Malevelon Creek

"The strange subversion of photosynthesis that sustains the oddly-hued flora that flourishes on this planet remains an intriguing mystery to the Super Earth's greatest exo-biologists."

Malevelon Creek is one of the five planets that reside within the Severin Sector. Its landscape generally consists of lush jungles and wide ponds and has become infamous for its extremely intense and difficult fighting. The resulting battles on the planet exacted an enormous human cost, though unconfirmed, it is the only planet that has over 10% of the total death toll. The planet's challenging terrain, combined with its thick layer of vegetation, fog and clouds, make for engagements which are extremely challenging to keep under control.

Malevelon Creek Memorial Day was officially established on April 3rd, an annual event that celebrates the first day of peace on this world devastated by the brutal conflict against the Automatons.

Topography
Malevelon Creek is largely covered in flora, including thick brushing and dense, dark forests. In addition, it bears a persistent fog and heavy clouds, giving the surface an appearance of eternal night regardless of local time. This unique terrain proved extremely challenging for the Helldivers to maneuver through. Its lush jungles slowed down movement, its dense overhead at times completely blocked the ability to see and appropriately track incoming mortar strikes, and it's foggy like atmosphere and dark shadows obscured vision. To make matters worse, the storms covering the surface of the planet are highly electrically charged, interfering with communications which resulted in difficulty in calling in help from orbiting ships, these storms varied in length and had the Helldivers fighting for survival without support for an extended amount of time.

The First Battle of Malevelon Creek (Feb. 8th-28th 2024)
Fighting on Malevelon Creek broke out immediately with the beginning of the Second Galactic War, with the first day already seeing small-scale fighting between Helldiver forces and the Automatons. Slowly but surely, the Helldivers called on for more reinforcements on the planet as the fighting grew more and more intense. This resulted in the "Fight for the Creek" recruitment drive, which saw a large propaganda campaign take place, calling for citizens to enlist and fight on the Creek, which quickly became infamous for being among the deadliest battles in the war. Some say the Creek single-handedly assisted in boosting the recruitment numbers for the Helldivers.

While other planets went back and forth with the liberation progress, the Creek consistently saw relatively low liberation percentages, proving the difficulty the Helldivers were facing on the planet, even though Helldiver deployment numbers were the same as other planets. Soon enough, Helldivers began to widely use napalm on the jungles of Malevelon Creek as a way to deprive the Automatons of cover. But, seeing the Helldiver effort on the planet, the Automatons only continued sending millions of their troops to defend the planet.

As fighting ensued, the Helldivers began to struggle on the Automaton front, and this all culminated on February 28th with Malevelon Creek falling together with the entire Severin Sector, Draupnir, Mantes, and other planets. The fall of the Creek was seen as a tragic moment for the war effort, but morale among the Helldivers remained high once news reached that Mort had been fully liberated.

Second Battle of Malevelon Creek (Feb. 28th - Apr. 1st 2024)
Although Draupnir and Mantes, the only supply routes leading into Malevelon Creek, both fell; pockets of Helldiver forces remained on the planet, in a ferocious siege which has become a legend among Super Earth's citizenry. This is where the term "Creeker" first started to become infamous. However, this second battle on the Creek was even more brutal than the first, as the Automatons wished to annihilate the remaining Helldivers before a counter offensive began, and Helldiver casualties spiked during this period, reporting extraordinary heavy losses. The Helldivers on the planet were able to continue fighting much longer than anticipated as the fighting on Draupnir and Mantes saw a cycle of Helldivers launching offensives on the planets, losing them, and then repeat.

During the second battle for Malevelon Creek, Helldivers began to report to High Command that the severed heads and mutilated bodies of their fallen comrades from the first battle had been staked and positioned at each entrance of any major Automaton FOB on planet as a war trophy. Also reported was a higher concentration of "death camps" where SEAF personnel had been tortured and killed.

The initial engagement proved fruitful, as Helldivers were able to dish out massive amounts of damage to the Automaton front and make a significant progress across the planet, however this advance was not sustainable for long, as Automaton forces began to regroup and the progress during the first engagement, became a fight to the death for mere inches towards liberating the planet.

On March 4th, the Helldivers liberated Mantes, allowing reinforcements to more safely enter the Creek. But this time saw a sharp decrease of the active forces on the planet as the liberation of Draupnir became a much higher priority once Helldivers understood that the Creek would be too difficult to liberate without major resource prioritization from High Command.

This engagement is widely regarded amongst the surviving Helldivers as the deadliest battle of the three. As High Command reported devastating losses during and after the siege, reports have come out that the losses sustained were double of the first and third battles combined.

On April 1st, the brave Helldivers finally retook Malevelon Creek, fulfilling a major order designed to liberate the world.

Third Battle of Malevelon Creek (Apr. 2nd, 2024)
The peace on Malevelon Creek unfortunately lasted only few hours: on April 2nd, the Automatons launched a dastardly attack in an attempt to reconquer this world. This included the most extensive Automaton support initiative to date, it included deploying the highest amount of Automaton ground forces, a deployment of new Automaton aerial gunships, a more rapid drop ship schedule, more strategically placed mortars, and finally new, massive walking mechs known as Factory Striders, in an attempt to thwart any Helldiver advance. Once again, the Helldivers were called in to rescue civilians and wipe out the Automatons. This battle saw the highest percentage of Helldivers deployed to any single planet to date at 35% of the Helldiver Corps, until the Battle for Durgen which saw an even higher percentage at 42%.

Just nine hours into the battle, the Helldivers had completely overwhelmed the Automatons: the planet's surface had been cleared of all murderous machines and numerous space wreckage orbited the planet, a last grim reminder of what once was the monstrous Automaton Fleet.

April 3rd was the first full day of peace on the planet since it's initial invasion. The President of Super Earth issued a decree which recognizes this date as Malevelon Creek Memorial Day. All Helldivers were issued a commemorative cape in memory of their fallen companions.

From that day forward, Malevelon Creek has remained quiet and peaceful, the Automaton threat now only a memory for the Super Earth Colonizers who survived it to remember. Despite the flames of war on the planet being long gone, the Creek still serves a purpose: to stand as a reminder to the Helldivers that even in Super Earth's darkest hour, their might and determination can light up the horizon with the flames of Managed Democracy.

FTL Lines

 * Maia
 * Durgen
 * Mantes - Xzar Sector
 * Draupnir - Xzar Sector

Trivia

 * Malevelon Creek became a popular subject within the Helldivers 2 community in the wake of the game's launch, with numerous memes springing up centered around how the planet has proven disproportionately difficult to liberate. Such memes became especially prevalent following the game's second major order to defend against Automaton invasions across the Xzar and Trigon sectors.
 * According to a major order issued on April 1st, Malevelon creek has exceptionally rich rhodium deposits, which is a highly valuable and rare metal, significantly rarer than gold.
 * The name "Creeker" became synonymous with a faction of Helldivers that stayed on Malevelon Creek since the end of the first battle, even though Major Orders had been given out that directed them to fight on other planets, as they seemed to enjoy the intense combat unique only to the Creek. This decision was a very contentious move, one that is debated heavily still to this day as many believe it was one of the main reasons why a few Major Orders leading up to the liberation of the Creek failed, as even though "Creekers" represented a small group of Helldivers when compared to the totality of the Helldiver Corps, Creekers were targeted as a group that were not helping the war effort overall. The spotlight given to the Creek and the Cape given to the Helldiver Corps after liberation, only fueled the debate further.
 * A popular title relating Malevelon Creek to the Vietnam War had sprouted up labeling it as "Space 'nam", or "Robot Vietnam", due to the similarities in environments and intense jungle combat.
 * Even though Durgen surpassed the Creek's record for the number of Helldivers on a single planet, Malevelon Creek still holds the record for the highest number of deaths at 42.8 million.