NOVEL NEXT B2 Chapter 30
Angar tried phasing through the ship, but it didn't work, probably being too thick.
Crusader Armor was meant to be space-worthy, built with zero-g fighting in mind. He activated the magnetic function with a thought, anchoring himself to the hull, both his tripod-foot and boot sticking to the strange surface.
He went to remove his maul from his back but decided to leave it there for now.
Each step silently thudded against the ship's profane flesh as he scanned the hull, as far down its mottled surface of jade scales and obsidian steel, writhing with blue-veined conduits, he could see.
He had to hurry. Old Guard ships had anti-personnel detectors and weaponry to specifically prevent Crusaders from doing what he was now doing.
There were no bays or entryways in sight. Explosives weren't an option.
No charge he could carry would scratch this abomination's hull. The alloys and energy shielding were forged to defy meteors at speeds where dust would shred his own armor like parchment, able to stand against massive railgun slugs, gigantic plasma beams, and everything else.
There must be multiple hull entrances for ships of this class, he thought.
He had two choices – wait around, hoping he spotted the flash of a port releasing drones, or get moving and find an alternative entrance.
Angar picked a direction and headed out. Crawling hand over hand, staying low to maybe help avoid the detectors, his magnetic boot and cybernetic limb dragging as he moved, pulling himself across the hull.
A missile streaked past. Shrapnel and plasma flares painted the blackness around him, the battle's carnage still a relentless storm. The hull shook with a great tremble as the battleship took a hit.
He continuously scanned the hull's expanse. He spotted something, making his way to it as fast as possible.
A maintenance hatch, he'd wager, designed to keep out fools like him. It was a circular maw, three meters wide, an oily membrane of bio-metal for a surface. Tendrils of crystal-like tissue snaked around its edges, kind of like they were probing for something.
He tried opening it, but it was sealed tight. He'd probably be able to phase through it, but he spotted something. Maybe a locking mechanism.
Angar activated his Hacking Module S2 Prime, the semi-AI coming to life, as well as the tools within his gauntlets.
From his wrists, a swarm of writhing tendrils erupted. He hadn't seen these yet. They looked to be metallic filaments tipped with various parts of the toolkit. A few had different barbs and probes, one had a plasma torch, and the last a vibrating claw.
The tendrils lashed at the mechanism, digging into its fleshy substance, burrowing into the bio-metal. A minute later, the hatch convulsed as its membrane split soundlessly.
Their work done, the tendrils coiled back into his gauntlets as he grabbed onto a ladder, crawling into the hatch.
Inside, the ladder ended a few meters down, his path blocked by another hatch. He hit a glowing blue button on the wall. The membranes above him reformed and Reptiloid-normal gravity and atmosphere filled the chamber.
As he could be in combat as soon as he opened the bottom hatch, he reviewed what he knew about Old Guard Reptiloids.
Terrans' strength lay in sheer numbers, fueled by Genitoriums and the Cloisteranage system, allowing swift reproduction and upbringing without societal collapse, raising children in a way that would make the other species' societies crumble.
Mass producing children without families in an uncaring way might not seem comparable to the Grays' psychic might, the Pleiadeans' naturally long lifespan and ability to pass wisdom through Bio-Sinusoid, or the Reptiloids' shapeshifting prowess, but it had saved the Holy Empire innumerable times.
About 80% of imperial citizens were Terran, dwarfing the Reptiloids' roughly 9%, the Pleiadeans' 7%, and the Grays' 4%.
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This numerical advantage kept the Holy Empire in the game, as the infernal abyss was relentless, and the Old Guard, unlike Theosis, had no constraints.
Reptiloids organized their society into packs with a rigid caste system, each pack ranging in size from small enclaves to colossal armies.
The Ruler caste was the only one to produce females, but that wasn't exactly true, as the winged Alate caste also had females, though they turned into Rulers upon founding a new pack.
All females, except Alates, were called Matriarchs, even if not yet leading a pack, like the one on Ierne, and commanded absolute loyalty.
Male Rulers, the vast majority of the caste, supported their Matriarch, performing intellectual and leadership roles such as scientists, technicians, and captains.
The sterile and ferocious Soldier caste made up the backbone of their fighting force. Or their living fighting force, as the Old Guard employed vast armies of war-machines.
The dimwitted Worker caste, unable to perform complex tasks or shapeshift, faced heavy culling. Survivors were often dosed with cheap apotheoserum, becoming hulking, bloodthirsty maniacs, controllable only through Neural Dominion.
He expected to face a lot of war-machines and Soldier-caste Reptiloids.
This wouldn't be easy.
He hit a new button that began glowing blue, and the hatch under him split open, this time with a wet, slurping noise.
He descended into a hot and moist room filled with strange machinery, all of it made of living flesh, each studded with glowing conduits and diodes.
The room reeked of strange scents, similar but much stronger and sharper than those of the Reptiloid ship he'd been on before, that of the Fellowship of the Blood Red Claw Knightly Chapter.
He had no idea if the machinery in this room was important, but he doubted it. There'd be guards, at least a squad of war-machines, if it was. He removed the power hammer from his back, gripping its haft tightly.
As he hadn't even fired his fighter's weapons, and wanted to destroy something, though he had only four explosives on him, he threw one near the machinery as he exited the room.
Debris blew out of the door as he made his way down the hall. He had no idea where he was going, so any direction was as good as another.
He sent out an imperial all-channel comms request, and received no pings or invites.
As his boot and tripod-foot clanked against the almost writhing floor, moving deeper into the enemy ship, a violent tremor shook the corridor, slamming him against a wall.
Fear gripped his chest as his mind flashed to the ship's destruction, and his body torn apart in a maelstrom of bio-metal and plasma, dying so ingloriously.
He clamped down on the panic, forcing his gut to steady.
Anyway, he knew ships in space didn't explode or implode like in an atmosphere. If the hull breached, the air rapidly depressurized, hurling debris and battering him against surfaces, sucking him out.
His Crusader Armor was a fortress of reinforced alloy and sealed systems. It could withstand debris battering it, depending on various factors.
If he was flung into the void, he'd drift among the battle's carnage, dodging enemy fire until his Energy Points drained.
But a catastrophic failure, some system or the drive core erupting in a plasmatic or bioelectric storm could fry or destroy his armor.
He tightened his grip, continuing on, pressing deeper and deeper into the Old Guard battleship, its humid corridors almost writhing, finding nothing of note, and no enemies.
Then his HUD flashed a warning, registering life signatures a heartbeat before the distant clang of combat reached his ears.
He broke into a sprint, gripping his power hammer tightly, navigating a maze of intersections that blocked him from battle. He went left, then right, then right again, the writhing jade-and-obsidian walls blurring past.
Rounding a corner, a towering soldier stood far down the corridor, clad in the green-and-yellow armor of Ierne's noble forces, the correct heraldry blazoned on his chest. "The battle's this way, Sir Knight!" he bellowed in a voice filled with urgency. "We're being decimated. Come, quick!"
Angar's eyes narrowed. The soldier was massive, rivaling a Crusader's bulk, far too large for a Layman.
Soldier-caste Reptiloids could shapeshift, but their mass was nearly fixed, unlike the far more powerful Ruler caste.
He was clearly being set up for an ambush, as obvious as a Hellspawn's stench.
Still, Angar hadn't glimpsed anything resembling a Synapse-Engine on his run through the ship.
A fight, even an ambush, was better than wandering this unholy labyrinth designed by a filthy, Heretical Reptiloid mind, while the battleship shuddered under distant hits.
"On my way!" Angar shouted, charging forward, his tripod-foot and boot thudding against the profane deck.
The shapeshifter called, "Hurry!" before ducking around the corner.
As Angar neared the turn, he activated Lightning Strike. Rounding the corner, a barrage of bio-plasma and flechettes tore through the space he'd just vacated, sizzling harmlessly against the corridor's walls.
He reappeared in a crackling flash of Ground Current deep within the enemy's ranks.
Lightning erupted downwards, striking all the nearby enemies, forking wildly, arcing between war-machines and the handful of Soldier-caste Reptiloids surrounding him.
The electric storm scorched their biomechanical hides, leaving sparks dancing across glowing conduits, but none fell.
That was fine.
He grinned beneath his helm, as many soon would.
A Lunger lunged forward, a nightmare of throbbing bio-metal, the monomolecular claws blazing with plasma.
Angar infused Energy into his power hammer and spun into Tempest. The Lunger's strikes clanged against his Crusader Armor, enhanced with 90% damage mitigation, and the blow skittered off in a shower of sparks, doing no real damage.
But the graviton-enhanced hit of his maul sent that Lunger shrieking through the air, battering into its unholy brethren, slamming against the wall.
Spinning, Angar hurled himself into the fray, a tempest of steel and Holy wrath, getting to work.