As for logistical vessels such as the Mechanicus’s foundry ships and the Truth Ordos’s scientific research vessels, they are not included in the calculation of combat ships.

The fleet brought by the ruling sage Jafar consisted of about warships. It was much smaller than the 13th Expeditionary Fleet in scale and did not have any large ships comparable to those of the Palace Heroines. It only had an ultra-large cruiser about 15 kilometers long as its flagship.

The 13th Expeditionary Fleet undoubtedly crushed the rebels of Antax in size, but Eliwood did not dare to take it lightly, because there were not only loyalists and betrayers of the Human Empire, but also terrifying enemies called “Necrons”.

Like the industrial machinery of Antax, the Necrons, whose bodies are cast from living metal, are considered inorganic life by clay artists.

They were endowed with souls and became free men. Like the oil man on Antax, they became fanatical believers of clay artists. Each Death Scythe warship also had a hollow ring composed of five segments, which was the symbol of clay artists.

Therefore, the Necrons and the rebellious Mechanicus can be considered to be the same camp to a certain extent.

This is not good news.

The combat power of the Necrons cannot be simply measured by armor and firepower specifications. These high-tech ships made of living metal are overwhelming the Imperial ships in terms of both warship performance and the types of tactics they can choose. Based on the performance parameters provided by Joshua, Eliwood came to the following conclusion;

Only at the cost of their own destruction could the seven Imperial heavy cruisers break the Necrons’ scythe.

This is the result of the fact that these ships had undergone war transformation at great cost by the Adeptus Mechanicus and the Adeptus Truth before the expedition. If it had been other conventional Imperial Navy warships, the damage ratio would have been even uglier.

At this time, technical advisor Joshua had returned to the Dian Ying Nv Jie from his research vessel and brought bad news:

“Just now, four Scythe-class harvesters, which are equivalent to Imperial heavy cruisers, and Jackal-class and Dirge-class assault ships, which are similar to frigates, used inertia-free engines to break through our encirclement from the weak point and merged with the original Death Scythe fleet. The situation is not optimistic, Chapter Master.”

The current lineup is already difficult to beat, and now…

Eliwood sighed and looked at the technical advisor who had just walked into the control room. “If we want to completely eliminate the rebellious Antax Order and this Necron fleet, how much do you think it will cost us?”

“Well… the answer to this question will shake the morale of the army. The expedition fleet and they will most likely perish together, and only the Heroine and our ships will be able to escape.” Joshua said.

Eliwood nodded.

Changing the subject, Joshua continued, “But in fact, we don’t need to clash with each other. Have you noticed? Neither the Antax Order nor the Freeman Necrons have directly shown hostility towards us. The Necrons even took a round of concentrated fire from our naval guns without fighting back.”

Senelio then said: “It seems that we were passively involved in a transaction with the God of the Warp.”

“Yes, you figured it out too.” Joshua nodded and said, “This place is not too far from the Far East border, and it is not beyond the signal range of the ultra-long-distance communication array. I just reported this to the leader…”

Eliwood immediately perked up: “What did the Star Slinger say?”

“He said it was a deal, and once the deal was done we would just get our team ready and leave. The clay artist was a respectable god and wouldn’t stop us,” Joshua said.

“that’s it?”

“That’s it.” Joshua said confidently, “Deals with God are always so absurd. Remember the short poem played by the Necrons before? That was the content of the deal.”

“After awakening self-awareness, the mechanical life inspired by the clay artist gains the right to control its own life.”

“If they choose to leave, we will have to bear the cost of losing several warships and damaging the expeditionary fleet.”

“If they choose to stay, we can obtain space battleships controlled by high-level machine spirits that have awakened themselves, and the overall strength of the fleet will be greatly improved.”

It was a very clear logic, a very reasonable transaction, even a little too reasonable. It was so reasonable that Eliwood could hardly believe that such a transaction was made by a god.

——In this universe, God has always been synonymous with evil.

“Whether you believe it or not, these are the words of the leader. The Clay Artist is a trustworthy God, fundamentally different from Chaos, who is unreasonable and cannot afford to lose.” Joshua finally said, “As long as we follow the rules in our transactions with the Clay Artist and do not break the rules set by Him, there will be no danger.”

Literally, there is no danger as long as you don’t break the rules.

“God-Emperor…” Senelio covered his chest with his hands, looking stunned: “What have I done?!”

Eliwood was a little confused: “What did you do?”

“The Chief Librarian asked me to kill all the warship machine spirits that chose to betray the empire, and I did it.” Joshua said calmly:

“My shadow banshees used soul-devouring toxins to kill every warship that chose to leave the fleet. All the machine souls that were assassinated struggled and died in extreme pain. None of them escaped. I also collected a lot of valuable experimental data, and I also have a direction for the next step of improving the soul-devouring toxin…”

Joshua was very grateful to Senerio. Without him providing a legitimate reason for himself, the Order of Truth would not be able to find so many high-level machine souls as experimental materials.

As for the consequences of doing so, the chief think tank director will be held responsible.

Suddenly, the communication signals from the Antax Order Fleet became as dense as a rainstorm, and countless waves hit the signal receiver of the Dian Ying Heroine. The Necromancer fleet, which had been quietly waiting for the result of the transaction in the encirclement, also became agitated, and the Freeman Necromancer sent a new signal to the treacherous expedition fleet.

“What is Antax telling us?” Eliwood asked.

“They are swearing.” The female hero of Dian Ying replied, “It’s very ugly.”

Before the female hero of the Palace of Heroes finished translating the new signal sent by the Necrons, a beam of dark green energy arc lashed the void shield of the battleship Glorious Expedition like a long whip, causing violent waves.

The free men launched an attack.

Then came waves of naval gunfire that pierced the darkness. The Antax Mechanicus also launched an attack at the same time. Their attacks were so tricky and so deadly. This group of Mechanic servants who had built countless war machines for the human empire knew too well the hull structure of the imperial warships. The hot plasma and high-explosive ammunition were mixed with slow-flying torpedoes targeting the void shields. They hid themselves in the colorful and constantly flickering artillery fire and slowly approached the hull of the expedition fleet, like hidden death gods hiding in the fog.

“Change course! All ships immediately evade the attack as quickly as possible. Don’t worry about the Valkyrie. She is tougher than any of you!” The regiment roared in the fleet’s internal communication channel.

He ordered the other ships to disperse quickly and let the Valkyries bear the first round of attacks. This was not an act of personal heroism, but a rational move based on objective facts.

The Dian Ying Heroine is equipped with zero-element armor that covers the entire ship and multi-layered void shields, psychic shields, and dark matter deflector shields. Such a body is used to resist damage, and it is not an exaggeration to call it the toughest ship in the Human Empire.

Moreover, it is very tanky and has high damage.

While the Dianying Nujie crossed its huge hull to block the artillery fire for the expeditionary fleet, it also launched its own counterattack against the enemy’s broadside fire.

The rows of Nova Cannon arrays and Destroyer torpedoes installed on the left side of the hull were fired continuously under the precise control of the ship-borne AI. The focusing array under the bow caught a Necron “Jackal” attack ship that was trying to rush in the face.

The next moment, blue electric current penetrated this high-tech battleship made of living metal.

This was the first ship destroyed in the Battle of Antaks, and the female hero of Dian Ying got the first kill on the battlefield.

“Actually, one shot…” Even Eliwood, who made the battle plan, hesitated at this moment. He looked at Joshua and asked, “What is the weapon hanging under the bow of the Palace of Heroes? That electric current… Why was the Necrons’ warship completely paralyzed by just a single shot from the front?”

“Sky Cloud Lightning, a chaotic energy weapon with decomposition and penetration properties, can ignore shields and armor and directly cause damage to the hull itself, but I don’t know more detailed information, I am engaged in biological research.”

Joshua, whose mind was full of newly collected toxin experiment data, answered the captain’s doubts in a perfunctory and lazy tone:

“The next-level penetrating weapon is called the Focused Arc. It can penetrate a fully-armed Ork war flagship with one shot, and has a longer range—to be precise, it can enforce laws across star systems. But the keel-structured Valkyrie can’t fit such a thick barrel, so it can only hang the lower-level ‘Sky Cloud Lightning’.”

However, even if it was not a weapon of the highest standard, taking a true-damage penetrating blow from a Valkyrie-class battleship at such a close distance would be tantamount to seeking death for the Necrons’ battleship.

Chapter 184 Material Decompressor

When Joshua’s message for help was transmitted back to the Far Eastern Frontier, Russell and Coronia were hunting down a group of Dark Eldar pirates who were roaming around in the Elinthia sector in the northern star belt.

If nothing unexpected happens, after destroying this group of pirates, Coroniai will be able to use the Elincia star sector as a springboard to complete the cleanup of the northern part of the Nightmare Constellation Void within 1 years and achieve actual control over the northern star belt that accounts for about 4/ of the entire Far East region.

Then Russell’s plan unsurprisingly went awry.

“Marshal! It’s bad! The 13th Expeditionary Fleet that Joshua is following is fighting with the followers of the Clay Artist!”

Gray Wind, bearing this sudden bad news, trembled as he passed through the biomass transport pipeline covered with dense pink tentacles, and hurriedly ran into the chest cavity of the biological mothership “Mother of Punishment”. After passing through the valve and entering the mothership’s chamber, he saw an unexpected scene:

“Eh? Why are you kneeling on the ground, Coronie?”

Gray Wind looked at Russell, who was sitting on the throne of flesh and blood with one hand on his forehead, not saying a word, in confusion. Then he looked at Coroniai, who was kneeling in front of Russell and prostrating himself, and he became even more confused.

“I made a mistake.” Kroniai knelt on the ground and answered Huifeng’s question without daring to move. Her soft voice trembled slightly, and Huifeng got goosebumps all over his body.

“What did you do wrong?” Gray Wind asked.

Koroni remained silent. This seemed to be a difficult question for it to ask.

Grey Wind turned his confused gaze towards the direction of the Flesh Throne. Russell looked at Grey Wind helplessly and said with lingering fear: “It just tried to stab me with the thorn on its tail… You know what’s inside.”

The sting on the tail? Gray Wind was stunned for a moment, then suddenly realized what was happening. The little sympathy he had for Coronie disappeared immediately: “I was the first one to come here…”

“What do you mean?” Russell looked at Gray Wind with disbelief: “You don’t need to rely on obtaining genetic information to evolve on your own.”

“Huh?” Gray Wind was shocked: “So this is why?”

The situation seemed a little different from what she thought.

“Well, that’s why. Koroni just confessed to me.” Russell said this with a tired heart: “The Zerg will obtain genetic information by devouring the biomass of other races, absorb the strengths of the information and write it into their own DNA, so as to improve their own genes and achieve evolution.”

Kneeling in front of the throne of flesh and blood, Koroni carefully raised his head and whispered, “Master is the most powerful biological individual I have ever seen. Since the first time I met you, I have been imagining how powerful Zerg individuals I can produce if I can obtain your genes, and to what heights my life level will be elevated.”

But it would never dare to eat its master in the physical sense, so Coronie had to start planning how to eat Russell in the physiological sense.

To this end, Coronia created several female bodies that met the aesthetic standards of adult male humans, and repeatedly adjusted the details of body shape and appearance in an attempt to impress its owner, but Russell was not interested at all. Decades passed and it didn’t get any useful gene fragments – Russell didn’t even lose any hair or dandruff, it was so sad.

“This is actually to prevent someone from developing biological viruses targeting my genes. You know, my physical body is very fragile and lacks resistance to physical damage from the real universe.” Russell enlightened.

There was another half sentence he didn’t say – his biggest target of defense was Coroniai. The Life-Shaping Queen’s attainments in genetic engineering were beyond the reach of even the most prestigious Biological Sage in the Mechanicus.

Looking at Coronie kneeling on the ground and shivering, Gray Wind lost his temper. He walked to the Queen Insect and squatted down, explaining, “Coronie, you are taking it for granted. The Marshal’s body is just that of an ordinary human without any biochemical modification. If you go to Faya and ask for a strand of hair from anyone, the key genetic information you collect will be no different from that of the Marshal.”

Coronia didn’t say anything, and Grey Wind felt that it most likely didn’t hear him. It seemed that it would not give up until it could collect Russell’s genes.

Russell was considering whether to pull out a strand of his hair to dispel Coronie’s unrealistic idea. He couldn’t give his virginity, which he had treasured for more than two hundred years, to a big bug. That would be a bit too abstract.

“Let Coronie kneel for a while. Let’s not talk about its improper thoughts towards me. Gray Wind, what’s the matter that brought you here in such a hurry?” Russell asked, “You should be releasing the nano plague on the capital planet of the Elinthia sector, ‘Aishalin’, at this moment.”

“Oh!” Huifeng stood up quickly.

Coronia’s attempt to rebel was so shocking to Grey Wind that it almost forgot why it came here.

“I just received a message from Joshua that the 13th Expeditionary Fleet has engaged in a fight with the followers of the Clay Artist,” Gray Wind said succinctly.

“In addition to the Necrons who believe in Clay Artists and call themselves ‘Free Men’, the Mechanicus of Antax also regards Clay Artists as the manifestation of the almighty Mechanical God. They betrayed the Human Empire and chose to follow Clay Artists, and renamed their organization the ‘Mechanical Art Association’.”

It is worth mentioning that the two organizations, “Free Men” and “Mechanical Arts Association”, dislike each other, but because they believe in the same god, they do not fight as soon as they meet.

Russell changed his hand and supported his forehead with one hand, and actually laughed: “What a talented group of people, they can even fight with a god with such a good temper as a clay artist.”

“Well, the conflict with the clay artists is actually half the fault of the Order of Truth.” Grey Wind briefly told Russell how Joshua deliberately rushed to carry out Senerio’s wrong mission in order to obtain experimental data.

“Oh, that’s okay then.” Russell couldn’t hold it in any longer.

There are still a lot of things that have not been resolved in their own backyard, but the expatriates are still continuing to cause trouble outside. This is because they are afraid that their boss’s mentality is not bad enough.

Russell could be said to be neither surprised nor surprised at the news that the clay artist appeared in this universe. Compared with the spirit forms of Jabakshi, the Queen of Thorin primordial worms, the malicious Rectification Host, and even Grey Wind himself who existed in the Zero Soul Stone, it was not surprising that a God of the Void came along to stir up trouble.

“A Forge World has been used for 25 years… It’s a daily routine in the Empire. As for the matter of the Necrons gaining souls and becoming free men, I wonder how the Silent King and some more powerful Hierophants will react to this after the news spreads?… The Sotek Dynasty is also a major dynasty.”

Russell rubbed his temples: “Why is it always bad news? Isn’t there any good news that can cheer you up?”

“Yes.” Gray Wind walked briskly to Russell’s side, and considerately massaged his neck and shoulders. He said, “Anti-Entropy told me that the matter decompressor will be completed soon. Marshal, do you want to go back to the Quiet Black Domain to take a look?”

Russell nodded decisively: “Of course.”

Leaving the cleanup work of the northern star belt of the Far East frontier entirely to Coroniai, Russell and Grey Wind prepared to leave the front line of the Far East Integration War.

Unable to bear to let Coronie continue to be dejected, Russell said to it before leaving: “Although my genetic information is essentially no different from that of ordinary humans, if you really want it… it’s not impossible to give it to you. But the prerequisite is that you do your job well first, and I want to inspect it.”

It’s just pulling out a hair, not a big deal.

After getting the master’s promise, the depressed Coronie suddenly became happy, perhaps a little too happy. Looking at its cheerful appearance, Russell always felt that something was wrong.