Recaps

Li Dadan and Li Zhongdan survived a Harpy dive attack with help from Hydra Flak Cannons and a Shield Knight, then destroyed the attackers with their laser rifles. The remaining Calidans turned toward a Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight and Luca.

• Two Harpies were killed by laser fire, and four others began diving attacks on valuable targets.
• Knight Guard crews fired Hydra Flak Cannons, shredding the accompanying Gargoyles and damaging the diving Harpies.
• The Harpies fired bio-plasma blasts at Li Dadan and Li Zhongdan, but a Shield Knight’s void shield blocked them.
• Li Dadan and Li Zhongdan fired their cooled laser rifles and killed both Harpies.
• The last two Calidans targeted a Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight and Luca.

Luca fought off a Harpy’s plasma blast with a perfectly timed Ion Shield, but the creature followed with a claw attack aimed at his Knight Mech’s chest. Elsewhere, another Harpy destroyed a Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight before being shot down.

• A Harpy tore apart an isolated Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight, then the battlefield’s Hydra Flak Cannons and Heavy Cannon Knights shot it down.
• The destroyed Knight’s heroic spirit returned to the Emperor Shrine, while its wrecked Throne Mechanicum and mechanical head appeared beyond repair.
• Luca killed a second Tyranid Saint with his Giant Sword, and Gargoyles swarmed his Knight Mech to obscure his vision as a Harpy attacked.
• Luca heard the Harpy approaching and raised an Ion Shield at the right moment, perfectly blocking its Bio-Plasma Cannon blast.
• The Harpy plunged toward Luca and drove its bio-molecular-force-field claws at his Knight Mech’s chest.

Luca beheaded a Harpy but was struck by its headless body and split in half, forcing the Sword and Shield Knights to rescue his upper half while abandoning his legs. He left the battlefield lamenting the loss of his lower half, and a knight suggested having a youngster build him new legs.

• Luca dodged the Harpy's diving attack and beheaded it with his Giant Sword.
• Luca stabbed the Harpy's severed head, unaware that its headless body was still moving.
• The Harpy's body attacked Luca, and its Monomolecular Blade split his chassis in two despite Luca cutting the creature in half.
• Tyranids swarmed Luca while the Sword and Shield Knights killed the Carnifex and pulled his upper half to safety.
• The Knights abandoned Luca's lower half to the Tyranids, and Luca shouted about his missing ass as they carried him away.

Li Qinwu and his forces retook the Great Wall, killing more than a hundred Tyranid Saints and forcing the Hive Mind to withdraw. As Li Qinwu proposed an advance toward the equator, the Grand Marshal showed him footage of Cultists slaughtering Tyranid Saints and collecting their bright red blood.

• Six Emperor's Poison Blade Tanks deployed from Drop Pods and destroyed a Tyranid Saint with coordinated fire.
• Li Qinwu and Bruce Crocodile drove their disguised Scorpion Tank onto a warehouse roof, where Li Qinwu killed several Tyranid Saints with its pulse cannons.
• Li Qinwu's forces and the Astra Militarum wiped out the Tyranids that had breached the Great Wall, and the local troops reclaimed the fortification.
• The Hive Mind withdrew after losing more than a hundred Tyranid Saints, and Li Qinwu asked the Grand Marshal to support a counteroffensive toward the equator.
• The Grand Marshal showed Li Qinwu footage of Cultists stabbing Tyranid Saints to death and carrying away the bright red blood from their bodies.

The grand marshal told Li Qinwu that Cultists were hunting Tyranid Saints to gather energy for summoning a Blood Daemon into Realspace. Li Qinwu ordered an immediate northward offensive to destroy the Tyranids before the Cultists could complete the summoning.

• The grand marshal explained that the Cultists needed to hunt increasingly powerful prey to gather energy for their brass cauldron.
• Li Qinwu watched footage of Tyranid Saints hatching and Cultists charging into Tyranid territory to kill them and collect their bright-red blood.
• Li Qinwu concluded that the Cultists’ hunts had restarted the process of opening a Daemon Portal.
• Li Qinwu decided to launch an immediate offensive north, while the Cultists attacked the Equator from the north, to trap and destroy the Tyranids.
• The grand marshal said he had assembled a billion troops, equipped them with protective suits and flamethrowers, and would support Li Qinwu’s assault.

Li Qinwu's mechanized forces and the Lord Marshal's Astra Militarum launched a counteroffensive against the Tyranids on Thunder Saint Alliance. Led by 100 Knight Mechs, the advancing spearhead reached the equator, leaving humanity's push against the swarm in progress.

• Li Qinwu sent 400,000 Fleet Iron Guards north toward the equator alongside the Lord Marshal's Astra Militarum.
• The chapter described how Fleet Iron Guard Armor and weapons let soldiers march for long periods, resist Tyranid spores, and deliver sustained firepower.
• Li Qinwu organized Fleet Iron Guards into three-man groups and ten-man squads, while Saint Raiser judged them outmatched by veteran Astartes but valuable as support.
• The 100 Knight Mechs led the attack as Fleet Iron Guards, tanks, and armored vehicles swept the flanks, destroying Tyranids with lasers, missiles, and flamethrowers.
• Humanity's spearhead advanced from the foot of the Great Wall to the equator, with Titans killing large Tyranids and Fleet Iron Guards clearing smaller ones.

Li Qinwu's forces pushed into the Tyranid ecosystem at the Equator and began burning its structures, while Lord Titus reported that he had destroyed the Tyranid fleet. Titus warned that the stranded Tyranids might spend their vast reserves of biomass on desperate biological weapons, leaving Li Qinwu facing an uncertain threat.

• The Spirit Knight Order and Fleet Iron Guard entered the Tyranid ecosystem and attacked its chambers, pools, and defenses with plasma, guns, and flames.
• Li Qinwu fired his Scorpion Tank's Pulse Cannons and instantly killed two Tyranid Saints.
• Titus contacted Li Qinwu and reported that he had destroyed the Tyranid fleet and would reach the surface in one day.
• Titus warned that the Tyranids might use their stored biomass to create powerful biological weapons now that they could no longer evacuate it.
• Li Qinwu scanned the ecosystem and saw Digestive Pools packed with biomass, then wondered what the Hive Mind would produce with it.

Li Qinwu’s forces burned their way along the Equator and advanced into the Anti-Aircraft Tower, where the Fleet Iron Guard fought through the Tyranids. The Grand Marshal then reported a new Tyranid creature attacking the army, and Li Qinwu identified it as a Zoanthrope.

• Li Qinwu’s forces used flamethrowers and napalm bombers to set the Tyranid biosphere along the Equator ablaze.
• Li Qinwu’s forces reached the Anti-Aircraft Tower and sent the Fleet Iron Guard into the skyscraper district to lead the assault.
• The Fleet Iron Guard used rapid-fire laser cannons, rockets, and jetpacks to fight off Tyranids and push through nearly half the city.
• The Grand Marshal showed Li Qinwu a video of a Tyranid creature destroying Leman Russ tanks and killing Astra Militarum soldiers from above.
• Li Qinwu recognized the creature as a Zoanthrope.

Li Qinwu learned that Tyranid Zoanthropes were devastating psychic attackers and ordered his forces to withdraw from the city and form a defensive line. When a Zoanthrope emerged, he destroyed it with a surprise shot from his Scorpion Tank’s Twin-linked Pulse Cannon.

• A video showed a Zoanthrope withstand thousands of Lasgun shots, blast hundreds of Astra Militarum infantry, and hurl a Leman Russ tank to pieces.
• Li Qinwu recognized that the Tyranids were deploying Zoanthropes in large numbers and warned his forces to retreat beyond the city.
• The mechanized army evacuated the city and formed a defensive line centered on the Spirit Knight Order, tanks, and armored vehicles.
• Li Qinwu spotted a Zoanthrope floating out from behind a skyscraper and identified its Psychic Shield.
• Li Qinwu fired both barrels of his Twin-linked Pulse Cannon before the Zoanthrope could reinforce its shield, destroying it and piercing several buildings behind it.

Li Qinwu faced a Brain Bug Tyrant leading thirty Zoanthropes and discovered that its Psychic Shield could reflect attacks and withstand his forces’ concentrated fire. The Brain Bug Tyrant kept its shield active by using the ordinary Zoanthropes as psychic buffers, leaving Li Qinwu’s army unable to break through.

• Li Qinwu spotted thirty Zoanthropes emerging behind a skyscraper, followed by a Brain Bug Tyrant.
• Li Qinwu fired the Scorpion Tank’s Twin-linked Pulse Cannon at the Brain Bug Tyrant, but its Reflective Prism shield reflected the beams and melted the tank’s turret.
• Li Qinwu and Bruce Crocodile escaped the wreck, and Li Qinwu ordered his force to focus fire on the Brain Bug Tyrant.
• The Brain Bug Tyrant linked itself to the thirty Zoanthropes and raised a vast Psychic Shield that blocked the army’s barrage.
• Li Qinwu realized the Brain Bug Tyrant was using the Zoanthropes as buffers to keep its Psychic Power from overloading it.

The Zoanthrope Tyrant routed most of Li Qinwu’s Fleet Iron Guard with its Fear Aura and devastated the battlefield with a Psychic Storm. Bruce Crocodile revealed that Psychic Reversal could exploit the psychic links between the Tyrant and every Zoanthrope on the planet, but Li Qinwu still needed a way to hit it.

• The Zoanthrope Tyrant used Fear Aura to panic the Fleet Iron Guard, and Li Qinwu ordered those who could not endure it to retreat.
• The Tyrant unleashed a Psychic Storm that knocked down several Knight Mechs and destroyed more than twenty armored vehicles.
• Li Qinwu realized the Tyrant was using ordinary Zoanthropes to bear the strain of its psychic attacks, after one of them died from the burden.
• Bruce Crocodile stopped Li Qinwu from retreating and showed him the psychic links connecting the Tyrant to Zoanthropes around the world.
• Bruce Crocodile told Li Qinwu that striking the Tyrant with Psychic Reversal could trigger a chain reaction and kill every Zoanthrope on the planet.

Li Qinwu and Bruce Crocodile tried to find a way to kill the Brain Bug Tyrant by disrupting its psychic attack, but its mass buffs drove the Tyranids through the defensive line. Bruce Crocodile revealed that Troy was already with him, leaving Li Qinwu furious as the Brain Bug Tyrant prepared another spell.

• Li Qinwu considered using Psychic Reversal to kill the Brain Bug Tyrant and shatter the planet's synapse creatures, but its Psychic Blast hurled five Knight Mechs aside and severely damaged five more.
• Bruce Crocodile explained that the Brain Bug Tyrant's Psychic Shield briefly weakened after it cast, but Li Qinwu said he could not strike accurately with enough power within the 0.01-second opening.
• The Brain Bug Tyrant buffed millions of Tyranids with Psychic Shields and increased their speed, forcing the Knight Mechs and Fleet Iron Guard to give ground.
• Bruce Crocodile said Troy could perform Psychic Reversal, and Li Qinwu objected that his five-year-old son was aboard the warship Fortune and could not reach the battlefield in time.
• Bruce Crocodile opened his maw, revealing Troy floating in a dark space and playing with his custom Switch, and Li Qinwu grabbed him by the neck and demanded to know why he had brought Troy onto the battlefield.

Li Qinwu discovered that Troy had been brought onto the battlefield inside Bruce Crocodile’s Beast God Space, then enlisted him to break the Brain Bug Tyrant’s Psychic Shield. Troy seized the brief opening after the Tyrant attacked and copied its Heat Ray, firing the spell back at it.

• Li Qinwu scolded Bruce Crocodile for bringing Troy to the battlefield, and Bruce explained that Troy was safe inside his Beast God Space and more comfortable there.
• Bruce Crocodile brought Troy to his throat, where he controlled Bruce’s body like a protective suit while remaining shielded from the fungal spores.
• Li Qinwu asked Troy to strike the Brain Bug Tyrant during the brief moment its Psychic Shield weakened, and Troy began drawing psychic power from Li Qinwu and Bruce Crocodile.
• The Brain Bug Tyrant cast Heat Ray, destroying armored vehicles, vaporizing Fleet Iron Guard soldiers, and crippling Knight Mechs.
• When the Tyrant’s shield briefly weakened, Troy copied its Heat Ray and fired a scarlet beam at it.

Troy killed the Brain Bug Tyrant, whose psychic explosion destroyed the Tyranid command network and turned the planet’s forces into disorganized beasts. Six hours later, Li Qinwu revived aboard Fortune and learned the Imperium was close to victory, then prepared to inspect his army’s heavy losses.

• Troy’s Heat Ray killed Li Qinwu and Bruce Crocodile, pierced the Brain Bug Tyrant’s weakened shield, and fatally wounded it.
• The Brain Bug Tyrant’s runaway psychic power killed nearby Zoanthropes before exploding and destroying Tyranid synapse creatures across the planet.
• With the Tyranids’ command network shattered, the Astra Militarum routed them and reclaimed territory near the equator.
• Li Qinwu awoke aboard Fortune six hours later and found Bruce Crocodile’s egg incubating in the Emperor Shrine.
• The captain told Li Qinwu that the Astra Militarum had taken eighty percent of the equatorial region and that Lord Titus had returned to lead the final operations.
• After learning that his forces had lost nearly a thousand Fleet Iron Guard units, almost a hundred vehicles, and several damaged Knight Mechs, Li Qinwu ordered a shuttle to the Knight Legion and asked Father Busi to assess repairs.

Li Qinwu inspected the damaged Knight Mechs and planned repairs, including taking Luca and a destroyed Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight to Agricultural World 496B. Nova confronted him over her share of the losses and uncovered that he had taken five-year-old Troy onto the battlefield.

• Busi reported that seven King Knights needed major frame repairs, three needed replacement legs, and the Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight could not be repaired with their current technology.
• Li Qinwu found Luca's Lancer Knight Mech badly damaged and learned its lower half, including its mechanical ass, had been destroyed.
• Li Qinwu ordered Luca's machine and the Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight loaded for transport to Agricultural World 496B, while Busi gave him specifications for the other repairs.
• Nova blocked Li Qinwu and demanded an account of the damage to the Knight Mechs she partly owned.
• Li Qinwu admitted that he had taken five-year-old Troy onto the battlefield, prompting Nova to react furiously.

Li Qinwu reassured Nova that Troy’s achievements and their growing power would earn them recognition from the Golden Lion Family when they next returned to Terra. After entrusting Troy’s future to Li Qinwu, Nova let him leave, and he returned to Agricultural World 496B with damaged Knight chassis.

• Nova asked Li Qinwu whether taking Troy back to Terra would secure recognition from the Golden Lion Family.
• Li Qinwu explained that his, Nova’s, and Troy’s status had risen greatly since their last visit and promised the family would welcome them.
• Nova chose to trust Li Qinwu and entrusted Troy’s future to him.
• Li Qinwu learned the planetary campaign was under control, with Titus leading the forces in clearing Tyranid structures before moving against the Cultists.
• Li Qinwu placed the Fleet Iron Guard and remaining Knight Mechs under Little Knife’s command for training and experience.
• Li Qinwu sent Luca’s chassis and the Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight wreckage through a Warp Portal, then teleported to Agricultural World 496B.

After visiting his family on Agricultural World 496B, Li Qinwu brought two wrecked Knight Mechs to Moon 2 and oversaw the rapid construction of two Lunar-class Cruisers for his eldest sons. The ships were progressing so quickly that they might be finished before Li Dadan and Li Zhongdan turned twenty.

• Li Qinwu visited his family, tended to his newborn fifth son, and then transported two wrecked Knight Mechs to Moon 2.
• Moon 2’s industry relied on ore mined by government ships, hired merchant fleets, and small System Craft, producing about 100 million tonnes of steel and 2,000 tonnes of adamantium each month.
• Workers on Moon 2 welded compartments onto two completed Adamantium Keels to build Lunar-class Cruisers designated Ship 1 and Ship 2.
• The Iron Skull Archmagos supervised construction, while Nightingale secured materials through trade, adamantium sales, and the purchase of 50,000 Tech-Priests’ lifetime services.
• Construction advanced rapidly, and the two cruisers might be completed before Li Dadan and Li Zhongdan turned twenty.

Li Qinwu brought two wrecked Knight Mechs to the Iron Skull Archmagos for repairs, but rebuilding the Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight risked creating abominable intelligence. To get Luca’s Lancer repaired in time for the fighting, the Iron Skull Archmagos proposed a radical upgrade that Luca and the Ancestor approved, and the repairs began.

• The Iron Skull Archmagos scanned the damaged Knight Mechs as Li Qinwu explained the battle on the Fortress World and his political reasons for joining it.
• The Iron Skull Archmagos said Luca’s Lancer could be repaired normally in under two months, but the Quadraped Heavy Cannon Knight was too damaged and dangerous to rebuild.
• Li Qinwu said he had to return to the Fortress World within a week, so the Iron Skull Archmagos offered a faster repair plan that would give Luca’s Lancer a massive upgrade.
• Li Qinwu and the Iron Skull Archmagos asked Luca for permission, and Luca consulted the Ancestor, who agreed to let them use his machine.
• The Iron Skull Archmagos summoned several thousand Tech-Priests and began the repairs.

Li Qinwu saw the Iron Skull Archmagos's Titan prototype and his enormous anti-ship plasma cannon battery. The Archmagos delayed starting the Titan, while Li Qinwu wondered whether the cannon could be mounted on the Knight Legion.

• The Iron Skull Archmagos repaired Luca's Knight Mech while Li Qinwu supplied adamantium components and arranged repairs for damaged Knight Mechs on the Fortress World.
• The Iron Skull Archmagos showed Li Qinwu an eighty-meter steel framework for a planned Warmaster-class Titan, but said he wanted to refine the design before construction.
• Li Qinwu agreed to stockpile the Titan's required resources until the Iron Skull Archmagos was ready to build it.
• The Iron Skull Archmagos demonstrated a fifteen-thousand-tonne plasma cannon battery capable of piercing nearly a hundred meters of armor, though it required extensive cooling and maintenance after firing.
• Li Qinwu wondered whether the plasma cannon battery could be mounted on the Knight Legion to strengthen the ship's weapons.

Li Qinwu arranged for a Giant Plasma Cannon to be mounted externally on the Knight Legion and oversaw Agricultural World 496B’s military and industrial development. Before leaving, he asked Nightingale to prepare supplies for Titus’s growing army and set his sights on meeting Guilliman and the Alchemists for genetic enhancement.

• Li Qinwu and the Iron Skull Archmagos agreed to mount a Giant Plasma Cannon beneath the Knight Legion with systems to jettison it if it overheated.
• Li Qinwu reviewed Agricultural World 496B’s completed military districts, the spread of Fleet Iron Guard armor, and the need for new vehicles and tanks.
• Li Qinwu ordered maximum production of Giant Plasma Cannons to strengthen the planetary system’s defenses.
• Li Qinwu asked Nightingale to sustain production for five million elite troops and planned to supply Titus through a new route between Macragge and Agricultural World 496B.
• Li Qinwu planned to seek Guilliman’s help in meeting the Alchemists, hoping they would genetically augment him.

Li Qinwu planned to win the Right of Settlement and a royal title from Guilliman by developing unclaimed planets, then returned to the warship Fortune and learned that the Fortress World’s battle had been warped by a Blood Daemon’s reality-bending aura. He ordered a shuttle and summoned Yellow Sand and Swift Shadow to join him on the surface as Lord Titus fought near the Grand Fortress.

• Li Qinwu planned to negotiate with Guilliman for the right to settle unexplored worlds and a title, choosing the posthumous name the Golden King.
• Li Qinwu returned to the warship Fortune, where the captain reported that Lord Titus’s forces had wiped out the Tyranids near the equator and advanced north toward the Grand Fortress.
• The captain showed Li Qinwu footage of weapons failing against the Cultists, leaving soldiers to fight with their bare hands as the battlefield’s laws changed.
• Li Qinwu realized the Blood Daemon’s aura strengthened people who were closer to a primitive, unadorned state.
• The captain reported that Lord Titus and his Astartes Company were within a hundred kilometers of the Grand Fortress, and Li Qinwu ordered a shuttle and called Yellow Sand and Swift Shadow to fight beside him.

Li Qinwu, Swift Shadow, and Yellow Sand flew toward a battlefield where a primal Daemon made conventional armor and weapons ineffective. During the journey, Li Qinwu revealed his ambition to use their gene-seed to create new Astartes Chapters, and explained that he could clone even the memory-bearing chest gene-seed.

• Li Qinwu told Swift Shadow and Yellow Sand that he would fight nearly naked because the Daemon’s aura favored primitive combat, while their armor would protect them from Warp corruption.
• Li Qinwu said he wanted to use their gene-seed to create new Chapters, shocking Yellow Sand, while Swift Shadow readily offered his help.
• Yellow Sand explained that his neck gene-seed had already been harvested and that taking the chest gene-seed could kill him.
• Li Qinwu assured Yellow Sand that his Green Injection could regenerate the chest gene-seed after removal and that he had mastered efficient gene-seed cloning.
• Yellow Sand realized that Li Qinwu could use the copied gene-seed to create Astartes with veteran combat experience and might truly become an Astartes warlord.

After warp energy disabled their navigation and damaged their Shuttle, Li Qinwu, Swift Shadow, and Yellow Sand landed on the Fortress World and set out north for the Grand Fortress. They reached the grotesque Grand Plaza, where Yellow Sand said they needed to cross before continuing toward the fortress.

• Li Qinwu learned that the Shuttle's locator and comms had failed as the craft entered a daemon's domain, and he ordered the pilot to lower it so the three could disembark.
• Li Qinwu, Swift Shadow, and Yellow Sand jumped into an empty military camp, and Swift Shadow warned that the approaching daemon was powerful enough to kill him within a few exchanges.
• Yellow Sand used his memorized map and biological locator to guide the group north toward the Grand Fortress.
• The three crossed more than thirty kilometers of deserted barracks as the daemon's presence and the smell of blood grew stronger.
• The group reached the Grand Plaza, where armored vehicles had been defiled with rust, Chaos graffiti, blood, and human remains, and Yellow Sand said they had to cross it to reach the Grand Fortress.

Li Qinwu, Swift Shadow, and Yellow Sand entered a Chaos blood arena where cultists gained power by killing in escalating bouts. The arena’s crowd spotted the intruders and called for their blood to be offered to the Blood God.

• Li Qinwu explained that capturing Oluka would let him inherit the authority of a Grand Inquisitor and Lord Inquisitor.
• Yellow Sand described a Lord Inquisitor’s authority over most Astartes Chapters, and Li Qinwu promised Swift Shadow and Yellow Sand powerful positions and cleared reputations.
• The three found a blood-soaked arena built from wrecked tanks, where Foot-washing Acolytes fought in groups of eight and absorbed the blood of the dead to grow stronger.
• Swift Shadow and Li Qinwu assessed the cultists’ escalating tiers of strength as the arena crowd turned toward them.
• A towering cultist denounced the three as intruders and ordered the crowd to kill them and offer their blood to the Blood God.

Li Qinwu, Swift Shadow, and Yellow Sand fought off thousands of Foot-washing Acolytes in the Duel Arena, killing the first- and second-tier attackers. The seventh-tier cultist then sent nearly three hundred stronger fighters down from Tank Mountain to face them.

• The seventh-tier Foot-washing Acolyte halted the Blood Trial and promised five trials' worth of power to anyone who killed one of the three intruders.
• Li Qinwu, Swift Shadow, and Yellow Sand formed a defensive triangle as thousands of Cultists charged them.
• The three men slaughtered the first- and second-tier Foot-washing Acolytes, leaving the Duel Arena covered in corpses.
• Li Qinwu taunted the higher-tier Cultists on Tank Mountain and demanded stronger opponents.
• The seventh-tier Foot-washing Acolyte summoned nearly three hundred third- and fourth-tier Foot-washing Acolytes to attack.