Green Ass

Lin En crawled out of the cave entrance, expecting sunlight, a breeze, and a vast new world to greet him.

Instead, he saw a huge green ass.

Aaaaaaaah—!!!!

A green! Enormous! Wart-covered ass!!!!!!!

Yue.

That ass was squatting beside the cave entrance, less than half a meter away from him.

It was at least a meter wide, with a few scraps of cloth and sheets of metal hanging from it.

The owner of the ass had its back turned squarely toward them as it squatted on the ground, apparently rummaging through something.

There was no need to see its face. That distinctive skin color and body shape said it all.

Greenskin Orks.

Lin En froze.

Half his head poked out of the cave entrance as he stared at that enormous green back, his mind completely blank.

Cecilia was right behind him, her voice barely above a whisper. "Don't move."

Lin En didn't move. He even stopped breathing.

That green ass shifted, moving slightly to the side, and Lin En saw its profile.

A huge green body, thick arms, broad shoulders, a massive head, two pointed ears atop it, and a gigantic mouth with exposed fangs.

That mouth was chewing something, making a loud crunching sound.

Lin En vaguely saw that it seemed to be a human hand.

A Greenskin Ork. An Ork.

Lin En suddenly felt cold all over.

The Ork was holding a massive club studded with spikes. He was less than a meter away from the weapon that could smash him into meat paste in a single blow.

Behind him, Cecilia quietly and gradually pulled him back.

Lin En hurriedly shrank back into the cave, his heart pounding like a drum.

He lowered his voice and quickly told Cecilia and Iron Hammer, "Greenskins!!! There are Greenskins outside!!!"

Iron Hammer was crouching behind them, his gas mask hanging around his neck and his gray-blue eyes opened wide. "What?! There weren't any when I came in! How many?"

"I saw one, but there should be more!!"

Cecilia drew her Power Sword from her back.

Energy light flared along the blade.

She moved sideways to the cave entrance, stuck half her head out, and glanced outside.

Her eyes were far sharper than Lin En's. With a single look, she took in the enemy situation across the battlefield.

"There are five outside the cave entrance, with a camp farther away. The ones at the entrance are rummaging through the cultists' belongings. They're probably a scavenging party."

A scavenging party.

They killed people first and then searched their corpses. That counted as scavenging too.

Lin En leaned against the stone wall, still shaken.

Greenskin Orks were one of the most common alien species in Warhammer 40,000.

They grew from underground like mushrooms. Wherever their spores drifted, Greenskins grew.

Greenskin Orks were dim-witted and didn't distinguish between factions. They attacked everyone—the Imperium, Chaos, Aeldari, Tyranids, Necrons, T'au, even their own kind. Greenskins lived to fight, fought to have fun, and kept fighting after they had finished having fun.

However, Greenskin Orks possessed WAAAGH Power and Orky Belief Power.

After letting out a great WAAAGH, anything they believed in would come true.

So if they wanted to become stronger, they became stronger. If they wanted to build weapons, they could assemble piles of junk and scrap metal into powerful vehicles and weapons.

The Imperium of Man and the Greenskin Orks were mortal enemies—the kind that hacked each other apart on sight.

Damn it. They had just escaped from a cultist den, and now the Greenskins were blocking the cave entrance again.

Was this damned planet holding a grudge against them?

Cecilia glanced outside again, this time more carefully.

"There are five at the entrance, all low-level Ork Boyz. No Psyker Boyz or Warbosses. Their weapons are big choppas, cleavers, and shootas. There's an open area outside the cave, with a Greenskin camp. They may be stationed here to intercept cultists, and happen to be blocking us too."

The Greenskins hadn't come for them. They had come for anyone emerging from this cave entrance.

The cultists needed supplies delivered and people moving in and out of the cave.

The Greenskins simply guarded the entrance. Whenever the cultists came out, the Greenskins fought them.

To the Greenskin Orks, this cave entrance was practically a Warhammer-style place where they could wait for prey and have enemies automatically respawn.

They didn't care who they fought. As long as there was someone to fight, that was enough.

"'Happen to,'" Iron Hammer repeated, a trace of helplessness in his voice.

What terrible luck.

Greenskin Orks were difficult to kill, and impossible to kill off completely.

When one died, its spores would spread in huge quantities, and new Orks would grow from them.

In some ways, Greenskin Orks were even more troublesome than Chaos.

Damn it. He really wanted to slaughter all these brainless things.

"Sis, can you deal with these Orks?" Lin En turned to Cecilia.

Cecilia said cautiously, "I can handle the five outside, but there's also a Greenskin camp in the distance. If all the Greenskins inside come out, it might be difficult."

Fortunately, these Greenskin Orks were only a scavenging party of low-level Ork Boyz. There were no high-level Psykers or Warbosses. A Battle Sister in Power Armor with the right weapons could deal with them.

If there were stronger ones, they might need Astartes warriors.

Sigh.

But there were quite a lot of them.

This was going to be troublesome.

The Orks were guarding the cave entrance. If they wanted to leave, they had to deal with them.

Cecilia sheathed her Power Sword and switched to her Bolter. "We'll lure the Greenskins in here. The entrance is narrow, so they can only enter one at a time. We'll hold the passageway. Whoever sticks their head in gets chopped."

Lin En looked at where they were standing. The passageway's exit was very narrow, about a meter wide—just enough for one Greenskin Ork to pass through.

The passageway itself was somewhat wider than the entrance, shaped like a pouch that narrowed at the mouth and widened inside.

As long as they blocked the entrance, the Greenskins wouldn't be able to get in for a while.

If Iron Hammer could set up explosives in the pouch, lure all the Greenskins over, and then open the entrance to let them in, they might be able to wipe them all out in one go.

Lin En asked, "Hammer, do we have enough bombs?"

Iron Hammer nodded. He pulled a welding torch and several Warp Crystal Triggers from his waist. "I dismantled all the Psychic Focusers from those cultists earlier and extracted a lot of Warp Crystals."

Warp Crystals could trigger small spatial explosions capable of shredding objects apart.

He connected the crystals with wires. A few sparks from the welding torch flashed in the darkness, and a simple bomb was assembled.

Ork Boyz weren't as tough as their Warbosses. If they placed this inside the cave entrance, waited for them to charge in, and detonated it, they could kill several at once.

If that wasn't enough, they could just set up more. They would eventually blow them all up.

Even if a few survived the explosions, it wouldn't matter. Cecilia could finish them off.

********

Iron Hammer finished setting up the explosives and notified Lin En and Cecilia.

Cecilia nodded. "I'll lure them over."

Cecilia stuck her head out of the passageway and fired several shots at the Greenskins without hesitation.

She turned the smallest Jump into a sieve.

During a battle over a narrow passageway, those smallest Jump Boyz were actually more dangerous.

The Greenskins hadn't reacted yet. They stared blankly in this direction.

Her silver Power Armor gleamed brightly and stood out against the gray-white light. When the Greenskins saw her, they froze for a moment.

Then their walnut-sized brains finally processed what had happened.

The Greenskins roared in fury.

"WAAAGH—!!!"

The four Greenskin Orks roared together, shaking the cavern.

The Ork camp in the distance heard their roar as well, and a tide of Greenskins poured out.

Cecilia retreated to the passageway entrance and stood sideways behind the stone wall.

This cave entrance was incredibly convenient. Like a door, it kept the Greenskins from attacking as long as she stood sideways behind it. They could only stick their heads or weapons inside to attack.

But their weapons couldn't turn corners.

The moment the first Ork's head poked into the passageway, Cecilia brought down her Power Sword.

The blade entered through the back of the Ork's head and cut all the way to its chest.

The Greenskin Ork collapsed without even having time to cry out. Its head rolled into the cave, while its body jammed the entrance and green blood flowed across the ground.

The Greenskin corpse blocking the entrance was roughly dragged away by the Orks behind it. Then another Greenskin thrust its weapon inside.