Return
"A counterattack?" Eileen thought bitterly. "Old Huang… my hands are almost shattered. I can't even properly hold the sword, let alone activate anything…"
[Who said I need you to activate your aura?]
Old Huang's tone turned sly.
[Do you remember those Death Guard Sicarius and the others killed earlier? When those rusted cans died, everyone assumed they just dissolved into filth and ash.]
[Heh. While they were busy watching the fireworks, I opened a little 'backdoor' in the warp and skimmed off the most primal energy that spilled out when they died.]
[It stinks, sure. But it's genuine warp-essence from the Fourteenth Legion. It carries their original imprint—the scent this traitor knows better than anyone.]
Eileen blinked. "What are we going to do, blow him up with it?"
[Blow him up? Too crude. Too merciful.]
Old Huang's voice sharpened.
[To kill someone, first break their spirit.]
[Doesn't this dung-soaked preacher love rambling about 'eternity'? About 'loyalty' to his green master?]
[Good. Then let him meet an old friend. Let's see how loyal he feels after that reunion.]
An unseen force steadied her.
Eileen wiped the blood from her mouth and forced herself upright, leaning heavily on the still-burning short sword.
Typhus loomed closer, plague fumes curling from his armor.
"Karas Typhon…" she called hoarsely.
He stopped.
Mockery twisted beneath the fused helm. "What? Ready to beg?"
"Beg?"
Her smile was thin, blood-streaked, defiant.
"You really think I'm alone? You abandoned wretch… you think I only have the dead mortals behind me?"
She lifted the short sword—
Not toward him.
Toward the ground.
"Then I'll show you… who's truly alone."
She drove the blade into the plague-eaten earth.
"Thud!"
"In the name of the Supreme Emperor, Lord of Mankind—rise upon this living soil and claim the blood-debt of the oath-breaker!"
Old Huang insisted it sounded more dramatic that way.
The stolen warp-essence surged down the blade and into the earth.
Buzz—
The swirling green miasma around them faltered.
Then froze.
Across the ground spread a color alien to rot.
Ash-gray.
Dry, stone-like gray mixed with dark, dried-blood crimson.
The humid stench of decay vanished.
In its place came the scent of old gunpowder, scorched engines, and vows sworn in fire.
Typhus hesitated.
For the first time.
"What… is this?"
His voice lacked certainty.
The aura was familiar.
Painfully familiar.
It was the scent of another age—
When he had still been Karas Typhon.
When he had fought beneath the banners of the Great Crusade.
A pale, heatless flame ignited where Eileen's sword pierced the earth.
Within that ghostly light—
Figures emerged.
One.
Two.
Ten.
Silent.
They wore ancient Mark III "Iron" pattern power armor—plate heavy and brutal, predating the Heresy's damnation. Their forms were not flesh, but burning spirit.
No rusted green.
No bloated corruption.
Their armor was the austere ash-ceramite of Terra's legions.
And on the right arm—
Crimson.
Cole stared.
"The crimson right arm… Dusk Raiders."
The name spoken before corruption.
Before the Fourteenth Legion became the Death Guard.
Before Mortarion's fall.
The spectral warriors advanced in perfect formation.
Bolt pistols and chainswords burned with cold, pallid flame.
At their forefront—
A taller figure stepped from the brightest fire.
Bareheaded.
A stern Terran face, scarred and resolute. Bald scalp marked by an old wound.
Across his breastplate burned the twin-headed Aquila—symbol of absolute loyalty to the Emperor.
In his hands—
A two-handed greatsword wreathed in white flame.
Ancient. Imposing.
On its hilt, in High Gothic script—
[LIBERTAS]
The moment Typhus saw him—
"Clang."
The manreaper slipped from his grasp, striking the ground.
The Herald of Nurgle trembled.
Not with rage.
With fear.
"No…"
He staggered back.
"This is impossible… I watched you die! Terra! During the Siege! Your ship was destroyed—your soul should have been lost!"
"You cannot be here!"
The ghost did not answer immediately.
He raised his greatsword slowly.
Eyes of white fire locked onto the traitor.
Through ten thousand years.
Through Isstvan.
Through betrayal in the warp.
Through every broken oath.
When he finally spoke, the voice did not echo in air—
It resonated in the soul.
"I never imagined… Karas…"
"…that I would be granted the chance…"
"…to strike down this traitor… with my own hands."