Chapter 405: The Titan Temple, Part 2
Major Noa led Kian through the outer ring of the factory complex, where Ecclesiarchy militants stood guard and patrolled everywhere.
Mechanicus militants: heavily augmented cyborgs with barely any flesh left on them at all. Their gear was ornate, red robes, plasma carbines, arc rifles, and every single one carrying a powered melee weapon. Where power swords were normally reserved for senior officers elsewhere, here every militant carried one as standard issue.
Noa led Kian into one of the factories, an armour-plating facility, rows of hydraulic presses and forges hammering red-hot metal into shape for Chimera hulls and Leman Russ plating. She walked straight up to the facility's overseer, a tech-priest.
"Little brother, I need a favor."
A tech-priest with a refined face and a respirator grafted where his nose and mouth had been turned around.
"Sister? What is it?"
"It's like this."
Kian watched the two of them with real interest. A PDF major and a Mechanicus tech-priest, siblings. This world really did blend Imperial and Mechanicus power structures more tightly than most.
The tech-priest heard his sister out, then turned to Kian.
"Honored Count, I am Tech-priest Boothe. Could you provide me the damage assessment for your Knight suits? I'll need a detailed diagnostic before I can determine the repair approach."
Kian pulled out a data-slate and handed it over. Boothe took it, connected it through a data port on his mechadendrite, and returned it a dozen or so seconds later.
"My lord, your Knight suits have suffered severe damage. The armour frames, servo-mechanisms, even the plasma reactors, none of that concerns me, we can handle all of it here. The real difficulty is the command thrones. Those are extraordinarily precise instruments, and several of yours are completely destroyed. That's going to make the repair work considerably harder."
Kian asked, "Can it be done?"
Boothe nodded. "It can absolutely be done. If this Temple has the technical capability to construct a Titan, repairing a lesser Knight suit is well within reach. But my lord, there's a price to pay, and that decision isn't mine to make. A matter this significant needs to go to the Magos directly. If you're agreeable, I'll forward this data to him and arrange a time for you to meet in person, so the two of you can negotiate terms."
Kian nodded. "Please do."
Boothe closed his eyes for a moment, submitting the request instantly.
"Then please wait, my lord. Once the Magos has time available, he'll respond to your request."
Imperial efficiency. Kian muttered internally about it but held his tongue, since he was a guest here.
He moved on to other business.
"Tech-priest Boothe, does your Forge Temple sell weapons?"
Kian had six thousand private troops under him now, his hard-earned assets, and every one of them needed to be armed to the teeth. Three thousand were his graduate-degree soldiers, each of whom needed full power armour and plasma rifles, weapons that combined armour penetration, explosive force, and incendiary damage all in one shot, ideally one or two per infantry squad. He also wanted arc rifles for his squads, a signature Mechanicus weapon.
An arc rifle looked something like a flintlock, but the bolt of electricity it fired had extraordinary penetration. Where a lasrifle killed by dumping its energy into the target on impact, an arc rifle fired a bolt of high-penetration current that punched through armour and, on contact with flesh, discharged straight into the nervous system, frying the brain outright. Against vehicles, the discharge could fry every electronic system aboard.
The Imperium had its own share of internal conflict now and then, and the Mechanicus was no exception, a faction built almost entirely around machines, which made arc rifles brutally effective in a fight against their own kind.
Boothe said, "My lord, every weapon this facility produces already has a designated destination. If you want to purchase equipment, we'd need to run a fresh production cycle for it. We can discuss the specifics of the transaction when you meet with the Magos."
Kian said he understood, and Boothe arranged lodgings while Kian waited for the Magos to respond to his request.
Boothe set him up in a room at the top of one of the major factory towers, a high-grade billet with its own filtration system, no need for protective gear inside, and a spectacular view.
Kian settled in, but didn't bother taking off his armour to rest, since he'd noticed something: the Titan Temple sat barely a few hundred kilometers from the front line.
The Temple's infrastructure was massive, which meant it could only be built out on open ground far from the hives. And with the Orks now holding sixty percent of the planet's surface, the fighting had crept right up to the Temple's doorstep.
The Mechanicus had no intention of ever losing this Titan, and the defenses around the Temple reflected that. Over five hundred thousand militants were stationed here, along with heavy PDF armoured forces, thousands of vehicles dug in for the defense. Further out, Kian spotted artillery emplacements too, hundreds of heavy guns lined up in rows, an intimidating sight.
Security at this level meant even a determined Ork push from the front lines wasn't likely to take this place easily.
Kian looked out the window at the factory sprawl and the desert beyond, taking in the alien scenery. As he watched, a sandstorm rolled up over the horizon, a wall of dust blotting out the sky as it swept toward the Temple.
Once the view outside vanished into the storm, he sat down cross-legged, plugged a cable into his power armour to charge it, and began meditating, working on his psychic strength.
He sank deep into the meditation, losing all sense of time or surroundings. His Focus climbed from seventy-three to seventy-four, and daylight gave way to full night outside while he sat there. The sandstorm raged from afternoon straight through to nightfall, sand rattling against the metal hull of the building in a constant patter. In white noise like that, left undisturbed, Kian figured he could've sat there for three or four days straight.
But deep in the night, his eyes snapped open, pulled sharply out of the meditative trance.
Through the howl of the storm, he'd caught the sound of war cries and gunfire.
He was on his feet instantly, snapping his helmet into place, grabbing his bolt carbine and sword, ready for a fight. That was when Boothe's voice cut into his comm.
"Count, please remain in your quarters. An Ork strike force used the sandstorm as cover to breach the Temple's outer perimeter. Our militants are already engaging the intruders. Your bio-signature isn't registered in their combat data, and with visibility this poor from the storm, you risk being caught in friendly fire."
☆☆☆
-> 20 Advanced chapters Now Available on Patreon!!
-> https://www.pat-reon.co-m/c/Inkshaper
(Just remove the hyphen (-) to access patreon normally)
If you like this novel please consider leaving a review that's help the story a lot Thank you