21 Statues Shattered, the Dead Revived (VI)

The Soul of Night is a typical Retribution-class Battleship. It lacks good maneuverability but possesses heavy armor and firepower that is almost incomprehensible.

The designers responsible for this type of ship likely had a severe fear of insufficient firepower, which is why they wanted to cram massive weapon arrays onto both sides of the ship, madly arranging the Macro-cannon and torpedo arrays as if they were machine gun positions.

He was completely oblivious to the immense burden this would place on the crew responsible for loading the ammunition. Moreover, he also installed a "smaller" number of light lances on the stern, as well as a Nova Cannon hidden beneath the figurehead.

Simply using the term "excessive firepower" to describe the Retribution-class is completely inadequate, but it does have its advantages— the Retribution-class's firepower gives it a unique deterrent effect.

Once an opportunity to aim is found, most enemies within range will be instantly obliterated by a volley of fire. They won't even have a chance to fire back; the Void Shield is practically useless against this level of firepower.

Without a doubt, the Soul of Night is a warship capable of instilling fear in its enemies. But the problem is, the enemy she is now facing does not exist in the cold vacuum.

It was right on the deck of the Soul of Night. No matter how powerful her firepower was, it was nothing more than useless data on paper against an enemy she couldn't hit.

"Shen!" Samus roared. "It's time!"

No one answered; only the deep darkness surged across the deck. The ancient warship seemed enraged by its arrival; thick fog swept in, followed by a fierce wind, transforming the frigid mist into countless cold, bloodthirsty daggers.

They hovered around the Daemon, creating countless wounds on its body. Thick blood gushed from the wounds, and before it could release heat or cause blasphemy, it was pierced by the sharp knives, turned into ice shards, and flung away and shattered.

Samus suddenly burst into laughter, two streams of hot breath coming out of his wet nose, completely disregarding his injuries.

Its face, neither beast nor human, was filled with pure excitement, as if it had waited for this day for hundreds of lifetimes.

And indeed, it was banished by the Shadow Knights hundreds of times.

This feud can be traced back to Calth ten thousand years ago, and in those ten thousand years, the battlefield of hatred has expanded to the entire galaxy.

It appeared alongside the demonic tide at the Fortress Wall in the Sol System, attacking the defenses and attempting to enter the shattered Terra. It also secretly entered the homeworld of the Shadow Knights, Vilayne, where it unleashed a bloodbath.

It wasn't that no one had tried banishing it with flames of fury, thus solving the problem once and for all. However, this beast was exceptionally cunning. If it sensed the presence of flames of fury, it would never appear.

Except for this time.

This time, however, was the only exception. Shen made no attempt to conceal his arrival or the changes he had undergone. Samus, however, did not flee; instead, he stood still, watching Shen stroll towards him from the darkness.

The already faint light was completely swallowed up, and the flames roared in the darkness. The composite steel that made up the deck twisted and deformed as a result, and was scorched by the raging flames into crystal clear molten iron, which silently clung to Shen's armor.

At the top of the corridor, the pipes responsible for transporting energy and maintaining temperature bent over spontaneously, as if the warship itself were bowing to Shen, before snapping in unison, as if bidding farewell. From the broken ends, steam continuously gushed out, obscuring Shen's presence.

Only those burning eyes remained clear.

"How long have we waited for this day?" the Daemon asked with a sigh.

Its left paw rested on its chest, appearing surprisingly polite. Shen did not answer, so it stared intently at Shen with its wet, beastly eyes, full of expectation, wanting to get his answer.

Shen did not answer.

He never answered.

A flash of fire streaked across the porthole, illuminating their faces completely. The deck rumbled, and the ripples of the Void Shield took on a mesmerizing purple hue in the firelight. Not far away, the Litatera continued to burn, and the collapse of the Furious Abyss never ceased.

Those fragments were like burning comets that had traveled through the Milky Way, traversing thousands of worlds, just to come to this world and rain down fire, crashing into the ground, forcing continental plates to shift, destroying the Hive City, and killing civilians one by one amidst screams.

"Isn't it beautiful?" Samus asked.

Shen shook her head gently. The Daemon, unconcerned, extended its right claw and tapped the porthole. It could have easily torn the porthole apart as if it were a blank sheet of paper, but it didn't. Instead, it began to explain its thoughts to Shen very seriously.

In my opinion, most ordinary people don't deserve to live.

They simply don't understand how much effort goes into the gift of life, which we are born with. They don't know that their right to live is something that countless people like you fought to the death for across the galaxy.

"They haven't seen you wallowing in the mud, charging forward to your deaths, tearing at your enemies like wild dogs. They have no gratitude or respect for you; instead, they see you as jinxes, simply because you only appear in the most dangerous places."

Shen watched him indifferently. The molten iron and steam began to twist and distort, as if they had come to life, embedding themselves one by one into the molten cracks of his charred armor.

Seeing this, Samus grinned maliciously without realizing it. It listened intently to Shen Na's increasingly strong, thunderous heartbeat, and its smile widened.

It sighed with emotion.

"Just like I said last time, Shen, in my opinion, they were just wasting their lives. But now it's different. Now, these numb people have a chance to see the error of their ways."

"Oh, right, I have to admit something to you. I don't actually like Erebus. Even to someone like me who is not alive, he's utterly repulsive."

"In my opinion, he's nothing more than a pretentious, self-important bastard. But even such a bastard did one thing right—he brought enlightenment to your world and your people."

Samus sincerely clasped his claws together and straightened his hunched back like a human. A longing that only humans possessed appeared on the beast's head.

"After today, will those mediocre mortals continue to sink into depravity?"

Samus stared wide-eyed, uttering a soft question between its fine, sharp fangs. Then came more words that seemed utterly inappropriate for Daemon. Each sentence carried philosophical implications, each syllable brimming with bloodthirsty anticipation.

In the darkness, Shen's heartbeat resounded like thunder.

"No, they will never do it again," Samus said softly. "From this day forward, they will cherish every single moment of their lives."

"As long as they survive to see the next day, the morning sunlight will be the most brilliant and warmest Radiance in their lives. But this is conditional."

Samus loosened its paws, letting them hang naturally beside its bent hooves.

The Daemon roared.

"The prerequisite is that there must be a hero to save them!"

Shen stared at it indifferently.

In the darkness, his non-existent Shadow began to burn.

Then the steam dissipated, the mist vanished, and the black armor and chains, engulfed in the boiling molten iron, turned into pale ashes and fell away completely. What was revealed beneath was not a bare chest, but another kind of armor.

A type of armor somewhere between flesh and steel, its grotesque appearance resembling the ritual armor unearthed from ancient times.

In the past, priests wore similar garments, smeared their faces with blood, and received the authority of the gods, reciting ancient prayers during human sacrifices.

But Shen said nothing. The pitch-black flames slowly enveloped his face, burning his flesh and blood, turning everything to ashes in the rising black smoke.

In the end, only a white yet grotesque bone remained in place, with wisps of black smoke, still burning, escaping from the empty eye sockets and the finely fitted, inhuman-looking teeth.

The mark of the Chaos Star appeared silently beneath his feet, one of its points shining brightly, pulsating incessantly in crimson, each pulsation accompanied by a thunderous roar.

Like a heart buried beneath the ground, just pulled from the chest of an enemy, still bleeding fresh, waiting for a sharp blade to pierce it.

What was once Shen began to roar in the darkness.

--

Sevatar slowly put on his helmet.

He had a private armory, which he didn't want himself, but after generations of his Chapter brothers persuaded him to do so, Sevatar set up such a place for himself.

He still doesn't like it here.

In his view, the room served no purpose other than to project an unnecessary sense of authority and special status; he didn't have so many weapons that he needed a private armory to store them separately.

After all, over the past ten thousand years, he had stored all the weapons he had captured and been rewarded with in the Chapter's armory. New recruits with excellent training results could receive them, veterans could receive them, and the elite soldiers of the combat company were required to each have a finely crafted weapon.

Furthermore, Sevatar did not leave the Chapter in financial straits.

Backed by Nostramo and numerous connections within the Imperium, they simply cannot afford to be poor. Although the Adamantium ore produced in Nostramo can no longer be traded or given away, there is no problem consuming it internally.

So, what exactly is the purpose of this private armory?

Sevatar glanced down at the Servitor who was holding the chainsaw and looking at him, then extended his right hand. The Servitor respectfully lowered his head and, following the pre-programmed procedure, raised both hands, reverently handing over his weapon.

The Servo-skull began playing prayers and triumphant epics from within the Ecclesiarchy. As the sacred chants sang, Sevatar grasped his weapon. Then, a dazzling golden light showered down from above his head.

These are the remains of devout believers who voluntarily donated their remains after death.

Sevatar suppressed his urge to flee immediately, letting the golden ashes fall on him before leaving the armory.

The war was no longer the one he once knew; the power of faith prevailed. Although he had refused the Ecclesiarchy's offer to send a chaplain to the Nightfall, he couldn't stop them from sending these devout remains time and time again.

They are useful to Daemon, and not just to Daemon. With that in mind, Night Lords are perhaps the Chapter in the entire galaxy that needs them the most.

Thinking of this, Sevatar chuckled lightly, devoid of any real smile, but filled with sarcasm. He suppressed this emotion and quietly made his way to the boarding deck.

In the dark hangar, the eight squadrons of Night Lords waited silently, eight flags fluttering gently above their heads. These flags, weathered by millennia of wind and frost, were worn and tattered, stained with blood, yet they still hung there untouched.

Sevatar glanced up at them, said nothing, and casually tossed the chainsaw. A veteran from the First Company immediately caught it, as if it were nothing new to him.

Then, Jago Sevatarion's signature hoarse voice echoed throughout the massive hangar.

"Ten thousand years."

He said this, and then slowly took off his helmet. His pale face showed only calmness, without a trace of his former frivolity and indulgence.

"I often gaze at my own face in the mirror, yet I see no trace of aging. I am exactly the same as I was ten thousand years ago, not even a single scar has appeared."

"Time has been far too generous to me; my physical functions have not weakened over these long years, and my strength and speed have never diminished. The only problem is that time has not changed my soul."

"My perspective on the world hasn't changed much in the same way I did ten thousand years ago; I still tend to treat the world the way I did in the past. That's why I remember each and every one of you. I personally carved the tombstones and epitaphs of every person who died in these ten thousand years."

"I watched your predecessors pass the selection process, enter the Chapter, undergo surgery, and finally don the armor to become Night Lords. Then, I watched them die, in various ways."

"Post-war data reports fail to capture the loss of countless lives. They were submitted to the Departmento Munitorum, earning numerous awards and honors in return, but who remembers those who died?"

Sevatar smiled.

"Only I remember," he said softly. "I remember them, and then it's you again. The cycle repeats itself. I watched you pass the selections, undergo training, survive the modification surgeries, become Night Lords, and finally stand here, ready to step into hell."

His smile began to widen, a smile the Night Lords had never seen before. In their memory, Jago Sevatarion had never smiled. At least not like this, a genuine, heartfelt smile.

"But no matter what the final outcome is, I will always remember you."

He raised his right hand and pounded his chest. "Yes, Jago Sevatarion will remember all of you. And if we win and he returns, I will introduce you all to him. He will know you, he will remember you, just as I have."

No one spoke; only the neat, gleaming light emanating from the crimson eyepieces filled the air.

Sevatar raised his hands and put the helmet back on.

"Now, get ready. We're about to enter hell."