Compared to the Lamenters, who could at least maintain contact with Imperial Factions and receive some support and supplies, the Mantis Warriors' logistics could only be described as tragic.
As a region directly facing the heart of the Maelstrom, the Warp Routes of the Endymion Star Cluster were exceptionally chaotic, leaving it almost isolated from Imperial Territory. Naturally, delivering Imperial supplies there was extremely difficult.
Most Imperial Worlds here were feudal worlds. Although the Mantis Warriors were practically the masters of this star cluster, its backward productive capacity could not provide them with logistical supplies.
More importantly, as successors of the White Scars' bloodline and a successor Chapter of the Marauder Chapter, they had inherited neither the White Scars' nor the Marauders' bold and forthright nature. Instead, they were like taciturn Rangers, silently guarding their little patch of Endymion.
They had almost no contact with other Imperial Factions. The only force with which they maintained long-term cooperation was the Deathwatch Chapter, and together they fought all manner of Xenos enemies in the Maelstrom Zone.
But even the Deathwatch could not provide the Mantis Warriors with sufficient supplies.
As time passed, the Mantis Warriors Chapter grew poorer and poorer.
By now, they were even running increasingly short of the various drugs used to assist in transforming recruits. They had no choice but to let reserve recruits fight alongside them for extended periods without augmentation, using this to select better candidates and ensure the success rate of the augmentation surgeries.
It was precisely this practice, along with the chivalrous spirit inherited from the White Scars' bloodline, that allowed the Mantis Warriors to get along ever better with the ordinary people of the Endymion Star Cluster. Many myths and legends about the Mantis Warriors had even arisen spontaneously among the locals.
Thus, under these circumstances, the Mantis Warriors were somewhat subdued when faced with the Astral Claws Chapter that had come from afar.
Carl, commander of the 2nd Company, did not mind. After exchanging greetings, she handed the gift list to Chapter Master Saris.
Like Forlorn, Saris was troubled by supply issues. When he saw the contents of the list, the lavish offer left him dizzy.
But unlike Forlorn, he fell silent for a moment before asking, "What is the meaning of this equipment?"
"These are merely gifts." Carl was unsurprised. "However, Chapter Master Huron does hope that your Chapter can send forces to fight alongside us. We especially need your intelligence."
As an ancient Chapter rooted in the Maelstrom for thousands of years, even though they had long operated only within the Endymion Star Cluster, they still possessed a vast amount of information on the Maelstrom.
In particular, they knew the specific locations of those Human Pirate fleets and even pirate kingdoms.
Huron had no desire to let the Raider Fleet wander around relying on luck. He would rather attack their bases directly, wipe out their fleets in one stroke, and loot their homes while he was at it.
That was the Astral Claws' underlying logic.
Saris looked over the three hundred sets of basic equipment and the ammunition counted in tens of thousands, especially the ten Land Raiders, then nodded in agreement.
"We can send three Companies, one Strike Cruiser, and two Frigates. We can also share our Maelstrom intelligence, so long as your Chapter can guarantee our supplies."
As expected, Saris also gave up the right to divide the spoils.
Though taciturn and independent, the spirit of chivalry still ran through the Mantis Warriors' blood.
Besides, accepting another's gifts made it hard to demand more.
The gifts sent by the Astral Claws were nearly worth half the Chapter's assets apart from its fleet. Faced with such a generous offering, he had no face to continue asking for spoils.
Or rather, he had already tacitly accepted that these gifts were the compensation.
Quack! Don't get me punched by the Chapter Master!
Carl was somewhat speechless. She had not even opened her mouth, yet the other side had given up on its own.
Just divide the spoils properly!
After a period of negotiations, Hans and Carl finally dragged the two stubborn bulls back on track. They agreed to distribute the spoils according to military merit, with the Mantis Warriors' intelligence serving as an important part of the overall framework for calculating that merit.
As for the more detailed distribution plan, because Astrotelepathy kept cutting in and out, Saris and Forlorn accompanied the fleets each had dispatched, preparing to head to Badab to negotiate with Huron.
As they each prepared to depart, because of the Maelstrom's Warp influence, it was already 720.M41 on Badab.
After a year of development, Palatos Hive had changed drastically.
The Auxilia's training had never stopped. Over the past year, six batches totaling more than eight billion Auxilia had graduated, and the Badab Government's control over the entire planet had reached an unprecedented level.
Not all of those eight billion Auxilia were residents of Palatos Hive. A considerable portion came from the other thirteen Hive Cities, specifically to strengthen control over those other hives.
After a census, the combined population of all Hive Cities across Badab was estimated at nearly seventy billion, almost half again as much as the fifty billion recorded on paper.
Even so, the Badab Government had completely grasped control of those seventy billion people. Rather than compromising with the nobles, it had trained the Auxilia from scratch by itself.
Two years ago, Odinson had still been worried about how to govern Palatos Hive, racking his brains over where to find one billion or more lower-level officials.
Now, there was no need to worry about that. There were more than enough hands.
But his workload had only increased, not decreased. And it was not because the government's territory had expanded, but because there were simply too many damned bastards to kill.
Because it had neither compromised with the nobles nor relied on the old administrative system they had built, the new government put every noble and their retainers on trial.
More than one billion of those beasts and bastards alone deserved execution.
This horrifying proportion was even more frightening than the great purge Huron remembered, yet he approved the figure without hesitation and issued the execution order in his capacity as sector governor.
Because he had already been merciful, merciful, and merciful again.
Taking the setting of this world and the actual conditions of each Hive City into account, the relevant legal standards had been lowered again and again.
Involuntary manslaughter received life imprisonment at most. Crimes of passion were sentenced to life whenever possible. Even for smuggling and selling narcotics, Huron swallowed his disgust and tried to sentence those bastards to life imprisonment if the quantities were small, the offenses infrequent, and the harm limited.
Yet even after all those concessions, more than one billion beasts and bastards were still sentenced to death.
After reading the relevant charges and crimes, Huron chose to personally issue the order sending those who should have long since died to hell.
The Battle Sister incident that had driven him into such a frenzy that he chose to seize power by force was practically routine in those reports. Similar incidents numbered in the billions.
That was without mentioning all the other charges and crimes whose mere written descriptions sent his blood pressure soaring.
The Chapter's and government's other senior figures agreed, and quite a few Tiger Claws even felt that too few were being killed.
With unanimous approval from the senior leadership, and with almost no one in the entire government system holding any goodwill toward the nobles, the relevant orders were naturally carried out strictly.
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