Seeing Valdor reveal his hand first, Malcador no longer concealed anything and laid out the part of the mission entrusted to him.
"Drach'nyen?"
"You brought it back?"
Valdor's blade-sharp gaze swept over Malcador, and a rare trace of gravity appeared in his eyes.
The Captain-General of the Custodes knew no fear, but that did not mean he would not find something troublesome.
The brutal memories of the Webway War surged back in an instant. In that horrific conflict, the damage Drach'nyen inflicted upon the Ten Thousand exceeded that caused by all the other Warp daemons combined.
So long as one was human in the conceptual sense—whether mortal, Astartes, Custodian, Primarch, mutant, abhuman, or even a Tech-priest with barely a few pounds of flesh—Drach'nyen could restrain them.
Even the mighty Captain-General of the Custodes felt an instinctive threat from a higher dimension when facing this fated enemy.
"Drach'nyen is necessary insurance. The true name you seek is not absolute insurance. We must prepare for the worst and have the most extreme means at hand," Malcador said.
"Where did you hide Drach'nyen?"
Valdor was still concerned. He knew full well how terrifying that daemon was. If Ra Endymion had not sacrificed himself and used his flesh and soul as a prison, even the Emperor could not have banished it.
"Where did I hide it? That is a good question." Malcador suddenly revealed an unfathomable, strange smile.
"Deep in the Webway, I encountered an individual exceedingly rare even among the Drukhari—a Haemonculus of Commorragh. He was leading his servants in search of human intruders."
"Russ and the others turned the entire Webway upside down. Even Commorragh was thrown into unrest by them."
"That fellow had left his lair because of it, only to run into me."
"And since I had encountered a Haemonculus,