While the Silent King was deep in contemplation,
the Tyranids—forced to reroute after he personally destroyed their direct path into the Milky Way—began advancing along an alternate route.
The casualties they suffered were negligible.
Andromeda Galaxy
Millions of years ago, most of Andromeda had already fallen under the control of the Orks spilling out of the Milky Way.
Unlike the Orks who remained inside the Milky Way—continually culled and harvested by the ancient Aeldari Empire until its collapse—
the Orks who migrated into Andromeda faced no such "cheat-code wielding" empire.
The local species simply lacked the strength to resist.
The result was predictable:
brutal, overwhelming conquest.
Even after hundreds of thousands of years,
some native forces in Andromeda still resisted,
but their defiance was little more than a symbolic struggle—
weak, pitiful splashes against an unstoppable tide.
Their greatest blessing was not their strength,
but Ork stupidity.
Ninety-nine percent of Orks were severely brain-damaged.
The remaining one percent were only slightly brain-damaged.
Strategy?
None.
Extermination of enemies?
Only if they happened to remember.
They lived entirely by instinct and impulse—
their fate determined mostly by dumb luck.
Were it not for their genetically embedded Old One–crafted technology,
their bizarre WAAAGH! psychic field,
and their ability to reproduce by spore,
the Orks would have gone extinct long ago.
---
On one Ork-infested world, a warlord commanding over one hundred billion Orks lounged in the sunlight, grumbling loudly:
"WAAAGHHH!! Another boring day!!
I wanna find some runtz to bash!!"
As half-plant, half-animal organisms, Orks didn't need to eat.
Sunlight alone—or nutrients from the soil—was enough to sustain and empower them.
But boredom…
boredom was their greatest enemy.
Many ages ago, driven by boredom and a few other impulses,
these Orks had migrated from the Milky Way to Andromeda just to "stir up trouble."
Irritated, the warlord rose, casually kicked a passing Gretchin to death, and muttered a prayer:
"Oh Gork who is brutal but cunning!
Oh Mork who is cunning but brutal!
Send me a foe worth bashin'!!"
He waited.
Nothing happened.
Just as he prepared to vent his frustration by beating up his lieutenant—
Something Changed in the Sky
Far above, the horizon warped.
Orks all across the planet stared and cried out:
"OOOHHH—!!"
"ORLY GIVEEE—!!"
"JEGOR NOOO—!!"
(As always, their reactions were completely incomprehensible.)
They watched in awe as their system's sun—
the star providing light and heat to the region—
was drained dry in moments.
A titanic fleshy organism, its surface covered with writhing tendrils, sucked the star's energy dry and left it a dead husk.
And then—
___
Across the far reaches of space,
countless Tyranid bioforms surged forward in waves so massive they blotted out the stars.
Among them were creatures comparable to the titanic stellar-feeder that had just devoured the sun.
The warlord's eyes lit up.
"GORK MORK!!
Now THAT'S a foe worth bashin'!!
…Just a bit strong.
And maybe… just a little too many…"
The Tyranid stellar-feeder paused as though noticing the planet below.
Then, without hesitation, it extended a tendril—
a tendril millions of kilometers long.
It swung it like a whip, slicing down toward the planet.
From the Orks' perspective, it looked like a massive continent-sized slab falling from the sky.
Any sane species' morale would've shattered instantly.
But Orks were not sane.
The warlord roared with ecstatic frenzy.
He raised an enormous axe—decorated with two Gretchin tied on as "offerings"—
and charged straight toward the incoming tendril.
His body was insignificant compared to the cosmic scale of the attack—
an ant challenging a world-serpent.
But his strength was real.
As powerful as many Primarchs,
his full-powered strike could cripple a planet.
Inspired, every Ork joined him,
shrieking with joy,
swinging their crude weapons at the descending tendril.
Not one of them felt fear.
---
A moment later—
The colossal tendril, tens of millions of kilometers long and nearly a million kilometers thick,
moving at thousands of times the speed of sound,
smashed into the planet.
The Ork warlord, his followers, and the entire world itself
were pulverized into dust finer than molecules.
Only faint embers remained where the planet had been.
Their resistance had not slowed the tendril even slightly.
Were the Orks weak?
Not at all.
Placed in Imperial territory,
this Ork force would have required one or two fully manned Space Marine Legions—plus enormous Imperial Guard support—to suppress.
But to the Tyranids—
a swarm that had consumed tens of thousands of vortex galaxies—
they were meaningless.
---
As this Ork host was obliterated,
Orks across Andromeda and nearby galaxies sensed something through their species-wide gestalt field.
"A foe… a STRONG foe… iz fightin'…"
One by one, billions upon billions of Orks turned toward the Tyranid direction.
Those close enough didn't hesitate.
Excited beyond reason,
they began building "spaceships"—
ramshackle constructions of wood, rocks, and trash—
and launched themselves eagerly toward the Tyranid swarm.
The greatest battle of their lives was calling.
....
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