The aftermath of the Elf-Gork Rally stirred a towering wave of Waaagh! energy throughout the entire space station. Before the cheers at the finish line had even fully dissipated, the name of the Hokage Clan had already spread to every corner of Karl-2.
Those Greenskin Boyz who previously only recognized the established clans now spent every waking moment talking about "Sasuke" and the "Hokage Speedsterz." Even the graffiti on the walls began to change; the blood-red, grinning sun-face of the Evil Sunz was being painted over by the colorful cloud emblem of the Hokage Clan.
Leveraging the unprecedented prestige brought by the Elf-Gork championship, this rising clan—which had emerged only months prior—was now effectively overshadowing most of the veteran clans on Karl-2.
Merchants from the Bad Moon Clan scrambled to establish connections, hoping to secure the rights to supply equipment to the Hokage Clan. Groups of Evil Sunz Boyz swarmed the Hokage camp, eager to challenge them to tests of speed. Even the habitually reclusive Snakebites sent envoys expressing a desire for an alliance. Their reasoning was simple: the specialized Squigs showcased by the Hokage Clan during the rally were far too enticing to ignore.
However, Raynor rejected them all. These "confidential technologies" could absolutely not be leaked on Karl-2.
The only entity that still sat firmly above the Hokage Clan was the Deathskulls. With Big Mek Chandler at the helm, that clan remained the anchor of Karl-2, sitting unperturbed while the outside world surged with change.
This remained Raynor's sole regret. For the Elf-Gork Rally, he had prepared a "special gift" specifically for Chandler, yet Chandler never once showed his face. Even Greatfoot Seth, presiding over the Core District, had watched the event with his psychic gaze; at the moment of Sasuke's gravity reversal, Seth had even pulsed out a psychic signal of approval for the mind-blowing maneuver. Yet Chandler, the undisputed boss of Karl-2, remained holed up in his workshop in total seclusion, without making a single sound.
Had Raynor been able to discover the exact location of the laboratory, this entire plan could have reached an early conclusion.
"A pity," Raynor remarked in the control room, looking over the surveillance reports. "But it doesn't matter. You have to eat one bite at a time. The phase-one objective has already been achieved."
He had never wanted just a rally trophy. The prestige brought by the championship was merely a brick to knock on the door of his larger plan.
Three days after the event concluded, Raynor and Tooth-Rich visited the Greenskin General Command of Karl-2, bringing dozens of crates filled with premium big teeth. Relying on the fame gathered from the rally and using a mountain of teeth to grease the wheels, the Hokage Clan successfully supplanted the Evil Sunz. They took over command of all mobile and reconnaissance forces on the Karl-2 front.
These two positions had traditionally been the exclusive domain of the Evil Sunz. After all, it was a fundamental belief among Greenskins that Evil Sunz Boyz were the fastest runners and flyers. But now, the Greenskins of Karl-2 followed a new logic: the Hokage Clan, who won the Elf-Gork Rally, were the real "hard cases" who had mastered speed to its ultimate limit.
More importantly, mobile units currently had a pathetically low presence on Karl-2. The Imperial Fleet had been loitering on the outskirts of the system for nearly two months, their defensive formations airtight. The Evil Sunz' tactics—relying on small assault craft and space bikes for harassment—couldn't even get close to the Imperial void shields and macro-cannons. Every charge was a suicide mission. Over time, even the Evil Sunz grew tired of managing these thankless posts.
Since the Hokage Clan wanted to take over, the other clans naturally had no objections. It was a position where it was difficult to achieve results, so it didn't threaten anyone's core interests.
What they didn't know, however, was that Raynor was the "Boss" of that very Imperial Fleet outside.
Immediately upon receiving command authority, Raynor sent Tooth-Rich to every scrap workshop on Karl-2. He spent a fortune to hire Kazuk the Welder—the second-ranked Big Mek on Karl-2 after Chandler. He also poached over a hundred top-tier Mekboyz from various clans as assistants to build a brand-new fleet of assault craft for the Hokage mobile forces.
Raynor's requirement consisted of only two words: "Top Spec." As for the budget? The limit was that there was no limit.
This statement drove Kazuk and the Mekboyz into a frenzy. A Greenskin Mek's greatest dream was to practice "I-fink-so" technology without restraint—ignoring material costs, ignoring whether there were enough teeth, and simply building toward the most "Waaagh!" direction possible.
In just two weeks, the most luxurious space assault craft in the history of Karl-2 were born in the Hokage Clan's shipyards. There were five hundred Hokage assault craft in total, each a masterpiece of Greenskin technology. The hulls were made of scrap metal that even the Deathskulls would be reluctant to use, and the engines were the finest the Evil Sunz had to offer, matching the speed of their proprietary craft.
The bows were welded with custom assault cannons and las-cannons from the Bad Moons. A broadside from all five hundred ships could briefly suppress an Imperial frigate swarm. The ships were also packed with "black tech" from the Deathskulls: boarding torpedoes that could ignore void shields to launch Boyz directly into enemy cabins, "Zzzap" cannons whose power and ammo relied entirely on the Boyz' belief, and "Noisy Engines" that emitted deafening roars in the vacuum to jam enemy communications and fire-control systems.
But the most critical point was that the hulls of all five hundred assault craft were painted with the highest-grade purple pigment on Karl-2.
The Hokage Boyz now held one firm belief: Purple is da sneaky color!
Since this came from the mouth of Big Brother Itachi—the leader who led them to the Elf-Gork championship—the Boyz believed it implicitly. Every time they went out on patrol in their assault craft, they felt they were the stealthiest hunters in the entire galaxy.
Thus, a mobile force that was arguably the most luxurious and terrifying in the history of Karl-2 was officially formed.
However, the other veteran clans reacted with nothing but disdain and mockery.
"Just a lucky nouveau riche, no different from dem Bad Moon gits wiv teef for brains," the Big Bosses of the Goff Clan remarked, blowing smoke rings and giving the middle finger toward the Hokage shipyards. "Wot good is fancy gear? Against da 'umies? Dey won't even touch da edge of da Imperial fleet. When da fightin' starts, it'll still be up to us."
This sentiment was shared by the vast majority of the clans. In their eyes, the Hokage Clan was just a new power that had exploded in popularity due to a single race. No matter how much flashy gear they piled up, it would be useless when it came time to actually fight the "humies."
And the Hokage Clan, having just made a name for themselves, did indeed desperately need a real, hard-fought battle to prove they weren't just "show-ponies" who could only run in circles.
That battle came faster than anyone expected.
On the third day after the Hokage Boyz finished familiarizing themselves with the flight paths on the system's periphery and mastering their new craft, the Imperial Navy fleet on the outskirts suddenly launched an attack.
For the past two months, this Imperial fleet had resembled a group of crocodiles lurking at the bottom of a river, consistently guarding the periphery of the system. Their sole mission was to intercept Greenskin reinforcements arriving from the Dorido system and prevent them from attacking the Brevis system.
Aside from occasional small-scale skirmishes, they had almost never launched a proactive offensive. Their passivity was so consistent that the Greenskins of Karl-2 had nearly forgotten their existence. If not for the weekly Waaagh! GP points races keeping them entertained, the restless Boyz would have charged out with their guns long ago to fight the "humies" to the death.
But this time, these "passive" humies played a most sinister hand with a surprise attack.
They timed their strike with surgical precision to coincide with the start of a new round of the Waaagh! GP. At this moment, more than a third of the Greenskins on Karl-2 were crowded around various racing venues and live broadcast screens, their eyes entirely fixed on the racers on the track. Even the frontline defense towers were manned by only a skeletal crew.
The main body of the Imperial fleet first launched a frontal feint, drawing away what remained of the defensive fire. Simultaneously, they dispatched a rapid-response flotilla to seize the vital routes leading from the race tracks to the various frontline ports, pinning down the Greenskin Boyz who attempted to return and reinforce.
During this window of vulnerability, the main Imperial fleet broke through the outer defense ring. A massive number of landing craft and frigates drove deep into Karl-2's Middle District. They did not succumb to greed or overreach by attempting to push into the Core District all at once. Instead, they concentrated all their firepower on the space station's core infrastructure.
Ports were blasted into space debris; frontline anti-air turrets were uprooted. Recycling berths piled high with ore and scrap were blown to fragments. Even the few remaining large-scale Squig ranches on Karl-2 were turned into a carnage of flesh and blood by beams descending from the heavens, as countless farm-raised Squigs were vaporized in the explosions.
For Greenskins who survived on scrap manufacturing and squig-meat, such destruction was far more lethal than killing millions of Boyz.
The entirety of Karl-2 fell into unprecedented chaos. The Big Bosses of various clans roared frantically for their Boyz to return and reinforce, but the paths back were held tight by the expedition fleet. Wave after wave of charging Boyz were turned to dust by macro-cannon fire.
Siss, presiding over the Core District, snapped his eyes open from meditation the moment he sensed the explosions in the Middle District. Psychic fluctuations instantly swept through the entire Core. Disregarding his not-yet-fully recovered body, he seized his staff, prepared to personally intervene and tear apart the humies who had intruded into his domain.
At that exact moment, the Hokage Clan's mobile force—which had been lurking on the outer edges—commenced its operation.
Five hundred purple Hokage assault craft moved like five hundred ninjas lurking in the darkness. Relying on "Noisy Engines" to jam the Imperial fleet's long-range scans and using the asteroid belt as cover, they silently circled around to the rear of the Imperial invasion fleet.
That was their supply line: a formation of troop carriers protected by exactly ten frigates. They were continuously funneling ammunition and manpower to the landing forces on the front line.
The commander of the expedition fleet "completely" did not expect these Greenskins—who usually only knew how to charge head-on—to actually play a flank-and-backstab maneuver. It wasn't until the roar of the Noisy Engines echoed through space and the void shield of the first frigate was blasted open by concentrated fire that they realized someone had plunged a knife into their backside.
"Fire! Blast dese 'umie ships into scrap metal!"
Tooth-Rich sat inside his assault ship, holding a megaphone and screaming his war-cry at the top of his lungs. Although he was just a Gretchin, the fact that five hundred top-tier assault craft were following him made his spine stand perfectly straight.
Five hundred craft opened fire simultaneously. Dense lasers and shells hammered into the Imperial frigate swarm like rain. The firepower of these assault craft was built to top-tier specifications; the collective broadside of five hundred ships even briefly suppressed the retaliatory fire of the ten frigates.
One by one, the void shields of the frigates flickered violently under the frenzied bombardment before finally dissipating into particles of light. The hulls were torn open with massive gashes by las-cannons, and the firelight of explosions linked together into a chain across the void.
What drove the expedition fleet to even greater despair were the Hokage Clan's boarding torpedoes. These weapons, brought to life by the Mekboyz' "I-fink-so" logic, had a fifty-percent chance to ignore void shield interception. They passed directly through energy barriers, randomly teleporting the Boyz inside the torpedoes into the cabins of the Imperial ships.
As alarms blared aboard the frigates, howling Hokage Boyz appeared in the corridors clutching choppas and sluggas. A Greenskin boarding action was one of the most headache-inducing tactics for the Imperial Navy in the entire galaxy. The Boyz cared nothing for casualties; their eyes held only "Waaagh!" and combat. They slaughtered the "humies" on the ships indiscriminately, sabotaging control systems and engines. Furthermore, they did not encounter those terrifying Tyranids inside these Imperial vessels.
In just over ten minutes, three frigates were completely paralyzed in space by these boarding Boyz.
No one knew that this exhilarating raid was entirely paid for by Raynor's own assets. But he understood the principle that you have to lose a pawn to win the game. Sacrificing a few frigates and some supplies was worth the prestige the Hokage Clan would gain on Karl-2.
The Imperial landing forces at the front soon discovered the disaster at their rear. With their logistics line severed and ammunition or reinforcements unable to reach them, and with more Greenskin reinforcements arriving at the front to launch a frenzied counterattack, the situation was untenable. If they stayed, they would be sandwiched and annihilated.
The expedition fleet commander could only grit his teeth and issue the order to retreat.
A surprise attack that had been entirely one-sided was forcibly overturned by the Hokage Clan's single flank-and-backstab maneuver. When the Hokage assault craft towed a battered Imperial frigate back to the ports of Karl-2, the Greenskins of the entire planet boiled with excitement.
Those Big Bosses who had previously mocked the Hokage Clan as "show-ponies" now kept their mouths shut. A racing champion could make the Boyz cheer, but only a hero who drove back the "humies" on the battlefield could earn the genuine awe and respect of the Greenskins. Overnight, the Hokage Clan became the most "Waaagh!" clan in the mouths of Karl-2's Orks, their fame unrivaled.
The day the battle ended, Luna could not wait to initiate a transmission to Raynor. She believed that the raid Raynor had orchestrated had been a total failure. As soon as the comms connected, she began her mockery with a tone of schadenfreude.
"Oh, our 'Great Commander' Carey von, is this your surprise attack?" she sneered. "You didn't even touch the edge of Karl-2's Core District before being driven back by a bunch of Greenskins? I thought you were supposed to be impressive."
However, she did not expect that the voice coming from the other end was not Raynor's, but a female voice so cold it lacked a single shred of emotion.
"How childish."
Sarah's voice came through the comms, carrying undisguised disdain. As soon as she spoke, she immediately cut the transmission.
On the other end, aboard the Measure of Discipline, Luna froze. The schadenfreude on her face instantly locked up, replaced by a flush of red. She had never heard that voice before, but the disdain in that tone made her feel both ashamed and infuriated.
Luna slammed her fist onto the control console in front of her and hissed through gritted teeth:
"Damn you, Raynor..."
At this moment, Raynor had no time to worry about Luna's temper tantrum. He was busy operating "Itachi," commanding his own fleet to attack his own fleet.
Although his heart bled at the cost, his grand design had reached its most critical step. Leveraging the military merit gained from repelling the Imperial fleet, the Hokage Clan had officially secured a firm foothold in Karl-2's military circles. Consequently, Tooth-Rich and Raynor received an invitation to the Karl-2 High War Council.
This was a top-level meeting that only the Warbosses of the major clans were qualified to attend. The meeting was held in the Great Hall of Karl-2's Core District.
When Raynor walked into the hall behind Tooth-Rich, he was met by dozens of gazes filled with disdain and hostility. The entire hall was choked with foul air; Big Bosses from the Bad Moon Clan were guzzling mushroom beer from massive barrels, while leaders of the Evil Sunz and Goffs stood on tables, shouting at each other until they were red in the face. In the corners, Mekboys from the Deathskulls crouched, fiddling with small mechanical parts.
Nearly every major clan had representatives present, with the notable exception of the Blood Axes. Following the Imperial raid, an "anonymous source" (Raynor himself) had leaked information suggesting the Blood Axes had tipped off the "humies" about the frontline's vulnerability during the Waaagh! GP.
Even though the Blood Axe leaders immediately issued joint statements claiming innocence, no one believed them. Among Greenskins, there was usually only one answer when it came to being backstabbed by their own kind. It was like a 21st-century police officer encountering two suspects of different ethnicities, or a strange occurrence in the Warp that even the gods couldn't explain: you simply grab the "usual suspect" first. No one felt it was wrong to blame the Blood Axes or punch a Tzeentchian cultist just to be safe.
As a result, while the other clans met, the Blood Axes were busy fighting off "punitive expeditions" from multiple directions and had no time for the council.
The meeting was ostensibly about discussing war strategy against the human fleet, but in reality, it was a venting session for the major clans. For two full hours, they argued over trivial clan squabbles. The Bad Moons cursed the Evil Sunz for seizing their mines; the Evil Sunz blasted the Deathskulls for stealing their engine schematics. They accused each other, traded insults, and even came to blows on the spot. In this room, whoever won the fight was considered "right."
The actual time spent discussing how to deal with the human fleet totaled less than ten minutes. Even though the Hokage Clan was the rising star that had just "saved" Karl-2, none of the Big Bosses gave them a second glance. To these veteran Orks, the Hokage Clan was a joke. What kind of clan lets a Gretchin be its boss? Even if they won a race and repelled a human fleet, it didn't change their "lowly" nature in the eyes of the others.
Despite the fact that many in the room had made a fortune in teeth betting on the Hokage races, their disdain remained undisguised.
Throughout the proceedings, Tooth-Rich sat in his chair, his body stiff with tension. He barely spoke. Every time he attempted to open his mouth, he was interrupted by the boisterous laughter of the other Bosses. No one wanted to hear a Grot talk.
Raynor stood behind Tooth-Rich like an inconspicuous guard, silently gathering every piece of information in the hall. But all he heard was useless garbage: frictions between clans and arrogance toward the human fleet. They didn't seem to realize how dangerous an Imperial fleet capable of timing a precision strike actually was.
Finally, as another round of laughter died down, Raynor took a step forward. He broke the cacophony with a single question.
"I'd like to ask a question, Bosses. Regarding the human fleet outside... how do you actually view them?"
His voice wasn't loud, yet it carried across the entire hall. Instantly, every eye fixed on him. Then came a deafening roar of laughter.
"How do we view 'em? Just a bunch of 'umies standing in a corner outside!" A Bad Moon Boss slammed the table, laughing so hard his beer spilled everywhere. "To fink your Hokage Clan just fought 'em and you're already dis scared?"
"Dem 'umies have been out dere for two months. Dey attacked so many times, and every time we beat 'em back!" an Evil Sunz Boss added, spitting on the floor. "Wait 'til we're bored, and we'll drive our ships out and blast 'em all to scrap!"
An old Mekboy from the Deathskulls, covered in wires and cables, raised his head with arrogance. His voice held absolute worship for Chandler. "When our Boss Chandler finishes his seclusion, he'll build the biggest, most Waaagh! mecha in the galaxy! When dat happens, forget dis 'umie fleet—we'll charge straight into dere home world!"
The hall erupted in cheers. The Big Bosses were filled with fervor. They remembered the power Chandler displayed when he raided Luna's fleet. They all firmly believed that once Chandler built the legendary Great Mecha, a Grand Waaagh! would begin. They wouldn't just drive back the humans; they would conquer Brevis in one go.
As the cheers grew louder and everyone immersed themselves in the fantasy of the Great Waaagh!, Raynor's voice rang out again, sounding utterly out of place.
"So, I have another question for everyone."
"When Boss Chandler leads us on this successful Great Waaagh!... who exactly are we supposed to listen to?"
"Do we listen to Boss Ragna, or do we listen to Boss Chandler?"
The sentence plunged the hall into a dead silence.
A second later, a psychic pressure so terrifying it was suffocating swept through the hall like a tsunami. Every Greenskin Boss went stiff, their faces turning pale as breathing became difficult. They instinctively looked toward the head of the table.
Greatfoot Siss, who had been sitting in the primary seat with his eyes closed throughout the meeting, slowly opened them. This second-in-command of Karl-2, Ragna's most trusted right hand, had eyes swirling with a green psychic storm. The horrific pressure locked onto Raynor.
Ultimately, however, Siss did not strike.
No one else in the hall dared to speak another word. The rowdy war council ended in an oppressive, suffocating silence.
Walking out of the War Hall and into the wind smelling of machine oil, Tooth-Rich's legs were still shaking. Drenched in sweat, he grabbed Raynor's arm, his voice trembling.
"Itachi, are you crazy?! How did you dare ask that?! Boss Siss almost killed you on the spot!"
Having spent time with Raynor interacting with the various clan leaders, Tooth-Rich had come to understand the power structure at the top of Karl-2. Siss was Ragna's core loyalist. Raynor's question was the equivalent of tearing away the paper-thin veil between Ragna and Chandler in front of everyone. It was a suicide move.
Raynor, however, didn't care. To use the life of "Itachi's" vessel to test Siss was a bargain.
Siss's rage hadn't been triggered by Raynor's disrespect or arrogance. It was triggered because the words had struck the deepest suspicion in Siss's heart. Once Chandler cracked the Mecha Secret Vault, his strength would only continue to grow. When that time came, would he truly be willing to remain subordinate to Ragna?