Chapter 173 The Unstoppable Progress

With Calvin's return, the episode in the main tent also ended.

Mars let Little Mal go and no longer pursued his fault. And Little Mal hurriedly left to repair his psychological trauma in some unknown corner.

The soldiers in the camp regained the lively atmosphere under discipline, which in itself explained the significance of Calvin's existence.

The sun had just reached the middle of the sky, and taking advantage of the right time, the team began to break camp and set off to return to the way they came.

Compared with the time when they came, the whole team was no different except that there were two more people.

The team was fully prepared for the long march. There were as many as five large horses for Calvin alone, and two of them were just right for the two of them.

The strict discipline of the army effectively suppressed the curiosity of the soldiers, and no one showed an abnormal reaction to the arrival of Elvis and Allen.

Mars did not ask about their origins. After spending a long time with Calvin, he understood that there were some things he needed to know, and Calvin would naturally tell him. Otherwise, it was not the right time.

He suppressed his imagination and did not guess what was in the palace that descended from the sky, nor did he think about the origins of the two giants who were taller than them and nearly twice as wide.

Anyway, from the fact that they retreated together with Calvin and their absolute obedience to Calvin, the soldiers knew that these two were also subordinates of the great chief.

As for Calvin's identity, there is no need to mention it. The tribe has long had its own understanding of his natural martial arts and his abnormal appearance of never aging, but it has not been made clear.

The way back was still the same, but the difference was that this time no sound of small animals was heard, which was the result of the overflow of psychic energy of Allen Janus as a Grey Knight recruit.

He was still adapting to the feeling of his soul connecting with the etheric ocean, but fortunately this body was directly derived from Calvin's genetic template, and the adaptation to psychic energy was also like instinct, and it was rapidly strengthening with his breathing.

He rode the large horse prepared for Calvin and followed Calvin closely.

This was a strange feeling, and he could not describe it specifically with his limited vocabulary:

The close relationship with his genetic father made him feel trembling and excited at the cellular level every moment.

In addition to controlling his psychic power, all his energy was devoted to observing Calvin's actions. Every detail he observed at the psychic level made him feel that he was one step closer to perfection.

He could sense how magnificent Calvin's soul was hidden under his body. It was a body that was beyond Allen's ability to look up just by sitting.

The invisible face was high up in the clouds, and just breathing could bring up white and gold wind and thunder.

The iron crown covered with thorns was worn on that head, and the thorns symbolizing suffering and the spikes symbolizing authority were looming in the clouds, and the voices of thousands of souls were faintly singing in it:

Holy! Holy!

Alan wanted to see more clearly, and his soul also wanted to get closer to his source.

Unknowingly, the surrounding environment changed.

He found that he had a set of silver power armor that he had never seen before, and was in an unknown city-state.

In front of him was a huge square that seemed to have no boundaries, and in the center of the square stood a towering nameless temple.

Following his instinct, Alan walked to the door of the temple, and then saw three people wearing the same armor as himself on both sides of the door, holding a slender and sharp halberd in one hand and meditating with their eyes closed in a half-kneeling posture.

"Who are you? Where is this?" Alan couldn't help but ask.

In response to him, there was damn silence. His voice echoed in the square for a long time before one of the gray knights opened his eyes and looked at him.

"Oh? A living person who came in unexpectedly? It's still a newborn." The hoarse voice came from under the silver-gray hood, which made Alan instinctively feel awed.

The body that was more burly than him stood up from the kneeling position and walked in front of him with a halberd in his hand. Alan couldn't see his face clearly, or he should have seen it clearly, but his cognition was not enough to remember it.

He just remembered the man's friendly smile to him:

"It's not time yet, this is not the place for you, go back..." After saying that, the mysterious Grey Knight reached out and gently pushed him, and he returned to reality in a dizzy state.

"Uh..." Alan shook his head in a trance, and saw his big hand still holding the reins.

The leaves in the surrounding woods rustled, the smell of decayed wood in the air and the crackling sound of horses' hooves trampling dead branches and fallen leaves made him confirm in the chaos that this was the side of reality.

And he looked up again, just in time to see Calvin turned his head and smiled mysteriously at him...

Elvis looked at the surrounding woodland, hiding his confusion with a calm expression.

Away from the mothership where he had lived for a long time and the pharmacist power armor that he had been with day and night, he had an illusion of being extremely fragile.

Elvis knew that was his psychological effect. Looking at the slender and fragile native cervical vertebrae of the mortals in front of the team, he knew clearly:

As long as he wanted, even with his bare hands, none of the more than 100 soldiers here except Calvin and another Grey Knight could survive for more than ten minutes.

This is Elvis's basic confidence, and it is also the essential difference between Astartes and mortals.

Their strength does not come from external materials. No matter how powerful their indestructible armor and devastating weapons are, they are just a way to release their combat power.

What really makes them powerful is themselves. It is their understanding of war itself resulting from the transformation of life forms. That is what distinguishes them from ordinary people.

Hundreds of years of conquest can make any mortal collapse, but in the eyes of an Astartes, hundreds of years of conquest is only considered a fierce battle, not all.

Their willpower and life span beyond mortals allow them to concentrate on the path of war skills for hundreds of years, polishing their combat skills and spiritual shortcomings with inhuman patience.

The time for this kind of growth and transformation varies, because the gene seed has the function of recording the memory of the battle where the gene comes from.

The Astartes will strengthen their inherited combat memories from a first-person perspective during their daily sleep, so that they can immediately understand how to deal with a specific target when they encounter it.

Training under the acceleration of this memory can last from a hundred years to a few decades.

You can see the transformation of an Astartes from a new recruit to a veteran of many battles going on visibly with the naked eye.

Eventually it grew to represent the limit of force of the human race, and rushed to various battlefields with aliens and chaos in the vast star sea of ​​the empire, thereby defending the interests of the human race.

Astarte, the literal translation in High Gothic - the person who walks in the starry sky. The original name is derived from this. As for the title of monk added later, it is just a unilateral arrogance imposed by the ignorant beliefs of mortals. That’s all.

The team was still marching quietly, but the speed was much faster than when they came. Without the threat of accidents while exploring the unknown, the unscrupulous warriors were more motivated by the hope of returning home.

The three-day journey back took only one day, and the total fifteen-day journey was only on the fourth day as the team headed south. The border checkpoint belonging to the tribe had already appeared at the end of the field of vision.

Elvis quietly advanced amidst cheers and said to Calvin behind him:

"Dear Mr. Ji..."

Halfway through his words, Elvis decided to call the Primarch in front of him simply "Sir" under the hint of Calvin's eyes.

He exerted force on his legs, urged the horse under his crotch to take two quick steps to reach a position beside Calvin, and asked Calvin in a low voice the question he had wanted to know along the way.

"Lord Calvin. I want to know your next steps for me and the chapter I belong to."

It's not because he's too anxious or not kind enough, but it's about the future of his war group. Being able to endure so long before asking already made Calvin look high on the young man.

Calvin did not answer his question directly, but under Elvis' nervous gaze, he mentally calculated the return date agreed with Constantine.

"Ten years, 15 years at most."

He raised his hand to stop Elvis' urging, and explained seriously to this young man who shouldered a heavy mission.

"Within five years, the ally I am waiting for will arrive. With his help, I expect to be able to complete the initial industrialization of the northern continent of this planet within ten years. This is also the basic condition for us to return your mothership to space."

"So long?" Elvis still couldn't accept it.

"I'm afraid the High Lords Council will not allow us to disappear from their sight for such a long time." He said worriedly.

Diplomatic matters concerning the Chapter were not within his scope of responsibilities.

But as the chief and only pharmacist, he is also half of the top management of the war group. Although he has no decision-making power on all major internal affairs of the war group, he is obliged to attend and observe.

Under the influence of his ears and eyes, Elvis knew a little bit about the management of the war group, although he had never seen a pig run away, but the pork there was inedible.

"You have no choice in the first place, right?"

Calvin looked at Elvis calmly, reminding him with his eyes and words that even if they had not lost contact with the High Lords Council, they would still fail the Tribunal's next gene seed inspection.

"Okay. Follow your will."

Under the puzzled eyes of the indigenous warriors beside him, Elvis made an eagle salute to Calvin from the saddle. This was his way of testing Calvin to see if he was hostile to the Empire's Legitimacy.

Naturally, this little thought could not be hidden from Calvin's eyes. He smiled casually and said to Elvis: "The Emperor's blessing! You can trust any Gray Knight! We are different from you. We have been fighting against Chaos for nearly ten thousand years. In battle, we never fell!"

"you!"

The red-faced Elvis was about to argue, but Calvin didn't give him the chance. He had already mounted his horse and charged forward, joining the soldiers cheering for seeing their hometown.

The sound of horse hooves sounded behind him. It was Alan Janus who strolled and drove his horse to Elvis. Under the gaze of the young man, he said to Elvis seriously:

"Condens your useless emotions and think carefully about my father's words. You will know how ridiculous your doubts are. As he said, the genes of the Gray Knights come from the holy emperor himself, and my father is only responsible for the inheritance. , Our purity is not something you can desecrate! You should be careful what you say!”

As soon as he finished speaking, Allen also urged the mount on his crotch to rush towards the fireworks-filled walled city ahead. At the end of Elvis' field of vision, from the main gate of the city that opened wide, he could already see the huge greeting team of mortals...

In Imperial Calendar 020.M36, 30 years have passed in the blink of an eye since the collective establishment of the eleventh Astartes chapter in the second year jointly initiated by Terra and Mars.

Calvin, who returned to the center of the tribe, began to devote all his energy to the management of the tribe.

The long-term and stable economic policies of the past ten years have begun to bear fruit. No matter how the southern countries intervene and infiltrate, the materials and population of the entire northern land have increased to an extremely terrifying number.

And this number is hidden in the complex political orders set by Calvin and the complicated economic data of various places. The spies of the southern countries have not failed to investigate.

But without the overall data summary, this core secret is still known only by Calvin.

Under his complex but clear-purpose policy adjustment, in half a year, the work center of the entire northern Han Zuting began to slowly withdraw from production and construction, and turned to the direction of military preparation.

Weapon smelting workshops and warehouses in various places are transferring all their stocks and transporting them to the key route warehouses where the main force is assembled.

The training subjects of full-time professional soldiers in various places are quietly turning to actual combat, and the content of the performance is no longer a single subject, but a set of systematic strike procedures under the support of the complete staff function.

The second-line militia mobilization plan has not been made public, but the number of training sessions is slowly increasing in density on a monthly basis.

Reserve officers from all over the country have also been drawn from various departments under the order of the General Staff, and they have been referring to the maps of southern cities that have been distributed to them, as well as the information about the villages and water sources that connect them, in a centralized and closed environment.

The wheel of war has begun to slowly start, and Calvin does not have much confidence in absolute confidentiality.

Once the national-level armed sequence is activated, it will bring about a huge impact that can never be covered up. This is his unique sober understanding as a ruler.

But unfortunately, the enemy this time is too ignorant and too arrogant.

Their ignorance and contempt for the modern military mobilization system have made them lose the most precious time for assembly and preparation on the eve of the war.

The southern countries, paralyzed by long-term peace, are still immersed in the illusion of a good economic environment, no worries at home and no strong enemies abroad.

The corruption of the army and the phenomenon of empty salaries are all over their army, and even the front-line troops cannot avoid it.

The irony is that their envoys are arrogant but weak inside. Calvin even heard the envoys of the southern countries stationed in the tribe's ancestral home that "the northern nomads are naturally inferior".

Obviously, this group of people who have been at peace for too long and have lost their sense of crisis are still stuck in the illusion that the northern people have been "successfully domesticated"...

When these documents symbolizing the completion of the preparatory work were collected like snowflakes in Calvin's hands, and all the preparatory conditions under the southern map in his work account had been met.

Calvin knew that the day of unifying the continent was not far away.

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