NOVEL NEXT B2 Chapter 27
The three species of the Old Guard never changed religions after the Holy Joining. They were secular rationalists, adhering to an atheistic materialist ideology aimed at suppressing religious beliefs and superstitions.
They saw Hell as just a different dimension, a resource that could be understood and exploited, its Demon Lords as extremely formidable entities to one day surpass through relentless scientific and technological advancement.
Gateways to the Underworld could open through rituals, like his mother's seven-child sacrifice, which spawned a Minor to Moderate portal, rank one to three.
Reptiloid females reproduced through oviparity, laying egg clutches, or viviparity, live births.
Viviparity only occurred cross-species, with a shapeshifted Reptiloid female bearing offspring fully of the mated species.
Sacrificing Reptiloid clutches opened only lesser gateways, insufficient for the Devourer's goal.
She sought a Cataclysmic-rated event, rank nine of ten, ripping open at least thirty-six portals to spew powerful demons of the higher planes.
Her ritual required thirteen of her own infants, untainted, conceived in sacred matrimony with a man of true faith.
The Holy Empire's child tithe wasn't just Theosis' craving control. It was a barrier against such rituals, enforced with an iron fist.
Birthing thirteen children was feasible. Twenty-six was another story.
She hadn't sacrificed thirteen children yet. Her child-sacrifice count, whether four or twelve, mattered little, as the bombing wasn't about that.
All Seraphs, whether Saints, Hierarchs, or Paragons, were said to be similarly powerful, as the second and third Realms narrowed the gap.
A direct assault with Hidetada's merged-drone form, Thryna, and Harc would've resulted in the Reptiloid slipping away, as Devourers were notoriously hard to kill and always escaped. It'd likely result in Harc or Thryna killed too, as those monsters were far more powerful than Seraphs.
A rare chance to slay such a foe bound Hidetada to strike, his duty demanding it. The town of Rhiginia and its thousands, Rusak, and Angar, were mere costs.
Insignificant costs weighed against such victory.
It wasn't so different from Angar's father's math with the Shirdis eruption, unlike the warehouse innocents, whose slaughter would've yielded no meaningful triumph.
Angar wasn't sure if he'd be able to order the bomb as Hidetada did. He believed he would've fought the widow. In which case, he'd have died gloriously, and she'd have slipped away.
His gut twisted thinking of how many innocents died. He hated to admit it, but he wouldn't miss Rusak.
One of the remaining Exactors could've been saved, but maybe that would've tipped the widow off. He didn't have all the details and hadn't been the one calling the shots, so wouldn't condemn.
Theosis would. For the killing of so many innocents, it'd demand the Sacrament of Reconciliation.
Theosis could even demand a trial of purification. But forcing the crippled Saint, a man kept alive locked in a machine and fed liquid goop, to renounce all earthly comfort and pleasure through asceticism and abstemiousness seemed pointless.
Hidetada wasn't a monster, not for the bombing. He had honor and was about to save significantly more lives.
Devourers were Matriarchs without their own Reptiloid pack, working under another.
These weren't like the Holy Empire's thirty-four-member Crusader companies. These were traditional packs of at least three heavy-class ships brimming with warriors, swelling as the Matriarch's influence grew, sometimes vastly.
Reptiloid vengeance, especially among the Old Guard, was a core tenet of the species, unrelenting and fierce. Whether the Devourer escaped or died, the pack she belonged to would come for Hidetada.
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Staying on Ierne would damn the planet. The pack would tear through Eblana, its sole city, slaughtering the vast bulk of its population.
That's why they were leaving, to draw the pack away into the void. There'd be a naval battle, one they had no chance of winning, despite Hidetada's optimism.
Less than three weeks ago, the Zephuros, a medium-class Excalibur-type ship carrying a single fighter, barely, just barely, overcame a single heavy-class juggernaut in a grueling clash.
Now, it'd face a far deadlier threat, truly impossible odds.
At best, if they were lucky, they'd face just three Old Guard heavy-class battlecruisers, each bristling with a full wing or more of fighters, all elements synchronized by hivemind, fighting as one, controlled by a powerful Neuronaut.
He had no doubt the Zephuros was doomed.
If they were flying to Eblana or the Zephuros in orbit, he had hours to kill. He sat up and began practicing exercises meant to awaken precognitive psychic powers.
The cargo shuttle clanged down in the Zephuros' large fighter bay, the hull groaning under the weight of settling.
As the hatch slowly hissed open, the clamor of shouted orders, grinding machinery, and the relentless stomp of armored boots on metal grates hit Angar.
He scrambled out, looking around at the chaotic sprawl of the bay. There were a dozen new fighters with rusted hulls lining the deck. Crews swarmed with fervent purpose, hauling munitions and barking commands under the bay's harsh lights.
It appeared Hidetada had conscripted the old Viscount's forces into his service.
Angar didn't know who'd been elevated to Viscount or Viscountess, but they would be compliant, wary of suffering their predecessor's grim fate.
Harc, in his matte-black, custom, light power armor, yelled orders. A compact turret jutted from his suit's right shoulder, a short-range-missile array adorned his left, and four spindly mechanical arms sprouted from his back, articulated at two joints, curling outward like skeletal wings poised to strike.
The longshoreman pilot in grease-stained coveralls clambered out of the cargo shuttle. Spotting Harc, he straightened. "Can I take the shuttle back to Eblana now, Lord?"
Harc's helm swiveled toward him. "I'm no Lord. And no."
The man's face twisted with frustration. "They'll think I stole it! I haven't seen my family in a week. They don't even know where I am. I just work the docks. Please, let me go home."
Harc's gauntlet snapped to his sidearm, leveling it at the man's face. "The Holy Empire demands your service, Layman. Serve with zeal, not questions. Or are you a Heretic? Get to the cargo bay. Stay out of the way until called."
The longshoreman's shoulders slumped as his eyes dropped to the pitted deck. Without a word, he staggered off, swallowed by the bay's relentless clamor.
Harc pivoted to Angar. "You're going to the Gulson. It's equipped with sling-rails."
Angar's brows knitted in confusion, his mind churning to figure out why.
Another vessel fighting alongside the Zephuros was welcomed news. It having massive tracks running a ship's hull, hurling fighters into the void at breakneck speeds, called sling-rails, marked the Gulson as at least heavy-class, which was even better news.
But why was he being sent there?
And why did it having sling-rails matter? He couldn't fly a fighter. He'd never even been in one. He'd never even flown a shuttle. Or anything at all.
Harc barked at a figure sprinting past. "You! Pilot this Knight to the Gulson in this cargo shuttle, then return here!" The man froze mid-stride, snapping to attention with a fist thumping his chest.
"Yes, Paragon!" he shouted in a crisp voice sharp with obedience.
Other Cloisteranage graduates had trained in basic piloting. His brief time at Saint Krakus had included no such lessons. "You know I can't fly, right?" he asked Harc.
"By the blessed Mother!" Harc hissed out. "Don't you start with a thousand questions too. If you dislike the orders, take it to your chapter's grand marshal, and leave me be."
Angar swallowed a sigh and clambered back into the shuttle's hold. If they were all doomed, he'd rather die flying a fighter poorly than trapped inside the Zephuros doing nothing.
During the flight to the Zephuros, he'd been focused on coaxing his psychic potential, ignoring the tiny viewport slit.
Now, wanting to glimpse the Gulson, he pressed his helm against the slit on the rear hatch, his only chance to see it before the shuttle began its approach.
As the shuttle's engines roared to life and it lurched from the bay, Angar peered out, twisting his helm around, taking in all he could.
Instead of a single ship, a sprawling fleet of over two dozen vessels surrounded the Zephuros.
Only three were heavy-class. There were two lumbering bulk freighters, and a battlecruiser with sling-rails, unmistakably the Gulson. But its frame seemed like a jury-rigged mockery of warship, half-crippled by cargo conversions.
Among the medium-class ships were a pair of destroyers, and three shipping frigates, called shippers.
Another medium-class vessel, a repurposed shipper, stood out as a transport for Ordo Sanctus Puritas troops. The bigger sects all had one or two of these at every monastery or convent. Angar would wager it was packed with warriors of the Sanguineous Sisterhood.
The light-class ships numbered five gunboats alongside a mix of a dozen or so merchant cutters and bulk haulers.
Hidetada hadn't merely conscripted the Viscount's forces.
He'd swept up every ship on Ierne, regardless of its fitness for battle.
The sect's transport ship lacked any armament, and the merchant and shipping vessels were barely equipped, if at all.
For ships suited to naval warfare, only the five gunboats, two destroyers, the Zephuros, and the Gulson stood a chance, and he doubted the Gulson's combat readiness, with its half-repurposed hull.
Against an Old Guard pack, even if luck spared them to face only three heavy-class ships, their odds of survival with this ad-hoc fleet went from zero to still zero.