At the dinner table, Yuki and Nurgle chatted about various events from Warhammer's past.
"You're talking about how the Legions that betrayed the Imperium back then chose which faction to throw their lot in with?"
Nurgle glanced over at Mortarion. "What do you think?"
"Destiny," Mortarion replied. "Destiny drove us into Grandfather's embrace."
Typhon looked as though he wanted to interject, but ultimately, he kept his mouth shut.
"In truth, it wasn't entirely destiny," Nurgle explained slowly. "When Erda scattered all the Primarchs back then, their respective fates began to gradually shift under the interference of the Warp. The homeworld of each Primarch, and the trajectory of their upbringing, was both the consequence of destiny and its root cause."
Nurgle added softly, "This might be quite difficult to grasp, but I am doing my absolute best to explain it."
Yuki only half-understood, but he posed the most critical question: "So, was Khorne happy when he managed to claim Angron back then?"
The moment those words left his mouth, the entire room erupted into laughter.
"Hahaha! At that exact moment, Khorne's pure fury could have ascended into a daemon prince entirely on its own! Though judging by his subsequent performance, he seems reasonably satisfied. Angron's work ethic is certainly sufficient—provided those Nails are still biting into his skull."
Another wave of roaring laughter swept through the gathering. Yuno had remained silent, but she let out a gentle smile alongside the laughing crowd.
Once Yuki finished his questioning, Yuno raised a query of her own.
"Nurgle, is there a way to rapidly enhance the combat capabilities of our fleet, particularly when contending with the Immaterium?"
"Is it really appropriate for you to so blatantly ask such a thing of me, one of the four Chaos Gods?"
"The next time we clash with your forces, I can choose to hold back a little."
Nurgle did not display any resistance; instead, a quite excellent idea formed in his mind.
"Great Devourer, if that is your objective, I would advise you to subject your organisms to some form of psychic evolution." Nurgle's voice carried a hint of amusement. "And if you wish to pursue psychic evolution, I imagine you know exactly what needs to be done, do you not?"
"Go cause trouble for Tzeentch—"
The bad blood between Nurgle and Tzeentch was practically public knowledge at this point. Nurgle framing it this way was clearly intended to mess with Tzeentch's head.
"Should we pay a visit to Magnus? I haven't crossed paths with that fellow in quite some time."
"Magnus... that guy is remarkably unreliable. Looking at it that way, it was truly a stroke of good fortune that Mortarion became my Primarch."
"Grandfather, your words deeply touch me," Mortarion murmured.
Yuki kept quiet. How long could this display of wholesome filial piety actually last? He didn't care to predict it.
With the feast concluded, Yuki and Yuno prepared to take their leave. As they bid farewell, Nurgle voiced a rather bizarre inquiry: " Yuki, Yuno, do the two of you have any intentions of having a child?"
"Hmm? Is such a thing even possible?" Yuno looked exceptionally intrigued.
"Naturally. I am quite eager to bear witness to the birth of such an entity. Should you require any assistance, you are welcome to seek us out."
"Seek the help of the four of you? I would much rather go ask the fellow rotting on the Golden Throne."
"That fellow might actually be intrigued as well. Ah, right—one final little token." Nurgle produced a small vial and handed it over to Yuno. "This is a strain of Rust Plague I engineered. If the need ever arises, you can use it to give those metallic automatons a pleasant little surprise."
Back in the material universe.
Yuki turned back to address Mortarion: "This is far enough. We should begin our journey."
"Where do you intend to go?"
"To Prospero. Since Yuno wishes to bolster the fleet's psychic warfare capabilities, that is the only logical destination."
"Prospero... that was once a magnificent place," Mortarion mused, as if an old memory had been stirred. " Yuki, I must offer you a warning. Though it may be somewhat unjust to say of my brother, within the ranks of the Thousand Sons, Ahriman poses a far greater danger than Magnus."
Ahriman—the Chosen of Tzeentch, Magnus's most exceptional son, the greatest of the Thousand Sons, and an Astartes whose true depth of power was utterly unfathomable.
"How much longer do you two intend to chat?"
Yuno's prompt left Yuki with no further time to dig for specifics. He boarded the hive ship, and Mortarion watched his silhouette recede into the distance.
"Father—"
A contingent of Death Guard approached, eager to comprehend why their Primarch had displayed such profound familiarity toward a mere xenos.
Facing his genetic progeny, Mortarion offered his assessment: "We are so desperately wretched, so utterly miniscule in the grand tapestry of destiny. Yet a single individual such as him possesses the sheer audacity to bind himself to an entity we cannot hope to oppose. His will and his intellect are exceedingly rare in this cosmos.
"If you commit the grave error of viewing him as an ordinary mortal, you will blunder catastrophically. If you view him as a monster, you are closer to the truth. If you mistake him for a friend, you court absolute ruin. You can only perceive him as a vessel—one into which you pour something, and simply watch to see how it manifests and grows."
Mortarion immediately issued a directive to his legion: "Set course for Prospero. We shall bear witness to exactly how my brother handles these Tyranids."
The projection of the Planet of the Sorcerers.
Deep within the threshold of the Warp.
The Crimson King reached out, manipulating his immense psychic reserves. He had performed this act countless times before; it was the capability he took the greatest pride in, yet it was also the catalyst for all his tragedies.
Once again, he cast his gaze out to peer into the future, precisely as he had done countless times across the millennia.
"What is it that you see, my Lord?" a attending Lord of Change enquired from the side.
"I see absolutely nothing."
The Crimson King stared blankly into the absolute void stretching out before him, utterly bewildered.
Why?
Why is my psychic foresight yielding nothing but absolute vacancy?
"What target were you attempting to observe?"
"I was monitoring the mortal forces assembling near the ruins of Prospero. They act precisely as they always do, marching blindly toward their own demise. Why has my psychic divination failed me?"
Magnus sank into a deep, brooding contemplation. He channeled his psychic might once more, yet the results remained entirely stagnant. He was thoroughly confounded. Why was this happening?
After a moment of silence, he turned his gaze upon the Tzeentchian daemon. "Why did Tzeentch dispatch you to my side? Did He foresee this exact scenario?"
The daemon remained silent, offering no answers to his inquiries.
"Must I force your true name from your lips? Do you wish to endure a far more agonizing torment under my sorcery? Or perhaps you would prefer to be delivered into the hands of my wretched brother, Mortarion, to be subjected to his tortures?"
The daemon abruptly flapped its wings. Magnus attempted to seize it directly, but a powerful surge of raw warp energy manifested to obstruct his grasp.
"Look closer, Magnus. You must think—think deeper."
Magnus froze, the overbearing will of the Architect of Fate leaving him with no avenue for resistance. He turned his attention back to his prophetic divinations.
It remained an absolute, suffocating blackness.
Why?
Suddenly, a spark of realization clicked within Magnus's mind. He expanded the perimeter of his prophetic search, yet it remained dark, endlessly dark.
Only after broadening the scope of his psychic divination to encompass several entire star sectors did a completely different perspective finally resolve itself.
Magnus realized, with a sudden jolt of profound dread, the sheer gravity of the situation.
That was no ordinary darkness. That was the Shadow in the Warp.
"Hive Fleet Aether-Kronos has been detected."
The Astropathic Choirs relayed this dire tidings to the Imperium.
Hive Fleet Aether-Kronos—this newly entered Tyranid fleet—had inflicted structural damage upon the Imperium of Man far exceeding their bleakest estimations. They materialized with blinding speed, striking targeted sectors through their weakest defense perimeters, only to vanish into the void the moment they completed consuming the vast majority of local biomass. The Imperium had repeatedly attempted to corner and neutralize them, but this particular swarm acted with a far greater degree of calculated caution than any hive fleet before it, completely denying the Imperial Navy any opportunity to cut off their lines of retreat.
Consequently, the Astra Militarum regiments tasked with defending the system were gripped by absolute terror upon confirming the swarm's arrival. According to several prior tactical records, the Guardsmen who first pinpointed their arrival were invariably the first to be slaughtered.
"Forward this tactical data to Segmentum Command and request immediate reinforcements. Our current objective is to buy as much time as humanly possible."
A few days later, an entirely unexpected vanguard of reinforcements arrived.
Facing the sudden manifestation of several warships belonging to the Adeptus Sororitas, the Astra Militarum officers anchoring the local defense were thoroughly bewildered. Since when did the Departmento Munitorum operate with such staggering efficiency?
A vox-link was established, and an icy voice echoed through the bridge:
"We are the Battle Sisters of the Order of the Bloody Rose. We have received the Emperor's divine guidance; the enemies of the Emperor are poised to manifest within this sector. Have you prepared yourselves, and have you marked the coordinates of the Emperor's foes?"
The commanding officer relayed the exact coordinates of Hive Fleet Aether-Kronos's latest sighting to the Order of the Bloody Rose.
The tone on the other end of the vox immediately shifted. The officer could have sworn he heard these Daughters of the Emperor offering fervent praise to the great God-Emperor. Moments later, with a zeal bordering on absolute ecstasy, they demanded the local Astra Militarum forces provide combat support—they intended to deliver the Emperor's flock from the jaws of the Great Devourer.
The tactical situation was rapidly deteriorating.
Once the vox-link severed, the adjutant turned to his commanding officer. "Uh... sir? Weren't we originally supposed to avoid a direct, frontal engagement with the Tyranids? Does this mean we're forced to march to war alongside them now?"
" Yuno, how much further?"
Yuki had spent a significant portion of their journey focusing on upgrading his physical form. It felt remarkably similar to leveling up in an old video game; once your personal capabilities reached a certain peak, carving out further progression became exceedingly difficult.
There was, of course, a far simpler alternative, though it wasn't a choice Yuki could easily bring himself to accept.
That path required him to completely dissolve his individuality and fuse seamlessly into the Hive Mind, becoming a secondary consciousness template much like War. Doing so would grant him a level of raw combat efficacy that could comfortably rival or even surpass a Primarch.
But if he chose that path, would any true semblance of his independence remain? Did he possess the absolute resolve to truly become one with the Swarm?
As it stood, he was merely an entity anchoring himself to the Tyranids. If he were to merge entirely into the Hive Mind, even Yuki could not predict what would ultimately become of him.
"We're almost there," Yuno murmured, leaning in to press a gentle kiss against Yuki's cheek. "The vanguard splinter led by War is already closing in on the designated coordinates. The warp distortions in that star sector are exceptionally volatile; an anomaly could manifest at any given moment."
"Say, Yuno, why exactly do you harbor such a distinct hostility toward War? In the grand scheme of the Hive Mind, isn't she effectively identical to any other organism?"
Yuno fell silent. Yuki pressed on: "I've stopped filling my head with those idle, existential doubts. My only desire now is to continue living peacefully alongside you in this universe. If you truly despise War that much, why not just reabsorb her entirely? Every time she manifests, she looks so utterly terrified of you that it's getting a bit difficult for me to watch."
Finally, Yuno spoke: " Yuki, the architecture of the Swarm is highly specific. War is different. Though she refuses to acknowledge it and I am loath to phrase it this way, the reality remains that she is me. We are not simply a matter of a prime entity and a clone. If there ever comes a day when my singular will wavers, or if there comes a day where I desire it... she possesses the capacity to step forward as the new core of the collective.
"I love you. I have never once doubted that fundamental reality, and it is precisely that emotion that allows me to adopt this human guise to be with you. But the Hive Mind is gradually birthing other desires—cravings for entirely different concepts. We are beginning to resemble true, sentient organisms more and more, and with that shift, the elements of uncertainty and anxiety grow increasingly pronounced."
Yuki frowned, his sharp intuition flaring. He could tell Yuno was deliberately withholding something from him. "There's more to it than that, isn't there?"
Yuno sank into silence once more, her gaze fixed intently upon him as if silently pleading: Do not dig any deeper.
Ultimately, she relented.
"I am terrified that she might steal you away from me. She and I are constructed from the exact same essence; any sub-consciousness cleaved from my core matrix carries that inherent potential."
"Do you not trust me?"
"No—"
Yuno hadn't quite formulated a rational answer to that question. By all accounts of logic, her trust in Yuki should be absolute. Did she, as the Great Devourer, truly lack that level of absolute certainty and control? When had she begun losing her confidence?
"I understand your anxieties, Yuno. I know that even if I tell you right now that such a thing could never happen, it lacks any real weight. The inner workings of the Swarm are far too complex for me to fully comprehend." Yuki took a deep breath before continuing, "I won't interfere with how you choose to govern those secondary consciousness nodes, Yuno. Let's leave it at that, alright?"
Yuno nodded softly, resting her head against Yuki's shoulder. "With War managing the frontline, the strain on my mind has lessened considerably."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Do you truly believe War is merely commanding the local fleets you see on the tactical maps? War is the literal manifestation of the entire Hive Mind's absolute desire for conquest. Her manifestation has allowed her to shoulder a massive portion of the strategic combat processing for the main fleet."
"I see... Is it possible to simply excise her higher intellect and reduce her to a pure weapon of war?"
"If we strip away her higher intellect, does she not simply revert into a colossal, overgrown Tyrant Guard?"
"Fair point."
Suddenly, the discussion between Yuno and Yuki ground to an absolute halt. A fundamental alteration rippled through the interior atmosphere of the hive ship—it was a sudden, suffocating drift of toxic spores.
"Are we under attack?"
Their voyage up to this point had been remarkably secure, devoid of any hostile encounters from either the denizens of the Warp or the forces of the Imperium. Yuki immediately formulated a tactical assessment. "If it's a pathogen, could Nurgle be crossing us?"
Yuno's expression turned remarkably grim as a sudden realization dawned upon her. "This is bad... how could this happen—"
"What's wrong?"
"Another sub-consciousness is actively fracturing into existence."
"Are you kidding me?"
Yuno surged to her feet and sprinted out of the chamber, with Yuki following closely at her heels. They cleared the interior corridors of the bio-ship, emerging onto the outer chitinous hull. Before Yuki's eyes, an incredibly bizarre, jarring spectacle unfolded.
Several gargantuan hive ships had begun to violently coil and merge into one another. At the epicenter of their overlapping biomass, a colossal, pulsating structure resembling a cocoon was rapidly taking shape. Yuki could distinctly perceive an absolute, bottomless reservoir of vital energy and a manic, ravenous drive for life radiating from within it.
" Yuno, what is that—"
Yuno dropped to her knees, clutching her head in apparent agony. The sudden manifestation of this crisis left Yuki completely panicked. "What's happening to you?"
Without a shred of hesitation, he directly interfaced with the synapse network, desperate to discern the root cause of the anomaly.
The vanguard fleet continued its relentless advance.
Eleven had comfortably settled into her role as War's chief lieutenant. The cooperation between the two had proven to be exceptionally seamless.
Presently, they commanded roughly half of the total tonnage assigned to Hive Fleet Aether-Kronos, executing suppression sweeps across the star systems flanking Prospero to liquidate local resistance and harvest critical intelligence data, paving the way for the Swarm's targeted psychic evolution.
"I can't shake this incredibly bizarre sensation," Eleven noted abruptly, her gaze fixed on a distant celestial body—an industrial world belonging to the Imperium of Man, already cataloged for their upcoming consumption phase.
"Elaborate."
"By all accounts of cosmic logic, the psychic resonance surrounding Prospero should be exceptionally volatile. Yet, why are the local warp fluctuations across this sector performing at an unexpectedly low baseline?"
"Could our Shadow in the Warp simply be dampening the background noise to that extent?" War surmised.
"No, this does not bear the signatures of a standard synapse suppression. It carries the distinct markers of an intentional, localized suppression on their part." Eleven paused, then queried, "War, is it within the realm of possibility for the Emperor's fleet of flesh to be ensnared within the Warp?"
"The possibility exists, but to execute a suppression of that magnitude would require the direct, personal intervention of a Chaos God... Speaking of which, what about the main fleet? Can we re-establish a stable link?"
The physical distance separating the two splinters of the hive fleet was immense; even utilizing the instantaneous pathways of the synapse network, data transmission required a brief buffer window.
The moment she realized she could not forge a stable connection to the main fleet, War finally recognized the sheer gravity of the situation.
"What about the primary hive fleet outside the galactic rim?"
War had given Yuno her absolute solemn vow that she would never act outside the boundaries of her designated authority. But the current parameters had shifted. The prime ancestral attributes she had inherited from Yuno allowed her to temporarily step into her creator's shoes to anchor the network.
Moments later, War's expression turned utterly horrified.
"How can this be... Yuno's unique consciousness signature has vanished entirely. The Great Devourer has reverted back to its ancient state of collective, unaligned unconsciousness—"
War remembered that primal state perfectly. Originally, the entirety of the Tyranid race was nothing more than a mindless, unaligned monstrosity; it was only after crossing paths with Yuki that this fundamental reality had reshaped itself.
But now, why had the Hive Mind suddenly regressed into that primal void?
An absolute crisis had to have compromised Yuno and Yuki's position.
"Invert our trajectory immediately! We must ascertain exactly what has befallen Yuno and Yuki!"
War and Eleven instantly rerouted the headings of every single hive ship whose functional status could still be verified, charting a direct course toward the coordinates where Yuno and Yuki had last dropped a synapse beacon.