At the top of the towering water purification station.
Sith kicked the Purestrain Genestealer he had impaled with his sword off the elevator. Watching it plummet, he flicked the blood from his Power Sword.
The last few veterans activated their jump packs and flew up through the shaft. Of the two thousand who had set out, more than half were gone after fighting their way through over a thousand kilometres of teeming Genestealers.
Every survivor was now covered in blood, their fine carapace armour scarred all over.
Everyone was breathing heavily, but they did not rest. Still holding their sabres and firearms, they fixed their eyes on Sith.
Putting away his Power Sword, Sith looked down at the thousand-plus kilometres of space elevator he had fought his way up, then waved to the soldiers.
"Restore the water supply immediately."
The veterans turned and scattered. With help from the few Servo-skulls still functioning inside the station and the Adeptus Mechanicus on the ground, the enormous steel dome overhead rumbled open to either side amid the echo of gears.
Sith tore his gaze from the "bottomless abyss" beneath his feet and looked overhead instead.
Pushed by several flying servitors, an enormous ice crystal slowly drifted into the dome.
Sith glanced twice at these expressionless "humans," their lower bodies converted into flying machines and their upper bodies studded with machinery embedded in flesh, before deciding to focus on the ice crystal instead.
An enormous floating block of ice. As the servitors brought the crystal to a halt in the centre, the various machines around it slowly started up amid jets of steam.
Massive mechanical arms approached the ice crystal. Drills and mechanical saws started up, and amid the overlapping sounds of "sawing wood," clean water once again flowed through the pipes beneath their feet.
"My lord, your canteen."
A veteran brought Sith a canteen of clean water straight from the source.
After fighting the whole way, Sith looked at the cool, clear water, which actually shimmered. He took it, removed his helmet, and tilted his head back for a long drink.
The cool water slipped down his throat, instantly washing away the heat throughout his body.
Around him came the splashing of veterans washing themselves directly with the purified water.
Lowering his canteen and letting out a long breath, Sith could not even be bothered to raise an eyelid at the veterans' wastefulness and complete lack of any concept of "conservation."
After all, even if each person used several hundred tonnes a day here, it would still be a drop in the bucket compared with the station's output!
Sith also looked around, hoping to find an outlet where he could give himself a thorough rinse.
But after looking around, his attention gradually drifted away from his surroundings. He slowly raised his head toward the vast universe beyond the dome.
More precisely, toward the densely packed masses within naked-eye range, covered in all manner of blasphemous symbols and decorations...
The armies of Chaos!
The fleet stretched without end, and at that moment, directly in Sith's line of sight was a massive Macro-cannon, fully extended, its muzzle wide enough to fit an Ork Gargant.
At the same time, a terrifyingly enormous shell slowly came into view inside the muzzle, pointing straight at Sith...
He looked away and turned toward the veterans who had only just fought their way up with him. Lowering his eyes slightly, Sith cursed silently before suddenly shouting:
"Everyone."
"Jump down immediately!!!"
Like a celestial maiden scattering flowers.
Hundreds of tiny figures trailing long jets of flame suddenly scattered from the top of the purification station.
Behind them, a massive Macro-cannon shell tore through the void and slammed straight into the station.
The white figures were still trailing white smoke as they scattered and fell "slowly," while the towering purification station behind them had already erupted in soaring flames, like a blooming firework!
Sith plummeted, the roar of air friction filling his ears. Behind him, explosions raced down the space elevator as though chasing him.
Countless fragments of wreckage flew everywhere, many striking Sith's Power Armour with a dense series of sharp cracks.
But Sith had no time to pay attention to the explosions behind him. Behind his helmet, his eyes remained fixed on the direction from which the Macro-cannon shell had come.
There, the drop pods Abaddon had deployed were piercing the clouds like a fiery meteor shower!
When a "meteor" suddenly crashed down from overhead, neither Brunok nor Ana, nor even Daviro, paid it much attention.
Only the other surviving 101st storm troopers standing around the clearing hurried forward to take the ruined jump pack Sith tossed down.
"Where's Brunok? Where is he?"
Without even pausing for breath, Sith asked for his adjutant's whereabouts the moment he reached the ground.
A squad of soldiers hurrying past had no time to respond. Left with no choice, Sith stepped forward, grabbed their officer, and repeated his question:
"Where's Brunok?"
The anxious officer, caught by the arm, was about to look up and start swearing, but when he saw that the man holding him was Sith, he hurriedly swallowed his words.
He even stood at attention and saluted before pointing toward the eastern side of the tower top.
"Officer Brunok is directing the fighting on the eastern side."
Sith looked over. Compared with the scattered exchanges of fire elsewhere, the eastern side was already engulfed in flames.
Even the artillery regiment nearby was frantically pouring all its firepower eastward.
Sith released the officer, who stood at attention and saluted again, then turned to head east.
But before taking a step, he paused. Looking around at the surviving 101st storm troopers who had returned, Sith sighed inwardly.
"You have half an hour to rest and refit. After that, return to your units."
Three thousand more 101st storm troopers remained stationed at the tower top. Sith knew he would soon need these elite troops, capable of facing Astartes head-on.
The storm troopers immediately saluted, while Sith strode straight east after finishing his instructions.
Soldiers along the way saluted when they saw him. As the address of "my lord" spread, their already high morale rose even further.
When Sith reached the eastern side, the sight before him made the corner of his eye twitch.
Across the area of the tower top that had been utterly reduced to rubble by artillery fire, masses of Chaos Cultists and his own soldiers lay piled among countless ruined buildings.
The fighting was still ongoing. In one clash that unfolded before his eyes, a full fifty of his recruits threw themselves forward one after another, taking a Chaos Astartes covered in skulls down with them.
"What the hell? How did so many people die?"
Somewhat angered by the sight, Sith grabbed and lifted Brunok, who had already fired his machine gun until its barrel glowed red.
Suddenly pulled away from his beloved weapon, Brunok froze. He turned to see Sith in Power Armour holding him up, and the fervour on his face instantly faded.
Then he stared at Sith, his eyes wide with disbelief.
"What? Too many dead?"
Brunok did not know how to respond. Meanwhile, across from them, the Chaos commander's face had completely lost the ardour he had worn upon landing, when he was about to begin a grand revel of sacrifice.
He merely stood there in a daze, watching his Astartes fall one after another before him. Doubt even surfaced in his eyes as to whether Tzeentch's sorcery had beguiled him.
"Just now, I think I saw my Astartes, by fewer than fifty mortals..."
"Traded away???"