleethordes that the Krork have at this particular warfront. One, with its accompanying single Battlemoon formation(the one with the Warp Shadow Generator upgrade) are to go with a pure Breakthrough action, working to go from one dense formation/key battleground to another, clearing each out in turn through sheer force concentration; while the other, with its three more standard Battlemoon formations accompanying it, are to go with what boils down to an Advance-Breakthrough formation, working to support the Krork's allies and defenses with holding the line and ensuring that this territory remains in Krork hands)

But even with all of the forces present here, even with all of the Allies that came when the Krork became under such massive threat, not everything could be held, not everything could be contested; thus, in place of yet insufficient defenses, of allies that could only be present in sufficient numbers to hold their own in so many places, some worlds became death traps, seeded with hidden Planetbusters in there core by the efforts of Krork commandos, to go off when it might deal the greatest blow to the enemies of the Krork. (Commandos, with assistance, are on Planet Wreka duty, to make even the worlds that are considered to be un-holdable be deathtraps for the incoming hostiles)

While their defenses and allies, with a bit of support, would be more than enough to hold, holding was not enough against enemies such as these. No, instead one had to also deal with their malevolent influence, and cut them off at the source. To this end, the Krork's Warlocks and Mechs were deployed, to work together to stem the incoming tide. And in this case? That tide was a bit more literal. To this end, the Mecks were tasked with creating giant, practically teleporting, Suneshiners; capable of outputting more than enough radiation(of whatever form the Krork might want, for finely tuned hawking radiation from precisely fed, charged, and spun black holes can produce anything from high energy gamma rays to usable mass) to turn the massive amounts of water that the Oglomarix are producing into highly radioactive steam, and rendering the Electorate Protectorate's rust into naught but iron scrap, as all materials that don't simply eat radiation are reduced to naught but steadily decaying radioactive scrap, in the process fouling all standard forms of electronics(the Krork have none of these, with hulls and armor that has no decay state that radiation alone can force.); while this would not be effective against anything truly heavier than the strikecraft of any of the opposing factions, it would be more than enough to render the mundane side of their environmental effects null.

As for the more mystical side of their assorted forms of environmental warping… that's where the Warlocks came in, repeatedly casting an extremely well refined, extremely powerful spell that, in older, simpler times, would have been known simply as "It Belongs to da Orkz!", rendering all other mystical territory claims into naught but spoken words, to be decided not by fancy mojo, but by those who fought the hardest, struck the most often, and won the most.

And for now? That would hopefully be the Krork and their allies.

(in case it matters, defensive reactions are universally(at least for the Krork) on Concentrate(Krork forces concentrate to deal with the most dangerous enemy attacks, instead of either dispersing to fight around them or simply having whatever forces end up against them simply hold their ground- note that this will not be attempted if the math works out that holding in a given area/planet wouldn't be worth it- at which point the local Commando action would kick in), and priorities, at least for the Krork, are prioritizing taking out the enemy forces over trying to hold territory over preserving their own forces, as shepherding one's strength for future battles is pointless if there's nothing left to protect, and attempting to hold territory at all cost is somewhat less useful against foes that have the ability to fairly rapidly replace their own losses.

The shrieking of strange patterns of data, the roar of aquatic leviathans and horrors, the howling of hungry energy, these met with the tusked throated cries of "WAR!", the psychic chants of "MY LIFE FOR AIUR!", and the age-old cry of "VIVE LE REVOLUCION!" across more than a hundred thousand star systems in a clash of gods.

The Protoss fleet, with its mastery of teleportation and its preference to act before others would strike first, just ahead of the Krork with a wave of interceptors, scouts, corsairs, phoenixes, and other craft launched from the expansive hulls of their carrier ships, pushing into swarms of Protectorate Gremlins, Flying Rippers, Terminations, Elimininations, Interdictors, Devastators and more so dense a blind man could fire blindly in their general direction and hit dozens of them.

Glittering shards of silver and purple erupted as plasma and heavy slugs smashed into the machine hordes, nanite constructs falling apart as the Krork added their own voice to the chorus of firepower and the Revolutionaries began to scourge the stars with fields of spacetime distortion and cascades of quantum foam briefly erupting from the vacuum into brilliant life.

The Unbidden, drawn in by the feast, apparated in shimmering flicker lights with deafening hunting calls that screamed through every electromagnetic frequency. They were here and they were so very, terribly hungry. They would eat, they would feast, they would kill. Their ships launched waves of disintegration into the fleets gathered before them, those unable to resist the careening arcs of power lobbed forth crumbling into disparate dust as the Unbidden drained every form of energy down to that which kept atoms and molecules together.

Krork batteries would pummel into them in rapid but disciplined bursts, timed to overwhelm their regenerating layers of shielding and rapidly self-stitching fields of hardlight, not relenting until they came apart into diffuse, nebula like clouds of power as their transluscent hulls popped. Others were disrupted by relentless pummeling from gatling munitions by the protectorate, walls of stuff floating through the spacelanes and rippling across shields until they cracked apart so that the devastating fractal beams could splinter and shatter their hardlight structures or retropulsars could impact with a literally chilling effect, temperatures and energy levels dropping rapidly into sheets of ice.

The Protoss' psionic storms raged through the battlefields in wide area castings joined by the scalding heat of purification beams that while perhaps not as eminently suited for space battle as the Krork's own weapons, were useful in thinning out the herds, Revintern chronal distortion fields slowing the enemy down where possible.

The War Tides however, were heralded by the empty void of space starting to shift and shimmer into water, water without the pressure it should have, but with a physicality all the same. At least, not when they did not wish it so, as many ships found the pressure of arbitrary amounts of water suddenly manifesting around them, the squeezing force compressing into localised fusion detonations and even collapse events. Other times, the water would whip itself into great long distance barriers, sapping away the energy of incoming shots that had to travel through endless oceans, boiling and displacing, but inevitably slowing.

The War Tides could fight without the Cosmic Water, and most often did, but the water was their element, it was their pantheon, and the ocean was their strength. So long as they were immersed in anything associated with the ocean, they drew anomalous strength and power, Karvak Soldier-Forms concealed in layered armour bonded atop gelatinous frames with frames of menacing strength, able to throw down with even a Krork physically as the digitigrade

Midi-dermal levels of Oglomarix Soldiers

Oglomarix Power Suit frame

Protoss Zealots with psi-blades would swing and stab, the Soldier Forms weaved around with quicksilver speed, draining energy from movement, for ice too was water, and ice was cold, the theft of energy, their forms shimmering with steam while their weapons released bizarre condensates and supercritical fluids that stole away heat and fed in devastating amounts of electric charge that shocked without warmth.

The Oglomarix had come far in their quest to be one with the tidal cycles of war, for billions of years they had crushed civilisations into the dust across countless galaxies, following the currents of battle and the waves of slaughter. They had fragmented into separate oceans that did not consider themselves kin any longer, as they battled to determine whose sea-song was the stronger and the more worthy. But the purpose had remained unchanged, even as Adepts and Zealots ripped them to part and Krork Warriors pounded them into gristle.

In space, their hydrodynamic ships engaged with the brutish arrowheads, the golden armada, and the gun shaped fleets of the allies facing them, moving with the grace of sea-life even where their cosmic, reality warping water was not present. Krork and Oglomarix ships would trade devastating broadsides of gravitic anomalies and matter phase state alteration beams, pounding back and forth while the Revolutionaries and Protoss sought to use the opportunity afforded to move in across the battlefronts in the shadow of enormous Krork Attack Moons that emerged from subspace with heavy bow waves of gravitic radiation.

Typhoon class Juggernauts more than eighty kilometres long bled from multiple impacts as Krork dreadnoughts surrounded them, like orcas attacking a tentacled and multi-finned humpback whale. Arrowhead shaped battleships smashed into the ranks of sharklike Akula class Battleships, pushing through their cryogenic weapons and their pressure cannons to get to grips despite losses, simple brutish forward momentum and strength against aquatic agility and grace.

Pihranha class Strike Craft that looked like so much flying fish with odd, segmented heads danced through the void, flapping their fins to adjust their momentum while Krork attack craft pursued, missiles and canonnade traded with a violence to add to the pinprick lights of the stars.

The Krork Warlocks however, were vital, cooperating with the Protoss Psions in countering the strange reality warping of the Oglomarix, for it was difficult for many ships to even move when suddenly going from a zero G vacuum environment to an impossible ocean. And these waters gave them great power, healing them before the very eyes of their foes, empowering their weapons, and bending to their will to attack or defend them.

The Shadow in the Warp helped to dim their malice, and the surging powers and wills of the Allies struck at the Oglomarix's waters of death, causing them to wisp away as if they never were, for they could hold no true existence in anything resembling baseline reality. As hard radiation flickered across their forms and struck at shields that glowed bright blue in the face of the brilliant light of dying black holes accreting hydrogen and oxygen into much heavier elements that would often decay away mere moments after their birth, their formations started to waver.

The Unbidden were meanspirited and foul tempered, they were hunters, devourers, theirs was an appetite that picked entire galaxies down to the last shred of life. They would manifest on krork warworlds again and again, looking to leech from them their energies of life and existence, and again and again they would be popped like soap bubbles.

But they were persistent, especially as death was more of an inconvenience for them than a serious obstacle and there were so very, very many of them able to pour out of the tears in spacetime from which they sounded their clarion calls to hunt. Dealing with them is a matter of closing the places from which they come, and so long as they are allowed to continue the offensive, they will only keep on coming with more powerful and advanced...technology is an odd word to use in this case but let's call it that.

Their craft are far more willing to simply brawl it out with the Krork and the Revolutionaries than the Oglomarix are, using their superb manoeuvrability and capacity to flicker in and out of hyperspace or temporarily move at energy's proper speed (light) to jump around yes, but doing so mostly so that they can get to grips with a meal ticket. Krork warp shadows thrum, gravitic distortions slipping into hyperspace and stranding some of their strange, hard light fleets for the killing, while time and space bend at the command of the revolutionaries who activate localised time freezes to allow for major blunting sof Unbidden offensives.

But they keep on coming, and they are learning. They are continually dispersing themselves into energy to flick around incoming attacks at light speed, reconfiguring themselves out of harm's way in an eyeblink while bringing large numbers of their heavy ships to attack the largest worldcraft of the allies, surrounding them and sacrificing themselves to tear open rifts into the depths of hyperspace from which they come to allow their kin to swarm aboard, trying to drink of the binding fields that provided Krork planetcraft with their armour and assail the Green Goliaths who rushed out to defend against the cavalcade of energy beasts that gleefully jumped out of the deeps of hyperspace.

The basic dynavore took roughly humanoid shape, with the distinctive three eye like glowing circles in their "head", intense fields of darker blue energy bound around their core like some sort of armour while their weapons of hard light let out not the usual energy drain or matter disruption, but outright annihilation, streams of anti-particles produced by the mastery of the Unbidden over the fields that govern things, flicking protons and electrons into negatrons and positrons and sending forth these streams in deadly pulses.

Others made use of magnetic fields intensified to the point of essentially forming electromagnetic sand belters, a chainsaw of photonic excitation that would cause electrons to peel away and then follow the circuit in a repetitive, vibrating motion like a chainblade, back and forth in a massive electrical current that would also tear the now naked nuclei towards the chain of electrons.

Others simply superheated the air into streams of plasma that they launched with magnetic pulses or fired their more usual matter disintegrators and energy eaters along with plain old lasers and bolts of lightning. Plenty of ways to die, as many a revolutionary comrade's vapourised corpse could attest to, the mechanical and human soldiers often to the Krork's bemusement, moving to take hits for them out of a sense of obligation even if the Krork were tougher pound for pound (and having more pounds to begin with).

Scuttling, eight limbed Starspiders stampeded forwards like war beasts, breaking up into bursts of energy to rush at light speed before recompiling themselves to open fire from hardlight weapon formations splintering forth from their energy matrices, the seventy metre tall monstrosities screeching out waves of annihilation and electromagnetic chaos before Krork Gargants and Revolutionary Megamechs splattered them in return, firing away at the waves of odd floating tank like constructs that shimmered into being out of massive amounts of raw energy.

Ominous shapes with pseudo-wings careened overhead, sparking out as massive amounts of anti air fire burst them back into hyperspace; causing their forms to discorporate and fade back to whence they came. But they kept on coming, hungry and bolstered by the appearance of Dynaliths that towered mountain tall over the battlefield, walking in a mockery of the humanoid fashion and smashing fists of pure power into the ground like gods.

In space, while they had fewer planetcraft, they were able to reinforce themselves at an absurd rate and get stuck in almost immediately by simply discorporating into true energy before recombining back into hardlight to engage their foes at their preferred range. Wherever the warring giants of the Krork or the Singularity Engines of the Revolutionaries went, they died, but they seemed to be set on instead, flanking these strongpoints at a strategic scale, feeling around for weak points in the defensive wall and concentrating against them, hammering more and more.

When they detected the planetcraft and felt they could not overwhelm them, they had switched to a new tactic, they would discorporate into light and withdraw at lightspeed until they got far enough away from the shadow in the warp to re-enter hyperspace. And while Gravity did not allow even light to move without paying it its due, it took significantly more gravity to bend them into the directions the Krork wanted than it did when they were in hardlight form, though Black Holes were no less devastating to them when they were consumed by them than when they were more "solid".

Indeed, Black Hole weapons seemed to give them the most pause and fear, as did cryogenics that would, by definition, negate, drain, or suppress their energy. The former because they were as gone as nearly anything else that fell past the event horizon and was unable to activate an FTL system to get out, the latter because it was a painful form of weaponised starvation for them, diminishing their forms and inevitably discorporating them back into hyperspace.

Furthermore, the Krork battlemasters and mechanics were working out a theorem of how Hyperspace and Subspace interacted. Hyperspace clearly responded to conventional centrumspace fundamental forces, particularly gravity which in sufficient amounts could do anything from ejecting things at a significant deal of relative motion within hyperspace to scatter them into oblivion. While the Shadow in the Warp was more of a nuisance to them, the gravitic fields were like cages, and the cryogenic weapons of the revolutionaries were like poison.

Furthermore, it was theoretically possible to, as they were energy, trap them in capacitors where they would face the ironic fate of being fuel themselves. While this did require them to make some sort of contact with the capacitor, it would be an effective way of thinning out their numbers, especially with the need for counterattacks against their hyperspace tears from which they pour from endlessly.

The protectorate however was...odd. They were nanites of a sort, little machines wound together at a level only possible through a grand unifying theorem that connected gravity to quantum mechanics and allowed them to truly examine the world at its most basal and fundamental level, made even stranger by the thing that offered them patronage. Black Holes were effective weapons, but they understood Black Holes a bit too well for machines built in the mid 20th century, let alone machines built to be artists.

For one thing, they seemed to understand how to resolve the black hole information paradox, recombining the hawking particles excreted by the dying sink holes in spacetime into new matter and new combat morphs, the chittering of insane computerised screeching getting clearly and overly excited. They were being destroyed in enormous numbers with everything from black holes to plasma bombardment to ultra intensity lasers, but they kept on adjusting themselves on the fly.

They had new shielding, particularly around more valuable combat mainframes, while the lesser ones exhibited a strange sort of "pull" effect where shots that passed too close to a large mass of them would pull away and impact the expendables instead. In essence, they were perfecting the art of cannon fodder. This was clearly from some means to manipulate the curvature of space that could prove quite interesting if studied, but even more concerning was their methods of trying to get through defensive lines.

When it was clear that the Krork, Protoss, and Revolutionaries were experienced enough with foes who would be able to start a major incursion from a single microbial intruder to make nanite seeding largely nonviable they instead started creating...things that looked rather like a deranged, postmodernist take on the idea of an altar. Things that once their excited chants and ritauls were complete, collapsed around downright lovecraftian shapes to provide a mechanical body for fragments of some terrible abomination on the other side.

Things so deletrious to reality that their simple presence caused the laws of physics to break down in heavily damaging ways. The speed of light raced up and down, constants altered or even inverted or became nonsense, time and space curved, bent, and even snapped or reversed, thermodynamic principles became nonsense as matter and energy sprung from nothing or became nothing, and every sensor and scanner warned of dreadfully anomalous data that often spiralled into absolute raving nonsense.

These were the summoned receptacles of the Icon, the Protectorate's mysterious patron and a god that only the foolish, insane, or spiteful would dare try to get the notice of. And some of them were indeed, quite big, with one Krork attack moon going silent when the protectorate had covered an entire world in altar structures until the planet had become a vessel for the merest sliver of their God to enter, becoming a dwarf planet sized mass of monstrosity that even the gravity whip only did so much to slow down.

The good news was that their shells were only resistant to their own effects, not immune, and inevitably the shells would break apart and the thing behind would retract its digit poking into our reality, which could be accelerated by damage. The other good news was that the Protectorate seemed to have very little control over the Vessels of the Icon, more giving them vague suggestions of where to go and hoping that the vessels did not linger near the machines themselves lest the protectorate be devastated by its own superweapon.

The bad news however, was that the Protectorate had made a breakthrough with them, flooding into the breach where their machines had been successful in carving out a break in the line, with Protoss Psions who had sought to stem the tide breaking down into spasmatic gibberish as the Icon touched their minds and set all of their nerves alight at once and the Krork's focus on successfully dispelling the bulk of the Oglomarix's mystic water giving the machines enough leverage to tear their way through, even falling upon the Unbidden and the War Tides for more mass-energy to honour the singularity god.

The situation was overall positive, with the enemy having taken significantly greater losses than the Krork across the board, with only the Oglomarix about breaking even with the Allies but given the amount of forces committed, this certainly stinging the aquatics more than the allies. But there could only be dreadfully terrible consequences to the Protectorate getting free reign to invite the thing behind them and play around with technology meant to break reality itself.

(one Krork fleethorde with its accompanying single formation of Battle Moons to be deployed here, alongside a somewhat well-funded intrigue action)

"Right then, we all know what we came here for. So let's get in, get out, and perhaps break some of these purposeless paperclip machines in the process should any be convenient."

And so, over revealed, embattled worlds, Tai worlds, came the Krork. Here they fought, fought the Wayfaring Scourge to determine not the fate of the worlds, for said worlds were already considered to be doomed, but for the fate of the people who called them home and the valuable information that was in their possession. For the Krork had run the numbers, and determined that the Tai's Cultivation knowledge was more valuable than the Tai civilization as it is right now.

Cultivators were powerful, powerful enough to be worth preserving as an asset; and Cultivation is something that was calculated out to be usable and useful for the Krork. To that end, the Krork would go out of their way to preserve whatever information on Cultivation that they can find, and coerce as many potential teachers of such information over to their side as possible. To this goal, as many of the people and knowledge of the Tai would be preserved as possible.

The Tai civilization on the other hand? Was considered to be nigh worthless. Unwilling to reach out for help, and perfectly willing to turn on themselves and their surroundings at almost the slightest of slights the moment that their prior-ruler had ceased to rule them; the Tai civilization was determined to be too non-functioning to be kept around in its current form. It's failure as a fully functioning civilization, combined with its unwillingness to work with others, made it less of an asset and more of a liability, and when that information was combined with the strength of the forces assailing it, it was calculated out that preserving the Tai's civilization would take more than what the Krork had currently to spare. And so the Krork sent what they could, not to protect the remnants of the Tai's civilization, but to protect its knowledge.

(-4 RP) Intrigue Action: by all possible means, be it coercion, bribery, 'honest' diplomacy, threat, or outright infiltration, the Krork are to acquire as much cultivation knowledge from the Tai as possible; be that in the form of assorted texts, or those who could teach the Krork such knowledge, ranging from the lowest of Outer Disciples to the greatest of Sages and Masters. If necessary, offers of worlds to rebuild on, and eventual(as in within the next few 'turns') territory of their own, is on offer, as is continued funding of whatever projects they might wish to engage in(assuming that said projects are not completely bank-breaking). While this is going on in the more peaceful areas, the Krork fleethordes(and accompanying planetoids) are to clear the skies and grounds of embattled worlds, and then offer(maybe not nicely) to transport all of the previously doomed people back to Krork space, where they are to be steadily processed and integrated into the assorted 'protected worlds'(worlds set aside for those who have grown tired of War).

Where coercion, salvation, bribery, 'diplomacy' and gentle actions would not be enough, the Krork's commandos would do what they do best, and loot beliverant, doomed Tai worlds of all of the carryable knowledge that they have before it is lost forever. (Commados are on 'loot the Tai of what texts on Cultivation they have if/when they refuse to cooperate with the Krork)

Over world after world, the Krork's forces show up in numbers almost beyond compare, acting as the most over-equipped, overly concentrated raiding force ever devised. With no territory in need of holding in the longer run, no civilian targets in need of long term protection. The Krork were almost free to fight where and when it suited them. Avoiding the absolute densest of formations, those that couldn't be cracked sufficiently quickly by the application of the Krork's Battlemoons and their accompanying fleets, and over worlds where evacuation would be considered impossible, even by Krork Battle and Fleet Masters, the Krork struck again and again with almost impossible speed, their Battlemoons, with the bulk of the fleethordes carried within the portal network that stretches between all of them, carried along by carefully shaped currents of green light.(Warlocks are on Warp Double-Time, greatly speeding up the travel time of the Krork's Battlemoons between one system and the next)

Upon reaching their destined world, their destined key location for their goals here, the Krork would fan out, seeking to destroy as many of the Scourge's forces, both in the void and groundside. during whatever time it would take to conduct 'negotiations' with the now secure world below. (Gravity Storm generators are turned off, Life-eater and Toxyferin ammunition is not allowed, and massive collateral damage is to be limited to the areas that have already fallen to the Scourge- as our goal is to liberate the Tai survivors, not accidentally kill them alongside those that they are fighting against.)

As soon as evacuation is as complete as it can reasonably be, and all cultivation information that can be reasonably secured is secured, the Krork forces are to move on, as to stay in one place for far too long is to invite disaster as ever more Wayfaring Scourge forces make their way to the growing battlefield. (the Krork's forces are effectively on Breakthrough-Envelopment, (with the Disperse defensive reaction) using their overwhelming strength focused into a few key points to hold key areas, while withdrawing in the face of completely overwhelming enemy forces)

Upon completing this process over one world, the Krork are to move to the next, and the next, and the next, until they either lack the forces to continue, or the Tai have run out of worlds(at which point this force would continue raiding the Wayfaring Scourge forces here, switching to pure Breakthrough to attempt to bleed them dry before they reach Krork space in numbers enough to be a serious threat).

To assist with this ongoing process, and to ensure that the Krork's forces face as little opposition here as they can, the Mechs here are to focus on constructing massive ECM generators, as to ensure that the Wayfaring Scourge has as much trouble controlling and directing its forces as possible(note that this is mostly communications jamming- hacking is secondary at best).

The Tri-Scourge Catastrophe was to put it politely a clusterfuck of biblical proportions. Arrangements of viral genetic molecules, membranes, acids, and organelle structures were mixed like the world's most disgusting cocktail to form a far more efficient take on life than the crude accidental arrangements of the naturally evolved, creatures who were very carefully crafted organic machines more than animals, even, like machines, being comprised out of many discrete parts to allow for structures one would never find on anything natural.

Such as for example, wheels on war forms made to go quickly on flat ground. Generally impossible for a single organism's skeletal system and ligaments, but when multiple living machines are woven together, inert mass can be formed into an approximation of tires that are connected into the main mass, allowing for the creation of a circle that can roll without tearing tendons and connective tissue as would most likely happen with most conventional attempts at a biological wheel.

This similar principle, of having biomachines working in concert rather than a singular, complete organism, also allowed for the easy formation and creation of turrets and appendages capable of ranges of movement that would require at least some degree of tearing were they actually a part of the organism rather than being along for the ride so to speak. Such tandem arrangements also easily allowed for multitasking, as the body could do something entirely different than what the cannon was up to with no distraction.

This being of course, a long way of saying that the Scourge had what amounted to biomechanical armoured cars racing around and firing plasmic acid that tugged and sawed away at matter while producing incredibly intense amounts of heat and electricity while they worked in a manner reminiscent of the pneumatic action of hocking a loogie but assisted by a massive telekinetic push. At enough speed that the liquid's differences from a solid projectile in terms of what the impact actually does was no longer relevant.

The Tai peasant troops flailing and screaming as the acid ate, burned, and electrocuted them to death could at least die knowing that for once, an organic gun wasn't like an ejaculating penis. Perhaps not an especially great comfort, but often it's the little things that make life worth living and let people find dignity in death.

Others died rather more hideously when the Alghollthus warped them into their thralls, or more explosively as the Wayfarers simply blew up everything and swept aside organic life with hard neutrons and gamma rays. But at the very least, they could say that they fought organic swarms and did not die via a phallic weapon's emissions.

But not all of them would die, not when the Krork were coming. The Krork smash in hard and fast, blasting everything in sight with their trademark extreme violence. Trying to respond to them by sensing their incoming subspace signals is like trying to avoid thunder by using a camera to see the lightning first, technically perfectly possible, but not soon enough that it would really help all that much.

The Multiterra alliance briefly makes note of the entry of the Krork as their intervention forces wisely decide to not be in the direct line of fire, while the Wayfaring Scourge, being the largest force in the region, is the first to feel their wrath as their brute ships pour out of subspace like whole new night skies worth of stars, opening fire straight away without hesitation or pause. The scourge's machines had the strength and certainty of steel, but the Krork had surpassed such things long ago, and their macro-basters and accelerated slugs would break their shields and hulls open in only a few minutes of bombardment each, sooner when weapons like the gravity whip are used to redshift them into oblivion.

Krork Krash Kapsules and Battlehives rain on worlds being fought over by monsters of metal, meat, and madness, though perhaps the Prethoryn are not quite monsters in the way the krork understand them, the others likely qualify. Gunhounds that had given the Imperium a galaxy away trouble were stomped in half by Krork warriors or cleaved in twain by slayers looking for big things to kill, while tripedal machines built in the image of the original creators of the Scourge found their great five metre height dwarfed by the Krork Nobles who tended to quite quickly bring mass hammers down on top of them to splinter them into shards of composite material and sparking components.

Tracked fusilier drones pivoted away from the Tai troops and the Multiterra Marines they were busy drowning with sheer numbers as their neutron spark guns whirred for a moment, only for the bark of Krork exotic matter bolters to rip through their shields and then themselves, tearing turrets off of chassis and reducing chassis into junk. The more humanoid infantrybots turned to fire their x-ray lasers in return, and were met with the heavy dakka dakka to sweep them off the field.

MTF teams that had been sent on Commando insertions into the horrific interiors of Alghollthu Dread Cities which could reduce a man to what the Alghollthu thought of their species; Skum that served; through their reality distorting glyphs and blasphemous sigils that twisted the weak beyond death; instead found that Krork Commandos were basically speedrunning their way through the compounds they had been carefully trying to infiltrate and destroy. The Krork, rooted in existence by their creators, used their gestalt and their own expert crafting to simply ignore the infohazards, with Krork adaptation quickly deadening and then eliminating weakness to those that worked.

Sigils that would make a human who so much as looked at them melt to death as if half their bodymass was replaced by acid hurt but could not fully kill, and then the Krork armour simply scrubbed out the sight of the aberrations while their bodies and minds changed to resist the effect more and more until even unhelmed goblins could have a staring contest with them. Creatures whose forms made those who thought of them within a certain distance turn into more of them got some limb mutation that was automatically cauterised by the armour, cutting off the infected tissue and other Krork quickly making Cykrork replacements for the missing parts from whatever was at hand, and eventually later Krork would be able to write philosophical treastises on the shapes of these things.

The Krork were made to war with the Strangers amongst others after all, and even if these Krork were not ones who had met the Strangers before, the Old Ones had certain contingencies in place for the things beyond. And ultimately, when conventional or "conventional" explosives didn't work, Warlock rituals would more than do the trick.

And the Prethoryn were perhaps the least unknown factor, they were not the Devourer, they were not Her, because they were they. They for one, understood that this wasn't a winning proposition, not when the situation was as confused as it was and there was such a dearth of absorbable mass energy, leading to them briefly pulling back to observe, letting the others fight it out as the Krork rounded up and took captive the bulk of the Tai culture's intellectual figures and data archives, pushing through the morass of machines and madness long enough to take what they want before the commanding Grand Battlemasters ordered the withdrawal once they had what they wanted.

"We accept your deal. Let us take the fight to the Monsters that inhabit this galaxy."

"Come, let us fight together. To the hunters of Monsters, the Angry Coconuts, and the Observer, we accept your help, for your foes are our foes, and we have nothing to hide.
(mercenary purchases for this front: Clan Skarvald Jomsfear, Keluko Warriors, and The Observer, who is being allowed to observe our faction for the coming five turns)

The ships of Clan Scarvald are instructed to form up with the fully mustered local Fleet Communes, and are warned of the disorienting nature of subspace, even when in the vastly more ordered bits of it that form the potentially giant network that is the Krork's SubSpace Bridge network; while the Keluko Warriors are brought onto the Krork's Battle Moons, to fight alongside them. The Observer is also politely asked to join them in the SubSpace Bridge network for quick and easy deployment and redeployment throughout the battlefield. If either Clan Scarvald or the Observer decline that part, then they will be given the required information and asked to keep up to the best of their ability, for the Krork will not be waiting on them.

While the allies are being mustered and brought in, the battle overall, with both past known events and likely future actions, is laid out in the Krork's War Sphere/Map, and paths to victory are drawn up. Here the Krork have no territory to defend, no key locations that must be held at all cost, and no civilian fleets that cannot simply lurk in the subspace bridge network or simply live in the depths of their own planetoids(for now), and no supply lines that could be made vulnerable to interception. And so the Krork were free to pursue their own, extremely mobile, form of warfare to the best of their ability. Freed from supply lines, the Krork had no vulnerable depth to exploit that wasn't in the depths of their own planetoids, and so they were free to strike when and where they wanted.

While the Krork's own supply lines were practically untouchable, their allies were not; and while their Sub Space Bridge network could in theory be used to handle it; in practice it ran into a number of complications, the least of which being the fact that the Krork's subspace based infrastructure… was not built for the use of anyone not a Krork; and these other non-Krork allies(the Mandosi and the Vycondians) were in far too large numbers for them to simply be guided through the portal network like the less numerous Mercenaries could be.

Of the enemies, both the Kroat and the Sutaitazu were both secondary targets; as while they were large enough in number to be a threat, they were both each other's mutual enemies and were outclassed, sometimes drastically, by the Krork, the Mandosi, and their assorted allies. As they were now, in the numbers that they had available in this particular warzone, dealing with them would be tedious, but perfectly doable without needing to pull out anything particularly special.

And so the fight would come down to this: dealing with the Iridescent Knights before they dealt enough damage for the Kroat and Sutaitazu to come in and finish the job. The Iridescent Simulacrums would be simple enough to deal with, as the Cabal, for all their seeming might, would be trying to match the Krork in brute strength and ordered might- a losing proposition if there ever was one. Their Paintings were no different, as they held nothing that the Krork had not faced before, and could do nothing that was truly new- such ever is the life of plagiarizers and copy cats. No. the fight here with the Iridescent Knights would come down to their Men At Arms, and their War Arcs, which seemingly worked to anchor their Simulacrums and Paintings to reality.

All of this was factored in, and plans were drawn up. Engaging the Men at Arms was a priority, but doing so without the aid of those who had fought them many times before would be the height of foolishness- and so the Krork's first target would be revealed: the ever swarming Kroats and Sutaitazu. To this end, to ending the threats of the ongoing raids, half of the Krork's available forces were deployed; while the other half was kept together, brought in to break wherever the battle might grow its fiercest.
(two Fleethordes and its accompanying standard Battle Moon formation are on Breakthrough-Envelopment, to act as one giant whole to secure the most important areas of the battle, while the other two, and their accompanying upgraded Battle Moon Formation, are to stick to pure Breakthrough, to engage the largest of enemy formations head on, barring wherever the Iridescent Knights are and wherever a Sutaitazu category 3+ Battleworld might be, as those are not meant to be dealt with by Battle Moons alone, not without support anyways)

And so the Krork moved out, flicking from one key area of the ongoing war to another with shocking speed(Warlocks are on Warp Double-Time on the Krork's Battlemoons). Acting as one beast with almost a dozen heads, the Krork's battle moons roared with nigh unstoppable might, and unleashed their accompanying fleets from within themselves to free whatever system they appeared in of hostile forces, only for the disgorged forces to return back in to do the same thing again, again and again, facilitated by the constantly repositioning Battle Moons.
Almost each and every single engagement into one otherwise-overwhelmed system was heralded by Gravity Storms that wracked their targeted areas, disrupting enemy formations and breaking whatever might be broken with the shifting tides of gravity. But even these gravity storms were not enough to get even a single step ahead of the Krork, for over half of the unleashed storms were false, and often the Krork would arrive without any such force heralding them, such was the will of the Krork.(commandos are on generating false gravity storms)

What forces might have been able to directly contest the Krork's otherwise overwhelming localized force superiority, the greatest combat-planetoids of the Sutaitazu and the Iridescent Knight's Men At Arms, where more often than not simply predicted ahead of time, with them showing up to already mostly evacuated systems when they didn't find themselves one step behind. Even worse, whenever the Men At Arms found themselves too far away, too busy to swiftly make their way back without sacrificing some other part of the battle, their own War Arks came under assault, their doom made clear by the Planet Killing weapons of the Krork.

Meanwhile, back within the highly protected innards of the Krork's battlemoons, several devices were either under construction or already charging up, causing the Warp around the Battle Moons to become ever more turbulent, ever more jammed, ever more under the shadow of the Krork, as the Krork's own Shadow In The Warp grows ever darker(Meks on Koo Koo Kachoo's), as if in anticipation of the battles to come.

(dueling the Men At Arms comes next 'round', assuming that not enough War Arcs are taken out to force them to consider withdrawing anyways due to the lack of a screening force)

- 30 RP spent on getting (the rest of the way to) Ridiculous Defenses for I-9 Center.(see earlier for why it only costs 30)

4 RP spent on Intrigue Action for getting Cultivation knowledge/trainers from the Tai before they die, with a side of getting as many of them to evacuate to Krork space as reasonably possible.

4 RP consumed by the upkeep of the reinforcing fleets that managed to arrive in range of the Krork's current supply lines (because the other fleethordes and planetoids are both new and arrived more than two full large squares away- they will need to be either supplied local RP(likely from the Keepers) or be somehow reconnected to the Krork's built up areas to replenish anything other than infantry and basic ground vehicles; and reconnection alone will likely not be enough due to RP shortage.)

12 RP spent on mercenaries for the battle that's occurring far away from the Krork's currently developed territory(see earlier for which mercenaries were purchased)

Final RP goes towards one more Research slot; both of which are to go towards Fleet Runes

The first Kroat and Krork contact was marked by rain. Not of water, but of artillery. Even the imperial guard would not have packed so many guns aiming at every single kilometre of front. Multiple guns aiming at every square metre, parked often hundreds if not thousands of kilometres back. Enough to ensure that not a single unturned stone on the front would not be subject to the sky falling on their heads every second. So many shells and missiles that they seemed to cast the sky into shade like massed archery barrages of the distant past, so many one could try shooting them out of the sky before they landed by just spraying into the air and hoping to hit something.

But one cannot shoot every raindrop out of a storm, and the Iron Rain could not be stopped fully, as mushroom clouds erupted against shields and blossoming explosions detonated against theatre screens. The Kroats sensed an inherent worthiness in the foe they laid their many eyes upon, and were bringing in everything from absolutely absurd multi-kilometre "gunracks" which fitted dozens of guns the way MRLS systems would fit rocket launch rails to maintain a deafening and constant tearing sound of guns firing to bases covered in missile silos briefly disappearing beneath the contrails of the rocket's red glare.

Their scrum rushed forward with the clanking of the end of worlds and the tearing of the very earth itself beneath waves of armour, power suit equipped fast troops and plated warbeasts, and stomping mechs. All bellowing that infernal, monotonous cry.

"KROAT-ANGA! KROAT-ANGA! KROAT-ANGA!" The drill cadence sound off that gave them their names and was the last thing countless civilisations heard as the incredibly violent monsters sought out anything either sufficiently fighty to be worth their time, or anything meek or gentle enough to be deserving of their infamous cruelty. There was really no winning with the kroats in this regard, at least the Orks could deem someone boring; the Kroatanga meanwhile saw the "boring types" as a challenge to make crueller and more warlike, to show them the futility of peace and the need to give up and embrace the beast within.

Even as many of them were shield bursted and then shot down by their Krork counterparts firing into them until their armour broke and their matted fungal tissue came apart in wet explosions, they were eager to get to grips with their foes, not with childlike glee, but with the deranged enthusiasm of a thrill seeker finding their next big hit. Even as many were cut down by power axes and krork gravity hammers that bore their way through shields, armour, and flesh, others took their place as the humanoid Kroat Troopers and their more Goblin like Cappers rolled forward in a seething tsunami of fungal violence.

Multi-headed and multi-legged dons strode forth like mythical beasts, extending roping tendrils crackling with energy fields to grab at Krork warriors while mounted weapons crackled to life, nuclear detonations exploding up and down the frontline as the Kroats did just love radiation so; even to the point of finding ways to boost the energy output of fission ad fusion beyond their normal limitations to keep the hard rads coming. And why wouldn't they? The Kroats were radiotrophic after all, radiation healed and strengthened them, it empowered their technology, and it made them better.

Double Barelled Tanks pushed through the scrap heaps of their predecessors, cutting tracks whirring with power fields that often ground many an unfortunate goblin; armour and all; to a smear or rolled over and hacked into smaller vehicles unable to get out of their way as their nuclear propelled cannons launched nuclear ordnance to explode with yet more nuclear fury while rattling gatling guns howled in multiple directions, particle beams stabbing in every which way as their tanks both large and small trundled along.

Warspirits, colossal many headed hydra like monsters with far too many arms and tendrils, trundled forwards in their heavy armour, moving like mechs as more doglike Kroathounds sprinted on all fours, mounted guns firing ahead of them while winged Hummakroats swarmed through the sky, three pairs of wings beating in humming bird like fashion with great agility, heavy three-engined aircraft racing overhead to unload with chain-fission bombs that induced fissility in what their explosions touched, causing massed atomic detonations.

Even when the Krork Warlocks obliterated them with cascades of viridian energy, the Kroats only fell back to regroup and come again harder, bringing out bellowing Kroatgres whose horned heads came in threes, six arms swinging in many directions while they bellowed, smashing aside many of the native machines and sutaitazu that sought to get in their way while symbionts grown onto them manned turrets to check the flanks of the cybernetic monstrosities. Krork Slayers would often be the ones to take the fight to them, furious clashes usually ending in more Kroatgres than Krork dead, but never without spectacular violence.

The Sutaitazu were more insidious, noting that the Krork were not taking them seriously at first and deciding to exploit this. Distance Devourers, which would literally eat the conceptual distance between the formations under their purview and their targets in a very odd form of teleportation, snapped at what seemed to be empty air with whirling jaws and grabbing appendages on bodies that were mostly mouth and head and the means to support them. And these efforts brought many Krork fortifications under assault by forces that seemed to have come out of nowhere as the Distance Devourers; whether spaceborne or land bound, allowed them to bypass normal teleportation blocks.

Uzorniaps mobbed Krork Warriors, Mandosi killing machines, and Vykondian Warden Bots with the aid of much smaller Flagiraks whose twelve limbed bodies scuttled like demented crabs with much larger jaws as well as the more insidious Sicklejack, whose strange frame was well suited for squeezing through just about any opening, even if virtually physically impossible for them to, four weapon limbs, six manipulation limbs, and two locomotion limbs springing out like a coiled trap while bear trap like jaws and scissor like mandibles unhinged in half moons and snapped down with psionically boosted force, the sickle claws of the Sicklejacks tearing into flesh and metal alike.

Whenever one died, its component organisms detached, even down to its most basic of structures such as individual bones or muscles and then would simply cannibalise each other or attach onto others in the Thought Jewel, forming into amniotic pseudo-crystal sacks that would be eaten by reborn terrors shortly after. When a limb was severed, the limb was a living thing in and of itself, and would act on its own while the parent organism regenerated with unnatural speed, with severed limbs growing new bodies when they engorged themselves enough to form their egg sacks or when in the presence of amniotic biokines who could stimulate their growth.

They were not the New Devourer nor the Tyranids, they were something all their own, something that would survive at all costs, something that would homogenise everything into itself, so that everything would be like it, so that everything would be immortal within it. And in space their shipbeasts were just as relentless as they were on land. Even in the face of incredible Mandosi firepower that would entrap them in distorted fields of timelike space subjected to "dark energy constant modulation" that would induce localised big rips among other fascinating weapons, they studied, they released organisms that would stabilise and modulate the constants of creation in their favour, and came again.

The Jewel-Thought was a chattering chorus of infinite voices. The scion of a civilization from the very earliest age of creation's desperate desire to survive no matter the cost even as the universe cooled, time accelerated, and the fundamental forces began to separate. Everything could be made part of the lattice, a quasi-stable remnant of a earlier phase state of the quantum fields, you too would be part of the lattice. Whether at the behest of planetbeasts, including star-sized nightmares that had to be kept in check by the Mandosi with weapons that pummeled them with ontokinetic manipulation of reality itself as well as significant Men at Arms and Kroat commitment, centred around a beast thankfully quite far from the front best described as being a "category seven" whose frame could be tracked primarily by the distortion of spacetime from its sheer mass and the massive amount of anomalous interactions needed to keep it from collapsing on itself.

That was thankfully, not the Krork's problem. Especially as the Mandosi warped in more of their aides to help keep the Sutaitazu and the Kroats in check, using their mastery over spacetime to instantly bring in a wave of fresh troops, as well as the mercenaries that the Krork had requested. Including waves of brave, fearless really, Keluko warriors in their fist, shell, and shield ships.

"KEL-U-KO! HU-OH KO-SO!" They chanted as they emerged from wormholes in great numbers, bashing each other with headbutts to affirm their willingness to fight. The Keluko were incapable of fear, it was not an emotion they had the physical capacity to experience, and it was not really an idea they understood except as an academic question. They could understand when a fight was lost and thus the time to withdraw was here, but they would never be actually scared, especially not when they couldn't feel pain at all either and were exceptionally hard to kill between their bizarre durability and incredible healing abilities.

"ZUO-HOH-ZUO-HOH-ZUO-HOH-ZUO-HOH-ZUO-HOH!" They chanted in sound-offs as their craft did what very, very few sophonts would ever be brave or ballsy enough to try, ramming Kroatanga and Sutaitazu ships directly with their blunt instrument craft and then coming out to board, filling hulls and halls with thousands of diminutive but fearless warriors, including the bizarrely adorable Berserkers who spun disruptor blades like precisely aimed tornadoes of violence, screeching in high pitched voices. Other foes would find themselves swarmed by the Coconut people, stabbing wrist bayonets and firing pistols into every opening they could while others were dragged down with grapple beams to be beaten to death with shockwave hammers.

The Observer's frame simply decided to be there, and so it was, a planet sized mass that was rather bigger than the thousand kilometre chassis, a hundred times bigger in fact, comparable in diameter to Saturn, with a constellation of "moons" ranging from ice giant to planetoid sized and their accompanying escorts. The Observer's frame was a sphere whose perfection was interrupted only by protrusions of odd machines that operated at a level even the Mandosi could not fully grasp, a product of what, or whomever created the black orb and its many, many bodies that seemed to slip in ad out of time and space and between realities as it pleased.

With the glowing protrusions, one might think of it as a gigantic eyeball, with gyroscoping ring structures fitted around it in a carefully calculated orbit, moving away from its "pupils" whenever it needed. The machine gathered all information at the site it arrived at in a matter of moments, crunching its numbers and drawing its conclusions before the events had even occurred before it pulsed and affixed its largest bodies towards defensive positions spread across the front.

Enemies who sought to breach this front were met with patakinetic warping of narrative and concept, while ontokinetic alterations to reality was it was made things appear from nothing, great defensive works and structures and fleets manifested to the design of the Observer. Time's relativity was altered, shaped so that enemies would feel time move against them while time would bolster those the observer chose, making allies faster and enemies slower with seemingly no regard for causality paradoxes if the differing rate of progression let its allies perceive things that the enemy had yet to do before destroying them.

The larger observers would remain outside of Krork control, with the promised package of a thousand kilometre battleworld and its escorts arriving where the Krork were going to command it to do so. It would directly engage with the Iridescent Knights themselves, reporting back with the Krork fleet with a light cone illusion to comply with its orders before taking point ahead of the Krork, Keluko, and Clan Scarvald.

Arcane devices manifested into being to contest flows of bizarre colour primordial, fighting a delaying action with the aid of the Mektic, the Mandosi, the Earth Custiodianship, and some forces from much closer to the Altrans, including from the so called "SCP foundation" and a "Sorcerer Supreme" (amidst others) against a true knight, the Category seven, and a "Kroatphoon" of explosive manifestations of Kroatforce that frayed at reality, trying to force the true knight into paths of stalemate, the cosmos shuddering at the clash of arms while the Knight's coloured wings blossomed into metaspaces of its dominion over things, stretching outwards and reshaping the very nature of existence as a painter would an easel.

How long they would be able to hold off the True Knight was anyone's guess. Pataphysics and Ontokinesis were beneath the Colours Primordial, the most basal concepts of existence and what it meant to be, a twisted gnosis, holding out against a true wielder was a matter of trying to ape the colours and reinforce their memes of being against someone who supereded the notion of reality itself. And it was a process that was helped in no small part by the fact that there were other forces at play, the inversions of the dark below, the surreality of the strange beyond or the grey between, and one peculiar fact that drew the pleromites to these realities in the first place. Something made the Colour resist them, and allowed its pigments to stain the uncoloured who by right should simply be undone with a thought, giving them a chance where there should have only been defeat by the decree of the Lords Artistic.

Whatever the case, it was precious time to enact the Krork plan, and their gravity storms and War energy ravaged through the simulacra of the Men at Arms of the True Knight and their squires, false Cabal troops coming apart under the storm of Krork firepower while the Uskarlings launched out to board, tear their way through, and then exit doomed ships whenever they did not shoot them out of the stars from a distance. New simulacra formed, woven into being and then forced to exist in new shapes. They took the form of something perhaps familiar to the Krork, plucked from the falseness of the Magellanic Imperium but given significantly more solidity as the primordial could easily make Isn't into Is.

Then they melded them with aspects of their False Cabal and Guardians as well as something rather...odder, tapping into the beliefs of the Church of the Broken God, the Hierarchy of a Universe at War, the Ethereals and their many servant races, the Tal'darim Protoss twisted by Amon, the Ur-Quan, The Hordes of Winter of the Worlds Aflame, the Created of a galaxy of great Halo Rings, and blending the nine into the Imperious Host of many Lights, weaving ghosts of the light into being to resurrect their simulacra soldiers again and again. The contradiction of the Cabal, the Mekhanites, the Hierarchy, the Ethereals, the Winter Horde, the Tal'darim, the Ur-Quan, the created, and the Imperium all serving the same master was bluntly and flagrantly ignored.

Their units were blended together, with simulated histories that brought them into a somehow (and impossibly) functional alliance even though the seven interacting should have resulted in something unrecognisable rather than clear amalgamations, especially when so many of these amalgamations were clear violations of the principles and ideas behind each one to be altered in such a way. But it was hardly like the Coloured Kings cared very much for the way that the things they saw as less than bacteria, less than even fiction, lived.

Of course, even this aberrant combination of impossibilities still did not produce simulacra who could best the Krork in terms of infantry, and that same restraint on their colour force, particularly against the summoned, seemed to prevent them from plucking something that could win easily outright. There were for the time being, rules they had to play by, and even forces made of a combination of technologies, such as Created Combat Skins on Cabal Troops enhanced with Ethereal and Tal'darim Psionics, Astartes Geneseed, Mekhanite cybernetics, Winter Horde Magic, and Umgah genetic alteration produced forces that while certainly formidable supersoldiers and commandos; ran into the issue that the Krork, the Mektics, and the Vykondians had both quality and quantity.

And with the surge of fresh troops in response, this alliance was able to press towards some of the Arks of the Iridescent Knights, craft that evoked a theme more than a singular narrative or appearance, seeming to change even while being observed while sticking to certain theme of noble grandiosity and prismatic splendour. The Arks were rare, many flotillas not even being graced with the presence of a true arkship for the men at arms, and those that did rarely having very many at all, most often just the one. However, just the one was often enough.

Waves of Kroat and Sutaitazu ships came apart retroactively or when they were not able to push back against the ark's power, compacted and shifted, twisting into servants of the ark and turning on their kin. Attacks were turned away or made harmless, even beneficial, while reinforcements were simply willed into being as they moulded reality, narrative, ideas, and even themes to their will. But the Krork mechs found a way to tap just a bit into the pastels that they were painting over existence with. Not with true colour, but enough to define themselves with shades.

The baseline of shading they had by being brought to this place like all the other players of this game was already enough for their own methods against such attacks to work when they normally should have been irrelevant, but this was enough to engage the monstrous arks in a manner largely resembling the way they fought the forces of Chaos; and then as they approached, actually do significant damage to the arks. Already the called and elected were something of a blind spot to the othersight of the iridescent ones, and the idea of the mere Krork scuffing any of their arks was inconceivable. Incomprehensible even, an insult.

To take the Krork seriously would be insulting, so they did not, not at first, even as the Krork advanced through the endless armadas of painted and simulated ships, conjured by cruel artists who saw resources in the suffering of others and power in the threads of destruction. The paintings grew stranger, more myriad, deviating from the themes of playing cards, tarot decks, and Abrahamic angels, becoming large turreted ships, fantastical warriors like grander than life knights that cold be described as neither futuristic nor retrograde, strange beasts like dragons and fair folk and even the more abstract such as floating equations that sought to equalise those they interacted with to zero and yet more beings given animus in order to do battle with the Krork and their allies.

Clan Skarvald, whose enhanced physiologies and armours allowed them to endure subspace travel without much issue, did what they were recruited to do, and pressed ahead to make use of their firepower and their durability to carve a path. The Keluko, looking on as the foe rained from above in swarms of simulacra, paintings, and the false-coloured, poured out of their holding areas and jumped directly into the fray without hesitation, and the Observer; which had returned from its prior assignment channeled forth a beam of normalisation from one of its pupils.

In tandem with the gravity whips concentrated by the Krork fleet and the Skarvaldic Tachyon beams to essentially dig their way through the morass of things created by the Arksto attack the citadels, they were approaching one of the Arks, closer and closer. Allies moved in to engage other elements of the Iridescent fleet, seeking to keep the foe as pinned down and distracted as possible, Scranton Reality anchors, Rosenberg Pataphysical Negators, combined with the Shadow in the Warp and similar devices from the Mandos, the Vykondians, the Skarvaldics, and the Mektics to try find the heel of the proverbial achilles.

The Krork were the first to attempt to actually board it, with the first landers being vapourised when they realised that for whatever reason, these beings were especially resistant to being simply unmade, thus prompting the Heraldry to animate in response, humanoid armoured constructs burning with some sort of power within made of things that were more than matter engulfing the Krork in the essence of annihilation. But as they were wiped from existence, their deaths could not discourage the next wave of Krork, or the next, and more and more and more.

Once the MTFs set up their devices, these incredibly ballsy humans setting foot in a place where even Krork, Mektic, Mandosi, and Clan Soldiers were being annihilated the breach was enough for a dreadnought carrying a warp shadow generator to simply ram its way through the breach and further suppress the colour madness, while disgorging many millions more Krork who poured out with enthusiasm for the endless variety of foes within the strange, overly grandiose halls evoking nobility and dominion over all who stepped inside.

The Seneschals and Sentries moved in response, bringing devastation where they tread while the simulacra and paintings manifested in their wake. A seneschal of spades was a black figure of death, a knightly terror whose plate armoured frame made things that could be construed as alive simply stop, even if "life" was very metaphorical, such as the cohesion of units, the belief in causes, the ability of equipment and weapons to function, even sound and perception.

A krork battlemaster would, buoyed by the counters to this bizarre form of colourotheurgy, be the first to bring down one of the Seneschals, smashing power claws into its body as it found itself having to bring out its scythe to sweep through the crowd of brutes pushing through as the Krork grew more resistant to its metaphysical thanateurgy. This would continue, until at last they overwhelmed and destroyed the ark, detonating it with a raucous laugh even with mounds of their own dead created by an ocean of titans of concept above narrative and reality.

To take any losses of Arks at all was shameful, and the Men at Arms would not allow the insult to go unrepaid, radiant warriors emerging in shimmering bursts of light bearing dreadful weapons. They came in showers of light to blot out all natural sources of the stuff, and the parchment of reality twisted around them as they drew their armaments and called forth their hosts.

"Impertinent aberrations, you have done yourselves a great disservice by drawing our wroth, raw and hot. Now, you will end, for we demand it, and shall make it so. Now, cease."

- Situation -

The conflict with the Oglomarix and Unbidden is holding steady, but the Protectorate is making breaches with the usage of Icon avatars and is threatening to pierce into your defensive depth.

You have what you need from the Tai, and the Prethoryn seem to have backed off for the time being to let the others fight it out.

The Kroats and Sutaitazu are at a stalemate while the Mandosi have called in fresh reinforcements to help the push, causing enough losses of Arkships to draw many Men at Arms out to the fight directly to take them on, weakening the Iridescent force overall.

Spartakrod · Aug 7, 2023

SteelWriter77 said:
Musings on the Taiidan: Penned by Escharum

"When the Banished first arrived at these stars, we knew there would be conflict amongst them. For as often as the idealist or the dreamer may desire for a truly peaceful existence, there will always be the corrupt or foolish to drag the stars into bloody war, we had assumed that the Covenant and the UNSC were the worst offenders of such warmongering, that is until we met the Taiidan Empire.

Make no mistake, the Taiidani people are as any people, their species as a whole deserves no blame for the actions of the Empire, but I know that is of little comfort to the billions that they have slaughtered in their madness. The Taiidan Empire have been our first foe here and stand to be ones that we will enshrine in history not for the glory of recounting great foes, but to serve as an example of the base cruelty and madness that can stem from unchecked power and ambition. Qualities that the Mad Emperor holds in great abundance as he declared war on nearly every power he had come across.

The Information given to us by our allies and what we have learned from our own action against the Taiidan have painted a wretched Empire of constant expansion, without it they crumble under the sins of their leadership. I pity such wasted effort and life, pointless for if you only had war and conquest, what culture and legacy do you leave. The Banished are soldiers and warriors yes, but we have ideals to champion and fight for, the freedom of life to not fight pointlessly over such things as species or faiths, to tear down those who would enslave or proclaim themselves masters of any kind.

The Taiidan Empire have no such ideals, for the longest time I had worried that none of their people saw the waste they trapped themselves in, but I have been happy to be proven wrong, learning of those groups who spoke out, who fought against and who now fight to be free from the Taiidan Empire. I often wonder as I read reports from those we send to aid them, do they have a visionary like Atriox to lead or inspire them, the one who stood up to proclaim enough. Or was a rising of the masses, I do not know…nor does it matter really, Atriox was needed for the Banished to rise and continue, whatever the Taiidan needed before means little, as the Banished now come to break their Empire and free the people.

This is my last War, the rejuvenation material and other such technologies found can only do so much, and I see my time ending. And it is a comfort that it is a war that speaks to the true ideals of the Banished and Atriox, a war to showcase honor against a dishonorable foe to use more poetic words. Atriox would simply deem it an end to an egregious enemy against our values and leave it at that, never claiming honor only glory, such is his way.

But before I leave this writing, one must wonder how far the Taiidan have pushed themselves to fight us, to fight others…Will they be the only souls to distort and ruin their own people we face, will this be the face of war in this universe, battles against monsters. It truly is fortunate that the Banished were brought here, to secure against the madness. "
======================

General:

- Preemptive Salvation: Atriox would not put it past the Mad Emperor to decide that destroying this system and it's people to stop the Banished from winning was acceptable. So Banished forces are put on guard to make sure any Taiidan attempts to destroy their own territory or the worlds is the main targets for Banished counter attacks and prevention measures.

-Precise Industrial Targeting: Despite wishing to take this system for the Banished's continued growth and prosperity, Atriox knows that it cannot be allowed to fuel the Taiidan's war machine if he wants to win. So orders are to target bioferrite mines and the Tiberium, both of these resources are critical to the Taiidan's current efforts and to curb their production lines we must target the sources and the supply lines.

Space:

- Space's Hammer: With the might of the Taiidan now amassed against the Banished and their allies, the battle over this system must be perfectly calculated, no misdirections and no obscuring between out forces, all must fight as one and under a unity of purpose. Targeting any and all weak points in the Taiidan and their mercenary forces, be they physical or mental the Banished will break them down under an aggressive and absolute attack while our allies and other forces cripple their means to withstand our attack.

- Shipyard woes: The Shipyards of the Taiidan are one of their most vital factors for the battle and are thus the most well defended of areas. Let'Volir and a decent sized part of the main fleet are put on the attack against these areas, while the rest of the fleets maintain the attack against the Taiidan fleets, there is a chance that some will split off to deal with Let'Volir, but his skills in naval combat along with our advances in technology should be enough to withstand their attacks.

- Boarding: As always, the Banished will seek to gain control over the vessels of the Taiidan through boarding actions, targeting the most powerful ships to secure them for personal use. Leading these advances primarily is strangely enough one Yapyap the Destroyer, leading his Unggoy kin on these daring actions from his Battlesuit to claim a vessel of his own.

Ground:

- Honor to those who trusted us: The promise Atriox had made to the Krogen of Clan Weyloc and those that now serve and live among the Banished has not been forgotten, and while it is unlikely that any facility in this system may hold the supposed cure the Taiidan had promised them, Atriox will still lead attacks on any sort of research facility in search of it.

- Fist of the Free Empire: While this war is to end the Taiidan Empire as a threat, it is also one to free the oppressed people under the Taiidan's boot. Civilian population under Banished occupation is to be treated fairly and kept secure, while still watched to ensure no spies or agents of the empire tamper with the Banished holdings, the newly freed people will be allowed to speak as they wish without the fear of the boot of the Emperor to stamp them out.

- Ending the Madness: Pavium will be given a direct mission from Atriox himself, taking a force of both Banished forces and mercenary allies to find the areas where the Taiidan create their new soldier weapons, the monsters created with their foul dealings or sciences. His goal is to destroy them or end whatever effect they may have, this is both a practical goal as it stops the Taiidan from gaining an advantage in battle, and stops whatever horror is being inflicted on their soldiers, weak and soft as they are, none deserve what is being done to them.

- The Walking Wall: Under the orders of Atriox, Elo Kadu Baqzo and Ndo Kadu Baqzo (Colony) lead their Lekgolo kin and their various constructs will showcase the might of the Banished as they march towards capitals or high value military targets, Locusts and Scarabs firing their weapons against the enemy which only has mercenaries to rely on for this kind of tonnage.

Mercenaries:

- Webway Fun: With our latest allies in the Void Raven Corsairs giving us limited access to their strange method of transportation, Atriox requests to the leadership of the Eldar group on using this Webway to let forces of his own and their allies join theirs in raiding operations across the Blue Eye System, larger groups being able to ensure less deaths for their own forces when attempting more daring raids on more high profile targets.

- Assassinations of Nobility and Military: With the Taiidan crumbling under their own actions and the efforts of all their foes, Atriox knows it is time to deal another blow to their defenses. Gathering the legendary Raid Team Alpha and Tenno under his employ, they along with Banished Silent Shadows under the command of Jega 'Rdomnai will strike those of noble blood in command of this system and those of high Military ranking, all to throw what meager defenses remain into chaos.

- Magic Nonsense: While the Banished as a rule find little comfort in the strange supernatural powers that their allies possess, they are nonetheless useful for operations and battles. So a catch-all order is given to Legion Masters across the battle, to give those allies with said powers the materials or things they need to best utilize their powers against the enemy.

The Battle for the Blue Eye was a straight-up uncomplicated, unambiguous brawl. Warships smashing into each other, trading broadsides, turreted fire, spinal weapons, and missiles with wild abandon. This was not the sort of battle won in a single clever manoeuvre or one weird trick, it was a war of equations, who could gain the most ground, achieve the most objectives, and do so with the fewest permanent losses. It was not entirely ungainly, but there were ships crawling on each other, contact points indicating strike craft racing between carriers, hangars, and factory craft or launching forth from the planets below. Banished warships using their supersized gravity hammers careened into enemy craft for devastating rams that could splinter shielding and crush hulls, while Taiidan Ion Beams carved bright blue lines through the void.

Many other ship types and forms of uniform were present across the gathered array of mercenaries and allies wielded by both sides, trading their blows in their own particular ways to achieve their advantages one way or the other. The diversity of the factions at play meant that ultimately, each doctrinal gap had something to patch it up, some subset of the gathered forces could be relied on to provide what the main force could not, and as such the grim equation of industrial warfare was not made a simple game of rock paper scissors, but a complex, ever-evolving problem with a multitude of chaotic factors.

It was quite simply put, utter pandemonium. But it was also abundantly clear that the majoritarian portions of both forces were the Banished and the Empire respectively, the latter having increasingly replaced its baseline Taiidan soldiers with alien auxiliaries, robots, and the nightmarish creations of their laboratories. Disconcertingly common amidst their mercenary ranks were small, plant like humanoids with coconut like outer shells married to an incredible ability to soak up punishment and a complete lack of fear responses or the ability to feel pain. The Keluko.

The Keluko were smaller than even grunts, standing maybe a third the average height of a human, but even a brute gone berserk would be. easier to intimidate, as the stumpy legs of the coconut men carried them forward while they made their loud war chants. Even a Krogan could find themselves pulled down in short order by a mob of the power suit clad little men and then swiftly beaten or stabbed to death, the impassive, immoving, bowling ball grip hole "faces" of the Keluko letting out high pitched war cries as they surged forward without fear.

Perhaps more traditionally intimidating were the massive Ranurgi mercenaries, two hundred and thirty plus tonnne creatures of organic metal who could belch sulphurous flames from their mouths, moving around on six limbs that they could change gait from bipedal to quadrupedal to hexapodal without missing a beat, with enough strength and size to grab and bench press wraith tanks and then pitch them like supersonic softballs, smashing their way through many of the soldiers who sought to get in their way and leaving greasy smears in their wake.

Strong enough to jump seven kilometres in earthlike gravity and clap their hands with enough force to create body-crushing shockwaves, even completely unarmed Ranurgi were regarded as some of the deadliest non-hypermassive combatants in the cluster, and they could amplify their strength by eating and adding more mass to their bodies and more fuel for their internal fires. Needless to say, such a physics-defying level of strength was far beyond what even a Spartan or Brute could hope to match in terms of raw musculature, and their bodies took plasma blasts like rain, snorting stinking black clouds through the grilles on their helmet while their horned, tusked heads fixated on those who sought to hit them in such a way.

And when armed, they tended to bring heavy weapons easily hefted by sixteen-metre tall frames, as big as King Kong in his film debut in 1933. And unlike Kong, attacking them with slow moving aircraft tended to result in the craft being shot down, or leapt on and then slammed back down into the ground with their freakish strength, dunked into oblivion like a basketball. If the Ranurgi had a weakness, it was that they were not only large and thus poorly suited for anything that involved tight spaces, but their internal biology; which resembled a turbo-charged internal combustion engine more than carbon-based physiology; was explosive, with the materials of fuel rod cannons, when they managed to break their metallic skin and scutes, typically causing them to explode dramatically, preventing their freakish healing factors from putting them back together.

The other weakness was of course, that they approached food more like a vehicle than an organic being, there was no "starvation mode", there was either "on" or "off", and when they were running low on fuel, they would break away to quickly consume things they could break down into the incredibly intense orange fluid that the steely coloured and power suit clad beasts metabolised.

On the surfaces of the warred over planets, soldiers rained from the heavens and set up bases on the surface, with the enormous Taiidan Landships being more than a bit of a problem to deal with as always, as even Super Scarabs and Democratic-Republican Mammoths would simply not do much damage of note to such massive vessels layered in so much armour and shielding. Wraiths would vent their payloads largely impotently, and the Land Carriers would continue to churn out new forces, particularly powerful and high-speed aircraft.

Of course, being that big meant that boarding was a much more viable tactic, and dropship were well suited for the task once the air was sufficiently cleared for them, throwing themselves upon the flat tops to disgorge payloads of Brutes, Cabal, Krogans, Elites, Trandoshans, Eldar, and other warriors, sometimes appearing through the usage of the webway gates spread across each world to get the drop on their enemies. The Taiidan's "new soldiers", purposefully designed monstrosities of genetic science that were altered from the base template of what were once wild animals.

Such radical alteration to create intelligent soldiers out of animals is supposed to be beyond the capabilities of the Taiidan, and yet somehow they manage, unleashing soldiers made from flies that now stood on two legs and grew to about a meter and a half or from majestic sabre toothed felinid predators that now stand at three meters of sinew, muscle, and glossy, strange skin, and six-limbed simian creatures a head shorter than a normal human, able to crawl around just about anywhere and fighting with ease from the rafters and high spaces within the interior of ships and buildings to name a few. This is likely the Combine's work, though the next surprise is perhaps even ruder, with the deployment of "Legion" class aerospace-land mecha to further even the odds.

This, and the prior efforts to create all sorts of irradiated horrors and abortions of mechanical technology, were more than enough to convince Pavium that his mission was of particular importance, leading his attack on some of the seeded worlds and their deranged facilities where they produced all manner of freaks of anything but nature. Cayde-6's raid team, Wreyloc Guld's Krogans, Tenno, THEBANS, the Banished EXILE Team of Spartans, Sangheili Warrior Elites, Eldar Corsairs, and the Sanguinans are also deployed to help with the assault on the main raid.

There they were working on new warriors not merely altered from pre-existing love, but created from scratch wholesale. Woven according to Rissetiu's exacting design to create his Praetorian Knights who would defend his person with absolute reliability. The Prototype Praetorians were creatures of bizarre biology, as much a collection of organic nanites as it was anything conventionally alive. With base forms like a grotesque, biomechanical and antlered knight with snouted helms that bore the impression of sabreteeth, clusters of eyes bound to their forms that emerged with extended claws and long, scorpion like tails that arched over their heads, smaller manipulation limbs emerging from miniature shoulders at the edge of their "ribs".

These prototypes had not yet been tested with mutagens, and had yet to receive their gear, but their glossy black frames were clearly made of complex lattices of carbon, while rust red and oxygen-blackened sinews of meat pulsed before coats of obsidian scales covered the remaining flesh. They exhaled steam and heat distortions, tissue cracking as they settled into place.

More than a few Taiidan scientists braced themselves for the Praetorians to kill them, but the invisible presence of the Emperor's will asserted itself, and they fell into line all the same, sensing intruders and prompting them to race out to confront Pavium's intrusion team, bounding with an unnatural gait. Jackals, Grunts, and Vorcha were some of the first to be torn apart by the new creatures, but others would find them a nightmare to deal with as well, healing far too fast to be anything natural when they were injured at all. They were terrifyingly strong and fast, but the Tenno and Sanguinans were stronger and faster.

Monsters were released and slain, and carefully set up charges were placed across the facility to ensure that its demise would be final. Pavium would smash one of the last of the Praetorians with his arsenal, ensuring that each blow hit its pulp until it was thoroughly, absolutely dead, its remains burned as the Tenno Lisets arrived to pick up the teams with absolute stealth and secrecy before the bombs erupted, reducing a massive small nation sized complex to a crater in a detonation that could be picked up on sensors far across the system.

Shipyards struck by the webway borne boarders exploded one after the other, and the Banished began to get an advantage in terms of the planets being acquired and the territory being taken in each planet being fought over. The Taiidan coalition was more fractious and divided, not just in the fact that the components didn't like each other but also in that the Taiidan were in terms of strategic needs and concerns, significantly more divided than the Banished, especially as another society known as the T'au was reported as launching its own offensives on the Empire.

The mines being destroyed slowed the Taiidan logistical machine more and more, their chain of command starting to fray more and more, especially as Republican agents activated sleeper cells in their war machine, asking that these soldiers abandon their post and join the revolution elsewhere. It was going well overall, but the Taiidan were not out of tricks just yet. As the Banished had come to occupy more than half of the territory in the Blue Eye system, they brought in their battleworlds and megacapitals.

Emerging with significant gravitational distortions, they came adorned with their escort fleet, including new Category 0 Citadels which functioned as mobile strongpoints in space, to take whatever was thrown at them and dish it back in spades, escorting a new model of Category 1; the "Ion Emperor", built around colossal particle cannons and hyperspace cores to allow for rapid movement of entire formations as well as devastating firepower that thankfully, was mostly meant to fight other craft of similar size and thus spare the Banished the worst of it.

Something new though was the singular Category 2 "Imperial Feast" which existed to devour and produce, even to the point of consuming entire planets with its dreadfully powerful tractor beams ripping those caught in its grip apart to be fed into its refineries and produce everything a Taiidani fleet could need, while also packing the ability to reverse these tractor beams for use as incredibly powerful mass drivers for this planet sized behemoth.

The reinforcing fleet that arrived powered up their shields, bearing new marks and models fresh from the laboratories of a dying empire, and gathered in their formations before advancing, launching out a never ending stream of strike craft, frigates, corvettes, and destroyers ahead of their movements while the Imperial Feast class Battleworld ominously moved towards the blue hypergiants and their starlifters that were the primary prize in all this. It would take its position, and then hold, seeking to defend and grind the enemy to gristle against them.

- Situation -

The banished have achieved control over 60% of the contested territory, but the Taiidan have moved in reserve and freshly produced fleets to reinforce their position, including constellations of battleworlds to try and hold their position.

The Tau have, sensing weakness, launched their own attacks on Taiidani space, further dividing their resources and efforts.

Taiidani reinforcement cycles are rapidly slowing with the division of their forces and the disruption to their resource harvesting and soldier growing efforts.

The Emperor seems to be genuinely somewhat desperate, throwing prototypes into the grinder as the stars seem to swallow his domain whole.
The Banished have the strongest advantage in Clash and Shock with their superiority in infantry, but the Taiidan hold an advantage in Skirmish with their far more replaceable and numerous Strike Craft, while planetside the Taiidan advantage in very large ground combatants forces the Banished to have to react to the presence of their largest vehicles more than the Taiidan have to react to the Banished's ground assets.

Taiidan command assets are decaying, but the Emperor seems to be able to assume direct control by some mysterious process, and is increasingly overriding the will of his troops and soldiers personally, making them into sorts of puppets, with the first examples of this being rather crudely controlled, but he seems to be learning quickly, with his puppets showing less and less unnatural disruption to their motor functions and more and more ability to act at full capacity; just without fear or disobedience. This suggests the Emperor is doing something to himself to attain some sort of power.

Banished weapon investments have proven to be well thought out, achieving greater advantage than the Taiidan's attempts at just pushing along the Emperor's personal pet projects for terror weapons and bizarre ideas of the ideal life form along with throwing funding at just about anything that might turn the tide.

All named characters have survived and are making progress to their following legend levels.

SteelWriter77 · Aug 11, 2023

Spartakrod said:
The Battle for the Blue Eye was a straight-up uncomplicated, unambiguous brawl. Warships smashing into each other, trading broadsides, turreted fire, spinal weapons, and missiles with wild abandon. This was not the sort of battle won in a single clever manoeuvre or one weird trick, it was a war of equations, who could gain the most ground, achieve the most objectives, and do so with the fewest permanent losses. It was not entirely ungainly, but there were ships crawling on each other, contact points indicating strike craft racing between carriers, hangars, and factory craft or launching forth from the planets below. Banished warships using their supersized gravity hammers careened into enemy craft for devastating rams that could splinter shielding and crush hulls, while Taiidan Ion Beams carved bright blue lines through the void.

Many other ship types and forms of uniform were present across the gathered array of mercenaries and allies wielded by both sides, trading their blows in their own particular ways to achieve their advantages one way or the other. The diversity of the factions at play meant that ultimately, each doctrinal gap had something to patch it up, some subset of the gathered forces could be relied on to provide what the main force could not, and as such the grim equation of industrial warfare was not made a simple game of rock paper scissors, but a complex, ever-evolving problem with a multitude of chaotic factors.

It was quite simply put, utter pandemonium. But it was also abundantly clear that the majoritarian portions of both forces were the Banished and the Empire respectively, the latter having increasingly replaced its baseline Taiidan soldiers with alien auxiliaries, robots, and the nightmarish creations of their laboratories. Disconcertingly common amidst their mercenary ranks were small, plant like humanoids with coconut like outer shells married to an incredible ability to soak up punishment and a complete lack of fear responses or the ability to feel pain. The Keluko.

The Keluko were smaller than even grunts, standing maybe a third the average height of a human, but even a brute gone berserk would be. easier to intimidate, as the stumpy legs of the coconut men carried them forward while they made their loud war chants. Even a Krogan could find themselves pulled down in short order by a mob of the power suit clad little men and then swiftly beaten or stabbed to death, the impassive, immoving, bowling ball grip hole "faces" of the Keluko letting out high pitched war cries as they surged forward without fear.

Perhaps more traditionally intimidating were the massive Ranurgi mercenaries, two hundred and thirty plus tonnne creatures of organic metal who could belch sulphurous flames from their mouths, moving around on six limbs that they could change gait from bipedal to quadrupedal to hexapodal without missing a beat, with enough strength and size to grab and bench press wraith tanks and then pitch them like supersonic softballs, smashing their way through many of the soldiers who sought to get in their way and leaving greasy smears in their wake.

Strong enough to jump seven kilometres in earthlike gravity and clap their hands with enough force to create body-crushing shockwaves, even completely unarmed Ranurgi were regarded as some of the deadliest non-hypermassive combatants in the cluster, and they could amplify their strength by eating and adding more mass to their bodies and more fuel for their internal fires. Needless to say, such a physics-defying level of strength was far beyond what even a Spartan or Brute could hope to match in terms of raw musculature, and their bodies took plasma blasts like rain, snorting stinking black clouds through the grilles on their helmet while their horned, tusked heads fixated on those who sought to hit them in such a way.

And when armed, they tended to bring heavy weapons easily hefted by sixteen-metre tall frames, as big as King Kong in his film debut in 1933. And unlike Kong, attacking them with slow moving aircraft tended to result in the craft being shot down, or leapt on and then slammed back down into the ground with their freakish strength, dunked into oblivion like a basketball. If the Ranurgi had a weakness, it was that they were not only large and thus poorly suited for anything that involved tight spaces, but their internal biology; which resembled a turbo-charged internal combustion engine more than carbon-based physiology; was explosive, with the materials of fuel rod cannons, when they managed to break their metallic skin and scutes, typically causing them to explode dramatically, preventing their freakish healing factors from putting them back together.

The other weakness was of course, that they approached food more like a vehicle than an organic being, there was no "starvation mode", there was either "on" or "off", and when they were running low on fuel, they would break away to quickly consume things they could break down into the incredibly intense orange fluid that the steely coloured and power suit clad beasts metabolised.

On the surfaces of the warred over planets, soldiers rained from the heavens and set up bases on the surface, with the enormous Taiidan Landships being more than a bit of a problem to deal with as always, as even Super Scarabs and Democratic-Republican Mammoths would simply not do much damage of note to such massive vessels layered in so much armour and shielding. Wraiths would vent their payloads largely impotently, and the Land Carriers would continue to churn out new forces, particularly powerful and high-speed aircraft.

Of course, being that big meant that boarding was a much more viable tactic, and dropship were well suited for the task once the air was sufficiently cleared for them, throwing themselves upon the flat tops to disgorge payloads of Brutes, Cabal, Krogans, Elites, Trandoshans, Eldar, and other warriors, sometimes appearing through the usage of the webway gates spread across each world to get the drop on their enemies. The Taiidan's "new soldiers", purposefully designed monstrosities of genetic science that were altered from the base template of what were once wild animals.

Such radical alteration to create intelligent soldiers out of animals is supposed to be beyond the capabilities of the Taiidan, and yet somehow they manage, unleashing soldiers made from flies that now stood on two legs and grew to about a meter and a half or from majestic sabre toothed felinid predators that now stand at three meters of sinew, muscle, and glossy, strange skin, and six-limbed simian creatures a head shorter than a normal human, able to crawl around just about anywhere and fighting with ease from the rafters and high spaces within the interior of ships and buildings to name a few. This is likely the Combine's work, though the next surprise is perhaps even ruder, with the deployment of "Legion" class aerospace-land mecha to further even the odds.

This, and the prior efforts to create all sorts of irradiated horrors and abortions of mechanical technology, were more than enough to convince Pavium that his mission was of particular importance, leading his attack on some of the seeded worlds and their deranged facilities where they produced all manner of freaks of anything but nature. Cayde-6's raid team, Wreyloc Guld's Krogans, Tenno, THEBANS, the Banished EXILE Team of Spartans, Sangheili Warrior Elites, Eldar Corsairs, and the Sanguinans are also deployed to help with the assault on the main raid.

There they were working on new warriors not merely altered from pre-existing love, but created from scratch wholesale. Woven according to Rissetiu's exacting design to create his Praetorian Knights who would defend his person with absolute reliability. The Prototype Praetorians were creatures of bizarre biology, as much a collection of organic nanites as it was anything conventionally alive. With base forms like a grotesque, biomechanical and antlered knight with snouted helms that bore the impression of sabreteeth, clusters of eyes bound to their forms that emerged with extended claws and long, scorpion like tails that arched over their heads, smaller manipulation limbs emerging from miniature shoulders at the edge of their "ribs".

These prototypes had not yet been tested with mutagens, and had yet to receive their gear, but their glossy black frames were clearly made of complex lattices of carbon, while rust red and oxygen-blackened sinews of meat pulsed before coats of obsidian scales covered the remaining flesh. They exhaled steam and heat distortions, tissue cracking as they settled into place.

More than a few Taiidan scientists braced themselves for the Praetorians to kill them, but the invisible presence of the Emperor's will asserted itself, and they fell into line all the same, sensing intruders and prompting them to race out to confront Pavium's intrusion team, bounding with an unnatural gait. Jackals, Grunts, and Vorcha were some of the first to be torn apart by the new creatures, but others would find them a nightmare to deal with as well, healing far too fast to be anything natural when they were injured at all. They were terrifyingly strong and fast, but the Tenno and Sanguinans were stronger and faster.

Monsters were released and slain, and carefully set up charges were placed across the facility to ensure that its demise would be final. Pavium would smash one of the last of the Praetorians with his arsenal, ensuring that each blow hit its pulp until it was thoroughly, absolutely dead, its remains burned as the Tenno Lisets arrived to pick up the teams with absolute stealth and secrecy before the bombs erupted, reducing a massive small nation sized complex to a crater in a detonation that could be picked up on sensors far across the system.

Shipyards struck by the webway borne boarders exploded one after the other, and the Banished began to get an advantage in terms of the planets being acquired and the territory being taken in each planet being fought over. The Taiidan coalition was more fractious and divided, not just in the fact that the components didn't like each other but also in that the Taiidan were in terms of strategic needs and concerns, significantly more divided than the Banished, especially as another society known as the T'au was reported as launching its own offensives on the Empire.

The mines being destroyed slowed the Taiidan logistical machine more and more, their chain of command starting to fray more and more, especially as Republican agents activated sleeper cells in their war machine, asking that these soldiers abandon their post and join the revolution elsewhere. It was going well overall, but the Taiidan were not out of tricks just yet. As the Banished had come to occupy more than half of the territory in the Blue Eye system, they brought in their battleworlds and megacapitals.

Emerging with significant gravitational distortions, they came adorned with their escort fleet, including new Category 0 Citadels which functioned as mobile strongpoints in space, to take whatever was thrown at them and dish it back in spades, escorting a new model of Category 1; the "Ion Emperor", built around colossal particle cannons and hyperspace cores to allow for rapid movement of entire formations as well as devastating firepower that thankfully, was mostly meant to fight other craft of similar size and thus spare the Banished the worst of it.

Something new though was the singular Category 2 "Imperial Feast" which existed to devour and produce, even to the point of consuming entire planets with its dreadfully powerful tractor beams ripping those caught in its grip apart to be fed into its refineries and produce everything a Taiidani fleet could need, while also packing the ability to reverse these tractor beams for use as incredibly powerful mass drivers for this planet sized behemoth.

The reinforcing fleet that arrived powered up their shields, bearing new marks and models fresh from the laboratories of a dying empire, and gathered in their formations before advancing, launching out a never ending stream of strike craft, frigates, corvettes, and destroyers ahead of their movements while the Imperial Feast class Battleworld ominously moved towards the blue hypergiants and their starlifters that were the primary prize in all this. It would take its position, and then hold, seeking to defend and grind the enemy to gristle against them.

- Situation -

The banished have achieved control over 60% of the contested territory, but the Taiidan have moved in reserve and freshly produced fleets to reinforce their position, including constellations of battleworlds to try and hold their position.

The Tau have, sensing weakness, launched their own attacks on Taiidani space, further dividing their resources and efforts.

Taiidani reinforcement cycles are rapidly slowing with the division of their forces and the disruption to their resource harvesting and soldier growing efforts.

The Emperor seems to be genuinely somewhat desperate, throwing prototypes into the grinder as the stars seem to swallow his domain whole.
The Banished have the strongest advantage in Clash and Shock with their superiority in infantry, but the Taiidan hold an advantage in Skirmish with their far more replaceable and numerous Strike Craft, while planetside the Taiidan advantage in very large ground combatants forces the Banished to have to react to the presence of their largest vehicles more than the Taiidan have to react to the Banished's ground assets.

Taiidan command assets are decaying, but the Emperor seems to be able to assume direct control by some mysterious process, and is increasingly overriding the will of his troops and soldiers personally, making them into sorts of puppets, with the first examples of this being rather crudely controlled, but he seems to be learning quickly, with his puppets showing less and less unnatural disruption to their motor functions and more and more ability to act at full capacity; just without fear or disobedience. This suggests the Emperor is doing something to himself to attain some sort of power.

Banished weapon investments have proven to be well thought out, achieving greater advantage than the Taiidan's attempts at just pushing along the Emperor's personal pet projects for terror weapons and bizarre ideas of the ideal life form along with throwing funding at just about anything that might turn the tide.

All named characters have survived and are making progress to their following legend levels.

The sounds of the ongoing battle far from the base camp provided only a slight comfort as Pavium sat in the barracks, the rumble of impacts miles away kept him grounded as his mind drifted to the past. The distorted monstrosities that the Taiidan were crafted still haunted him, not in any way of fear, no, pity was primarily the feeling associated with the creatures he saw.

He had no doubts some signed on willingly to fight the "Invaders" as they have been called by Taiidan Soldiers…but he knew that many more were not willing participants and changed into nothing more than a weapon for the Taiidan Empire.

"Brother, I did not hear that you had arrived" A voice cuts through Pavium's thoughts, turning his head he saw his brother walking into the barracks, armor in clear need of repair but still a smile upon his face. "I have been preoccupied Voridus, much as you have been with your guard duties."

A slight snarl escapes his brothers mouth as he is reminded of his less then glorious tasks as of late, even now years after they had left the Ark, his need for glory let loose a Flood Infestation and cost many their lives. Atriox was merciful in letting him live after this failure, but ever since he has been given orders in the back lines of campaigns, acting as a rear guard. An important role which befits his skill, but damming his pride.

"Heh…not letting that go, same as the Warmaster eh?" He asked, tone strained but still jovial as he took off his armor. "Well since you have been so curious Pavium, the battles have been trying on the old gear, might have to upgrade to the newer models soon enough, will miss the old set though."

Voridus's word choices were more familiar and unfamiliar then Pavium was expecting"You've been spending too much time with those Humans, your starting to pick up vocal cues from them." Voridus chuckles at Pavium's words as he places his nearly broken armor on a cart. "Ah they just understand me a bit more than you do, no need for any worry Brother.

There was a silence for several moments before Voridus spoke again "Pavium…come back from this war, It would not do to lose you to these unworthy foes." As he spoke he lifted up his forearm in the customs of their people.

Wordlessly Pavium returned the forearm bump to his Brother, the both of them slamming their fists into their own chests. "Always Voridus, stay out of trouble and stop listening to those Humans of your Squad, they are almost as bad as you are in glory seeking."

The last thing Pavium hears before the doors to the barracks close is Voridus's laughter.

============================

Tactical Orders:

General:

- Emptying the Coffers: One of the few stabilizing features of the Taiidan is their amounts of funds, and while it is clearly draining fast in their mad efforts to stop the Banished. The flow of it can be hastened with a well placed strike and for lack of a better term, heist on their treasury. This task will be given to Raid Team Alpha and forces they consider best suited to lead this raid so deep in enemy territory to deprive the Taiidan another method to prolong this conflict.

- Cutting Rissetiu off: While it is only a theory, the occurrence of this strange power the Mad Emperor has gained in conjunction with the Spice and Dust being allowed to be shipped to him is a concern. So orders are to be sent to small time fleetmasters and Captains of the Banished, sending them to assault production/collection of this material and any supply routes they have of them.

- Continued Splintering: With the Taiidan growing more and more desperate and turning to created horrors, it is a safe assumption they are trying to prepare if their Mercenaries or other soldiers should turn on them. So several Legion masters decide that adding some more stress to that tension will only be a net benefit to our efforts, trying to flood the Taiidan communication channels with recordings of the Lessons of Atriox or the true reports of their Empire's failures in this war. With any luck this will create more division and make several break away either in self interest or decide to pick up arms against their oppressors.

Space:

- Ending the Feast: Atriox will turn his direct attention on the Imperial Feast, such a weapon can not be allowed to gain traction or remain in enemy hands. So a massive attack will be organized to send Banished and Desmondic Freedom Fighters onto the Battleworld and render it unusable for the enemy.

Leading the Boarding attack with Atriox will be Escharum and Colony, all leading their own attacks on separate portions of the Battleworld, Escharum leading an attack on the production facilities that work to create more ships for the Taiidan, Colony leading efforts to destroy the Tractor Beam controls, and Atriox himself leading an attack to the command position of this vessel.

- Beheading Battleworlds: While Atriox and his forces attack the Imperial Feast, Let'Volir and hThe Cabal Redeemed fleet will do battle against the multitude of Battleworlds brought to Blue Eye. Despite the sheer difference in scale and mass, the Banished fleet and their allied fleets do have maneuverability over these Battleworlds and Let'Volir is going to take every advantage that can bring, keeping the attacks a constant moving attack, while this is not indicative of a constant source of damage, it will make their vessels harder to destroy, which will give the Boarding attacks by Yapyap and his own forces the time they need.

Yapyap and his forces are to not be focused on taking these vessels however, their goal is simple destruction via whatever means they can manage. Targeting systems or parts of the Battleworlds that make their operation, let us see if Yapyap can earn his title of Destroyer.

- Striking fast and Hard: While the main fleets of the Banished and their allies fight in the grueling match up against the Taiidan Battleworlds, the Void Raven Corsairs are given their own task, using their faster ships and tactics to harass and take pot shots at the enemy fleets or locations of importance.

Ground:

- Supply Smashing: With the supplies of the Taiidan no doubt dwindling, Jega 'Rdomnai will take command of several Banished forces with the intent to find and destroy any hidden supply or attempts of the Taiidan to alleviate their losses.

- Shield of the Banished: With his success in dealing with the major facilities creating monsters, Pavium will be leading more direct efforts on any planetary attacks or defenses of the Banished on their claimed worlds/the worlds of their allies.

Mercenaries:

- Landship Acquisition: The Landships of the Taiidan are both impressive marvels of technology and destructive assets our enemy has on hand, so it is no surprise that Atriox creates a strategy to take some for ourselves, handing this task to the Guardians and several Tenno and Banished advance teams, they will be sent on missions to either take out the command of these Landships and allow them to be taken by our wider forces, or lead missions to plant bombs near critical systems, destroying what makes these Landships operate from the inside.

- Cutting the Strings: Whatever means the mad emperor is using to gain control over his leadership needs to be stopped, not just for the rights of a free mind, but to ensure more abandon this lost cause or join to fight against this madness. So those who understand the esoteric or magic of these stars, are to look for ways to cut the control away and free those under the Emperor's command.

Crayak · Aug 13, 2023

EternalStruggle said:
-Initiate tactical turn: Rumble in the Ruins. The Fleethorde sent to enact an evacuation of the arriving Reapers is able to infiltrate Ruin-Maker space without being detected. When it arrives, a pitched battle is ongoing around massive ruin complexes. The Reapers have one Mag 1 Fleethorde entering the system and one Mag 1 Fleethorde already engaged in the clash phase with a Mag 2 Ruin-Maker Kroatangan fleet in and around the massive ruin complexes. Performance in this tactical turn will determine if these fleethordes will make it back to Reaper space, and if so whether they will have the strength to invade either Tau'ri territory (due to the unexpected development of the CPH, plans for these fleets can be slightly changed).

Tactical Turn: Rumble in the Ruins

"Kroatanga. A runaway bioweapon. Worthless."

"Barbaric."

"Useful, if they could be controlled."

A parasite had been expunged, just as the Thorian had been.

Humanity was under siege, only this branch of that stubborn species actually had bite where the Systems Alliance only had bark. Earth was not burning yet, but it soon would be. Their destruction was inevitable and only delayed by a slim margin.

These were patterns that the Reapers noted as they conducted their tasks. The similarities were almost reassuring as the anomalous elements in the new reality continued to make themselves known.

The Kroats were frustratingly new, and not to be treated lightly if half of the information about them was to be believed. They were a created race that had exterminated their creator long ago, and without the intervention of a party like the Reapers had become a blight on multiple galaxies. This was vindication for their efforts even though the Kroats were biological and not synthetic.

From the data share the fleet engaged with them, that had not made them any less formidable.

This task, while initially judged as an annoyance, received increased attention once it became clear that this would not be the simple extraction planned but rather the first instance where the Reapers and Kroats could take stock of each other. This would affect the plans for how to deploy their forces to an even greater extent than the Tau'ri siege depending on what was revealed.

Orders:

[Unkillable Swarm trait: Reduce casualties in Clash phase]

Arrival: Information from the other fleet about the layout of Kroat ships is to be exchanged so that the flanking fleet has knowledge of Kroat ship systems and where to aim to inflict the most damage (prioritise targeting enemy engines). Capitals and Destroyers to overcharge their drive cores before jumping in to join the fleet in clash. Use lessons learned from combating USPR battleships to minimise damage when taking on larger ships and for the most effective manoeuvres to avoid the forward firing arcs of Kroat ships.

Bombardment: The arriving fleet will join the battle by bombarding the Kroat fleet. BOSS Reapers will remain at this range to provide fire support and to use the megastructure debris as cover from return fire. Capitals and Destroyers will jump to Clash.

Skirmish: Capitals to cycle to this range from Clash when repositioning.

Clash:

BOSSes to enter this range if necessary to support their brethren, but should mainly stick to Bombardment
Capitals and Destroyers will grapple with Kroat warships and unload their static discharge into them, hopefully frying the occupants or at least damaging the power grids.
While the Capitals will detach after unloading Husks, Destroyers will remain to directly target Kroat systems, cover the Sovereigns as they disengage (by activating their Gravity Well Projectors to stop the Kroats from using their FTL) and to continue boarding actions.
Oculi will be taking on Kroat fighters, if there are any, and acting to disable Kroat subsystems.
The boarding actions should be used as a test for how Husks stack up to Kroat goons, and if Kroats are compatible with Husk conversion and Indoctrination.
- While the combat Husks are engaging the Kroats grunts, the Banshees and Gorgons should focus on finding and eliminating Kroat command units (through duels and assassinations respectively).

Disengage: Once the Kroat fleet has been damaged enough to take pressure off the fleet under fire to enable them to disengage, both fleets to disperse and fall back. Use the ruined megastructures as concealment, move to disable the Interdiction beacons and exit the system.

The strategic orders remain the same, but rather than attacking CPH space the fleets should reinforce the Tau'ri offensive after repairs.

Chimeraguard · Aug 14, 2023

EternalStruggle said:
Diplomacy Orders:
Calling all sellswords: Look into the possibility of hiring mercenaries. While they're unlikely to be available in time for the immediately upcoming combat actions, having instant combat power (just add dollars) in the future can only be a good thing if this universe is going to be this hostile to us. With the integration of the Imperial State, we now have limited access to the Hypernet, and hopefully Marchokai has some experience with the local PMC culture and groups himself. Which is good, because with the SMS branches that hopped the universal border already hired or nationalized, we'll have to look elsewhere for military support.

The New United Nations appears to have a bit of good fortune in their search for mercenaries. This region of space has long been something of a hotbed for conflict between warlords and various other rival powers, with things only recently being shaken up by the arrival of the Loptrathi, NUN, and now the Platinum Horde. Which means there is a good number of mercs out there missing their former employer.

Ykantras Synthetic Tumen: While most known for as nomadic raiders, the mechanically-minded Ykantras also maintain a steady business producing military-grade Synthetics. Most Ykantras Synthetics are bipedal and generally known for having a couple exploitable flaws, but they are affordable while still retaining a solid combat record when used correctly.
-Summary: Affordable Tier Primus infantry combat specialists, with large amounts of expendable chaff. Built for direct confrontation rather than more subtle or flexible work.
-Effect: Attachment that grants an additional Focus to the Infantry of one War Fleet.
-Cost: 1 RP per War Fleet. Permanent until destroyed (Note: due to expendable nature, very likely to be destroyed.) Multiple Available

Xyvus Solutions Cybernetic Enforcers: For those who wish to express their displeasure at their enemies with an infantry-sized package, Xyvus Solutions offers a diverse array of cybernetically augmented enforcers with skillsets ranging from melee combat to infantry fight dominance to anti-vehicle sniping to covert assassination. Soldiers who who witness these masters of warfare-for-hire and wish to emulate them are advised to speak to our nearest representative. Generous hiring bonuses are available for those willing to submit themselves to conversion processes to replace in-field casualties.
-Summary: A large collection of Tier Extremis Supersoldiers in various specialties that can serve as relatively numerous force-multipliers for infantry combat.
-Effect: Attachment that grants an additional Focus to Supersoldiers of one War Fleet.
-Cost: 1 RP per War Fleet per turn. 4 Available.

Temtum's Tripods: A hardened Tertak mercenary with over a century of combat experience, Temtum leads a sizeable mercenary command built around tri-legged ground mecha, armed with potent energy and chemical weapons. Questions about the legality of his command's Black Smoke weaponry is replied to with him pointing out that he never signed any international treaty banning it.
-Summary: An elite, Tier Extremis Attachment of advanced Tripod walkers, armed with both direct-fire and indirect fire weapons.
-Effect: Attachment that grants an additional Focus to Main Battle Units and Artillery for one War Fleet.
-Cost: 3 RP per War Fleet per turn.

Rulu Loko Vuko Fistfleet: The Keluko, commonly known as "the angry coconut people", are a highly belligerent plantoid species from the Marshaldom of Janth. Having no fear mechanism and short tempers makes them poor neighbors, but excellent mercenaries, with a preference on ground for large armies of mechanized infantry and in space with a fleet divided between close-ranged assault ships and long-ranged missile artillery vessels.
-Summary: A single Magnitude 3, Tier Primus War Fleet, with Focuses in Infantry, Battleships, and Main Battle Units. Preference for offensive action over defensive.
-Tier: Primus
-Cost: 40 RP to hire, 10 RP per turn to maintain.

Xyvus Solutions Problem-Solver Fleet: While known as the soldiers of Octarine Incorporated in all but name, Xyvus Solutions is more than willing to work for other paying customers as well, so long as they're not opposing Octarine's interests. Xyvus Solutions is most known for their long-ranged precision work with railguns, torch shells, and missiles, though they tend to struggle in close-in combat.
-Summary: War Fleets of varying size, built around long-ranged sniper units. Powerful at long range and good in a Skirmish, but somewhat fragile (both physically and in a morale sense) in a Clash.
-Tier: Extremis
-Cost: 1.5x Standard Magnitude Cost and maintenance. No limit to amount or size of War Fleets hired.

Intelligence Orders:
Scouting Ops: With open space to our west and east both, send survey teams in both directions (past virgin space to the east and in the northeastern corner of L-19 to our west) to see what else might be going on in our neck of the woods.

Scouts head out to the west and east. The west seems almost refreshingly boring compared to what's happening back home. What there is to the east is a... bit more concerning, though it still pales in comparison to the onslaught coming in from the north. Though from piecing together the reconnaissance reports and what history there is of this region, it's quite clear the Tertak were once part of a much more vast and powerful civilization, before everything descended into chaos and warlords.

-Pureline Assembly (3; South, Center, West): The main power of the sector, the Pureline Assembly appears to be a gene-modification created subspecies of the Tertak, sacrificing much of their physical capabilities for psionic ones, becoming what almost appear to be giant brains with eyes and tentacles. Largely viewing the other Tertak as inferiors, the Pureline Assembly is an isolationist power that seems to retain much of the technology of this region's pre-collapse state.

-Primitives (2; East, Southwest): While there are signs that these regions of space were once home to much more advanced civilizations, warfare has degenerated things to the point where all that remains are a number of primitive, largely pre-FTL civilizations. Those in the Southwest appear to be under constant observation and stewardship by the Pureline Assembly, which seems to be interested in observing how the "inferior genelines" of their species develop and recover.

-Kroatangan Marauders (2; Northwest, Northeast): A fungal self-replicating bioweapon gone wrong, the Kroatanga are one of the most prolific and iconic threats to most who live in the Vyranodasik Galactic Cluster, capable of escalating from small bands to massive warpaths that tear their way across whole galaxies. These groups thankfully, seem to be on the lower end of the scale, content to squabble with each other and their neighbors rather than assembling into a massive horde.

-New Tetharti Empire (1; North): Some warlords saw the writing on the wall when the Loptrathi first arrived and fled west, setting themselves up and declaring the dawn of a new empire here. Primarily focused on slowly clearing out their Kroatangan neighbors, though it's hard to say if they have a legitimate chance of doing so, or if they're all just hot air.

-Virgin Space (1; Southeast): A once-inhabited slice of territory that seems to have been largely cleared out by various wars, and now lies open to colonization. A handful of Loptrathi outposts and space stations have been set up in this sector of space, as the interstellar diplomacy equivalent of calling dibs.

-Void Reef (2; West, Southwest): Much of the territory to the NUN's immediate east is inhabited by what can only be described as an enormous space ecosystem, most concentrated in a set of megastructures in the Southwest, with biometallic "Hydelga" cosmo-coral attracting vast amounts of predatory void fauna, ranging from fighter-sized creatures to lumbering monstrosities that could eat capital ships whole. While awe-inspiring to any cosmic biologist, those looking on the maps are more concerned with how the ecosystem is constantly expanding.

-Virgin Space (1; Northwest): A series of sparsely populated worlds occasionally populated by the ruins of previous civilizations, this section of territory is largely devoid of any organized polity that could contest a colonization push. Thankfully, the Platinum Horde seems to have overlooked this subsector of space for now. In the process of being colonized by the New United Nations.

-Containment Zone [ERROR DATA CORRUPTED ERROR ERROR ERROR] (1; Center): A series of megastructures inhabit the outskirts of this region, which appear to be projecting some sort of energy sphere over the rest of the subsector. Attempts to send probes in seem to see the distances needed to travel artificially increase to the point where it is impossible to progress further in... and presumably also prevent anything inside from getting out. Various beacons carry messages that manage to emphatically warn against attempting to break this containment in spite of obvious language barriers.

-The Ion Legion (1; South): A Chapter of the Sentienality of Polrus militant order, the Ion Legion is assigned to making sure that whatever's inside the Containment Zone stays contained, and that nothing threatens the integrity of the ancient megastructures that maintain the zone. This involves keeping the local Kroats down, pruning the Hydelga Cosmo-Coral when it starts expanding too far east, and taking care of any other problems that inevitably emerge when one lives in the Vyranodasik galaxy.

-Kroatanga Marauders (1; Southeast): Oh look, more Kroats. Much like those to the west, these appear to be little more than marauders and glorified pirates content with picking from the ruins of the region and squabbling with each other over the spoils. The Ion Legion make sure to nip Warfiends who look like they're growing too powerful in the bud to keep things that way.

-Chaos March (2; East, Northeast): More detritus of the long-fallen proto-Tertak civilization. While a bit more developed than the sectors of the Warlord Alliance, these Subsectors are nevertheless filled with petty empires and warlord states feuding over the remains of their predecessors.

-The Penitent Consecrators (1; North): What appears to be an art project on an unimaginable scale, with most of the subsector apparently having been strip-mined for the purpose of creating an incomprehensibly vast sculpture of numerous species linked in poses of horror and dismay as they face towards the containment zone, while others are in poses of supplication and worship to artificially re-positioned celestial constellations of stars. As impressive as it is ominous, the display's security detail of advanced combat drones and religious cults zealously keep any would-be scavengers from pillaging it for its materials. Or criticizing the practicality of making such a thing.

Target: The Platinum Horde
Nature: Observation
Resources: 1 RP

Ahead of our military action, we need to try and figure out where the Platinum Horde's main factories are coming from. Based on their field production capabilities, a depressing possibility is "everywhere", but that's still important to know if true.

Unfortunately, the sheer volume of Platinum Horde ships and intruders makes any real penetration into their territory to find a main sector of production difficult. The most that can be determined is that the three subsectors to NUN's immediate north appear to have been recent conquests, which are still in the process of being fully digested. Hence why the New United Nations is only facing a relatively "light" assault for now.

Target: Warlord Space
Nature: Hostile
Resources: 8 RP, 2 Turns (Second Turn.)

We are no longer asking. Join up. The infiltration campaign will continue, now with military support (see below). With the worst warlords as our first targets, get in secret contact with the ones more open to cooperation that have yet to begin massacring their own population and make the reality of the situation clear. They can join up and get a Marchokai supporter-style golden parachute, or they can get eaten by the Loptrathi when the latter swoop in to enforce their claims next year, and that's if we don't decide to do them in first. The choice is theirs, but which option is preferable for all parties involved should be reasonably obvious. This also extends to sub-warlords and military officers deemed pliable: They can turn their coats against any recalcitrant masters they have and join the winning side with a full pardon (within reason of course), or they can be either missile fodder or, even if they do miraculously survive the year, Loptrathi chow. Again, their choice, but it doesn't take a genius to figure out the smarter option.

For the areas in active turmoil, attempt to stay in contact with pro-NUN groups so they can be identified, protected, and then brought up as our local support base during the course of the military operation. If any relatively unobjectionable pro-NUN active rebel groups are present, supply them with weaponry to make them more effective allies, up to whatever they can handle and we can afford to give them. In short, cultivate our base of supporters in order to ensure we win not only the war but also the peace. As part of this, while some of our highly-placed against go after military leadership, attempt to deploy more low to the ground propaganda to convince low-ranking soldiers to defect to the pro-NUN groups of Warlord Space. We're not the ones shooting at your civilians, after all.

Pursuant to this, part of the infiltration budget is going towards ensuring humanitarian aid flows in immediately behind our military forces, mitigating the damage of the fighting and beginning the process of uplifting the local population. As well as being the right thing to do this, should hopefully sway the large parts of the population currently broadly neutral to the NUNG to be more supportive of the installation of democracy and probable short-term military occupation.

Military Orders:
Target: Warlord Space
Assets: 2x Bruised Magnitude 2 War Fleets

Having fucked around, the Warlords must now begin the process of finding out. Deploy our forces still damaged from the fight against the Corsairs last year to engage the openly oppressive Warlords in battle. To end things quickly, focus on policies of decapitation strikes against enemy capital systems and leadership before supporting local pro-NUN forces, ideally causing the whole edifice to collapse in on itself sooner rather than later. Surrendering or captured warlords and senior military officers are to be placed in front of a military tribunal for their actions.

Use the high mobility granted by Fold Drives and the brutal fast attack power of Variable Fighters to achieve this both in space and on the ground. Ideally, targeting only part of the Warlords and achieving hopefully swift results will cause the rest, likely caught up in at least some civil strife of their own, to hesitate before acting, letting us defeat the enemy piecemeal. Once the enemy is leaderless and we have local control, deploy ground forces to engage in policing actions, suppressing any active nationalist forces and uplifting pro-NUN groups to temporary leadership positions wherever practical. Additionally, cooperate with any defecting military units where possible.

The end goal of this operation is to secure the entirety of Warlord Space as NUNG-aligned territory. Due to the oncoming lack of leadership of the space, it's expected we'll be able to annex it outright, adding it to our rapidly growing confederation. Warlords that have managed to avoid engaging in crimes against humanity that are also recalcitrant about joining our sphere and additionally lack a large amount of local pro-NUN groups are to be left alone for now unless they attack our expeditionary force, although this Venn diagram is expected to have a central of zero to near zero inhabitants. Whether or not the Loptrathi will consider them fair game is their problem.

To call the conflict against the various remaining Warlords of the sector a "war" would be giving them far too much credit. They are divided, torn by civil strife, and otherwise incapable of resisting a serious NUNS military force. As the various fleets of NUN warships emerge over their worlds, the response of the warlord armies can only be described as a complete and total collapse.

Not that there aren't those who try to resist. A number of Keluko mercenaries introduce the NUN to what native humans have nicknamed "the angry coconut people." These small but hardy amd belligerent plantoids are some of the most ubiquitous mercenaries in Vyranodasik. Their missile-happy long range game is nothing new to NUNS, but their preferred tactics seem to be using large amounts of assault ships designed for close-range combat. And by "close-range combat" they mean "ram the bastards and board them!"

Letting out the common Keluko battlecry of "Ugo wuko Krulo!", the Keluko mercenary assaults are spearheaded by waves of electromagnetic pulse missiles that send out net-like pulses of EMP to shut down NUNS warships and fighter squadrons, followed up by a spearhead of assault ships that prove quite willing to simply ram their way through opposition, unleashing gunships and boarding pods on anything they don't take apart. In boarding actions, the imposing size of Zentraedi Marines is countered by the sheer bloody-mindedness of the Keluko mercenaries, who fight seemingly without fear, pain, or concern for their own lives, willing to clamor up Zentraedi with explosive charges if need be.

Still, these are not strategic problems, but merely tactical obstacles, and the Keluko are the exception more than the rule as warlord after warlord either falls or accept NUN offers of a quiet retirement instead of being shot by the UN military or lynched by their own infuriated population. NUN sympathetic groups in various systems are quickly established as on top and supplied with vast amounts of humanitarian aid in preparation for a future integration into the NUN itself.

At the southernmost border, a handful of warlords take a different approach to preserving their power, abandoning the most compromised worlds in favor of deep space stations and atmosphere-less planetoids, fortified fallback positions without a hostile populace but enough stockpiled resources to sustain them for years to come. The New United Nations declines to even bother with these new pirate kings, whose rejoicing and continued survival proves very shortlived when their sensors begin to report the telltale signs of Loptrathi collarships emerging from FTL.

Results
-Warlords crushed, easy NUN victory.
-Casualties relatively minor. Some battlegroups that fought the Keluko got torn up a bit, but not enough to have strategic implications.
-Both Subsectors acquired at Claimed level, with 1 pop each.
-Loptrathi acquire enough systems in the south to get access further west, but not enough to dispute NUN's control of the overall subsector.
-The two War Fleets could theoretically be deployed back to the Platinum Horde Front, but may risk taking heavier losses due to the increased wear-and-tear to rush them into the action without as much maintenance. This is not a guarantee however.

Target: M-19 North
Assets: 6x Magnitude 2 War Fleets, 8x Fulbtzs-Berrentzs Constellations, universal Heavy Defenses.

The majority of the NUNS is to be put in place along the northern edge of our territory in order to defend against the sudden unprovoked assault of the Platinum Horde. The missive given is not one step back. The fighting will be fierce, but if we let the enemy gain even an inch, then it won't be long until they use that inch to generate more forces, and take more inches. Needless to say, this is unacceptable.

Also needless to say is that we shall do our level best to prevent fighting on planetary surfaces. We are singularly incapable of meaningfully engaging the Platinum Horde in a land battle, and as such will avoid doing so where possible. The order of the day when we're inevitably forced into such an engagement is mass orbital and reaction warhead bombardment to sterilize infected areas. Unfortunately, anyone still in the blast zone were likely dead anyway, so only minimal efforts to avoid collateral damage should be taken, although all plausible evacuations should be done preemptively to avoid unnecessary loss of life.

In space, the highest priority is the usage and protection of Macross Cannon-equipped ships such as the Battle-class, Medium Gun Destroyer, and the refitted Nupetiet-Vergnitzs-class. These weapons have traditionally served in an anti-fleet role, but the durability of Loptrathi and Corsair vessels recently returned them to "merely" being exceptionally powerful anti-ship weapons. Now, however, they can return to their original intended role, with beams being able to wipe out vast swathes of enemy forces by 'sweeping' the beam. The Platinum Horde will not be stopped by this, but it should be able to stem the tide. Other ships are to guard these heavy weapons with their lives, because if they drop off then we'll be defenseless against the Horde's onslaught.

Strike craft are to deploy with heavy combat loads as effectively pitched battle configurations. This can be as simple as Super Defender Destroids deploying with rotary cannons rather than autocannons, and as significant as Variable Fighters preferentially deploying with the heavy firepower and durability of Armored Packs where such are available. Fighting the Horde head-on will leave no room for maneuver, only a contest of our raw firepower versus their raw numbers-

If the fight against the warlords was an easy romp barely worthy of the name, the conflict with the Platinum Horde is the exact opposite.

To call the Platinum Horde tactics human wave may be technically correct, but fails to encompass the sheer scale of their assault. Enough warships to refight Space War I multiple times over are unleashed on each individual world, enough soldiers are landed to outnumber the population, nevermind the defenders, on a five to one margin. This is nothing like a conventional fight, nothing like organized battlefleets jockeying for advantages and edges. This is a swarm, a flood, a veritable avalanche of meat and metal that simply hurls forward until either all obstacles give way or some method is found to stem the flow of bodies and ships.

Against it is arrayed the fleets of the New United Nations Spacy, backed up by satellite defense grids and hastily assembled anti-orbital cannons. Engineers swarm over space stations as campaigns rage in front of them, desperately trying to get additional battlestations online in time.

The Macross Cannons do much of the work here. Designed as fleet-killers to begin with, every shot from them sweeps over the Platinum Horde, incinerating entire armadas of densely-packed warships, coordinated volleys carving whole sectors of space temporarily free of hostile assault. Spacy squadrons push into the cleared areas, Armored Pack-equipped VFs blasting apart waves of fast-movers that try to re-secure the regions, then slowly pulling back to trade the newly gained space for time as the next wave of heavies comes in, inflicting additional losses all the way. The battlefields begin to resemble some spaceborne equivalent of the First World War, one where every inch is only gained over mountains of blood. The losses the Platinum Horde suffers would have even most Vyranodasik commanders balking, but the Horde just doesn't seem to care.

The space battles are ugly, but manageable things, the combination of Macross Cannons carving open capital ship squadrons while micro-missile heavy VFs massacre the primitive screenships and starfighters. The ground is another matter, especially as the sheer pressure the Horde spacefleet continues to mount means that the standard NUN tactic of providing atmospheric support with warships is unavailable, aside from the more ground-focused vessels that are almost always deployed planetside. Here is where the Platinum Horde is at their most sickening and horrifying. From every assault craft or even spaceship wreck that makes planetfall, the Hordelings hurl out in every direction like a plague. Legions of infantrymen so thick as to literally carpet the ground, accompanied by equally bottomless throngs of battle tanks and walkers. As the frontline advances, artillery cannons are dragged out behind them, setting up in parks that stretch for kilometers on end, burying the enemy in shot and shell, with replacements being pulled in for every one lost to König Monster and missile artillery return fire.

Against them, the New United Nations' ground forces are nearly overwhelmed. Zentradi Marines are lethal combatants, especially when augmented by Destroids and Battle Pods, but never have they had to deal with the sheer number of swarming opponents. A hundred divisions worth of infantrymen die simply to provide cover that will allow the next hundred divisions to push forward another centimeter before they die as well. The bodies and wrecks stack so high in many places that the Marines could theoretically use them as cover. This is not done however, because it soon becomes clear that a common Horde tactic is to use these corpse piles to push onto the enemy to literally bury them in bodies, or at least allow the hordelings to get close enough to start clamoring onto the Zentradi (sometimes with jumppacks specifically to throw themselves at individual marines in battalion-sized quantities) and bringing them down with satchel charges.

What comes as a surprise though is the Tertak. The NUN military had been previously skeptical of the full Table of Equipment the Tertak brought to the ground wars, but it's becoming clear that it's now a boon. With their distinctive battlecry of "ULLAAAAAAAAAA!", powered armored cephalopods hurl themselves into melee combat, crushing multiple Hordelings at a time with their tentacles and integrated weapons. Many of the arboreal species have picked up a new tactic of their own, latching onto nearby Destroids and Zentradi and whipping around their bodies to fend off teams of boarders and gun down any nearby infantry with anti-armor weapons like a living point defense network.

Such tactics have allowed the NUN to hold the line temporarily, but the pressure is starting to wear on them. This is simply not the sort of war the NUN has ever been prepared to fight on the ground. Ironically enough, it is the newly integrated Tertak that are keeping it together the best as the conflict rages on, their combination of infantry, tanks, tripod walkers, and artillery batteries mixing in with a society that has cut its teeth in ground battles for generations worth of warlord conflicts. The skies also remain an area where the NUN can generally rely on holding, but missions against the Platinum Horde are interfered with by the absurdly excessive number of anti-air guns, which make up for their embarrassingly primitive construction with sheer amount of flak. The frontline is not collapsing, but it is clear to most that it is losing slowly.

Summary:
-Battles in Space are in the middle of a stalemate that seems to be favoring the NUNS, through use of Macross Cannons to temporarily clear the Platinum Horde from an area, reoccupy it in the aftermath of the volleys, then steadily trade the newly acquiring space for time until the cannons recharge. Use of the Fulbtzs-Berrentzs Class Motherships has allowed NUN fleets to quickly repair and resupply much faster than it would take them to pull back to a conventional yard, helping keep the lines stable. However, the pressure being put on them has rendered them largely unable to help the ground forces except in extreme circumstances.
-Ground battles are rougher due to the sheer overwhelming numbers of the Platinum Horde, particularly in terms of infantry and to a lesser extent artillery. Local Tertak defense forces have performed beyond most expectations, having been vital in preventing the Platinum Horde from gaining infantry supremacy. They are not falling apart, but they're also definitely not winning.
-Platinum Horde invaders continue to flood in, reinforcing the initial wave of attackers, which is slowly pushing the NUN back.
-Things are particularly rough in the northeast sector, where there is less built up infrastructure and no pre-existing veteran Tertak militias. Without something changing, it is possible that the NUN might be thrown out of the Subsector entirely by the end of the turn.
-Events below mean there is a slight gap where the sheer number of Platinum Horde reinforcements is less than usual, which would temporarily allow more freedom for redeployments.

Target: The Platinum Horde
Assets: 2x Magnitude 2 War Fleets, 2x Fulbtzs-Berrentz Constellations, Skull Squadron, TSU "Minmay".

-which is a fight we're guaranteed to lose. It has swiftly become obvious that the Platinum Horde possess a truly immense industrial base, including the ability to generate combat forces, personnel and all, in the field in large quantities. In other words, defeating them in a war of attrition is literally impossible. At the same time, counterattacking becomes difficult due to the sheer press of bodies on our own planets.

The force allocated to the defense in the section above is a very approximate match for the enemy's military forces, discounting the support of both their Constellations and the local fortifications. This is still not sufficient when the enemy has seemingly vast amount of reserves, which they'll likely deploy when their initial forces fail to find purchase. But it does present a potential opportunity.

This section's forces are to initially engage in local deep-strike counterattacks against isolated Platinum Horde factories and MPCVs, both deep-space and ground-based, with a mix of conventional military tactics focused around a high-speed insertion and heavy reaction warhead usage to clear a path and subsequent Minmay/Culture Attacks directly on the enemy staging ground enabled by usage of the VF-31 Siegfried Tactical Sound Fighter and its Cygnus plates, with Skull Squadron and Lynn Minmay taking point on the initial proof-of-concept attacks. Effectively, we're testing the effectiveness of these unconventional attacks on the Platinum Horde to see if they have a similar effect to them as they did to the Zentradi. In the event where they are effective, enemies resistant to becoming Cultured are a high priority for elimination across all battlefronts. In the event where they aren't, the Siegfried and similar Fold Wave-enhancing fighter units are to be phased back out of frontline operations due to their relative lack of direct combat capability.

Preliminary reports suggest that unlike the pre-Culture Zentradi, the Platinum Horde understands sexuality, so this aspect of the Attacks (e.g. images of kissing) are to be deemphasized in favor of a focus on pure romantic and other forms of love as well as the traditional focus on peace, understanding, and the fact that was is not the only possibility for a civilisation.

Either way, once the initial counterattacks have successfully tested and refined our anti-Horde raid tactics and hopefully lessened the pressure being placed on the front line, this force is to launcher deeper raids against the first echelon of Horde rear-line production facilities, either destroying them outright with heavy firepower or, if the Culture Attacks proved successful, subverting them. This relatively small force can't go too deep, lacking the necessary mass, but hopefully they can cut off the Horde's assault fleets from their reinforcements and logistics, insofar as such things are relevant to them, and allow our defensive units to defeat those troops in detail and then move up to the new front for a larger-scale counterattack, or in the unfortunately likely case that the enemy remains too numerous for this a continued defense that is no longer directly on top of our citizens.

Since this force will likely struggle to clear a path to the Horde's factories even with use of area of effect weapons if it has to fight through the entire armed force of the Horde, the focus will ideally be on small task forces penetrating deep behind enemy lines to strike at the Horde's infrastructure directly. Fighters with Fold Boosters, small carriers topping out at the likes of the Elysion-class, and a focus on exploiting our tactical stealth systems that normally just make our ships harder to hit but may be able to serve as actual cloaks (albeit not to the naked eye) against the Horde's seemingly extremely primitive sensor technology. The Mothership Constellations are thus mostly here to serve as mobile fortresses and resupply depots, letting our strike teams attack and if necessary retreat with relative impunity, rather than to act as direct combatants.

In the event that the Platinum Horde proves vulnerable to becoming Cultured, a tactical focus on saving them from themselves is to be put into action, but with caution. As individuals, they can choose whether or not to become good or continue to be evil, and as a shock tactic a Minmay Attack only ever works once. Thus, an operation relying on one has to be done correctly the first time. There will be no second chances.

While the main battle rages, it is clear to the New United Nations that fighting solely on the defense will simply result in them losing more slowly to the sheer numbers of the Platinum Horde. Therefore, a picked force of NUN battle fleets are sent deeper into Platinum Horde territory itself.

The Platinum Horde's territory seems to be every worst stereotype of industry combined. Every planet, every moon, every asteroid that the Horde can reach is in the process of being stripped bare by armadas of mining ships, industrial crawlers, factory-motherships, and in some cases that exemplify the callousness of the Horde, hurling out billions-strong armies of clones with pickaxes and jackhammers to strip-mine regions the old-fashioned way. In many places, they seed a strange, alien material known as "Xarinite" that self-replicates using available resources before presenting itself for easy harvest, leaving behind planets stripped of any life.

Into this the NUNS plunges in a series of lightning raids. Fold Booster-equipped fighters jump in and unleash reaction missiles into vulnerable mining bases, stealth ships raid supply armadas and shipyards, and overall two War Fleets worth of New United Nations Spacy makes as much of a nuisance as they possibly can.

Retaliation is swift and done in typical Horde fashion: massive fleets are assembled and hurled wherever the NUN is suspected of being. Against these forces the NUNS simply fades away, pulling back to their motherships and jumping elsewhere. Whenever the Horde locates one of these Motherships, a fierce battle ensues as they throw themselves at the planetoid-sized vessels in hopes that they can be destroyed before they escape.

It in during this that the effects of Culture Attacks are reviewed. An effect is certainly being had, but it is interfered with by one key factor: The Hordelings die too quickly. Hordelings that are exposed to Culture Attacks are often just included in the next wave to die against NUN guns, preventing any subversion from spreading through turning any potential dissidents into casualties.

Indeed, as the task forces spend more time in Horde space, they realize this is something created by design, as the history of the Platinum Horde begins to come to light. To the horror of many, it becomes clear that the Platinum Horde are... humans. As in, "are from Planet Earth" humans. However, endless generations of cloning and copies of copies of copies has led to near-total degeneration, with most of the results being so degenerated that they need extensive cybernetics just to survive. Divided into caste systems based on the level of degeneration (with some of the better "noble" gene-lines being relatively free of such and instead given biological genetic enhancements, while the lowest castes of slaves are in fact formed from living cancerous tumors), every caste is prevented from realizing how genuinely awful things are by the sheer shortness of their lifespans, with even the proud, genetically augmented and apparently psionic "nobility" having an average lifespan measured in weeks.

But existential angst over the depths humanity can apparently sink to will have to wait. For now, there is a war to win, and the nature of the Platinum Horde means a change in tactics is needed. If the problem is that the Hordelings die too quickly, they will just have to live longer. So, after asking for and receiving permission from high command, the NUNS task force commits to a new strategy: sandbagging.

Retreats are made early, without attempts to whittle down pursuing forces. Raids focus more and more on high-population areas, with broadcasting Siegfried fighters letting everyone in the system hear. Drives are redlined again and again to keep ahead of the increasingly infuriated Platinum Horde. The wear-and-tear on the ships is extensive, even though few ships are outright destroyed, the strain on men and machines means much of both fleets will be out of action until they can be repaired.

But it seems to be working. It's hard to tell through the sheer mass of the Horde, but from underground chatter and an increasing frequency of internal crackdowns noted by SIGINT, something is growing within the Platinum Horde. It just needs a bit more time before it overflows...

Results:
-The damage inflicted across the Platinum Horde's rear-echelons may seem insignificant compared to the sheer vastness of the Horde's scale, but it is notable. Many Platinum Horde units meant to be reinforcing the invasion are instead now chasing the NUN attackers in a game of cat-and-mouse across their own territory. NUN forces are deliberately sandbagging to keep Platinum Horde forces alive and therefore exposed to the Culture Attacks for longer.
-Knowledge about the Platinum Horde's origins, particularly the fact that they were human and originate from an alternate Earth, has been uncovered and disseminated to the NUN leadership, and is also slowly trickling its way through the rank and file. Knowledge is also gained about the caste system within the Horde.
-Something is happening within the Platinum Horde. Full effects will be revealed at the start of next turn.

Research Orders:
4 Slots (14 RP.)
-Ultimate Fighter Project (Heroes Revolutionary Breakthrough): Continued development of the VF-32 is unlikely to yield short-term results. While some would suggest that more immediately applicable research should be pursued, slowing the completion of the UFP could have severe long term consequences due to the raw capabilities it represents. The VF-31 Siegfried should prove able enough as a stopgap in the same role, although its lack of an FDRS is unfortunate. Tidbit: One notable feature the Galatine might have over its predecessors is the ability to penetrate FTL interdiction based on the YF-30's ability to penetrate dense Fold Faults, engineers believe. (3 Slots, 3 Slots already invested.)
-Miclone Battle Suits: Based off of military-model EX-Gears, these powered suits sacrifice the collapsible/transforming capabilities, the VF-pilot integration systems, and the flight system of standard EX-Gears in order to boast aim-assist functionality along with superior strength augmentation and additional armor plating. The heaviest of all EX-Gears and typically armed with appropriately weighty firepower, it's being developed in a hurry to outfit the suddenly woefully underequipped NUNS security troops in the face of the Platinum Horde. While mobility is likely not required in this role, as a kind of future-proofing the gliding wheels of the base EX-Gear are retained, allowing for high speed. (1 Slot).

Once more resources are poured into R&D, primarily focusing on the Ultimate Fighter Project once more. Another year, and a boost in funding, should see the project completed. (6/10 Slots completed.)

Of more immediate use is the Miclone Battle Suit project, a program which is responded to with a nigh-universal "Oh thank God!" from human infantrymen. Due to the haste with which it is rushed out into service, the new Battlesuits are somewhat unoptimized in their role as a true mass-prouced power armor suit, but the Platinum Horde does not leave time for perfection. What there is now is good enough, and the issues can be ironed out after the average human footsoldier isn't relegated to cannon fodder against the cloned hordes.

Industrial Orders:
Ex-Marchokai TP to Established + Heavily Defended (2*(10 + 10 - 4 - 3 = 26 RP.) As part of our deal with Marchokai, this territory must be developed industrially, and as the first line of defense against the Platinum Horde upgrading their defenses simply makes sense. It's unfortunate that these additional defenses must be field constructed, but better late than never. At least this will represent a moderate increase to our overall industrial capacity if we can survive the coming onslaught.

Gateway to Colonized + Heavily Defended (4 + 10 = 14 RP.) Conceding this flank to the Platinum Horde gives them additional territory and resources, opens up their path to our core territory, and complicates logistics. It must be defended, it is therefore helpful to manufacture defenses in it, and to maintain those defenses forward infrastructure must be constructed. Plus, we were meaning to colonize this area of space anyway. As for the Gateway itself, we do not at present have the time or resources to investigate and attempt to reactivate it.

Virgin Space to Colonized + Moderately Defended (4 + 3 = 7 RP.) Even further east than the Gateway, making our claim on this area of space felt and protecting it against light attacks would be worthwhile. Make it so.

Expedited Fleet Repair (8 RP). Enough money has been earmarked to bring the damaged fleets up to full strength early. However, what that money is actually going to be used for is replacing the inevitable heavy losses that will be suffered when facing the Platinum Horde.

78/78 RP spent.

Frantic efforts are made to build up the north both industrially and militarily, even as the war wages on right outside the city limits (or within them when things go wrong.) Planetside bunkers and anti orbital guns are assembled, with local communities familiar with "construction under fire" mobilizing their populations into labor divisions to assist. The most eastern Virgin Space is so far spare from this, making it a quite popular destination among the would-be colonists.

Other resources are held back, used to crash-repair damaged ships and launch additional recruitment drives to replace the fallen. Many Tertak, from Marchokai's territory, that of the former Warlords, and even amongst the various refugees sign up in droves, including a large number of already-experienced militias.

patrickmm1 · Aug 14, 2023

Spartakrod said:
6. Scout out local area
Prioritise South, East, North, and West in this priority
If exploration efforts are met with hostility, withdraw temporarily with whatever data is acquired and analyse, attempt communications via proxy placed in interstellar space given maximum standard counter-memetic, counter-antimemetic, counter-info/cognitohazad, and anti-tracing systems as is required under Omdyn law regarding hostile first contact, do not lower security even if hostility is reduced, contact is to be left strictly to machines under the command of the Subroutines of the Mind Spiders to eliminate chance of error.
If Hostility increases, prepare for LEGBREAKER class operations to eliminate spacefaring and military capability of hostiles until surrender can be forced.
If hostility is asophontic, upon preservation of sufficient samples to be kept in temporal stasis for study and eventual sophontisation; engage in protocol WILD HUNT to reduce asophont presence and eliminate where practical, as far as military resources allow.
Addendum, WILD HUNT and LEGBREAKER are to be put on hold due to lacking resources. Switch to JUSTIFIED PARANOIA conflict avoidance protocol.

Spartakrod said:
Exploration

We will be dispatching probe mechanoids and fully automated ships into the galactic east, southeast, southwest, northwest, northeast, and south to map out at the very least, the entirety of the sectors there to resolve our information deficit in these regions. Probe Mechanoids will generally seek to avoid conflict where possible and are to withdraw immediately upon any significant hostility using standard random jumps to elude possible pursuers before returning to safe territory. Von Nuemann protocols are permitted to ease the process of exploration, with the mechanoids being designed to replicate so that they can cover more space as quickly as possible, though superluminal scans and listening arrays will also be used to gather whatever information that is there to be had.

If diplomatic contact is established, the mechanoids are sapient enough to carry on discussions and will have continual contact with the greater Omdyn, and as such meetings can be had away from our territory until we can ascertain the intent and disposition of those we encounter. Upon any attempt at subverting the probes, including info or cognitohazards, with a certainty of over 99%, or any successful or likely to succeed efforts to capture the probes, the probes are to immediately self destruct. Any probe that has been contaminated with an agent likely to spread an infection into our territory is similarly to self-destruct immediately as per the "justified paranoia" protocol.

As we are unable to spare any resources for military or resource construction for the time being, simply passively perform a webcrawl and present a list of any available mercenaries to the council for consideration.

Northeast: here, all that can be found is devastation, be it in the forms of merely shattered planets and supernovae remnants, or in vastly, vastly more strange forms, some of which are actively hostile, and others… still expanding. Included in these stranger forms are 'death lines', miniscule corridors in space where the speed of light has been forcibly reduced enough for the areas to be both as dark as and as inescapable as a black hole, as many of your more unfortunate probes can attest to. Stretching for parsecs, these lines curve and twist around the entire zone, sometimes fading away only to suddenly reappear some light years away. Unfortunately, these lines are not always lines, as many, many more of your probes can attest to; as whenever matter intersects with one, it violently expands, engulfing entire planets, probe fleets, and sometimes stars in their black embrace. Unfortunately, the fate of those trapped within can only be assumed, as soon after ensuring its prey any given line starts to slowly shrink down again, as whatever is inside of it is often subsumed by its own gravitational pull exceeding the local speed of light; and with the collapse of the items trapped within, the line transforms back into being that much thinner, that much less obvious, that much more deadly. Elsewhere within this zone these lines cease to be lines, but instead appear to be spheres, isolating entire systems from the world in bubbles of time. Bubbles in which even Taychrons fail to return back, such is the speed of light there. Elsewhere, other strange anomalies are seen, as momentary corridors of vastly recurved spacetime open and close through space; albecurrie bubbles, sped up to the point where thousands of parsecs are traversed in mere seconds; their origins? seemingly dead systems(neutron stars, supernovae remnants, and lone planetoids drifting in the cold dark of the interstellar void) and areas that already seem to be doomed to their own gravitational pull; their destination? Yet more stars, once inhabited, now in the process of going supernovae.

Further exploration deeper into this zone only uncovers ever more anomalies, and the feeling of being watched, for as soon the probes themselves arrive en masse in the deeper reaches of this zone, they consistently go dark, either falling prey to the spacetime anomalies, being destroyed by the nearest planet, gas giant, or star exploding, or falling prey to other von neumann probes, silver gray in color and ovoid in form, striking at FTL speeds from the depths of the interstellar void before fading away into the cold dark. Here is a dark forest, and in their search for whatever calls this region home, your scouting probes have become the prey.

East: beyond its northernmost reaches, which are as devastated as almost any other region bordering the Dark Forest, here lies a region at war with itself, as robots, often disguised as other machines, are engaged in a civil war of seemingly long forgotten origins. The sides of this war have been many, and have gone through multiple name changes over the eons as their reasons for continuing to fight shift and change, but for now the combatants are called the Autobots and Decepticons, one on the side of "upholding truth and justice through the galaxy", the other wanting to fully conquer and rebuild their long since devastated home megastructure, acquiring enough 'energon' to restore its long dormant subsystems and bring back their home to the hights that it once was at, progressing technology, and destroying their enemies, not precisely in that order.
Before arriving here, their fight was mostly contained to Cybertron itself and the rest of their empire of old; but with their arrival in this new galaxy came new worlds, new systems, and new chances to turn the tide in their favor. Sadly, this has failed to alleviate the growing stalemate, for wherever one goes, the other soon follows, seeking to disrupt the plans of their hated enemy.

Southeast: beyond a bit of spillover from the civil war to their north, this area is fairly calm; although fairly calm does not mean safe, as can be attested to by the fates of many small civilizations that used to call this area home; for while in the distant past much of this region was relatively empty, ruled over by numerous small, local factions, each one seeking to carve out its own niche in the galactic rim, now it is dominated by the Kazmorak Regnum, and the Hogathrux that have claimed the southern reaches of this area, and the area south of that, as their own, ruling it with an iron will. Recently they have been expanding northwards, seeking to join in with the Supernova Pact(and its more local branch, the Neutronium Pact) in turning the Syndicated Councils of Trezmar into even more of an island in an ocean of hostiles than it already was.

The Kakmorak Regnum represents the second greatest base of the Co-DominationSphere in this entire galactic cluster, and as such, its vast armada of thralls are powerful and well equipped, and its ruler is a Hogathrux Elder whose length is more easily measured in parsecs than gigameters- taking them on directly without support would be a fools errand. Thankfully, their focus is not pointed northwards, and there are those within this region that still resist their expansion: most notably, an outpost of the Yashigani Empire, which was one of the very few survivors of the Yralgar's last purge of the Eklamarid galaxy; and the Sixth World, a cosmopolitan dystopia ruled over by Dragons, dragons who are most unpleased with the forced coercion of their subjects.

Yashigani Empire outpost: after losing contact with their parent empire some 30 or so years ago, these giant coconut decapod crustaceans(coconut crabs) went into full isolation mode, refusing to leave the area that they had only recently claimed while fortifying the region to an ever more ridiculous level. These five meter tall sentient coconut crabs still consider themselves the Yashigani Empire, although they have long since stopped expanding and have long since isolated themselves from the wider galaxy. They also enjoy building shells around their worlds, going well above and beyond what anyone would consider necessary out of a cultural-level fear of whatever seemingly destroyed their parent empire. This buildup has served them well in recent years, as the arrival of the Kakmorak Regnum would have otherwise long since doomed them to lives of servitude. But even this level of buildup was not enough to stop the Regnum's steady advance, for all the defenses in the universe if those controlling said defenses get controlled themselves. They have already lost half of their territory, and would have been been doomed to lose the rest if it wasn't for a recent streak of good luck, for they managed to somehow get in contact with their parent policy, and have since built a portal back to their homeland, through which additional reinforcements and resources are now flowing through.

The Sixth World: a still expanding and developing corporate dystopia, this realm has refused the advance of the Regnum through sheer stubbornness and magical prowess, as those from the very bottom of society to the very tops of their megacorporations have for once actually become united in purpose, for both the Dragons above and the Shadowrunners below wish to be free to do what they will. (Shadowrun in space, more information will require more scouting due to them being discovered relatively late in this action, what with them being on the other side of some hostiles)

South: here, spacetime is twisted into knots, with the path from point A to B going through Z, T, and Q; and then, mere weeks later, trying to go straight from T to Q suddenly involves traveling through point U. here, the space between each and every stellar system is a constantly shuffling jumbled mess no matter how far from the base three(plus basic linear time) you might go. Thankfully, it is only the spatial distances that are so shuffled and warped; and even these become relatively consistent near enough the gravitational influence of a sufficiently massive body(planets make their main orbits safe, and stars make their inner and middle systems safe), and when navigated for long enough patterns can be found, enough to make traveling through this region with even the slightest degree of accuracy possible at all. Unfortunately, or fortunately, this does not make the area very conductive to large scale civilization building, and the existence of several almost constantly shifting extragalactic portals makes ending up in the entirely wrong galaxy a distinct possibility when traveling through this region unprepared.

Fortunately, your von neuman probes are perfect for this role, and through their scouting they have found both several mostly consistent routes through this region, the three largest and most stable portals. Unfortunately, what lurks on the other side of these portals is not always conductive for healthy living, as can be observed when approaching the centermost of these three.

Nearing the gaping portal, spacetime is tinged with a riot of colors, of which the swirls of orangish purple and purplish orange predominate. These swirls of hostile gasses even show up in the higher and lower dimensions, holding sway even in realms where light itself should be an almost forgotten concept. Approaching even closer to the portal, ships become under attack by entities very much not native to this reality; entities that, if described more mundanely than really fit, could be described as ravens of change, toads of virulent life, beasts of excess, and horned monsters of rage. Whatever is on the other side of the portal, whatever might be causing this extra dimensional bleedthrough, is not of this reality, assuming that it ever was. Worlds that find themselves drifting too near become grotesque, living things, even as the light of the stars themselves becomes tainted and warped. On the outskirts of this region there are still worlds that are mostly as they were, worlds that have only been recently subsumed. Here it is not safe, here is a problem that must be dealt with before it expands further than it is. (that portal used to lead to an area with some Chaos Raiders in Eklamarid; now it leads into the Maw of Horror)

Avoiding that rift, the second portal leads to another galaxy, one very similar to this one. Soon after arrival, the local Extranet is picked up on, describing the galaxy that your probes have arrived in as Eklamarid, with this portal, and the much smaller region of twisted space around it, as being in its easternmost reaches, technically beyond the galactic rim but before the stars become rare enough for said galaxy to have been left in its entirety. Further scouting reveals a whole slew of other recent arrivals, rich in magic, culture and life, but poor in technology that is not simply magic pretending to act as such.

The first such culture that you run into here is a group of powerful almost-human humanoids, piloting winged boats and wielding insanely heavily enchanted melee weapons when they aren't simply flying through space unaided. They introduce themselves as Asgardians, and ask the probes to 'please not intrude further on our realms, for it might spook those not used to such things' while kindly asking for those behind the probes to "come here yourself, either to face us in battle, or join us for a feast, a drink, and some stories."

Farther afield, your next point of contact are some extremely mystical monkeys of all things, piloting chariots through space at FTL speeds when they aren't simply treating the intervening distance as if it were a mere step or two instead of astronomical units or even light years. These forces are but scouts, but once again they ask for 'whomever made these seeing eyes of metal, come see us in person so that we might be friends or foes'.
The third group of the three seems the least mundane, if such a thing could be said about such unusual factions, with ships hidden by prismatic barriers of hard light. But Upon meeting your probes, their small scouting ship suddenly disappears, only to reappear over a galaxy away, almost right next to the ones who caused the first probe of this particular wave to be built. From there, they quickly apologize, and send over a fairly nice scroll(that seems to be holding allot more paper than should ever fit in it) containing first contact package before flashing away again. After being scanned to prove that it is not hostile in nature(as one never really knows with mostly unknown magic) The first thing in that scroll is an a an apology, in script that seems to shift to match the native language of the reader, as they thought that you might be a servant of their great enemy, who also made the journey with them to this new reality, and offer both safe passage for your scouts(for they understand the importance of information), and an easy way to schedule a vastly more formal meeting between actual diplomats.

Upon going even further, traveling through the pace occupied by this 'League of Heroes', the probes eventually come upon a region of even more vastly warped space, populated by the impossibly eldritch entities that the League warned about in their first contact message, the ones that have been their hated foe for millions of years now, the denizens of the Far Realms. The denizens of the Strange Realm far beyond the edge of the Great Wheel of Creation.

(Bandar Log scouts from the west, Asgard and the Nine Realms to the south of this region, and the League of Heroes to the galactic east of where this portal emerges)

The third and final of these stable portals is only discovered towards the closing of this galactic year, and beyond its exit being in the far galactic east of Veronodasik, and its immediate surroundings being relatively empty, noting else can be discerned before the new galactic year begins.

Farther south, beyond the region of twisted space, lies the Syndicated Council of Trezmar, a policy much like your own, if lower in technology but vastly greater in number and current military prowess. While not fully a consensus based government, still maintaining councils of assorted labor forces as a means to "guide" the state, Tremzar remains a committed part of the Universintern and actually joined it somewhat earlier than the Union. Once a despotic monarchy, the Monarchy could not withstand the political pressures put upon it by its involvement in the universal war and the debacle of its attempted campaigns against the Ecumene which resulted in crushing defeat when the Ecumene committed a few ships and armies away from fighting peer enemies and curbstomped the Empire of Tremzar into the dirt. With the Emperor fleeing the galaxy to avoid the fallout, a provisional republic tried to keep it in the war only for the Ecumene to blow up the entire provisional government with a quark-inversion beam, turning the provisional government into anti-matter in the brief attoseconds before they did as anti-matter is wont to do and exploded. After a period of heavy confusion and disarray where the Arch-Ecumenical ships were strangling the empire, a second provisional government made out of terrified trade union officials signed a harsh peace deal. Though the Ecumene was defeated later and Tremzar retook its lost territory, Tremzar has never forgotten the terror the Ecumene inflicted on it, and are nervous about the Ecumene's rhetoric of taking their space so that the Ecumene may prosper. The dominant species of Tremzar are somewhat Dragonfly like creatures known as the Ilyuish, who are notably large and have thick strong carapaces, along with powerful wings that often scintilate a great many wondrous colours, Ilyuish are usually about as big as a very large bison. Tremzar has a number of disputes with the Union over which enemy to focus on, but when one is threatened, the other will always help. Currently under pressure from the Kazmorak Regnum to their east and the steadily rebuilding Lesser Eccumine not all that far to their south, they will make for great allies given time and diplomatic work.

North: Here lies the Serene Realm, which occupies its southern, southwestern, and western sections, and the Empire's currently intact colonies, which stretch over much of the southeastern section of this region. Beyond that, lies mostly devastated and ruined space; destroyed not by the inhabitants of the Dark Forest to their east, but by a whole assortment of forces originating from either the galactic rim or outright beyond it. While much of this devastation is clearly fairly old, its source long since either moved on or defeated, some of the devastation is much newer, as in one areas the still somewhat intact wrecks of those that caused the devastation- a robotic faction of relatively primitive but plentiful make, can be found orbiting over many wrecked, glassed, or outright broken, worlds. Inquiries about these reveal the fate of the robotic plague as well- defeated by the Serene Realm a few years ago, and pursued back to the portal that they emerged from, with their production facilities destroyed along the way. As for the goal of these robots? Acquire more matter to turn into paperclips.

Farther out, the remains of the most recent inclusion can be found, defeated not by the Serine Realm, but by the one other civilization that calls this region their home: the Imperial Trust, a faction of fairly advanced, if still relatively primitive by your own standards, humans who were transported here by the same inter-universal event that ripped open the portal that you used to arrive here. While mostly shockingly near baseline, if with decent power armor and shockingly good weaponry, amongst their number there are billions of veteran soldiers, each one wielding the same level of fate manipulation that was once considered limited to the Lost Scions of Cylosis. What sets these soldiers apart isn't some mythical power granted to them, or some legendary victory attributed to them, but simply their system of origin: the one system in this region that your probes were unable to enter even the outermost reaches of: the Deathworld of Avernus, and the entire solar system that it has recently spread its anomalous properties to. From this world, almost countless other species have technically joined the Imperial Trust, from Lizard people of frightening skill and magical prowess, to some surprisingly nice and social rat men, to termites whose mastery of technology has consistently rivaled your own for millions of years(as they repeatedly blow up and then rebuild their own civilization), to some of the most frightening warriors of all: penguins.

To their east lies the remnants of the most recent incursion: green skinned, fungoid entities of multiple varieties, from the Kroats, who were easily identified based on information from the Extranet, to Orks, who have received multiple entire forums dedicated to the study of their Kulture and Teknologie. These entities appear to have been recently blasted back to the relative stone age, their remaining populations on isolated, partially destroyed, worlds, surrounded by the wreckage of what was once their armadas and armies. Sadly, they appear to be using this wreckage to rapidly rebuild, and will likely be returning the stars in less than a galactic year; although there is a vast difference between that and actually being a threat.
Beyond these, beyond the devastation and the Imperial Trust, lies the full blown edge of the galaxy, where stars fade away into intergalactic void. Here though also lies a portal, from which Monsters and Eidolons regularilly emerge.

Northwest: here lies the very edge of the galaxy, but even on the edge, life and civilizations can find a way, as can the worst of eidolons. Most of this region is relatively peaceful, with medieval level humans and humanoids wielding magic in place of what otherwise would have likely been near-industrial level technology. These are the lands of swords and sorcery, of minor civilizations building their petty empires on some fairly hospitable planets, unaware of the wider universe, let alone what lurks elsewhere in this galaxy.

Other areas appear mostly deserted, with habitable worlds being few and far between even relative to the galactic norm. Here lies empty space, mostly just waiting for either terraforming or resource gathering operations; here lies hidden worlds, only detectable by their still present interstellar level gravitational influence, for their system level gravitational influence has been as thoroughly erased as the worlds themselves, here lurks what might be the destroyers of Cylostris, or what might just be some other party that wants to stay equally hidden with the technological might to actually stay mostly hidden from you.

Farther in, on the relative edge of the galaxy, lies a region entirely stripped of life, infested with life and energy eating 'thread' that are all too eager to devour everything short of the planets and stars themselves; with sometimes not even those being safe. Here lies a single world in the most infested area, seemingly almost entirely untouched by them despite the wholly converted world lurking within the same solar system. Thankfully, these threads are not sentient, and seem to be only attacking your probes when the randomness of gravity and solar wind cause the thread-like organisms to drift into their path.

Farther beyond, where the galaxy starts to thin out, lurks a much greater threat. Worlds infested with a corrupted green rock, studded with giant spires, surrounded by fleets that seemingly obliterate your probes within a moment of their discovery of said probes. Here lies a foe whose mastery of space and time is unsettling. Here lies a steadily growing outpost of what are later identified as the Skrin. Thankfully, their growth has been stymied, both by the rarity of stars, and thus worlds, in this region, and by the presence of foes who can actually successfully fight them to their south.

West: here lie the Allies, a somewhat lower a-chronic(with the time part being very much relevant) tech faction of humanity. Formed in the aftermath of their alternate version of World War two, and several instances of paradox causing time travel, this alliance of their world's Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and (the united States of) America, their technology and military has since gone in a drastically different way than what is ancient history to you. While the wars that led to the formation of this alliance are also in their not-so-recent past, the societal norms of its founding members and the technology developed during those early wars has come to define this nation. Capitalistic, neo-imperialist, and neoliberal, it is precisely a showcase of what a successful, equal civilization isn't. Democratic, diplomatic, open minded, scientifically progressive, and as egalitarian as a capitalist society can be, it is as close to being such a civilization as a society born out of the victory of the West in the Cold War that hasn't socially progressed all that far beyond the late 20th and early 21st century can be. Perfect allies for the Citadel, while very much imperfect ones for the Clan.
Technologically, they are for the most part not much to write home about, having for the most part not really progressed beyond what would be considered to the average for this galactic cluster(tier primus); but there are two areas in which they have progressed far beyond what would be considered average: size manipulation and time manipulation technology, with them having no true equals in the second category beyond maybe the Skrin to their north-west. Capable of stopping time for all hostiles on a large scale, moving individuals almost freely through spacetime(including back in time), and of 'time locking' their own troops for temporary practical-invulnerability; in this area they are technically beyond even you(if likely not beyond the progenitors). Recently they have finished building up their core territory, and are now sending colonization efforts to a region somewhat to their south and are supporting their neighbors, the Dawi, against the Skrin.

Speaking of neighbors, beyond the Allies lies the Karaz Ankor, home of the Dawi. the most stubborn, grudge filled entities that you have ever met that aren't fully bound by their role. Humanoid in nature and short in stature, they are master craftsmen and experts at welding 'runic magic', to the point where their own magic and technology has melded to the point where they are practically one and the same. Expert warriors, each and every bit of the weapons and armor is hand crafted to what would normally be considered nigh impossible standards(for the tools that their smiths seem to be using, anyways), as they seemingly disdain goods produced without the touch of an artisan. While this makes them unusual, what really sets them apart is their worlds, which, beyond being universally fortified to what would normally be considered a semi-impossible level, are all connected, as tunnels in their depths don't just tunnel through molten rock, but through spacetime itself, connecting their worlds into one insanely fortified whole. Their ships are almost the same, each one being a large, slow moving, fortress in space, and each one linked to each other and the worlds below through the same system of 'tunnels'. This has granted them the ability for sieging a single hold without also sieging the Dawi as a whole almost impossible, but also means that the overrunning of a single hold could leave the others all the weaker.

Fortunately, they also have a way to close these portals, be it temporarily or for good; and this ability has proved quite fortunate, for it limited the number of worlds that the Skrin could infest with their green rock before the real danger was caught and confronted. Now, all along it's northern edge, the Dawi are pushing themselves to their limits and beyond, as Dawi craftsmanship runs up against the reality warping power of the Skrin, and finds itself ever so slightly inferior. Now they are ever so slowly loosing holds and worlds to the green tide; and with each loss, another entry into their Great Book of Grudges is formed, and the Dawi? They never forgive, never forget, and are no longer fighting alone, for the Allies are living up to their name.

Southwest: here lies a relatively peaceful area, untouched by the ongoing conflicts to their north and the all too expansionist and destructive factions to their east. Here lies no one dominating faction, for no majorly expansionist power calls this region home. Here lies an area entirely populated by newcomers, most apparently from the same universe.

The first such civilization that you run into- the first, that is, the first of such that could be considered important on the galactic level, is a civilization of humans, having only barely left their home world. In fact, their first definitive first contact situation was actively after they arrived here. Their technology is primitive, limited to the same general mix of missiles, railguns, and nuclear weapons that were probably in use before they even left their homeworld of earth. Their FTL isn't much better, as despite using a form of subspace called 'slipspace', their FTL is painfully slow, necessitating the use of cryosleep for long distance travel. Despite all of this, they are no slouch economically, already having well over a thousand fully established colonies despite these limitations, with most of them having an appreciable level of industrialization. In addition, their terraforming capabilities were already no slouch, having turned many of these worlds from lifeless husks to breadbaskets in well under a century. Combine that with their still ongoing rapid population boom, and you have a faction that prove formidable in its own right, if only given the time and technology to thrive. Sadly, this peaceful advancement has been marred, and they have only recently gotten out of a decades long civil war, in which the United Earth Government proved successful in crushing- partially through implementing the reforms that the outer colonies originally wanted, and partially through the deployment of black-ops super soldiers, Spartains, armed with equipment far beyond the norm. (UNSC with some not precisely minor timeline anomalies, with only the recent most changes coming from their arrival here)

To their south lies another even larger, more technologically advanced civilization, or at least the remnants of one, for no sooner had this region of space been transported here, than this entire civilization been eradicated, it's fortress-moonlets shattered and its blue-purple fleets turned into so much scrap. On the worlds below the steadily dispersing debris fields, lies the remnants of such civilizations, stripped bare of technology and all memory that they had ever been spacefaring, with only the cold, drifting bodies overhead saying anything otherwise, for whatever technology was planetside was erased almost without a trace, with nature overtaking the rubble with supernatural speed. already, on several worlds new, tribal, future civilizations have formed, rebuilding in the rubble of their once mighty civilization.(something went and essentially killed off the Covenant the turn that they arrived here, and somehow(I know how) did an almost impossibly thorough job while sparing the species themselves) but even here, there are signs of something else at foot, as the Council report differs in several systems, systems that are now seemingly much clearer of debris than when their own expedition came through this region.

Farther to the galactic north-west, just south of the recent colonies of the Allies, lies a region filled with naught but dust and echoes, and a giant megastructure, A series of spiraling, circular platforms arranged around a central rod, larger than most stars. Perhaps it was once fully inhabitable, perhaps with a compatible atmosphere and life, but now all that lives there is an entity of a fungoid nature, having infested the whole thing with massive growths that stretch through the very vacuum of space. From deep within this infested megastructure, a signal can be heard, one whispering of secrets and technological wonders for the taking if one only comes onboard and travels into its depths. (Maethrillian, with a renewed flood infestation) all is not silent here, for a scouting expedition from the Council has disappeared while scouting one of the life baring worlds in this region.

Most of the rest of this area is almost empty, with only the occasional small, usually system bound, civilization, ranging from primitive natives, to civilizations ranging from as advanced as the UEG, to almost as advanced as the recently destroyed civilization discovered earlier, complete with the same technological base. Other systems merely have ruins, minor hints that an advanced civilization might have lived there once; the higher and lower dimensions aren't much better, strewn with scars and seemingly purposeless structures, one of which would have been a habitable dyson sphere if it wasn't for it being in an uninhabitable dimension. It is only when the probes reach the farthest reaches of this sector that anything else is discovered. And what is discovered is a doozy, as within the farthest reaches of this region of space lies a civilization that couldn't be called anything less than a peer to your own, in technological might if not in scale, anyways. Traveling through the galaxy at shocking speeds in ships seemingly made out of liquid silver, this 'Celestial Confederation' is the first civilization that you have met that could be called a true peer. Within moments of first contact, a massive information package is sent over; a package made not just of raw data, but of codified thought and self adapting teaching programs, meant to facilitate communication.

Perhaps not quite so surprisingly, this is yet another civilization made mostly of near humans; what is surprising though is the sheer number of other sapient species present in their fully terraformed(and it is very much terraformed, complete with many of the same species, alongside almost countless other vastly stranger ones) and heavily colonized core territory, and the even wider array of somewhat more mythical species living alongside them, ranging from unicorns and dragons, to Nudus and Storm Birds, to countless others that seemingly never made it into recorded mythology, or at least the bits of mythology that survived to the founding of the Federation.

Spacefaring and incredibly advanced, they wield a combination of extremely advanced technology and magic that seemingly puts even the Asgardians to shame in everything short of personal, melee, combat abilities; or at least, that is what can be inferred from the first contact package and what can be inferred from your probes, both in what they managed to see, and how swiftly communication ceased from each and every one of them soon after discovering one of their worlds or other claimed system; and how the vast, vast majority of those were delivered back to you, seemingly unharmed, alongside their own diplomatic team. Elsewhere, before being similarly neutralized and returned, they stumble upon silvery stars, former supergiant stars being steadily converted over into whatever that silvery, part liquid part metal, material is. Elsewhere, deeper in in other similarly uninhabitable systems, the stars themselves are practically gone, converted into spheres that are being slowly moved and reshaped into whatever the Federation of Celestia, as they call themselves, desires. (to be continued either in a mini turn or during next turn, depending on which one you would prefer)

View: https://imgur.com/a/UorjgMs

Spartakrod said:
3. Integrate Protectorates
4. Establish trade deals for resource boost and further entrench diplomatic relations.
5. Expand military capacity until general hegemony over local space is achieved.

Spartakrod said:
Integration Efforts

Use 8 RP towards a diplomatic plan to ensure the fastest possible integration of the former Empire, programs to induce this will include the offer of development, massive technological improvement, the abolition of slavery (particularly that of droids, whom we are entirely willing to arm if needed), as well as even the rich enjoying massive improvements in their living standards. For one thing, we can quite trivially cure old age itself, and even bring back the dead and can cure just about every disease and heal every injury. Simply put, we can give them lives free of most of the current problems that they face, and are willing to provide all this if they would but join the democratic process of the Omdyn.

We won't even ask them to provide military manpower for some time, especially as it would take time for them to get used to Uskarling or Omdynic warfare. We will protect them at our own expense and they will gain full right of participation in our democracy as well as everything we can offer to improve their lives. We will not merely rebuild what the empire destroyed, together we will build something far better in its place. One where people are not merely free of the tyranny of the jackboot and the autocrat, but free from the tyranny of hunger, disease, and to a significant degree; even death.

Millions cry out as the swell of support for joining the Clan grows ever larger. Senator after senator in the only just reformed imperial senate announce the intent of their home worlds to leave this still seemingly powerless body to join the Clans in a more advanced, more equal society, one that would actually deliver the improvements that the New Order promised. No longer would they be bound to an empire that pushed military strength over actual reform, no longer would they be left at the mercies of pirates and the Huts the moment when their world was no longer important to the oligarchs in the Core. no longer would they be sidelined by their more politically and militarily important neighbors, no longer would they be impoverished just because another world had a head start in producing the same products.

World after world after world signed on to join the Clan, be it out of want of genuine change, or merely greed and desire to have the life changing technologies that were promised to them for doing such. Either way, the outcome was practically the same, as over half of the former Empire worlds under the technical control of the Clan signed on to join them. Ranging from minor farm worlds and barely settled mining outposts, to a few ecumenopoli almost equal to Corascaunt itself, they would prove to be a great boon to the Clan in the years to come.

Sadly, not all stories end quite so well, including this one, as for each world fully joining the Clan, another is denied entry, be it by the oligarchs in power carefully cultivating their local news and spending large sums of money and political will to stay in power, or by the Hut Cartels and other criminal organizations seizing entire worlds in their grip, fearing the end of even their more legitimate businesses and thus whatever power they might have had. Other words are even less willing, as worlds ranging from the shipbuilding centers of Fondor and Kuat, to the literal banker-owned and run worlds of the Banker Clan, to the technically independent worlds of the Mandalor region and Hut space itself, deny even the slightest hint of access to the Clan's report to their citizens; and while the pirate and slaver held worlds can be simply liberated, the, at least seemingly, more legitimate holdouts will need a more gentle touch. (one of two small-squares technically fully acquired, along with 20 population; said region averages out to Industrialized, as many of the most productive worlds are currently being held by assorted holdout groups. Said holouts are mainly clustered in the 'core region', as it is there where the oligarchs held the most sway and where the worlds actively benefited from the system of old; holdouts in the galactic rim are more limited, with the big ones being assorted already semi-independent worlds with a drastically different cultural norm than the wider Empire. The Empire Colonies also join you in full, partially due to these new settlers already looking for a better life, and partially out of fear of whatever is to their east.)

Spartakrod said:
The spheres will receive a separate 8 RP plan for integration, in acknowledgement that our cultures are very different and that their feudal system has...rough patches to work out before they can join with us. We are willing to fast-track the recognition of each of the noble houses as tribes of clan Grendakal, fully equal to ourselves as part of a means to sweeten the deal, and that we will make even the paupers into princes and grant the princes everlasting life. And for the houses that are indebted to us from the war with the Empire earlier, we are also willing to...deal with the intransigent for them.

We will also include them in the plans for expansion into the western fringe, ensuring that their newly minted Tribes will receive their fair share in the growth into the concerning emptiness to the west. Furthermore, they will of course, have their languages protected and we will work to integrate their leaders and people into the system as equitably as possible, and if needed, we are also willing to solidify ties by having the worthies of the tribes who have brought great honour to the names of their tribes and families in this endeavour enter marriage agreements with the houses.

The actual integration here goes both better and worse than in the empire, as the promise of continued political power and acknowledgement of their culture persuades more than not, with the masses once again enticed by both by said acknowledgement of (and seemingly promised near-preservation of) their culture the potentially drastic improvement in their wealth and standard of living that would come with joining Clan Grendikal. The promise of new territory to expand into does not hurt either, as many of those with little to care about at home(be it due to destruction caused by the recent civil war or due to not having much to care about in the first place beyond their family and clan members themselves) move into the former Empire Colonies.

For others, it is the promise of the ability to move up in the ranks of this new society that they have joined. Already, many prominent Clan families are bombarded with courtship requests and even marriage proposals for their youngest, still unmarried, children, with several of them receiving requests for future arranged marriages between people that are still toddlers at the moment. While while many of these requests are easily honored in some manner, even if just by having the kids/teens in question meet to see if they would get along, not all of them are quite so easily solved, as even the Duodecimarchs are showered with surprisingly nicely written and somewhat honest marriage proposals. Of the duodecimarchs, it is Arne in particular who is showered with the majority of them, as his returned parents receive what for a little while seemed like multiple requests for arranged courtships and marriages per day. Most of these requests are from relatively minor houses, easily politely turned down when they aren't either rather honest power grabs or hero-worshiping love letters in all but name; unfortunately, not all of these are quite so easily ignored, as extremely high up members of the Terran Hegemony, Free Worlds League, Taurian Concordat, and Magistracy of Canopus have all offered up their daughters hand in marriage to him, and most, if not all, of them will need to be going home somewhat disappointed. Of these proposals, several of them have recognized Samus's role in Arne's life, and have offered what basically amount to mistress/2nd wife contracts in response. (integration goes well, but Arne is inundated with far too many marriage proposals, which you may resolve on or off screen as you desire. The other Duocecimarchs also receive proposals, although these seem to be much easier to turn down. Even Samus receives a few, with a couple of these basically refusing to even acknowledge her relationship with Arne.)

Despite these minor complications, integration goes well, and while further investment will be required to bring up the Sphere's industry to the Clan's standards, the influx of people, territory, and resources is not an unwelcome one. (Sphere territory in the process of being fully assimilated by Clan Grendikal. Gain one Industrialized territory point along with 30 population; an investment of 10 RP will be required to bring up the industry of said region to the Clan's standard, at which point said territory point will be at Heartlands level development.)

Spartakrod said:
Diplomacy

Target: Allies and Citadel
Resources: 8 RP, Mind Spider Council

We are of course, looking to open up a full trade agreement with theirs for mutual profit and benefit as well as an extensive program to help them technologically catch up. We will also expand our existing non-aggression pact into a guarantee of independence, or perhaps a mutual defence pact if they would so wish it. This will also open the door to intelligence-sharing arrangements so that we may keep each other informed of the going ons of this universe, and we will also seek to cooperate on shared strategic concerns, such as the Volreapers who clearly have it in for humanity and humanoids as a whole.

We hope to work together to destroy this ecumenical aligned enclave as soon as possible, and would greatly appreciate them sending whatever military forces they feel they can spare to ensure as swift and overwhelming a victory as possible. Given the monstrosity of the existence of an industry of genocide for hire and the issues of dealing with former Imperial Officials, we would like to cooperate on the formation of an international tribunal for crimes against sophoncy to ensure that such barbarous acts as genocide and ethnic cleansing are consigned to the history datalogs where they belong.

It is to be emphasised that all information points to this ecumenical polity being just the tip of the iceberg, and that much of the Citadel and all of the Allies are also on the chopping bloc. We have already achieved significant deeds together against the Empire, and we will play on any warm feelings from that to draw further sympathy. We will also seek to formalise a deal regarding the former empire, with a commission for the integration of their third of the former empire into Citadel Space that we will support, recognise and aid.

In exchange for their assistance against the Volreapers, we are also willing to invest some of our research capacity into projects of their choosing. We would also like any starchart data they may have.

At first, the council is reluctant, as assorted 'news sources' and blogs on their extranet have went and cast doubt into the nature of the false flag attack as an actual false flag attack- instead casting it as either an attack in truth or a double bluff; yet other, vastly wilder rumors proclaim that you are allied with the Skrin, or even the Neutronium pact, sowing rumor, disinformation, and doubt wherever it might be found. Naturally, none of the higher ups believe any of this, nor does a large section of the populace; but enough do believe in some part of this trite to force the Council to take their beliefs into consideration. Already, this false information campaign is being investigated, the relevant social media accounts shut down, and the live perpetrators are being hunted for; but while the investigation is ongoing, the rumors are still being spread bringing with them doubt and warryness. All together, it still puts a discordant note into what otherwise could have been a fairly successful alliance. As it is, you are able to set up a long series of trade deals, and are able to push through basically all of your secondary objectives that do not require quite so much interaction with the public. (trade integration level one acquired with the Citadel Council; higher levels of trade integration and a defensive alliance temporarily blocked by disinformation campaign) (yes, a low roll on an internal intrigue action against a hostile disinformation campaign interfered with the results of this part of the action.)

Fortunately, the agreements to share important information go through without a hitch, as they share the information on their own allies' ongoing war with the Skrin, and on information of the other policies that they have run into to their south, north, and west.(information folded into scouting information).
As for the fate of their region of the empire, they thank you for the formalized recognition of their control of their region of the Empire, and inform you of their intent to reform something similar to the republic of old in that region, if hopefully without the rampant corruption and graft that defined its final years. (relations are improved and steadily improving going forward; the disinformation campaign denied you the immediate benefits of this good PR move)

The final request, for assistance in the fight against the Neutronium Pact and the Voi Reapers, goes wonderfully, with the offer of aiding in their own technological development being enough to push them over the edge into acting now instead of later. While they are unable to dedicate all of their military might to this endeavor, for patrol routes must be maintained and the perpetrators of the events of the past two turns are out there, they are more than willing to send in their fleets against this mutual foe, for while there are no humans here, further investigation into what Vol means, and the rest beliefs of the Singularity Pact, is more than enough to stir them into military action. (you receive: a rather high magnitude 4 tier Secundus fleethorde(90% of a magnitude five force, born from nine magnitude two fleethordes) for your upcoming action; they receive: one research slot of yours per turn for the next three to five turns(depending on how much of their own research slots they invest into said semi-joint research project).)

Spartakrod said:
Target: Serene Realms
Resources: 4 RP

Now that the prior state of crisis is largely abated, we are primarily interested in exchanges of goods and resources, and would hope to establish long-lasting ties in this regard. Trade is of our highest value, but we are also looking for information regarding the rimward part of the galaxy and what may lay there. We are also willing to extend a guarantee of independence, and an offer of shared research agreements so that we may pool our expertise together towards common goals.

The Serene realms welcome the new friendly contact, and are maybe a bit too eager to integrate themselves into the clans, offering not just trade, but almost fully open borders and an extremely open immigration/emigration policy. They also freely share with you information on the policies to their north and their relatively recent conflicts against the steady stream of hostile agitants emerging from that direction(information is integrated into your scouting action). Sadly, their news on the policies to their east is out of date, made null by their recent annihilation, as whatever killed the policies to their east arrived during the same galactic year that you did.

As for the guarantee of independence, it received mixed reactions, as if they were just as much wanting to integrate themselves into a policy that they had only barely just met as wanting to preserve the independence that they already had. (Trade Economic integration raised to ⅖, with higher levels limited by the Clan's own weariness at the Serene Realms overflowing enthusiasm towards integration.) even more confusedly, despite the Serene realms seemingly overwhelming enthusiasm in joining with the Clan, they remain quiet on whatever their scientists are researching, and refuse any interference in that area. (joint research opportunity is denied)

Spartakrod said:
1. Mitigate Space Pirate Operations
Under honour obligations to progenitors, Scions of Cylosis are to be dispatched to deal with Space Pirate interference with detachment from Combat Group Lothbrok. As the Lost Scions are revenant type morphospectral the risk of permanent loss with them is minimal. Inheritors are to be kept away from their sources of trauma where possible to avoid loss to possible Ridley sighting.

Spartakrod said:
Anti-Space Pirates

Tribal Combat Group Lothbrok and the Lost Scions of Cylosis will engage with the pirates to drive off the space pirate raids through massive brute force. If it's something that can be dealt with by the twelve and their close companions, sending a tribal combat group should be sufficient overkill to quickly put paid to the whole endeavour. Under no circumstances are the twelve to engage with the space pirates for the sake of their mental health, particularly that of Samus who has the most personal trauma regarding them.

However, as she is not a citizen of the Omdyn or its member nations, and indeed, holds citizenship with the United Nations of Sol within the Galactic Federation, we do acknowledge that we do not strictly speaking have any authority over her and as a child it would be a significant breach of propriety to drag her into this.

Arne is similarly not to partake in this, Gyda and Erik's ghostly forms represent a substantial unknown quantity but it appears that they are incapable of suffering permanent harm and have essentially become morphic entities capable of long-term manifestation on the material plane, though they seem to weave in and out of material reality from time to time they always come back when called on or needed...for now. Given his mental state, the distress of seeing his parents, or at least what seem to be his parents, in harm's way may be too much for him.

If it is in fact Ridley, and he is operating with his old Inferno Pack; particularly the "Dragon's Claw" gag of his most elite subordinates; Marshal Weavel, AAE-13, Strategos Zenkin, Hunter Corvus, and Co-Enforcer Ivax, priority will be on repulsion, with a request to the Omdyn for additional special assets to protect supply lines on their end as we are currently stretched thin. Ridley however is easily bored and as a solitary creature only capable of academically appreciating the notion of society, he is likely to lose focus if he doesn't get his "fix" of predatory violence on perceived prey for long enough or for High Command to tug at his chains once again.

However, his capacity for regeneration, adaptation, and anomalous physical prowess means that dueling him is generally speaking out of the question. Gyda and Erik died fighting the golden Hydra on Cylosis who is regarded as an equivalent threat, and they do not seem to have improved enough from their baseline capabilities in life to make the likelihood of victory against Ridley or the Dragon's claw within acceptable margins.

While they do not truly answer to the Omdyn government and their background in deep special operations to encourage guerilla resistance have always distanced themselves somewhat from the government of the UOC; nevermind the greater Omdyn, they are to be reminded that their son is waiting for them to return home safe and sound before they get any ideas of a second martyrdom. Against the Space Pirates, the standard protocol of the UOC is to draw them into protracted engagements, Dismor's troops are extremely difficult to beat man for man due to its mastery of Transsophontic augmentation and lack of concern for the viability of its troops outside of combat; what with the average Trooper being roughly 150% taller than a baseline human and even the disposable "Zeilain"[1] mass-produced cannon fodder packing a punch.

Thus overwhelming force will be used instead. And hopefully the usage of force will allow for them to deal with this issue quickly and then return to the battlefront for the preemptive invasion of the Ecumene aligned state to achieve maximal concentration of force.

The expedition back through the portal starts with some very good news: Samus and the other duodecimarchs have been successfully dissuaded from traveling back to the other side to confront the Pirates themselves, avoiding the source of some of their trauma; in hindsight, it prevented Samus from having a major mental breakdown due to the fact that Ridley was in fact amongst the raiders, and did in fact stick around long enough to confront your forces before being recalled. The battle against him was devastating, or would have been, if the forces that he chose to pit himself against weren't the lost Scions of Cyclosis and their small semi-ghostly fleet(a small upgrade to said Legend if they didn't already have one), so even his attempt to get indirect revenge on the last living member of the Aran family through re-killing Arne's parents didn't stick even when he went far, far out of his way to get the job done.(you were trying to avoid a duel, Ridley was trying to get one; Ridley succeeded, but it didn't stick) Fortunately, Ridley's personal side of the attack was mostly limited to slaying those that were technically already dead, for he was recalled back to Dismir space not very long after that battle. (feel free to expand this out into a full scene if you so wish; Ridley is mostly alone, with a rather large force(by the standards of a mostly Legend vs Legend fight) of generic space pirates backing him up.)

As for the rest of the campaign against the Space Pirates, it goes as well as one can expect, as raiding party after raiding party being crushed by the localized deployment of overwhelming firepower. Eventually the remaining forces are either forcibly recalled(in the case of Ridley's battlegroup(not the Inferno Pack, just a somewhat more generic group that he hitched a ride on for the purposes of maybe getting in some carnage against targets of opportunity)), or being reduced to the point where they are forced to flee to avoid defeat in detail.

Sadly, this fight, while not overwhelmingly damaging to the Clan forces that were sent as reinforcements from your side of the portal, took a non-insignificant portion of time, causing Tribal Combat Group Lothbrok and the now slightly larger force that is the Lost Scions of Cyclosis to arrive late to the ongoing battle against the Vol Reapers and the Neutronium Pact.

Spartakrod said:
2. Protect against Volreaper offensive
Prevent Omdyn or allied civilian loss of life as far as is practical, particularly Tribesfolk below age of majority
Destroy Volreaper organisations, if in conflict with directive two, evaluate consequential loss of life before committing
Prevent Volreaper society civilian loss of life (Military Personnel are allowed to surrender but no special effort will be made) with exception of political and economic leaders, who are to be publicly terminated whenever capture is impossible. Captured leadership is to be remanded to rehabilitative care pending trial; egregious offenders will be liquidated.

Spartakrod said:
Military
Anti-Volreaper

Spartakrod said:
4 RP into preliminary scouting and information gathering efforts

4 RP into N-sub interdiction warfare

4 RP into campaign of sabotage

Spartakrod said:
All plans are consolidated into overall military plan described below.

Combat Group Skjoldr and Combat Group Vornhynir are to launch offensive operations on Ecumenical polity with the mass deployment of interdiction, the commencement of convoy raiding, and heavy usage of offensive mechanoid type combatants to establish an early presence on the ground while void combat is ongoing. Extreme long range attacks will be favoured, including usage of interstellar torpedoes, strike craft, and missiles fitted with n-space, tachyon, or alcubierre drives upon detection of enemy assets via superluminal scanner and initial n-sub, drone probe, and strike craft reconnaissance.

Initial bombardment is to prioritise systems of command and coordination as well as mobile production assets, followed by ships capable of long range combat or closing into long range combat. Once volley is launched, combat jump into extreme long infrasystem range will be initiated to follow up bombardment with shorter ranged munitions. Mobile assets are to commence running engagements to attack in fluidic formations that will use sub and supralight speed acceleration superiority to maintain distance, using inverted tractor beams when needed to push enemies farther away.

Close combat assets will close and then begin "scissor cut" pattern attacks of withdraw, close, withdraw before closing in a more permanent manner once enemy forces are sufficiently crippled to ensure annihilation. Communication attacks are to be frequent and thorough, while combat esoterics are to strike at the enemy's minds with memetic hazards to disrupt focus, coordination, and motivation. Mass Boarding will be effected in final stages of conflict, though commando strikes via cloaked insertion craft or rapid boarding torpedo will be effected at targets of priority and opportunity to mitigate enemy leadership structures.

Standard restrictions on perfidy will be ignored due to enemy's genocidal intent, commandos who seize control over enemy ships are authorised to redirect their weapons to fire on their own comrades and spread false information suggesting treachery from within, playing upon internal prejudices and fears where needed to dissolve the cohesion of the enemy force. Agents of shapeshifting capable species or Mechanoid types will also be used to infiltrate and spread paranoia and mistrust amidst enemy nation and exacerbating any existing rivalries and trust deficits.

Objective is complete governmental dissolution and collapse, assassinations of figures of political, military, and economic import is authorised while enemy information networks are to be suppressed by multiformat attack methods ranging from jamming to datavoric malware to network subversion. Duodecimarchs are to be asked if they are willing to partake in order to shut down the genocidal operation of this polity once and for all, with an emphasis on taking out high ranking and highly skilled Volreapers in tandem with special forces operations and engaging in acts of sabotage and technology theft (through their suits' ability to assimilate abilities and devices) to aid in the destruction of this polity.

The initial strike proceeds with such rudeness that the Vol Reapers, never really expecting their targets to go on the offensive frist, are caught entirely off guard, leading to the rapid annihilation of large swaths of their leaders and what seemed like way, way too many of their smaller command vessels; this causes the already disorganized and motley crew of glory seekers, pirates, murdur-hobos, apocalypse streamers, and actual military bands to be reduced to an even more disorganized mess. Things get even worse as almost every single courier ship in transit got intercepted and destroyed while in a region that they assumed was mostly safe from said FTL combat when they even knew that said FTL combat was a thing that could actually happen to them. This leaves most of the formal military groups amongst the ranks of the Vol Reapers to be left leaderless, falling apart into an unresponsive, even more disorganized mess even as the true opening blows of this war begin to land.

Things went bad to worse as countless Genocide Streamers had their streams hijacked by assorted forms of data eating malware, forcibly ending their streams and causing their streaming platforms to shut down, often for good. Denied the subscribers and add revenue that made going on such rampages a profitable endeavor, many of these murder hobos, as I hesitate to call them people, simply packed up and left on their personal vessels, looking for some other work to tide them over before they could find a new platform to stream on. Of these, large numbers of them failed to make it out alive, intercepted by the same FTL and interdiction based warfare that doomed many of their more organized semi-peers.

The Neutronium Pact itself fares little better, as while many of their leaders are relatively safe behind powerful planetary shields and/or nestled amongst the civilian population, this does not mean that they suffer no casualties, as their logistics network, already stretched to its limit by the arrival of so many Vol Reapers, snaps under the sudden assault. Many of their shipyards and void based automated mining centers fare little better, for they make for some fairly soft targets of opportunity for the initial extreme range bombardment. To enhance the confusion, many of their own more minor flagships, and the admirals, commanders, and rear-admirals on board suffer the same fate as their Vol Reaper counterparts.

And this isn't even the end of the opening hour of the war, as the rest of the opening FTL bombardment strikes home, leaving the forward most fleets in confusion, with the follow up, somewhat shorter ranged, alpha strikes leave them a crippled mess, to be mopped up over the following few minutes. Military fleet after military fleet, transport fleet after transport fleet, glorified raiding fleet after glorified raiding fleet, all meet the same end, annihilated with little recourse in an astonishingly small amount of time.

Sadly, quantity has a quality of its own, and even this overly successful grand scale alpha strike can only do so much. Almost inevitably, through the power of sheer weight of numbers, reinforced with the fact that the most important Vol Reaper fleets and flagships were sitting far from the front lines, actual battle lines are eventually formed, and the forces arrayed against you finally get to land some actual blows; mostly through a combination of guile and deception, but actual blows nevertheless.

It starts with some rather simple things: desperate forces, under attack, moving to hide behind planetary shields, or in some cases even landing their ships, assuming that their ships are built to fully land instead of merely survive the crash, dispersing themselves throughout the civilian populations, populations that the Clan are almost entirely unwilling to hurt. News of this spreads, and spurs on even more dastardly tactics, as yet others forcibly abduct civilians onto their ships, broadcasting messages showing off their use as hostages even as the ships themselves close in and start blasting away at the Clan's forces, forcing many of them to make decisions that will likely haunt them to the end of their days, as while teams of Supersoliders, often deployed alongside Ards and Skalds can often deal with these situations without the civilians coming to harm, and the appearance of even a single Duodecimarch is more than enough to end any such situation with both care and haste, deploying such elite forces onto enemy ships takes time- both for their deployment and for them to successfully resolve the situation, and the Duodecimarchs can only be in so many places at once. Thus many commanders are forced to make the ultimate choice: to either repeatedly swiftly and messily resolve the situation at the cost of civilian lives, or to watch as their own companions are steadily taken out by the mass of malicious shanghaiers. (shanghaier: a kidnapper who drugs men and takes them for compulsory service aboard a ship)

Elsewhere, where there is no convenient civilian populace to either hide in or forcibly weaponize, the tactics of the Vol Reapers become both more brutal and more desperate, as, devoid of any real way to take advantage of this weakness of the Clan, they resort to tactics that, while arguably rather wasteful in terms of lives and tonnage, do manage to turn the casualty ratios from absolutely ruinous, to merely costly in the extreme. The first and simplest of these, deployed by forces with no other real recourse, is to simply charge at the Clan's forces, making use of FTL to close the gap whenever their engines alone are not enough. The rush is devastating for their numbers, as many of their ships end up being used as shields for those following behind, but it nevertheless allows them to close into Clash range without being whittled down to the point of uselessness beforehand. There they manage to use their numbers and sheer tonnage to do what their tactics(or practical complete lack thereof) and technology could not. Nevertheless, the cost here is steep, as even the most chaotic realm of combat casualty ratios often reach at least 5-1 in the Clan's favor despite it all.

Elsewhere, the means to close the gap is much less costly, and the weaponry all the more devastating, as FTL systems meant to bypass entire fleets are used to instead close into shockingly close range of them, and weapons meant to devastate entire planets through their shields are used to comparatively ruinous effect, bypassing the shields of the Clan's ships just as they would have their planetary shields had that been an option. Weapons used to clear out bunkers and hideouts are used to ruinous effect against the internals of the Clan's ships by boarding parties, and terror weapons are made no less gruesome just because they were used against a military target. Sadly, those equipped with such technology are relatively few in number, and are just as discombobulated by the initial blows as their lesser compatriots; thus such weapons and tactics come to naught in the grander scale of things.

While these tactics are enough to slow down the progress of the Clan's forces, they are not enough to stop them; and when reinforcements from the citadel arrive, it would seem to be the final nail in their coffin, as the Citadel takes over dealing with the multitude of smaller, weaker, targets, leaving the forces of the Clan free to deal with the actual threats amongst the enemies ranks. Unfortunately, the forces of the Citadel are simply that much weaker than the Clan's pound for pound, and Vol Reapers are nothing if they are not opportunistic.

Thus the counterattack lands, not against your own forces, but against those of the Citadel Council, who have dedicated the vast majority of their forces to assisting you in this endevor. Vastly larger in numbers, but much smaller in tonnage(per ship) and much weaker in actual military might, they make for a way for the Vol Reapers to at least claim some sort of a victory. Thus a new board is set, as the Vol Reapers seak to re-invigorate their flagging forces through successful battles against the forces of the Citadel; and thus a great counter-offensive begins, as Vol Reaper forces make pushes for the greatest concentration of Citadel forces in this region of space.

Fortunately, said pushes make for prime targets for ambushes, as Vol Reaper forces brought beyond the reach what passes for defenses in this particular region of space, beyond the reach of their most technologically advanced, most organized, forces, make for prime targets for annihilation. unfortunately, it is only that fact that saves the forces of the Citadel Council from repeated decimation, for as fast as their ships are, they are not truly ready for the level of combat prevalent in this galactic cluster, for their Kinetic Barriers prove useless against the energy weapons so commonly used here, and even their spinal kinetic energy weapons are often found to be lacking in terms of combat effectiveness against the larger vessels that are oh-so-common in these battlezones. Thus the Citadel's forces are forced to adapt, as even their so-called Dreadnoughts resort to hit and run tactics, and as massed volleys of Disruptor torpedoes become preferred over directly using the spinal weaponry of all but their heaviest ships, and newer dreadnoughts, wielding experimental Thanix weaponry, are deployed in ever increasing numbers. Their Tactical FTL makes for a great boon in this regard, as the Citadel's forces are able to resort to hit and run tactics on a truly grand scale, slowly picking apart both the smaller ships and fleets of the Vol Reapers, and whatever softer targets have avoided annihilation thus far.

Due to this change in tactics on the part of the forces of the Citadel, and due to the continued actions of the Clan's own extremely long ranged, highly mobile, and extremely destructive, forces, the slow yet steady steady trickle of deserting Vol Reaper forces increases to a steady stream, and then a flood, as disparaged forces and leaderless mercenaries seek to flee the ongoing war before their turn for annihilation comes. Thus, the forces reducing you are further reduced, not by your own actions, but by their own cowardness.

Eventually all that remain are the most insane, the most devout, the best equipped, and those whose means of leaving has already been destroyed by the Clan and/or Citadel forces parked overhead. These forces would hold out for a time, as the combination of their reasonably advanced Leviathans, terror tactics, and the Clan's own unwillingness to kill civilians and devastate already habitable worlds does what sheer weight of numbers could not. Unfortunately for them, the Clan had yet more reinforcements on the way, as their final detachment arrives alongside the Lost Scions of Cylosis to finish the fight. And thus it is finished. Not without a price being payed, not without the remaining Vol Reapers reaping a bloody tole of their own, and not without many entire fleets breaking themselves against the most heavily defended worlds of the Neutronium Pact; and not without a joint operation between the Lost Scions and the Dueodecimarchs taking out the Neutronium Pact's single true planetoid, a tier three monstrosity the size of a small gas giant, built to shatter entire fleets at interstellar range through use of its Taychron based cannon. (feel free to write this part up yourself, as this is genuinely a familial joyride taking out the final hardpoint in the entire Neutronium pact long after the rest of the entire war has been already decided; all that actively having the heroes take this out changes is the final casualty figures, which were already even lower than expected due to the Vol Reapers failing several early-ish critical morale checks.)

Spartakrod said:
7. Investigate potential Cylosis attacker involvement
Sweep through potential internal espionage nests within the settlements to determine reason for information leak to the Confederation.
Priority is currently low due to intense resource crunch, upon alleviation plan SNIFF TEST will be drafted.

Unfortunately, no connection between the Cylosis attackers and the Confederation getting information about the portal can be found, as it was only after the raiding started that Ridley managed to find out about the Duodecimarchs being present on the other side of the portal, and it was only as the initial raiding first began that they discovered that this is in fact where this particular portal was. What they did find out about was a mass movement of both people and supplies to some singular location, and it is said people and supplies that they wanted to take. As for how the movements of the people and supplies were found out? Basic corporate espionage tactics can cover a lot of ground, as a movement of goods and people on this scale is not all that easy to hide, even when all of the policies involved span across multiple galaxies.

Spartakrod said:
8. Meet Omdynic strategic requests.
Submit request to All-Omdyn government for further resources as resistance to current operations exceeded initial projections.

Your request is heard, and as thanks for the assistance dealing with the pirate problem. you will be receiving [5 RP worth of] additional resources in the next expected shipment period, alongside the resources that were delayed due to said previously ongoing pirate activity.

Lord_Abaddon · Aug 14, 2023

Zerg Battle against The Golden Pirates and Fools for the Vespene Harvesters in the Kar'Ach Constellation

Invaders come to destroy The Swarm. The corrupted and insane pirates have found those fellow hosts of the Infesting Gold who would heed their distress call, as well as symbiote broods who take resources in exchange for their succor. They come with a force insufficient to overcome the weight of The Swarm awaiting them! However, their forces are hefty enough to push it back, if The Swarm were to be complacent. But The Swarm is never complacent.

The invaders seek to wrench from us our Infested Vespene Harvester Stations in the Kar'ach Constellation, a series of red dwarf stars with orbiting gas giants flush with high-quality vespene gas. If this is allowed the 'crusaders' will have gained a significant foothold in Zerg Space, requiring the reallocation of forces best used elsewhere. The Swarm cannot allow this. Fortunately at our disposal are the broods of our ingenious ruler Cerebrate Symbion and the fastidious Cerebrate Vesma, along with the minor broods in charge of the local defenses that have been hastily mutated.

The stations are constantly dredging up vespene from the planet, granting us an essentially infinite supply for the course of this battle. We must use this wisely.

To The Swarm's knowledge the impending 'crusade' is composed of five taxons, one of those taxons seems to have two speciations, though their similar technology makes their separate brood structures a moot point in terms of strategy.

The Pirate taxon is the largest, however they are also the least adapted to fight The Zerg, hence their enticement of symbionts to aid them. Despite their Gold-powered weaponry The Swarm will overwhelm them, however their symbionts could prove to provide an edge.

The next largest taxon are the two Terran 'mercenary' broods, The Blue Suns, and The Eclipse. Their defenses and weapons are unfamiliar, however the strategy they are likely to utilize is unlikely to do more than add bodies to the pile.

The next taxons are much more worrying. The Machine Empire and Smoke Jaguar broods are specialized in warmachines many times the size of an Ultralisk, and can generally disregard most frontline Zerg, simply flattening them in their tracks. If allowed to land on our stations they could break their way into the hives and cause massive damage, as well as allowing the infantry of their counterparts to follow in their wake.

The Machine Empire brood is the more advanced of the two, with massive walking goliaths of energy weaponry empowered by the Infesting Gold. It would be preferential if they are destroyed in space, if The Swarm is forced to choose which one to destroy before they make landfall.

The Smoke Jaguar brood is less advanced and threatening than the Machine Empire brood, having mostly kinetic and explosive weaponry, with few, if relatively devastating, energy weapons. Though we will have trouble dealing with their mechs if they land, it would be much less difficult compared to the Machine Empire.

Finally, the Jedi brood, a metaorganism of psychics infested with Gold, using it to enhance their abilities. From what The Swarm has determined through the Hypernet they use a force called… The Force… to enact a variety of esoteric effects that would have an outsized influence on the battlefield despite their few numbers and small size. Another force that it would best be served to destroy in space.

The Swarm will not fall to this cancerous, parasitic material and its hosts and their dupes shall drown in a tide of flesh and teeth and claws and acid. Their corpses shall either add to the swarm or be destroyed in a black hole. Their machines will be stripped and digested. They will be thwarted here and now!

For The Swarm!!!

Orders:
Queens will try to parasite opponents' mechanical units when they are damaged enough so The Swarm may turn them against the invaders.

Have Symbion adapt local spore colonies to shoot Psar spores, which should be able to burrow past the hull of a ship, then use their stored nutrients to grow throughout it and damage important systems, either through growing like mold over electronics, or through splitting apart important infrastructure and joints. Perhaps if there's enough biomass inside the ship it can start attacking other ships surrounding the wreck. It is likely that the Psar attacking Golden ships will be infested with Gold, but in this instance it is fine for the Psar to utilize it, as long as it doesn't seep into The Swarm's consciousness. It's all getting thrown into a black hole anyway. However, have the Psar launchers preferentially focus on the Machine Empire mechs, then the Smoke Jaguars, then others.

During the bombardment phase have the Leviathans focus on destroying point defense ships and the Machine Empire ships.

Use the massive quantities of vespene that are in the system to churn out Mutalisks from the local hive clusters. When their armies near the system it should be like a cloud in space, intermixed with pockets of scourge using their larger brethren as meatshields. Have the Mutalisks harry and blind the fleets with their mass, and the scourge dive in and destroy the Jedi and Machine Empire broods while they're still in space. Clog engines with corpses, blind sensors with bodies, and have devourers search and destroy the least maneuverable ships inside the Mutalisk cloud.

The Leviathans will be used as support for the Mutalisk cloud, spawning more as reinforcements and brawling with ships outside of the cloud, while Impalers shoot at the blinded ships caught inside the cloud.

The Jedi are psychic individuals. Use the overlord's psychic bandwidth and scream in their ear. If they try to block out The Swarm claw our way through their shields and scream louder. If this happens to affect other psychics in the invader's swarm it is a happy accident. If they are uninfested by the Gold then they may be captured and used as proof of our willingness to not destroy potential symbionts. If the Jedi do happen to land, send Hunter-Killer Hydralisks after them with plenty of chaff to distract and support.

Wherever the invaders land they should know no respite. As soon as they are spotted constant Artilerlisk fire will rain on their base, and an endless wave of Zerg flesh, teeth, claws, and acid will flood in. Use the local hive cluster's production of Zerglings, Hydralisks, and Roaches to maul their infantry, and mutate the Zerglings into Banelings as needed to destroy their defenses and mechanical units, backing up Ultralisks as they attempt to break through. Have a few Defilers interspersed to disrupt and debuff the enemy when useful. If they need to eat a few Zerglings it's no loss. Set up a Nydus network from the hives to the frontline, so that reinforcements are constant and timely.

Have lines of Guardians raining down direct fire from behind lines, focusing on high-value targets like the Jedi and vehicles. Ensure there are enough Mutalisks above the battlefield to maintain air superiority and protect the guardians from reprisal. Have Lurkers and Impalers(ground) sneak their way near the front lines and wreak havoc from below while the invaders are distracted by all the other incoming fire.

For the larger units, like the Machine Empire and Smoke Jaguar's war engines, focus direct Artilerlisk, Guardian, and Devourer fire on them until they cease to function. If possible also have Banelings melt their ankles.

Cosmolux: In the Noble Darkness of the Far Future, there is an indecent quantity of armed conflict

Marineford War, Part 2

Judeo-Spartacist Bolshevik-Kabbalist

Banished Turn 3​

Sith Empire Strategic Turn 3 Opening

Judeo-Spartacist Bolshevik-Kabbalist

Quetzal Turn 3​

Strategic Turn 3​

Tactical Turns - Invasion ​

Tidal Surge

Rust-Red Rampage

Perhaps, this is Hell

Judeo-Spartacist Bolshevik-Kabbalist

Clan Grendikal Turn 3 Start @Spartakrod

Imperial Findings:

Homefront Woes:

Volreapers:

Military

Anti-Volreaper

Anti-Space Pirates

Integration Efforts

Diplomacy

Exploration

Fleetcommune of the Krork Krork Turn 3:

Unbound Turn 3 Results

Home Affairs

Diplomacy

Leng

The Stellar Bulwark

Relics

Meeting the RDA

Warfare

For Science!

War Against the Night

Crystal Entity Poaching Prevention

The Flood Breaks

Judeo-Spartacist Bolshevik-Kabbalist

Fleetcommune of the Krork Krork Turn 3:

Judeo-Spartacist Bolshevik-Kabbalist

Tactical Turn: Rumble in the Ruins

We do deserve to exist.

Integration Efforts

Diplomacy

Anti-Space Pirates

Military

Anti-Volreaper

Banished Turn 3

Quetzal Turn 3

Strategic Turn 3

Tactical Turns - Invasion