Ardgit Redaxe's Ambition

 "Wot's dis?" Ardgit Redaxe growled as he listened to the grot manning his heavy slugga above his mega-armor. He couldn't remember the grot's name, and couldn't be bothered. The git wasn't important, not to his grand schemes of conquest. What it was babbling, though, was a whole another matter. "Wot do ya mean, Blitzog krumped a humie supa-heavy tank?!"

This wouldn't do. As a rival warboss, Redaxe couldn't allow that git, Blitzog, to upstage him. Hamlicar was his to conquer, not that ursurper. He was gonna show the evil Evil Sunz who was the real boss around here.

"Let's go!" He roared, raising his mega choppa and shaking it angrily. "We ain't gonna let that Blitzog git get one over us! We iz gonna do better and get ourselves a humie supa-heavy tank too! WAAAGH!"

Gathering a fearsome force of Beastsnagga Boyz that had joined his growing Waaagh!, Redaxe led the charge. Clouds of smoke filled the air as the warbikers charged forward, their riders whooping and yelling excitedly. Opposite them, the Squighogz Boys galloped forward, the greenskins whipping their pink steeds into a loping run. Their Nob on a squighoz led the charge, keeping his Boyz in line. Behind them, a Kill Rig trundled idly, the Weirdboy manning it chanting something incoherent. Redaxe couldn't understand what the weirdo was muttering about. Probably communing with Mork or summat. Ain't his business.

All he needed to know was that the hocus pocus of the Weirdboy worked.

Then the Kill Rig exploded forcefully, bowing over the Nob on the Squig and dealing a couple of mortal wounds to him. The Nob being a Nob, simply shrugged off lethal injuries that would have laid low a pathetic humie and got back onto his sqealing squig.

"Wot iz zat about?!"

Nobody answered him. The Nob scowled and turned to his Squighogz Boyz, ready to give them a good krumpin' for ignoring him, for he was the Nob and Nobs don't get ignored by no dumb gitz. However, his jaw dropped.

The Squighogz Boys were...gone.

Instead, smoldering remains of green puddles and ashes scattered about, the aftermath of a searing plasma blast having reduced the poor Boyz to nothing.

"Where did zey all go?!" He demanded.

Opposite the charging Ork Waaagh!, the stalwart men of the Draconis Imperial Guard regiment stood. Or rather, sat within the armored confines of their venerable tanks and walkers.

"I thought this was going to be an uneventful holiday, but looks like the Orks are out to ruin our festive plans," Colonel Ikeda grumbled. The Emperor's New Year was due to be celebrated later that evening, but as punishment for their defeat at the klaws of Blitzog earlier, the 4th regiment of the Draconian Defenders had been posted as sentries in the outskirts of Hamlicar. Ikeda clenched his fists. "We may have lost the last time, but we shall not be found wanting tonight! Men of Draconis, we fight!"

"Yes, sir!"

Tenken rumbled forward, its plasma blastgun-turned-volcano cannon erupting in an incadescent beam of destructive fury. A ramshackle contraption, with some Weirdboy on top whipping a large squig, vanished in an explosion. Beside the Stormblade-turned-Shadowsword, the venerable Leman Russ Executioner, Taiyou, added to the thunder of Tenken's many guns. Plasma seared through the air and vaporized a trio of Squighogz Boyz.

The plasma cannons bellowed, spitting superheated death at the Boyz running in the open. The Greenskins were so caught up in their bloodlust that they were running ahead of their Warboss, only for over half of them to vanish. The twin heavy bolters of Tenken chattered, firing mass reactives at the Warbikers, but the skilled greenskin riders swerved and dodged, making good use of their cloud of smoke to obscure their bikes. One of the bikes disintegrated when a shell detonated within its mechanism, hurling its shrieking rider into the dirt. The poor Ork hit the ground with a thud and didn't move, even its legendary resilience helpless against a snapped spine and shattered skeleton.

Ueda's Armored Sentinels opened fire, the plasma cannons catching more of the Orks and obliterating the Boyz. The sole survivor broke when he saw the ashy remnants of his comrade, and fled.

"Stop!" Redaxe hollered. He shook his head in disgust and gestured to the grot on his shoulder.

"Yes, boss!" The grot swiveled the slugga about and shot the running Boy in the head. The greenskin tumbled over, his skull split open like ripe fruit. Redaxe sneered at the deserter and returned his attention to the approaching super-heavy tank.

"Ya iz mine! Blitzog ain't the only one capable of krumpin' humie tanks! I don't care how big ya iz!"

Despite the violent demise of the Kill Rig, the Beastsnagga Boyz hitching a ride in it miraculously survived the flames, shaking the embers off their thick hide and patting out ablaze leather as they tore their way free. While they did so, the Kommandoes struck.

Unfortunately, Sergeant Shirakawa had spotted them.

"You aren't gonna fool me again!" he snapped, pointing his plasma pistol at the supposedly stealthy Kommandoes.

"Take aim!" Major Murakami ordered, rushing forward. The Draconian infantry hefted their lasguns, sniper rifle, plasma gun and meltagun up, waiting for the Kommandoes to sneak within range before they scythed them down with a barrage of las, plasma and melta. The Kommandoes fell back, routed, only for Ueda's Sentinal squadron to hunt them down. With buzzing chainsaws, they cut the fleeing Kommandoes apart, though a desperate Kommando smashed a breacher round into one of the Sentinels, causing it to buckle. A bombsquig threw itself at the already teetering Sentinel before detonating.

"Hey!" The Sentinel pilot yelled, his walker swaying unsteadily on scorched legs. "What the hell was that thing?!"

"Quit your whining and keep your eyes up front!" Ueda commanded, only for the Nob on squig to ram right into the damaged Sentinel, bowling it over and wrecking it. Ueda tried to call for support, but Ikeda had problems of his own. A Deff Dread had just emerged from a building to careen right into Tenken, its power klaws digging deeply into the ablative plating of the venerable Shadowsword. Not to be outdone, Redaxe charged in and buried his axe into the front armor, sending a shower of sparks.

"Ya iz mine now!" He crowed.

"I'm not going to lose a Shadowsword twice!" Ikeda snapped. "Driver, reverse!"

"Yes, sir!"

"Mizuno, cover fire!"

"Uh, I'm busy right now, boss." Sergeant Mizuno was struggling to maintain calm in the crew compartment of Taiyou, which had just been smacked by a couple of Warbikers. They pummeled the thick armor of the Leman Russ Executioner, with little effect, but the tank was unable to run them over. While Taiyou struggled to back away, the front edge of the Leman Russ clipped a warbiker and sent it spinning into the dirt.

"Watch it!" The Ork yelled, waving his fist futilely at the reversing Taiyou.

"Crush them!" Ikeda shouted back, and Tenken lurched forward, the adamantium tracks colliding against Ardgit Redaxe with a crunch and sending the warboss toppling back. Fortunately for the Warboss, his mega-armor held, and he wasn't squished outright by hundreds of tons of adamantium and ceramite.

"I iz tough as nails!" He roared defiantly as he struggled to his feet, the grot hanging onto the slugga desperately. "Ya cannot kill me with zat!"

Ikeda ignored the dude for now and instead ordered Tenken to fall back. The volcano cannon erupted once more, and the Deff Dread vanished in a blinding explosion. Lascannons spat ruby beams, but Redaxe's mega-armor withstood barrages that would have felled a tank, a shimmering kustom force field enfolding him in a bubble.

"Hah! If ya want to beat me, ya gonna have to do it the 'ard way! In good ol' fashion combat!"

One of the Warbikers was caught by a stray mass-reactive shell from the rumbling twin heavy bolters and turned into a mist of blood, but the Nob deftly pulled his bike away, turning to charge the Shadowsword at the same time as his warboss. Redaxe bellowed in triumph when his kustom force field actually blocked a hasty volcano cannon blast, the anti-Titan weaponry sizzling ineffectively against his mega-armor.

"I told ya! Ya cannot kill me with gunz and dakka! For I iz da best! Better than that git, Blitzog! Waaagh!"

"Where is my Sentinel support?!" Ikeda yelled, trying to have Tenken retreat from the near immortal Ardgit Redaxe. "Ueda!!!"

"Uh, I'm getting slaughtered here myself," Ueda said tersely. The Beastsnagga Boyz had snagged the other Sentinel in his squadron and brought it down with choppas. Even though their deadly chainsaws had cleaved a trio in return, they were getting overwhelmed by the whooping and jeering Beastsnagga Boyz.

Until Major Murakami intervened.

His power fist glowed a deep blue before it punched a hole through a stunned Ork's chest. The others turned to face him, but another Beastsnagga Boy had his head obliterated by a hook. Darting out of the way to avoid a second choppa slash, Murakami lashed out and tore out the heart of a third Boy, causing him to fall to his knees, gurgling in blood.

"I learned from the Catachans themselves!" The major yelled triumphantly. "It doesn't matter if you are Orks or Traitor Marines! I'm gonna punch your lights out!"

"Ya gotta be kiddin' me! We iz not gonna lose to humies like zis!" One of the Beastsnagga Boyz yelped in frustration, only to have his head taken out by a chainsaw. Ueda spun around, his Sentinel almost flying through the air, before the buzzing chainsaw carved through the Nob on a squig. The Nob's mouth gaped as his head transformed into mush, and the squig wailed as its spine was severed by the grinding weapon. It flopped on the ground before being stomped to oblivion.

"Dis iz not good..." The remaining Beastsnagga Boy murmured, backing away.

"Don't run, ya gitz!" Redaxe roared, undeterred by the intimidating silhouette of the Shadowsword. He charged once more, swinging his axe and cleaving an entire track guard off. Sparks flew from the Shadowsword, promethium bleeding from cut pipes.

"Not again!" Ikeda groaned, clenching his fists as he stood in his cupola. "Just crush that damned Ork already! I'm not going to lose my Tenken to another greenskin barbarian who thinks he can tear apart a super-heavy tank with nothing more than a giant axe!"

With a thunderous bellow, Tenken charged forth once more, and this time the venerable Shadowsword finally crushed the shrieking Redaxe beneath its adamantium tracks.

"No! NOOO! Dis can't be! I iz as good as Blitzog! I can't die like dis! Ya gotta be kiddin' me!"

Redaxe thrashed violently underneath Tenken before he disappeared, his mega-armor chewed apart by the sheer weight and bulk of the super-heavy.

The sole surviving Warbiker nob and the tattered remains of the Beastsnagga Boyz looked at each other for a second before they promptly spun around and fled. Ikeda watched them go and raised a hand.

"Don't pursue. I repeat, don't pursue." He sighed. "We're pulling back. Don't forget, we're having fireworks tonight to celebrate the New Year."

As the battered armor regiment of the Draconians returned wearily to their fortress-bunker, there was a slight movement from the crumpled mega-armor.

"Boss? Iz ya all right?" The grot sqawked, carefully running its hands over the dented metal. There was another tremor, and then the mega-armor burst open.

"Does I look all right to ya?!" A bloodied Ardgit Redaxe snapped, limping out of his ruined mega-armor. The grot shrieked and ran off, cowering behind a totaled warbike. Muttering to himself, Redaxe wiped the blood off his misshapen face. "I iz gotta find a Painboy. And den I will get my revenge on those damned humies! I iz not inferior to that git Blitzog! If he can do dis, den I can too!"

Using the broken shaft of his once glorious big choppa for support, the warboss disappeared into the night, his beady red eyes shining with vengeful fury.

Blitzog Krumps a Shadowsword

"Waaagh!!!!"

Blitzog was driven into a frenzy as his band of gitz was driven to a fanatical rampage. Charging through the ruins of Hamilcar, they smashed into the Imperial Guard lines, hacking and chopping at the beleaguered guardsmen with impunity. Blitzog himself led the charge, bellowing in fury as he swung his power axe and cleaved the humie commander in half.

The rest of the Guardsmen were routed before they could so much as raise a bayonet, chopped to bits bu the berserk greenskins. Dripping in blood and viscera Blitzog raised his axe high and yelled in triumph.

"Get yer head down, boss!"

One of the greenskins hollered, ducking as plasma blasts streaked overhead. One of the scrapjets vanished in an explosion, caught in the incadescent fury of a volcano cannon. Ikeda's Shadowsword, Tenken, lumbered forward, its sponson lascannons and twin heavy bolters chattering. A bombblaster fell apart, unable to withstand the barrage, but its comrade pulled back after having recklessly charged a now smoking Leman Russ tank.

Mizuno's Taiyou didn't bother firing, having reversed in order to allow his commander a clear shot. On the other side, the Armored Sentinel squadron led by Ueda smashed into the Orks' ranks, scything them down with buzzing chainsaws.

"Fall back!" Blitzog barked. One of his Boyz looked up, stupefied.

"But, boss! We iz not runnin' away from a good krumpin'!"

"Shut up, ya git! Who's da boss here? Ya or me?"

"Sorry, boss..."

Knowing that their warboss had the kunnin' of Mork, the chastened Boyz fell back from the vengeful Sentinels having lost more to the vengeful Sentinels. Fortunately, the bomber jet swooped in as reinforcements and fragged the Sentinels with a bunch of explosives, blowing the bipedal walkers open.

Not to be outdone, Tenken crushed the remaining bombblaster and opened fire at the retreating greenskins. The Orks were cut down and annihilated, but Blitzog cared not for his Boyz. Instead, he grabbed hold of a railing of his Trukk and hauled himself back in.

"Drive, ya git!"

The driver of the trukk complied, yanking on the steering wheel and twisting away. While the trukk dodged the shells and las-fire of the Shadowsword, two Deff Dreads teleported right in front of a stunned Mizuno.

"What on Holy Terra...?"

The lead Deff Dread cannonballed into Taiyou, and with four power klaws, mauled the already damaged tank. Even the venerable Leman Russ Executioner tank couldn't endure such a vicious onslaught.

"Eat lava, grox frakkers!" Ikeda yelled. The volcano cannon lit up again and the Deff Dread vanished. The other Deff Dread also stumbled when Tenken fire its lascannons into it, but it stood its ground. Until Tenken ran it over and crushed it under its adamantium tracks.

The last surviving scrapjet served about and smashed into one of the Saints' statues, burning it to the ground. By the time Ikeda rallied and turned toward the scrapjet, it had already razed a second idol, the engines burning furiously.

"That's enough!"

Even as the Shadowsword shuddered from the explosive projectiles from the bomber jet above, its weapons howled ferociously. The lascannons tore the sole surviving scrapjet apart, turning it into, well, scrap. The volcano cannon erased the Trukk from existence, but Blitzog launched himself out with a half-ditch effort. With a roar, he charged toward the Shadowsword, only to bounce off the front plating.

Despite the bruises, he picked himself up and rend the front armor of the reverseing Tenken. Ikeda split his attention, firing at both the bomber jet and the furious warboss, but only the aircraft crashed.

"Drive me closer!" He ordered the tank driver, waving his hand. "I want to hit it with my sword!"

Tenken growled as it rammed Blitzog over, but the Warboss wasn't going down without a fight. Snarling, he carved the Shadowsword open, exposing the tank compartment. Grinning, he reached in and plucked the screaming driver out with his klaw.

"There ya are, little humies..."

"Frak you!" Ikeda yelled and slammed his palm down on a red button. The Shadowsword juddered and blew up, hurling Blitzog across the air. He slammed into the ground and skidded, leaving an ugly trail.

For a few moments, Blitzog lay there, stunned. Then he slowly rose to his feet, shrugging off the mortal wound that he would otherwise have suffered from the explosion. With a grin, he raised his power axe and bellowed triumphantly.

"WAAAGH! Hah, take that, puny humies! Ya iz not gonna beat me! Because I da best!"

As if to emphasize his point, he swung his power axe and smashed the next idol, sealing his victory and proving the superiority of the greenskins over the poor humies.

More Krieg

I mean, sure, I built them as generic Death Korps of Krieg, but they are meant to be Draconians. I'm going for the whole Jin Roh aesthetic, so yeah.

That's an old Japanese anime...yeah, 1999, but that's kind of old now since it's over 20 years ago. But as you can see, they have a similar aesthetic, so I thought Krieg would best represent them. I would love to kitbash, but...the components of the Krieg kit don't really mesh well with, say, the Cadians. Or other Imperial Guard models. So I don't know. Best to assemble them as they are and treat them as Draconians. I do like their mini transhuman, though, but...we'll see. On the other hand, I hope I can convert the Cadian Castellan into a Krieg one with the spare bits I have, but we'll see. I'm also planning on converting the Atilian Rough Riders into Krieg Death Riders, but again, we'll see how feasible that is. Anyway...yeah.

Oh, you will have noticed that there are two meltagunners. That's because one of them is meant for the previous squad. I intend on replacing the vox-caster with a meltagunner. Having 3 special weapons is more fun! Yay! Especially since I don't have a master vox or a platoon command squad. Anyway, I look forward to running them in the future!

The Edgelords, Death Guard and Angels of Death

"Hah! Those skeletal xenos never stood a chance!"

War Warrior crowed after his warband crushed the awakening Necrons under their ceramite boots. Having unleashed the Possessed upon the metallic xenos, War Warrior watched as they overwhelmed the legions of warriors, smashing them underfoot before tearing through Wraiths and other constructs. Even the Overlord was no match for the surviving Possessed, and despite scything them down, he was worn out by their sheer numbers and ferocity.

The Obliterators seemed to have pulled their weight too, their firepower crucial to the Edge Lords' success. With this, Barca seemed to have fallen under the Chaos Warband's control.

"You guys are the true MVP," War Warrior told the proud Possessed. He nodded at the Master of Possession, who straightened his back while trying not to look too pleased with himself. "Great work, Riot."

"With the daemons under our control, nothing can match our power. With the gods in ascension, we will throw the entire sector into...chaos! Muahahaha!"

"Not yet," War Warrior cautioned Riot. "There is one more obstacle we must clear. Let us invade Carthage, for there is hidden archeotech on that world that will serve to further our plans of galactic domination!"

"For the Warmaster!" The Master of Possession raised his force stave. "We shall drown the Imperium in a tide of blood!"

Or so he thought, but when the Edge Lords landed on Carthage, they found a wall of adamantium, steel and ceramite waiting for them. The Draconian Imperial Guard regiment, usually under the jurisdiction of House Yato in Draconis III, had taken up defensive positions. Right in the center of the fortress was the modified Shadowsword, Tenken. Known as the Divine Blade, the super-heavy tank had functioned as a lynchpin in many defensive actions.

The tank commander, Colonel Ikeda, stood in his cupola and surveyed the approaching warband grimly. They had landed in a flourish and were now stampeding toward the Imperial Guard positions like the fanatical zealots they were. Leading the charge was an advancing horde of Possessed, but they were accompanied by burning Cultists. Unlike the crazed Cultists and berserk Possessed, a small squad of legionnaires hung back by the Noctlith Crown they had constructed, trusting in its empyric powers to protect them. A forcefield shimmered around them, the unnatural energies billowing like a storm.

Riot cackled as he led two Obliterators who were ready to...well, obliterate any enemy that stood in their path. Much like the Necrons they had blasted to oblivion earlier. Their fleshmetal guns rippled and extended, the gleaming barrels ripping through pinkish meat to point toward Tenken.

War Warrior followed in the wake of his Possessed, determined to offer the lives of the stalwart Guardsmen to the dark gods. He grinned and licked his fanged lips in anticipation, his aura granting his daemonic possessed brethren strength.

"That doesn't look good," Ikeda murmured. He thumbed the vox device. "Mizuno, you ready?"

"As ready as can be, sir," the sergeant replied. Unlike Ikeda, he commanded a Leman Russ Executioner tank, and was already readying his gunners to kill on sight. Further up, three Armored Sentinels stalked forward. Led by Sergeant Ueda, they trained their plasma cannons on the squad of legionnaires.

The Obliterators and the legionnaires opened fire first, but the lascannon missed Tenken. The Obliterators, on the other hand, delivered a ferocious barrage that stripped the front plating off, leaving molten metal dribbling down the surface.

"Fire!" Ikeda ordered. Tenken rocked as the plasma-powered volcano cannon roared, the incadescent beam slicing through the Possessed and disintegrating half of their number in one volley. The lascannons added to their fury, vaporizing another Possessed with a direct hit. Meanwhile, the twin heavy bolters chattered angrily as they ejected mass reactives at the legionnaires, who took cover. One of them fell, his armor dented by the endless stream.

Still, the Possessed kept coming.

"Mizuno, any time when you're ready."

"Right you are, sir."

This time, the Leman Russ Executioner, Taiyou, opened fire. The excutioner plasma cannon unleashed a bluish-white stream of superheated matter that engulfed the remaining Possessed and wiped them out completely.

"What the?!" War Warrior bellowed in disbelief as he saw his main force get taken out in a single round of shooting. "That's not fair! My whole strategy depended on getting the Possessed close enough to destroy those damned tanks in melee! What are we going to do now?!"

"Continue attacking!" One of his legionnaires yelled as they ducked under a barrage of plasma from the Armored Sentinels. Most of the superheated shots went wild, disintegrating the cover around them but otherwise failing to hurt the legionnaires. "We can't give up so easily!"

The cultists howled as they were cut down by a barrage of las-fire from an infantry squad. Sergeant Shirakawa and his men took aim and fired, following Major Murakami's orders. By the time the dust settled, only a single cultist was left in the open, looking dazed from the death and fire around him.

"Destroy that tank!" Riot yelled at the Obliterators, and they complied as best as they could. The fleshmetal guns roared once more, pummeling the front of Tenken and causing its armor to buckle. "What the, why won't it die?!"

"It's too tough," one of the Obliterators replied sourly. Riot spat and pointed his force stave at Shirakawa's squad.

"Fine, whatever! Charge into them and massacre the infantry!"

"Good idea."

"Uh oh."

Shirakawa gulped and watched helplessly as his squad was massacred. The last thing he saw was a force stave detonating with distorted energies that sent him flying across the ground.

"Hey! Pick on someone your own size!" Ueda yelled, leading his Sentinel squadron to the fight. They opened fire with their plasma cannons and finally wiped out the legionnaires, and then they crashed into the Master of Possession. He turned to direct his Obliterators forward, but realized they no longer existed.

Tenken had opened fire and wiped them out from existence with its volcano cannon. Meanwhile, the heavy bolters finished off the last Cultist. The Sentinels then hacked at Riot, but he parried and blocked them before destroying one of them with his force stave. Twirling the stave, he proceeded to slay Major Murakami, whose shining power sword did frak all. The officer should never have challenged a transhuman warrior swelled by the warp to physical combat, but...hey, at least he had courage.

"It's your turn now."

Mizuno gestured to his gunner, who squeezed the trigger. Plasma and las-fire lanced into War Warrior, and despite the blessings he had received from the dark gods, he was erased from existence, banished into the warp once more.

"Not again!" He screamed as he was sucked into a vortex, only to look up fearfully when he felt the disapproving gaze of the ruinous powers. "No! Give me another chance!"

"Sure," Tzeentch said before flinging him back to his ship. So the Warband broke even on glory points, thankfully.

Riot, on the other hand, continued to fend off the Armored Sentinels' repeated attacks with their chainsaws. He chuckled as he smashed them, his force stave glowing ominously.

"Why won't he die?!" Ueda complained.

"Get out of the way! We're going to crush him!" Ikeda bellowed. He slapped the side of his cupola and waved his hand. "Drive me closer! I want to hit him with my sword!"

With a roar, Tenken surged forward and crushed Riot under its adamantium tracks. The Master of Possession howled in defiance, but he disappeared under the tremendous weight of the super-heavy tank. Pulped into nothing but a bloody smear and flattened power armor, his remains twitched once like a chaos spawn in a pool, then went still as Tenken continued to roll over the area. Just to make sure.

"Phew..." Ikeda sighed a breath of relief. He stared down at Tenken, which was battered but otherwise still very much intact. Raising his hand, he cheered triumphantly. "We've successfully defended Carthage! Good job, men!"

Inwardly, he wondered if bringing a super-heavy tank to a battle was overkill. Maybe he should go a little easier on his enemies. He decided to swap Tenken for a Leman Russ tank next time, unless the enemy was bringing a Knight.

And thus the Astra Militarum prevailed. For now.

"What? We're being attacked by the Encarmine Angels and a bunch of Skitarii?"

No sooner than when he had switched to a Leman Russ tank, Ikeda received bad news. He glanced up at the fiery contrails of drop pods. The Encarmine Angels and a ranking Tech-priest had claimed that the Astra Militarum were sitting on a treasure trove of archeotech, and they were determined to seize it. However, Ikeda had orders from high command to not allow anyone to enter the area. Even if they were of the vaunted Adeptus Astartes.

Unbeknownst to the Draconians, the Death Guard had landed not far away and were carrying out their own insidious plans to infect the sector. Having realized the anomaly, the bulk of the Adeptus Mechanicus forces landed in the area, with Skitarii Rangers marching foward to pump volley of galvanic rounds into the inexorably advancing Plague Marines.

"Technoheresy!" The Magos Dominus hissed in binharic when he saw the foul shapes of Plagueburst Crawlers crest the hill. He waved toward a couple of Ironstriders Ballistarii, filling them with doctrina imperatives via the noosphere. "Destroy these tech heretics with extreme prejudice!"

Twin cognis lascannons hissed as they unleashed ruby las-beams at the Plagueburst Crawlers. Onager Dunecrawlers lumbered toward the battlefield, one of them equipped with an Icarus array. Autocannon rounds cluttered and rockets rained down on the Death Guard's position, blasting even the revoltingly resilient Plague Marines to bits.

The other Onager Dunecrawler fired its neutron laser at the Leman Russ tanks that had taken up defensive positions on the other side of the fortress.

"Damn it! Tell them to stop firing!" Ikeda complained. He winced when he saw two units of Kataphron Destroyers roll up, hammering Ueda's Armored Sentinels with grav. In a single volley, all three Armored Sentinels were crushed by esoteric grav weaponry. "Holy Throne! They're murdering us out here!"

To make matters worse, the Encarmine Angels had joined the fray. While the Leviathan Dreadnought advanced toward the Death Guard's position, backed up by a tactical squad, the Intercessors and a third tactical squad hunkered down before firing at the poor infantry. Shirakawa's squad took cover, suffering minimal casualties.

While the Dreadnought traded fire with a Foetid Blight Drone, the Astra Militarum retaliated. Plasma volleys engulfed the Kataphron Destroyers, eliminating the maniples before the lobotomized servitors realized what was happening. Plasma cannons barked, engulfing the Intercessors in plasma and erasing them from the surface of Carthage.

Then the Sanguinary Guard swooped down from above.

The Death Guard were slowly being ground down by weight of fire, with the Poxwalkers falling over from volley after volley of galvanic and radium fire. The Death Guard moved in, the Plague Marines shrugging all but the worst of the bombardment, and a Skitarii Ranger squad was butchered by a Sorcerer in Terminator armor. Meanwhile, the Plagueburst Crawlers continued to pound their positions, causing diseased Skitarii to fall over as they rained diseased shells upon their position.

Fortunately for the Adeptus Mechanicus, they managed to blow up one of the Plagueburst Crawlers, with the combined firepower of the Ironstriders Ballistarii and the Leviathan Dreadnought carving it open and noxious fumes billowed out of the wreck.

Undaunted, the Death Guard continued moving forward, with the Foetid Blight Drone charging at the damaged Leviathan Dreadnought. Not to be outdone, the Lord of Virulence joined the combat, and with his flail, he brought the might walker down with a couple of blows. The Blight Drone stabbed the Librarian with a plague probe and caused the ill space marine to succumb to whatever foul diseases it carried.

Even so, there were very little Death Guard left on the field. Both the Death Guard and Imperial Guard were being slaughtered by the sheer firepower the Adeptus Astartes and Adeptus Mechanicus brought to bear.

"Ugh!"

Ikeda watched in frustration as two units of Sanguinary Guard chopped and hacked the Leman Russ tanks in his squadron to pieces. Shirakawa was forced to witness his squad get massacred once again as the murderous transhumans cut the relatively unprotected infantry apart, and he was hurled across the room after attempting to parry a power sword with his own.

Of course he would be no match for the augmented Adeptus Astartes. He closed his eyes and slumped against the wall, unable to respond to the frantic demands of his commanding officer who wanted to know what was going on inside the building.

Ikeda was about to issue an order when a neutron laser beam from the Onager Dunecrawler blasted his new Leman Russ tank to bits.

"...I should have stuck with Tenzen," he groaned as he crawled from the ruins of his tank, wishing for the armor and resilience of the venerable Shadowsword. And firepower too.

Only Mizuno was left, and he ordered Taiyou to reverse as he opened fire on the Sanguinary Guard. Avenging the other Leman Russ Executioner tanks that had been wrecked, he killed all but one Sanguinary Guard. Meanwhile, the lascannon and Executioner plasma turret slew the Captain who led them, melting him and his power armor to slag.

Apparently, that act of defiance allowed the stubborn Astra Militarum to dig in and hold onto the archeotech. With the dwindling forces of Encarmine Angels and Adeptus Mechanicus succumbing to disease, and perhaps realizing they were attacking loyal, Imperial allies, they decided to retreat. The Death Guard also pulled back, with only a Lord of Virulence, Maglinant Plaguecaster and Sorcerer in Terminator armor left. That and a single Plagueburst Crawler that was in danger of being blown apart by two Onager Dunecrawlers and a single surviving Ironstrider Ballistarius. At least they had killed almost all of the infantry, Skitarii or Astartes.

With that, the Astra Militarum were the only ones left standing over the archeotech.

"At least we carried out our orders to the bitter end," Ikeda remarked as he was tended to by a medic, his arm in a sling. He glanced at the grotesque heavens, the dark colors dancing in hideous fashion as they basked in the insidious glow of the Great Rift. "Holy Terra, I'm sick of all this. I hope the xenos and traitors give up, or we're royally screwed."

The battered colonel vowed that the next time he fought, he was going back out in Tenzen. No more going easy on the enemy, that was for sure. The Draconians might not have the genhanced might of their Space Marine allies or the cyborg augmentations of the Skitarii, but they had the grit and will to outlast anyone in a battle of attrition.

...or so he hoped.