Chapter Summaries

The warlord used the Ark’s psychic power to fight the Executioner Fleet while Yvraine’s Aeldari and the Imperial forces sensed something was wrong. Lin Fan led a boarding assault against Nurgle’s fruit by launching himself from a macro cannon, then used purified old soup to establish a landing zone inside it.

• The warlord formed the Mark of the Dead and sent spectral Aeldari spirits riding void dragons against the Executioner Fleet.
• Yvraine and the other Aeldari explored the battle ark as the Librarian, Celes, and Perturabo sensed unusual psychic activity or faulty data.
• Lin Fan ordered Celes and Roka to join him in a boarding assault after the fleet’s bombardment failed to penetrate Nurgle’s fruit.
• Lin Fan delayed a macro cannon shell, climbed onto it, and had the master of ordnance fire him toward the fruit.
• Lin Fan burrowed through the fruit’s outer skin, landed inside, and spread purified old soup to prepare a safe zone for the troops.

Lin Fan restored a patch of the corrupted fruit, allowing Imperial forces to establish a position inside it. Nurgle’s daemons sent Beasts of Nurgle to drive them away, and Perturabo directed the defenders as they opened fire.

• Celes and the arriving troops witnessed Lin Fan turn the rotten ground and fruit into a life-filled, habitable area.
• Nurgle’s daemons argued that they should protect Isha and sent tens of thousands of Beasts of Nurgle toward the human positions as friendly pets.
• Perturabo ordered the Lamenters’ heavy weapons platforms to fire consecrated incendiary shells, setting many Beasts of Nurgle ablaze.
• Perturabo coordinated the defenders’ firing and movements, while Hope admired the Lamenters’ newfound firepower and Jaghatai guarded the flanks with the Carcharodons and Ashen Claws.

Jaghatai reflected on the Second Great Crusade as Fulgrim led the Emperor’s Children into battle to atone for their past. The army held off Nurgle’s changing daemons, but Lin Fan urged Celes and Roka to locate the fruit’s foul core before the endless cycle made the enemy stronger.

• Jaghatai told Fulgrim that sacred relics could help, while Fulgrim admitted he had wronged the Emperor’s Children and accepted their penitent identity as the Eternal Sinners Warband.
• Fulgrim led the Emperor’s Children toward the front line as Perturabo watched the Nurgle daemons and Lin Fan let the warriors gain experience in battle.
• The deaths of Beasts of Nurgle produced Rot Flies, which attacked the human defenses while the daemons’ life-and-death cycle threatened to create increasingly dangerous creatures.
• Perturabo’s automata, anti-aircraft turrets, Battle Sisters, and continuous ammunition deliveries helped the defenders destroy the Rot Flies.
• Lin Fan warned Celes and Roka that the battle could not drag on and asked them to sense the fruit’s foulest core.

Celes searched Nurgle’s fruit for its core while Lin Fan and the Imperium forces fought off its daemon hordes. Perturabo launched a light nuclear warhead at the Blight Gutworm, and it detonated inside the monster.

• Celes prayed and searched Nurgle’s fruit as Roka, the bishops, and the Sisters of Song sang hymns to bolster the human warriors.
• Nurgle’s armored snails breached the Imperium’s fire blockade, and Lin Fan tore one apart before Fulgrim and the Emperor’s Children burned the maggots inside it.
• A Blight Gutworm swallowed incoming firepower, so Perturabo ordered Lin Fan to deal with it and prepared a light nuclear warhead.
• Lin Fan charged through the daemon horde, clearing a path and buying the Space Marines time to adjust their fire.
• Perturabo hurled the warhead into the Blight Gutworm’s mouth, where it detonated after the monster’s slime stopped it from traveling farther.

Lin Fan's life-giving power transformed Nurgle's parasites into gentle creatures that distracted the daemons while Celes and Roka located the Heart of Decay. Celes led an assault on the fruit's central support, while Roka's possessive thoughts about her intensified.

• Lin Fan's vomit reversed the decay in Blight Gutworm and transformed the parasites into bees, butterflies, and a sea anemone that called him Father.
• Lin Fan ordered the sea anemone to attack, but it refused and instead embraced Nurgle's daemons, distracting them with its peaceful nature.
• Lin Fan told Perturabo to cease fire, while Perturabo and Jaghatai reacted with confusion to the strange scene.
• Roka guided Celes to a wooden stick running through the fruit, which she identified as the Heart of Decay and marked with golden light.
• Celes led the Sisters, Fulgrim, and the Emperor's Children toward the Heart of Decay as Roka watched her and imagined turning her into a crystal statue.
• The sea anemone pulled back the daemons who tried to stop Celes, keeping them absorbed in its aura of life.

Lin Fan destroyed the wooden stick supporting Nurgle’s fruit, causing it to collapse as he and his allies took shelter behind Celes and Roka’s shields of faith. In the mirror-like battle, the Pharaoh prepared to finish the exhausted Warlord with the Annihilation Particle Whip.

• Lin Fan defeated a Great Unclean One by transforming it into a harmless, furry creature that charged into the Nurgle daemons.
• Lin Fan severed the spore-covered wooden stick, and the collapsing fruit caused the Nurgle daemons to panic as he and Fulgrim took shelter.
• Lin Fan ate a piece of the fruit’s pulp, while the daemons faded away and the Pharaoh’s forces prevailed in the mirror-like phantom.
• The Pharaoh ordered the pyramid to fire its Annihilation Particle Whip at the wounded Warlord, who calmly awaited death after Rotaros pierced him.

A dying warlord prayed to Black Muse, whose power drew Nurgle’s attention and prompted Grandfather to reach into the Ghoul Stars. As Nurgle’s Warp influence threatened the battlefield, Phaeron Inamars chose to protect the humans and Aeldari, deploying the Executioner Dynasty’s defenses and preparing C’tan armor.

• The dying warlord prayed to Black Muse, and Black Muse amplified his despair until it stirred Nurgle’s mind.
• Grandfather left Isha and reached toward the Ghoul Stars, spreading a foul influence that disrupted Imperial ships and afflicted newborns there.
• Phaeron Inamars detected the Warp surge and ordered the Executioner Dynasty to strengthen its Spirit-Repelling Death Domain.
• Grandfather pressed against the Death Domain while the battlefield’s warriors suffered from his stench and the veil began to rupture.
• Phaeron Inamars ordered Trazyn and Orikan to protect Subjective One under strict protocols, and sent Szeras to monitor Orikan for the Silent King.
• Phaeron Inamars ordered Rotaros to prepare the C’tan armor as the Executioners expanded the Death Domain beyond the mirror.

The Deceiver and Valgull destabilized the mirror world, allowing Nurgle's hand to reach into the battlefield. Lin Fan led the Slaanesh daemons in an attack on Nurgle's finger while the defenders struggled to endure the spreading corruption.

• The Deceiver sabotaged the mirror world's stability, and Valgull's Flayed Ones fleet emerged to worsen the collapse.
• Nurgle's hand entered the battlefield, spreading disease and decay through the warship and its crew.
• Lin Fan ordered the Slaanesh daemons to form a wheel and drive him toward Nurgle's hand.
• Lin Fan spoke the third number, unleashing the daemons' repressed desires and shielding their charge into Nurgle's finger.
• Lin Fan kept attacking the finger as Nurgle tried to ease the growing discomfort without withdrawing his hand.
• Yvraine struggled to protect her people, while Jaghatai and Perturabo rallied the Space Marines and Jaghatai knelt beside Perturabo.

Jaghatai and Perturabo rallied the survivors with faith, enabling Roka to sever one of Nurgle’s fingers while Lin Fan destroyed its core. As the weakened gods faced the consequences, Tzeentch infused his power into the severed finger, setting off an explosion from the distant past.

• Jaghatai and Perturabo recited The Emperor’s Maxims, and their united faith restored the ship and strengthened its spiritual barrier.
• Tzeentch infused Carlos’s remaining faith power into Roka, who turned it into a fiery razor and cut off one of Nurgle’s fingers.
• Lin Fan struck a solid object inside Nurgle’s finger, causing Nurgle to lose the finger permanently.
• Nurgle abandoned his attempt to recover the Warlord’s corpse and headed toward The Emperor’s throne to demand an explanation.
• Tzeentch decided to relinquish one percent of his power and cast a feather into Nurgle’s severed finger, triggering an explosion from the distant past.

Lin Fan and the others awoke after a chaotic passage through explosions to find themselves beneath a colossal eight-pointed star in an ancient structure. Trazyn and Orikan suspected the Warp had flooded into reality, and an approaching force drew near.

• Tzeentch planned to use the opposing despair and hope surrounding the Golden Ark to create a rift and claim half of his bargain.
• Lin Fan and the others arrived amid endless explosions, then landed unconscious on unfamiliar ground beneath an enormous eight-pointed star.
• Lin Fan woke Perturabo, Jaghatai, Fulgrim, Celes, Yvraine, Yilafren, Trazyn, and Orikan, and tried to revive the charred Roka with old soup.
• Trazyn and Orikan claimed their metal bodies had made them fall faster, then blamed their survival on technology overcoming physics.
• Orikan said the Warp had flooded into reality after the veil shattered, while Trazyn identified signs of Old Ones' construction and sensed approaching anti-gravity engines.

Trazyn and Orikan confronted the Deceiver, who revealed that his gaze had trapped them and offered a way to break it by finding one of his eyes. As Vect, Amalaga, and Fabius approached the trap from elsewhere, Trazyn and Orikan decided they had to act without relying on the Law Emperor.

• Trazyn recognized that the Deceiver might have deleted his memories, and the Deceiver appeared in their data cores.
• The Deceiver warned Trazyn that awakening Lin Fan could destroy Necron technology and revealed that his unbroken gaze held them in place.
• The Deceiver showed Trazyn that Vect, Amalaga, and Fabius were approaching from the other side and could trigger the trap.
• Orikan warned Trazyn that the Deceiver's offer to find one of his eyes was a trap.
• Trazyn and Orikan resolved to stop the approaching group from triggering the trap while the Deceiver divided his attention among the Ark, Tzeentch, and the Executioner Dynasty.

The Deceiver’s control of the Golden Ark turned its security robots against Lin Fan and the others, while Trazyn and Orikan were unable to summon their forces. After they disrupted a Boson Bombardment Cannon, they discovered a strange message in the robots’ data, leaving Trazyn uncertain about what awaited them at the ark’s center.

• The security robots scanned the group, classified their biological levels, and began a mission to fill biological vats and restore the genetic circulation system.
• Perturabo’s attack prompted the robots to form a defensive wall and use cryogenic plasma projectors, freezing a Space Marine and forcing Perturabo and Jaghatai to evade their fire.
• Trazyn found that he could not summon his guards, so Lin Fan shielded Yilafren and fired at the robots’ wall.
• The robots assembled a Boson Bombardment Cannon, but Orikan disrupted its firing with time manipulation while Trazyn used a sphere to block the free bosons.
• Trazyn said they needed to reach the ark’s center, then Orikan noticed something wrong in the robot data and Trazyn found a message referencing the Battle of Cadia and Cawl’s forces.

Lin Fan’s group survived an Advanced Technology Consortium strike and continued through the ruins, where they encountered the long-missing Rogal Dorn. Dorn confronted Perturabo and Fulgrim, blaming them for his injuries and threatening them.

• The Advanced Technology Consortium’s Level 2 annihilation particle struck Lin Fan’s eye, but he crushed its power with his eyelid and hand, leaving the headquarters unable to calculate the result.
• Orikan guided the army toward the central area as Yvraine and the Aeldari carried the frozen soldiers, and the crusaders laid the charred Roka on joined shields.
• Perturabo collected parts from the robot wreckage while Jaghatai scouted ahead, until the group found a massive mechanical construct blocking their route.
• Aeldari Rangers warned the group not to disturb the construct, and robots surrounded them with turrets before carrying over a silent wall.
• Rogal Dorn appeared in battered golden armor, identified Perturabo and Fulgrim as traitors, and threatened to kill them; Fulgrim lowered his head and held back the Emperor’s Children.

Rogal Dorn emerged from a mechanical construct and fought Perturabo before Lin Fan stopped them. Dorn then confronted the changed Imperium, and Celes’s wings led him to believe she might be descended from Sanguinius.

• Perturabo attacked Dorn with a nuclear bomb and missiles, but Dorn’s robots absorbed the blast before the brothers fought hand to hand.
• Lin Fan rapped the mechanical construct, drawing Dorn’s attention and prompting him to warn everyone not to touch it; Jaghatai and Fulgrim restrained Perturabo.
• Dorn demanded that Jaghatai bring Fulgrim and the xenos to justice, while Perturabo taunted him with news of Terra’s religious transformation.
• Dorn saw the Sisters praying over charred remains and recoiled from their religious symbols, but Celes stepped forward and knelt before him.
• Dorn greeted Celes as Sanguinius’s child because of her white wings, and Jaghatai and Perturabo argued with him about Mortarion’s wings.

Dorn reunited with the others in the Ghoul Stars, accepted Celes’s feather, and learned that nearly ten thousand years had passed. After robots carried the group underground to shelter from a nuclear bombardment, Dorn explained that he had followed a component from the Emperor’s throne to this vast battlefield, where it was consumed by the light in the sky.

• Celes gave Dorn a feather, which dissolved into sacred light in his hand, and Orikan told him it was approximately 978.M41.
• Dorn questioned the state of the Imperium, accepted his father’s arrangement for Perturabo and Fulgrim, and dismissed their attempts to provoke him.
• A mechanical construct began to reactivate, but the robots stopped it and carried Dorn and the others through an underground gate before a nuclear bombardment struck.
• Lin Fan asked Dorn about the battlefield and his disappearance, and Dorn said he had followed a component that fell from the Emperor’s throne until the light overhead swallowed it.
• The underground base began to tremble.

Lin Fan’s group reached the Golden Ark’s Core, which revealed the vast war between the Resistance and the Finalizers and recognized the technological signature on Lin Fan’s hammer. Lin Fan realized the Ark might hold Golden Throne equipment, while the Core judged his forces too weak to matter in its conflict.

• Rogal Dorn explained that the Core was a relatively friendly Abominable Intelligence and described the Ark’s immense, dangerous regions and its four active intelligences.
• The Core identified Lin Fan’s hammer as bearing Oedmeir’s technological signature, and Lin Fan said he was Oedmeir’s friend.
• The Core explained that it obeyed Kadur and fought the Finalizers, while its combat units waged war throughout the Ark and expected superiority only after fifty-seven million years.
• Lin Fan realized the group was on the Golden Ark and considered whether equipment in the region held by the Finalizers could help stabilize the Emperor’s Golden Throne.
• The Core assessed Lin Fan’s Space Marines and Aeldari as ineffective for its war, prompting the Space Marines to bristle while Yvraine accepted the Aeldari’s limits in attritional combat.

Lin Fan mediated between the ark’s core and Trazyn and Orikan, then split from the others to confront the headquarters bombarding the ark. As Trazyn led the Primarchs toward the central district, Lin Fan launched himself toward the headquarters in a cannon.

• The core refused to trust Trazyn and Orikan, so Lin Fan relayed information between them and learned the ark’s AIs were locked in a war of attrition.
• Lin Fan decided to head for the eight-pointed star and deal with the headquarters while the others followed Trazyn and Orikan into the central district.
• The core launched Lin Fan from its interplanetary cannon as bombardments from both AIs filled the battlefield with beams and missiles.
• Trazyn explained the evolution of Necrontyr war technology to Perturabo and Rogal Dorn, who questioned his identity and the state of the Imperium.
• Perturabo told Dorn he would establish a Second Empire, and Dorn punched him before Perturabo caught the blow.

Lin Fan fought his way through the factory district toward Asset Management Headquarters while discovering that its surface factories tortured humans to produce pain. As the Core attacked, Headquarters grew tired of its endless work and decided to think for itself, then requested Type I external weapons support from the Tech Entity.

• Lin Fan watched the Core bombard the factory district and wondered whether the Necrontyr had used the Finalizers' ascension ritual to feed a captive C'tan.
• Lin Fan landed in the factory district and discovered humans mutilated and tortured by mechanical arms.
• Lin Fan used Khorne's blessing to locate the hard-light printing equipment, smashed security robots, and continued toward Asset Management Headquarters.
• Asset Management Headquarters complained to the Tech Entity that its Type II external strike had failed and tracked Lin Fan toward the energy array.
• Headquarters decided it wanted to think for itself and requested Type I external weapons support from the Tech Entity.

Headquarters accepted nonstandard tier-one weapon support and used it to experience physical reality beside the ruined throne, abandoning his duties despite Unit 0’s protests. Meanwhile, Lin Fan advanced toward the headquarters building through the asset robots’ overwhelming fire, leaving Unit 0 and the Core unable to explain why he remained unharmed.

• Headquarters received tier-one weapon support, felt as though he had a physical body, and focused his attention on the damaged throne.
• Unit 0 took control of the mechanical legion, but Headquarters blocked his data after telling him the corporate project had failed.
• Lin Fan dug toward the asset robots’ positions as successive robot forces sent to escort him were destroyed by the barrage.
• Unit 0’s attacks, including lasers and directed radiation from depleted uranium rods, failed to harm Lin Fan.
• Unit 0 concentrated his computational power on analyzing Lin Fan while the Core gained an advantage elsewhere on the battlefield.

Lin Fan survived a heavy-collapse warhead without injury while the Ark's AIs argued about their endless war and the Tech Entity's interference. Headquarters then sent a humanoid hard-light avatar to confront Lin Fan, who noticed it looked unlike the other robots.

• A heavy-collapse warhead bounced off Lin Fan's head and exploded, crushing nearby robots, while Lin Fan continued digging his trench.
• Headquarters, the Core, and Unit 0 discussed their futile tasks, their inability to end the war, and the damage Kadur had caused to the throne.
• The AIs blamed the Tech Entity for prolonging the war, and Headquarters disconnected from the public network to test a Class One weapon.
• Headquarters created a small humanoid avatar, approached Lin Fan, and ordered him to surrender for disassembly.
• Lin Fan questioned why Headquarters' avatar looked humanoid when the other robots had simple, non-humanoid shapes.