Chapter 107: A Harvest of Red Mist (Part 2)
The masses in the conduit hesitated, their hungry eyes darting toward the heavy bulkheads. They had heard rumors of a scavenger-king who hoarded grain and liquid gold. To a Sump-rat, a full belly was a dream worth dying for. If they could breach the wall, they could feast for a lifetime.
Driven by a hive-mind of collective greed, the first few hundred surged forward. Some carried crude fire-bombs made of chemical waste; others hammered on the plasteel with industrial sledges, trying to find a weak point in the masonry.
They hadn't even reached the gate when the first tongue of fire erupted from the wall.
DA-DA-DA-DA-DA-DA!!!
The thunderous roar of the Lumberer-pattern Heavy Stubber shattered the silence of the tunnel, the report so violent it likely burst the eardrums of anyone within twenty meters.
The 20mm armor-piercing rounds possessed a terrifying kinetic profile. At this range, a single slug didn't just stop a man; it bored through him and the six people standing behind him. The corridor was transformed into a pressurized slaughterhouse. Human bodies were torn into wet, ragged chunks; heads were deleted by glancing blows; internal organs were sprayed against the curved walls like a grisly brand of paint.
Kian held the spade-handles tight, his thumbs buried in the firing plates. The heavy tripod groaned as it absorbed the massive recoil, allowing Kian to walk the stream of lead back and forth across the "fatal funnel."
The stretch of pipe in front of Kian was a straight four-hundred-meter shot with zero cover. The mob was packed shoulder-to-shoulder. There was nowhere to run. It wasn't a battle; it was industrial-scale reaping.
DA-DA-DA-DA!!!!
The seventy-five-round drum went dry in seconds. Kian didn't pause to admire his work. He barked an order to Little Joel: "RELOAD!"
Kian leaped from the gun-platform, unslung the Kantrael-pattern Lasgun, and stepped to the secondary firing slit. He didn't aim. He simply pointed the barrel into the mass of screaming humanity and held the trigger down on low-power automatic.
BIP-BIP-BIP-BIP-BIP!
The Lasgun shrieked, the ruby beams ionizing the air with a series of sharp, electric cracks. When a beam hit a chest, it triggered a micro-explosion as the moisture in the man's lungs flash-boiled. Armor melted; flesh scorched.
Kian emptied an entire power-cell, pouring two hundred pulses of coherent light into the tunnel until the barrel began to hiss with white smoke. He dropped the empty cell and looked at Little Joel. The boy had already slammed a fresh drum into the Lumberer.
Kian stepped back behind the heavy stubber and resumed the sermon of lead.
On the opposite end of the brewery, a second Lumberer began to bark. Shiv had opened up on the secondary mob. Between the two heavy cannons, the staccato rhythm of Big Joel's light machine gun, and the occasional snap-hiss of Las-fire, the conduit became a symphony of the macabre.
The firing continued for four minutes. By the end, Kian had emptied three drums of 20mm and four Las-packs.
The air outside the firing slits was a white wall of pulverised plastocrete dust and gunpowder smoke. The stench was a physical weight: burnt ozone, scorched meat, and the foul, copper tang of three hundred fresh corpses.
As the haze slowly settled, Kian flicked on his high-lumen tactical light and swept the corridor. He let out a low, appreciative whistle.
The "maggots" had been liquidated. The floor of the conduit was a carpet of red pulp. Shattered bones and discarded scrap-weapons were piled high. The survivors—the lucky few at the back who hadn't been shredded—had long since vanished into the dark, their greed replaced by a terror that would haunt their bloodlines for generations.
Kian checked his HUD. His eyes widened.
[COGITATOR NOTIFICATION]
Ballistics Proficiency: 150 (Master Tier).
Rank: Deadeye of the Sump.
Trait Unlocked [Cold Bore]: Your first shot from a cold barrel has +50% accuracy and penetration.
"One hundred and fifty," Kian whispered. At this level of proficiency, his understanding of ballistics was near-supernatural. He didn't just know where the bullet would go; he could feel the physics of the shot. He was now on par with the elite veterans of the Astra Militarum.
He noticed his proficiency gain had slowed down significantly. The higher the tier, the more souls required to move the bar. But for a single morning's work, he was satisfied.
A rhythmic, agonizing moaning drifted through the slits. The "wounded" were calling for a mercy that didn't exist in the Underhive.
Kian had an idea. He turned to Little Joel. "Gather the new recruits. All fifteen of the 'Warriors.' Full armor. Weapons hot. Tell them we're going out for a 'Soil Audit'."
Minutes later, the brewery's heavy gate groaned open. Kian stepped out, followed by a squad of fifteen men clad in Grade-4 Carapace armor and tactical masks. They looked like a squad of Kasrkin stormtroopers emerging from the mists.
Kian pointed to a scavenger lying fifty meters out, his legs missing and his chest a ruin of shrapnel holes. The man was whimpering, his hands clawing at the cold floor.
"Finish them," Kian commanded his troops.
The recruits hesitated. Most were former Mid-Hive laborers or shell-shocked veterans. They had seen death, but they had never been the executioners. They looked at the mangled, pathetic creatures in the dirt and then at their rifles.
Little Joel stepped forward, his face grim behind his visor. "The Master gave an order. Execute the heretics. I've trained you for ten cycles—is your trigger finger soft? If you can't kill a dying rat, how will you face a rebel with a stubber?"
One recruit, a man who had lost his home to a debt-collector, stepped forward. He leveled his autogun at the scavenger's head and squeezed the trigger.
DA-DA-DA!
The scavenger went still. The recruit turned pale, his hands shaking, but he didn't lower the rifle.
Kian pointed at the man. "Note his name. He gets a double-ration of Grox-meat tonight. When the Syndicate expands, he's the first candidate for a Sergeant's pips."
The promise of meat and power acted like a stimulant. The other recruits immediately fanned out, their rifles barking in the gloom as they systematically ended the suffering of the survivors.
One by one, the "Civilians" were being baptized in the red mist of the Sump.
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