Yuki rose slowly from the ruins, ripples shimmering across the psychic shield on his chest.
"How is the output this high?" he muttered to himself, the searing heat of the bolt shell still lingering on his fingertips.
Hopper's silhouette broke through the dust and smoke, her bolter spitting tongues of fire incessantly. Unlike ordinary bolt weaponry, every round she fired was enveloped in an unsettling holy energy that triggered violent fluctuations in Yuki's psychic shield.
"Where is your Paragon Warsuit, Hopper?" Yuki sidestepped a hail of gunfire, his tattered robes snapping in the turbulent air. "It's been a long time; you won't even wear a proper set of gear to greet me?"
"I don't need such things to deal with you."
Hopper calmly swapped magazines, her gaze locked firmly on Yuki. The two danced and clashed through the broken walls, bolt shells and psychic impacts colliding violently in the air.
"How has life been since you escaped?" Yuki unleashed a wave of psychic force, his tone mocking. "It seems things went well; you haven't added many new scars to your body."
"Under the protection of the God-Emperor, all suffering is as sweet as nectar."
"You've certainly turned into a version of yourself I quite dislike."
Yuki suddenly surged with power, a heavy psychic strike whipping Hopper away. She crashed through the wall behind her but scrambled to her feet immediately, wiping blood from her lip. "And you have long since become the monster I loathe."
Yuki shrugged indifferently. "Then consider me dead. I should have died back then anyway."
"No." Hopper raised her weapon again, her eyes resolute. "You must die by the God-Emperor's judgment."
From the distance came the piercing, soul-tearing shriek characteristic of the Tyranid swarm. Yuki looked toward the horizon, his gaze piercing through the ruins to see the blue armor of the Ultramarines advancing in steady formations, interspersed with several Chapters of different colors—forces drawn to Macragge for various reasons.
"It seems we'll have to end this here today, Hopper."
Hopper opened her mouth to speak, but her impending outburst of fury was interrupted by a psychic wave surging from behind her. The warp energy was so vast it felt as though a literal ocean had suddenly descended upon the battlefield.
Tigurius had arrived.
His psychic power constructed a translucent barrier, completely sealing Yuki within a zone less than a hundred meters in radius. Ancient runes flowed across the psychic wall, each line radiating suffocating pressure.
"No," Tigurius's voice was calm but brook no argument. "There will not be a next time for you."
Yuki frowned slightly. The Imperium of Man was always like this—seemingly on the verge of collapse, yet always capable of producing heroes who disregarded their own lives at the critical moment. He silently assessed the situation; facing Tigurius head-on was not a wise move.
"There's no need for this," Yuki spread his hands in a gesture of concession. "Let's just call this defense of Macragge your victory."
"We never mind adding another victory to our tally."
Tigurius's psychic lightning struck down abruptly, but its power diminished sharply as it neared Yuki, as if absorbed by some invisible force.
"Interesting..." Yuki felt the shift in the ambient psychic energy. "It seems you've made up your mind to have a real match with me."
The air around Yuki began to vibrate as psychic fluctuations gathered toward his body like a vortex, emitting a low-frequency energy hum. Tigurius, a top-tier psyker himself, immediately recognized this as a charging state.
Almost at the exact same moment Yuki finished gathering his power, both men struck.
Chronologically, Tigurius had started his charge later, yet he unleashed his power simultaneously with Yuki—the gap in their raw capability was beginning to show. The invisible psychic torrents collided fiercely in the air. Though unseen by the naked eye, the pressure of the clash caused rubble within a hundred meters to hover, and the ground cracked in spiderweb patterns. Two distinct psychic signatures suppressed and tore at each other.
As the psychic struggle reached a deadlock, Tigurius thrust his staff upward. The psychic gem atop it burst with blinding light just as Yuki charged forward like an arrow from a bow. Staff and bone-blade clashed repeatedly, sending out sprays of psychic sparks.
Tigurius's every strike was precise and controlled. Yuki's assault was as frantic as a storm, his bone-blades lunging like vipers from every angle. For the most part, Yuki maintained a human-sized form, as increasing his mass did not significantly boost his strength; he preferred using that marginal power to enhance his agility instead.
In the minds of many, Astartes Librarians occupied the niche of a "mage," responsible for providing psychic protection against the Warp. However, Librarians never forgot that they were Astartes first and psykers second. Tigurius's combat skills were more refined than those of many veteran Space Marines. Facing Yuki's close-quarters combat and psychic assaults, he attacked with composure while maintaining the barrier that blocked Yuki's retreat.
The Astartes were a collective. Terminators had been deployed, and the elites of the Ultramarines were returning. No matter how high this monster's individual combat power was, it could not withstand an entire Chapter.
Yuki realized this as well. Dammit, these guys.
Yuki had to find a way to escape. Just then—
A combat blade suddenly pierced his back. It was an Astartes combat knife, wielded by Hopper; the blade was so large that she had to hold it with both hands.
When had she grabbed that knife?
In that fleeting moment, he noticed another bizarre detail. As a mortal—at least compared to an Astartes or himself—how had Hopper bypassed the psychic storm between him and Tigurius to get so close?
He saw Tigurius looking equally surprised. A faint golden flame burned around Hopper's body. Though it lasted only an instant, it was enough to grant her the power to kill this body.
"Dammit, Golden Corpse... you don't show up when I'm about to die, but you show up to pull this crap when someone's trying to kill me."
Stabbed and slowed, Yuki took a direct psychic blast from Tigurius after being knocked back. However, the true threat in Yuki's eyes was no longer Tigurius, but Hopper. She now possessed the potential to be chosen by the Emperor as a Living Saint. Even if this body was lost here and he had to endure Yuno's mockery back home, he had to kill Hopper!
He lunged once more, his body swelling gigantically until he reached the size of a Primarch within seconds. Dozens of tentacles and bone-blades swept toward Hopper.
Hopper showed no fear, gripping a chainsword. Tigurius, however, would not sit idle.
"I know what you intend, monster. Do not even dream of it!"
"Then watch and see!"
A massive psychic explosion erupted. Disregarding whether the blast would harm himself, Yuki forced even Tigurius to contract his psychic defenses. In that moment, Yuki's body split. From within the massive frame emerged a hideous, two-meter-tall individual that lunged toward Hopper with lightning speed.
"Goodbye, Hopper!"