Asmodai stood atop a mound of daemon corpses, his gaze lost in the burning sky above. His once-pristine cloak hung in tatters, armor scored with gashes from the brutal engagement. He was exhausted—utterly spent—but his thoughts were not on his wounds. Instead, his mind was consumed by awe, offering silent praise to the Emperor... and to the Warmaster.
From the heavens descended a golden Aquila, wings outstretched, blazing with divine fire as it shrieked across the battlefield, trailing destruction in its wake.
A storm of drop pods rained from the golden firmament, streaking downward like fireballs, blotting out the sun as if a deluge of flame had been unleashed from the sky.
Upon impact, the thunderous shockwaves incinerated entire swaths of the daemonic legions, hurling up searing walls of flame across their ranks.
Gunships and atmospheric fighters screamed overhead, and the Emperor's Angels of Death—his chosen reapers—rained holy vengeance upon the warp-spawned horde, saturating the air with a symphony of autocannon fire and lancing beams of ruby energy.
Daemon flesh and traitor filth were torn asunder, their corrupted bodies shredded into airborne gore and smoke.
The skies rumbled again. Like leviathans forged from steel and wrath, the Imperial fleet emerged—one after another—through the immense Eldar Webway portal hanging in orbit.
Colossal warships stretched across the void, their engines belching kilometer-long tail flames as they shattered the turbulence of the immaterium with raw power.
The sun itself seemed dim in comparison to the splendor that now shadowed the world below.
Their macro-cannons roared with the fury of Old Night. Spearing lances of superheated light rained down like divine judgment. The sheer force of orbital fire created rippling void distortions on the battlefield's surface, distorting air and ground alike.
In the midst of smoke and blood, daemonic remains turned to ash, scattering in the updraft.
From the freshly fallen drop pods, Astra Militarum pilots in Destroyer armor surged forward—mortal men wrapped in ceramite and faith, moving with terrifying speed. Though not as mighty as the Primaris Astartes, their near-limitless numbers made them just as fearsome.
Chainswords and blood-red power blades extended from their gauntlets. The daemons, in their arrogance, had never imagined they would fall to mere mortals.
Even the corrupted Astartes of the Heretic Legions were torn apart when overwhelmed by the fury of the Destroyer-armored squads.
The daemons howled and counterattacked, lunging at the drop zones, but their resistance was as futile as insects battering stone.
What truly unsteadied the traitors was the presence that followed: behind the mortal ranks came the towering forms of the Primaris Space Marines.
Each was a living legend—blooded in flame and trial—steel-bodied warriors wielding thunderous fury. Wherever they marched, heretics fell like wheat before the scythe.
With their arrival, the beleaguered defenders erupted in cheers. Though many bore shattered armor and bleeding wounds, their spirits blazed anew.
Without hesitation, they launched another charge, surging into the daemonic lines with defiance and valor.
Asmodai, dragging his battered form from the wreckage of a ruined bulwark, raised his blade and roared, leading the remnants of his company into the fray.
Imperial priests raised their voices, calling upon the Emperor and the Warmaster, waving banners of the Aquila through smoke and blood, reigniting the will of man.
Even the canoness-saint, who had fallen into unconsciousness, stirred. Hearing the cries of war and faith, she awoke beneath the golden sky. Light surrounded her, her wounds sealing with miraculous speed. Without hesitation, she seized her spear and sword, returning to the front to smite the unclean.
The counterattack of the Imperium had begun.
Greater daemons were torn asunder, their monstrous frames reduced to bloodied ruin. The heads of heretics tumbled across the ash-choked soil of this ancient world. The rivers ran red.
The sorcerers of Chaos lashed out with dark hexes and corrupt flames, trying desperately to halt the Imperial tide—but precision fire from orbit and ground devastated them in reply.
Yet what shook the heretics most wasn't just the bloodbath—it was the Webway Gate.
That immense Eldar construct, vast enough to blanket the stars above Synnlaith, showed no signs of closing.
Imperial vessels continued to emerge in endless waves. After the gleaming ships of the Order of the Argent Shroud passed, came the earth-shaking rumble of engines far more ancient and powerful.
Battle barges of every hue now pushed into realspace—crimson, azure, jade, gold, and ivory.
Blood Angels. Ultramarines. Dark Angels. Space Wolves. Salamanders. Iron Hands. Raven Guard. White Scars.
Every founding Legion was present, their successors alongside them, unleashing righteous vengeance forged over ten millennia.
Never in living memory—not since the height of the Great Crusade—had such a spectacle graced the galaxy.
Tears welled in the eyes of grizzled veterans. Scholars among them understood: not since the Emperor walked among them had mankind been so united.
For ten thousand years, Mankind had squabbled—divided by ideology, betrayal, and arrogance—even when faced with extinction.
No mortal High Lord, no Primarch, no saint had ever succeeded in reuniting the Imperium.
But now...
Now, someone had.
It was not the Emperor.
Not even a Primarch, save one.
It was Dukel, the Supreme Warmaster—feared, hated, exiled... and now, the unifier of humanity.
Even the Sisters of Silence, the Grey Knights, and the Imperial Guard bent to his call, coordinating the might of ten billion auxiliaries in a storm of annihilation.
Warp rifts that had once spewed forth hellish daemons now became their tombs.
The warp-born terrors, long the nightmares of mankind, now cowered before Imperial might.
The war shifted in a single moment.
The tide was turned.
Humanity advanced—not cautiously, not slowly—but with the fury of a billion bayonets and burning suns.
Traitor corpses were trampled. Xenos were vaporized. Chaos was crushed beneath unyielding boots.
Humanity was an unstoppable tide.
Yet aboard the Spirit of Vengeance, Horus remained composed.
He watched the ground battle unfold with cold detachment. Losses meant nothing. The daemons were cannon fodder—expendable. No matter how many were slain, his expression did not flicker.
Instead, his eyes turned to the fleet now surrounding the system. His expression darkened, a shadow of old emotion in his gaze.
He had expected Dukel.
He knew this brother—arrogant, uncompromising, wrathful.
A brother who did not weigh politics or consequences. A brother who returned an insult with steel—who answered deception with destruction.
Not even the Emperor was exempt from Dukel's wrath.
All the Primarchs had long known that the Emperor was no perfect father—aloof, cold, deceitful. Lorgar had cursed His name. Angron had drowned his hate in blood.
But even Angron—the mad, the berserker—had known when to kneel. When to stay his hand before the Emperor.
Only Dukel had drawn his sword.
Only Dukel had dared defiance, even if it cost a third of the Imperium in flames—and ten thousand years of exile.
How could such a man stand by while his most trusted warrior fell?
Horus had laid his trap well, knowing full well that even if Dukel saw it, he would still walk into it.
That was Dukel's flaw—and his strength.
It was that fearless defiance, that refusal to yield in the face of doom, which drew the finest warriors in the Imperium to his banner. But today, that same unwavering conviction had become his fatal weakness.
Horus understood all too well: those who know you best are always the ones most capable of delivering the deepest wounds.
"Brother… this is where it ends for you," Horus muttered, his voice low. But even as he spoke, there was no satisfaction in the words—only a sorrow too ancient to fully articulate.
They had once been kin—Primarchs, forged from the same genetic crucible, raised for the same great purpose. Now, they were bitter adversaries, split by ideals irreconcilable. A galactic tragedy, played out beneath the uncaring stars.
Victory, however, felt close.
Dukel had brought a formidable host. But Horus—he had the Warp.
He had the endless legions of Chaos, and he knew how to use them.
Ten thousand years ago, he had shattered the Emperor's grand strategy with a single card—a daemon's whisper—and now, history echoed itself.
The Chaos warfleets poured forth from the Immaterium, one after another. Their numbers were uncountable, and Horus had long ceased trying. In the end, they were cannon fodder, pawns in a larger game.
The four gods—Khorne, Tzeentch, Nurgle, and Slaanesh—had committed deeply to this conflict. Each had sent their avatars of destruction:
The Blood Comet of Khorne, roaring through space like a burning omen of slaughter.
The Crystal Fortress of Tzeentch, a labyrinth of lies and shifting realities.
The Plague Ark of Nurgle, dripping with entropy and corruption.
And the Labyrinth of Desire, Slaanesh's shrine-ship of temptation and ruin.
Even xenos species, twisted by Chaos or corrupted through sheer desperation, had joined the tide.
The war machine of the Ruinous Powers was a monstrous thing—and in Horus's eyes, more than sufficient to drown Dukel's rebellion.
But not everyone aboard the Vengeful Spirit shared that certainty.
The robed figure draped in cerulean feathers stood silently at Horus's side, scrying through a shimmering crystal orb. His voice broke the quiet.
"Dukel's arrival wasn't fated to occur here. He has appeared too soon, and even the Eldar were caught unaware. This was not foreseen. Perhaps... it would be wiser to withdraw and reorganize."
Horus turned to the Magister of Schemes, his tone tinged with disdain. "Did you not see his role in your so-called drama of fate?"
He remembered well how the Crystal Cult had failed him before, especially during their flight from the Golden Sun's vengeance. Once trust is fractured, it cannot be reforged—it can only rot.
The Primarch of Chaos no longer offered his former reverence to these so-called allies. He saw the cracks in their masks.
The sorcerer did not respond to the barb, his gaze never leaving the orb. "Dukel is... anomalous. His destiny is clouded. The stars that chart the course of fate tremble in his wake. If he continues to interfere, even the Celestial Map may shatter—and we will lose the ability to track his movements entirely."
Horus's expression darkened, his amber eyes narrowing. "Then we must destroy him now. If fate itself cannot bind him, we must end him before he tears the game board apart."
"The game can be changed," the sorcerer replied carefully.
But Horus had made his decision.
"The victory we need isn't over the Imperium. Let the daemons burn. Let every spawn and corrupted beast be cast into oblivion. So long as Dukel is slain... it will be worth the price."
The scholar flinched—ever so slightly.
So did the others.
None of the four spoke, but unease spread among them like a slow infection. Even the brute in blood-slicked armor—Khorne's dog—shifted.
Dukel's armies were not like those of past Imperial crusades.
They wielded true annihilation—purity that unmade daemons entirely, casting their essence into the void from which not even the Warp could retrieve them.
Each daemon was a fragment of a god. Their erasure struck at the Chaos Gods themselves.
If Dukel succeeded, it would not merely be a defeat. It would be a wound.
Still, they said nothing.
Even the gods, in their maddening power, could not turn the tide of Horus's will.
And in truth, he was not wrong. To eliminate Dukel would be to sever the Imperium's spine.
Dukel was the one who dared everything. The gambler who threw not dice, but worlds. He had taken the Imperial Army into the heart of the Immaterium to challenge the gods themselves.
But Horus and the others—despite all their dark blessings—could not guarantee victory.
They were gamblers, too. And this table belonged to no one.
And the gods… the gods do not favor wagers they cannot rig.
…
Belia IV Starfield. The Crucible of Betrayal.
Now, nearly every traitor to mankind had gathered in the Belia IV starfield, a region on the brink of total corruption, lying perilously close to the Eye of Terror.
At the edge of this void-ravaged battlefield loomed the corrupted flagship of the Plague Fleet—End of Doom. Upon its diseased bridge stood a towering figure: bloated, rotting, and wreathed in the pestilent aura of his patron god.
Typhons, Daemon Prince of Nurgle, commanded his festering armada with solemn intent. Once a proud captain of the Death Guard, he now bore titles that reeked of dread: The Chosen of Nurgle, Lord of the Hive of Destruction, and Master of the First Great Plague Company.
In this war, Typhons marched at the head of the Death Guard—not merely as a general of disease, but as one of the most terrifying warlords of the Dark Pantheon.
His betrayal ran deep. Long ago, the fall of Primarch Mortarion had wounded their "father" gravely. The once-loyal Death Guard had become little more than bloated husks of decay and ruin. But where others saw ruin, Typhons saw opportunity.
To him, this was not just another crusade for Chaos. It was vindication.
If he could crush Dukel—the so-called Bloody Comet—here in the Belia IV starfield, then he would finally prove his worth. Not just as a servant of Nurgle, but as a replacement for Mortarion himself. A true heir to the Plague Lord's affections.
Typhons remembered the Horus Heresy well. He had despised his genetic father—had even murdered the fleet's Navigator to force their descent into the Immaterium, ignoring Mortarion's commands and dragging the Death Guard into damnation.
It was Typhons' willful pride that had sealed their fate—stranding them in Nurgle's Garden, where plague and despair became their eternal companions.
In that corrupted garden, Mortarion had no choice but to surrender. But Typhons... Typhons embraced it.
He broke away from Mortarion's authority, splitting the Death Guard. With his own plague host, he brought ruin to world after world, turning them into diseased mockeries of life—verdant gardens of rot, reeking tombs beneath bloated skies.
Entire populations vanished beneath the shrieking winds of contagion.
To Nurgle, all life was precious. From the smallest bacterium to the mightiest warlord, all were cherished equally. His blessings—the Gift of Decay—were spread lavishly across the stars.
But mercy, in Nurgle's eyes, was twisted. Those blessed by the Plaguefather would suffer an endless, writhing torment. Death was denied. Pain became eternal. And their wails—dirges of the damned—echoed forever in the warp.
This was Typhons' devotion. This was his sacrament.
Now, standing before the hololithic map of Belia IV, the Daemon Prince gazed at the swelling front lines. Dukel, that accursed Imperial warlord, was here. The Fabricator General's forges burned at full capacity. Magos chanted in binary hymns. The Imperial Fleet had arrived in force.
And Typhons... welcomed them.
This was his proving ground. Here, before daemon, mortal, and god alike, he would show that he, not Mortarion, was the true Scion of Decay.
...
TN:
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