Lamenters

Ashes, plague, and the final weeping.

Malakim Phoros knelt in the mud.

This mud is not a creation of water and earth, but a blasphemous mixture of rotten flesh and blood, broken Ceramite, and eternally decaying soil blessed by Nurgle.

Every breath burned his lungs.

The air was thick with a sweet, putrid stench—the smell of the plague flowers blooming on the bodies of Nurgle Cultist, and the fermenting odor of exposed wounds.

It is the lingering feeling left after a complete death.

His only remaining left arm gripped the Power Sword "Blade of Sorrow," the energy field on the blade flickering like the heartbeat of a dying man.

At the severed area of his right shoulder, a temporary clotting agent had barely sealed the artery, but with each heartbeat, beads of blood still seeped out, mixing with rainwater.

If that pale yellow, acidic liquid could still be called rain, it flowed down the peeling red and gold armor.

Red was once the color of glory.

Gold was once a symbol of pride.

Now all that remains is faded shame and an indelible stain.

Three hours ago, the Lamenters still had an intact position.

That was the third continent of an unnamed world on the edge of the Maelstrom; its coordinates were meaningless, and its strategic value was negligible.

They shouldn't be here, just as they shouldn't exist anywhere in the Imperium.

The route of the Penitent Crusade was imposed, drawn by the cold will of the Inquisition.

Like a hook piercing flesh, it dragged these Sons of Sanguinius, burdened with the name of "traitors," through the darkest and most dangerous territories of the Imperium.

"We covered the civilians' evacuation, and then we left."

At the pre-war meeting, Malakim said in a hoarse voice, like sandpaper rubbing against Ceramite, "We do not seek victory, only survival."

What a ridiculous request.

Their Chapter cry was, "For those I cherish, I choose to die with honor."

For Space Marines, survival is never the goal, but merely an occasional byproduct of achieving it.

Their purpose was death—to die for the Emperor, to die for the Primarch, to die for humanity.

But Malakim was tired of death; he had witnessed too much.

Three hundred names, three hundred faces, three hundred brothers who survived the Badab War, now only one hundred and twenty-seven remain standing before him.

No, it's not a station.

It was leaning against the broken bunker, kneeling on the ground adjusting the last remaining Bolter, and using an oil-stained mechanical hand to repair the crack in the breastplate.

Everyone carries wounds, everyone is missing some organ or limb, and everyone has experienced at least three potentially fatal injuries.

Those Lamenters have no Apothecary.

The last Apothecary melted during the encounter with the Kraken Hive Fleet while trying to salvage three tubes of Gene-seed from the acid of the Devourer.

They had no Techmarine — the Techmarine had been taken by the Minotaurs Chapter along with the flagship, the Sorrow.

They had no Librarian — the Chief Librarian, while suppressing the group's erupting Black Rage, had his own soul swallowed by the abyss.

They had nothing but each other and a fading hope:

Perhaps one day, the atonement will end; perhaps one day, the Imperium will accept them back; perhaps one day, they will be able to stand under Baal's sky.

It wasn't for the sake of fighting, but simply to see the world where Sanguinius was born.

Then the Red Corsairs arrived.

It was not a surprise attack, nor a probing strike.

It was a complete warband of 1,500 Nurgle Cultist, armed with rotting ships, plague weapons, and blasphemous war machines.

They descended from the sky, like a disease suddenly erupting in healthy tissue—if the Lamenters can still be called "healthy."

"For my loving father!"

The traitors' battle cries echoed through the communication channel, their plague-modified vocal cords emitting a wet, gurgling sound, "Offer the blood of angels!"

The first wave of contact lasted seventeen minutes.

Twenty-three people were killed in the Lamenters.

Malakim personally led the counterattack, his Power Sword decapitating five Plague Marine, the sixth's axe embedding itself in his shoulder armor.

He felt the sound of his collarbone shattering as he snapped the traitor's neck.

"Chapter Master, the eastern defensive line has collapsed!"

The voice of Third Company Captain Castor came through the communication, followed by the roar of a Bolter Bolter, then an abrupt silence.

Malakim didn't have time to confirm Castor's fate.

He rushed eastward and saw a scene of hell: thirty Lamenters were surrounded by two hundred Red Corsairs, while Plague Marine advanced unhurriedly, enjoying the slaughter.

A young warrior— Malakim remembers him as Aelius, who had only Chapter forty-two years and was still a child.

The child was now being held down by three Nurgle Cultist, who were using rusty daggers to pry open his breastplate, not to kill him, but to stuff live maggots into his chest cavity.

Malakim unleashed the speed of the Sons of Sanguinius, his Power Sword slicing through the air with golden arcs.

Three heads flew up.

He pulled Aelius up, the boy's eyes filled with pure fear, a harbinger of the Black Rage, and also its end.

"Hold the formation!"

Malakim roared, but his voice was drowned out by a barrage of slime cannon fire.

Yellowish-green corrosive liquid spilled onto the battlefield, the Ceramite armor hissed, and flesh melted into pus.

A Lamenters screamed and scratched at his helmet—corrosive fluid had seeped into the seams.

Malakim watched his brother fall, watched him be consumed by his own panic and pain.

That was Gorgis, the tenth squad leader, a warrior who single-handedly defended the passage for four hours during the Badab War and repelled three attacks by the minotaurs.

Now he rolls in the mud, his fingernails digging into his eye sockets, until his brains spill out from between his fingers.

The Nurgle Cultist laughed.

The laughter sounded like the squeezing of a festering wound.

Malakim felt a burning Red Thirst deep in his throat.

That's not a metaphor.

It's a physical burning sensation, a thirst, a primal craving for blood.

The curse of all Sanguinius' children is not apparent in the Lamenters.

Perhaps it was because of the Cursed Founding by the Adeptus Mechanicus that they developed a certain resistance to the genetic diseases of this Chapter at the genetic level.

But when things reach this point of despair, that little bit of resistance is no longer effective.

He bit his tongue, using the pain to suppress his desire.

The taste of blood spread in his mouth, only intensifying his craving.

"Chapter Master, we need reinforcements on the west flank!"

The voice of the lieutenant Redma came through, accompanied by the roar of Chainsword tearing through flesh.

Malakim turned westward, each step treading on the corpses of his brothers.

He saw Redma —the always optimistic old soldier who, even in the darkest moments of the Badab War, would tell the story of Sanguinius flying high over Terra.

Redma is now leaning against a wrecked Rhino, his left leg missing below the knee. He is using Bolter for support and wielding Chainsword that is now only half intact in his right hand.

Five Plague Marine surrounded him, not in a hurry to kill him, but toying with him.

One pulled at his intestines with a rusty hook, while the other struck his helmet with a dull knife.

"Come on, you traitor!"

Redma roared, "Come and face the Emperor's wrath!"

"For those we cherish, we choose to die with honor!"