Real Men Charge Forward Fearlessly--!

The cultists behind them were drawing closer and closer.

Dense black waves of cultists also appeared on both sides.

The Battle Sister carried Lin En and Iron Hammer, one under each arm, and urgently retreated toward Iron Hammer's Prospecting Station.

Lin En no longer dared look back. Danger Sense shrieked like an air-raid siren, making the back of his head throb painfully.

Iron Hammer's Prospecting Station was to the northwest, just behind that rocky hill.

As long as they made it inside before being caught, they could survive.

Cecilia carried Iron Hammer under one arm and ran with Lin En until they were only a few hundred meters from Iron Hammer's Prospecting Station.

They would be able to see the Prospecting Station once they went around the rocky hill ahead.

"It's—right ahead!" Iron Hammer shouted with difficulty, encouraging his two teammates.

That wimpy physique of Iron Hammer's, seriously!

Cecilia had him tucked under her arm as she ran, jostling him so badly that he was even more out of breath than Lin En and the others who were running on their own.

Lin En raised his head and saw the rocky hill Iron Hammer had mentioned.

They were really close now, right in front of it. A corner of steel jutted out from behind the rocky hill.

Cecilia rounded the rocky hill. Her silver power armor flashed once in the gray-white light before disappearing behind the rocks.

Lin En followed close behind.

But before he could run past, Cecilia suddenly rounded the corner and ran back behind the rocky hill, dragging Lin En back with her.

Lin En: "???"

"Don't go over there!" Cecilia lowered her voice and pressed Lin En against the rocky hill.

"Those cultists have surrounded Iron Hammer's Prospecting Station!"

Lin En poked his head out from behind the rocky hill and saw Iron Hammer's small spacecraft.

The hull was about thirty meters long, shaped like a flattened box, with an engine compartment on either side. Gears and skull emblems adorned the dark-gray hull, and High Gothic writing beneath the emblems read, Prospecting Station.

A spacecraft—an incredibly rare item worth two thousand credits.

But the spacecraft wasn't the main point right now. The main point was—

People completely surrounded the spacecraft.

Dark-red robes. They weren't members of the Mechanicus. They were cultists, cultists wearing bone masks.

The open ground around the spacecraft was packed with heretics.

A group of cultists stood beside the spacecraft, as if waiting there to ambush prey.

The heretics had already seized this place. They knew Iron Hammer and the others would return to the spacecraft sooner or later, so they had waited there in advance.

Cecilia clenched her fist.

She watched those cultists from behind the rocky hill, tightening her grip again and again on the power sword in her hand.

Iron Hammer saw them too, and his face turned from pale to gray.

There were too many of them.

There were hundreds of heretics, including no small number of psykers. Cecilia couldn't defeat them alone.

They couldn't get through.

How could there be so many heretics on this planet?!?!

They had thought the camp of several dozen people in the cave was the whole group, but after finding their lair, they discovered that the cave they had seen earlier was only a small squad.

They had thought the few hundred in the lair were the whole group, but after coming outside, they discovered that there were still tens of thousands more across the planet.

What were they doing here????

Where had these cultists come from??? Wasn't Istvaan III destroyed by an exterminatus order? Hadn't Fulgrim's Chaos warband, the Emperor's Children, bombarded it all over again??? Weren't there supposed to be only scattered cultist camps and scavengers? How had so many suddenly appeared?

What had they come to this ruined planet for????

Right, Istvaan III was a holy site of Chaos.

After the massacre back then, the Warp here had become extremely unstable. Could these cultists have gathered here because they wanted to...

Cecilia leaned against the rocky hill and stared grimly at the cultists. Then she said, "I suspect they aren't here to make a pilgrimage. They're here to perform a sacrifice. They may be planning to open a Warp rift on this planet and summon demons. We killed their people, so in their eyes our blood is worth more. They want to capture us, offer us to their god, and exchange us for greater favor."

The blood of a Battle Sister, a psyker, or a Tech-Priest was especially useful. One of them was worth eighty ordinary people.

There were wolves ahead and tigers behind.

The cultists waiting in ambush were ahead.

The cultist pursuers closing in rapidly were behind.

They were huddled inside this rocky hill and had no idea where to go.

Damn it, they were trapped again.

Sure enough, people couldn't be reckless. The wilder they got, the harder they crashed.

Lin En glanced back. The black line on the horizon had already become a wall, bone-white masks densely covering its surface.

There were cultists in front, behind, and on both sides.

Those waiting in ambush were ahead, the ones rapidly closing in were behind, and the ones flanking them were on either side.

They couldn't let the cultists surround them. Once that happened, they would be wrapped up like dumplings, and it would all be over. They would have no way out.

He would never be reckless again. Once he got out, he would definitely keep his head down and behave.

Iron Hammer's data slate buzzed frantically. There were already so many red dots on the screen that it couldn't display them all.

Dejected, he flipped the data slate over and threw it straight onto the ground.

Lin En looked again at the heretics beside the spacecraft ahead.

The heretics still hadn't discovered them. They didn't know how many people they were waiting to ambush.

The heretics behind them were closing in.

If they didn't run now, the cultists would surround them here and leave them no way out.

Cecilia could kill dozens, Iron Hammer could blow up dozens, and Lin En... well, he could probably smash a few with his steel pipe.

But there were thousands of them on the other side. They couldn't kill them all.

If thousands of cultists attacked at once, even Cecilia's power armor would be torn apart, and Iron Hammer's tool bag would be snatched away.

Lin En's Thirty Days would keep him from dying, but the cultists could capture him, lock him up, tie him to a stone altar, cut open his chest, drain his blood, and offer him to their god.

He didn't even know whether being sacrificed counted as "engaging the enemy."

But trying it would mean certain death.

There was no way to test it.

Lin En looked toward the cultists around the spacecraft.

There was really no other option.

It had to be him again.

Lin En stood up, tightened the straps of his leather armor, secured the bent steel pipe, and tugged on his backpack straps.

For an instant, Cecilia seemed to guess what he intended to do, and her expression changed.

Lin En once again planned to lure away the cultists lying in ambush in front of the Prospecting Station. As long as he could draw them away, Iron Hammer and Cecilia could take the opportunity to escape inside the Prospecting Station and get away.

There was no time to hesitate. Lin En charged straight out. "Sister!! Repeat the original plan!!! I can last thirty days! Go find reinforcements!!!"

He was somewhat stronger than before. The planet's surface was enormous, and although there were many enemies, he should still be able to survive for thirty days on this planet.

Iron Hammer's eyes widened as he watched him. He reached out to pull Lin En back. "What?! Lin En—"

He was going to lure away thousands of heretics by himself?

Could he even run? Where could he go?

But Cecilia grabbed Iron Hammer and held him back.

Cecilia pulled him along and stared firmly in the direction Lin En had run. "Go. He can do it. That's his ability. It only lasts thirty days, so we have to find someone to rescue him within those thirty days."

Iron Hammer turned to Cecilia, mouth hanging open and eyes widening even further. "Sister!!! He's crazy, and you're crazy too?! Do you know what he's about to do?! He's going to lure away thousands upon thousands of cultists by himself! He can't even kill people!!!"

Cecilia didn't answer.

She looked at Iron Hammer and said only one final sentence: "There's no other way."

This was the only way.

If the heretics formed a complete encirclement or opened a Warp rift, none of them would escape.

Iron Hammer's mouth opened and closed, then closed and opened again.

He saw tears glimmering in Cecilia's eyes.

The Battle Sister's gaze was compassionate, yet filled with self-reproach.

In this massive cesspit, they were merely a group of ordinary people.

Ordinary people who could only sacrifice some to preserve the rest.

It was all because they lacked the ability.

There was no other way.