Upon hearing Zhang Ge's words, the noble lady slowly shook her head beneath the sword's edge and responded:
"Just as the terms were proposed, I bear no hostility toward you. However, you must understand that if it comes down to the final step... the gap between riding in battle or not is difficult to cross."
After this statement, she added:
"However, they will not make you their primary target. Twenty cavalrymen charging towards that traitor from such a short distance, then using Melta Bombs to turn everything to ash—without any evidence, are you seriously suggesting they would condemn the family based solely on a pict-record, something that can be easily forged?"
"In that case, the end result would not differ at all; many more lives would be lost in the process... Those cavalrymen are loyal to the family, and my life is of lower priority than that. Even Canoness Amelia, at such a short distance, wouldn't be able to stop them all."
To be frank, her words were quite persuasive. After all, this noble family was reacting remarkably quickly, having dealt with the traitor in just a few hours, reducing the traitor's exposure to almost nothing.
Moreover, since each head was worth a bounty of one hundred Throne Credits, the PDFs could easily dig deep and eliminate every enemy soldier who had ever seen this traitor.
Without any substantial evidence, unless in extreme cases, Inquisitors typically wouldn't wipe out a military noble during the critical juncture of a Cicatrix Maledictum opening.
After all, they represented not just a small faction of Nest City nobles; behind them stood an entire military aristocracy. Should an Inquisitor choose to act without reason against a family today or tomorrow, those noble groups wouldn't stand idly by.
In fact, other factions might not support such actions either, as doing so would grant too much power to the Inquisitors, ultimately making life difficult for everyone. A previous mortal faction that seized power had inflicted wounds upon the Imperium second only to the Great Uprising.
However, she didn't understand Amelia well enough, nor did she understand Zhang Ge.
Zhang Ge's sole purpose here was to wrap things up quickly. Given the justification for curbing the spread of Chaos, with Amelia present, he could easily take the risk of confronting those twenty-plus cavalrymen. The conditions that held weight for normal people held no significance for him.
Noting the current situation, he mockingly replied:
"If the outcome is going to be the same, then let's get on with it."
Upon hearing this, the noble lady's expression fell; she felt as though she were negotiating with someone completely irrational. Yet, violence was the last thing she wanted to see.
The more people that died, the more factions would be provoked, leaving behind more evident traces.
Moreover, one among the trio was a Canoness and another an Astra Militarum Colonel.
Were it not for the Chaos incursion having devastated them, they wouldn't have to rely on local nobles for reconstruction. If they were at full capacity, they would rank alongside the upper bureaucrats of the planet, and the ordinary nobles of Nest City wouldn't even be seated at the table.
Killing both of them might not yield repercussions any less severe than directly exposing this incident. It would only be possible to limit their actions and destroy evidence, but in doing so, she and her soldiers would ultimately die in vain.
Having arrived at this juncture, she could only say:
"Since you're not acting now, you must have some demands. Why not state them clearly? We can negotiate."
Indeed, Zhang Ge had demands, primarily aimed at buying time for negotiations to see if more reinforcements would arrive.
Unfortunately, given the current context, it seemed this operation only included these loyalists, and reinforcements wouldn't be arriving anytime soon.
Thinking this, Zhang Ge raised his Boltgun while saying:
"Dominika, keep an eye on her."
Amelia was quicker than Zhang Ge. The moment he initiated his attack, she was already charging toward the cavalry.
The first man in the front hadn't even registered what was happening before the silver-white flash of her sword passed by, and his head was cleanly split in two. With his cerebellum destroyed, he couldn't even muster a reflexive struggle.
Even such solid high-quality Artificer Armour offered no resistance against Amelia's longsword; its ceramite plating and the flesh underneath were sliced through effortlessly, and various metal components flew out as the integrity of the power armor was compromised.
The second man was simply struck by Amelia's shoulder as she hadn't yet fully retracted her sword after swinging. The impact of the collision sent him flying backward, like a human cannonball, shattering the stable formation of several men behind him.
At this moment, Zhang Ge had already aimed his gun at them.
However, his targets were not the cavalrymen on horseback. While their Artificer Armour was as flimsy as paper before Amelia, its defensive capabilities against conventional weapons were still significant.
Even a Space Marine's Boltgun would find it challenging to penetrate the main armored section effectively in a short time.
Thus, Zhang Ge targeted the cavalry's horses, specifically the vulnerable equine limbs—the lower legs.
The precise explosive rounds thundered from the muzzle, each shot daringly flying out. Although the horses had subdermal armor implanted, their lower legs remained inherently weak; even with enhancements, they couldn't withstand Boltgun fire.
As for the challenge of hitting such slender targets, it hardly posed any barrier under Zhang Ge's blood-pumping synergy with the Boltgun.
Constantly adjusting the angle allowed him to keep the trajectory on target, and even the anticipated recoil aided in his aim, decreasing the time he needed to align the gun.
The attack was so sudden that most surviving cavalrymen only began to react now, but by that instant, only two-thirds of them remained mounted.
At such a close range, while this would allow them to minimize the time to reach the near-fallen Chaos commander, it would also enable certain extraordinary individuals to more easily exploit their advantages.
However, these were still elite members of the household; well-trained and having undergone genetic enhancements, they were not merely lambs to the slaughter.
Recognizing the impending danger when Amelia closed in, the remaining cavalrymen realized they faced a dead end. Thus, the two nearest to her simultaneously charged forward, swinging their Power Swords in an attempt to buy time for their comrades behind.
Though the outcome was, of course, a quick and clean bisection, during that brief delay, several approaching cavalrymen activated their Melta Bombs.
The high temperature exploded outward, and the deafening blast reverberated throughout the room. The incendiary Melta Flash, along with the rising smoke, obscured Amelia from view.
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