Lacking the weight of Cordelia, her armor, the sled, and the equipment Isolde had gathered made climbing the rest of the mountain relatively simple despite incurring a continued toll upon Isolde's body. When she finally did reach the top it was with severe exhaustion as she collapsed down once again, her breathing like that of someone who had just run a marathon for the first time in their life.
The pride of having succeeded fed Isolde just enough strength to rise up after a few moments of laying face-first in the snow, first lifting her torso up using her arms like she was doing a push-up, then continuing to a kneeling position on one knee...at which point the other gave out and she fell back down upon both knees and hands, gasping for breath as her body revealed its exhaustion.
From there it took Isolde another minute of gathering her breath and strength to even raise her head, at which point she was stunned not by her injuries but by what she saw: beyond the mountain in the sky above was a beautiful aurora that had been obscured to her until now.
In spite of her own lack of spirituality Isolde could not help but feel something as she stared from the mountain's peak towards the aurora left in the storm's wake. The vibrant display before her eyes brought out the natural beauty of Kimara in full, pulling on the hearts of any who might gaze upon such brilliance firsthand. With its utterly fiendish conditions it was all too easy to forget that Kimara had once drawn settlers to it, moments such as this no doubt helping build the bond between its fledgling members and the world they would call home.
Despite its brutality, Kimara was not resented by its inhabitants but rather celebrated and proudly conquered by those who could see the beauty past the endless toil. It was little wonder that such a world had drawn in the Iron Warriors during the Great Crusade whose members would later call the brutal world of Olympia their home, as if it spoke to their own duality as seekers of Utopia and as a Legion made to break all which stood before them.
Just as the young boy named Trahaearn once was reborn upon these very wastes, so too did Isolde feel like she found some degree of purpose and calling as she, for the first time in her life, truly took the time to just bask in the glory of her homeworld. Even with her body beaten to the bones just moments before by the very same elements she now gazed upon it added rather than detracted to her appreciation, knowing she could only now witness such streaks of beautiful light across the sky because she held the grit and determination required to survive what came before.
Isolde could have considered the light of the aurora a sign of some sort or a blessing of the Emperor of Mankind, but instead once the awe of its visage died down she used it for practical purposes: the light it shed around it in the darkness alongside the moon gave her a relatively decent lay of the land surrounding the mountain. Through cross-referencing the visual data with what she had studied before the mission and during her time at the Schola it was possible for Isolde to locate herself within the region, as well as then map out where she would have to travel using the data granted by the Commandant to most likely locate the cache she had been assigned to secure.
Someone more poetic than Isolde would say that Kimara itself was leading her to her objective with the direction in which the aurora faced, but there were only so many relative directions and so it was bound to happen that such dancing lights might point in the same way as Isolde would have to journey anyways.
To descend the mountain and return to the cave would require more strength than Isolde had when she finished planning a traveling route for them that would mostly shield them from the wind and cold, so Isolde decided to linger and continue viewing the aurora above until her body could withstand the journey. She found that she did enjoy the sight despite never having sought out such a thing before, just as she enjoyed looking at the dresses and clothing a woman might have worn in years past that she could not partake in with Kimara's current status. Simply admiring beauty was something lost upon her spartan upbringing, and while she did not regret her years at the Schola neither did she regret having this moment to bask in the beauty of her world.
Eventually the beautiful lights of the aurora faded away into the night sky, and with them so too did Isolde's rest come to end. It was easier for her to descend than climb, even just sliding down some parts of the mountain on her return trip, but she maintained a degree of care to make certain she did not fall to her death after having survived so much.
When she returned to the cave Isolde found Cordelia awake, though only sitting up against the wall as she struggled to reach for their supplies to better treat her leg.
Noticing Isolde, and having figured out what had roughly happened since she had been rendered unconscious, Cordelia weakly bowed her head to her team leader, "I'm sorry..."
Isolde saw no reason for Cordelia to apologize, even though she did understand why the other Progena was doing so: if Isolde had simply left her behind then it would have been far easier for her, and yet Isolde carried her all this way to wherever they had ended up just to save an injured comrade. To Isolde the lack of need for apology came from how it was her decision to save Cordelia despite the difficulties incurred, and so any issues she ran into as a result were her own fault, not Cordelia's.
Seeing Cordelia strain herself to reach for what little first-aid materials remained prompted Isolde to bring them to the injured girl who so resembled her superficially, though Isolde doubted that Cordelia could have journeyed all this way carrying Isolde had the positions been reversed just as Isolde was certain her singing voice would never match Cordelia's.
"Take it easy. You are in no condition to be moving around," Isolde chided out of concern.
Cordelia gave a nod of thanks as Isolde passed their supplies to her, noticing the way Isolde favored one of her legs as she approached, "Even our injuries seem to match."
Isolde simply nodded, not particularly caring that by chance they had both received injuries to the same leg which only deepened their superficial similarities.
While Cordelia treated her own wounds she hummed the tune to the song she had sung while aboard the Lighter, it seemingly being a favorite of hers. Isolde used the opportunity presented to have Cordelia tend to wounds she could not reach while she returned the favor, neither particularly experts at medical treatment but accomplishing what they could with what they had. With Isolde undressed Cordelia made a comment about how once their armor was off it was impossible to mistake one for the other, quipping that it must have been difficult for Isolde to see where she was stepping throughout her trek through the snowy wasteland they crashed upon.
Truthfully Isolde had not even pondered the fact she could not properly look down and see where her feet were stepping because she had not been able to do so for years, years in which she had been training in the field and needed to intuit where to place her feet without seeing past her bosom. It was just second-nature to her now to know where and how to step despite a lack of vision, and while some like Mahla considered Isolde's chest an unnecessary burden she instead took pride in her appearance. Kimarans had selected for beauty because they wanted to be better than others, and if Isolde could maintain her superiority in various regards while having a supposed handicap then she felt all the better for it.
That their ancestors had also selected for traits that nullified resulting back pain (for unnecessary pain was unnecessary) as well as sagging (a counterintuitive feature to the desire of beauty) went unsaid by Isolde, though Cordelia did allude to the former with how she commented about Isolde's poor bra. The custom garment had born some of the brunt of Isolde's journey given her harness bore down on where it carried over her shoulders, damaging it even beneath her armor by the exerted force, as shown with Isolde undressing briefly to have her cuts and bruises taken care of. It was evident that Isolde's marble skin wound take some time to heal, but Cordelia noticed that it seemed to have already begun mending itself to how she recalled Isolde appearing when dressing for missions.
Why or how that was flew over Cordelia's head, with Isolde's subordinate chalking it up to her leader's gene-crafting that everyone was sure Isolde was the result of. One did not simply by chance create a seven-foot tall woman with lithe muscles, curves beyond even Kimaran standards, and a capable mind beyond those possessed by her well-equipped peers. To Cordelia it was as if someone had tried to create the idealized Kimaran form to create a symbol rather than a mere mortal, but she kept that to herself as she knew Isolde would be annoyed by such pondering. Still, Cordelia could not help but feel that any child Isolde might one day have would be well primed to conquer the sector if not the galaxy itself given the stock it would be coming from.
Both Cordelia and Isolde coordinated to further improve the dressing of Cordelia's lower leg, though in doing so some blood poured out and coated the bandages that currently lay across Cordelia that were meant to wrap around the injury. Ruining the bandage before it was even used caused Cordelia to scoff, noticing that at the moment the way they covered her legs made it seem as if she was wearing a dress rather than pants.
"Too bad red isn't my color. It almost looks like a skirt."
"A rarity now even among so-called fashionista's," Isolde coldly commented, her tone an indication as to what she thought of how Kimaran culture had shifted even in their lifetime.
"Generations past wore them all the time," Cordelia noted wistfully, "Long of course, it would be immodest to dress otherwise. Now such normalcy is an invitation to predation. Before we took over city KO-35, Eisengard, I couldn't even sing lest it attract the wrong attention..."
Isolde finished cleaning and dressing Cordelia's leg injury again, it being easier now that she had taken time to rest a bit and that Cordelia was awake, though the fracture piercing the skin would mean Cordelia would need true medical care sooner rather than later. Now done tending to Cordelia, Isolde set aside the remainder of their medical supplies in a weatherproof bag and promptly set about placing herself in her half of the sleeping bag with her back turned to Cordelia. From her body language it was obvious Isolde was perturbed even further by the fact that they were denied even something as simple as an unmolested trip to the city or the ability to dress in clothes that embraced their femininity rather than downplayed it.
"As Progena, we are no longer people. We are tools to be used, pawns who must fulfill our orders," Isolde spoke resolutely, as it was her true opinion, but a hint remained that she wished for something a bit more than just the life of a soldier, "A 'normal life' is something for others to have."
Cordelia lowered herself down and turned her own back to Isolde, the two now fully wrapped in the sleeping gear that would keep their body heat regulated and prevent the temperatures outside from causing harm.
As skilled and beautiful as Isolde was, it was easy to forget how hard she had to apply herself and the risks she had to take as a daughter of the Commandant. To live only in service and never knowing happiness of one's own was pitiful in a way, as while Cordelia at least had her singing to bring herself comfort Isolde's talents all directly were tied to her role as a soldier and spokesperson for the Commandant when he was unavailable. It was blatant that Isolde loved and respected her father, but the shadow he cast was a difficult one to live up to as a beloved public figure and veteran of many wars for the Imperium.
"I do not envy your position and the weight you carry. Every pawn has its role to play," Cordelia's tone remained wistful, "But even so, it's sad, isn't it?"
"My purpose is to serve. That is all," was the only response Isolde would offer, once again truthful even if she longed for a greater calling. To Isolde it was as if her duty and desires were mismatched puzzle pieces that she could not reconcile, and so duty there was to consider.
Cordelia offered up another alternative born of her respect for her classmate who had risked so much to save her life, "One form of service is to assume the mantle of leadership on behalf of others."
That earned a wry retort from Isolde, who in the process revealed an insecurity Cordelia would not have expected of the Schola's top student, "Your voice is the one that others desire. Mine serves to echo my father's."
"My talent for vocalization is wasted on a daughter of Kimara. In all of our patrols through the city how much have you heard the locals speak? I haven't heard a single word from them, and their spirits being broken can only account for a piece of that."
Cordelia's own reply cut to the truth of the matter, as while she was an accomplished singer it was not as if it would ever truly amount to anything. What husband was there to woo with a sweet melody? Children to lull to a peaceful sleep? Their people were set on a path to oblivion, and what remained of them were hardly the sort to care about frivolities such as music. Those who had shown appreciation for her singing now lay dead, whatever possible connections formed working together shattered by Kimara's ruthless nature.
"Words hold little social currency, especially given the Conomors' sophistry broadcasted day-in and day-out. Actions are what we care about, and now that Kalles is missing there are none at the Schola who doubt your efforts."
"Flattery won't save us."
"No, it won't," Cordelia agreed before saying her last words before resting, "But I have faith that you will: in Regicide even a pawn can rise to become a queen."
Try as she might, Isolde had no response to give.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The following day was mostly spent recovering for both Isolde and Cordelia, the latter still unable to properly walk yet given the status of her leg while the former was exhausted and injured from the prior day's travel. Any thoughts of going outside were whisked away by the storm returning to its previous state of completely blotting out any form of visibility, and so Isolde used the time she had to prepare a travel route from what she recalled of the terrain and the data the Commandant granted them.
Narrowing down the likely location of the base was easier now that she had seen the area herself and cross-referenced it with the Commandant's information, and while she was not absolutely certain she knew where it was Isolde had at least narrowed it down to a particular region of this area. Kimaran bases were made to withstand the harsh weather, and one that was likely subterranean like the one they sought likely had fared better than Fortress Cities that had to endure much more. The possibility of Yormungaros or other wildlife damaging it in the past century was possible, but it still remained the Progena's best chance at escaping the cold as well as fulfilling their objective.
For Isolde finding a way to call for help and then escaping was a last resort compared to locating the facility and making the deaths of her team worth something. Besides, once they found it getting extracted would likely be easier thanks to whatever technology remained at the base, so carrying on with the mission seemed the best option to both Isolde and Cordelia.
When the storm finally died down they set off along the relatively safe route Isolde planned using the terrain to protect them from the worst of the storm, Isolde once again pulling Cordelia along despite Cordelia's protesting that she wanted to help. They were in less danger now that they knew roughly where they were headed and where they were, so Isolde did not want to let Cordelia injure herself further and die pointlessly on the way.
There were setbacks along the path as Isolde would be blown back off a ledge by a sudden gust of wind, crashing down on the sled and Cordelia at one point, but renewed purpose allowed her to carry forth despite moments such as that. It took a great deal of care and effort, but they were able to avoid the worst of the storm while maintaining their general path forward to where Isolde predicted the base to be.
Almost there.
Surveying and climbing parts of the region Isolde expected the base to be within revealed nothing at first, causing Isolde to doubt herself as she failed to find the facility again and again...but upon reaching the final mountain in the range she had sought out Isolde realized she had found it: traces, however faint and weathered by time, existed of Kimaran architecture by the mouth of a particular cave that likely served once upon a time as an entrance to seal off the inside from inclement weather before the technology broke down.
The inside of the cavern itself was nothing special beside its depth, stretching on for seeming ages with many pathways to embark upon. Without a particular reason to pick one over another, Isolde used her gauntlet to mark the cavern wall at points to show where she had come from as she began to explore it all, sled in tow. It was eerie in a sense to walk into almost complete darkness where around any corner a monster may be laying in wait, but besides the occasional falling icicle or other natural disturbance there was nothing to be heard...at least at first.
What may have been hours into her surveying the area Isolde felt that the path she was on was the right one, as while other parts of the cavern had been caved-in and destroyed over the years this one was well-maintained. It had been some time since anyone would have used it, but if she had a good light source Isolde would be that she could find signs of Kimaran architecture holding up various passes and walls beneath the snow and ice that had trickled into the cavern through various holes above.
There was probably an actual entrance on the other side of the mountain that Isolde was unaware of rather than this hidden path through a decrepit cave, but it was too late to turn back now and so she followed her gut instinct deeper within. She made steady progress despite the darkness thanks to bits of light poking down from the skies above, and so with care she even climbed down a particularly steep edge onto a Y-shaped path with two routes coalescing into one that descended to what appeared to be the final depths of the cave. If she was to find what she was looking for, it would be there.
The path which Isolde stood upon was higher than the other, though exact details of each were difficult to determine on her own...though from the other way she began to see artificial light creep in just as voices began to trickle in as well.
"Ya sure know a good tastin' Mol when ya see one, brother," one voice spoke in a heavy accent of one of Wostyn's many regions.
"Bah, when can we finish dem off and be done wit' it? De're jus' animals, so why we waitin'?" another complained in a voice quite similar to the first, likely being the brother mentioned.
Isolde quietly set about undoing the harness she used for the sled, sensing that a fight might be on the horizon and she could ill afford to be tied down. She needed to scout out who these interlopers were and why they were present, as it was quite curious that Wostyn mercenaries would even stray beyond the comfort of Kimara's Fortress Cities and even more so that they would have ventured this far into Kimara's most unwelcoming territory. Were they hunting for the same thing as her? Were they simply trying to line their pockets with whatever they could scavenge from a region others have ignored?
"More'a us arrive by da day so we'll outnumba' dem soon enouf, right boss-man? I'm itching for a real fight, it's no fun when dey don' fight back," the first voice whined, only for a new voice to respond in turn like a patient paternal figure.
"Be patient, just as our Lord has been all of this time. We are but the chorus for the grand theatre that was set before even your grandparents were born. We each have our role to play for our marvelous audience, and when the time comes you will know nothing but your deepest desires."
Recognition sparked in Isolde's ears for this other voice as she crept closer to the ledge separating where she was in the cave and the voices now echoing throughout its expanse. The Commandant had made sure that she knew of the top threats among the Conomor regime for Isolde's own safety, and from recordings of broadcasts addressed to their soldiers she could recall that this voice belonged to Bludol, one of their top ranking mercenaries who oversaw countless men he personally recruited from their homeworld Wostyn.
Of those he hired there were certain traits that were common, and none of them were positive from the perspective of a Kimaran: almost every one of them to the last were addicted to substances highly illegal on Kimara due to their teratogenic nature yet were freely indulged in on Wostyn in recent decades. The teratogenic effects were evident in many of the recruits with their hideous birth defects that were compounded by the in-breeding common to Wostyn due to the natural consequences of a low-technology desert culture whose population were largely incapable of wider travel and lived in small 'packs' like wolves. As the refuse of Wostyn these soldiers were loyal only to the drugs that gave them nirvana, and Bludol was not only their benefactor but supplier. It was not the kind of loyalty practiced in perpetuity upon Kimara towards their own people, but rather a sick approximation of fealty born of the knowledge that each of these abominations lacked the connections of Bludol to obtain the drugs on their own so they would do whatever he asked of them to receive their chosen poison.
Unlike the high value placed on (Kimaran) life by Kimaran culture that valued survival, these soldiers were even more expendable than other mercenaries since every day more of their ilk were born to Wostyn: the drug trade had grown so endemic that healthy children born to the world were growing scarcer, and due to the corruption surrounding their governance and their various clans the Imperium remained ignorant to the fact that a world dedicated to recruiting Astartes would soon have no aspirants capable of surviving the process. The worldwide apathy towards Wostyn suffering Kimarans possessed and their cultural distaste for the Imperial Fists meant that they were not going to be the ones to mention it, perfectly content letting the Wostyn continue their path of self-destruction out of spite both ancestral and present. Why should they care if an inferior world with inferior Imperial servants collapsed? That would just prove that the Wostyn were unfit to survive in the cutthroat era they all lived in.
That desire for the complete destruction of their neighboring society was shared entirely by the Wostyn however, and right now they were the ones empowered by the current governance of Kimara. While the average Kimaran was fine allowing Wostyn's past century of escalating decadence to tear itself apart, those on Wostyn held onto their own grudges from millennia ago and blamed the Kimarans for all their woes. The Kimarans and Iron Warriors had reduced the barely hospitable desert planet to an even more barren wasteland, and for that they would always be guilty and deserved eradication: that the Kimarans had done so because the Wostyn of the time period were attempting to call the Imperium down upon Kimara to see their independence crushed and world destroyed was lost on the Wostyn of the modern era, only remembering what was done to them and not why. It had been punitive perhaps for the centuries of Wostyn invasion and raiding, but the decision had ultimately been made due to the fact that if one Wostyn vessel escaped to the Imperium then it would doom Kimara before it could entrench itself and regroup with the Jarn fleet.
The fact that the Imperium was notified in the end had led the Kimarans to determine that they had been too lenient and humane in their bombardment of Wostyn, further deepening the ruthless nature of their society towards outsiders even though they lost much of their ability to act upon it when the Imperial Fists conquered them. Any mercy to outsiders was a weakness that had cost them greatly, and so at best outsiders could expect apathy while at worst they were received with total hostility. Kimara had no friends or allies to call upon in a time of need, but neither did they desire such things as such outside reliance was a symbol of weakness.
"Serves dem right, ya know? Dose Mols act like dey're betta' dan us, but now we're da ones in charge!" the second voice responded to Bludol, his brother chiming in right after.
"One'a dem called me a sister-fucka' yesterda', can ya believe dat grox?"
Yes, I can, you depraved beast.
Now able to see them, Isolde instinctively turned her nose up at the creatures beneath her both figuratively, disgusted by the mere sight of their deformities that differed so greatly from the perfection of the Human form that Kimarans tried to exhibit. Suppressing her revulsion, Isolde began to examine their group and rapidly counted around ten with somewhat severe mutations and five who were so severely aberrant that to call them Human would be to disgrace the term. Their bodies were distorted in ways that were inconceivable to a Kimaran, so used to perfection that it was repulsive to witness their extra limbs in random places (some stunted and others wickedly long), bulging and emaciated muscles all over their twisted frames, sickly skin that diverged from the bronze expected of those born to a desert planet, and other mutations that would see them executed should the horror of their existence be witnessed by Imperial authorities. Tendril-like appendages joined their collection of distorted limbs, each and every inch of their forms constantly writhing as if in agonizing pain and torment.
It was somewhat difficult to tell with their malformed bodies, but the less distorted mercenaries were tellingly young to be soldiers. It was not unheard of for the Imperium to employ child soldiers, with even the famous Cadian regiment of the Imperial Guard possessing young boys and girls within their ranks. These soldiers from Wostyn were even younger than Isolde by her approximation, teens at the oldest whose upbringing had forged them into cruel monsters who the term morality held no meaning. Whatever innocent wonder children might possess was channeled into atrocities and war crimes, allowed to indulge in their whims and desires when set loose by their masters.
Heavy footsteps beyond their group implied that another grotesque creature was lagging behind the others, bringing their total count to sixteen members plus Bludol himself who stood proudly at the head of the pack. Unlike the others Bludol was relatively normal in appearance, the veteran soldier's bald head and bulging eyes his most prominent features. His body was clad in a stunning fuchsia colored armor specialized to allow for ease of movement while providing a fair amount of protection, fitting to his body like a second layer of skin and revealing his muscles that bulged almost as much as his eyes.
"Dose cozin-fucka's make babies in test tubes an' laugh at us for being in-breads!" one of the two brothers who flanked right behind Bludol scoffed, offended by the gene-crafting of their neighbors. Both of the boys were thirteen at oldest, but the skins they wore as trophies on their gear spoke to their true nature.
"Dats why dat Mol's skull had'ta be split, nobody disrespects me like dat."
From the path they were on the soldiers would soon reach an intersecting part of the cave that would reveal Isolde's position, and thanks to the ledge she just lowered herself from there was no easy way to go back in time to avoid them as well as protect Cordelia and their supplies. A confrontation was inevitable, so Isolde prepared her shotgun and pistols as quietly as she could on the likely outcome that there would be a firefight. Ideally she would unpack the sled and have Cordelia provide her backup, but the amount of time it would take to release Cordelia from the tightly wrapped sled would be too great, a natural consequence of making certain nothing would break free during their trek through Kimara's wastes.
Deeper in the cave was where Isolde predicted they would locate the hidden facility the Commandant tasked them with discovering, so slaying these soldiers of the Conomors was unnecessary: once they reached the base there would likely be ways to contact aid as well as to wall off the mercenaries. All she had to do was get to the end of the cave before they did, following the natural slope downwards to salvation...but right now they were in the way, and with their numbers just trying to break past them was a major risk. If they could be thinned down perhaps she could exploit an opening, but she had to wait and see how they would act so she could take the appropriate actions in turn.
Bludol's head tilted to the side as his forces reached the intersection ahead of Isolde, the man seeming to possess some degree of superhuman instinct as he picked out Isolde's form within the darkness of the cavern.
"My faith in the mirror has born fruit..." he spoke cryptically to himself as he drew his men's attention to Isolde, who in turn had her shotgun aimed right at them from where she stood twenty paces away. The mutant freaks behind Bludol stood as still as their shaking bodies could manage, waiting on their master to give a command to act lest they upset him and be denied their nirvana later.
"You are the soldier Bludol, correct?" Isolde sought to confirm her knowledge to gauge her circumstances properly, her finger on the trigger of her gun to end the man should the situation warrant it. A direct fight was unlikely to go in her favor given her condition and their superior numbers, the only benefit Isolde having over them being her carapace armor providing far more protection than anything they possessed. How the abominations were not freezing to death was unknown to Isolde, but if she had to guess they were on some form of drug that numbed their reaction to the cold since drugs were their specialty.
Bludol offered a half-bow to Isolde, his voice smarmy and filled with a sense of superiority that contrasted his physical action, "I am honored you know my name,
Princess. Lower your weapon, we are allies are we not?"
Princess?
Perhaps Bludol was referring to her higher status born of her relation to the Commandant, or maybe he was just mocking her attitude. Whatever the reason, that Isolde was still seeking information that could inform her of how to handle this group was the only reason she did not pull the trigger at that moment, well aware of how Bludol had been one of the officials who saw to the suffering of her people for longer than she had been alive. Behind the false joviality was the mind of a rabid animal famed for shedding blood in such gruesome displays that few would even dare give details of what they witnessed.
"Negative. What is your purpose for being here?" Isolde kept her gun trained on him as Bludol attempted to take a step forward with his hands raised up like a surrendering combatant.
"You wound me, but I can hardly be surprised given the bad...
blood between our causes," the way he lingered on the word blood was telling of his true nature, though he corrected himself upon his next utterance of it, "I would refrain from shooting an ally in cold blood however. I brought my personal battalion with me to comb through these wastes, and I would hate for us to possess a misunderstanding that causes any conflict."
He could be bluffing about possessing an entire battalion, but Isolde felt that he was actually speaking the truth: Bludol was careful in a way that many of his peers were not, and so if he had come to apprehend Isolde who might have a full squad of Schola students with her he would not risk bringing just over a dozen malformed soldiers, he would deploy everyone under his command to ensure success. He was a veteran of the Imperial Guard turned cutthroat mercenary, so he had an actual background in military tactics and deployments shared by the other members of the Sons of the Emperor upper echelons.
It also meant that mere rabble like those before Isolde were not the only soldiers likely to be deployed: true trained veterans like the kind that used their lessers as cannon fodder were likely skulking somewhere nearby, accompanied by many more mutants who would fight and die for them. Bludol's instincts had likely led him to where Isolde was with his own personal retinue, but his other skilled companions would not be too far and he likely was stalling for time.
The information she had gleamed painted quite the picture for Isolde, and was well worth not firing immediately upon the mercenaries: now she knew that she had to act with haste if she were to reclaim Laegjarn's Chest and prevent it from possibly falling into the hands of these animals.
"State your directive: this is your last opportunity."
It was entirely possible that they had no knowledge of what lay deeper within the recesses of the mountain and cave, that they had only been tracking her down, and so Isolde sought to learn if Bludol even was cognizant of
why she had come to this location. If he was ignorant to its deeper meaning then it meant she could take the secret to the grave alongside Cordelia if things went poorly, but ideally it would not come to that.
"Very well then, let me show you..." Bludol brought one of his hands down to his armor and retrieved from it something too small for Isolde to properly see, especially as he brought whatever it was to his lips and tilted his head back. Isolde did not trust whatever he was doing and so went to pull her trigger...but such a swift action was not fast enough.
In the time it took to pull a trigger Bludol had closed the gap between them, his purple armor a blur as he eclipsed even the speed of Dairine to reach Isolde. She attempted to react, but by the time she could shift her shotgun Bludol had already passed by her, his sword having crossed her shin and knocked her leg out from under her. The impact forced Isolde to fall to her left leg's knee as pain shot through her right shin, her injury flaring up from the force applied directly to it.
Bludol twisted around behind where Isolde had been brought low, his blade twisting with an eerie grace as it plunged towards her neck. Whether it would have penetrated the thinner plating protecting her neck or not would remain unanswered as the blade instead was diverted at the last moment by Isolde's refractor shield, Isolde unable to turn in time to stop the attack yet could instantaneously control her armor's settings to re-activate its automated defenses.
Isolde turned around even as her right leg crumbled beneath her, aiming her shotgun at where she expected Bludol to be only for her foe to disappear right before she could fire. Bludol's speed was truly beyond what was possible through natural means, and so he had taken the opportunity to fall back and put distance between them now that Isolde's shielding was up. Isolde forced herself upright as she tried tracking where he had gone now, only to notice that he had rejoined his fellow soldiers dozens of feet away nigh instantaneously.
"I noticed your leg was wounded already by how you were standing, so forgive me for taking advantage of it," Bludol spoke in feigned sorrow, his voice dripping with his growing bloodlust as he brought a finger to where his blade had struck Isolde's leg. His bulging eyes contrasted his seeming calm, their intensity all the more apparent now that he had scored first blood.
It was almost casual how Bludol moved aside when a solid slug from Isolde's shotgun flew by, the bullet colliding instead with a member of his entourage who flanked him. The soldier struck no longer possessed a face to scream in pain with, and his position at the back of the pack meant that the others barely noticed his collapse, but Bludol glanced back at their demise with a grin before turning back to Isolde who was now figuring out how to survive the encounter.
"I will admit I was impressed by your televised performance when I first bore witness to its carnage," Bludol appeared to revel in every word as his mind played back the sight of Isolde butchering the soldiers who had tried taking her into custody previously, "The brutality, the raw combat of a cornered beast surrounded by predators, it is something I have seen a thousand times before on the hunt, and never has it lost its appeal."
With a nod he sent his small horde of monsters bounding forth at Isolde, having no care for their lives and fully intent on seeing her torn limb from limb rather than taken alive. Some armed with lasguns fired at Isolde and had their shots stopped by her shielding while others alternated between firing shotguns of their own and advancing. Isolde took cover behind a small rock formation and returned fire, prompting the mutant soldiers to take what cover they could as well within the cave as their gunfire whittled away at Isolde's defenses.
Bludol remained beyond the others, content to study Isolde's fighting pattern and her current condition while waiting for an opening since time favored his forces rather than her, "Others have wanted you alive and have had their own designs to that effect, but their hubris surpasses their ability. We only need you dead, so anything more only serves ancillary agendas and purposes. Such politics and scheming are beyond me, which is why I sent Ferlo to take care of you the last time I had an opportunity."
Isolde remembered listening in on Ferlo and his team as they hunted after Isolde, Verita, Dairine, and Clausura, but she also remembered that something dealt with them before they ever reached the Progena...and it seemed that Bludol had a grudge to settle on that front, as Ferlo had been his most capable subordinate.
"Unfortunately, poor Ferlo never returned. Strange, given that I have seen that man cut through an Astarte in single-combat: his grace with a blade was near unparalleled, especially with the elixirs I gave him. His taste in other matters may have been perverse, but I will not begrudge his predilection for Abhuman Beastman-filth when I have my
own desires. That is what unites us, you see, the rapacious need forevermore of our wonton desires."
Unable to reload her shotgun before a mercenary charged her forced Isolde to drop it to her feet and instead fire with her personal pistol, drawing it and blowing the head off of the mutant only two steps out of cover. Blood sprayed as a geyser from where his head had been and coated the light layer of snow within this section of the cavern, though none mourned him as his fellow monsters continued their barrage to overwhelm Isolde through attrition. The deceased mercenary had counted the bullets in her shotgun and sought to charge the moment she was out of ammunition, not accounting for the fact Isolde had inherited her father's penchant for the art of the quickdraw. As the dead man fell Isolde noticed the bandolier of explosives he carried, a death sentence to use in the cavern with how they could collapse everything down which was why he opted to instead close in for melee.
In a sort of twisted glee the two brothers amongst Bludol's retinue laughed madly as they darted out of cover together, their own weapons different from the others in that they held webbers: net-weapons that could immobilize prey that they struck, and which would essentially bypass Isolde's armor by immobilizing her instead of seeking to break through it. Once she was vulnerable the others would be free to attack her without retaliation, so being caught in such a net was a death sentence without someone to free her from it.
Caught off-guard by the exotic weapons employed by the brothers, Isolde only managed to move out of the way of one net entirely as it flew by where she had been a moment before. The other however struck Isolde's arm and while it failed to properly wrap around her body did manage to reveal another feature of the webbers used: they were capable of sending severe currents of electricity throughout the body of their prey, shocking them into submission and slowly killing them unless freed. The sudden jolt into her arm made Isolde gasp in pain, shutting her eyes just a brief moment to cope with the agony inflicted as she shook the net free, though as she opened her eyes she had to quickly duck to avoid Bludol's blade from catching her in the throat.
As he had done before Bludol displayed astonishing speed and did not waste the opportunities and vulnerabilities presented to him, greatly surpassing Isolde and in fact even the Commandant in melee potential while possessing enough raw speed to invalidate any advantage they might possess at range. Despite this Isolde was a full foot taller than the muscular soldier and so he had to arc his blade up to try and behead her, meaning that when he missed he had to twist his blade before he could then bring it back down on Isolde, who in that moment lunged at him and tried to force her shoulder into his face.
Bludol avoided the strike by dancing around Isolde and kicking her in the back to press her towards where his soldiers continued to fire upon her, the brothers gleefully preparing their next nets to fire as Bludol slashed his blade at Isolde's back and struck the metal there directly. Her refractor shield was absorbing copious amounts of gunfire already and so could not also block his melee strikes at that moment, Bludol's reaction time allowing him to not even worry about friendly fire it seemed, though that might also just be the broken pieces of a mind hiding behind a guise of sanity.
Isolde dove to the ground and grabbed the shotgun she left there, rolling out of the way of Bludol's next lunge and fumbling to reload the ammunition. It would be more helpful if she had something other than solid slugs meant for penetrating heavy armor at a distance, but she had to work with what she had and the pistol couldn't really be used to parry a blade: the shotgun could, and so having it in hand could help protect her even if it possessed other issues.
Only able to reload one shell in the time she bought, Isolde twisted around and blocked Bludol's next attack at the last possible moment not by skill but by luck: the motion of lifting the shotgun up as a makeshift shield slightly diverted the sword's path and made it slide across the shotgun's barrel before being caught on a part of the frame. Bludol's greater strength and skill allowed him to wrest the shotgun from out of her hands with his next twist of his sword, then ducking beneath Isolde's fist to slam his sword right into her stomach plating.
Isolde was not incompetent in melee combat given her training at the Schola, but next to Bludol she was a novice against a grand master. There was a reason she had been warned about him in particular, and in confronting him Isolde was pushed each and every moment to just survive to the next.
Another pair of nets being fired forced Isolde to throw herself aside and for Bludol to put some distance between them as well, his agility his defining attribute in battle and thus any chance at losing it unacceptable. He could bide his time though and so darted behind a pillar in the cavern to avoid any reprisal by Isolde's weapons.
"I look forward to cracking your shell and feasting on your entrails as your life drains away, just as when I killed those members of the Deathwatch who were getting too curious some years ago...the new ones are far more amenable to our governance, but the flesh of Astartes was a delicacy that is hard to come by. Kimaran flesh is so cheap these days...but yours,
Princess, is all too alluring."
After scrambling for her shotgun in the snow Isolde fired at the pillar to try and pierce it and Bludol behind it, but the moment she pulled the trigger Bludol was already beside her. His blade slashed across Isolde's torso as he passed by her, Isolde's armor protecting her from much of the damage but the impact still re-opening the wounds she carried beneath it. Isolde's temper flared as she coughed blood up into her helmet, fully aware that despite years of training she had
nothing on this opponent who had mastered dueling a half century before she was born and had not lost his edge.
It was a testament to the sturdy nature of Kimaran weapons that when Bludol next darted past Isolde and slashed at her hand and weapon that the gun was merely knocked away instead of particularly damaged. Isolde's gauntlet absorbed much of the rest of the damage, though her fingers throbbed from the sudden strike that impacted them. With her other hand Isolde drew her personal firearm and tried to aim at where she expected Bludol to be, only for him to disappear in a flash before her eyes and for her bullet to harmlessly sail into the distance of the cavern. Bludol's associates continued their own barrage on Isolde and broke through what remained of her shielding, having rapidly burned through its power supply with the sheer number of bullets and lasgun shots peppering her.
Isolde tried to turn and catch sight of Bludol, but instead she only felt the movement of Bludol slipping past her again as his blade tore some of the armor off the side of her torso in an upward slash. Mithril armor was incredibly effective at protecting its owner, but at close range it was like any other armor and its natural vulnerabilities could be picked apart by a skilled foe. In this way Isolde found herself forced to endure the impact of various firearms, severely dulled by her armor but forcing her to focus on protecting her vitals rather than retaliating, only to have Bludol use her distracted status to make another pass and damage her thick plating further. This combination continued again and again until much of Isolde's armor was faltering just as her body was beginning to. All the while, Bludol continued to love the sound of his own voice as he picked Isolde's defenses apart, pleasantly surprised by how effective she had been trained at protecting herself even if it would prove fruitless in the end.
"I knew my calling ever since I killed another boy and tasted his flesh so I would not starve upon the barren sand dunes of Wostyn. You Kimarans have forgotten who you are: once you were the hunters but now you are nothing but prey. That was your mistake, and our boon."
One shotgun blast from Bludol's minions caught Isolde in the face, her helmet fulfilling its purpose and stopping the pellets which struck her, though part of its visor cracked from the attack all the same. Briefly stunned by the blow to her head, Isolde opted for a desperate ploy and tackled forward, knocking an unsuspecting Bludol back as he approached for his next strike between volleys from his men. Just as they had studied Isolde, so too had she learned about them during the battle: Bludol struck at moments where his forces were indisposed for one reason or another, and so when they stopped firing for a moment she figured he was moving in for the attack.
Bludol caught a fist to the gut, Isolde's metal gauntlet penetrating his thin armor and causing her to draw a small bit of blood from the skin beneath as he leapt backwards to avoid any follow-up attacks. As he had predicted, Isolde had brought out her spare pistol and fired at where he had been, once again missing not due to personal inaccuracy but because it was nigh impossible to track the movements of someone with such unnatural speed.
Content with the pain she inflicted and curious as to what she would do next, Bludol resumed his previous position at the backline of his forces and laughed as Isolde was driven back to taking cover by further gunfire. Her armor might be meant to endure intense punishment, but even Mithril would reach its limits eventually.
"What a tragedy it will be for the rising young heroine of a generation to have her mutilated corpse broadcast to the world at large, turning your very fame into a pyre to burn any remains of the Kimaran spirit. Your father will no doubt do something rash, as you simpleton Jarns are wont to do, and the cleansing of your bloodline will be complete once and for all. At that moment Kimara will truly be ours, our very own playground in perpetuity as promised by our Lord of Excess."
Damn you infernal wretches...
Isolde could barely comprehend what Bludol was spouting nonsense about. Jarn? Lord of Excess? Them being Chaos adherents like Boudica theorized did make sense, but why would a thrall of Chaos call her by the wrong name? She was no Jarn...
"That very Imperium you dedicated your life towards is what sold you out to us for mere baubles. Grease the right wheels, kill the right person, and you can control entire sectors! Your world is ours, so accept your fate and die already!"
Reloading her weapons, Isolde came to a conclusion about the battle and her circumstances within it: there was only one way out, though it was a risky option that could very well kill her rather than save her. Even so, Bludol's words had cut her as deep as his blade, and with no true alternatives Isolde embraced the only path left for her.
The crack in her visor was severe enough that the inner-workings of the helmet were exposed with the optical sensors on the left side exposed from beneath the surface once shielding them. The once faceless mask was given the appearance of possessing an 'eye' by this damage as pieces of the optic malfunctioned and emitted a blood-red glow that shone outward, as if reflecting the rage of its owner who continued to stand in defiance of her pursuers.
While Kimarans lacked much in the way of superstition and general faith their neighbors were heavily religious, be it to the Emperor or the Ruinous Powers, and so the 'daemonic eye' formed on Isolde's helmet would give some of their ranks pause despite being little more than a technological error caused by their own attacks. To them it seemed as if they had unleashed some greater power they had been aware of and so they recoiled as she finished climbing to her feet, blood dripping from Isolde's mouth as she fought through the pain to gather herself even on a half-broken leg.
Stepping out of her cover, Isolde took a few shots at the closest members of the accursed mercenaries before her to pin them down as she sought a new position. Her shots were wild and inaccurate, but that was irrelevant to Isolde as their only purpose was to buy her time.
"Kimara is the birthright of Kimarans!"
Despite their initial shock and her covering fire the mercenaries soon opened fire again, their own shots as wild as Isolde's as they saw she was on her last legs physically and risking their lives now by leaving their cover was pointless. What they lacked in accuracy they made up for in numbers however, as a lasgun shot caught Isolde in a damaged part of her armor and knocked the wind out of her even though it just barely missed searing her flesh. Collapsing from her wounded leg momentarily, Isolde pounded a hand into the ground as they continued to open fire, their shots still wild as they selfishly refused to expose themselves to any retaliatory fire.
"Damn you all..." Isolde had fallen, but she had reached the point she had been hoping to: in fact being closer to the ground helped her see her target even better given where he lay. Unlike her prior shots, now she took careful aim down at the body of one of the mercenaries she slew earlier, ignoring the bullets pinging off her armor and the lasgun shots striking her as she finished lining up her shot,
"All of you whose souls are enthralled by the Archenemy!"
Realizing where Isolde was aiming, Bludol shouted for his men to open fire immediately, but it was too late: Isolde had aimed at the mercenary whose bandolier was lined with a small armory's worth of grenades. As Isolde fired she yelled out what she knew might be her last words, deciding to make them count in case fortune did not favor her.
"Iron in ice!"
Whether it was by Isolde's renowned accuracy at the Schola or by chance, her shot connected with her intended target: one explosive was detonated and caused a chain reaction with the others, their volatile nature a result of the shoddy gear afforded to the rift-raff that new Wostyn mercs were outfitted with. Disposable gear for disposable soldiers, Wostyn favoring quantity over quality as compared to Kimara's quality over quantity approach.
In a single moment the cavern lit up as the pillar the dead mercenary used for cover was blown away along with some of the ceiling above him, prompting snow and the cave itself to collapse down on them all in an avalanche of destruction.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________
(Continued Below)