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The Dominus Bellorum ’s immense broadsides spoke. Six macro-cannon shells, each the size of a hab-block, slammed into the Blade ’s bow. For a moment, its corrupted shields flickered. The Righteous Wrath added its own lance batteries—twin beams of focused sun-fire that stabbed into the wound.
Caspian’s own fleet was a shadow of its former glory. The Battle of the Gath Rim had cost him three cruisers. What remained were his flagship, two Lunar-class cruisers ( Valiant and Stalwart ), a squadron of three Sword-class frigates, and the Righteous Wrath —a battered, venerable Gothic-class cruiser whose crew was rumored to still whisper prayers to the God-Emperor through bleeding lips.
But the Blade of Antwyr was the true terror. It did not fire lances. It vomited a cascade of warp-lightning that boiled through void shields like tissue paper. The Stalwart took a glancing blow. Her shields collapsed, and her dorsal battery was fused into a single, glowing scar of molten ceramite.
“All ahead flank. Form Line of Battle. Gunnery: load void-shield-penetrator shells. Launch fighters,” Caspian ordered, his voice a flat, iron monotone. The silent hunt was over. Now came the slaughter.
A young lieutenant approached, holding a data-slate. “Casualty report, my Lord. The Righteous Wrath … all hands, twelve thousand souls.”
“All ships, emergency reverse. Set a collision course with the debris field of Praxis VI. Gunnery, target the gas giant’s core fragments.”
Caspian closed his eyes for a single heartbeat. He thought of Captain Sulla. A devout man. He had christened his ship’s main cannon “The Emperor’s Forgiveness.”
Then, the first mistake.
The Valiant and the surviving frigates poured fire not at the Chaos ships, but at the unstable plasma eddies orbiting the dead planet. The chain reaction was immediate. A sheath of stellar fire erupted from the gas giant’s corpse, expanding outward at a million kilometers an hour.
The Righteous Wrath , its ancient plasma reactors cycling inefficiently, bled a micro-flare of drive wash. It lasted less than a second. But in the empyrean-saturated void, it was a lit match in a powder keg.
The Dominus Bellorum limped into Port Maw’s dry-docks, her hull scarred, her crew count reduced by a third. Lord Admiral Caspian walked the main hangar deck, stepping past medicae shuttles and the burned-out husks of fighter craft.
The Warp does not forgive. Neither, he knew, would the God-Emperor. But for twelve thousand souls, he had bought them a cleaner death than the Archenemy could offer.
