This is the Star Realm Army!

"We are currently inside a Deathwatch strike cruiser. The reason the hull looks like this is that the Deathwatch was ambushed by Chaos Space Marines while pursuing Dark Eldar raiders at a Mandeville point, and then they were rammed by a greenskin iron-hulk that just jumped in."

"As for the interior, the crew, corrupted by Chaos cultists, killed the Navigator and engaged the warp engines, holding a ritual on board. Since this particular cult worships Chaos Undivided, the ship has become a colorful mess, and they even managed to attract some lurking Genestealers."

Standing before a sealed iron door, Romulus stated the current status of the vessel with great composure.

Arthur shrugged as if he had already anticipated this, though he felt as miserable as if he had swallowed excrement.

The aesthetic was just too fitting; it was a veritable gathering of heroes.

"What do we do next?"

Too lazy to wait for the cogitator—which might have been infected with a virus—to respond, Arthur swung his sword and sliced through the blocking iron door.

"First, we head to the central elevator to rendezvous, then proceed with the Cadian Shock Troops 43rd Regiment to the Geller field generator. There is a Chaos Space Marine incursion there, and we need to assist the resident Deathwatch kill team in clearing out the enemy. After that, we go to the Navigator Sanctum to see if we can jump out of the warp."

Romulus tossed a melta charge behind him to seal the path; the melting plasteel blocked the cultists' pursuit, trapping them together with the frenzied greenskins.

"There is a Cadian Shock Troops 43rd Regiment on this ship, as well as Sisters of Battle, so the combat situation is still somewhat under control. By the way, spend some points to download High and Low Gothic from me, so we don't have communication difficulties later."

"How do I exchange for it?"

Arthur looked bewildered.

"You have a cheat and don't study it at all? All those years of writing webnovels were for nothing."

Romulus paused, unable to resist another jab.

He then shook his head slightly and explained.

"You just need the intent to spend points to redeem these two languages; you can edit this exchange system yourself—strictly speaking, it's not a system, but rather something that has adapted into a mode we can better accept. But there isn't much time for you to study it right now."

"Oh, I see."

Following his good brother's instruction, Arthur pulled up a panel from his consciousness and immediately began inputting the languages.

There were many things in there he had seen and some he hadn't; if he really wanted to use it portably, he would need time to study it properly.

Arthur examined the miscellaneous data and the items that were beginning to categorize themselves according to his subjective thoughts. After a moment of hesitation, he gave up on the idea of further exchanges for the time being.

"By the way, besides the two of us, who else came?"

Walking along the corridor, Arthur cautiously observed every shadow where enemies might be lurking.

The enemy density here was significantly lower, and along the way, there were numerous corpses hit by bolter rounds, each shot to a vital point; it was clearly the handiwork of Space Marines.

"Two others."

Arthur's question made Romulus think of that headache-inducing fellow.

"Let me guess."

Arthur, who had pulled a flamer from his waist and was busy roasting a greenskin Nob, asked tentatively.

"Karna and Ramesses?"

The four of them were old Moon-dwellers; one could tell just by their names, all of which were taken from historical Heroic Spirits. They basically played every game together, and since Romulus was here, the other two weren't hard to guess.

"Mm."

Romulus did not deny it.

"Are you kidding me? Does the draft come with collective punishment?"

Arthur looked sullen, but to be honest, his mood was much better than when he had first transmigrated.

Although he had already stepped in the muck, having three good brothers with him was much better than struggling alone.

"Maybe our IDs looked like actual people. I should have just listened to you and taken 'The Emperor's Crotch' as a name; I bet the Emperor wouldn't have dared to claim me."

Romulus sighed again, though he didn't have much negative emotion. After all, compared to being alone, having three other unlucky bastards with him wasn't so bad.

Eating excrement alone is suffering, but if a group of people you know are eating it together, your psychological balance is much better.

"Where is everyone?"

Arthur asked curiously.

"One is covering a shift at the Navigator Sanctum, and the other..."

Romulus glanced at the time.

"Should be killing his way over here about now."

"Huh?"

A large number of greenskin Orks suddenly appeared ahead. Arthur, who was just about to jump in and go on a rampage, was held back.

Romulus stared at the time, counting down silently.

"Three."

"Two."

"One."

"Horus!"

A crimson blur flashed past; Arthur barely caught a glimpse of it, with only a savage roar echoing down the corridor.

CRACK!!!

The scarlet warrior struck the ground, his power spear blooming with a cerulean disruption field. Propelled by the immense thrust of his jump pack, he carved a bloody path through the battlefield.

WHOOSH!!!

A continuous barrage of slashes swept back and forth until everything in sight was ground into debris. The Blood Angel below looked up at the two figures in the passageway, then glanced at the Astra Militarum soldiers providing covering fire from their elevated position opposite. With a roar, his jump pack ignited with promethium, and he crashed through the ship's bulkhead once more.

Only that terrifying, lingering roar remained, echoing in the ears of the two men.

"Horus!"

"...You're actually better than him."

"...Indeed."

With the assistance of a Blood Angel who did nothing but scream "Horus" and gnaw on the skulls of cultists, Arthur and his party soon reached the Geller field generator.

As Space Marines—superhumans with two hearts and three lungs—they had exchanged much information along the way. In reality, however, to the mortal heretics, they were merely two blurred figures, one black and one blue, flashing through the corridors before their heads went flying.

It was hard to imagine how such massive, hulking giants could move with such agility.

BANG!

Arthur didn't wait for the door to slide open; he sliced through the paneling and washed the enemies in fire from his volkite gun before they could react. After instantly killing those who couldn't be handled in melee, he blocked a chainaxe strike with his shield.

"WAAAAAGH!"

Before Arthur could counterattack, a line of fire from behind the Ork converged upon him in an instant.

In a heartbeat, searing laser beams pierced the creature's tough hide, tearing into the alien's body. To Arthur's surprise, the shots bypassed him—even as he grappled with the xenos—and struck with lethal precision.

He had been about to raise his arm to claim the alien's head, but seeing this, he sheathed his longsword in disbelief. His gaze turned complex as he looked toward the soldiers clad in red carapace armor over dark camouflage fatigues, who were already firing at other xenos.

At the front of the line, a smaller number of shield-bearers in heavy armor held key chokepoints with solid boarding shields. The corpses of traitors and xenos were torn to shreds by attacks of unknown origin; blood and gore mixed together, forming a viscous carpet under the boots of the shield-bearers.

In the center of the position, fire teams suppressed the corridors with surgical precision. The moment a Genestealer tore through the ceiling, its body was melted away by a volley of laser fire.

On the flank, the moment a heavy bolter fell silent, a soldier would drag away the body of the gunner—half-blown away—to take their place, and that reassuring, dull thud would ring out across the battlefield once more.

At the rear, transport squads hauled crates of ammunition and power cells between firing points, replacing magazines for the soldiers to ensure a relentless, unending stream of fire.

Everyone had their role to play. Relying on their own iron-willed discipline, these flesh-and-blood soldiers had forged an impregnable line of defense against all manner of horrors.

"This is the Cadian Shock Troops."

Romulus, as if he had long since witnessed the combat prowess of these Astra Militarum soldiers, cleared the enemies from his sight without a hint of surprise and entered the position first.

Admittedly, while the Astra Militarum were often portrayed as mere stepping stones or background fodder crushed by various horrors in Warhammer lore, in the real universe, they were the cream of the crop, selected from the populations of entire worlds.

Moreover, these soldiers in fire-red uniforms hailed from Cadia, a world where six-year-olds could handle a lasgun with precision. They were elites among the elite of the Astra Militarum, so such a performance was hardly surprising.

Compared to the Space Marines, who had shifted toward special operations due to the scale limitations imposed after the publication of the Codex Astartes, these vast numbers of mortal soldiers were the primary force of the Imperium in the fight against heresy and xenos.

Arthur scanned his surroundings in silence, committing the information to memory and listening intently to the soldiers' chatter before following Romulus.

This was the ship's transport elevator, held by the Cadian 43rd Regiment. As they entered the position, a group of greenskins charged into the fray, which had been quiet for less than thirty seconds.

However, under the fire net of this elite unit, the Orks—already thinned out by waves of daemons, cultists, and Genestealers—had little momentum left. Faced with such precise and dense firepower, they met only death.

The Astra Militarum had organized a tight defensive line here. Beyond the soldiers still engaging xenos on the front, some even had the energy to offer an Aquila salute to the Angels of the Emperor.

Amidst the cacophony of bolters, lasguns, grenades, and flamers, Arthur gave a slight nod in response.

"For the Emperor!"

Low Gothic was something of a hodgepodge of various symbolic languages, bearing enough similarities to the languages Arthur knew. Combined with his post-transmigration superhuman brain, he quickly grasped many of its terms.

Perhaps because he possessed a superhuman body, his learning progress became exaggerated whenever he focused on a subject—much like when he had been cutting down those horrors earlier.

"For the Emperor, my lord!"

The Astra Militarum soldiers, flattered and awestruck, shouted the slogan before returning to watch over their line.

Visibly, the morale of these weary soldiers had soared.