Raynor whispered low to himself, the phantom spine broadsword hovering at his side fluttering with the wind.
The previously churning, violent purple psychic energy began shrinking inward, transforming from towering, monstrous waves into fine, hair-like threads of purple light that laid out evenly along the blade.
Every strand of light carried attributes of devouring and domination, yet no longer spread recklessly, instead condensing with pinpoint precision within three meters of the sword's edge.
The moment adjustments were complete, Raynor gave his wrist a slight flick, delivering a second, oblique slash.
This time, there was no earth-shattering boom, nor was there a sword-trail spanning heaven and earth.
There was only a slender, almost invisible ribbon of purple light that sliced along the border between the moth swarm and the cloud layers like the sharpest surgical scalpel.
Wherever it passed, plague moths vanished in vast swathes, without a single trace of plague power managing to spill out.
Yet as the ribbon of light brushed past the clouds of the machine spirit's origin, it merely touched them gently before retracting, without leaking even half a fraction of surplus energy.
Phelps had barely stabilized his scattering demonic face when he felt another fatal force sweeping toward him.
He instinctively drove the moth swarm to block it, yet never expected this seemingly gentle slash to be even sharper than the last.
The outer layer of moths melted away like cobwebs meeting fire. The sword-light drove straight in, once more shaving off nearly one-tenth of his strength.
What chilled his heart even further was that this time, the opponent's power was terrifyingly precise.
Every single bit of damage landed unerringly on the plague consciousness entity, without impacting even half a fraction of the surrounding machine spirit energy.
"Impossible..."
The demonic face distorted as it let out a roar, its moth-formed contour flickering continuously.
Having infected the machine spirit for so long, he knew better than anyone how fragile the consciousness barrier of this realm was; even if he made no attempt to control the direction of the plague's expansion, it would inadvertently damage the core of the machine spirit.
Yet how could this purple figure who popped out of nowhere control his power to such an extent?
What he did not know was that the machine spirit itself had also moved.
This iron beast, wild and untamed for over a millennium, retained its most fundamental judgment despite having its sanity scrambled by the plague.
It could sense that although the violent purple light from earlier had hurt it, its target had never been the machine spirit.
Those glowing green moths, on the other hand, were the true deadly enemies gnawing at its flesh and blood and corroding its soul.
Especially when the purple sword-light precisely executed the moths without touching a single hair on its core origin, the machine spirit's hostility dissolved significantly in an instant.
The frantic, shooting lightning within the clouds began to re-aggregate.
It was no longer an indiscriminate barrage, but wrist-thick bolts of blue-white lightning that smashed down like they had eyes, targeting the dense clusters of Phelps' moth swarm.
With thunder and purple light attacking inside and out, the number of moths plummeted at a rate visible to the naked eye.
Phelps fell into utter panic.
He was already in a remnant soul state, relying on the Rot-Rust Plague to take root deep within the machine spirit, growing stronger by feeding on its origin while maintaining his advantage through the expanding plague.
Previously, the more the machine spirit resisted, the more he could use its own energy to spread the rust, snowballing his advantage.
Yet now, everything was different.
The purple figure's power carried a bizarre attribute of domination that erased the plague upon contact, without returning a shred of energy back to him.
Furthermore, the machine spirit seemed to have suddenly woken up, its thunder specifically targeting his weak spots—making it blatantly clear that it intended to join forces with the "outsider" to kill him first.
He had to divide his focus to maintain the plague anchor deep within to prevent himself from being completely purged, while simultaneously blocking Raynor's precision slashes and dodging the machine spirit's lightning strikes.
Beset on three sides, his already meager remnant soul power drained at a blistering pace.
"Despicable! Lapdog of the False Emperor! If you have the guts, fight me one-on-one!"
Phelps roared in exasperated fury. The moth swarm surged madly, attempting to brave the attrition and rush Raynor's phantom to corrode him up close using the plague's power.
Yet Raynor gave him no such opportunity.
The spine broadsword danced in his hands like a butterfly through flowers—each slash faster and more precise than the last.
The purple sword-light wove a seamless, airtight net; the moment a moth drew within ten paces, it was instantly shredded into nothingness.
He didn't even need to shift his posture, simply standing in midair. No matter how wildly Phelps slammed against it, he could never break through that veil of purple sword-light.
With every falling slash, Phelps' aura grew one fraction weaker.
The plague moth swarm gradually thinned down from a sky-covering cloud of green, until only a scattered few hundred remained, fluttering frantically around the faint human outline at the center.
Across the earth below, dark green mold receded rapidly like an ebbing tide.
The metal terrain, previously softened and corroded, once again exposed its cold, hard silver-gray base color. The rust accumulation in the fissures evaporated bit by bit, converting back into pure machine spirit energy that flowed back underground.
The corrupt green storm clouds in the sky gradually parted, re-exposing the dark gray base layer beneath.
The thunder in the clouds also shifted back from a sickly dark green to a crystal-clear blue-white, its roars carrying a newfound, fierce confidence.
The instant the final cluster of moths was shredded by the purple sword-light, the entire world fell into a sudden hush.
Phelps' consciousness entity was completely exposed.
No longer able to maintain the form of the moth face, only a faint human outline remained.
The tattered phantom of his body was pockmarked and battered, the plague emblem on his chest dim and lusterless. Where his head should be, there were only two clumps of murky green light, flickering like candles in the wind.
He stumbled to a half-kneeling position in midair, his form so faint it seemed ready to scatter into dust in the next second.
The murky green lights stared fixedly at the purple phantom in midair, churning with terror, unwillingness, and a bone-deep disbelief.
"What manner of monster are you..."
His voice was terrifyingly weak, every word carrying the static of disintegrating consciousness:
"A newly birthed evil god of the Warp? Then why... why would the Grandfather not know?"
Raynor did not answer immediately.
Hovering in midair, the phantom of the spine broadsword slowly dissipated in his palm, yet his brow furrowed almost imperceptibly.
Phelps' question was precisely the doubt lurking in his own heart at this very moment.
When had things started turning stranger and stranger?
At first, it was merely the system issuing conquest quests, where he relied on it to win over Sarah and the others.
Yet as Sarah's favorability climbed higher, he gradually uncovered numerous anomalies.
At night, he would dream strange, kaleidoscopic dreams of endless cosmic rainbow light in the abyss, with countless faint whispers calling his name.
When awake, whenever he drew near places rich in Warp energy, he could vaguely sense an inexplicable pull.
And this time, the system had directly popped up a "Domination" prompt.
Not conquest, not raising favorability, but absolute, unadulterated consciousness domination.
Even the non-human consciousness of a warship's machine spirit could be directly accessed and controlled.
An absurd yet naturally logical conjecture emerged uncontrollably in his mind.
Could it be... that the so-called system was actually his own innate Warp nature all along?
He wasn't someone chosen by a system; rather, he possessed a certain Warp authority himself, and the system was merely the concrete interface of that authority?
The moment this thought surfaced, Raynor felt a cold chill run down his spine.
In the universe of Warhammer 40k, becoming too deeply entwined with the Warp was never a good thing.
The gaze of the Four Gods, the loss of humanity, ultimately becoming a plaything of Chaos...
Such examples were countless in the Imperium's heretical archives.
If a day truly came where his "true nature" fully awakened, would he still be the Raynor Corvaner he was today?
Taking a deep breath, Raynor suppressed the churning thoughts in his heart.
At least for now, everything remained within control.
The system hadn't gone haywire, his will hadn't been twisted, and he was still the ordinary man who wanted to hold Brevis and live a good life alongside his loved one in this dark era.
As for what lay ahead... we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.
In the few seconds his mind had briefly wandered, the machine spirit—having accumulated boundless wrath—moved.
The cloud layer collapsed inward abruptly. All the blue-white lightning gathered toward the center, frantically compressing and condensing.
The sound of the wind, the rumble of thunder, and the trembling of the earth wove together, like a wild beast issuing a final low growl in its throat.
In a mere second, a lightning pillar of exaggerated thickness condensed deep within the clouds.
It was thicker and more dazzling than the main lance of the Gemstone.
That was the rage the machine spirit had suppressed for hours, the total resentment built from being gnawed by the plague for days, and the most violent counterattack of a thousand-year-old steel soul.
Without any warning:
Majestic heavenly thunder crashed down with a roar!
"NOOO!!!"
Phelps let out a final, desperate scream.
He no longer had the strength to dodge, forced to watch helplessly as that deep-blue pillar of light pierced through his remnant soul.
The ultimate lightning power shredded the last trace of the plague mark, crushing his consciousness together with the source of the Rot-Rust Plague into the finest dust.
Not a single echo was left behind.
The instant the pillar of light struck the ground, the entire iron wasteland brightened sharply.
The final lingering plague spores deep within the earth were completely evaporated by the thunder; the damp, moldy smell in the air was swept clean, replaced by the crisp, cold atmosphere of iron and lightning.
The crisis was resolved.
Yet Raynor's eyes did not relax.
He could feel that the machine spirit's emotions were unstable.
Days of plague erosion combined with the intense battle just now had left this untamed iron beast completely scrambled in its sanity.
It knew only the instinct to purge all foreign invaders, treating every entity that broke into its consciousness world as an enemy.
The thunder that had just settled within the clouds grew restless once more.
This time, the lightning locked onto two targets.
One was Dominic's consciousness on the ground, still in a daze and shrouded by the phantom.
The other was Raynor's phantom hovering in midair.
CRACKLE~ BOOM!
Dozens of lightning bolts as thick as water buckets struck down simultaneously, holding back nothing.
Raynor raised an eyebrow.
With a casual wave of his hand, a thin veil of pale-purple light unfolded out of thin air.
The incoming lightning slammed into the veil like pebbles dropped into a lake, dissipating without a trace after causing merely a few ripples.
He looked down at the restless thunder in the clouds and the faintly trembling earth beneath his feet, a playful curve curling at the corner of his lips.
"Heh, I just saved you, and you turn around wanting to slay your master?"
What answered him was an even more violent barrage of thunderbolts.
The energy across the entire machine spirit realm boiled as blue-white electrical light slithered wildly through the clouds, eventually condensing into a lightning flood-dragon dozens of meters long.
It roared and writhed, bearing the pressure of the entire realm as it lunged fiercely at Raynor.
This was the core body of the machine spirit, the purest manifestation of its will.
Raynor neither dodged nor avoided it.
He reached out his right hand, fingers slightly splayed, grabbing straight toward the roaring, lunging lightning flood-dragon.
Purple light exploded in his palm like an invisible hand, clamping precisely onto the dragon's vital point.
"Behave yourself!"
The instant the words fell, the glow of the purple phantom surged uncontrollably!
Like a purple sun rising at the center of the machine spirit realm, purple light spread in all directions, swathing the sky and covering the earth with Raynor as the center.
Clouds, earth, thunder, wasteland... everything as far as the eye could see was dyed in a light shade of purple.
The wild lightning flood-dragon writhed and struggled frantically in his grip, thunder crackling and popping, yet it could not break free from that purple palm no matter what.
The more it struggled, the deeper the purple sheen on its body became. Its roars shifted slowly from furious anger into low growls, and then from low growls into whimpers.
[Executing Consciousness Domination, Target: Gemstone Machine Spirit]
[Domination Progress: 12%, 37%, 69%...]
The cold system prompt sounded in Raynor's mind, the progress bar rising steadily.
The machine spirit's resistance appeared futile and fragile before absolute power of domination.
It could sense an irresistible will penetrating its core origin like the strictest set of shackles, locking down all its wildness and ferocity bit by bit.
It wanted to resist, wanted to shred this intruder, yet a sense of awe instinctively welled up from the depths of its soul.
That was submission to the strong—a core instinct to revere strength etched into the machine spirit's will.
A few minutes later, the purple light abruptly receded.
All purple light veils withdrew into Raynor's phantom like an ebbing tide. The cloud layer shifted back to dark gray, and the earth recovered its cold, hard silver-gray tone.
The lightning flood-dragon that had been twisting like a mad snake just moments ago now coiled obediently beside Raynor.
Its head was lowered, its thunderous light tame. Like a wild beast whose fur had been smoothed over, even its electric arcs jumped with utmost care, terrified of angering the man before it.
[Domination Complete]
[Conquest Target: Gemstone Machine Spirit]
[Favorability: 30 (Machine spirits only ever revere the strong)]
Raynor glanced at the system panel and couldn't help but roast it internally.
So beating it up increases favorability? Total masochist.
He looked down at Dominic's consciousness on the ground, which had yet to snap back to reality, then turned to look at the tame lightning flood-dragon beside him.
Finally, he spoke. His voice was not loud, yet it resonated across the entire machine spirit world:
"Listen to Dominic and the others properly from now on. Don't go blowing your top at every little thing."
As his words fell, the purple phantom began turning transparent.
The load of the consciousness link had reached its limit; it was time to withdraw.
As the phantom dissipated bit by bit, the coiling lightning flood-dragon raised its head, as if seeing him off, or perhaps remembering the will that had crushed it.
The iron wasteland returned to silence, leaving only the steady rumble of thunder in the clouds, beating like a calm heartbeat.
...
In reality, inside the Mechanicus Shrine:
Dominic snapped his eyes open.
Violent gasps caused his chest to heave drastically; cold sweat covered his forehead, and the back of his uniform was thoroughly soaked.
He instinctively gripped the armrests, his right fingertips meeting the cold, hard touch of metal.
It was no longer the ethereal energy of the consciousness realm, but the real, tangible temperature of realspace.
And the Machine Spirit Throne beneath him was undergoing a breathtaking transformation.
The dark green mold receded at a blistering pace; the pockmarked rust marks smoothed out inch by inch, once more exposing a polished, pure steel base.
The previously dim, murky runes lit up again with golden light. Blue-white electric arcs leaped merrily along the surface of the throne, far brighter and purer than before the battle.
The hovering throne rose nearly half a meter higher than before.
The surrounding energy circuits relit with a clear blue glow, and all alarm chimes ceased at the exact same moment.
Sarah slowly withdrew her finger from Dominic's forehead, the silver-red micro-glimmer at her fingertip fading away.
She took half a step back, the eyes hidden beneath her hood narrowing as she looked upon the newly restored Machine Spirit Throne, a trace of faint perplexity flashing in the depths of her gaze.
She could feel that the machine spirit's will had stabilized.
Not only had it stabilized, but it also seemed stronger than before, and far more... tame?
From beyond the shrine's heavy bronze doors came the shocked whispers of the Tech-Priests, alongside Bishop Venca's cry of utter disbelief.
The dull thud of hydraulic axles broke the dead silence outside the Mechanicus Shrine as the heavy bronze doors slid open to both sides.
Tech-Priests and clergymen who had been held back for over an hour surged forward in a near-frenzy, their red and black robes merging in the corridor like two swift currents.
Yet the moment they crossed the shrine's threshold, everyone's footsteps came to a dead halt.
There was no apocalyptic scene of spreading rust as anticipated, nor was there the scorched disaster of a rampant machine spirit.
The bronze light fixtures at the vaulted ceiling relit with a warm, gentle golden glow that flowed down along intricate mechanical patterns, illuminating every inch of the great hall in vivid detail.
The damp, moldy smell and corrosive rust that once filled the air had dissipated entirely, replaced by the crisp scent of ozone and refined machine oil blended with the faint fragrance of holy ointment.
That was the smell the Mechanicus Shrine had carried throughout the Gemstone's thousand-year service.
As for the black-robed woman, she was nowhere to be found.
Only Dominic remained, sitting upright atop the throne.
His military uniform had long been scorched black and mottled by electric arcs, the collar and cuffs curling with charred fringes.
The exposed skin on his neck and the backs of his hands was covered in fine burn marks, and the fire-red strands at his forehead were scorched curly.
His face was pale as paper, his eyes closed tight, and his chest heaving weakly, as if plunged into a deep coma.
"Rear Admiral!"
Adjutant Cullen let out a cry of alarm and made to rush forward, only for a Senior Tech-Priest beside him to yank hard on his arm.
The red-robed Senior Tech-Priest bore a solemn expression, his optical lenses fixed firmly on the electric arcs slithering around the throne, his voice carrying an unalleviated lingering dread:
"Do not approach! When the machine spirit was enraged earlier, an attendant was reduced to ashes merely by stepping inside the perimeter..."
Before his words even finished, everyone in the hall watched with wide eyes as a thin, blue-white electric arc leaped from the armrest of the throne, brushing past Dominic's cheek.
Yet as if possessing a mind of its own, it veered gently aside the moment before touching his skin, merely kicking up a faint trail of sparks before falling obediently back into the runic grooves.
Dead silence filled the hall.
Everyone was completely stunned.
The wild iron beast that was ready to shred everything just moments ago was now sitting beneath a mortal, as tame as a broken-in manticore.
Bishop Venca stepped forward rapidly, leaning on his silver staff, his white beard trembling faintly.
He paused for a moment outside the perimeter, confirming the electric arcs held no intention to attack, before cautiously crossing the boundary that had previously been viewed as a death line.
Walking all the way to the side of the throne, the machine spirit's thunder showed not the slightest hostility. Instead, as if sensing his approach, the leaping electric arcs grew increasingly calm.
"A miracle... This is a miracle from the God-Emperor..."
The old bishop muttered to himself, his eyes growing faintly moist.
Having lived for nearly a century, he had never seen an untamed machine spirit show such affinity toward a mortal.
He reached out to support Dominic's arm, finding it scalding hot to the touch. Dominic's consciousness was long blurred, maintaining a formal sitting posture purely through a soldier's instinct.
"Two of you, come carefully and help the Rear Admiral down."
A few young Tech-Priests stepped forward trembling, supporting Dominic's shoulders, back, and knees as they slowly eased him down from the throne.
Throughout the process, the electric arcs on the throne remained quiet, without flinging out even a surplus spark.
On the contrary, the moment Dominic's feet touched the ground, the entire throne sank slightly by a few inches, as if bowing in respect.
Placing him on a resting chair at the side of the hall, Bishop Venca wiped away the soot on Dominic's face using gauze dipped in holy water, softly calling his name.
After several calls, Dominic's eyelashes fluttered, and his eyes slowly opened.
His blue-gray pupils were shrouded in a layer of mist, unfocused for a long while before gradually locking onto Bishop Venca's aged face.
"Bishop..." His voice was terribly raspy, his throat feeling filled with sand.
"The machine spirit..."
"The machine spirit is fine! Completely fine!" Bishop Venca could hardly mask the excitement in his tone, pointing his hand toward the throne.
"Look, the rust receded, and the energy circuits are clear again—hardly any difference from before the battle!"
"Rear Admiral, how on earth did you manage it?"
The surrounding Tech-Priests and clergymen gathered around as well, their eyes filled with reverence and curiosity.
Dominic followed the direction he pointed, looking upon the newly restored Machine Spirit Throne, a trace of bewilderment flashing in his eyes.
He... managed it?
He hadn't done a thing.
The memories deep within his consciousness remained stuck at the moment he stepped into the machine spirit world—the sky-covering plague moths, Phelps' mocking cold laugh, the soul-corroding agony...
Beyond that was a dense, heavy darkness.
He felt as though he had sunk into a bottomless deep sea, his consciousness groggy and sensing nothing, right until he was awakened just now.
The only remaining fragment was a young male voice echoing in the darkness.
The voice was exceptionally calm, carrying a touch of casual amusement, sounding remarkably like that young governor back on Brevis.
Yet how could that be possible?
Dominic instinctively knitted his brows tight.
No matter how resourceful Raynor Corvaner was, he was merely a mortal governor. Could he truly span such a vast distance to step into the Gemstone's machine spirit world and slay the plague's remnant soul?
Preposterous.
It had to be a hallucination produced on the brink of death—a guidance from the God-Emperor, a divine grace bestowed through his hands by the Omnissiah.
"I cannot recall clearly either," he shook his head, avoiding everyone's searching gazes, his voice weak yet steady.
"I only remember... a light that dispelled the plague."
"Perhaps the Emperor and the Omnissiah showed mercy, protecting the Gemstone."
Hearing this, the onlookers drew the Imperial Aquila or the Cog Mechanicus across their chests, expressions of understanding and reverence spreading across their faces.
Indeed, what other explanation could there be besides divine grace?
A mortal body entering deep into the plague-infected core of a machine spirit, not only surviving but violently reversing a losing battle—what was that if not a miracle?
No one pressed for further details. Prayers echoed continuously throughout the hall, giving thanks for the favor of the Emperor and the Omnissiah.
Dominic supported himself against the back of the chair and slowly stood up, a lingering numbness still running through his legs.
He looked up at the hovering Machine Spirit Throne, yet the doubts in his heart did not scatter.
That voice had been far too real.
So real that he could even recall the tone in which the other party spoke—carrying a touch of casual certainty, identical to the way Raynor Corvaner looked whenever he pulled off a miracle.
Suppressing the absurd thought in his mind, he was just about to speak and inquire about the follow-up investigation when his vision went suddenly dark.
Days of fierce battling had exhausted all his energy, and the soul-level clash had hollowed out his foundation, relying entirely on a single breath to hold on until now.
With the crisis confirmed resolved, that final breath released, and his consciousness could no longer hold up.
"Rear Admiral!"
Cullen rushed forward to catch his collapsing body, hearing only his final low whisper before passing out: "The shipwide lower-deck purge... do not stop it..."
Dominic's period of unconsciousness was not long.
In merely twenty-eight minutes, Dominic opened his eyes amid the sharp blare of a communication alarm.
He lay in his captain's quarters, his scorched military uniform changed, his wounds dressed with salve.
Throughout his body, there was none of the expected paralyzing, severe pain, only a faint dull ache and numbness deep within his muscles—as if he had just endured an intense session of weight training, far from reaching the level of critical injury.
He knew in his heart that the machine spirit had shown leniency.
Had anyone else been struck by the machine spirit's thunder for that long, they would have turned into a pile of charred cinders long ago.
"General, you're awake?" Cullen, guarding outside, entered immediately upon hearing the commotion, his face still bearing unalleviated anxiety.
"Urgent report from the surface: Midtown is in crisis."
Dominic threw off the blanket and stood up, allowing the orderly to dress him in a pristine Rear Admiral uniform while accepting the war report to scan rapidly.
Every word on the paper weighed ten thousand pounds.
Nine recruitment camps experienced ritual meltdowns; flesh mutations burst forth from the earth, and a Warp domain expanded across several kilometers.
The Thousand Sons Legion had descended, led by a Thousand Sons Sorcerer Lord, commanding countlessly numbered Rubric Marines, Scarab Occult Terminators, and Daemonic throngs of the Four Gods.
The defense forces led by Bishop Jansen were falling back step by step, with the first line of defense lost; the Iron Guard's 6th, 7th, and 9th Regiments had suffered over fifty percent casualties, currently fighting for their lives relying on neighborhood structures.
The Thousand Sons Legion.
The 15th Traitor Legion—the Sorcerer Legion.
Dominic's fingers tightened abruptly, crumpling the report.
Opponents even more troublesome and treacherous than the Death Guard had actually descended upon Brevis as well.
What on earth did this remote border planet possess to warrant these traitors tracking its scent here?
"Connect to the Governor's Mansion encrypted channel immediately," he strode toward the command console, his voice carrying raspy undertones from just waking up.
"Get me Lady Isolde."
The communication connected swiftly, and Isolde's calm face emerged on the screen.
This steward of the Governor's Mansion stood in the top-floor command center, surrounded by dense tactical projection screens; though bloodshot threads ran through her eyes, not a trace of panic was visible.
"Rear Admiral Dominic," Isolde took the initiative to speak.
"We have already received word regarding the crisis aboard the Gemstone."
"The machine spirit crisis has been resolved," Dominic wasted no words, cutting straight to the point.
"I can deploy the entire Tithe Fleet to provide orbital fire support for the surface."
His gaze locked directly onto the woman on the screen, his tone heavy:
"Lady Isolde, take my advice."
"Certain things must be sacrificed accordingly; preserving Brevis is the top priority."
On the other side of the screen, Isolde fell silent for a second.
Naturally, she understood Dominic's underlying meaning.
She knew full well what orbital bombardment entailed.
Once the lances rained down, the targeted zones would be razed to absolute flatland; civilians unable to evacuate in time and remaining industrial facilities would be reduced to scorched earth alongside the Chaos hordes.
The cost was staggering.
Midtown was Brevis's industrial heart, home to hundreds of millions of people; once abandoned, the losses would be immeasurable.
Yet she knew even better that Dominic was not engaging in alarmism.
The Thousand Sons Legion was no ordinary Chaos warband; with Sorcerer Lords presiding and a Warp domain buffing them, if allowed to establish a firm foothold, what expanded would not be limited to Midtown—the entire planet of Brevis would be reduced to a new playground for the Great Game of the Four Gods.
"I understand," Isolde took a deep breath, her voice so steady no emotion could be discerned.
"I will immediately organize the evacuation of core zone personnel and designate bombardment coordinates."
"In ten minutes, the coordinates will be synchronized and transmitted to the Gemstone."
"Understood," Dominic nodded slightly.
The communication severed, leaving a heavy atmosphere in the command deck.
Everyone understood that once this order went down, it meant countless lives would turn into dust beneath the orbital lances.
Yet in the dark 41st Millennium, trade-offs were the norm.
No sacrifice was too great; no treason was too small to forgive.
...
Meanwhile, three levels underground beneath Castle San Gallus:
The roaring artillery fire and daemonic growls wove together, shaking down continuous dust.
Raynor stood atop the high command platform, his gaze spanning across layers of crossfire lines to land on that arrogant figure beside the Warp rift.
Luna floated beside the Gate of Scourge, her sorcery staff raised high as eerie blue sorcerous light continuously buffed the daemonic army.
Watching the human defenders retreat step by step, she laughed maniacally, her voice beneath the mask sounding sharp as fingernails scraping glass:
"Do you see, Raynor?! This is the power of Chaos! The Brevis you painstakingly built will ultimately turn to dust beneath the majesty of the Architect of Fate!"
Amplified by sorcery, her voice resonated across half the battlefield, her triumphant delight practically spilling over.
Looking at her inflated, self-satisfied manner, Raynor suddenly let out a low chuckle, shaking his head.
"Foolish creature."
His voice was very soft, completely drowned out by the artillery fire, yet his tone held undisguised mockery.
Luna actually believed this was her victory, thinking this Gate of Scourge was her ultimate trump card.
Yet she had no idea that the nine altars she had painstakingly erected and the Warp rift she tore open served only to pave the way for the Thousand Sons Legion in the end.
Atia leading the Thousand Sons warband into Midtown created energy fluctuations that could be felt across half the city.
That vast, treacherous sorcerous aura was far beyond what a half-baked Champion Sorcerer like Luna could compare to.
Truth be told, Luna's meager tricks probably weren't even worthy of carrying that Thousand Sons Sorcerer Lord's shoes.
When Atia conquered Brevis, the first person he would likely purge was this foolish, arrogant traitor.
Toiling for over half a year in her scheming, only to end up dressing up someone else's bride.
If that wasn't a fool, what was?
"The energy of the Gate of Scourge is decaying,"
Sarah's voice echoed in his mind, carrying the characteristic composure of the Swarm:
"Luna's strength cannot sustain such a massive rift; in one hour at most, the Warp Gate will close completely."
"The remaining daemonic forces—the Vanguard alongside the Cleansing Cult are sufficient to purge them."
Raynor nodded.
Luna was no longer a concern.
The true threat remained in Midtown.
The Thousand Sons Legion, the Sorcerer Lord, and that reality-twisting Warp domain.
That was the major enemy capable of shaking Brevis's foundation.
"Let's go. We fall back and rally toward Midtown."
Raynor turned to walk down the command platform, but after taking merely two steps, his brows knit together abruptly.
A mess of crackling static noise filled the communication channel; the real-time contact maintained with the outer reserve units had cut off completely at some unknown moment.
"Sarah, what's the situation on the perimeter?"
"The reinforcement routes have been severed," Sarah's tone grew significantly graver.
"All external access routes to Castle San Gallus have been locked down by an unknown force."
"Just ten minutes ago, large numbers of Chaos cultists surged out from the various noble domains in the Upper City, silently surrounding the entire castle."
"The cultist composition is mixed, possessing marks from all Four Gods, lacking a unified command yet coordinating with seamless tacit understanding."
Raynor's footsteps came to a halt.
Lacking unified command, mixed marks of the Four Gods, yet capable of coordinated action.
"Chaos Undivided."
Raynor uttered those two words in a low voice, his eyes darkening.
He had never expected cultists of Chaos Undivided to be lurking among the Upper City nobility.
These people did not revere any single Dark God, believing instead in Chaos itself—making their actions even more secretive and far more unhinged.
"Where is Leo?" Raynor suddenly remembered something, his voice turning a fraction colder.
"He's in charge of the castle's perimeter security and patrol. Where is he?"
Sarah fell silent for a second.
"Commander Leo lost signal an hour ago; his whereabouts are unknown."
Raynor's fists clenched abruptly.
Leo.
The legitimate heir of House San Gallus. Ever since returning to the Hive, he had been helping manage affairs big and small, acting with steady composure and impeccable precision.
Though not part of his inner core circle, he was a key figure in maintaining stability across the Upper City.
And now, he had vanished without a sound.
Judging by this setup, the enemy had clearly been plotting for a long time.
First pulling out Leo—the outer warning outpost—then silently assembling cultists to blockade the castle, severing his connection to the outside world, and trapping him inside this third underground level.
A master stroke.
A wave of irritable heat surged up his chest. Just as Raynor was about to order the Vanguard to concentrate their force and break through, a sharp, piercing pain suddenly hit his temples.
Like countless fine needles stabbing violently into the depths of his mind.
The vision before his eyes distorted abruptly.
The artillery-swept underground battlefield vanished, replaced by an endless sea of cosmic colors.
Red blood, green pus, pink mist, blue light—four colors of Chaos energy churned around him like a rising tide.
Countless fine whispers exploded in his ears: enticing, urging, calling out for him to drop everything and embrace Chaos—to embrace true power.
A familiar illusion.
Identical to the scenes in those countless late-night dreams before.
Only this time, it was clearer, more real, and that sense of pulling deep within his bloodline burned even stronger.
"Get lost."
Raynor gritted his teeth, issuing a low bark within his consciousness.
A powerful force of will acted like a dam, holding back those churning whispers of Chaos by sheer force.
He supported himself against the cold rock wall, standing with eyes closed for over ten seconds, fine drops of cold sweat beading on his forehead.
When the sharp pain receded and the smoke of the underground battlefield re-emerged before his eyes, his expression had hardened to ice.
Not a hallucination.
Not a Warp disturbance.
It was himself.
His true nature within the Warp was awakening.
The conjecture he had suppressed deep in his heart for so long finally received its most explicit confirmation in this moment.
Leaning against the rock wall, he actively adjusted his breathing, making no immediate move.
Irritation and panic receded like an ebbing tide, with cold reason reclaiming the high ground once more.
The messier the situation, the less room there was for panic.
Raynor opened his eyes, a faint purple glimmer flashing across his pupils—so fast it seemed an illusion.
He looked up at the rock strata above the castle, then glanced back at Luna, who was still laughing maniacally beside the rift, swiftly sorting through the situation in his mind.
Trapped internally by Luna's Gate of Scourge and the remaining daemonic forces, blockaded externally by cultists of Chaos Undivided, and eyed hungrily by the Thousand Sons Legion in Midtown.
Leo martyred, external communications severed, and only a few thousand Vanguard soldiers on hand underground.
It looked like a dead end, yet breaking the siege was not entirely impossible.
Luna was nothing to fear, and the cultists of Chaos Undivided were a rabble despite their numbers. The only truly tough bone to pick was the Thousand Sons in Midtown.
Leaning his back against the cold wall, Raynor casually scooped up a mini Ripper at his feet to stroke it, his mind rapidly calculating breakthrough schemes.
The main force of the Vanguard stationed in the Upper City was less than twenty kilometers from Castle San Gallus. At the Vanguard's marching pace, they could reach the outer perimeter in ten minutes.
So long as those elite units—trained and honed by Genestealer officers—pushed forward, these mob cultists and the Scourge army cobbled together by Luna couldn't hold back a Vanguard charge at all.
Tearing open the encirclement and rescuing him, the Governor, would be a trivial matter.
The moment this thought surfaced, Raynor's fingers froze abruptly.
Something felt off.
He narrowed his eyes slightly, suppressing the urge to mobilize the troops immediately.
From the current perspective, rescuing himself—the commander—first, and then mobilizing all available forces on Brevis to head to Midtown for a final decisive battle appeared to be the most logical, optimal solution.
Yet the more logical it seemed, the more wrong it felt to him.
Luna knew about the special connection between him and the Tyranid Swarm.
Though paranoid and unhinged, that woman was not truly stupid to her very core. She knew full well that he, Raynor, was never a man who had to personally grace the frontlines to command the entire theater.
Even if trapped in this underground castle, he could still firmly control every armed force on Brevis through Isolde and those omnipresent "eyeballs."
If information like that was clear to Luna, there was no reason Tzeentch's followers wouldn't know it.
Those Thousand Sons Sorcerers who had lived for a thousand years—those schemers who worshiped the Architect of Fate—would see through it even more thoroughly than Luna.
Go through all this trouble, subverting cultists inside the castle and drawing him deep underground—was it truly just to trap him, the "Emperor's Chosen," so he couldn't personally grace the battlefield to boost morale?
That reason was far too flimsy.
Brevis had suffered no shortage of crises—Orks at the city gates, the ice plain defense line in dire peril—which one hadn't been a matter of life and death?
Those lurking Chaos cultists had always hidden their heads and tails, not daring to make any major moves.
Yet right when the Thousand Sons Legion expanded their Warp domain in Midtown, these people immediately popped out, coordinating seamlessly as if practiced countless times in advance.
"They are in league with each other," Raynor muttered in a low voice, his gaze turning cold.
This was no spur-of-the-moment riot; it was a carefully orchestrated joint operation.
Luna's Scourge army, the lurking Chaos cults, and the Thousand Sons Legion descending upon Midtown had long turned into a single rope.
Yet what was their core objective? Merely trapping him made no sense, and disrupting the command structure held no water either.
If the goal was to quickly take Brevis, they should have taken advantage of the chaos to expand into the Upper and Lower Cities with all their strength, rather than wasting troops on besieging an underground castle.
"Sarah," Raynor called in a deep voice in his mind.
"Broadcast the real-time battle situation in Midtown to me using the shared vision of the frontline officers."
"Understood," Sarah's voice sounded instantly, without a single moment of delay.
In the next second, countless fragmented visual feeds flooded into Raynor's mind like a rising tide.
Those were visual signals sent back by Genestealer officers embedded within the Vanguard and the PDF—scattered yet genuine, piecing together the full view of the Midtown battlefield bit by bit.