With the Imperial Navy destroyed, Caberlid II now faced the expeditionary fleet's guns alone.
Bona requested another transmission, demanding Caberlid II's surrender.
But the only reply he received was:
"We will never surrender, heretic."
Bona frowned and wrested control of the communications array from Brigadier Cage.
"Cabalide, let me repeat myself. We have not come here for war and slaughter."
"The will of the great Emperor has long since been twisted over these ten thousand years. Ignorance and madness now define the Imperium."
"I now demand that you surrender and join our Dawn Crusade."
Cabalide's response was simple.
The planet's few remaining Planetary Defense Systems unleashed furious salvos at the Dawn Fleet.
Bona's face twitched.
He could not understand it. Why had humanity become so deranged?
He remembered how, when his father had unified Terra, even those Techno-Barbarians and warlords could be negotiated with peacefully.
Why did everyone in the Imperium now seem even crazier than those lunatics?
But when he thought of the Ecclesiarchy, it made rather more sense.
Horus had been right after all. There was simply no talking to the Imperium as it was now.
The assault began.
Unlike Tarankd III, which nobody had cared to bother with, Cabalide had a considerable number of Astra Militarum regiments stationed on it, with a total strength of perhaps a hundred thousand or so.
The Astra Militarum's numbers seemed impressive, but spread across Cabalide, they were sparse.
Only the Spaceport on the Equator, the Primary Hive City in the Northern Hemisphere, and a few other Hive Cities had Astra Militarum Forces garrisoned there. Even the strategically vital Primary Hive City had only around twenty thousand troops.
With the loss of the Imperial Navy, each strategic position had been completely isolated, with only a handful of Thunderhawks shuttling between them.