The Use of Psychic Energy

The Xenos struggled in agony, only to be sealed inside an enclosed chamber.

Then Chaplain Kroll took charge, with a squad of elite Legion veterans escorting the prisoner.

Elsewhere aboard the Law of Faith, Lorgar was exploring Psychic Energy.

Put simply, Psychic Energy was magic—only a little more dangerous than ordinary magic, and vastly more powerful.

Golden flames sprang up in Lorgar's palm, a manifestation of his Psychic Energy.

But what was a Psyker?

A Psyker was a being capable of wielding Psychic Energy.

Many species had such individuals. Others were born without psychic potential and never produced Psykers, such as the C'tan and the Necrons. They despised Psykers and had even designed warriors to seek them out and destroy them.

Some species, such as the Aeldari, possessed innate psychic abilities.

The powers Psykers wielded took many forms, from predicting an enemy's movements to unleashing devastating blasts of Psychic Energy.

Some could even help troops launch more destructive attacks.

The earliest human Psykers were powerful beings known as Shamans, but afterward, Psykers would remain unknown to humanity for millennia.

Psykers first appeared in large numbers at the end of M22. They represented humanity's future: the ideal beings humans would evolve into, a stronger, smarter, more capable form of life.

Psychic mutations grew increasingly common among humans, heralding the emergence of a new psychic race.

This new race was still weak, its members lacking the psychic strength needed to withstand the dangers of the Warp.

They were both a threat and a blessing to the Imperium.

Left unchecked, Psykers posed a potential danger to entire worlds, and hunting them down was a major part of the Inquisition's duties.

The Imperium ensured that Psykers were suppressed, tracked, and controlled. Those strong enough were recruited into its service, filling the vital roles of Astropaths and sanctioned Psykers.

The weakest were destined to serve humanity through the Astronomican, as sustenance for the Emperor of Mankind, or simply to be lobotomized and made into one of countless Servitors.

A select few were taken to the Choir's Obsidian Fortress, where an unknown fate awaited them.

Those found to be tainted were purged and executed before they reached Terra.

The Imperium classified its Psykers according to their level of psychic ability.

This classification was called grading, with each grade indicating psychic strength.

An Omicron-level Psyker might possess only faint psychic abilities activated subconsciously, while an Alpha-level Psyker could split a Titan in two.

Lorgar had only just begun to wield Psychic Energy, yet the power he could already command rivaled that of an Alpha-level Psyker.

If Lorgar wished, he could withstand an entire Orbital Bombardment alone and strike back with Psychic Energy.

As he considered this, Lorgar picked up a training sword and touched its blade with his burning palm.

In an instant, flames raced across the blade, engulfing it in searing fire.

Lorgar felt the power coursing through it. It could wound the soul itself.

After a couple of quick swings, Lorgar tossed the training sword aside.

The flames on the discarded sword went out at once. Lorgar stretched, then prepared to resume training with the warship's virtual-reality technology when First Captain Rockefeller entered.

"My Primarch." Rockefeller saluted.

"What is it, Rockefeller?" Lorgar turned toward him.

Rockefeller replied, "My lord, we've captured one of the enemy crew alive. Chaplain Kroll is interrogating the prisoner."

"Let's go take a look."

Lorgar put on a white robe and walked slowly out of the training room.

"Repent, Xenos!"

Chaplain Kroll was conducting the interrogation with a Staff in hand. In practice, his interrogation consisted of swinging it a few dozen times.

The Space Marines had also tried eating the creatures' brains to obtain memories of their homeworld.

This process relied on an organ called the Omophagea.

Located within the spinal cord between the cervical and thoracic vertebrae, it absorbed genetic material from an animal's body, allowing the consumer to acquire its memories.

But this Xenos was peculiar. First, they had to work out where its brain was.

Judging by the shape of its head, its brain was either exceptionally small or not in its head at all.

Chaplain Kroll stood before the Xenos. His once-solemn dark-gray armour now looked more like a butcher's gear, smeared with dried and fresh fluorescent-blue slime. Tiny scraps of biological tissue were even lodged in the crevices of its embossed designs.

Before him hung the last prisoner: the Xenos officer captured deep within the bridge, who might possess valuable knowledge.

Heavy chains held the creature against a cold metal frame at an angle that would have caused a human excruciating pain. Its pearl-white carapace was covered in energy burns and deep dents left by physical instruments.

The many facets of its compound eyes had gone dull and cracked. Its beaklike mouth opened and closed weakly, letting out faint, broken, death-rattle hisses.

Kroll had just finished a round of "questions."

He set down a tool fitted with a heating element and a precision drill bit. It still glowed red and dripped melted tissue. Beneath his helmet, his brow furrowed. The Xenos' physiology and stubborn will—

Or perhaps its extreme fear for the fate of its species—

Whatever the reason, it had exceeded his expectations. The creatures' minds seemed anchored to some strange collective-consciousness network, making them highly resistant to conventional physical torture.

He could tear their bodies apart, but prying open their protected minds and extracting flawless navigational data with any efficiency was another matter.

Perhaps he should try neural stripping? Or connect part of its nervous system to the ship's Cogitator for a forced overload readout? But the risk was enormous. The data could be destroyed entirely...

Kroll sank into thought, weighing the various "novel" methods that might achieve his goal.

His fingertips tapped unconsciously against the grip of his Staff. The blood staining it had not fully clotted.

Just then, the hatch's hydraulics gave a smooth hiss.

As the heavy hatch slid apart, a figure entered.

His arrival filled the room with an invisible yet overwhelming presence. The smells of blood and scorched flesh, even the air of despair, seemed to be diluted and covered in an instant by something greater, something weightier.

Lorgar, lord of the Legion, had arrived.

Lorgar needed no heavy Terminator Armour. He was a walking wall in his own right.

He wore a deep blue-gray robe adorned with intricate golden scripture and arcane symbols over finely crafted Power Armour. Even a giant like Kroll, clad in Space Marine armour, had to look up at him.

The Primarch's bronze face was beautiful almost beyond human measure, yet it bore the marks of deep thought and a solemnity bordering on compassion.

Lorgar's gaze swept across the room, passing over the bloodstained instruments of torture before settling on the dying Xenos prisoner and its interrogator.

"How is it going?" Lorgar asked slowly.

"My lord."

Chaplain Kroll snapped out of his thoughts and dropped to one knee almost by instinct. His heavy armour struck the metal floor with a dull clang.

He lowered his head, a trace of anxiety flickering through him.

Had the Primarch come in person because he was dissatisfied with my progress?

What a disgrace. I can't even complete the Primarch's assignment.

Looking at Kroll, Lorgar wondered why the man had become as skittish as a cat when he had done nothing. Did he look that frightening?

"Rise, Kroll. No need for ceremony," Lorgar said.

"Still won't talk?" Lorgar asked.

To Kroll, his tone sounded calm, giving away neither pleasure nor anger.

Kroll hurried to his feet, his servos humming softly.

"My lord, its mental structure differs from that of lesser Xenos. Some kind of collective consciousness seems to be supporting it, preventing physical pain from breaking its mind."

"Give me another half hour. I'll try neural overload..."

Kroll spoke a little too quickly, afraid the Primarch would think him inefficient and a disgrace to the Legion.

"No, no, Kroll." Lorgar gently interrupted his subordinate, his gaze still fixed on the Xenos' shattered head. "You've done well. That's enough."

"I'll take it from here."

As he spoke, the Primarch raised one hand.

It was a perfect, powerful hand, its proportions beyond those of any Astartes, like the ideal masterpiece of a classical sculptor.

Now an indescribable energy began to radiate from his palm. The air around it warped faintly as Psychic Energy gathered, producing a hum almost too soft to hear, like a billion tiny hymns.

Then Lorgar slowly and gently laid that palm, charged with unseen power, over the Xenos' scarred, slime-slick head.

"Come now, Xenos bastard." Lorgar's voice became a low resonance that passed straight through the eardrums and reached deep into the soul.

"Tell me where your homeworld is. Show me... the deepest-hidden nest of your species."

The moment he finished speaking, everything changed.

A fierce light like molten gold burst from the Primarch's deep eyes, which seemed able to see into the heart!

The light was Psychic Energy made visible, a sign of immense mental power tearing through the barrier of reality!

Two golden beams seemed to shoot from his eyes, bathing the space before him in radiance and an inhuman, awe-inspiring pressure.

At the same time, a tidal wave of Psychic Energy surged through the hand pressed against the Xenos' head and forced its way into the depths of the pitiful creature's mind!

Lorgar's overwhelming power crushed through the Xenos' memories, rampaging across its mental world like a pair of enormous hands!

"Urgh... Aaaaaah—!!!"

The Xenos prisoner let out the last, most harrowing and indescribable scream of its life.

It was the ultimate cry of a soul torn open, memories rifled through by force, and consciousness burned away.

Its body thrashed and spasmed against the chains, every appendage rigid as iron. Beneath the golden light, the facets of its compound eyes burst one after another!

Meanwhile, Lorgar raised his free hand.

Golden Psychic Energy flowed and gathered around his fingertips like obedient flames, swiftly weaving itself into an intricate, astonishingly precise three-dimensional Star Chart!

Countless pinpricks of light marked stars. Nebulae hung like wisps of gauze, gravitational curves rippled invisibly, and navigational coordinates traced paths like golden threads.

As the Primarch forcibly drew information from the Xenos' collapsing mind, the map rapidly grew more complete and more distinct!

Chaplain Kroll and the other Word Bearers present held their breath as though witnessing a miracle.

They watched the psychic Star Chart fill with detail. Star systems were marked, routes lit up, and at last one particular system shone brighter than the rest. At its center was a planet with an ominous, pale sheen—unmistakably the target they sought: the enemy's homeworld.

"Found it." Lorgar flung aside the Xenos' corpse.

"Now, bring destruction to their homeworld."