Silas Darkstar
Knights of Ren
Posts: 198
Affiliation: Knights of Ren - The Magisterium
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Cormond
Mar 27, 2023 17:17:22 GMT -8
Post by Silas Darkstar on Mar 27, 2023 17:17:22 GMT -8
Missionary of the Obsidian Order
As the Obsidian Order grew within the Empire's core, Missionaries were able to travel further out and visit worlds that the Order did not already have a presence upon. Brentaal IV was one such world that had long gone neglected. A small outpost was established within Cormond from which sermons could be delivered and followers could be gathered to. It would be long work, but as the flock grew, so too could the Church
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Cormond
Aug 11, 2023 6:14:44 GMT -8
Post by Nicademus Delvardus IV on Aug 11, 2023 6:14:44 GMT -8
With the onset of the Third Imperial Civil War, Brentaal IV became a fierce battleground between Royalist and Pretender forces of the once united resurgent Empire. On the Royalist side, although they were tenacious, most of their ranks had young recruits and a few seasoned officers. Their overall commander was General Ordenu, a Near-Human Arkanian graduate of the Corulag Academy. He had served in the Imperial Army for a handful of years and only attained the rank of General, by his own men, when the system erupted into chaos at the news of Baltasar's seizure of the throne.
His contender, the commander of the pretender's troops, was the veteran Caster Krannurak, General of the 503rd Legion, which was stationed on Brentaal at the time of the seizure. Caster was among the most elite of the late Emperor's generals and had served long under Grand Marshal, now Emperor, Baltasar Delvardus. The Silver Seraphs, as the 503rd went by these days, were formed at the dawn of the First Order and seen many battlefields across the stars as the Empire resurged. He was a cautious commander however, one that was meticulous and resourceful. This was a double-edged sword, of course, as being too meticulous could result in conflicting orders. Krannurak wasn't a young man anymore, but still had respect and experience that ensured the 503rds continued struggle against Ordenu, even at the expense of losses during the ongoing conflict.
Cormond was quite the divided battlefield, forcing both sides to utilize their headquarters, outside of the capital, to command their troops from. Krannurak had command over the Imperial fort that was twenty miles away while Ordenu had command of the spaceport, which gave him a bit more of an advantage. In space though, the defending fleet was divided as several Star Destroyers collided with one another. This was the very same picture that was across much of Core territories of the Empire now.
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Taung H'rel
Retired High Councilor 
Posts: 469 
Affiliation: Galactic Empire
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Cormond
Aug 14, 2023 11:25:59 GMT -8
Post by Taung H'rel on Aug 14, 2023 11:25:59 GMT -8
The transport delivered the cargo and new mining employees to a warehouse in one of the many thousands of such cargo holding warehouses in Cormond and the surrounding area. Within an hour the freightor had already unloaded, reloaded and headed back to space, with such an important system the captain didn’t want to hang around hostilities and risk losing his cargo, it would cost him his job...or worse.
As soon as the warehouse was closed up, the work began. Men quickly began tearing up the duracrete and shuffling cargo. Other men quickly readied their A-11 model III Burrowers, loading up the things they would need and making last checks, before their machine fired up and quickly dug in to the ground, disappearing within moments. The men who were left quickly removed any trace of the excavations, laying new duracrete and making sure that the cargoes that were waiting pickup were placed back in their original places, now sitting on top of a completely new duracrete floor.
The burrowers made their way into the crust of the planet. The warehouse had been picked specifically for its lack of utilities underneath it, not that that was too much of a problem for block upon block of storage and transfer warehouses, their needs were limited. It was selected so that no one would notice or report on the interruption of services. The four Burrowers made their way deeper and deeper until turning towards their individual targets. They dug and bored carefully ensuring that the vibrations that their equipment might cause was limited, dampened with the use of intertial dampners to absorb the shifting forces, no need to alert their targets should their even be sensors that could detect them. It was an often overlooked area of warfare in the day of hyperspace travel and planet killing weapons. The constant landing and taking off of large cargo ships and heavy equipment constantly thumping and producing large amounts of noise and vibration on the surface.
The burrowers made their way to the beneath the three V-180 anti orbital ion cannons and the city shield. Onboard the burrowers were combat engineers specialized, specialists in making things work, and making things not work. First they set the Q-4 Borer droids to their tasks digging the last dozens of meters carefully, moving to excavate around the connectors from reactor to emitters. As the droids continued to move towards the floor of control rooms the combat engineers went to work rewiring bypass controls into controls that they controlled. If successful they would be able to turn off the power supply from the reactor up into the weapon mount itself. As a precaution they attached shaped charges on physical wires back to the burrowers to blow up the power links, ensuring that the weapons and shields could not be used against the fleet. A last series of of shaped charges were set beneath the reactors. Should the need arise, the reactors would be destroyed, though that was hopefully a last resort.
The droids continued to excavate carefully and took measurements of the material above them, below the control rooms and moving aside as the combat engineers finished with their tasks at the power connections and set shaped charges to break into the control rooms from the inside. In the Burrowers they had at their disposal new control panels that they could simply wire in to replace any damaged components, or if they were unable to crack the codes of the current specs. They would just put in their own codes on their new equipment to take control of the shield and ion cannons. Once complete, they merely had to wait for the signal from the fleet to begin the assault.
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Taung H'rel
Retired High Councilor
Posts: 469
Affiliation: Galactic Empire
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Cormond
Aug 25, 2023 16:51:55 GMT -8
Post by Taung H'rel on Aug 25, 2023 16:51:55 GMT -8
The arrival of the fleet combined with the demand from Admiral Othin kicked the proverbial hornets nest. The loyalty of the First Order in this system was divided, there were Imperial Knights in the system, but with a large number of troops holding loyalty to Baltasar rather than the strict line of succession, absolute control was not a guarantee and most of the fighting seen on other planets had not yet erupted into all out fratricide. This didn’t mean that individual brigade and division commanders had not mostly self sorted themselves and began preparing fighting positions in their assigned areas of responsibility. While outright fighting had not happened, the control being asserted by the Imperial Knights in their attempt to keep order had stoked suspicions to the breaking point. No one wanted to fire on those that they had been sharing drinks with off shift, gone to parties with, or shared meals and training times with. The suspicion however was a hairs breadth away from erupting into all out combat. Being far from the higher headquarters was the only thing that had kept the polarization to the point of violence at bay. With reports of violence erupting all over the empire however, had simply continued to increase the pressure.
Troops on all sides rushed to full battle stations, waiting for hot light to start flying.
The Imperial Knight who was in charge, if holding on by his fingernails, made the only response that he could. The die had already been cast, and already shown their symbols. The symbols of combat. The signals of death. He was well aware that his answer would bring death, but it was his duty to whom he considered to be the true ruler of the Empire.
He stepped forwards and keyed the comm device on, with an open broadcast, his only hope to unite those whom he still lead.
“Admiral Othin, this is Imperial Knight Garros Ritannan. By the authority of Emperor Octavian, I hereby refuse your request, and demand that you surrender your traitor forces to me, the representative of the true emperor!”
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Taung H'rel
Retired High Councilor
Posts: 469
Affiliation: Galactic Empire
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Cormond
Aug 25, 2023 16:55:35 GMT -8
Post by Taung H'rel on Aug 25, 2023 16:55:35 GMT -8
::All First Order troops and commanders on Brentaal IV, know that my offer of honorable surrender stands, and when the dust settles I will stand in your defense as having discharged your duty as expected of you. If I end up on the losing side of this sad situation we find ourselves in, I would hope that you would speak for me and mine.::
The second transmission was the signal to the ground teams.
The combat engineers activated their sonic nullifiers and turned them to their maximum settings, and blew the hole that they had prepared. Stun grenades were tossed up even as Mine Troopers charged up the stairs that had been set up, rather than trying to pull ones self up. The stormtroopers lived up to their name, literally storming into the room, weapons flashing almost silently as the sonic nullifier soaked in the sounds of explosions and weapons fire. These soldiers were not about asking for surrender, they enforced compliance brutally. Technicians and gunners were stunned, or bludgeoned into compliance and stunned on the ground. Twenty troops poured into the three ion cannon control rooms and the cities shield control center with the combat engineers hot on their heels. Smoke and dust were thick but the surprise and speed of the assault was too much for soldiers who were more techs than combat troops, nestled deep underground and expected to be some of the last troops to see enemy soldiers...not the first, and even then generally expected to surrender than die in a battle that was already far over. Not this time. Some Mine Troops quickly began shackling and stacking the unconscious technicians out of the way as others quickly set up a polarized portable shield generator to cover the door, and others came in with portable mag locks to physically clamp the doors shut. Sonic nullifiers were turned off and microphones were pressed to the doors to give advanced warning that they had been discovered. Combat engineers ignored these goings ons as they quickly quickly began taking components apart that had been damaged or had to be rerouted to give them control of the surface to space weapons and the shield generator for the city.
The combat engineers were good and had the access they needed in under five minutes, a minute to spare, and quickly checked the targeting computers and adjusted their aim. Deep below the capacitors whined as they charged and far above the V-180 planetary defense ion cannons rotated to their new targets, targets that sat perfectly still and were the largest targets in the sky. With a recoil the ion cannons chuffed bolts of ionic energy up into the heavens, charging quickly and firing again, and again.
Outside the troops saw the ion cannons fire, streaks of weapons fire zipping up into space. Inside the commanders saw something different.
“Sir our defense stations have just gone dark! I think the ion cannons hit them!” cried a sensor technician.
“What?!” Garros spun. “Confirm that!” Though he didn’t need to, watched the second volley reach up and strike the already helpless defense stations again. Treachery.
Treachery. Every First Order commander saw exactly what the Imperial Knight had, and they all had the same interpretation, except they saw it from different points of view. The stations had been mostly manned by commanders who were loyal to Octavian, those on the ground to Baltasar. Garros instantly assumed that the ion cannons had been breached, where those loyal to Baltasar assumed that Garros had ordered the strike on the platforms, hoping to eliminate someone that he couldn’t trust.
Orders were rapidly spewed out, orders to seize the defense installations came out, from both factions. Calls for support went out and brigades that were already primed for a fight instantly responded. Those commanders who had been on the fence about fighting either dived headlong, or pulled back. The 457th Legion was guarding the ion cannons and were genuinely confused about the order to take the ion cannons. There hadnt been issues, they were still in charge. The troops quickly took a head count and were only part way through it when the 476th and 477th Mechanized Legions loyal to Baltasar started firing, the heavy vehicles firing from many blocks down the roads. Hot light started zipping back and forth ended the roll call in a confusion of instant combat. Stormtroopers ducked behind what cover that was available as explosions ripped into masonry and duracrete, instantly cratering what was once a pristine buildings that surrounded the large ion cannons. The scene was repeated with the 837th loyal to Octavian, getting attacked by the 487th and 187th Mechanized legions, with the 197th attacking the 383rd Mechanized Legion defending Ion cannon emplacement number 3. and the 276th, loyal to Baltasar attacking the 437th Legion defending the city shield that was still operating.
The 716th Mechanized Legion mostly loyal to Baltasar had a commander that wasnt as sure to what was going on, and didn’t want to join in in a fratricide, but held itself back. The 187th Legion moved to deal with the threat visibly coming in to the atmosphere to give the other legions time to take the ion cannons that they were going to need. The final unit, the 577th Airborne Division of Jet Troopers, loyal to Octavian, followed the last order of Knight Garros, and moved towards the nearest ion cannon, for them it was a 10 kilometer trip from their station and the going was slower than desired.
Above the city the ships drifted lower and started disgorging their atmospheric fighters to run alongside of the starfighters. As they got closer the cities shields went down, turned off by one of the Mine Trooper teams assigned to it at just the right time. The Missile Boats were quickly given targeting information by the TIE/fc fighters flying high in the sky, and thousands of missiles streaked into the sky and fell from above. The devastation was awesome, and concentrated around the ion cannons and the shields, slamming into defenders and attackers alike, showing off the massive firepower that was being brought to bear. It happened again, and again, and again. The explosive firepower and shattering vehicles was such that the brigades moving forwards towards the fighting halted. Their lower level officers unwilling to throw their men into simply death. Their scanners were overwhelmed with aerial targets, targets that their vehicles were not equipped to handle. The leading brigades of each legion simply evaporated into dust, flame, shattered metal, and duracrete. And the ships hadnt even opened fire yet….
The 716th was the first to surrender, seeing the swarm of starfighters circling towards them. They hadnt been hit, but the ground had vibrated and they had seen the missile trails curving into the denser area of the city. Other brigades backed off, those closest to the ion cannons and shield generators simply stunned with the volume of firepower that had been put on display, knowing that they were all sitting ducks, yet the hammer didn’t fall. Generals looked at their aides, knowing there was nothing could be done. They were outflanked, not necessarily outnumbered, but they were outflanked and outgunned. Without the ion cannons, there was no way they could even hope to bring down the ships that kept getting closer, let alone the hundreds of starfighters that were circling ominously, clearly expecting a surrender. One commander, a young one, fresh from the academy, ordered his AT-MT to fire, the shot was more of defiance as he ordered his troops to fire on the starfighters, and in response his command was obliterated by the instant and merciless firepower of hundreds of laser cannons, turbolasers, and plasma torpedo launchers from two of the ship, not to count the hundreds of missiles volleyed off by the starfighters. Those who witnessed the destruction were left with no doubts as to who controlled the battlefield. One by one, brigades and then legions signaled their surrender.
The equivilent of four legions had just been wiped off the face of the planet. Four of twelve. Garros Ritannan could only stare in disbelief at the hammer that had been dropped on his men. He and his knights however could not surrender. Those that hadnt been killed quickly melted into the city, most would try to make their way off planet, others would wait and watch for their opportunity.
Terrh’s men quickly began the organization of prisoners and the collection of weapons, using the drivers to move the vehicles to designated locations and gathering weapons, moving troops back to where they could have an eye kept on them, under the watchful eye of starships, threatening instant retribution for misbehavior. Fifteen thousand men had died, with another twenty thousand wounded. A dark day for the Empire, but necessary. Terrh was glad that most of the brigade level commanders had enough sense to see who had won the battle this day.
Brentaal IV was now firmly under control of Empress Ren...
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Taung H'rel
Retired High Councilor
Posts: 469
Affiliation: Galactic Empire
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Cormond
Nov 15, 2023 19:45:19 GMT -8
Post by Taung H'rel on Nov 15, 2023 19:45:19 GMT -8
The engineers brought the ion cannons back online and had set about defending the underground areas with sensors and explosives, both mines and command detonated explosives. The mass detectors, magnetic detectors, and sonic detectors all set out to over a kilometer out from the two installations.
Terrh's troops had set up defensive perimeters and had the prisoners, those who had surrendered and not offered trouble, set to work repairing damage that had occurred during the battle. Trouble makers were pulled out and disciplined and confined, but those were few and far between. There wasnt mistreatment, all punishments were standard Imperial doctrine and law. There would be discipline in the ranks, active and prisoner alike, but they would not be idle.
Space traffic and the local economy were virtually uneffected by the change in command and even minor delays were quickly rectified and smoothed out. Business was business after all.
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Taung H'rel
Retired High Councilor
Posts: 469
Affiliation: Galactic Empire
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Cormond
Mar 20, 2024 10:22:10 GMT -8
Post by Taung H'rel on Mar 20, 2024 10:22:10 GMT -8
Engineers continue to build more and more defenses, bunkering and shielding buildings and preparing traps for walkers, and installing repulsorlift jammers, testing the shield generators and the heavy weapons power and calibrations.
Trade continues to flow in and out of Brentaal and Cormond. With the fighting over, at least locally, commerce continued to flow unimpeded for the most part, with increased scanning but little else changed.
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