23: Chapter 23 Fifty Years of Life

In the northwestern frontier of the Cheng Tianxiao star system... with the direction of Terra as true north.

Admiral Drake's fleet had already engaged the vanguard of The Great Devourer.

The Tyranids possessed no true intelligence; all of their responses were zero-frame reactions triggered by pheromonal chemical reactions.

Upon sensing the fleet blocking their path, the Tyranids / Tyranid fleet immediately began to split.

The Tyranids / Tyranid Leviathan-class flagship rapidly released an uncountable number of biological drones.

These little creatures looked somewhat like bats, but the way they flapped their wings resembled dragonflies.

These drones were not intended to kill enemy troops but were used to obscure the vision of the enemy fleet, allowing the main Leviathan fleet to escape the battlefield.

The Tyranids did not prefer to fight enemies in space because... it was a loss; the biomass gained was insufficient to replenish the consumption.

[Release infrared decoys!]

Admiral Drake ordered all thermite mixed with the ships' spare promethium to be ignited and jettisoned into space.

The Tyranids / Tyranid harassment drones, generally called "Sky Fiends" by the Imperium, had poor vision and relied mainly on thermal energy to identify targets.

The Tyranids / Tyranid Leviathan's escape plan failed, and the enemy immediately shifted tactics.

Its massive oral tentacles opened and closed as it began producing bio-gunships for space combat and bio-claw ships for boarding operations.

[Now, foul water attack!]

Dozens of Imperial monster ships loaded with storage tanks of foul water began to overload their engines, launching a suicide charge toward the Leviathan's oral cavity at speeds nearly capable of tearing open a rift in Warp.

Drake was still a kind-hearted man; he had installed escape pods on all the monster ships carrying out the suicide attacks, as he was ultimately unwilling to force his own soldiers into a guaranteed death scenario.

The Tyranids / Tyranid Leviathan reacted extremely quickly, immediately ceasing the production of bio-ships and rapidly transforming itself, acting as a gunship to fire plasma and acid at the monster ships.

At the same time, the bio-escort ships that had been guarding the Leviathan's flanks—creatures that looked like giant space catfish—swung out from the sides, beginning to use their own bodies as shields to protect the Leviathan's oral cavity.

Brilliant explosions carrying toxic chemicals rose and fell in space; one wave had not yet subsided before another came to assault them!

This was the critical moment for Main Body to land on Li Yu Planet. The clones over there had fallen into madness, and the clones here, affected as well, began to enter a state of war hysteria.

A Tyranids / Tyranid bio-claw ship had just torn open a monster ship, and various Tyranids / Tyranid infantry units had not yet crawled through the hole.

Cheng Yus Clones had already crawled out through the hole. Outside was a vacuum, and a vacuum has almost no air pressure.

After losing pressure, these Cheng Yus Clones immediately swelled up like balloons, but they did not pause for a second, crawling along the claws of the claw ship into the Tyranids / Tyranid warship.

[Kill!!!]

Silent screams in the vacuum, splashing spherical blood droplets, and the chitinous appendages of Tyranids / Tyranid creatures floated everywhere, like a waltz of slaughter.

The Leviathan sensed the boarding operation and immediately ordered the escort ships to shower the battlefield with plasma, but it was already too late.

[Banzai!] Cheng Yus Clones stuffed the remaining explosives into the foul water tanks and detonated them. After a flash of explosion, they perished together with this Tyranids / Tyranid claw ship.

The toxic chemicals were only effective against a portion of the small Tyranids and had no effect on the Leviathan or ship-class Tyranids / Tyranid units.

However, the goal had been achieved; the Tyranids would never recycle this toxic biomass, at least not during the battle, as it did not have the time to secrete an antidote.

[That is enough, clear a path.]

Admiral Drake ordered, his combat strategy being to pursue step by step, constantly consuming the Tyranids' biomass, rather than fighting a decisive battle at the frontier of the star system—which they couldn't win anyway.

In such a short time, the battle damage to the monster fleet had already reached one-third.

They needed to keep the Tyranids in a state of confusion, feeling as if "it seems like we can fight, but it seems like there is no need to fight."

By forcing its biomass production mode to constantly switch between space combat mode and planetary landing mode, by the time the Leviathan reached Li Yu Planet, its strength would be weakened to the greatest extent.

Cheng Yu's monster ships cleared a path and accelerated their engines to retreat to the edge of the battlefield.

The Leviathan only sent a small portion of its Tyranids / Tyranid escort ships to pursue, while most of the escort ships remained around it.

Consuming Li Yu Planet was always its sole purpose, so after a simple reorganization of its fleet, the Leviathan began to wave its tentacles, attempting to sail away from the battlefield.

[Begin harassment operations, fire at will, boarding is prohibited, retreat upon contact.]

Drake ordered.

...

On Li Yu Planet, the head of the Genestealer Patriarch had been hung high above the Hive City tower.

And the heads of the ordinary Genestealers had been piled into six massive mounds of skulls.

There were three Hive Cities, with one pile on each side of every Hive City.

It looked like... an Armstrong Cyclone Jet Armstrong Cannon.

Fortunately, the humans inside the Hive City were not all dead.

Many people had hidden in places like ventilation ducts, insulation layers, or corpse pits, escaping the disaster.

Main Body was overjoyed and immediately took control of all these people, sending them to a temporarily constructed medical zone to treat their illnesses and soothe their emotions.

[Are you the Emperor's angels?]

Some among the Hive City refugees were still somewhat knowledgeable.

[We are indeed the Emperor's angels, but our Emperor... might have a slight discrepancy from the one you understand.] The clone explained.

[How many arms does your Emperor have?]

[Of course, two arms.]

[That's good, that's good.] The refugee representative was relieved; they had been terrified by the Genestealers during this time.

After on-site emergency repairs and medical aid, a total of 3,152 human residents were saved from the three Hive Cities, among whom 930 were underage children, likely because children were smaller and easier to hide.

The nobles among the adults were screened, and those without useful knowledge or skills were executed on the spot.

It was easy to confirm whether someone was a noble; it had nothing to do with being fat—even starving to the point of edema could cause bloating—but those who couldn't find a single callus on their entire body were nobles.

The Tyranids were certainly hateful, but The Great Devourer had no thoughts and was merely a natural disaster in the galaxy.

What truly kept the Hive City people living in misery were these human nobles who ate until they were full all day long.

Those who have lived a life, shall perish today.

The remaining adults voluntarily declared their skills and knowledge levels; engineering and technical categories were prioritized, and entertainment and arts were also acceptable. Those who truly couldn't even read were sent to the upper levels of the Hive City with the children to attend literacy classes.

There, clones taught Gothic, and previously surrendered captives taught basic engineering skills.