Warhammer: Striving to Be a Grinding Man

Chapter 49 Dulob Sander

936.M41, Dulob Sander Galaxy.

After jumping from Mandeville Point, the Black Pearl spent six hours on a routine cruise. The deep space temperature at the edge of the galaxy was close to absolute zero, the star's apparent diameter was only 0.3 degrees, and its effective surface temperature was about 4500K, much dimmer than Lucis's artificial sun. The light falling on the portholes looked like a layer of washed-out gold leaf.

Liu En stood before the porthole on the bridge, the armored cover already open. The primary planet, Dulob Sand, slowly magnified in his field of vision. Its surface was a grayish-yellow, similar in color to Garros, but while Garros was barren, here it was deathly still—no atmospheric disturbance, no surface reflection, no dynamic signals. The entire planet resembled an eyeball forgotten for millennia, its pupil now a dull gray.

Marcus gestured through data in front of the holographic projection table. "Atmospheric composition: 11% sulfur dioxide, 8% nitrogen oxides, high concentration of suspended particulate matter. Surface temperature: 30 degrees Celsius at noon, -15 degrees Celsius at night. Toxic gases cover the entire surface, no open water bodies. Atmospheric pressure—40% lower than the standard for human survival."

Commander Kara stood at the entrance to the bridge, arms crossed, saying nothing. Her gaze was fixed on the holographic projection, a thin line forming at the corner of her mouth.

"Continue," Liu En said.

Marcus switched the scanning mode. The holographic projector began updating the high-resolution image of the terrain piece by piece. The wasteland was a grayish-yellow, a color darker than ordinary sand and gravel—not the color of the minerals themselves, but something that had seeped into the lattice of every grain of sand. The camera zoomed in, and several irregular depressions appeared on the wasteland, with radiating ridges at the edges. They weren't meteorite craters; meteorite craters don't look like this.

The sensor array revealed similar depressions at intervals, some of which had been largely filled in by wind and sand, leaving only shallow outlines. These were not dense clusters of bomb craters, but rather limited bombing traces distributed across specific areas. The entire planet was devoid of vegetation and water, consisting only of endless sand and the occasional protruding rock.

Marcus's record was only a few lines long: the main force of the expeditionary force suffered heavy losses in the protracted battle and eventually withdrew under the cover of "purification" bombing. The planet's surface was marked as "conditionally sealed off."

"Purification" bombing. In Imperial military terminology, this term has a specific meaning—not the extreme measure of an extermination order that burns an entire planet's surface to glass, but rather a limited, targeted cleanup bombing of a specific area. The aim is to destroy facilities that cannot be taken away, bury technologies not intended for the enemy, and provide cover for retreating forces. The evacuation fleet strikes key ground targets and then disappears into the warp.

The expeditionary force was defeated. Not because of firepower—the Empire's firepower was never an issue—but because the battle lines were too long and supplies couldn't keep up. Decades of protracted warfare had exhausted the fleet's resources and manpower. The fleet in orbit neither recovered the locked, silent core nor sent anyone to confirm its exact depth underground.

On the day of the evacuation, the orbiting fleet carried out a "purification" bombardment of key ground facilities. The area with the most dense craters was the location of the expeditionary force headquarters and technical research facilities. That high ground was originally the site of the Tau Empire's earth clan research facilities. After the expeditionary force conquered it, they directly requisitioned the Xenomorph underground bunkers and converted them into a forward command post. Deep underground, the Tech-Priests discovered the prototype of the "Silent Core" that the Tau were developing and established a research station on the spot. This thing had been buried deep in the mountain from the beginning and had its own independent energy center and cooling system.

Therefore, the fleet's "purification" bombing was primarily aimed at this area. It wasn't targeting the surface command center, but rather the underground energy hub and sealed laboratories—to collapse the entrance, bury the facilities, and let the prototype and its secrets rot underground. The planet's surface was marked "conditionally sealed off," meaning the Empire wouldn't prohibit further exploration, but it also wouldn't provide any support. Whoever came would die; the Empire didn't care.

For a full week, Black Pearl remained in orbit around Dulob Sand. Its sensor array scanned every corner of the planet's surface twice, creating a high-precision holographic map covering the entire star.

The headquarters ruins are located on a high ground near the equator. All that remains are pitted rocks and sputtered glassy molten material. The vast underground complex that once housed tens of thousands of aircraft and military equipment is now just a shallow outline of its foundations, mostly filled in by thousands of years of wind and sand.

Liu En stared at the almost completely flattened outline of the ruins on the holographic map.

"Signal relay servitors, prepare. First wave of mechs, one squad," he said. "Deploy to the perimeter of the ruins. Mechs go first, signal relay servitors deploy on the ground in the center of the ruins."

Marcus pressed the communication button to issue the command. Kara turned and left the bridge to go to the hangar for scheduling.

Marcus turned to the communications officer. "Increase the power of the communications array and lock onto the frequency of the armed transport ship. Also, upgrade the omnidirectional broadcast."

The communications officer's fingers danced across the panel. "Increased. But the electromagnetic environment on the surface is too complex; the effect... may not be ideal."

"Do what you're supposed to do," Marcus said.

The transport ship emerged from the Black Pearl's hangar, trailing a steady blue plume, and plunged into the atmosphere of Dulob Sand.

Data streams began to flow onto the holographic projection platform. The images started at the stepped cliff edge of the ruins—not natural cliffs, but bombing scars that had been mostly filled in by thousands of years of wind and sand, leaving only a shallow ridge. The mechs crossed the cliffs and saw the basin inside. Tens of millions of tons of rubble and gravel filled the blast-out craters. Occasionally, a few broken metal frames could be seen protruding from the rubble at the saucer-shaped edge, twisted, rusted, and covered with pitted corrosion.

The leading mechs slowed down and began turning toward the center of the basin. Data flooded into the Thinker array of the Black Pearl, fusing image and sensor data into a holographic dynamic reconstruction.

The indicator lights on the communication panel began to flash abnormally. The complexity of the surface electromagnetic environment exceeded expectations.

"Signal attenuation is worsening," the communications officer reported. "We're using maximum power, but uplink bandwidth continues to decline."

Marcus didn't speak, he just stared at the holographic projection.

Then the signal indicator lights of the first batch of mechs began to flicker—not to go out, but to flash irregularly. The power output data was still there, the joint movement data was still there, and the images from the optical lenses were still there. But the communications officer's face turned pale.

"Uplink denied." His voice was low. "It's not signal attenuation, it's that they're not responding."

Marcus switched the audio to the speaker. Instead of the standard binary pulses of the machine gunners' routine reports, the speaker emitted a regular, repetitive noise. Each cycle ended with a short, millisecond-precise silence—too precise to be considered signal distortion.

Then all twelve mechs simultaneously cut off the uplink.

"Omnidirectional broadcast," Liu En said. "Send a standard protocol identity verification command."

The communications officer complied. The static in the loudspeaker paused for a second after the command was issued. Then it answered—not in binary, not in High Gothic, but in a complete replay of the command just issued by the Black Pearl. The exact same encryption header, the exact same timestamp, the exact same checksum. Even the communications officer's voice was replicated.

Marcus's finger stopped at the edge of the holographic display.

"It's mimicking us," he said.

Liu En remained silent. His Thinker interface emitted a low hum deep within his skull—not an alarm, not an error message, but an anomalous signal described only in ancient Mechanicus texts as a "logical echo." His wet core, while processing sensor data, had encountered a recursive loop that shouldn't exist. It was as if something underground was responding to his scans in a format he could understand, but the content was all gibberish.

He shut down the interface, but the low hum persisted. It was faint and distant, like a needle pressing against the inner wall of the skull.

"The signal strength of the signal relay servant is also declining—uplink data stream is interrupted, and only basic telemetry can be received." The communications officer's voice was strained.

"Increasing the power won't help," Marcus said.

"Keep it going. Collect as much as you can," Liu En said.

The holographic image freezes on the last frame—a half-open hatch emerges from the rubble. There are cutting marks on the edges; it wasn't blown open, but cut from the inside.

"The second and third batches will remain on standby outside the ruins," Liu En said. "The fourth batch is on standby. Kara, take a company and assemble with me at the landing site."

He turned and left the bridge. The corridor lights shone with a cold white light as he walked past the garrison's training area and into the hangar. The transport ship was already in its berth. Regiment Commander Kara was already inside, followed by a company of veterans, fully armed.

Liu En boarded the transport ship, sat down in the left seat, and fastened his seatbelt. The power armor's servo system automatically tightened, and the locking mechanisms of the chest armor, shoulder armor, and leg armor clicked crisply in sequence. He glanced down at the internal panel—the reactor output was stable, the cooling cycle was normal, and the servo motors were on standby. Finally, his gaze fell on the status light of the field shield generator. It was solid green.

"The last frame before the first batch of mechs lost contact was in a pile of rubble in the core area of ​​the ruins, with a half-open hatch. It might be the entrance to the expeditionary force's underground bunker." He paused. "It could also be debris from an alien structure. We'll only know when we get there."

Kara nodded.

The transport ship detached from the hangar, its blue exhaust trail trailing a steady descent into the atmosphere of the Dulob Sand. Before the hatches closed, the bridge lights shrank to a tiny dot in the field of vision.

The landscape of Dulob Sand rapidly magnified outside the porthole. A gray-yellow wasteland, the edge of bombing scars, and that rising horizon.

Liu En pressed the communication button and said into the intermittent signal, "Black Pearl, maintain orbital monitoring. Let's go down and take a look."

Over the communication channel, Marcus's voice was fragmented by noise, but the last few words were barely discernible: "...power...at maximum...caution...safety..."

Then the signal was completely cut off.