Shipping goods from the game to the World of Warhammer

Chapter 70 Since We're Here

Inside the engine room of the Christina, the battle had been going on for nearly half an hour.

Alia Vandreck pressed her laser gun against the head of an orc boy emerging from a ventilation duct and pulled the trigger. A scorching beam of energy pierced the greenskin's skull, and the still-snarling creature fell backward, crashing onto the metal floor below the duct.

Several strands of her golden ponytail had come undone during the continuous battles, sticking to her sweaty cheeks and neck. Two buttons on her uniform collar were also undone, but her eyes remained calm and focused, just like her father's, the old Imperial Navy who had served in the Vandreich dynasty for forty years.

Behind her, Marines and Firebats were steadily advancing down the corridor. Two Firebats stood side by side at the front of the corridor, their large fuel tanks on their backs connected to their twin-barreled flamethrowers by thick hoses.

Orange-red flames erupted from the nozzles, turning the entire corridor into a mobile incinerator. The metal walls on both sides of the corridor were scorched red and black by the high temperature, and the pipes overhead were hissing and emitting molten smoke.

Those green creatures that emerged from every corner, some crawling out of the maintenance openings under the floor, some squeezing out of the holes in the walls blasted open by explosive shells, and some even falling headfirst from the ventilation ducts above the ceiling, were all engulfed by the flames before they could even get their footing.

To Aliya's right, Liriel deftly changed the magazine of an automatic rifle she had taken from the armory, her movements as swift as a veteran who had served on the ship for ten years. In reality, just three months ago, she was telling fortunes and swindling money in the back alleys of the Blackwing Harbor casino.

Her signature red hair was a mess, like a bird's nest. Her face was covered in streaks of black ash, whether from oil or gunpowder residue, and there was a shallow cut on the corner of her mouth from a flying shard.

She fired a burst at the green-skinned man peeking out from the end of the corridor; the spent cartridges clattered and rolled into the cracks in the floor.

"Where did these orcs come from?" Lillier shrank back behind cover and complained to Aliya. Her voice was muffled by the roar of the flamethrowers in the corridor, but her complaint was unmistakable. "We kill one wave and another comes, like they're never-ending. We just cleared the port side, and now the starboard side reports that orcs are crawling out of the sewer pipes! Sewer pipes! Can you believe it?"

When they crawled out of the sewage pipes, they were covered in some kind of sticky, disgusting stuff. "When will this ever end?"

Without turning her head, Aliya aimed the muzzle of her hot melt gun at the next green head that peeked out from the maintenance hatch.

"Shut up. Keep firing." Aliya pulled the trigger, and another orc boy fell. "The Lord Captain will have a way."

"You seem to have a lot of faith in that traveling merchant," Lillie muttered, as she deftly ejected an empty magazine and stuffed it into the ammunition pouch on her back, then pulled out a new one and cocked it. "I'm just afraid his plan is to let us fight here until the end of time."

He hadn't finished speaking.

The entire Christina shuddered violently.

It wasn't the usual combat vibration, nor the rhythmic tremor of a naval gun salvo; rather, it was a powerful vibration transmitted from deep within the ship's frame.

The overhead lights in the corridor flickered several times, and one of them shattered, sending shards of glass crashing to the floor. The fire bat's flamethrower was also thrown off course by the shock, and the flames swept across the wall, scorching a large patch of coating.

Aliya steadied herself by holding onto the wall, while the metal floor beneath her feet continued to make a soft, rhythmic sound.

Lillie didn't have such a good sense of balance, and she sat down hard on the ground, hitting the back of her head on the ammunition box behind her. She winced in pain, her red hair covering half of her face.

"What's going on now?!"

Aliya didn't answer her, but quickly walked to the nearest porthole and looked out.

Then she saw it: the asteroid that had been converted into a warship by the green-skinned people was spewing out rubble and scrap metal from its middle section.

A huge hole was torn open from the rock shell, and large chunks of rock continued to fall from the edge of the hole, like a giant beast whose internal organs had been emptied and was continuing to collapse.

Countless tiny green figures were flung from the hole into the vacuum of space, tumbling silently in the absence of air resistance, drifting further and further away, becoming smaller and smaller, until they finally became slow-moving dark dots against the backdrop of the starry sky.

From a distance, the orcish behemoth looked like a walnut hollowed out from the middle, with the two ends still maintaining a roughly intact shell outline, but the middle was a shocking hole.

Lillie also got up, leaned over to the porthole and looked out, her eyes widening in surprise.

"Good heavens—did it explode from the inside?"

Aliya didn't respond, but she noticed something else.

The alarm communication channels throughout the engine room, which had been ringing out every two or three minutes with reports of intruders being detected, suddenly fell silent. It wasn't because the enemies had all been killed; it was because no new enemies were being transmitted in. The orc lads that had been constantly emerging from some corner had suddenly stopped, as if a tap had been turned off.

The reason is not hard to guess.

The fact that the Orcish boulder could hollow out an asteroid and transform it into a warship is the ultimate manifestation of the Ork race's ingenuity. As long as enough Orks believe that this rock with jet nozzles can fly, then it can fly.

But to get this stone warship moving and its chaotic systems running, the Greenskins had to cram something they thought could move into the ship's hull as a power core. That thing might be a hodgepodge of old engines welded together, it might be some kind of machine that even the tech whiz kid himself couldn't explain how it worked but could still make a rumbling sound, or it might simply be a large enough battery.

But whatever that thing was, it clearly couldn't withstand the simultaneous explosion of dozens of overloaded waaaaagh force field backpacks inside the ship's hull.

Without power, the transmission naturally stops as well.

Aliya withdrew her gaze, turned around, and raised an eyebrow at Liriel.

"See?" Her tone was flat, but there was a very faint smile at the corner of her mouth. "I told you, the Lord Captain would have a way."

Liriel stared at the horribly damaged asteroid warship outside the porthole and nodded.

She did not deny it.

Back in Blackwing Harbor, she made a name for herself in the harbor with her silver tongue and unparalleled deception skills. She told fortunes to the passing Star Guardians, sold fake information, and occasionally forged one or two unimportant travel documents for people. She considered herself the least likely person to fall for her tricks in the entire Blackwing Harbor.

As a result, after Rhodes fell for the trap, the reapers he sent dragged her out of the lower district in less than two thousand minutes. To this day, she still doesn't fully understand how she was tricked.

So, Liriel never said anything about Rhodes's methods, but she knew the scales in her heart very well.

"Alright, alright."

She rested the butt of her automatic rifle back on her shoulder, gestured towards the depths of the corridor where a few remaining green-skinned soldiers, who had been teleported in before the explosion, were huddled behind a pile of pipes, peering around cautiously. "Then hurry up and clean up these leftovers on the ship, give the boss an explanation. Otherwise, when he comes back and sees this mess in the engine room, he might think these orcs are having a party here."

Aliya nodded and gestured for the Marines and Firebats behind her to advance.

"Attention all."

Her voice, clear and steady, came through the communication channel to the earpieces of every soldier in the engine room: "Enemy teleportation has been interrupted; no new enemies will enter. The number of remaining enemies in the engine room is limited. Clear each floor thoroughly, leaving no blind spots. Check all inspection ports, ventilation ducts, and sewage pipes."

Firebat's flamethrower glowed orange-red once more, two tongues of fire crisscrossing and surging into the depths of the corridor, the heat distorting the air. Marines followed closely behind, rifles in hand, their boots crunching on the spent cartridges and shrapnel scattered on the floor. Medics stood at the rear, their healing beams ready to sweep over any wounded comrades at any moment.

Liriel followed behind Aliya, wiping the grime off her face with her sleeve as she walked. After wiping, she glanced at the stains on her sleeve and then shook her hand in disgust.

All that's left is cleaning.

The Christina was much quieter after the battle; at least the corridors were no longer filled with shouts of "waaaaaagh!"

The green leather jacket burst out directly.

Rhodes sat back in the high-backed chair in front of the bridge command platform, leaning against the backrest, toying with a golden fang that was about the length of his forearm. The cut at the root of the fang was jagged, and the gold foil inlaid on the surface was pitted and chipped by the explosion, with a few pieces already peeling off, but it was still largely intact.

This thing was one of the spoils the fanatics had taken from that green-skinned captain, the big, dusty creature's final fate—Rhodes didn't want to recall the details, but it was pretty straightforward. He flipped the fang over, rubbing his fingertips against a deep engraving on the gold foil, unsure whether it was a decoration carved by the greenskin himself or a scar from some battle.

The Protoss troops who warped in had been placed in the empty compartments next to the Marines' quarters. The Zealots sat quietly cross-legged inside, their psionic blades retracted into the armor on their forearms, engaging in a kind of meditation-like recovery through the Kara connection.

The Apostles and Stalkers were assigned to the side compartments closer to the ammunition depot, while the mechanical Sentinels and Probes were neatly parked in the corners of the compartments charging. Aria had already arranged for people to stand guard in the outer corridor of the Protoss compartments, not to guard against the Protoss themselves, but to prevent ordinary crew members who had never seen them before from going over to watch out of curiosity and causing unnecessary trouble.

But Rod is not in the mood to care about these things right now.

The loss report handed over by Alia showed that, in terms of personnel casualties, the Marines and maintenance personnel on the engine room combined suffered nearly 20% losses, most of which occurred in the first few minutes of the Greenskins' teleportation and boarding operation. At that time, no one expected the Greenskins to teleport directly into various areas of the Christina, where they were immediately riddled with bullets by the gun-wielding kids.

The equipment losses were an even more confusing mess. Several auxiliary power lines on the engine room deck were cut, the ammunition conveyor belts of the two secondary guns on the port side were dismantled by the Green Leather for materials, and a quarter of the ventilation system pipes needed to be replaced.

But all of these are still within acceptable limits. What really gives Rod a headache is something else.

The Geller force field generator is damaged.

When the group of green-skinned pirates were teleported into the engine room, a few particularly persistent ones managed to touch the peripheral equipment of the Geller force field generator. Although they did not touch the core components, several sets of energy conduction arrays on the periphery were smashed to pieces, causing the output power of the entire generator to drop below the safe threshold.

This means that the Christina is not currently capable of conducting subspace travel.

The Geller Field is the only protective barrier for Imperial ships navigating in the warp. Without it, the entire ship and everyone on board would be directly exposed to the chaotic energy of the warp. Rhodes knew all too well the consequences of doing so.

Fortunately, the Star Speakers on board were still functioning normally, and the psionic signal had been sent out. Based on past experience, Imperial ships or supply depots in nearby star systems should dispatch ships with repair resources to provide support after receiving the signal, although the timing was uncertain—it could take several days or even longer.

Rhodes placed the golden fang on the command platform, and the fang made a dull thud as it struck the metal surface.

Having accepted the system's mission, I traveled all the way to this star system, only to be ambushed by a band of green-skinned pirates as soon as I arrived. We fought a war of attrition, spending a huge amount of universal energy, and my flagship was even crippled.

He took a deep breath and turned his gaze to the observation screen directly in front of the bridge. On the screen, a huge, desolate, grayish-brown planet occupied most of the image. A thin atmosphere formed a blurry halo around the edge of the planet, and the surface was covered with large areas of bare vegetation. Occasionally, the patterns of a few riverbeds could be seen winding across the sky.

This is the target planet marked by the system task.

Come here.

Rhodes stood up from his command chair and took two steps toward the communications station.

"Aliya, arrange for a shuttle to go down there."

Aliya's voice came through the communication channel, crisp and efficient: "Understood. Shuttle Five is ready for deployment; I'll arrange for the pilot to prepare. What are the requirements for the accompanying personnel, Captain?"

"You and Liriel come down with me."

There was a brief silence on the communication channel.

"Yes, ma'am." Aliya's tone was flat, but Rhodes could imagine the fleeting surprise in her blue-gray eyes.

Last time in Mordax, those Mechanicus geeks used safety regulations as an excuse to keep Aria and Liriel out of the shuttle. This time, without the Mechanicus's rules and regulations, she naturally wouldn't miss the opportunity to follow the traveling merchant.

Meanwhile, Lillie's voice came through the other end of the communication channel, sounding much more energetic.

"Finally, I don't have to smell the burnt green stuff on the engine room floor anymore. Boss, I'll go change into some clean clothes now."