Five months.

Five months, twelve days, twenty-two hours, thirty minutes, and seventeen seconds, this is the total time that the war dogs spend staying in this void, anxious and waiting: not a single point will be bad, and they will not dare to be bad for a second.

Everyone in the legion is counting down, waiting for that moment to come.

At the very least, when he stood in the triumphal hall of victory and glory of the [Resolute Resolve], Karn, as the new commander of the Eighth Assault Company of the War Dog Regiment, did just that: for five months, Karn never stopped counting down in his heart, and never stopped waiting.

The wait was a slow and incommensuring torture for him, or for any of the war dogs: hundreds of military missions had been terminated, and all the legionnaires were ordered to return immediately, crossing the endless stars into the cage of the void, where they had endured the long five months with the other battle brothers.

During these five months, they could not be honored on the battlefield, nor could they rest or replenish in the Void in any degree, and the only thing the entire legion could do was wait.

Willingly waiting, waiting for that final moment to come: anticipation, uneasiness, apprehension, fear, excitement at the end of the heir meeting his father, cowering in the gossip of the warriors.

The entire Legion of War Dogs waited like this for five months, without any instructions from the Emperor or any news about their genetic father: apart from the endless Nukerian War five months ago, the original body of the Twelfth Legion was like a celestial domain outside the porthole of a battleship, with nothing but nothingness under the huge outline.

Five months later, the War Dogs still knew nothing about their returned Genetic Father, they didn't know where the original body was, what had happened to them, they didn't even know what he looked like, his past, or his voice: they only knew that he was called Angelon, or the Son of the Mountain of Nukeria, and that he was the most special of the primordials: because the primordial of the War Dog Legion was the first to firmly refuse the emperor's call, This is something that none of his blood brothers has ever done.

Angron insisted on dying with his fighting brothers, and until the last moment, the emperor had to forcibly take him away in order to welcome back the son of the mountain.

This incident was mentioned again and again in the wardogs' warships, and every wardog who rushed back to the fleet had to listen to this story again, and their fighting brothers or commanders told it in the proudest tones.

That's right: pride.

This refusal, this willingness to refuse the Emperor's call for the sake of his fighting brothers, made the Wardogs proud of their Genetic Father: because it was perfectly in line with the fiery brotherhood of the Twelfth Legion, albeit somewhat deformed, and gave the Dogs every reason to believe that their Genetic Father was a great leader and commander.

But this pride did not solve the Legion's existing dilemma: they still knew nothing about their genetic fathers other than their names and great deeds, and even the fact that Angron had rejected the Emperor was conveyed on the behalf of the Dawnbreakers who had visited the Resolute Resolve frequently during the past five months.

More often than not, the tedious waiting was the main theme of the Legion: the expressionless Praetorian Army arrogantly rejected the Howling Legion's higher-ups to meet the Emperor, and the fleets of the Daybreaker and the Midnight Lord left in batches, leaving only a few dozen warships.

Although, both Morgan's Praetorian Guard, Lana, and the Midnight Lords' Legion's genetic protogen, Conrad, valued and welcomed the dogs' visits during this period, they could not answer the dogs' confusion.

What's more, the Wardogs discovered that the Dawnbreaker's fleet was actually in a certain amount of turmoil, because their original body had not shown up for a long time: but this uneasiness did not have a great impact on the Second Legion, which was dominated by Terra veterans, and whether it was the Midnight Ghost who visited regularly or those known as the Stellar Handmaidens, they all had the prestige and methods to appease the restless psychology within the Second Legion.

But when it was the turn of the Twelfth Legion, there was no such treatment.

At first, the entire Legion was optimistic with the excitement of finally meeting their Genetic Father, but after a few months, even the most optimistic of the dogs had to brew unease in their hearts after the fleets of the Forbidden Army, Daybreaker, and Midnight Lord came with no additional news other than their daily transfers and supplies.

Naturally, suspicion began to spread among the ships, from the rumors that the Primordial had actually been killed in the Battle of Nukeria, to the naïve remarks that he was undergoing special training by the Emperor and was expected to become the second Horus: the Twelfth Legion had been looking at the fighting brothers who could get along with the Primordial for too long, and this short wait for that last last time was like torture to them, a torture that could knock down everyone up and down the Legion.

……

However, Karn was not knocked down.

He was not decadent, not disappointed, and not like his fighting brothers, who had to fight in the arena all day long to relieve their anguish and uneasiness: he stood silently and stubbornly on the Resolute Resolve, where the atmosphere was gradually becoming gloomy, just as he had walked out of Divine Terra and participated in the Great Expedition every day.

As the commander of the Eighth Company, Karn was able to see the whole Legion, and he could meet the Legion leaders in the small room behind the Hall of Triumph, and he could also hear the words of ordinary soldiers on the middle deck: however, he never expressed his opinion, he was silent, silent counting down in his mind.

Among the War Dogs, few people will notice this obscure senior officer: Karn's promotion is more of an exception, the effect of a series of butterfly effects, originally he was only the middle commander of the Eighth Company, but a few months ago, because the Dawnbreaker Legion had to deal with the sudden attack of the heretical forged world Ulan Huda, so the rebellion that had occurred on the edge of the Maelstrom region was transferred to the Wardog Legion passing by.

This is undoubtedly a tragedy for the rebellious world: the rulers of the land are not arrogant enough to stand up to the human empire, on the contrary, they are well aware of the situation in the galaxy and have a strong determination to seek the future of their planet.

Their plan was to attract the nearest Dawnbreaker legion through an act of rebellion, and to become part of the Far Eastern Frontier after submission, thus freeing themselves from the increasingly heavy list of taxes from Holy Terra: even if the Lord of Avalon was not very merciful to the original rulers of the world, the leaders of the rebellion had already come to their senses and retreated.

But what they didn't expect was that the Dawnbreaker's actions were delayed by the Predator's Forge and replaced by the War Dog Legion: blood and carnage lasted for nine full days, and the inhabitants who survived complete resistance and ruthless suppression were left to endure ten generations of hard labor: the black humor of this crazy galaxy befell them.

It was during this small but intense repression that the Eighth Company lost its commander and Karn took over, having little enthusiasm for the management of the company, and cold to the Legion's top brass, and not even a wide network within the Legion: Karn was somewhat out of place for the Twelfth Legion, known for its brotherhood.

But despite this, he still has friends, or rather: acquaintances?

Whatever it should be called, Karn didn't enjoy the solitude of solitude for long as he stood alone in the corner of the Triumph Hall: soon another company commander marched to the banner under which Karn was located, accompanied by a muffled salute from the rest of the warriors in the hall.

"Are you remembering your victory over Solanus again, Karn?"

“…… Deregel. ”

Karn was silent for a moment before calling out the name of the comer: Dregel, the commander of the Ninth Company of the Legion, was one of the few brothers willing to show kindness and patience to Karn, with his usual meteor hammer hanging from his waist.

"Do you still remember in your heart how long we've waited here, brother?"

Dregel looked up and glanced at the tattered banners on Karn's head: there were thousands of them in the Hall of Triumph, all of them in tatters, for they were trophies taken from the enemy by the War Dog Legion in victory, the oldest of which could even be traced back to the War of Terra Unification.

The entire Hall of Triumph is a sanctuary of the glorious history of the Legion, which will make every wardog proud, they have one of the bloodiest and oldest victories of the Human Empire, and the only ones who can convince the wardogs in terms of Legion's history are the Dark Angel and the Daybreaker: the two most numbered legions, the glory won in the War of Terra Unification alone, can have a separate Hall of Triumph.

But this did not stop the Wardogs from choosing the Hall of Triumph early as the final location to welcome their genetic prototypes, and in the planning of the Twelfth Legion, the senior members of the Legion would first meet their genetic father, and lead him to the Triumph Hall to give an impassioned speech to the entire Legion: this would undoubtedly be the day of the Twelfth Legion's rebirth.

For this moment, the entire Hall of Triumph had become crowded, and all the corners of the walls were filled with all sorts of loot, from every company: all the company commanders and their warriors, eager for the glory they had won to be the first to be seen by the Primordial Body, to prove that their company was a great weapon worthy of the leadership of the Father of Genes.

The frenzy was rampant throughout the Twelfth Legion, but Dregel knew in his heart that if there was a fanaticism for the Father of Genes, the Eighth Company Commander, who was always unknown in the corner of the hall, was the one who stood out.

Ever since the end of the war on Nucheria, Karn had kept track of the time the Legion had stalled, forgoing even normal sleep to maintain a minimal meditation to keep pace accurately, and that meditation had lasted for five months: Dregel even thought he was a little crazy.

However, this madness was not enough to kill the friendship between the two, and in the corner of the hall, they began to gossip, just like the rest of the hundreds of fighting brothers in this hall, and the topic of conversation was naturally their original body, as well as the original body of the other legions.

"How does it feel to be in command of a company?"

Dregel adjusted the ship-like badge hanging from his chest, which symbolized his ship, the Provocateur.

"It's okay."

Karn was succinct.

"I don't have to worry about anything, I have a special person in charge, and occasionally I need to clean up a few disobedient: for example, the pharmacist in that company, Kargos, who is always in the arena, forgetting that his job is actually a pharmacist."

"That's good."

Dregel blinked.

"Didn't you see us merging with the Holy Blood Angel Legion: he and his arena partner in the Ninth Legion, it seems that he is called Amit, and he is simply mixed in the gladiatorial pit in black and white, and he can't pull it out."

"But then again, after the return of that St. Giles, few of the Ninth Legion will visit the gladiatorial pit: they boast of becoming artistic and elegant, as if they could suppress the smell of blood in their bones."

Dregel grinned, mocking the angels he spoke.

"It's different to have the original body: who remembers the group of ghouls from before?"

"Rest assured, brother: our genetic fathers are no worse than theirs."

Karn closed his eyes, his words more affirmative than comforting.

"I think so too."

Dregel nodded, his pupils twinkling.

"Which of his brothers do you say, our primordial will resemble more: the perfect wolf god Horus, or the somewhat fancy Vogrim, or the melancholy and fragile looking St. Giles, or the warriors like Ferus and Johnson?"

"It's like no one."

Karn snorted.

"He's definitely unique."

The voice of the commander of the eighth company was very determined, but after the determination, there was a somewhat strange silence, and it was only after a half-sound that Karn's somewhat hesitant voice sounded in Dregel's ears.

"Anyway......"

"Just don't be like that Morgan anyway."

"Morgan? That Lord of Avalon? ”

"yes."

Karn snorted.

"The primordial of the Second Legion, as a builder and goddess of mercy, as well as psykers and writers, is indeed quite adept: but it is certainly not suitable to lead a legion like ours, which only belongs to the battlefield."

Dregel raised an eyebrow.

"Don't say that, Karn: I don't think that Morgan is really bad, you look at her performance in Nukeria, she is still very qualified in the command of the war, not as pacifist as rumored."

"And what do you think of her heirs?"

Karn glanced at his brother.

"Dregile, it's not like you haven't been to the Dawnbreaker's flagship in the last few months: look what has become of it? I couldn't tell if it was a battleship or a light-hearted space garden, and I could even see a few kindergartens and schools on the lower deck that had been built for the descendants of mortal servitudes, and those little cubs could even climb on the shoulders of the Dawnbreakers to play, how could it be possible to train warriors in such an environment? You can't even train a qualified mortal servant! ”

"Don't say that, brother: at least the atmosphere of that battleship is good."

"Not to mention ......"

Dregel laughed.

"You are also a Terra, you should remember how many old monsters have been killed from the Holy Terra in the Second Legion: what they are now putting on the façade is just a bunch of milky imps, and the real terrifying side of the Dawnbreaker Legion is hidden by them below the level of the Far Eastern border."

“……”

Karn closed his eyes again, he didn't refute Dregel's words after all, but the commander of the Ninth Company seemed to suddenly remember something after a brief silence.

"By the way, I forgot if you didn't say it: I came to you to tell you that, according to the news from the Dawnbreaker Legion, their genetic mother, Morgan, had returned to the [Dawn Goddess] less than an hour ago."

"You know what that means, right?"

“！”

Karn's eyes snapped open.

"Is there any news from Kiel?"

"Captain, you say?"

Dregel grinned.

"I guess it's going to be soon: you're finally going to stop your timer, brother."

"Ah......h

"I can't ask for it."

Karn clenched his right fist tightly, the communicator that could directly convey the words of Acting Legion Commander Kiel, had been held tightly in the palm of the Eighth Company Commander's hand, just to be able to get the first moment to get the information that their genetic protoplasm had arrived on the [Fortitude Resolve].

"When do you think it's going to ring?"

Dregel's gaze swept over, and Karn's silence was answered: the silent company commander bowed his head, and after a dead silence of about a minute, he lifted up, a satisfied smile on his rugged face.

“…… Right now. ”

"It's now."

“……”

"He's back!"

(End of chapter)