The Astartes Family's Notebook

Kaz licked his salivary glands, thinking to himself, "We, the Desolate Wings, are not the offspring of Dorne. From now on, if we meet anyone, we can only call them godfathers."

The Astartes apothecaries' power armor is specially made, with an integrated life sign scanning system that is far more powerful than that of ordinary power armor. After a careful examination, the apothecaries said that only one person still showed signs of life, so Kaz and the others naturally could not detect any other problems.

One brother was left to guard the "body," while the others split into groups again to happily search and evacuate.

Meanwhile, Katz returned to his loyal bridge to continue wiring, looking rather miserable.

As for the matter of recycling the gene seeds, not a single Astartes of the Wasteland brought it up.

The reason is simple: the instigator has no descendants. Since there is still a possibility of saving lives, all medical resources, including pharmacists, should naturally be used to save the living first.

Preliminary estimates suggest that the shipwreck occurred over two hundred years ago, and the genetic seeds would have deteriorated long ago if they were going to. A couple more days won't make a difference; we can wait until the survivor with the brass skull comes out of the operating room before making any further decisions.

As for power armor...

To tell you a sad story, although the Loyal Faction is generally richer than the Chaos Traitors, they also have more rules regarding battlefield equipment recycling.

Even if the final brass skull cannot be saved, it doesn't mean that Kaz and his team have managed to get twenty-two sets of power armor for the chapter this time.

What if these power armors have already been corrupted by Chaos?

Take these back and give one set to the new recruits, haha, twenty-two brand-new enchanted warriors...

The empire has suffered this kind of loss countless times over the millennia.

Why are newly formed battle groups particularly prone to major safety incidents?

Aside from old-timers like Kars and Obi-Wan Kenobi, the new recruits, having never seen a bloody accident scene, simply don't understand the gravity of the situation.

This frigate is completely beyond saving.

After working for more than twenty hours, Katz finally preserved his dignity as a professional electrician. After successfully restarting the ship's self-inspection system, and seeing the bright red damage indicator for the core power compartment, the Eighth Company Commander's heart finally died.

If it were a cruiser, even an Indomitable-class one, Katz would insist on coming back on the return voyage to tow it away.

But as for frigates...

It's better to buy a new one than to repair it.

Astartes demonstrated exceptional efficiency; after carefully inspecting the wrecked ships, it decisively summoned mortal servants from the Nameless One to begin cutting and salvaging high-value assets.

The Empire's triple redundancy principle is both a burden and a treasure. Even after two hundred years of being scrapped, a lot of recyclable equipment can still be salvaged from the corvettes. The oil enthusiast has done all sorts of bad things, but he's good at modular design.

Seven days later, Katz, who had returned to the Nameless One, received a communication request from the pharmacist.

"Lord Kaz, the Scorsese brothers have woken up and want to see you."

Chapter 496 Peach Blossom Monkey's Wish

"The Eye of Truth?"

"Yes, the malevolent blessing of the Lord of Change."

Scorsese Adiga woke up and, wearing only his underwear, began to be questioned by Kaz and the rest of the Desolate Wings.

There was no dissatisfaction, nor any complaint of being neglected; if their positions were reversed, he would have done the same.

The careless Astartes would have been killed long ago by various old men inside and outside the warp.

In his own story, Scorsese is the careless person who almost got himself killed.

"Soradi Alpha, that's what he calls himself. Whether it's true or not is questionable and cannot be verified. What is certain is that he received the blessing of the Lord of Change and possessed a pair of... or perhaps a single eye, that can see through lies."

No, buddy, well, considering it's Tzeentch's blessing...

Never mind, the story about how to spot lies with your eyes isn't important.

"According to him, our brass skull injured him hundreds of years ago, so he came for revenge."

Kaz felt a tickle on his scalp; he seemed to recall similar stories before.

It's nothing more than the Celestials causing trouble by giving the loyalists the ability to distinguish between truth and falsehood, and then the Empire acting in all sorts of inhumane ways, forcing the loyalists to rebel.

From a personal perspective, sincerity is a valuable quality; however, lies, or telling falsehoods, are a necessary lubricant in political operations. A regime where everyone only tells the truth is impossible unless one achieves cyberpunk ascension...

No, the Necromancers in Space are just as full of nonsense.

Perhaps only a Great Devourer could do that.

“We received the distress signal from the frigate and rushed to its aid, only to fall into an ambush. Soladi then jumped aboard our strike cruiser.”

"But instead of killing us or even taking the gene seed, they trapped us on the frigate."

What deep-seated hatred...?

Scorsese spoke casually, but Katz and Obi-Wan exchanged a knowing glance.

Twenty-two gene seeds were simply not being dug up, and twenty-two sets of power armor were simply discarded. They just wanted to watch you perish in despair. This grudge is truly immense, and the cost of revenge is truly high.

However, after hearing the story, it's still necessary to ask about the details.

After all, there are precedents to learn from. If you, Scorsese, are also a spy of Chaos, then how we, the Wastewing, can avoid the same fate will be a true test of Kaz's leadership skills.

The questions were repeated, detailed, and some even touched on the "internal secrets" of the Brass Skull Warband.

However, after Scorsese awoke from his suspended animation, he seemed to have lost all his energy and became completely open and talkative.

"So, you ate it?"

"Yeah, I didn't eat it, the other brothers did."

"Why aren't you eating?"

“I led my brothers into a desperate situation. I failed to fulfill my leadership duties. I had no intention of surviving. What difference would it make whether I ate or not?”

As it turns out, you were the only one who survived.

Does the taboo against cannibalism really apply to Astartes?

Kaz didn't want to delve into the matter. After all, he had eaten plenty of brains and gnawed on a lot of alien flesh. What did prions matter under the Emperor's great power?

After the questioning was completed, a small meeting was held with the veterans, and most of them believed that Scorsese was telling the truth.

Combining the clues found on the ship with Scorsese's testimony, the whole story becomes clear.

It was just an organized and premeditated act of revenge by the Chaos War Gang.

The Empire can't even keep track of how many loyal Astartes factions it has, let alone the Chaos Warbands inside and outside the Eye of Terror.

This Solari Alpha was completely unknown to people like Qaz who had been in the Warband, as were Obi-Wan Kenobi and his other Warband brothers.

So let's just let him be a background figure and seriously analyze Scorsese Adiga's statement. There really isn't anything suspicious about it, so let's assume he's loyal for now.

What struck Kaz most about this incident was not the insidious and malicious nature of the Chaos forces, but the current crisis of trust within the Empire.

No wonder the various loyalist factions are all doing their own thing. They should be happy to have rescued a loyalist Astartes who was in a state of apparent death, but now that he's alive and they've asked him all the questions they need to, they have to treat him like a thief.

That's really messed up.

Two days later, Scorsese's health had improved somewhat, and he was able to move around on his own.

So Kaz returned the power armor to him and let Scorsese handle the remains of the other brass skulls.

There should still be combat footage inside the power armor of these fallen soldiers that could verify the truth of Scorsese's words, but Katz did not actively retrieve it.

Politics that disregards human sentiment is short-lived. If all the Astartes of this Brass Skull Chapter are killed, they can do whatever they want, since it's all about avenging their brothers. The Desolation Wings naturally stand on the moral high ground.

But if Scorsese is still alive, then it's a different process; Katz must be given the respect he deserves.

Even if there were two bomb guns following him at any time, even if Scorsese's personal weapons were not returned to him.

Scorsese wasn't annoyed; the professionalism displayed by Desolation Wings proved that it was a loyalist faction with a rich history.

Most importantly, the name of the Desolate Wings is really well-known in the Pacific Sector; Scorsese has heard of it.

After collecting the remains of his brothers, Scorsese gestured for Kaz to follow him, and then, in an inconspicuous corner of the ship, he pulled out a sealed box from the last brass skull.

However, upon opening it, a complex expression of disappointment and self-blame appeared on Scorsese's face.

"really......"

Inside the sealed box are two quadruple gene seed storage boxes, a common type used by Astartes.

As biological glands, gene seeds, despite undergoing considerable subspace processing, cannot be preserved at room temperature for extended periods.

Although the temperature in space is very low, with an average temperature only slightly above absolute zero, genetic seeds are still precious items and are very susceptible to drastic temperature fluctuations.

As expected, the genetic seeds that Scorsese had hidden had already died.

On the contrary, the apothecary successfully recovered seven still-active gene seeds from the brass skulls of the Astartes that had gone from feigning death to real death.

Advanced "modern" technology was once again defeated by the emperor's "ancient" alchemy.

“Scossay brothers, we still have a mission to complete and cannot send you directly to the warband.”

“I can understand. It was a trap carefully set by that traitor Soladi. You wouldn’t have come to this godforsaken place if you didn’t have a special mission. I can totally understand.”

"You should rest and recuperate on the ship."

"Please allow me to do what I can for your warband, otherwise I will not be at peace with myself."

"Mutual assistance is a matter of course, so why is there any unease about it?"

Everyone knows how to say polite words, but building trust is very difficult. Even after initially labeling him as a loyalist, Katz still couldn't fully believe that Scorsese was harmless.

Now things are really messed up. Of the twenty gang members, two have to be on guard against friendly forces at all times. Sigh, this is the daily life of our human empire. We have to get used to it.

The principle of "thieves never leave empty-handed" is a long-standing and excellent warband tradition of the Wasteland Wings. The Chaos Warband only damaged the frigate's propulsion system and did not touch other equipment, so the Nameless Ones took more than a month to dismantle the ship.

Genetic seeds cannot withstand the erosion of more than two hundred years, but imperial equipment can. This time, modern technology has won.

Especially things like oracle arrays; don't be fooled by the fact that they're just mid-to-low-end items on frigates—they're quite valuable.

While their skills weren't particularly refined, their firepower was ample. With the help of the unnamed individuals providing brute force to break through obstacles, the expedition quickly returned to normal.

The strategy remains the same: the strike cruiser first conducts a low-orbit scan, and then the Astartes proceeds to the suspected target location for detailed reconnaissance.

After two years of this, even someone like Scorsese, who had starved himself to the point of having zero body fat, has regained his robust physique. It just goes to show that the terracotta porridge from Desolation Wings is indeed nourishing.

Then, good luck finally smiled upon Kaz once again.

"It's a battle group beacon!"

The loyalist factions of the Empire were not the poor, desperate gangs that the Eye of Fear made them out to be. When they went out on missions, casually tossing deep-space beacons was just basic procedure for them.

It is smaller than the Astartes' power backpack and has solar panels attached to it. Depending on the debugging instructions, it only sends radio signals once every five minutes to two hours. It is not its own beacon, and the specific receiving frequency is unknown, making it difficult to find out.

The key is its excellent standby performance. If you really want to find it, you can find it all over the Empire during the Great Expedition era.

Now that the ancient beacon has been found, it proves that the Wings of Desolation once visited this star system.

Enough talk, let's get to work.

As a result, the nameless creature brought Kars an unexpected surprise after only a cursory scan.

"Someone?"

On a planet within the star system, an array of oracles detected signs of human production activities.

Sure enough, life will always find a way.

"Ignore all that for now and follow the established plan to start the search from the uninhabited planets."

The conflict between the two emperors lasted for two thousand years. In this long conflict, the Taiping Star Region, as the main battlefield, suffered the most severe damage.

Originally, the area under its actual control was the smallest among the five major star regions of the Empire, and Kaz had long since become desensitized to the fact that wherever he went, there were Imperial ruins.

This is the local culture and customs of our Taiping Starfield. If you don't like it, then immigrate. The Misty Starfield welcomes you.

Scorsese has come to understand in the last two years that the Wastewings are here to find something.

But what they were looking for was something their saviors didn't want to say, so he naturally wouldn't pry.

Only when sparring with the Katz brothers does the melancholic Scorsese show a bit of sharpness.

To be honest, Scorsese didn't care that he was out of touch with the times for more than two hundred years. Our imperial lineage is unbroken for ten thousand generations. Two hundred years may be a glorious but short life for Astartes. For the Empire, there are always a few kings with super long reigns in each cycle of high lords who have not yet been replaced.

Exploration work is quite similar to archaeological excavation; it cannot be rushed and must be carried out step by step, thoroughly investigating each plot of land.

After finding the deep space beacon, no useful information was analyzed; it was simply placed there haphazardly by Desolation Wings following standard procedure.

Three years have passed in the blink of an eye, and the project still has not yielded any results.

"Kaz brothers, has there been a major breakthrough in Imperial technology? Your ship is so durable!"

"There's no technological advancement here, it's just about packing more supplies and fewer people."