[The temporal field collapses.]
[Reality catches up all at once.]
[Azure plasma balls and explosive bolter rounds materialize from nowhere, already impacting the Haemonculus's tall frame. Her light armor, designed more for aesthetics than protection, shatters like resin, fragments spinning away.]
[Her shimmering force field activates automatically, wrapping her in distorted light and shadow. She flickers, becoming translucent, incorporeal, her form wavering like a mirage.]
[But you tracked her every movement during bullet time. You know exactly where she is, where she'll be, how she's trying to escape.]
[The shots keep coming. Plasma burns through the failing force field. Bolts detonate against flesh that's already cooking.]
[She tries to move. Tries to fire back. Too slow. Always too slow.]
[You rip a melta bomb from your waist, thumb the activation stud, and throw it at her feet in one smooth motion.]
[Your magnetic boots slam into the sand. You launch yourself backward, power armor servos screaming as they reverse your momentum.]
[The melta bomb lands.]
[The Haemonculus, armor riddled with holes, flesh charred and bleeding, finally processes what's happening. Her remaining four arms reach for weapons on her back, guns and blades, anything to strike back...]
[The melta bomb detonates.]
[The temperature beneath her spikes to thousands of degrees instantly. Her lower body vaporizes first, molecular bonds simply ceasing to exist. The heat wave travels up, consuming flesh, bone, modifications, everything.]
[She doesn't even have time to scream. She just... stops being.]
[The three Grotesques freeze. Their mistress, their creator, their owner, is dead. The shock and horror is almost palpable, even from creatures so heavily modified they barely qualify as sapient.]
[They emit high-pitched whistles, an alien keening that sets your teeth on edge. Their twelve klaives move faster now, driven by berserk fury rather than trained discipline.]
[The thirteen remaining Dark Angels were holding their own before, matching the Grotesques blow for blow. Power swords deflecting klaives, footwork keeping them clear of those massive arms.]
[But now the Grotesques are beyond reason. Beyond tactics. Just pure rage and strength.]
[A Dark Angel blocks high, expecting a head strike. The klaive comes low instead, cutting through ceramite and the legs beneath. He falls in two pieces.]
[Another tries to dodge, but there are too many blades. One catches him across the torso. His power armor holds for a fraction of a second, then fails. He collapses, bisected.]
[You watch coldly. Make no move to help.]
[Instead, you holster both pistols and draw your broad power sword from your power pack. The decomposition field hums to life, blue and hungry.]
[You turn away from the struggling Dark Angels and begin methodically slaughtering the remaining Dark Eldar warriors scattered across the battlefield.]
[They're already broken, already fleeing toward the webway gate. You cut them down from behind. Efficient. Emotionless. Complete.]
[Minutes later, the Dark Eldar are extinct. Every warrior dead.]
[You glance at the melee still raging. Seven Dark Angels left standing. Two Grotesques still fighting.]
[You flick alien blood from your sword blade with a sharp downward motion.]
[Then you turn and charge toward the melee, power armor eating up the distance in long strides.]
[The nearest Grotesque has its back to you, all four arms raised high, preparing to bring multiple klaives down on a kneeling Dark Angel.]
[You plant both magnetic boots and launch yourself into the air.]
[Your power sword, wreathed in its decomposition field, comes down in a two-handed executioner's stroke.]
[SHHLK.]
[The Grotesque's flat, serpentine head separates from its shoulders cleanly. The body doesn't understand it's dead yet. Keeps moving, keeps swinging. Then it collapses, nearly crushing the Dark Angel it was about to kill.]
[You land, already drawing your plasma pistol, already tracking the second Grotesque as it pivots toward you.]
[You fire. Again. Again. Again.]
[Plasma burns holes through its heavy armor, through the mutated flesh beneath. It charges anyway, roaring, klaives whirling.]
[You backpedal, still firing. The range closes to three meters. Two meters. One.]
[The Grotesque's klaives rise for a killing blow.]
[Another plasma ball punches through its chest, cooking its heart, if it still has one.]
[It collapses at your feet, smoking.]
[Silence falls across the battlefield.]
[Only the quiet hiss of Dark Angels' breathing apparatus disturbs the night air.]
["What are you waiting for?!" Asmodai's voice shatters the quiet, mad and furious. "He's a Fallen Angel! Lord Cypher himself! Make him suffer! Make him repent! Do your duty!"]
[The surviving Dark Angels move like activated automatons. Power swords rise. They advance on you as one.]
[You don't react with surprise. Don't feel anything at all.]
[The first one reaches you, his blade coming in fast and high. You parry effortlessly, power sword meeting power sword. The decomposition fields scream against each other.]
[You twist your blade, push his aside, and slash across his chest armor. Not deep enough to kill. Just deep enough to crack the ceramite, destroy the power feed to his armor's servos.]
[He staggers. You're already moving past him.]
[The second Dark Angel comes from your left. You duck under his swing, drive your shoulder into his chest, send him sprawling.]
[The third and fourth come together, trying to flank. You spin between them, blade work surgical, precise. You destroy their knee actuators, cripple their weapon arms. They fall.]
[One by one, you incapacitate them. Not kill. Just remove them from the fight with brutal efficiency.]
[Until only Asmodai remains, charging at you with his power sword raised, screaming incoherently.]
[You lower your stance and meet his charge head-on.]
[Your swords clash. Lock. You twist, using his momentum against him, and slam your shoulder armor into his chest plate.]
[He flies backward, hits the sand hard, tries to rise.]
[Your power sword comes down.]
["AHHH!"]
[His scream echoes across the empty battlefield. His right arm, severed cleanly at the shoulder, tumbles through the air.]
[He's still trying to rise, still trying to fight with his remaining limbs.]
[Your blade rises and falls again.]
[His left arm joins the right in the sand.]
["STOP! FALLEN ANGEL! KILL ME! WHY WON'T YOU JUST KILL ME!"]
[You don't answer. Your blade rises twice more.]
[Both legs, removed at the hip.]
[Asmodai lies in the sand, just a torso and head, writhing, groaning, screaming.]
[You stand over him, expressionless, blade dripping his blood.]
[The other wounded Dark Angels watch in horror, unable to move, unable to help.]
["Death?" you say quietly, voice flat. "No, Asmodai. After what you and the Inner Circle have done, you don't deserve to return to the Throne. The Lion would be ashamed of you."]
[You crouch down, bringing your helmet closer to his.]
["Does it hurt? Does it make you angry? Good. This is what the civilians you abandoned felt. What the allies your Inner Circle betrayed felt. I'm letting you experience it. Temporarily."]
[You straighten.]
["I won't kill you. I'll have you interred in a Dreadnought, lock this pain into eternal torment. Every time you wake, you'll remember this moment. Forever."]
[You pull back your white hood, revealing your face in the starlight.]
["Remember this face, Asmodai. You're welcome to seek revenge anytime. In fact, I'd love for you to fall to Chaos as soon as possible. It would give me a legitimate reason to kill you next time we meet."]
["You... it's you... but you're Lord Cypher? How? This is impossible! IMPOSSIBLE!"]
[Asmodai writhes on the ground like an earthworm, his words dissolving into incoherent screaming.]
[You glance at the other Dark Angels once more. Your cold smile never wavers.]
[Then you turn your back on them and stride toward the still-open webway gate, the Lion Sword heavy across your shoulders.]
[Asmodai's screams and curses follow you all the way.]
[You reach into the space-time crystal and withdraw a webway crystal sphere, seized from some dead Eldar years ago. You hold it up, examining the swirling patterns inside.]
[Following the ritual old Cypher taught you, speaking the words in the Eldar tongue, making the gestures with your free hand, you carefully alter the gate's destination coordinates.]
[The circular mesh gate hums, a deep thrumming that you feel in your bones.]
[Without hesitation, you step through.]
[Your tall figure vanishes from the Dark Angels' sight.]
[Behind you, the webway gate slowly contracts, shrinks, disappears.]
[Gone.]
["By the Emperor," you mutter, staring at the impossible geometry around you. "The webway is truly vast..."]
[Crystalline pathways stretch in directions that shouldn't exist. Bridges of solidified thought connect platforms floating in non-space. Distance and direction lose meaning. Beautiful. Terrifying. Alien in the truest sense.]
[Then you hear it.]
[The faint roar of an engine. Getting closer.]
[Your hand tightens on your power sword. Your other hand goes to your pistols.]
[You turn, scanning for the source.]
[Now, as Lord Cypher, you're about to embark on a legendary journey.]
[And you... you are still alive...]
[Simulation Complete]
[You have survived]