Warhammer 40k: Shattered Steel Soul

If Perturabo thought an hour ago that there were not many things in the world that could truly surprise him, he had now encountered one.

"Take a look for me, Morse." The Lord of Iron frowned, glaring at the piece of scrap metal floating in the air of the detection platform with a ghostly expression as if he had bumped into the Emperor in the corridor in the middle of the night, "Why can it resist gravity?"

Morse came over and looked at the broken iron sheet.

It looked like a part removed from some poster shelf, with half of the fancy paint sprinkled on it and brown rust corrosion caused by years of neglect.

There are no anti-gravity-related components installed on the surface of the iron sheet, nor are there any imprints of witchcraft or psychic energy. There is only a brown-red picture that looks like an arrow or a big tooth, but it just floats around like this. , just like the gravity stabilizing device on the Phalanx has long since failed, and this thing is flying freely in the universe.

Morse raised his eyebrows slightly and reached out to Ironhide. There seems to be a vague spiritual connection on this piece of iron sheet, which leads directly to a huge and mysterious consciousness hidden behind the scenes... Wait, one, or two?

Before he actually came into contact with the iron sheet and dismantled the weird force field connected to it, the iron sheet seemed to have suddenly lost its vitality and fell back to the table with no tendency to resume floating.

"How did you do it?" Dawn asked. Are there any hidden mechanical components on it? "

Although he is not as proficient in steel creation as Perturabo, this does not mean that Dorn knows nothing about it. After all, the maintenance of the Phalanx was mainly completed by Inwit's mortal engineers, and Perturabo only accelerated this process. But this strange creation that violated convention was completely beyond the scope of his common sense.

"Hmm..." Morse retracted his hand, and the curse rune flashed, burning the tip of his finger for a round of insurance. "It's a pity, I haven't seen anything like this before."

"Really?" asked Perturabo.

"Just because I have lived a long time does not mean that I am a galactic encyclopedia." Morse replied, "But we can assume that the attackers either have very high psychic attainments, or the technological level has far exceeded the level of the empire, otherwise we Can't explain it all."

"If so, this will not be an easy battle." Dorn said. He was not afraid, and was simply thinking about how to win his first battle since returning to the empire.

In his mind, some vague portraits of the enemy were taking shape - a vicious and mysterious psychic group, surrounded by cold and strange lightning, relying on rash first-round shots to cloud their judgment; or a mechanized high-tech group, It walks on cold iron tentacles, and can command the ship's macro cannon to fire a volley by raising its hand.

"Just be prepared. Wingdings: ♦︎♦︎⬧︎♦︎◆︎⌧︎♦︎♦︎□︎❍︎" Morse said, "Let go of your hands and feet first. If there is a problem that you can't handle, then call me - although I think The probability of encountering such a serious situation is about the same as the probability of us finding out what force this piece of scrap iron relies on to levitate."

Dorn's eyes rested on Morse.

"You'd better not say any more disappointing things like, 'Your work is free.'" Perturabo paused, "Rogal Dorn."

"I won't say these words again," Dorn replied seriously, "I'm just thinking about the upper limit of the fleet size that Morse can fight against."

"Oh, Primarchs." Morse spread his hands and threw a bolt of lightning to effectively disinfect the scrap iron sheets on the table. "What I mean by asking you to call me is that I will report to the Emperor and let him Send a fleet to rescue. My diligence is not enough to support me in fighting personally."

"I'll keep that in mind," Dorn said.

Perturabo sighed: "Ask your soldiers to send the remaining parts here, and I will see if I can find more clues from other relatively complete parts."

"This piece is the largest fragment salvaged by the Mortal Auxiliary Army."

"Then send all the remaining parts and give me enough scratch paper. I need to make statistics and calculations in all aspects."

Perturabo rubbed his fingers together. Such a confusing creation successfully aroused his long-lost anger and competitiveness, and he allowed himself to indulge his emotions in a place where the life of a soldier was irrelevant.

Dorn pressed the data pad to find his subordinate. Aeolus arrived in the analysis room earlier than he expected, and Donne immediately understood that this was because Aeolus had something to report to him.

The former Imperial Fist commander bowed his head in salute, and then spoke quickly: "A ship transporting semi-finished building materials was suddenly attacked by aliens. Since there was no military protection nearby, all the citizens on the ship have undoubtedly devoted themselves to the great cause under the glory of the Sky Eagle forever. "We are fortunate to have the final footage of the ship, which has been sent to the strategy room. In addition, the remaining shell fragments are on their way to the analysis room and will be available immediately."

Perturabo and Dorn looked at each other, and received some tacit permission in each other's eyes. Then the Iron Lord said to the Imperial Fist warriors: "Send the video here together, and we will analyze it while processing the fragments. ”

Aeolus looked up hesitantly at his genetic father, feeling a silent shock from Dorn's quiet majesty.

"Yes, my lord." He omitted the precise pronoun and left quickly.

What was sent first was the last video of the ship before its sacrifice.

It started with an ordinary voyage log, recording how they brought the semi-finished building materials used to expand the non-military functional components of the Rogal Dorn Fortress from Inwit's subordinate planet to the middle of the route, and decided on the route to the ice and snow world. line.

Then, during the ordinary voyage, the subspace stability displayed by the auspicious device suddenly fluctuated greatly. Immediately afterwards, a gigantic and strange thing sprang out from the void. The entire ship was simply pieced together from garbage and scraps. It was painted with extremely ugly yellow-green paint. The sealing and shape design They were all in a mess, and seemed to be accompanied by loud, hearty and wild howls.

It is a complete miracle that this thing that insults Perturabo's mechanical knowledge can operate, not to mention that it even rammed through the void shield with an attitude of contempt for physics and slammed it into the middle of the ship. The fragile waste The impact angle, which was of the highest quality in the empire, easily cut through the obstruction. Perturabo's eyes widened slightly and his fingers on the table trembled a little.

"Not quite psychic," Morse said softly. “It’s not very scientific either—scientific in the conventional sense.”

"Play this again," Perturabo murmured, then louder, "Play it again!"

Dorn flipped the progress bar on the data board and showed Perturabo frame by frame this ship that completely broke Perturabo's understanding. The Lord of Iron's pen was suspended on the draft paper. At first, he wrote a large number of shorthand symbols at a speed that was difficult to distinguish in the afterimage. Gradually, Perturabo stopped writing, and the trembling pen tip showed the shock he had received mentally.

"This is impossible." Perturabo maintained a calm expression, "Their technology is indeed beyond the scope of my analysis. Going forward, I want to know how a developed race can create such... simple and It pays attention to practicality and can also use its bizarre appearance to conceal the wisdom of its true technological level. "