Andrew's Company

719.m41, Palatos Hive, Deep Hive.

As the captain of the 2nd Company of the 3rd Regiment, 2nd Brigade of the Sixth Special Operations Division, Andrew's assigned mission was to plug the passageway leading from the abandoned waterway further into the Deep Hive.

Once, this place had been where the hive city discharged its wastewater. After losing control, the nobles had chosen another waterway for the wastewater, blocking this one off.

The nobles did so to reduce the resources delivered to the Deep Hive, attempting to starve the rebelling rabble to death.

This waterway was massive, with a radius close to a hundred meters, and more than spacious enough for ten Chimera Armored Vehicles to pass side by side. The surrounding walls and ground were caked with centuries of grime, exuding a pungent odor.

A multitude of bifurcated pipelines also branched out along both sides, ranging from half a meter to dozens of meters in diameter, forming a dense underground network.

This place was occupied by a remnant of the old Ecclesiarchy, an extremist cult named the Purifying Fire Cult. The mission of the Sixth Special Operations Division was to annihilate this extremist faction.

To prevent the war of annihilation from turning into a chase, the 6th Division had preemptively deployed troops to guard all possible passages, completely cutting off the extremist cult's retreat.

This was why Andrew had been assigned here.

His 2nd Company's main sector of fire was directed deeper into the Deep Hive, responsible for intercepting any new enemies that might emerge from the depths of the Deep Hive.

This sort of thing had occurred multiple times during previous clearings, becoming almost routine.

Behind him was the 3rd Company, whose main sector of fire was directed at the Purifying Fire Cult to prevent them from fleeing deeper into the Deep Hive.

At this moment, half a day had passed since Andrew led the 2nd Company to complete their deployment.

The 6th Division's general offensive had already begun, but apart from the sound of rumbling artillery, it was dead silent over on his side.

Having nothing to do, the company's master sergeant and quartermaster sergeant started chatting with Andrew: "Captain, I heard you used to serve in the Astra Militarum, is that true? How does the Astra Militarum compare to us?"

He looked at the company's three Chimera Family Vehicles, then glanced at the dozen or so Sapper Exoskeletons placed to the side, and shook his head.

"There's no comparison at all. The regiment I was in back then was an infantry regiment; the whole regiment only had a few Chimeras at the regimental headquarters, and everyone else went on foot. Nothing like it is now."

Thinking of his company's current situation and training standards, he dared to bet that ninety-nine out of a hundred Astra Militarum regiments of the same scale couldn't beat his company.

You must know that starting from the squad level, the Special Operations Division had a Chimera as a transport and fire support vehicle, and the nine dismounted infantrymen were all equipped with exoskeletons and bolters, plus a heavy bolter as squad heavy firepower.

Which Astra Militarum squad would dare fight against this kind of equipment? And he heard that heavy bolters would later be replaced with plasma weapons boasting even stronger armor-piercing capabilities, making it even harder for the Astra Militarum to fight.

A platoon had three squads, and including the platoon headquarters' Chimera, there were a total of four Chimeras.

As for the company level, it was even more insane.

Aside from the twelve Chimeras of various types across the three platoons, the company headquarters also had a Chimera Command Vehicle, a Camelot Fire Support Vehicle, and a Salamander Scout.

In addition to that, the company headquarters had a directly attached support platoon.

This included a heavy firepower platoon with three Camelotoxes, whose battle cannons could tackle both vehicles and fortifications.

An anti-aircraft platoon with two Camelotoxes, whose quad-barrel light autocannons were useless against high-altitude aircraft, but worked exceptionally well against light infantry and low-altitude vehicles.

A mortar platoon with three Griffin self-propelled mortars, which were heavy mortars mounted on Chimera chassis to provide artillery support.

Finally, there was a maintenance and supply platoon with two Trojan Support Vehicles, responsible for battlefield repairs and transporting ammunition.

His single company alone possessed twenty-eight vehicles of the Chimera Vehicle Family.

One had to remember that the Chimera came equipped with a fixed heavy bolter, and its turret could mount different fire support weapons such as an autocannon, twin-linked heavy bolter, flamethrower, or multi-laser.

Moreover, the Special Operations Division didn't just rely on equipment; their training intensity, organizational discipline, and combat will were also exceptionally fierce.

With just this single company, Andrew could make the Astra Militarum regiment he used to serve in howl in pain, and even had the confidence to completely annihilate and capture the entire regiment.

The quartermaster sergeant looked somewhat unconvinced: "Really? Didn't they say the Astra Militarum often fights in coordination with Astartes battle-brothers? Our brigade previously exercised with a company of Astartes battle-brothers and got beaten so badly we almost took a shutout. If someone hadn't gone desperate and stuffed a melta into a vehicle to ram them, I'm afraid our whole brigade would have had to do remedial training."

Recalling the previous exercise, Andrew couldn't help feeling speechless at the quartermaster sergeant's newborn calf fearless of the tiger.

A brigade of only around 6,000 men encountered a company of Astartes in a complex underground environment, where their own army aviation lost its utility, there were no allied troop reinforcements, and the Astartes even had dedicated transport vehicles.

Under these circumstances, the entire brigade had stalemated with the Astartes for over a day.

In the end, communications signals were intercepted, exposing the brigade headquarters' location and resulting in the entire command post being wiped out in one fell swoop. This also reversely locked down the locations of each battalion and company, causing them to be defeated in detail while lacking command and communications.

Even under such circumstances, some diehards relied on heavily modified Chimeras, under the cover of allies, to rush right in front of the Astartes carrying a vehicle full of meltas, achieving a one-for-five trade.

Andrew didn't know how anyone else viewed this result, but he had certainly been startled at the time.

According to that casualty-exchange ratio, even in that kind of heaven-defying close-quarters meat grinder environment where artillery and army aviation were entirely prohibited, a single Special Operations Division could trade away an entire Astartes company.

Ah, I'm so scared.jpg

Therefore, Andrew leaned toward the belief that the Astartes battle-brothers had held back to give them some face.

However, he now looked down a bit on his old employer, and pontificated loftily, "When I served in the Astra Militarum, there was no such thing as the conditions you have. Vitamin pills were used freely, there were gene-seeds of Tempestus Scions to use, and everyone got a vehicle to ride in and a bolter to use."

"Back in my day, most of the Astra Militarum were just cannon fodder used to plug gaps in the line; only a handful of elites were qualified to dictate the battlefield situation. Nothing like you lot nowadays, oh."

"Damn, an old-timer!" the master sergeant bantered, handing Andrew a small protein block. "Here, old-timer, I toast you."

Andrew took the protein block with his newly installed left prosthetic hand and tossed it into his mouth to chew, only to see the master sergeant and quartermaster sergeant wearing mischievous grins.

He raised an eyebrow: "Why are you smiling so wretchedly?"

The two exchanged glances, and the quartermaster sergeant said mysteriously, "Captain, do you know what the raw material for protein blocks is?"

"As long as it's not human meat, I don't care what it is." Andrew looked speechless; these little brutes had seen nothing of the world and actually thought he would lose his composure over something like this?

Sure enough, they had been living too well and hadn't been forged by harsh battlefields.

"Uh..." The quartermaster sergeant was choked by Andrew's words.

There were currently two sources for protein blocks: chemical synthesis and animal breeding.

The raw material for animal breeding was a genetically modified animal resembling a cockroach. It could eat almost all organic matter, whether promethium, plastic, cellulose, or anything else; as long as it was organic, it could ingest it and convert it into meat.

Not only could it serve as livestock, but it could also double as a garbage disposal station.

The quartermaster sergeant had visited breeding farms a few times, and it was safe to say it gave him, an underhiver, a dose of industrial shock.

So much so that a doubt arose in his heart: Can this stuff really be eaten?

However, seeing Captain Andrew's calm and composed appearance, it was clear he had known all along.

A sense of respect couldn't help but well up in his heart: "As expected of an old-timer!"

Right at that moment, however, movement came from the depths of the Deep Hive.

"Waaagh!"