The charge of the plasma annihilator could be felt through the bones of the world.
High above Theta-Prime, the Warmaster Titan Axiom Invictus stood like a god poised in judgment, its reactor output climbing beyond safe thresholds. Warning sigils flooded every command channel, machine-spirits screaming in binary distress.
Its Princeps Kaelor Vhane did not relent.
"Target locked," came the voice, calm and absolute.
Below, within the fractured vault chamber, Archmagos Ferrum-Rho finalized his equation.
"[Analysis]:
STC secured: 12.4%
STC compromised: 63.7%
STC denied: 100%
[Conclusion]: There was no choice."
The chamber trembled violently as the structure above continued to collapse. Chunks of ferrocrete and adamantium crashed down, crushing both Skitarii and Drukhari alike. Fires spread. Systems failed. Gravity fluctuated as ancient stabilizers broke apart.
At the center of the structure, the STC blurred with intensity. Systems activating in many areas though defunct. The sacred template is Awake.
Holographic streams intensified, flooding the chamber with impossible knowledge.
Biological schematics unfolded in mid-air toxin solutions, forgotten enhancement procedures, constructs that blurred the boundary between biology and energy.
Even Ferrum-Rho, who had briefly seen the secrets trapped within, registered deviation, overwhelming information stacks were transferred into his memory.
This was not a fragment, it still has its core functioning.
The Drukhari surged, their restraint was lifted as they moved forward with renewed vigor. No longer precise, no longer measured. It became a free for all.
"I can finally achieve longevity"
"Look at those enhancement, i could vie for Archon"
"Urien Rakarth, i am coming for your seat at the council" Archon Leprio said with a smile on his face.
"Kill the mon-keigh, and all that will be ours" he shouted at the top of his lungs
Kabalite warriors abandoned defensive formations, sprinting directly toward the STC projection. Talos engines forced their way forward, ignoring incoming fire as they carved a path through Skitarii ranks.
Losses spiked as a result. Established enemy assault patterns were no longer useful
"[Reporting]: Twenty thousand Skitarii reduced to seventeen. Now at sixteen." Magos Xerath-17 reported
Ferrum-Rho advanced through the chaos, his massive form absorbing impacts that would have obliterated lesser constructs. His limb extension lashed outward, impaling, obliterating, crushing, tearing.
But even he could not be everywhere, and the drukhari were closing in. Archon Leprio moved again. Although wounded and slower, it did not diminish his combat ability.
He blurred forward, his remaining blade flashing in a strike aimed not at Ferrum-Rho, but past him. It was an attack aimed toward the STC.
"[Conclusion]: Incorrect course of action," Ferrum-Rho intoned.
His cognition engines had already solved the motion.
An arm carrying his power sword intercepted, slamming into the Archon mid-lunge colliding with his sword and driving him sideways through a collapsing pillar.
The impact shattered stone and metal alike, burying both combatants in a storm of debris. The Archon emerged first, bruised but not defeated, he also began calculating too.
Above them, a glow intensified. Princeps Kaelor Vhane of Axiom Invictus spoke a single word.
"Fire."
Then a beam descended down onto the vault. It was not light, it was an erasure.
A column of contained stellar fury that tore through atmosphere, structure, and void alike. It struck Theta-Prime with apocalyptic force, punching through layers of manufactorum and bedrock in an instant.
Everything in its path ceased. The vault chamber disintegrated.
Ferrum-Rho had already moved, just before the shot was made, while others contemplated the devastation. With a boost from his flight systems, he accelerated past the speed of sound.
In the fraction of a second before impact, he enacted a contingency buried deep within his systems. Power diverted. Shielding rerouted.
He arrived at the core, his arms locked around the STC core housing, dragging it downward into a sub-vault as the annihilation beam struck.
Silence followed with the collapse of the vault. Magos Xerath-17, Magos Kroll, and Magos Theron, all assumed that all was lost.
"[Directive]: Begin sweeps, locate the Archmagos" Magos Xerath-17, commanded the Skitarii.
"[Query]: Activation of Niner-Echo-Maxum protocol, Is there concurrence" he continued
"[Response]: Negative. Activation protocol must be carried out after physical confirmation"
"[Data processing]....[Conclusion]: Acknowledges."
Entire sections of Theta-Prime caved inward, swallowed by the molten ruin left in the beam's wake. Shockwaves rippled outward, flattening what remained of the battlefield.
Titans staggered, Two Reavers fell. A Warhound simply ceased to exist.
When the dust began to settle, what was left was a broken surface. Molten slag flowed through the area, the majority of the units left continued to experience radioactive interference.
But deep beneath the forge, the battle still lived. Ferrum-Rho rose from the wreckage, severely damaged.
Entire sections of his outer plating were gone. Internal systems flickered. One of his primary locomotion limbs dragged uselessly behind him.
He is functional, and most of all he was able to successfully acquire the STC core and contain it.
Across from him the Archon stood, battered, bruised, and on his last foot, but still alive.
His armor was ruined. His body torn apart in places that should have killed him outright. But his eyes burned with something fierce.
There was nothing left to say, they moved at the same time.
The Archon struck first, faster than before, driven by desperation. His blade pierced Ferrum-Rho's chassis, cutting deep into core systems.
Ferrum-Rho did not resist. Using the combat data gleaned from a Custodian, he submitted his mind to the combat program. Instead of calculating he simply allowed the attack to reach him.
As the Archon committed fully to the strike Ferrum-Rho's remaining arm closed against his torso. Locking around him his DAoT weapon powered to maximum output.
At this range, there would be no possibility of evasion. Archon Luprio stopped struggling and accepted the inevitable. There was no explosion, no sound, the Archon simply vanished.
Ferrum-Rho released the empty space where his enemy had been.
Silence returned.
Above, the remnants of the Drukhari force began to withdraw. Their webway tear flickered, unstable now, their leadership gone. Raider craft disengaged. Surviving fighters broke orbit, vanishing back into the wound in reality.
They had failed in their harvest. Ferrum-Rho stood alone in the ruins of Theta-Prime. Looking at the destruction that had been done to his century plus of planing, and decades of implementation.
Status reports filtered in in from Xerath-17 as soon as a connection was established
"[Reporting]:
Skitarii remaining: 11,203
Warhounds operational: 31
Reavers: 18
Warlords: 9
Knights: 6
Warmasters: 3"
'[Data processing]:...
[Analysis]: Losses catastrophic, but within tolerance range.
[Conclusion]: STC secured, and enemies routed. Categorized under mission success'
Ferrum-Rho turned toward it. He already began recalculating the cost of getting the forge world getting back into maximum functionality.
Repair protocols initiated, reconstruction pathways forming, production outputs projected. Although costly, the war had been won, with new benefits to come.
Archmagos Ferrum-Rho began the work of rebuilding.