595th chapter, 891st volume, 13th library of the 50th city of knowledge, 7th universe, 974.593 cycle of eternity.
When my eyes are weighed with sleep I quench the evening candle’s glow
*Excerpt, from the works of Grand Scholar, and The Great War Expert Dja.n.u.s Todomari from the Imperium Archives*
On Caliupus 27th, Imperial year 1898, Federal year 3941, and Republican year 953 on the small home world of the Tolstoy sector, a Federal fleet clashed for less than 3 hours with an Imperial one. This small battle which was the first shot in The Great War was situated above a place called Graperust Manor, owned by a Novo Albetan lawyer called William Murasaki Kuckluck.
After the Battle of Graperust, mister Murasaki said that he had enough of the whole affair and decided to move his family 560.000 light-years to a town called New Hope within the Tremera system, to a house called Woodgrom Courthouse with the intention of avoiding the war in its entirety.
Years later the commanders of the belligerent forces came to that very same courthouse to sign the ending of all hostilities. So when it was over Mr Murasaki could boast that the war began on his front lawn porch and ended in his backyard gazebo.
The Great War raged across millions of star systems, billions of planets and trillions of light years, within it farm workers from Nova Bronze City of the Towar System, clashed with fisherman from Seshrim 9, lawyers and schoolteachers from the Brumbaki Plains of Bulla 8 with doctors and accountants from The Tjigu asteroid cl.u.s.ter.
Whole nations and ways of life would disappear only to be replaced by new ones and within this age of chaos great heroes and villains would emerge, several sentients would join the war, each from the three superpowers, they would be at the most crucial and most b.l.o.o.d.y of the battles and somehow survive them all, and give testimony of just how unrealistic reality could become.
A smuggler would save a country , a shadow warrior would emerge from the darkness, a rebel would reshape the galaxy, a sentient would change the way things were forever, and a potions brewer who did not go a single day to military school would become the greatest commander the known universe had ever seen or perhaps would ever see. So the sands of time flowed and with their pa.s.sing the universe changed forevermore.
Grand Scholar and Great War Expert Dja.n.u.s Todomari
Imperium Archives
Caliupus 8th Imperial year 1894, Federal year 3937, Republican year 949
Within the warp.
9:52 Imperial Fleet Time
A great train traversed the thin plane of hypers.p.a.ce, it was a ma.s.sive construct composed of at least 2.000 individual wagons, each one of them was over a hundred meters in diameter and stretched for at least five times that, but despite the t.i.tanic nature of this interstellar vehicle by the standards of its kind it was the runt of the litter.
These wagons where forged out of fine tempered steel with a smooth surface and each wagon’s front and back ended with a conic shape head and tail.
Seven great horizontal sheets of metal extended across their bodies, starting at the front and ending at the rear of each wagon, runes which glowed bright with energy where embedded on these stripes and from them magical energy was released for the purpose of moving and guiding the train towards its destination.
These bursts of energy started as a single line, that at certain points of its length bent upwards, downwards, left and right, and at each bent smaller lines formed from them, which they themselves bent and made new ones emerge, giving the magic the shape of a great tree branch that looked like it sprouted from lighting itself.
But it was only the shape of a plant and nothing more, for the purpose of this train was not the production of breathable air or that of fruits or flowers.
No, its purpose was transportation and among its cargo where two very important pa.s.sengers.
A surge of energy, which was called since ancient times a gust of warp wind shook the s.p.a.ce train, not enough to cause any damage or deviate it from its course, but enough to wake up one of the occupants of its VIP room from his nap.
For a few brief moments confusion and disorientation dominated his person, that was generally what happened when you traverse the realm of reality and the realm of dreams and no more so than when you are inside the warp which existed outside both of them.
For it was a very mysterious and unnerving place and even veteran sailors and soldiers where not to comfortable with pa.s.sing through this plane which seemed to be nowhere yet everywhere at the same time.
As for the drivers of this train the feeling of dread caused by venturing in a place outside of what you considered your ‘normal reality’ was present to them as well. Even though they’ve learned to overcome it and even partially control it, its presence remained an eerie reminder that they didn’t belong here.
So you should now be able to understand the temporary confusion of the aforementioned pa.s.senger, but that quickly gave away to remembrance, as he now reacquainted himself with this plane of existence and thus the confusion disappeared as his mind recovered from the daze and remembered everything and realized that he was on a galactic train, souring in the limitless heavens of s.p.a.ce towards its stop.
It was an Imperial Fleet supply train, carrying essential food, medicine, clothing, and ammunition for the 378th Corps that was stationed on planet Volun 4. The train slithered its way through the warp like some great celestial dragon towards its destination with those supplies, along with the aforementioned corps’s new commander and his knight and chief of staff.
Namely the newly minted Commodore First Cla.s.s Metternich per Pelasgiamus and his knight Commodore third cla.s.s Adrian de Morowetz.
Metternich was a unique creature amongst the Empire, his hair was black as night and shortly trimmed, but not in a military stile, more like a summer style.
His skin was dark blue, which was not unheard of in the Empire but not entirely common and finally his eyes where perhaps the most unique thing about him, for their retina was a blue one, but his sclera was of a bright glowing red, which combined with his skin and his voice which was low and a bit gruff made him a very imposing visual figure.
His uniform consisted of black leather boots, black pants that were secured to his waist by a belt, along with as sheathed sword on his left side, a dagger on the back side of his belt, and a one handed crossbow on his right, his chest was covered in a black tunic, on his shoulder pads where three golden bars that symbolized his rank of Commodore First Cla.s.s.
On his chest where it curbed to his sides was two lines of gold b.u.t.tons united by a series of golden ropes that traversed his chest, they where for both decorative and practical purposes, since the real b.u.t.tons where on the inner side of the left flap of the tunic.
He looked like someone who was born for war, who belonged on the battlefield, who would stand when others would fall, that was something no one could deny! Too bad he was a coward.
“Did you sleep well my liege?” Adrian asked him, he was dressed in the exact same uniform as Metternich but there was one bar on each shoulder to display his rank of Third Cla.s.s.
Adrian was an Avian, his race was humanoid in its appearance, he had white feathers encompa.s.sing his entire skin, a great golden beak for a mouth and two black eyes that looked like they were constantly zoning into s.p.a.ce, also his aforementioned feathers where ruffled and his beak had a slight dent in it, giving poor Adrian the appearance more aching to a crazed half dead chicken than that of a professional soldier. But he was anything but weak, as his past foes or rather the absence of past foes, or any foes for that matter was a very good testament to his skill.
“About as well as one can, given the current circ.u.mstances.” Metternich replied and Adrian gave a nod of agreement and said nothing else, he too felt uncomfortable traveling through hypers.p.a.ce, but he was more unnerved by being on a train instead of a ship than the fact that he was in the warp.
“I’ve been meaning to ask Adrian, why when we are about to meet new people do you always stop grooming yourself?” Metternich enquired.
“People don’t take you seriously when they first meet you if you don’t look pretty, their true nature comes out easier that way, good thing wouldn’t you say?” Adrian asked and gave a slight smile to his commander, one which Metternich returned in kind.
Ever since they first met, Metternich had always treated him with the upmost respect and professionalism you’d come to expect an officer of his rank to give and receive, that had made an impression on Adrian, which was what eventually convinced him to become Metternich’s follower, a fact that the Commodore would be secretly grateful for but also secretly resentful for the rest of his life, but generally more times he would be the former rather than the latter.
The seconds ticked away in silence and seeing that the conversation had died down for the moment, Metternich decided to once more go over the briefing papers he had been given for his new command.
He was using a farview screen to review them and after that was done he started to once more research the culture of the opposing nation.
The farview or rather this variant of it, was a rectangular shaped ma.s.s of crystals with magic runes embedded on its surface, that when activated a mist like gas would emerge from its screen and take the shape and color of whatever the farview’s user desired, or if he preferred it could only project 2d images on its surface, it was very flexible device!
It was also a very useful tool, one which Metternich regularly used since he could have hundreds or thousands of books stored on it, making it easier to carry and ideal for alleviating boredom.
But as they got closer and closer to their destination, he silently wished for eternal boredom.
“I’ll take a lifetime of boredom over any war or battle, at least boredom doesn’t come running towards you with a big sharp magical weapon with the intent to play squash with your head!” he thought to himself, hoping that this tranquility would last forever, but like all good things it had to eventually come to an end, for a beeping sound was heard from the ships internal speakers signaling that they were getting near the exit of the warp and that soon they would be arriving at they’re destination.
“It is a good thing that they decided to use a warp portal train instead of a ship to get us there, last thing we need is some b.l.o.o.d.y raid ambushing us before we arrive at our new command.” Adrian said to his liege.
“Well, despite the best attempts of the seemingly universal and unstoppable power of stupidly to make a wrong decision, the vile forces of logic and reasoning have seemingly prevailed and vanquished this oh, so great foe!” Metternich said in a hammy tone which clearly indicated he was joking and Adrian showed his appreciation with a good chuckle.
A warp portal was as its name suggests, a portal that is situated on a planet or in outer s.p.a.ce which allows faster travel trough the warp if a ship is not using a portal, making it at least twice as fast if not more depending on the state of the warp between two points, the size of the gate and the amount of power it had access too.
Also, when in hypers.p.a.ce there was the danger of being ripped apart by gravity fields or energy nexuses if a ship was not in peak condition or low on power and if it was traversing a less than ideal hypers.p.a.ce route, well you get the general idea.
Why a wandering comet, a small dust field, of even the remains of a small pa.s.sing solar flare could tear a ship apart!
A warp portal along with the great power provided by either the sun or a planet’s energy nexus engulfed a ship or in this case a train in a protective field as it traversed the warp, protecting it to a certain degree from such perils and shredding whatever was in its way, as long as it was not too great an obstacle.
Also ships who did not use jump gates had to have a build in warp sanctuary and plenty of power crystals to make the jump, a ship using a jump gate would not require an expensive warp sanctuary or power storage crystals in order to jump, all the ship needed was it to be was airtight, also the energy required to enter and exit the warp was provided by the starting gate and the destination gate, thus the gates where faster and cheaper and that was always the way to go.
But for all its advantages the aforementioned warp train had no means of its own to enter and exit warp without a gate.
It was also impossible for trains to change and adjust their route when using one, this was one area where they where outcla.s.sed by ships.
Also if you’re enemies manage to find just the right conditions along you’re potential route with the train, they could pull you out of the warp and ambush you, a train of course could be retrieved with a special support ship designed just for that purpose and be back on its way, but until then it was vulnerable to attack.
But that was a moot point since military trains where armed to the teeth, that combined with their long bodies gave them excellent options for defense, they could form a protective sphere or dodecahedron, which unlike ships had no vulnerable point and had excellent anti-light ships defenses, it truly was the safest way to travel when confronted with pirates or enemy s.p.a.ce raiders.
Fully fledged warships where an entirely different matter and when it came to that a ship was the way to go if you wanted to outmaneuver and outrun them.
So it was a constant debate between the advantages of rigidness but high security against greater flexibility with freedom but also the presence of an unknown danger and many supporters of both sides argued day and night over which was best.
For both means of transportation had their pros and cons, but for the current route which took the train trough friendly territory and lands in which the Empire was the dominant power (at least for now) the train was best suited for such a purpose, also many would think that a fleet corps commander would never ‘lower’ himself to ride a simple train instead of a battleship and that was also the reason Metty chose this, since it also gave him the element of surprise over his potential enemies.
And for the young Commodore First Cla.s.s that thought brought him some piece of mind from his troubles.
“Though I am grateful that I will not have to worry about being torn to shreds by some small s.p.a.ce pebble or flying into a mine field and being ambushed while traversing or entering a new system, the idea that I have to face death sooner rather than latter is not a very appealing one.”
Metternich thought to himself as he lamented the sad state of affairs he currently found himself in and within his mind he briefly looked back on how he had arrived to his current predicament, thoughts that he would eventually write down in his posthumous memoirs.