In an Aeldari outpost, a special detection device suddenly began sounding an urgent alarm.
The attendant in charge paled instantly.
Without hesitation, he seized the communicator at his side and relayed the warning to his superiors.
Moments later, Farseer Eldrad Ulthran received the report:
The Necron Silent King had officially returned to the Milky Way.
As their ancient nemesis, the Aeldari had always monitored the Necrons closely.
Ever since confirming the Silent King's departure from the Solar System, they had created specialized equipment specifically to track his movements and serve as early warning.
Originally, the proud Aeldari believed that if the Silent King ever returned, they would simply destroy him.
After all, they once repelled the Necron dynasties and forced the remaining Necrons into millennia of dormancy.
With the vast resources of the Milky Way reorganized under Aeldari rule, they had grown many times stronger; fear was beneath them.
But the Aeldari Empire vanished overnight—
Slaanesh's birth turned their civilization to dust in a single scream.
Now, the barely surviving remnants of their people were in no condition to confront the Silent King.
As someone who had lived through the fall, Eldrad understood all too well:
Even assuming the Silent King had not grown stronger, he was still far beyond anything the current Milky Way's inhabitants could oppose.
Indeed, aside from the Eye of Terror itself, the combined forces of the galaxy today likely could not defeat even a single full-strength Aeldari fleet from the Empire's golden age.
And the Silent King's power was equivalent to—if not greater than—such a fleet.
Dropping him into today's weakened galaxy was like releasing a giant anaconda into a domestic fishpond.
He would change everything.
Thus, after a moment of thought, Eldrad decided the Aeldari should contract their territory and remain hidden for now.
Out of a sense of kinship, he also passed word to the pleasure-drenched Drukhari in the Webway,
and to the scattered Craftworlds beyond his authority…
Meanwhile
The Necron ruler Eldrad feared so deeply—the Silent King—
was currently in an extremely poor state.
Around his fleet, dozens of forces from entirely different civilizations had gathered:
Cultivators from some mystic world…
A "divine race" claiming godhood…
Even enormous mobile plant-creatures…
A menagerie of bizarre beings, all crammed uneasily together.
Despite their diversity, their strength was roughly equivalent. But the tension in the air had nothing to do with each other.
The real threat was the Tyranids pursuing them from behind.
Long ago, upon realizing how many extragalactic forces were entering his home galaxy, and believing he could not defeat the Tyranids alone, the Silent King had seized the chance to manipulate events behind the scenes.
He engineered conflicts, planted false information, and quietly redirected every faction's hostility toward the Tyranids.
Soon, more than twenty civilizations—each for their own reasons—
united to attack the Tyranids:
Some out of hatred.
Some out of scientific curiosity.
Some because they simply feared the Tyranids' growth.
Even those who saw through the Silent King's schemes chose not to speak. Everyone shared the same goal.
Together, under the Silent King's direction,
the coalition forces completely overwhelmed the Tyranid vanguard, beating them down ruthlessly.
For the first time, that Tyranid detachment was losing troops faster than they could be reproduced. Their numbers finally began to shrink.
Victory seemed close. The various civilizations were already planning how they would divide the spoils.
Then disaster struck.
In their eagerness to annihilate the Tyranids,
the coalition forces unleashed all their unique technologies and secret techniques.
Many were methods the Tyranids had never encountered before.
These peculiar abilities finally caught the attention of the Hive Mind, which had not cared about a mere scouting swarm.
Suddenly intrigued—and hungry—
the Hive Mind dispatched the true Tyranid main fleet, accelerating its advance.
Like a tank crushing chickens,
they consumed everything along their path—
entire star systems, even black holes.
Countless civilizations were obliterated before they even understood what was happening.
Then, as the coalition was still busy slaughtering what they believed was the Tyranid "main force," they encountered the real main fleet…
No real battle occurred.
They simply scanned its size—
and instantly panicked.
They retreated in blind terror.
___
The Silent King had barely escaped into the Milky Way and had destroyed the galactic core behind him to stall the swarm's advance.
But even with this buffer, the scale of the Tyranid main fleet was enough to make him shudder.
It was not just a problem—
it was a catastrophe, a cosmic-level disaster.
According to joint scans performed with several other civilizations, the Tyranid main hive cluster, when compressed together,
could cover a region of space two million light-years across.
And that was the minimum estimate.
The real number was likely far worse.
How does one even fight that…?
The Silent King felt a pounding headache just imagining it.
The other civilizations shared the same despair.
The Tyranids would not forgive any of them.
There would be no negotiations, no treaties, no coexistence, no trade, no diplomacy.
They killed everything.
They devoured everything.
They never stopped.
And now the Hive Mind was interested in them.
That made it even worse.
....
🔥 Can't wait for the next chapter? Read ahead! 🔥
If you're loving the story, you can unlock 140+ ADVANCE CHAPTERS right now for just $4/month on my Patreon! Not only do you get a massive backlog to binge-read, but you also directly support my daily translation work. ❤️
👇 Grab your early access here:
🔗 [patreon.com/user?u=79514336]
(Or simply search for Translator-Sama on Patreon!)