Beyond the garden filled with flowers and joy, one place remained steeped in deadly poison gas and muddy swamp.
This was Mortarion's room. When Grandfather had given Nurgle's Garden its grand renovation, he had not rashly disturbed Mortarion, who was still shutting himself away. Instead, he had considerately worked around the place.
As a result, this swamp was utterly out of place amid the strange beauty surrounding it.
Bona kicked the door off its hinges, sending it spinning into the distant mud. In an instant, an enormous scythe flew silently toward his forehead.
Bona did not even turn aside. He simply raised a hand and caught the scythe by its haft. He examined the object, caked in rust and sludge, then casually tossed it to the ground with a dull thud.
A roar came from inside.
"Get out!"
The voice sounded like a bubbling pool of rotten mud, every word laden with a suffocating wheeze.
Bona walked in and saw nothing but a rusty tin can soaking in the swamp, and an utterly gloomy face beneath a cloak.
Mortarion's clouded eyes made out his visitor.
He gave a low, cold laugh, then turned his back on Bona.
"'Father' wants you at dinner," Bona said, his voice devoid of warmth.
"I'm not going."
"No one likes a failure. No one."
"Just let me rot here."
Bona's already foul mood was set ablaze by this pigheaded stubbornness.
Without another word, he walked back to the entrance, propped up the door he had just kicked apart, closed it, and casually cast a soundproof barrier.
All the noise outside vanished at once.
Before long, one wall of the room exploded with a crash. A massive body smashed through it and tumbled onto the lawn outside.
His face battered and swollen, Mortarion struggled to get