*Snikt!*
Another cultist was cleaved in two by a chainsword. His mangled remains crashed to the ground as blood and shredded viscera erupted from the wound. The viscous fluid bubbled across the battered altar, reeking of iron and gore as it pooled into a crimson stream.
"He's over there!" a cultist shrieked in agitation, pointing toward a towering dark silhouette in the distance.
Yet before the Cult of the Dragon could muster their forces to surround him, a thick steel gun barrel thrust out from the heavy smoke, its gaping black muzzle locking squarely onto the shouting cultist.
*Bang!*
With another thunderous report, an orange-red projectile tore from the barrel and punched straight through the cultist's skull, bursting the scale-covered head like a melon and splattering red and white across the floor.
"Damn it, where the hell are those Imperials?"
"There are thousands of us here! If we rush them together, we can rip those rebels to shreds!"
Under the cover of thick smoke, the Dragonscale Marines moved like the wind and butchered without mercy. Nothing could stand in the way of their slaughter.
The Cult of the Dragon devotees—who normally swaggered about with impunity, lording over others and treating humans as sacrificial cattle—were now like sheep surrounded by wolves. Powerless to resist, they could only huddle on the altar, shivering in terror.
High above, the concealed sky vessel maintained its stealth, continuously firing streaks of orange-red missiles that blew fleeing cultists into charred fragments, forming a wall of death around the perimeter of the altar.
"May Tiamat grant me the winds of fury, to scatter the bones of my foes—"
Mahmoud raised his scepter high. A howling gale surging with the scent of blood swept across the platform, driving back the smoke and revealing the sinewy, muscle-bound frames of the Dragonscale Marines concealed within.
"Spotted, huh..." Gangtie Kuangchao grinned fiercely. He swung his chainsword, lopping off a cultist's head in one stroke, let the headless corpse drop, and turned his gaze toward the evil dragon priest in the distance.
"Take down the boss!"
"Charge!"
"For the Empire! For the Emperor!"
The Dragonscale Marines roared, charging forward at terrifying speed like rampaging behemoths. With overwhelming momentum, they converged on the evil dragon priest from all directions.
"Worthless trash! Get out there and block them!" Mahmoud shrieked in panic, an eerie gleam flashing within his narrow slit-pupils. Cultists surged forward immediately, fanatically throwing themselves in front of him to form a dense human wall of flesh and blood.
"Protect Lord Mahmoud!"
"For Tiamat!"
Without hesitation, Gangtie Kuangchao raised his chainsword and sneered, "Trying to stop us with human-wave tactics? Dream on!"
The teeth lining the chainsword revved at blinding speed, instantly chewing through skin, muscle, and bone. With a single sweeping strike from Gangtie Kuangchao, severed limbs went flying in all directions as jets of blood erupted skyward, whipping up a sanguinary tempest that cleanly cleaved several cultists in two.
Every Dragonscale Marine operated like a mobile meat grinder, efficiently butchering and tearing apart every enemy around them, carving hole after hole into the living wall of flesh.
Mahmoud thrust his scepter forward, pointing it at the approaching Dragonscale Marines as he chanted ancient Draconic syllables: "Destruction—let lightning obliterate the flesh and souls of my enemies!"
Instantly, with sharp, crackling snaps, bolts of silver-white lightning erupted from the dragon eye atop the scepter, dancing like frenzied silver serpents as they struck out at the Dragonscale Marines.
Gangtie Kuangchao rolled sharply to dodge the first bolt, then raised the compact energy shield mounted on his arm to weather the impact of the second.
He loaded a specialized round, raised his bolter, and aimed the muzzle straight at Mahmoud—
*Bang!*
A bullet gleaming with crimson light burst from the muzzle, tearing through the air with a piercing sonic boom as it screamed directly toward the evil dragon priest's heart.
"These Imperial contraptions again..." Mahmoud's eyes darkened. A sinister gleam flashed from the depths of his pupils, and pitch-black energy coalesced into an enormous translucent sphere that enveloped him completely.
Watching the shield woven from divine magic materialize, Gangtie Kuangchao showed no dismay; instead, an eager grin crept across his face.
The pointed projectile flared with surging light, spinning furiously as intricate patterns surfaced along its casing. It unleashed a jet of high-temperature, high-pressure anti-magic molten metal that struck like a peerless lance, shattering the black sphere on impact.
This was one of the Empire's specialized anti-magic armor-piercing rounds, engineered specifically to counter spellcasters' protective wards, capable of producing miraculous results in pivotal moments.
Seeing his divine shield shatter, Mahmoud paled, his pupils dilating with sudden panic. Several magical artifacts on his person activated in succession, draping him in seven layers of arcane barriers that flared in shimmering resonance.
Yet before the armor-piercing projectile, these magical barriers folded like paper, punctured one after another by the anti-magic metal stream.
With an ear-splitting shriek, the round bored through the tough scales and plunged deep into the priest's chest with a dull, sickening tear.
Mahmoud was blasted backward as if an invisible warhammer had smashed into his chest, the tremendous kinetic force sending him hurtling through the air.
The slender alloy penetrator, driven forward at horrific velocity, tumbled violently inside his chest cavity. Like a spinning mincing blade lined with jagged edges and barbed hooks, it effortlessly shredded through muscle and tissue.
His internal organs stood no chance against the devastating storm of metal, crushed, ripped, and churned in an instant into an indistinguishable mass of scalding, viscous mush.
With a gut-wrenching *splat*, a violent geyser of scalding blood mixed with shredded organs erupted from his back, showering the scorched earth behind him.
The once-proud evil dragon priest collapsed into a crumpled heap like a torn rag, his mangled body broken beyond any recognizable human form.
Gangtie Kuangchao blew the lingering smoke from his barrel and chuckled. "This baby was made for dragons and colossal magical golems. Using it on a mere spellcaster is like swatting a fly with a cannon. Dying to an anti-magic armor-piercing round—you ought to be proud."
"Lord Mahmoud is dead!"
"Th-these damned Imperials killed him in a single shot!"
The cultists completely broke formation, plunging into sheer panic and disarray. Stripped of their final shred of will to fight, they became nothing more than cattle awaiting slaughter at the hands of the Dragonscale Marines.
Gangtie Kuangchao stepped forward, sliced through the ropes binding Baldur with his sword, and announced loudly, "Coalition."
Baldur scrambled up from the blood pool. Without a word, he grabbed a sabre discarded by a cultist and hurled himself into the fray. The deaths of his comrades, the humiliation dealt by the cultists—a bottomless reservoir of fury burned inside him, begging for release.
Yet right at that moment, an abrupt mutation occurred. The puddle of butchered flesh began to squirm, and the filthy, stagnant fluid in the blood pool began flowing toward Mahmoud's "corpse."
Countless corpses of dead cultists began crawling toward Mahmoud, gathering together. With the evil dragon priest serving as its "heart," they fused into a grotesque, dragon-shaped monstrosity whose surface was covered in contorted human faces.
The creature stood over ten meters tall, drenched in blood and draped in sparse, mottled scales. The grotesque maws lining its body tore open simultaneously, unleashing an overlapping roar composed of countless shrieking voices:
"For Tiamat..."
"Kill you..."
"Rebels, you will pay the price..."
Beholding this twisted, unnamable abomination, even Gangtie Kuangchao took a step back in surprise and couldn't help but complain, "Holy crap, what the hell is that? That's so grotesque! How did it turn out this ugly?!"
"Well, hear me out, I have a bold idea..."
"Stop right there! A man's tastes can be down-to-earth, but they can't be down in the underworld!"
"Something this ugly has no right to exist in this world! Brothers, with me—for the sake of our eyes, put down this hideous freak!"
In an instant, the Dragonscale Marines coalesced into formation. Armed with bolters, melta guns, and heavy lascannons, brandishing chainswords, power swords, and power axes, they completely surrounded the twisted monstrosity.
Baldur stared at the evil dragon priest entombed within the flesh at the creature's core, fury blazing in his eyes. Gripping his sabre tightly, he said to Gangtie Kuangchao in a deep voice, "Friends of the coalition, you don't need to risk yourselves. Mahmoud... he is the core of this beast. Let me kill him and end this!"
Gangtie Kuangchao extended an arm to hold him back, replying nonchalantly, "Danger? We finally get a halfway decent enemy, at least let us have some fun first."
He grinned ferociously, then gave a broad wave of his hand. "Fourth Legion, focus fire! Blast this grotesque monstrosity into slag!"
*Boom!*
Hissing shockwaves ripped through the air as rippling heat distortions shimmered in midair, followed immediately by roaring detonations.
The melta guns in the hands of the Dragonscale Marines unleashed blinding pillars of superheated energy. The surging thermal blast instantly melted the scales covering the creature's exterior, punching gaping craters through its colossal, distorted bulk. Flesh and bone dissolved into charred debris and molten slag, billowing dense plumes of smoke from the craters.
Under the concentrated volley of melta fire, the dragon-blooded monstrosity's defenses were thoroughly ripped apart. Agonized expressions twisted across the countless faces on its skin as they wailed and shrieked, visibly feeling the searing torment eating away at their collective form.
Baldur froze where he stood, staring blankly at the screeching beast in disbelief, his sabre nearly slipping from his fingers.
The sheer might of these Imperials far exceeded anything he had envisioned. A profane horror that ordinary mortals would find utterly insurmountable and terrifying could not even mount a defense against the concentrated firepower of these Dragonscale Marines.
"That's it?"
"Its guard is broken! Don't waste fuel—let's take it in melee!"
With a shout from Gangtie Kuangchao, the Dragonscale Marines brandished their chainswords, let out thunderous war cries, and swarmed forward.
The creature roared in frenzy, spewing elemental breath weapons of flame, lightning, and frost from its gaping maws, blasting them toward the oncoming Marines.
Yet they raised round shields plated with dragon scales and embossed with the imperial crest, braving the potent draconic breath to close the distance.
In their preceding war against the Cult of the Dragon, the Imperial military had captured and slain numerous chromatic dragons, including ancient dragons well over a thousand years old. Their scales were so thick and tough that ordinary attacks could not scratch them.
As the Empire's premier elite special forces, virtually every Vitagis Dragonscale Marine possessed a dragonscale round shield; some shields were even carved from single pristine ancient dragon scales, offering formidable defensive protection.
Operating with practiced coordination, the Dragonscale Marines pressed their advance and quickly reached the monster's flanks.
"Die!"
Gangtie Kuangchao raised his chainsword high and brought it crashing down. Its spinning teeth easily tore through the meat, burying the blade deep into the creature's mass as it churned violently, spraying blood and viscous slime from the gaping wound.
"Rebels..."
"Submit to me..."
Chaotic shrieks echoed as a ferocious head erupted from the beast's massive torso, snapping open its bloody maw to bite viciously toward Gangtie Kuangchao.
"Watch out, Brother Kuangchao! I've got this!"
Another burly Dragonscale Marine vaulted more than ten meters into the air, swinging a power axe whose razor-sharp blade vibrated at extreme frequency. Driven by tremendous kinetic force, the axe cleaved straight through the neck, lopping off the head.
The severed head tumbled across the ground for several paces before a descending Dragonscale Marine crushed it underfoot.
Even after losing a head, the monster was not hindered in the least. Its bulk suddenly ruptured outward, sprouting over a hundred snarling heads and limbs that unleashed a barrage of various breath attacks, surging furiously toward the Dragonscale Marines.
Undeterred, the Dragonscale Marines met the onslaught head-on, swinging their weapons as they engaged the creature. Chainswords roared and power swords hummed, severing limbs and flesh from the dragon-blooded abomination until pieces flew in all directions across the gruesome, blood-soaked scene.
Gangtie Kuangchao severed a lunging dragon claw with a sweep of his blade, his eyes narrowing sharply as he spotted the beast's vulnerability: Mahmoud, nestled at the creature's core, was now stripped of his fleshy barrier, exposed to the open air.
"Die!"
The chainsword thrust forward through the air. Its whirling teeth mercilessly chewed through Mahmoud's scales and skin, plunging straight through his chest and churning madly within his ribcage, reducing what remained of his organs to mincemeat.
*Rrrrip!*
A massive rupture tore across Mahmoud's chest. Fountains of blood and organ fragments burst forth, and like a punctured waterskin, the ten-meter-tall dragon-blooded monster collapsed inward, spilling its foul, motley innards across the platform.
At last, the abomination crashed down in ruins. Rivers of blood drenched the altar, strewn with severed appendages and shredded viscera as the Dragonscale Marines led by Gangtie Kuangchao hacked the colossal, twisted profanity to pieces.
The Dragonscale Marines continued their pursuit of the surviving cultists. Before these bio-armored hulks, even cultists who had undergone half-dragon transformation proved fragile, cut in half one after another by roaring chainswords.
In the distance, Baldur stood motionless, staring wide-eyed at the horrific, awe-inspiring scene. His eyes flickered as he muttered under his breath, "Is this the power of the Imperials...?
"Perhaps... only the blood of dragons can vanquish these evil dragons. For vengeance, I will pay any price—even if it means becoming a monster myself."
After putting the remaining cultists to the sword, the Dragonscale Marines ascended to the pinnacle of the altar. Raising a loudspeaker, a booming voice resounded through the city: "The Blue Dragon Sect has fallen! The City of Kafar is liberated! You will no longer be slaves and sacrifices to the evil dragons' spawn!"
The small sky battleship decloaked, brazenly revealing its form high in the heavens and casting its imposing shadow over the city below.
Tattered and bruised, the common people looked up, gazing at the vessel that had appeared in the sky. Hearing the resounding proclamation, they felt a surge of excitement and disbelief, mingled with a lingering, dazed bewilderment.
The Cult of the Dragon, an invincible nightmare in their minds for so long... had it truly fallen just like that?
Only after a long while, when neither cultists nor dragonbeasts emerged, did someone finally cry out in ecstatic jubilation: "By the gods... it's real! The coalition is here! Our city is liberated!"
Chapter 831