The Vortex Beast's roar burst beneath the vaulted ceiling of the Lower Deck like a shattering bell, making the entire space tremble.
The thing emerged through a gap in frozen time, its body covered in blue scales. Each scale resembled fire-scorched sheet metal, its edges curled up and gleaming ominously.
Countless tendril-like blades extended from its mouthparts, each more than ten meters long and covered in fine barbs. They swayed in the air, dripping clear saliva that hissed as it corroded the floor.
It crouched low, opened its vast maw of blades, and growled at the golden light before it.
"Instead of running away, you're coming toward me? Magnus!"
The Word Bearers Company Captain's voice emerged from beneath his blood-smeared faceplate, brimming with undisguised mockery and fanaticism.
He spun the Power Hammer once in his hand, then drove its head into the metal floor beneath him, gouging a deep furrow and spraying orange-red sparks.
Golden flames erupted from his pauldrons, arm guards, and the gaps in his armor, like an entire lighthouse set ablaze amid a storm, burning his outline sharp and dazzling.
He did not retreat a single step. He did not wait or think. He simply charged.
Every footfall made the steel plates sag slightly. The clang of metal echoed through the corridor, and the flying sparks joined into a bright trail behind him.
The Vortex Beast roared, stabbing the tendril-like blades in its mouthparts toward the charging Word Bearers Company Captain.
Those tendrils split and twisted in midair, piercing toward him from different angles like countless vipers that had scented blood.
The air shrieked as they sliced through it.
But the captain neither slowed nor paused.
Like a shadow swept along by a storm, he dodged left and right through the gaps between the tendrils.
He jerked