Primarch Savage was standing on his command deck overlooking a massive projection of the area around the fleet. Every ship down to the last hunter squadron was a green dot on the projection.
He nodded satisfactorily at the formation and turned on the fleet-wide comms, "Get ready for warp! We are gonna be rolling in hot and running a train on those flesh bags that dared fuck with us! I want every Basillius-damned weapon in this fleet primed and fucking ready to unload a holy hellfire as soon as we emerge on the other side!"
The troops in the fleet all yelled out "Terra Invictus! Terra Victoriam!" as they snapped off their Imperial salutes.
The space before the fleet began to open with the thunderous roar that always accompanied a Terran warp. Every single gun in the fleet was primed and ready to unleash a rain of Basillian steel and laser fire.
Savage looked out at the faces of those on the command deck and grinned as he saw their eyes filled with determination and excitement. "Alright, you glorious bastards! Get ready to let loose and make Basillius proud! We've got some critters to save, so take your positions and help me command this huge damned fleet."
His command crew saluted him and took their positions by the tactical map. Seconds later, they crossed the horizon into an alien system. The capital ship that housed fleet command burst into the system before the rest of the fleet and the tactical map lost all of the friendly indicators across the board. They were now replaced with tens of thousands of red indicators.
Savage burst out laughing, "HA! HAHAHAAAAA! A Basillius-damned treasure! A target-rich environment! Deploy the Temporal Sovereign!" The map pinged as a green 'safe' bubble expanded around the battlefield, cutting off the Azarian's authority over Time.
He pointed a finger-gun at the tactical map and grinned as he mumbled, "Bang..." green dots filled the tactical map that very instant. The 50 battlecruiser class ships, 100 destroyers, and 100 hunter-killer squadrons all opened fire on the Azarian swarms closest to them.
The Warlord overlooking the nearby swarms noticed the incoming hail of fire and moved behind the hordes of its lessers, commanding them forward. "Go. Prove yourselves worthy before our god and slaughter the demons' children. Rend their metal coffins asunder and tear apart the fleshy ones. Bask in their fear and evolve into something greater to better serve our god."
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The immature Azarians were stirred into a frenzy and they shot forth into the incoming fire heedless of their own demise. All for the chance to prove themselves before their god.
Thousands were immediately smashed into a paste as slugs moving at 99 percent the speed of light slammed into, and through the front lines. The particle lances and lasers gouged deep rifts into the initial swarms as well, but the middle and backline pushed forth the corpses of their brothers, allowing push further and further into the Terran fleet.
Primarch Savage watched as the red dots collected into a point heading straight for them and sighed. "My god... Can they only use this one strategy? Even with a Warlord guiding them they're still doing the same stupid ass rush... In-fact... That Warlord looks like it cares even less about these little shitlings than they normally do... What the hell is that big-ass C'thulu thinking?"
He pulled up a smaller version of the tactical map on his own ocular interface before zooming in on the Warlords dot. The thousands of Azarians pouring in from everywhere around him were gathering specifically in front of the Warlord as if they were little more than an expendable shield to it. Savage cupped his chin and opened up an interface for his capital ship.
He swiped through several options before arriving at the Stellar Lancer. He looked to one of his command crew, "What's our firing line between us and that Warlord for the next three hundred lightyears? Anything important in the way?"
The crewmen glanced up at Savage before returning his gaze to the tactical map and running some numbers. "Primarch Savage, Sir. It would appear that there is a Jupiter-like planet 281 lightyears away in our direct firing line. If you are authorizing the Stellar Lancer, I would recommend we move our formation here." He said as he highlighted a section of the tactical map.
Savage smiled at him and gave him a salute. "Very well, let's make sure we don't hit anything other than the intended target boys and girls. That Warlord is acting incredibly self-important and I don't like it. If it is special... We should kill it for tactical reasons. If it's just an asshole among assholes? We should kill it for fun. Well, it'll be fun either way... but you get the point. Get rid of the eyesore."
With that said, he activated the Stellar Lancer and began charging it. "Well, soldiers. I hope the little fluffy people on that world can see this holy beacon of hope. It may not be the Stellar Annihilation Cannon on the planet-sized big hosses... But our little Stellar Lancer will still be pretty spectacular for them. Be a shame for them to miss it."
The command crew grimaced at the reminder that there was an entire alien world waiting for them to rescue them if there was even anything left. Savage noticed their expressions and sighed, "Now, I know that you've all felt the pain of an Azarian invasion before... But, what pulled us out of our despair? What gave us the will to push on and survive? A fucking light show from god himself. So, Let's be that ray of hope."
The map pinged to signal that the fleet had moved out to the intended destination and Savage activated the charged Lancer without missing a beat. A stunningly bright flash of cyan blue exploded throughout the dark void as it turned into a pillar of death for the Azarian swarm.
The Warlord seemed to have gotten bored with the whole fleet behind him as it focused on gazing towards the world full of livestock. It assumed that the lessers it gathered as a shield would hold out for a while as it stood. Yet, it was awoken from its daydream of carnage by a bright blue light.
As it turned to see what it was, the light crashed into it, covering most of its form with the brilliant blue, and scorching away even its body tempered by the veil.
Savage raised an eyebrow, somewhat shocked at how easy it was. "That... That was it? It really just gathered all of the little ones in front of it and allowed us to shoot our biggest gun at it... It wasn't bait? No Priest coming out of a rift to tear into our backline? Just... Shooting Azarians on easy mode? Was this a delaying tactic from a Priest?"
The more he thought about it the more ridiculous it became. He started drumming his fingers on his chair and tapping his foot as anxiety over the situation bloomed. 'There were over ten thousand with this one Warlord on the outskirts alone... That is a full invasion force. If the Priest literally didn't give a single fuck what the hell is over in the main swarms that it does care about? It hasn't even glanced this way...'