A hundred thousand soldiers formed twenty dense formations, their backs to the passage, like a mountain of people on the Upper Hive's broad plaza.
At the front, Brunok and Ana stood behind Sith, one on either side. Behind them were more than two thousand handpicked "hundred-battle recruits."
Everyone's eyes were on Sith, while Sith held out his wrist and carefully watched the second hand ticking on his watch.
When the second hand completed another circuit and the hour hand pointed straight up again, the day-night cycle at the tower's summit told Sith that this twelve meant midnight.
Looking up, Sith drew his sidearm.
The hundred-battle recruits behind him raised their weapons as well, though they carried no rifles or other conventional weapons, but daggers and silenced pistols suited to close-range assassination.
"I'll send a signal once the operation succeeds. When that happens, the entire army is to charge the passage immediately and fight its way out of the Hive City before more rebels can react."
Sith spoke, and Brunok saluted solemnly behind him, while Ana gave him a "concerned" look.
After all, he was a key component of her great invention. Ana's concern for Sith was absolutely genuine.
Then Sith stepped forward, and the two thousand recruits hurried after him, silently creeping toward the battle-ready rebels.
Sith planned to launch a sneak attack on the rebels before the full army attacked, reducing their losses in the main assault as much as possible.
As he crept forward, Sith kept glancing toward the deep passage leading out of the Hive City.
A hundred thousand seemed like a lot, but outside the Hive City, against the surging tide of Orks, every bit of strength would be precious.
Sith had no desire to squander that strength on a Hive City doomed to annihilation.
Sith advanced as he thought, but after walking for a while, his contemplative gaze gradually sharpened, and his attention slowly shifted to what lay before him.
After scanning his surroundings twice in confusion, Sith suddenly raised his right hand.
Not a sound came, yet the two thousand recruits in the shadows behind him instantly stopped in place.
Without moving, Sith carefully surveyed his surroundings again, especially his own soldiers.
Once he confirmed that his side had not killed even a single rebel so far, the confusion in Sith's eyes turned to bewilderment.
He even glanced around again, doubting himself. Only after confirming that he really was deep enough inside the rebel positions did Sith straighten up, his face full of bewilderment.
He no longer even concealed himself, yet even with Sith standing beneath the lights, the packed rebel positions remained utterly silent.
Behind him, Brunok and Ana looked equally confused.
At first, watching Sith creep inside, the two had been pleased, thinking their troops were so elite that the rebels had failed to notice them.
But now, seeing Sith standing openly beneath the lights without the slightest reaction from the rebels, they too realized something was wrong.
Though they could hardly believe it, a thought surfaced in both their eyes.
Hesitating, Brunok looked around before finally turning to Ana, unquestionably the smartest person present:
"Could the rebels... be... pretending to sleep?"
As a member of the Adeptus Mechanicus, Ana should have had only rational calculations, yet despite the Servo-skull beside her constantly supplying calculation results, her face remained filled with utterly uncomprehending confusion.
"According to the calculations, the probability that they are pretending to sleep is 97.26 percent."
After speaking, Ana faced the ironclad facts, her round eyes filled with enormous confusion:
"But... why?"
The Servo-skull could not answer Ana. Brunok stared at the rebel positions several more times, and understanding gradually dawned in his eyes.
"We've beaten these rebels so badly they're scared of us..."
"They want us to leave!"
Brunok spoke, and Sith up ahead understood this as well.
After all, in rebel positions holding over a hundred thousand men, everyone was supposedly sleeping like a log, yet there was not even a single snore!
Sith even glanced at several rebels nearby and discovered that their sleeping postures were remarkably alike: every one of them just happened to have his back to him.
Sith's eyes filled with utter speechlessness. He straightened fully and stopped walking cautiously.
Distinct footsteps sounded behind him as Brunok jogged up to Sith.
Seeing that even such obvious footsteps had failed to wake a single rebel, Sith had nothing left to conceal. He simply sat down casually on the edge of the nearest rebel's makeshift bed.
His saber struck the ground with a crisp metallic clang.
Sith even made a point of glancing at the rebel beside him. The man's eyes remained tightly shut, but his face had turned completely purple.
Brunok cast a pitying glance at the rebel beside Sith, then addressed Sith:
"My lord, should we hurry and withdraw?"
Brunok's words instantly relaxed the rebel's expression. Some color quickly returned to his livid face, and even his breathing grew noticeably heavier.
But Sith did not give the answer he wanted. Instead, he looked at the deathly silent rebels around him, thought for a moment, then suddenly raised his head and spoke louder:
"Our ammunition reserves are low. It would be even better if we could gather some ammunition before leaving."
Brunok's expression stiffened, both because Sith's voice carried quite far through the silence and because he had suddenly discovered that his regimental commander was quite the thrifty housekeeper!
Then, before Brunok could respond, a pack of ammunition suddenly dropped beside Sith's feet.
Immediately afterward came a dense rustling of ammunition falling to the ground throughout the surrounding rebel positions.
Brunok: "..."
At that moment, Brunok no longer knew what to say.
He merely watched this absolutely stunning sight with his face twitching violently. Tens of thousands of people sleepwalking simultaneously, all coincidentally having the same dream about dropping ammunition-this certainly qualified as a galactic wonder!
The surrounding soldiers bent down in utter bewilderment to pick up the ammunition that had fallen beside their feet. Then their eyes turned toward the densely packed rebel armaments around them, enormous anticipation gradually appearing in their gazes.
Sith stood and pointed straight at the Lasgun belonging to the rebel beside him.
Brunok took the rifle away in a daze. As though given a signal, the soldiers who witnessed this abandoned all pretense of concealment and walked straight toward the rebels' weapon stores.
Sith's rapid military expansion had put enormous pressure on supplies.
Even uniforms were scarce, let alone weapons.
Many recruits were still using shoddy homemade weapons, and one entire regiment was even armed exclusively with melee weapons.
How could Sith pass up an opportunity like this to help himself?
Looking over the sprawling rebel positions before him, Sith even beckoned more soldiers forward from behind, having them begin systematically clearing out the rebels' weapons.
Lasguns were merely the standard haul. At some key firing positions, the soldiers even carried away more than a dozen bolt machine guns!
As for conventional heavy weapons such as rocket launchers, flamethrowers, and laser machine guns, they carried them on their shoulders and backs, piling them all over the ground.
The rebels had so many weapons that Sith's soldiers could rearm themselves right there!
Only once all the equipment in the rebel positions had been cleared out, every soldier under Sith had a firearm, and their heavy firepower had been greatly strengthened did the delighted troops look toward Sith, ready to leave the Hive City as planned.
The surrounding rebels' breathing also grew heavier, and an irrepressible joy spread among them.
Brunok was thoroughly satisfied too, having traded his weapon for a bolt machine gun!
But just as everyone thought things should proceed normally, Sith looked at the now-unarmed rebels and his fully reequipped soldiers, then drew his sidearm without hesitation, perfectly naturally.
He raised it, pointed upward, and pulled the trigger!
The gunshot was especially loud in the deathly silence. Then, as rebels and soldiers alike stared in shock, Sith kicked over the rebel pretending to sleep beside him:
"Everyone, get up!"
"I still need a few fucking tanks!!!"