Danger
The gaze turns south.
Across thousands of kilometers. Through the lingering pall of green poison.
An hour earlier—Southern Hemisphere of Plenty III. The Great Plains Region.
---
The fertile farmlands were gone.
What remained was a slaughterhouse.
The earth shook beneath the advance of tens of thousands of Leman Russ battle tanks. Their engines roared like a rolling storm.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
Artillery thundered across the horizon. Lascannons, plasma bursts, battle cannon shells—interweaving into a lethal lattice of light and fire.
At the center of it all, near a towering Warlord-class Titan striding like a metal god, a figure in radiant gold carved a path through the Nurgle horde.
Roboute Guilliman.
Each swing of the Emperor's Sword released a sweeping arc of golden fire. Plague Marines, shambling carriers, corrupted war engines—anything that came within reach dissolved like wax in a furnace.
"Advance! Do not falter!"
Guilliman kicked aside a bloated Nurgle spawn. The multi-ton beast flew like debris, smashing into a rotting Rhino transport behind it.
"For Macragge! For the Regent!"
Marneus Calgar fought at his flank, the Gauntlets of Ultramar blazing with crackling power fields. Every strike reduced plague warriors to shattered ruin. Terminators of the First Company advanced in disciplined formation, storm bolters roaring.
Elsewhere, Chief Librarian Tigurius raised his force staff. A spear of psychic lightning split the sky, obliterating a corrupted Helldrake diving toward a Titan's knee joint.
For a moment—
The tide shifted.
Then the world changed.
"Gurgle…"
The ground softened.
What had been solid earth turned to something obscene—flesh-like, ulcerated, riddled with teeth. Tanks sank as foundations liquefied beneath them.
Above, the cloud layer sagged low, swollen and bruised.
A stench pierced rebreathers and sealed helms alike.
Three immense warp rifts tore open reality.
And from them, doom descended.
---
First came a vast palanquin borne aloft by a tide of Nurglings.
Seated upon it was a colossal Great Unclean One, even larger than most of its kind. In one hand it cradled a bubbling cauldron; with the other it lazily tossed shrieking creatures into the brew.
Ku'gath Plaguefather.
"Ahh… why such violence?"
His voice rolled like distant thunder, vibrating tank hulls.
"So many lives wasted. Let them embrace the plague. Then there will be peace."
To his left, the earth split.
A towering daemon of hardened, keratinous growth hauled itself upward. Its body was layered in barnacle-like plates over raw muscle. It dragged behind it a colossal rusted iron hook.
Rotigus.
With a contemptuous swing, the hook snagged a Leman Russ Destroyer attempting to fire.
Metal screamed.
The sixty-ton tank was lifted like a child's toy and hurled into another vehicle. Both detonated in a blossom of twisted steel.
Then—
The third figure descended from the sky.
Wings tattered yet majestic beat slowly, each movement spreading clouds of corpse-flies.
Barbarus-pattern armor, grotesquely warped. A titanic scythe clutched in skeletal hands.
Mortarion.
Daemon Primarch of the Death Guard.
He touched down fifty meters before Guilliman. Flies carpeted the ground at his feet.
"Cease fire!"
Guilliman raised his hand.
The guns fell silent nearby.
All who stood close felt it—
The shift.
This was no longer a mortal engagement.
It was a clash of demigods.
"Roboute."
Mortarion's voice rasped through his rebreather grille.
"You look weary. Your armor groans. Your soul strains."
He stepped forward. Silence, his great scythe, trailed toxic vapor across the earth.
"Why persist? Struggle only deepens the wound."
He gestured toward sinking tanks and shattered corpses.
"Look. Metal rots. Your soldiers die. This is your vaunted order? The glory of that carrion corpse enthroned?"
Guilliman did not retreat.
The Emperor's Sword flared brighter, forcing back the poison.
"I see only cowardice, Mortarion."
His voice was iron.
"You once raged against tyrants and slavers. You spoke of breaking chains."
He stepped forward, meeting his brother's gaze.
"And now?"
"You serve the greatest enslaver in existence. A puppet dancing for a god who rots you from within."
"You are more pitiful now than you were in life."
Mortarion's aura darkened.
"Silence!"
His wings snapped wide, a storm of flies exploding outward.
"I am the Lord of Death! I command decay and rebirth! And you—are nothing but a tool of that withered tyrant!"
"Ku'gath! Rotigus! Advance!"
He lunged.
A blur of gray-green corruption.
Silence carved through the air toward Guilliman's throat.
"If you crave death—have it!"
Steel met steel.
"Clang!!"
The Emperor's Sword locked against Silence.
The shockwave blasted craters into the earth.
Guilliman braced, both hands gripping his blade. The Armor of Fate strained under the corrosive miasma saturating the air.
"You falter, Roboute," Mortarion hissed.
"Or perhaps… I have surpassed you."
He pressed down.
Guilliman dropped to one knee.
Then Ku'gath acted.
The Plaguefather did not charge.
He dipped his ladle into the cauldron and flicked a spoonful of bubbling violet slurry toward Guilliman.
"For you. A special recipe."
The liquid became mist midair.
Guilliman tried to disengage—but Mortarion held him fast.
"Ssszz—"
The purple vapor enveloped him.
Not simple toxin.
A tailored contagion—engineered by Ku'gath himself. A conceptual plague crafted to afflict even Primarch physiology.
Guilliman coughed.
It felt like molten blades shredding his lungs.
His transhuman resilience faltered.
Vision blurred.
The Emperor's Sword flickered.
Mortarion saw the opening.
He withdrew Silence—
And struck again.
Thud!
The scythe bit through the Armor of Fate at the shoulder joint.
Black blood sprayed.
Guilliman staggered.
Before he could recover—
A rusted iron hook slammed into his back.
Rotigus.
The impact forced him fully to his knees.
Now the three daemon lords formed a triangle around him.
Poisonous fog thickened.
Starlight vanished.
Across the battlefield, Titans faltered. Tanks drowned. Astartes were overwhelmed.
At the center—
The Lord Commander of the Imperium knelt, wounded, surrounded by gods of decay.
Despair settled like a shroud.