The total amount of happiness in the world remained constant. When one group cheered in celebration, another struggled and clawed their way through the depths of despair.
The Vengeful Spirit sailed through the boundless dark void like a lone boat breaking through black ice.
Behind it followed countless battered Chaos warships, which could only rely on the Vengeful Spirit's protection to survive within this realm that extinguished all life.
The great Four Gods had chosen Horus to complete the sacrificial ritual upon Beta-Garmon III. His domain would now expand and spread until it reached the site of the fated confrontation.
But before that, all the armies and warships of the rebel factions had to gather at Ullanor, the former capital of the Greenskin Ork Empire, according to the Warmaster's final orders before he fell unconscious.
The Battle of Beta-Garmon had not only dealt the Imperium grievous losses; Horus's faction had been shattered as well.
The Iron Blood and the Iron Warriors fled. The Thousand Sons' Radiant Magnitude was captured, while Ahriman was forced to lead his battle-brothers into The Empyrean in physical form.
The Thousand Sons, whose genetic flesh had already been exceedingly unstable, suffered severe mutations of the flesh under such intense provocation. Many of them had nearly become horrific beings akin to Chaos Spawn.
Rebels from across the galaxy were converging. They would make their final preparations and gather at Ullanor, then march under the Warmaster's command toward the Solar System, where the Imperium's forces were now heavily concentrated, for the ultimate final battle.
Yet now, there was not the slightest sense of tension or crisis before a decisive battle aboard the Vengeful Spirit. Everyone felt an instinctive dread and unease.
The surviving Dark Mechanicum priests hurried across the Vengeful Spirit's decks, while countless Warp phantoms flitted hastily