Toying with fear was the instinct of Tzeentch's daemons. Born from countless intricate conspiracies, calculations, and stratagems, these Warp creatures could peer into the deepest fears of a living soul and endlessly magnify them.
Marcus's will had been tempered by decades of war and was already incomparably resolute. Even the Lord of Change had searched carefully for quite some time before uncovering his deeply buried fear.
Marcus did not fear death. During his service with the Dark Angels, he had witnessed far too many deaths—those of mortals and those of the Emperor's angels alike.
Some died obscurely, while others died greatly. Marcus hoped his own death would be closer to the latter.
What he feared was that his sacrifice, and the sacrifices of countless others who had died for humanity, would become meaningless and be completely wasted.
Within the illusion personally created for Marcus by the Lord of Change, the steadfast commissar saw the defensive lines laid down by the Lion being destroyed one after another beneath the surging tide of Chaos daemons.
The Dark Angels were nearly annihilated, while the Iron Hands and Space Wolves also suffered grievous losses.
Powerful combat white dwarfs and battle planets were shattered under even more devastating strikes.
The wrath of the Chaos Gods carried the wreckage of those incomparably massive celestial bodies and hurled it directly into Cadia, crushing that rivet nailed to the edge of the Eye of Terror with irresistible violence.
Neither the Emperor nor Lox could stop the Eye of Terror from expanding. The spreading Great Rift split the galaxy in two, and the Imperium once more descended into civil war.
Marcus roared endlessly, carving wound after wound into his own body with a dagger, using pain to remind himself that everything was false.
Yet faced with an illusion meticulously