The Secret of an Ancient Civilization

The landing formation swiftly headed into Planet B's suffocating atmosphere.

Intense friction instantly wrapped the dedicated Thunderhawk Gunship and its escort craft in searing plasma, like a string of burning stars plunging into an abyss.

As their descent deepened, atmospheric pressure climbed at an astonishing rate. Even cushioned by multiple layers of shielding, the sturdy hull groaned with teeth-grating metallic stress, as though it might be crushed by the terrifying pressure at any moment.

Through the violently shaking portholes, endless dense yellow clouds churned outside, streaked with unsettling dark red bands—

They were highly concentrated sulfuric acid droplets, gleaming eerily beneath extreme heat like poisonous blood flowing from the planet.

Every collision between the shields and the acidic mist threw up blinding electrical sparks, briefly outlining the formation's vehicles in the dense fog.

The composition of the landing force personally led by Sui Meng itself demonstrated just how dangerous this mission was.

Every member was either a Formation Breaker guard or one of the most elite Imperial Martial Soldier Astartes. Not a single ordinary Auxilia soldier was present.

The reason was simple.

Even the most advanced Auxilia Powered Suits and CMC Powered Combat Suits lacked the environmental adaptation systems and structural strength needed to function normally in such an extreme environment.

The atmospheric pressure here was eighty times that of Earth, enough to crush ordinary vehicles instantly;

The heavily corrosive acidic mist saturating the air could eat through most alloys within an hour;

The ambient temperature remained steadily above 300 degrees Celsius, enough to melt many conventional materials.

Only Primarchs and Astartes enhanced through Primarch technology and clad in top-tier Power Armor could move freely in such a purgatorial environment.

Below the clouds lay a world of deathly silence.

When the formation finally broke through the seemingly endless cloud layer,