The encroachment of the Tyranid Swarm was like a cataclysmic tsunami.
To those anchoring the defensive positions under their assault, it felt precisely like standing upon a shoreline, watching a massive tidal wave hundreds of meters high crashing straight down upon them. Standard assets could only expect to be utterly submerged and violently ground to pieces beneath the weight of such a wave.
The sorceries wielded by the Thousand Sons could warp localized space and reverse chronological flows; a single psychic storm generated by their cabal possessed the baseline capacity to thoroughly scour the surface of an entire world.
Yet confronted with the terrifying, infinite volume of the Tyranid Swarm, even the devastating output of these arts proved entirely incapable of halting the momentum of the living wave. Within a mere handful of hours, dozens of Thousand Sons sorcerers locked in combat with the Necrons were cleanly consumed by the Swarm alongside their mechanical adversaries.
And this exact variable was precisely why Yuno had directed her primary echelons to make transit to Prospero across vast distances. Yuno understood that the tearing open of the Great Rift was an unavoidable chronological nexus point. Once that threshold was crossed, the forces of Chaos across the length and breadth of the galaxy would experience an immense surge in power. To preserve their strategic advantage beyond that event horizon, the Tyranids had to continuously evolve their psychic capabilities.
Her primary objective for this campaign was anchored strictly to that goal. Though Prospero itself lay in absolute ruin, the unique metaphysical bond linking the Thousand Sons to this world meant that the mathematical probability of intercepting elements of the XV Legion was at its absolute peak within these specific coordinates.
Historically, the genesis of the Zoanthropes had been engineered by harvesting and coding the genetic data of Aeldari psykers. The Hive Mind had officially demonstrated that even the anomalous traits of psychic potential could be systematically integrated into the Swarm through directed consumption.
By consuming the Thousand Sons and harvesting their gene-seed, the Swarm could archive their specialized genetic markers within the primary bio-vaults. Over subsequent decades, these traits would be seamlessly encoded into entirely new strains of bio-forms, monumentally amplifying the future psychic combat efficacy of the Tyranid species.
"That structure is—"
Yuno swept her gaze upward. Across the distant perimeters, a massive network of colossal spires began to rapidly erupt around the primary tower. While their architectural silhouette bore a superficial similarity to the pyramids deployed by the Thousand Sons, a clinical breakdown revealed an entirely distinct paradigm of design.
"Are those Necron Obelisks? It appears they are finally preparing to deploy their absolute baseline of strategic capabilities."
Hum—!
The distinctive, heavy reverberation of phase technology tearing through realspace echoed across the grid. Yuno turned her head just as an infinite vanguard of Necron legions materialized directly onto the coordinates.
"Heh."
Several Norn Emissaries and Hive Tyrants descended violently from the upper atmosphere, flanked by high-tier heavy organisms projecting long-range acid salvos, while waves of Haruspexes surged forward into the vanguard to lock the Necron phalanxes into a brutal war of attrition.
Yuno withheld her personal intervention; she was perfectly aware that the solitary entity worthy of her active engagement had yet to step onto the field.
Yet within a mere fraction of a second, that precise variable materialized.
An immense projection of a colossal throne solidified across the coordinates, flanked by a phalanx of Triarch Praetorians and their heavy constructs.
Seated upon the dais were three Necron Phaerons.
A Phaeron typically held absolute dominion over an entire stellar dynasty. Following the formal return of Szarekh, the Silent King, to the galactic theater, he had selected two such rulers to reconstitute the Triarch Council. Naturally, in accordance with the long-standing political traditions governing the Necron species, these two Phaerons functioned exclusively as puppets for the Silent King—mere vessels engineered to broadcast his dictates to all lesser existences.
"A pathetic, collective consciousness of biological anomalies. Your current material manifestation is thoroughly repulsive."
"Szarekh, you sang a remarkably distinct tune when your vanguard crossed paths with my primary hive fleets all those millennia ago," Yuno countered, her consciousness projection dripping with unadulterated sarcasm. "Do you genuinely evaluate the liquidation of a solitary, minor vanguard tendril as a monumental strategic triumph? Or does your consciousness harbor a sense of profound pride over the reality that you managed to escape my absolute gaze with your life intact? Well... I suppose survival under those conditions is indeed a metric worthy of your pride."
"The Silent King does not experience irritation over such laughable, self-deluding mockery. In that ancient epoch, the Silent King shattered your vanguard tendril utilizing nothing more than his Song of Oblivion and a handful of specialized legions. At this present juncture, with the collective unity of every Necron dynasty across the galaxy consolidated beneath his banner, you shall merely be cataloged as another glorious notation appended to his eternal title."
Yuno stood with her arms casually crossed, her tone remaining entirely mocking.
"Indeed. And during that precise engagement, nearly ninety percent of your collective legions were systematically devoured by my matrix. Had your vessels lacked the operational parameters of your inertialess drives, your personal framework would have failed to secure extraction. When all variables are calculated, you still fled the field, did you not? Not long ago, Yuki materialized directly before your vessel to mock your position, and I am genuinely at a loss to comprehend what variables fuel your pride. Ah... I recall now. During your last engagement, you were reduced to forging a desperate alliance with humanity just to match our vanguard. Cooperating with such an incredibly fragile biological strain, only to execute a frantic retreat in the final accounting—how thoroughly comical."
Every syllable Yuno articulated was an absolute, objective reality. Left with no logical rebuttal, the mouthpieces of Szarekh lapsed into silence. The towering projection raised its staff, directing a brilliant, blinding beam of absolute energy to crash straight down upon her coordinates.
Yet to an entity of Yuno's tier, the assault was entirely meaningless.
She declined to even shift her physical positioning, effortlessly absorbing the absolute brunt of the kinetic and thermal discharge with her raw physical vessel.
"If your consciousness harbors a genuine desire to inflict structural trauma upon my form, you should at least utilize a weapon commanding a sufficient operational threshold. Why don't you deploy the exact mechanism you utilized to fracture the C'tan all those eons ago?"
Szarekh continuously regulated the resolution of his projection, evidently harboring a distinct aversion to exposing his true visage.
An immense volume of Necron constructs was systematically hurled into the melee; a Seraptek Heavy Construct engaged in a brutal exchange with several massive bio-titans.
Yuno felt her patience thoroughly evaporating. Just as she prepared to articulate a command, a devastating arc-lightning storm violently swept across the entirety of the theater.
An assault of this immense magnitude was completely indiscriminate; Tyranid bio-forms and Necron legions alike were instantly disassembled and atomized into raw molecular dust within the raging electrostatic tempest.
Nothing but a handful of her most powerful apex units remained standing within Yuno's immediate perimeter.
"It appears your consciousness has also lost the desire to tolerate further delays, seeing as you have unleashed a tool of this nature."
"Enjoy the parameters of this engagement. The Silent King harbors a distinct hope that your capabilities have not been excessively eroded by the corrupting tendrils of romance; otherwise, even when the Silent King secures your ultimate termination, the victory will command absolutely no structural honor."
The projection dissolved into nothingness. Yuno deduced that the primary catalyst for Szarekh's rapid departure was the reality that if his projection remained anchored to the grid, the ultimate weapon he had just unleashed would invariably re-register his own energy signature as its primary target.
The humanoid manifestation before her clutched a long spear. Its physical silhouette appeared remarkably unassuming, yet the baseline physical laws governing the material universe were violently twisting and rewriting themselves around its immediate perimeter.
A shard of the C'tan—The Void Dragon.
"Mag'ladroth. It has been an age. I never calculated that your existence would be reduced to a state this pathetic."
Unexpectedly, the tone animating Yuno's consciousness carried a trace of ancient familiarity.
"The Great Devourer—"
The fractured shards of the shattered star god were a mere shadow of the entity's primordial, complete state. Confronted with its gaze, Yuno found her thoughts drifting back to events that transacted a vast, unfathomable duration ago.
This was a historical tapestry that even the Silent King, Szarekh, possessed absolutely no structural understanding of.
"Mag'ladroth, during the epoch when our consciousness first intersected, your kind lacked even a basic material vessel. You were mere energetic entities charting a course across the interstellar void. Yet now, your existence is permanently caged within the boundaries of this solitary galaxy. Though I suppose I possess no moral leverage to criticize your placement—after all, hundreds of millions of years later, have I not arrived at these exact coordinates myself?"
Yuno recalled the variables of that ancient era—an experience so deeply buried in the absolute depths of time that even her own consciousness had nearly lost the memory.
"Come then, Mag'ladroth. Let us personally evaluate whether your current shattered state possesses the operational parameters to dismantle my present material vessel."
Monitoring the trajectory of the conflict from his secure command node, the Silent King registered a sudden, bizarre anomaly the exact microsecond the Void Dragon declined to initiate an immediate frontal assault.
From what cradle the Tyranid species had originally emerged, and the precise cosmic mechanics that birthed the C'tan, remained variables that even a sovereign of Szarekh's magnitude could not decipher.
Could it be... that a structural link of some nature existed between the Great Devourer and the Star Gods?