The Primarch of Liberty-Chapter 178: The First World to Fall

The crimson dawn of Helheim painted the sky in shades of dried blood, a fitting palette for what they called the Meat Grinder. Lucian Vue-Baptiste adjusted the weight of his Liberty Pattern Las Gun against his shoulder, the weapon's familiar heft a constant reminder of his forty years of servitude in this frozen hell. The T-45 power armor encasing his frame hummed with the steady thrum of its zero-point power core, the same Power source that made his weapon capable of punching holes through Leman Russ tanks – yet here he stood, just another cog in the vast machinery of the Valorian war machine.

The Great Wall of Liberty, he thought with bitter irony, gazing out across the defensive positions that stretched beyond the horizon. The most impenetrable position in the galaxy, save for Terra itself. That's what they called it in the propaganda broadcasts, what the fresh-faced recruits believed when they stepped off those gleaming transport ships with stars in their eyes and promises of redemption on their lips. Three hundred solar systems. Ten core ring worlds. Trillions of men, women, artificial intelligences, and automatons all standing guard against the darkness beyond Imperial space.

And here he was, Lucian Vue-Baptiste, heir to what had once been the Vue-Baptiste Shipping Consortium – the largest commercial enterprise in the Independence Sector before he came along. Before Franklin Valorian, the so-called Great President, the self-proclaimed Liberator, had torn down everything Lucian's family had built over centuries and replaced it with his vision of "freedom."

Freedom. The word tasted like ash in his mouth. If this was freedom, why was he here, shivering in the perpetual winter of Helheim, watching the same blood-soaked horizon for forty years? If this was liberty, why would he be shot like a rabid dog if he dared abandon his post? The hypocrisy of it all would have been laughable if it weren't so personally devastating.

But we brought this on ourselves, whispered a traitorous voice in the back of his mind – the voice that sounded suspiciously like his father's ghost, the voice that spoke of accountability and consequence. Lucian crushed that voice with practiced contempt. They hadn't brought anything on themselves. They had simply refused to kneel before a tyrant, refused to surrender their birthright to a jumped-up warlord who styled himself as humanity's savior.

The irony that Franklin Valorian rejected any claim to divinity, insisted he was merely a man serving humanity's greater good. Just a man. Lucian's scarred lips twisted into a smile. He had witnessed the Civil War firsthand, had seen what this "mere man" could accomplish. The Mega-Corporations had pooled their resources, their greatest minds, their most advanced biotechnology in an attempt to level the playing field. They had created giants of their own – hyper-augmented warriors eighteen feet tall, their bones replaced with adamantium, their muscles enhanced with synthetic fibers, their minds expanded with cogitator implants.

None of it had mattered.

Franklin Valorian had walked through their armies like a force of nature, inspiring loyalty with his mere presence, commanding devotion that bordered on religious fervor. Mortal men had charged plasma cannons for him, had thrown themselves against impossible odds with disregard for death that belonged to fanatics or saints. This was before he even received his Legion of Astartes, before the Emperor had gifted him with superhuman warriors to match his own God-like abilities.

He never missed, Lucian remembered, the memory sharp as broken glass after all these decades. Every shot, every decision, every tactical maneuver – flawless execution. They hadn't been fighting a bio-mechanical giant or an enhanced human. They had been fighting something out of myth, something that had no business existing in a rational universe governed by natural law.

The Primarchs. That's what they called themselves now, these twenty sons of the Emperor who was conquering the galaxy in the name of human unity. Twenty demigods unleashed upon an unsuspecting cosmos, each one unique beyond replication. During the Civil War, the corporations had tried everything – genetic sampling, biomechanical reconstruction, psychic enhancement. None of it had worked. You couldn't mass-produce divinity, couldn't synthesize whatever spark made these beings so godlike.

Lucian shifted his weight, feeling the servos in his power armor compensate for the movement. The T-45 was reliable equipment, he had to admit – bulky but effective against small arms fire, though "small arms" was a relative term that excluded plasma weapons, heavy bolters, Eldar Shurikens, and most of the truly dangerous equipment fielded by serious enemies. It was good enough for the rebels and minor xenos threats that typically tested the outer defenses, but anyone who made it to the front lines of the Great Wall came armed with considerably more firepower.

His Liberty Pattern Las Gun was a different story entirely. The weapon was a masterpiece of engineering, its zero-point power core providing infinite ammunition and an extensive cooling system that could maintain sustained fire for hours without overheating. Without his power armor, he couldn't even lift the damned thing, but its output could punch through tank armor with ease. It was signature Valorian technology – elegant, efficient, and devastatingly effective.

Just like everything else in this cursed regime, Lucian thought. The healthcare that promised three-hundred-year lifespans, the automated production systems that had eliminated scarcity, the educational programs that had supposedly lifted millions out of poverty – all of it bore the stamp of Valorian innovation, all of it designed to make resistance seem not just futile but actively harmful to human progress.

Lies, he told himself, though the conviction felt weaker with each passing year. He had never seen anyone reach three hundred years of age, though that might have more to do with the fact that most soldiers on Helheim died long before they could test the limits of Valorian medicine. He had arrived here with a million other "losers" – children and grandchildren of the families who had opposed the new order, sentenced to military service as penance for their ancestors' rebellion.

Now he was the only one left.

Forty years of watching his comrades die in the frozen mud of Helheim, forty years of holding the line against whatever horrors emerged from the void between stars. The promise had been simple: serve for one hundred years, and your crimes would be cleared, your family's debt to society paid in full. But Lucian had learned to read between the lines of Valorian rhetoric. The one hundred years wasn't a term of service – it was a life sentence disguised as hope.

They called this place many names. Helheim, after the ancient terran myths of the dishonored dead. The Meat Grinder, for obvious reasons. The Bloody Planet, though the permafrost turned most blood black within minutes of spilling. The Red Planet, though that had more to do with the iron oxide in the soil than any romantic association with ancient Mars. The Prison Planet, which was perhaps the most honest designation. But to those condemned to serve here, it was simply Hel – a place of punishment where heroes were forgotten and martyrs were just another casualty statistic.

The irony of defending the very system that had destroyed his family wasn't lost on Lucian. Every day, he watched fresh transports descend from orbit, disgorging new recruits with that same sparkle of hope in their eyes that he remembered from his own arrival decades ago. They believed the promises, trusted in the rhetoric of redemption and second chances. Most of them would be dead within their first year of service, ground down by the relentless attrition that defined life on the frontier.

One hundred years of service, Lucian mused, watching a group of new arrivals struggle with their unfamiliar equipment. As if any of us will live that long. The average lifespan of a frontline soldier on Helheim was measured in months, not years. Disease, enemy action, equipment failure, accidents, madness – there were a thousand ways to die on the frontier, and the cold ground of Hel had claimed them all.

But perhaps that was the point. Perhaps the one hundred year promise was never meant to be fulfilled, was simply a way of ensuring a steady supply of expendable soldiers for the most dangerous postings in the Independence Sector. Send the malcontents and dissidents to the front lines, let natural selection eliminate the potential troublemakers, and maintain the fiction that everyone had a chance at redemption.

Elegant, Lucian admitted grudgingly. Cruel, but elegant. It was exactly the sort of solution Franklin Valorian would devise – efficient, cost-effective, and wrapped in enough noble rhetoric to satisfy the consciences of those who implemented it.

The morning briefing crackled through his helmet comm, the same litany of threats and defensive positions that had defined his existence for four decades. Sensor sweeps of the outer system, patrol reports from the asteroid mining stations, cargo manifests from the supply convoys – the endless minutiae of maintaining a defensive position that spanned multiple star systems.

But today felt different. There was tension in the automated status reports, an urgency in the tactical updates that suggested something more than the usual probe attacks and smuggling operations. The outer sensor networks were reporting anomalous readings, mass displacements on the edge of detection range that could indicate anything from a major asteroid impact to an incoming invasion fleet.

He had long since stopped caring about the politics of the conflicts that raged across the galaxy. The Emperor's Great Crusade, the expansion of the Imperium, the Liberation of humanity from alien oppression – all of it was just noise to someone who had spent half his life watching friends die for principles he didn't believe in.

But he was good at killing. Forty years of constant warfare had taught him skills that no amount of training could replicate. He knew the sound different weapons made when they discharged, could identify enemy troop types by the pattern of their footsteps, could calculate firing solutions in his head faster than most targeting cogitators. It was a skillset born of necessity and refined by survival, the only currency that mattered on the frontier.

The transport ships continued their descent, bringing fresh meat for the grinder. Lucian watched them with the detached interest of a professional undertaker sizing up future customers. Some of them might survive their first engagement. A few might even last long enough to develop the cynical competence that characterized veteran soldiers. But most would simply become statistics, their names added to the endless casualty reports that nobody on the core worlds bothered to read.

Franklin Valorian's grand vision, Lucian reflected. A galaxy united under human rule, defended by the willing sacrifice of patriots and the unwilling service of dissidents. It was working, he had to admit. The Great Wall held, the Independence Sector prospered, and the Imperium expanded across the stars with inexorable momentum. The cost was measured in lives like his own – expendable resources thrown into the void to maintain the illusion of invincibility.

But perhaps that was enough. Perhaps his forty years of service, his comrades' sacrifices, his family's destruction – perhaps all of it served some greater purpose that his bitterness couldn't perceive. Perhaps Franklin Valorian truly was the visionary leader his propaganda claimed, building a better future on the foundation of necessary cruelties.

Or perhaps he was simply a tyrant with better marketing than most, and Lucian's suffering was meaningless beyond its utility in maintaining order.

The comm system squawked again, this time with priority encryption that made his armor's tactical systems sit up and take notice. Emergency protocols, fleet-wide alerts, the sort of communications traffic that typically preceded either disaster or opportunity.

Lucian checked his weapon's power level, verified his armor's system status, and settled into the familiar rhythm of preparation that had kept him alive for forty years. Whatever was coming, he would meet it with the cold professionalism of a man who had nothing left to lose and no illusions left to shatter.

A whisper brushed against his mind, soft as silk and cold as void ice. freewёbnoνel.com

"You are right... take what you must... make him pay."

Lucian froze, his hands tightening involuntarily on his weapon. The voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere, a susurrus of sound that might have been Helheim's perpetual wind playing tricks with the atmospheric processors. He had heard of soldiers developing auditory hallucinations after prolonged exposure to the frontier's psychological stresses – forty years of watching friends die could break anyone's mind.

"Just the wind," he told himself, though his armor's atmospheric sensors registered no unusual air currents. "Just my own thoughts finally cracking under the weight of four decades in this frozen hell."

But the whisper returned, more insistent this time, carrying an intimacy that made his skin crawl beneath the protective layers of his power armor.

"Do it... for justice... for power...the Revival of the Vue-Baptiste!"

The voice felt alien yet familiar, like hearing his own thoughts spoken in a stranger's tongue. There was something seductive about it, something that resonated with the bitter core of resentment he had nursed for forty years. The voice understood his pain, acknowledged his suffering, validated his anger in ways that no human authority ever had.

Lucian swallowed hard, tasting copper and defeat. Despite every rational thought screaming warnings, he found himself... listening. The whisper spoke truths he had never dared voice, offered solutions he had never dared consider.

"Take down the Eagle and the Sector will go down in flames,"

The thought crystallized in his mind with startling clarity. Franklin Valorian, the Great President, the self-proclaimed Liberator – he was the keystone that held the entire Independence Sector together. Remove him, and the carefully constructed edifice of human unity would collapse into chaos. The Mega-Corporations would rise again. The old order would reassert itself. And the Vue-Baptiste family name might once again command respect instead of pity.

The alarm klaxons began to wail before he could fully process the implications of his treasonous thoughts. The harsh mechanical shriek echoed across Helheim's frozen landscape, accompanied by the crackling static of emergency vox transmissions flooding the tactical network.

"This is not a drill," came the voice of Sector Command, professional composure barely masking underlying panic. "Enemy contact confirmed. Classification: Orkz. All units to battle stations. Repeat: this is not a drill."

But as Lucian watched the morning sky with eyes trained by forty years of warfare, he witnessed something that defied every tactical manual in the Independence Sector's extensive military library. The fortress moon of Grimhold – a celestial body converted into an orbital defense platform during the early years of Valorian's rule – simply... shattered.

Not destroyed by conventional bombardment, not overwhelmed by sustained assault, but shattered as if some cosmic hand had reached out and crushed it like an eggshell. Debris rained down through Helheim's atmosphere in burning streaks, each fragment representing millions of tons of adamantium plating, neutronium cores, and the lives of the hundred thousand souls who had called the fortress home.

In the void where Grimhold had maintained its eternal vigil, massive ships began to materialize. Vessels the Size of small Moons their hulls scarred by countless battles and adorned with the grisly trophies of a thousand conquered worlds. Green flashes of light erupted from their weapon batteries as they established orbital superiority with brutal efficiency.

"WAR! WAR! WAR! WAAAARRR!!!!"

The sound hammered through every vox channel simultaneously, a bestial roar that seemed to shake the very foundations of reality. It wasn't transmitted in any conventional sense – the Orkz were broadcasting their bloodlust directly into the electromagnetic spectrum, their psychic gestalt field translating alien bloodthirst into something human ears could comprehend.

Lucian had fought Orkz before, during the minor incursions that regularly tested the Great Wall's outer defenses. They were savage but predictable, possessed of crude technology and cruder tactics. Dangerous in large numbers, but manageable with proper preparation and overwhelming firepower.

These were not those Orkz.

The first wave of drop pods began their descent, massive tear-drop shapes that glowed cherry-red with atmospheric entry. Helheim's shield generators – technological marvels that could deflect the main guns of battleships – managed to intercept most of them, causing the pods to detonate in spectacular fireballs high above the surface. But even the failures told a story that chilled Lucian's veteran soul.

There were so many of them.

Wave after wave of drop pods descended like metallic hail, their sheer numbers overwhelming defensive systems designed to repel conventional invasion forces. The few that managed to penetrate the shield envelope crashed into Helheim's surface with earth-shaking impacts, disgorging their contents into the frozen wasteland.

"All units, weapons free," crackled the voice of Colonel Hastings, Lucian's immediate superior. "Engage targets of opportunity. Show these green-skin bastards, what freedom looks like!"

The first wave of Orkz that emerged from the drop pods died swiftly and efficiently, cut down by concentrated lasgun fire and automated defense turrets. They were larger than standard Ork specimens, but still within parameters that human forces could handle. The second wave met similar fate, as did the third.

But the fourth wave brought something new.

Nine-meter tall behemoths emerged from the drop pods, their massive frames encased in power armor that bore little resemblance to the crude scrap-metal protection typical of Ork technology. These giants moved with purpose and intelligence, barking orders in a guttural language that somehow carried tactical sophistication. Under their direction, the chaotic Ork assault began to take on structure and coordination.

Lucian's targeting reticle locked onto one of the massive warriors, his Liberty Pattern Las Gun charging to full power. But before he could fire, the world exploded.

The massive communications tower that had dominated Helheim's central plateau – the same tower that projected the shield generators protecting the planet's critical infrastructure – simply vanished in a pillar of green fire. The explosion was so violent that it registered as a minor seismic event, causing avalanches in the distant mountain ranges and triggering emergency protocols across the planet's surface.

"Shields down!" screamed Colonel Hastings, his professional composure finally cracking. "All sectors, shields are down! Enemy bombardment incoming!"

The orbital vessels that had been held at bay by Helheim's defensive grid opened fire with weapons that turned night into day. Lance strikes, plasma bombardments, and stranger energies that defied classification rained down upon the planet's surface. The carefully constructed defensive positions that had held the line for forty years began to crumble under sustained assault.

Lucian watched his commanding officer's tent disappear in a gout of superheated plasma, taking Colonel Hastings and his entire staff with it. Around him, the defensive line that had been his home for four decades collapsed into chaos as soldiers abandoned their positions, fled in panic, or died where they stood.

"Fucking idiots,"he cursed, watching disciplined troops devolve into a terrified mob. Forty years of war, and they fell apart at the first sign of real opposition.

His combat instincts, honed by decades of frontier warfare, screamed danger as an Ork Nob – larger and more heavily armed than its subordinates – charged toward his position. The creature stood nearly three meters tall, its crude but effective armor decorated with the skulls of previous enemies. Lucian didn't hesitate, his enhanced reflexes allowing him to sidestep the creature's clumsy swing and place a point-blank las-bolt through its chest cavity.

The Ork Nob staggered, green ichor spurting from the massive wound, but managed to speak before collapsing.

"We... the Krorks... have returned..."

"Krorks." The word sent an inexplicable chill down Lucian's spine, though he couldn't explain why. He had never heard the term before, but something about it carried weight beyond its alien pronunciation. These weren't ordinary Orkz – they were something older, something more dangerous.

But that was a problem for the strategists and xenobiologists. Lucian's immediate concern was survival, and the collapse of Helheim's defenses had created an opportunity he had never dared hope for.

As the battle raged around him, as his comrades died in their thousands, as the carefully constructed order of the Independence Sector began to crumble, Lucian felt something approaching joy. For forty years, he had dreamed of seeing Valorian's system burn, had fantasized about the collapse of the regime that had destroyed his family and condemned him to this frozen hell.

Now it was happening, and he intended to survive long enough to witness every moment of the fall.

A fellow soldier from his unit – Private Kellerman, a young man who had arrived on the transport hours ago – spotted him moving away from the defensive positions.

"Lucian! Where are you going? We need to regroup with—"

The las-bolt took Kellerman in the center of his chest, punching through his T-45 power armor as if it were paper. The young soldier looked down at the smoking hole in his torso with an expression of complete bewilderment before collapsing into the blood-soaked snow.

"Let them all die," Lucian thought with savage satisfaction. "Let every one of these blind fools pay the price for their loyalty to a tyrant."

He had crossed a line, committed an act that would brand him as traitor and murderer if discovered. But the whisper in his mind assured him that he was right, that his actions were justified, that greater power awaited those bold enough to seize it.

The restricted area housing the Eternity Gates lay three kilometers to the northwest, buried beneath layers of security and administrative bureaucracy that had frustrated him for years. During his decades of service, he had studied every aspect of Helheim's infrastructure, memorizing patrol routes and security protocols with the obsessive dedication of a man who had nothing else to occupy his thoughts.

The Eternity Gates were Franklin Valorian's greatest secret – technological marvels that allowed instantaneous travel across galactic distances, bypassing the dangers and delays of Warp transit. Only the highest-ranking officials were permitted access, and even then under strictly controlled circumstances.

But with Helheim's command structure collapsing and its defenses crumbling, those restrictions might finally be vulnerable.

Lucian's T-45 power armor included an artificial intelligence designed to monitor the wearer's vital signs, location, and behavior patterns. Under normal circumstances, any attempt to abandon his post or commit acts of violence against fellow Imperial forces would trigger automatic alerts to command headquarters. But forty years of enforced intimacy with his equipment had taught him every subsystem, every protocol, every vulnerability.

A few carefully applied electromagnetic pulses to specific neural pathway nodes, and the AI went silent. To any external observer, Technical Sergeant Vue-Baptiste was simply another casualty of the Ork assault, his armor's transponder lost in the chaos of battle.

The fighting grew more intense as he approached the central citadel, Krork forces pushing deeper into Helheim's defensive perimeter with each passing hour. The Liberty Spires – massive psychic dampening towers designed to suppress the Ork gestalt field – came under concentrated assault as the enemy recognized their strategic importance.

Lucian moved through the chaos like a ghost, his decades of experience allowing him to anticipate patrol routes and avoid automated surveillance systems. The whisper in his mind continued to guide him, offering suggestions and encouragement as he navigated the collapsing infrastructure of Valorian's regime.

"You are right," the voice murmured as he watched a Liberty Spire collapse under concentrated fire. "Take what you must. Make Valorian pay for his thievery, it is only right and just"

The words resonated with his own thoughts so perfectly that he couldn't distinguish between his internal monologue and the alien influence. The distinction no longer seemed important. What mattered was survival, revenge, and the opportunity to strike back at the system that had consumed his life.

As he approached the Eternity Gate facility, Lucian encountered a group of defenders making a last stand against advancing Krork forces. Their commander, Captain Morrison, was a man Lucian recognized from the officer's mess – a competent leader who had earned his rank through merit rather than political connections.

"Vue-Baptiste!" Morrison called out, relief evident in his voice. "Thank the Throne you made it through. We've lost contact with the frontlines. What's the situation?"

Lucian didn't hesitate. "The frontlines have fallen, sir. Complete collapse. I barely made it out alive." The lie came easily, supported by the very real sounds of battle echoing from the direction he had come.

"Understood. We're falling back to the secondary defensive line, but we need every man we can get. Are you wounded?"

"No sir, ready for duty."

As they fought side by side against the advancing Krork forces, Lucian allowed himself a moment of dark satisfaction. Morrison was competent, professional, everything a soldier should be. He would die defending Valorian's vision, never knowing that the man fighting beside him had already chosen a different path.

The Liberty Spires continued to fall under sustained assault, their psychic dampening fields flickering and failing as the Krork gestalt grew stronger. With each tower that collapsed, the enemy's coordination improved, their savage enthusiasm becoming focused into something approaching tactical sophistication.

"Excellent," whispered the voice in Lucian's mind, and he couldn't disagree.

As the defenders retreated deeper into the citadel's defensive perimeter, a blue feather drifted past Lucian's helmet visor, carried by Helheim's perpetual wind. He barely noticed it, focused as he was on the opportunity that chaos presented.

The Eternity Gates were within reach, and with them, the chance to strike at the heart of everything Franklin Valorian had built. Forty years of bitter service were about to bear fruit in ways that neither his family's enemies nor the whisper in his mind could fully anticipate.

The fall of Helheim was just the beginning.

A/N: Hello Hello, its me here's a Chapter!May has been an uncooperative month hopefully June is better, We just Left Yokohama, Japan our next stop is Mexico Then the rest of South America, "No Hablo, Español"