Nykona and Hill

The Ultramarines on the ground naturally had no way to contact the flagship, the Macragge's Honour, because the bridge of that Gloriana-class Battleship had already been destroyed by the Word Bearers' Warp sorcery.

Along with the Ultramarines' primarch, Roboute Guilliman, a great many senior Legion officers had either died or been swept into the cold void of space.

The entire upper command structure of the Ultramarines Legion had suffered a devastating blow in a very short time.

Chapter Master Marius Gage had survived the supernatural explosion from the Warp. The shockwave had hurled him into a bulkhead, leaving him sprawled helplessly in a pool of his own blood.

He was losing a great deal of blood. Warp poison was corroding his enhanced organs, preventing his wounds from clotting, while a terrible fever tormented the Chapter Master's will. The vile things from The Empyrean were utterly unknown to the Ultramarines.

Fear had been removed from the Astartes during their augmentation, and long years of war and training had further suppressed their awareness of it. Even under torture or in the face of death, Space Marines could remain calm and detached.

But now, Marius felt fear again after so long. His iron will resisted that fear of the unknown. He had thought that, through fighting the enemies of the entire galaxy, he had long since understood the nature of fear. Yet now he realized that had been arrogance and conceit.

Marius struggled out of his own blood. He realized that the arrogance rooted deep within the Ultramarines' hearts was a weakness. Their illustrious reputation had made them ignorant, lacking caution and arrogantly convinced that there was nothing in the galaxy worthy of fear.

At that moment, the Chapter Master recalled the primarch's teachings. Guilliman had once rebuked the Ultramarines for being too arrogant, for their tendency toward self-righteousness and detachment from reality. They simply had never truly taken it to heart.

Gage hoped that, after this war ended, he could personally beg the primarch's forgiveness. But reason told him that was only wishful thinking. Guilliman had been swept into space by the explosion. Even one fashioned from the Emperor's genes could not possibly survive in space.

The primarch might already be dead.

He reached that conclusion in utter agony. It hurt more than all his injuries combined. Their gene-father had been threatened with death because of their incompetence. He would rather die himself in exchange for his father's return, but no such bargain existed in this world.

As Chapter Master, he had to pull himself together and continue leading the Legion in its vengeance against the utterly despicable Word Bearers.

His throat was full of bitterness. The fever had subsided somewhat, but weakness and exhaustion still hung over Gage. That strange toxin continued to sap his strength. At this moment, even a single breath brought searing pain to his lungs and windpipe—pain that not even the analgesics injected by his power armor could suppress.

The chamber was filled with murky smoke and dust. Debris stirred up by the explosion drifted in endless currents, while air from elsewhere aboard the flagship rushed in under the pressure differential. Other than him, little else remained alive.

He saw a dead Ultramarine whose head had been twisted and crushed into a grotesque shape. Farther away, several mortal officers lay huddled together, their bodies marked by bites and desecration. That had not been caused by the explosion.

Among the corpses, Gage discovered the culprit behind it all. A giant ape-like monster with a rough humanoid form, twice his height, prowled nearby. The air around it warped and twisted as though beside an intensely hot object, draping it in an illusory veil and making it as elusive as a nightmare.

It had no eyes. Its body was covered in long black bristles, its head grotesquely distorted. A huge maw packed with dense, jagged teeth gaped open, venom spilling everywhere and dripping onto the floor.

The venom corroded the deck plating, sending up smoke as a thick stench rapidly spread.

Its hollow eye sockets turned toward Gage. The Chapter Master immediately realized that this blasphemous thing had bitten him after the explosion and injected its venom into his body.

Gage tried to draw his boltgun, but it had been lost at some point. Several of his fingers were missing as well, making it difficult to pull a trigger. His power sword lay farther away, and in his condition, he could not retrieve it and grip it properly.

Weak. Powerless.

The Ultramarines Chapter Master had never been in such dire straits before, but now he tasted that bitter helplessness.

The monster from The Empyrean noticed that Gage was still alive and pounced like one of the savage beasts of the physical universe, seeking to tear out the Astartes' throat. But in his desperation, Gage summoned the last of his strength and clamped his right hand tightly around the creature's throat.

But his strength was too weak. The monster seized the opportunity to swallow his right hand into its mouth and began to chew and tear savagely. Amid the sound of power armor and reinforced bone shattering, Gage's arm was torn away.

Having lost an arm, the Ultramarine's disadvantage only grew. He gradually began to lose this struggle.

The violent pain even overwhelmed the agony of the poison for a moment. Gage roared and slammed his left fist into its face, knocking out two fangs.

But it was not enough. The monster lunged again. It had already swallowed his severed arm whole, and it craved more flesh and souls.

To a Warp daemon, the Chapter Master's resolve and courage were more delicious than flesh. It hungered to devour his soul.

Souls—the souls of the brave—held a fatal allure for Warp daemons.

And now, that sweet and delectable soul was right before it.

But its hunger could go no further. A black figure and a blue figure slammed it aside, and thrusts from bladed weapons grievously wounded its core, making it howl as it crawled across the ground.

Over countless ages, myths, legends, and fables had reinforced a single notion: only fire and blades could defeat demons. These Warp creatures born from humanity's fears had naturally inherited that weakness.

Before the fallen and powerless Chapter Master stood an Ultramarine covered in wounds and wearing a red helmet. He held a power sword in one hand and a Khorle-pattern power axe in the other. Beside him stood an uninjured Raven Guard warrior clad in black power armor.

Why was there a Raven Guard aboard the Macragge's Honour?

The thought surfaced in Gage's muddled mind. The toxin had dulled his thoughts, sending them into strange, fleeting associations, and blood loss only worsened it.

Before the thought faded, the two warriors had already moved.

The warrior in the red helmet roared as he swung his power axe. The disruptive field along its edge tore apart anything in its way. The huge axe, capable of severing matter at the molecular level, cleaved through the Warp daemon's body. A foul, rotten black liquid burst forth, contaminating the ship's deck.

The Raven Guard, meanwhile, pulled back and continuously fired his boltgun. Precise shots struck the target's limb joints, face, and other vital areas.

Though the powerful bolts could not kill the enemy outright, they tightly pinned down its movements and gave the red-helmeted warrior an opening to take its head.

One at range and one up close, the two worked in concert as the Warp daemon's roars grew weaker and weaker. Once its shattered body could no longer contain this thing from The Empyrean, it became bound by the laws of reality and was finally banished.

After the two warriors finished off their enemy, another combat squad rushed in behind them. There were several Ultramarines among them, but more were mortal soldiers. Their weapons came in all varieties, nothing like uniform-issue armaments.

"Flamers! Clean up those traces of corruption! Make sure not a single bit is left behind!"

The warriors shouted as soldiers carrying promethium tanks aimed their flamers at the ground. Blazing fire consumed the remnants of those vile things, burning them away completely.

The Apothecary in the squad immediately rushed to the fallen Chapter Master and used his equipment to stop Gage's bleeding and disinfect him. His wounds were quickly cleaned, and the painkillers pumped into him cleared Gage's mind further.

"Your name? Sergeant."

The red-helmeted Ultramarine answered calmly, "Hill. Aenid Hill, warrior of the One Hundred and Thirty-Fifth Company, Chapter Master."

"Did you organize these people? Including this Raven Guard?"

Marius sat up. He did not ask why an ordinary Ultramarine was commanding the battle. The XIII Legion was now in the most chaotic period of its history, and the heavy losses among its command ranks had left the Ultramarines without leadership.

"I did, sir," Hill replied. "But Nykona was not organized by me. This Raven Guard brother returned with Captain Luciel. They claimed that the Word Bearers had already begun their betrayal when the Bell Tower began accelerating."

Nykona Sharrowkyn removed his helmet and nodded to Gage.

"We are survivors from Isstvan. We came to deliver word of the betrayal."

"But it seems we were still one step too late. The Word Bearers had already acted."

"Words cannot express my gratitude, battle-brother of the Raven Guard."

Gage was already able to stand. With his one remaining hand, he gripped Nykona's tightly. At that moment, he realized that the earlier warning at Calth had come from these survivors of Isstvan. They had overcome countless hardships to deliver the message to the Ultramarines.

Though the XIII Legion had still suffered grievous losses, the Chapter Master knew those losses were not fatal. Half their warships had still managed to start their engines and begin fighting back.

Without that warning, the entire Legion would have become lambs awaiting slaughter.

"What happened, Chapter Master?" Hill asked.

"The Word Bearers. They unleashed something that destroyed the bridge. Many people were lost."

"Do you mean the Legion's senior command, apart from yourself?" Hill's voice remained steady and calm. He needed the truth, not these ambiguous answers.

"Including the shipmaster, and most of the senior officers. Chapter Master Varred, Chapter Master Banzo, and your Chapter Master, Antoli."

Hill stared into Gage's eyes and spoke the name he did not want to mention.

"What about the primarch? Is he still alive?"

"I did not see him die, but he was swept into space. I cannot answer that question." Gage's voice was hoarse. He believed the primarch was still alive, however slim that possibility might be.

Hill finally fell silent. His calm decisiveness was not without limits. Now he needed time to accept this devastating news.

A series of beeps came from Nykona's communicator. It was a communication request from Lox on the surface of Calth.

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