53 Blood Sea (5k)

Angron had met Horus Lupercal many times.

From a bloodline perspective, they are brothers. Although they do not look alike and come from different backgrounds, they do indeed inherit the blood of the Emperor, which is quite interesting considering the vast differences between them.

You see, Horus Lupercal was from Cthonia, and he was a gangster; that mark is very evident in him. And Angron? He was a gladiator, savage, and had to be savage.

The Radiance of the Wolf God was known even in the wild and remote borderlands of the Imperium, yet the commander of the Twelfth Legion remained remarkably low-key. No Remembrancers was ever able to interview him in any meaningful way, and people knew far more about the War Hounds than about him.

This difference is striking, and not entirely due to upbringing. But none of that matters, because Angron always respected his brother.

Until now.

Until he boarded the Vengeful Spirit.

Kharn was the first to notice Angron's unusual behavior; he discovered that his Primarch was gently rubbing his teeth together.

At first, he thought it was the Butcher's Nails that caused it. That damned instrument of torture was forever tormenting the War Hounds' Primarch, and he himself regarded this pain as part of his glory.

But he soon discovered that the truth was probably not so, because the Vengeful Spirit was too dark and too foul.

The stench stirred up some memories buried deep within Kharn's mind. He couldn't help but clench his teeth and look around, only to find that everyone who had experienced the same thing back then was wearing a similar expression.

He then knew that this was not his imagination.

Clinging to a sliver of hope, Kharn looked up at his Primarch, just as Angron was looking down at him. In that instant, their eyes met, and a silent exchange was completed.

They remained silent as the Primarch Guard, numbering five hundred, escorted Angron slowly forward. The Sons of Horus was leading the way, maintained his composure, proudly recounting the journey, seemingly unaware of the slightly tense atmosphere.

They traveled on until they reached the royal court of the Wolf God.

Here, everything is radiant and pure white, honor is everywhere, and every banner bears the mark of bloodshed. The Radiance of the stars, reflected by the glass overhead, is transformed into a pale golden Radiance by the skillful craftsmen, illuminating the Throne.

Ivory, gold, and silver—these worldly luxuries—become captivating under the light of their owners. A mortal king might need these to assert his status, but he doesn't; he is king in himself.

Horus Lupercal sat Throne, smiling, his countenance surpassing all adornment. Space Wolves surrounded him, their elite troops, fully armed, adding to his majesty, but none could compare to the wolf god himself.

He didn't even need to speak; his mere presence was enough to make him the most dazzling person in the royal court.

Angron finally let out a slow, heavy breath.

"No." He muttered to himself, lowering his head. The Butcher's Nails began to writhe in response to its host's emotional reaction, its tip flaring and reflecting light.

"Brother!"

Horus rose enthusiastically from his Throne and strode down the steps. His steps were firm yet swift, and he opened his arms before he even reached Angron, as if to give him a hug.

Faced with such goodwill, the commander of the Twelfth Legion raised his hand to stop him.

"What's wrong, brother?" Horus asked, puzzled.

His Radiance remained unchanged, the starlight inexplicably following him, making his face appear hazy and dreamlike. Angron slowly shook his head without explanation, and his guards began to disperse spontaneously.

He strode forward and approached Horus. The two Primarch locked eyes, one with a constant smile, the other filled with sorrow. After a moment, Angron broke the silence.

"I spotted the Pride of the Emperor in your fleet. Is Fulgrim there too?"

"Of course he's here, brother," Horus said. "We just had a little argument; he doesn't quite agree with the tactics I want to use on the Istvaan III."

Where is he?

"He's right here, Angron," the Wolf God replied with a smile.

"My question is, where is he?" Angron said, enunciating each word clearly. "Answer me, Horus."

"Why bother getting to the bottom of this?" Shepherd Wolf looked at him inquisitively. The atmosphere around them had already begun to change because of these two short sentences, but no one dared to speak up to stop the change in atmosphere.

The War Hounds didn't want to, Sons of Horus dared not.

Angron stopped asking questions, and a hint of bloodshot gradually appeared in his deep blue eyes. Horus frowned, and his expression gradually calmed down from confusion.

"I seem to know you poorly, brother," Horus said, gazing at Angron with an expression that was strangely calm at this moment.

"Indeed," Angron said. "You know very little about me; you don't know what I've been through."

Are you referring to your past as a lowly slave?

"No." Angron shook his head, ignoring Horus's mockery.

If someone were to examine this moment closely, they might even find a hint of a cold smile, a mixture of pity and sorrow, on his twitching face.

A few seconds later, Horus sighed with regret but also determination.

"It seems you've made up your mind," said the Wolf God. "But before we begin, I want to make one last effort. Listen to me, Angron."

He looked at his brother earnestly.

"No matter what you try to do, you won't succeed. Trust me, okay?"

The Angron's response was a simple, direct, and powerful punch.

The cold gauntlet struck the Wolf God's chest, the metal clanging with a deafening roar. The War Hounds' attack followed, gunfire erupting, but the Sons of Horus behaved in a way that was completely unlike themselves.

Few of them foresaw this, and despite having several times the number of War Hounds, they couldn't even organize a complete offensive in the first half minute of the battle.

In an instant, Lupercal's Court was transformed into a brutal battlefield.

For the master of the Vengeful Spirit, this should have been a situation that filled him with shock and anger, but Horus was laughing. He stood there as if nothing had happened, and Angron's punch hadn't even managed to knock him back an inch.

"Protect the Warmaster!" one of the Sons of Horus roared, and the wolf pack charged toward them, only to be stopped by a rain of death.

Angron remained standing, silent. He was unarmed— the Primarch's weapons were not exactly portable for a meeting, and he didn't even bother to draw his ceremonial sword. But that didn't matter; he was still going to fight.

He charged toward Horus, who stood quietly in place, slowly lowering his head. The next second, just as Angron's fist was about to touch Horus again, a black mist swept in, completely enveloping him and his War Hounds.

When the fog cleared, they had vanished without a trace.

The Space Wolves were bewildered by the enemy's disappearance, and Ezekyle's Abaddon charged toward his Primarch, but the Wolf God had already returned to his Throne.

"No need to worry." His voice echoed through the royal court, carrying a certain reverberation. "Pass on my orders: prepare to deal with any potential defection."

Boarding over?

The wolves looked at each other in bewilderment, but Horus had no desire to explain.

He glanced to the left porthole. Behind the orbit of Istvaan III, a fleet was slowly emerging from behind the planet. The leading warship was none other than the flagship of Kolus Corax, the Emperor's Shadow.

--

As the black mist dissipated, Angron silently and slowly rose to his feet. He and his guards were far from Lupercal's Court, but still within the Vengeful Spirit. He surveyed his surroundings, reaching this conclusion in less than half a second, and simultaneously formulated his next plan.

But he also sensed something else.

The Primarch turned his head and began striding forward in a certain direction, his azure eyes blazing with a fury far greater than before.

With shoulder strikes and punches, he used sheer force to destroy the barriers of the lower deck, ripping cables off and crushing metal into pieces with his bare hands before throwing them to the ground.

The War Hounds followed closely behind. They didn't ask Angron why he was doing this; there was no need—once the war began, the War Hounds would only ever be War Hounds.

They continued onward, and after Angron breached the eighth deck, they came across an altar.

The ceiling was filled with corpses hanging upside down, and the floor was covered with bones. In the center of this secret room, a rough but huge eight-pointed star was pieced together from the corpses, and an supernatural blood-red light flickered on it like breathing.

The Angron silently waved his arm, and a rain of fire, imbued with boundless rage, was unleashed from behind him, instantly destroying the corrupt altar.

But this is not the end. Angron closed his eyes, and in the empathy fed back by pain and talent, the dead were whispering to him about their experiences.

They were once servants of the Emperor and his Warmaster, sharing glory with the Sons of Horus on this ship, but now they are not. Now they are merely the dead, sacrifices, uncared-for corpses.

But that wasn't enough. He continued to amplify his suppression of his talent, and thick, sticky blood gushed from his nose. The lord of the Twelfth Legion silently opened his eyes a few seconds later and looked up.

His eyes pierced through the metal and darkness at that moment, reaching someone's side.

"Find a path, let's go up," Angron said. "My brother needs help."

Horus?

"No, Kharn." Angron lowered his head. "It's Fulgrim."

--

What happened?

Garviel Loken stopped running, his breathing becoming slightly rapid.

He could vaguely sense that something was changing about the Vengeful Spirit; he looked into the dark corners and found that they had become denser. At the same time, he heard a faint sound behind him.

Garviel Loken whirled around and found that the path he had come from had completely vanished. The connecting archway of the eighth deck was gone, replaced by a completely twisted spiral staircase. This discovery caused him to take a step back and bump into someone.

"Your ship is truly extraordinary, cousin," Akurduana said.

"It"

"Don't explain to me, Garviel Loken Commander Locken. The most urgent thing is to find a way to the infirmary," said the Second Company of the Emperor's Children.

He wasn't unarmed; Garviel Loken managed to retrieve weapons and armor for the surviving Emperor's Children. His careful planning over the past few days had finally paid off, and his plan with Torgaddon was actually quite simple.

As soon as the meeting began, the Emperor's Children were immediately liberated according to plan. It wasn't just the two of the Sons of Horus who realized the Legion's current madness; after some cautious contact and probing, more than seven hundred people joined their ranks.

The number of people was small, but more than enough for their plan—therefore, they would disperse and lead the Emperor's Children to the various hangars and boarding decks. As long as one force could leave safely, it would all be worthwhile.

Meanwhile, Garviel Loken and Akurduana's squad also have another mission: to do their utmost to rescue Fulgrim.

"I understand." Garviel Loken took a deep breath, turned around, and continued running.

Twenty men from his company followed him, while the Emperor's Children numbered one hundred and thirty-one. Silence, sorrow, and rage filled the air.

They proceeded through the eighth deck and soon realized how much had changed—every corridor shifted after they passed, and the path ahead was not necessarily the one Garviel Loken was familiar with.

Their sense of space was also seriously compromised; in their perception, the entire eighth deck seemed to be a giant vortex that would spin on its own even if they didn't move. After another five minutes of blindly moving forward, Garviel Loken decisively called a halt to the operation.

He gave a tactical signal, Emperor's Children immediately understood his intention—how ironic, they had once truly been as close as brothers, even their tactical signals were interchangeable.

Garviel Loken struggled to articulate his feelings at that moment. He forced himself to clear his mind and began calling Tarik Torgaddon Torgaddon on a newly created communications channel.

The latter answered his call a few seconds later, his voice accompanied by a strong background noise. Shipboard communications shouldn't be like this; clearly, they were experiencing severe interference. Moreover, this interference wasn't limited to communications.

Garviel Loken's heart sank.

"We're heading to Hangar 21," Torgaddon said on the other end of the channel. "Also, I have some bad news for you, Garviel Loken."

"What?"

I haven't seen a single person along the way.

"Me too, Tarik Torgaddon."

"Looks like he saw right through our plan all along?" Tarik Torgaddon Torgaddon chuckled twice.

He was trying to joke, Garviel Loken could tell his intention from the two monotonous laughs. He didn't answer, just breathed calmly. Half a second later, his brother's voice rang out again.

"It's so hard to always be right, brother," Torgaddon muttered. "But I won't become an accomplice to evil. Horus is doing things he'd never done before; his actions transcend not only the law but also morality. We will never blindly follow him, Garviel Loken, even if he is our father."

"Even if he's the father," Garviel Loken repeated. "So what do you plan to do?"

"Proceed according to the original plan. No matter what he wants to do, we only have one path to take."

"Clear."

Garviel Loken hung up the communication, Akurduana looked at him as if waiting for a reply. He looked around and realized that everyone was waiting for his orders, not just his own brothers, but also the Emperor's Children.

A moment later, Akurduana made a series of tactical hand gestures. Garviel Loken smiled behind his helmet, and also gave a firm fist clench.

They set off again.

--

"Father," someone whispered, standing on the other side of the sea.

Fulgrim knew him; how could he not?

The phoenix stood still, the sea churning and the wind and waves raging. The sky turned a frenzied pinkish-purple, with blood-red clouds swirling above it like giant eyes staring at him. Lightning flashed continuously, striking the sea not far away and stirring up huge waves.

Everything was madness, everything was unbearable to look at. Fulgrim stared at the figure in purple and gold armor, who responded to his call after a moment.

"Eidolon." He approached him slowly, calling out his name. "Do you understand what you're doing?"

"Father," the man called out, but did not answer his question.

As Fulgrim slowly approached, his face gradually came into view.

It was a face completely unrelated to the Eidolon he remembered; the skin was deathly pale, covered with the marks of trauma and uncleanliness. Six vials for injecting drugs were deeply inserted into his jaw and neck, injecting drugs of unknown composition.

His hair was thinning, remaining on the side of his scarred forehead, like a Shadow or echo of his former glory, but only something to be disgusted by.

What's most unbearable to look at are his eyes. Those eyes don't reflect love for his father, but a different kind of love.

Fulgrim was familiar with that kind of love; he had experienced it countless times long ago, when he was still a worker on Chemos.

"Father." Eidolon stopped his ethereal call, his withered lips curving slightly into a smile. He looked at the naked phoenix, his tongue unconsciously licking his teeth.

"I've waited too long for this day, Father," he said tenderly. "Do you remember the past, Father? We would fight for each other—"

"--Shut up." Phoenix interrupted him, her eyes twitching, her expression more one of disappointment, shame, and disbelief than anger.

He couldn't believe his offspring had become so depraved, lowly, and vile. And this man was Eidolon. Eidolon the Exemplar, the first Emperor's Children whom he had personally promoted.

Over the years, Eidolon has never let him down.

"Even when you're angry, you're so alluring," Eidolon said boldly.

Phoenix didn't answer the question; he forced himself to observe Eidolon, who was displaying himself openly, unaware that the disgust in Fulgrim's eyes was growing stronger—or perhaps he did, but that look only pleased him more.

A few seconds later, the Chemos man slowly spoke, his voice now filled with coldness.

"So this is what Tacitus warned me about." He clenched his fists and slowly approached Eidolon in the frigid seawater. "You are nothing but a fake."

"But I stand right in front of you, Father," Eidolon said.

"Yes," Fulgrim said. "Do you know what that also means?"

"Excuse my ignorance?"

"You will die!" Fulgrim roared as he charged toward him. At that moment, the seawater suddenly began to change color, turning from pitch black to a blood-red hue, with alluring pink peeking out beneath, and thousands of dark figures swimming about.

Eidolon laughed, laughing so hard he almost lost his footing and fell. After a moment, he stood up again, and in the calm before the storm, Eidolon looked at his father with possessive eyes and uttered a single sentence.

"I want his head."

The seawater surged, and more Shadow slowly rose from beneath it.

Two more chapters to go.