Before the final step of activating the stasis device crafted by Perturabo, everyone had evacuated.
Nareth pressed the activation rune, then returned to the thirty-three pillars of dual-numbered black gold. Gripping the banner shaft in his right hand, he loudly chanted the ritual incantation in Dunnic.
"I, in the name of the 'Red Priest,' request the 'Kingdom of Disorder' to grant me power, so that this stasis field is not perceived by Hrud beyond Kraven."
The "Baron of Corruption's" spiritual energy was instantly drained. The shaft grew hot.
Light and shadow flickered in the Primarch's eyes. His consciousness expanded.
'Hmm... the numbers are off. Far fewer than I expected.'
Though the Hrud surged endlessly, in the Primarch's mental perception, their numbers were significantly lower than on Golghis.
'Even if Kraven had the fewest Hrud among the three major worlds of Gurgan, and millions fell in the void battle, it's still far below the expected number.'
As Nareth pondered, deep beneath Golghis.
Millions of Hrud frantically excavated the collapsed tunnels.
The blinding light that had illuminated the underground had triggered a deep-seated fear, causing tens of millions of Hrud to flee in panic.
Their combined twisted fields caused temporal waves that made hundreds of caves vanish and thousands of tunnels collapse.
Their limbs, wrapped around their spines, thrashed frantically, rapidly opening paths towards the detested light.
With their compact, small bodies, and limbs that could bend in any direction, their excavation speed in groups exceeded that of Termite Tunnelers.
Hundreds of tunnels were visibly rebuilt, rapidly extending towards Nareth's location.
In the Gurgan system, a Gothic-style ship, painted green and bearing no Legion markings, appeared unexpectedly.
On its bridge, six Aeldari stood behind Farseer Eldrad Ulthran.
Tall, clad in a flowing purple robe, scepter in hand, Ulthran issued commands in Low Gothic to the human crew:
"Broadcast on all channels:"
"Humans, this region holds terror. If you touch it, destruction will follow."
"Leave now. Do not approach again!"
Then, Ulthran entered the Aeldari-specific state of consciousness, his mind stepping into the vast Sea of Souls.
He used his mind's eye to perceive the subtle threads.
On Kraven's surface, Nareth's brow furrowed.
Tens of millions of Hrud surged frantically. The stacked entropic fields were already overwhelming the stasis field's periphery.
Under the opposing forces of the stasis field and the temporal waves, tens of thousands of Hrud underwent bizarre transformations.
Thousands aged rapidly, turning to dust.
Hundreds swelled like balloons, then burst, their released toxins turning the ground black.
Dozens escaped stasis, the faint veils reforming around them.
'I can't wait any longer.'
'The black gold pillars, the Silent Talismans, even the stasis device could be damaged.'
With this thought, Nareth loudly chanted the incantation in Dunnic:
"I, in the name of the 'Red Priest,' request the 'Kingdom of Disorder' to grant me power!"
"I command the Hrud: Silence!"
Black mist rose in the "Baron of Corruption's" eyes. A sliver of the sefiroth's power was leveraged by the ritual.
Black mist enveloped the green teardrop-shaped talismans, invoking the power of the Silent Cry.
Green silence power, interwoven with black mist, spread rapidly, surpassing even the range of the Primarch's expanded consciousness.
Tens of millions of xenos fell into silence, frozen in place.
Beyond the range of Nareth's consciousness, deep under Kraven, millions of surging Hrud went rigid.
THUD, THUD, THUD...
A cascade of falling bodies, the earth resonating with tremors.
The Bloody Chain on Nareth's right pinky glowed. His spiritual energy rapidly recovered.
The Primarch's wings beat, lifting him into the air. Telekinesis swept up large groups of Hrud, sending them into the Kingdom of Disorder.
After five repetitions, his expression suddenly changed.
At the edge of his consciousness, a thousand Hrud appeared.
Then tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions.
'Indeed, Kraven was one of the Hrud's fifteen major worlds. Its numbers couldn't be less than a hundred million.'
'Why were they late?'
As he pondered, countless Hrud gathered. Their stacked entropic fields intensified.
Temporal waves spread. Hrud in silence rapidly liquefied and died, becoming pools of slime.
In the Hrud's eyes, only the detested stasis device existed.
They surged frantically. Their twisted fields mercilessly tore through entire groups of their own kind.
After the Rangdan War, Nareth had used up the Silent Talismans he had made. He could not perform such a ritual again soon.
Observing the Hrud's frenzy, a flash of inspiration struck. He opened the vox channel and issued the order.
"The Hrud are attacking the stasis device. The Second and Fourth Chapters are to attack immediately from behind."
Then, Nareth spread his wings and flew towards the densest Hrud concentration.
En route, he continued sending Hrud into the Kingdom of Disorder.
In moments, he reached the battlefront.
The "Baron of Corruption" channeled most of his spiritual energy into the iron-black banner, whispering "flame" as he swept it forward.
The moment the "Red Priest's" uniqueness descended, a formless, colorless sea of fire erupted.
The surging Hrud were swallowed by the flames. Their stacked entropic fields could twist macro-cannon shells to dust.
But against the Flame authority, they were like tissue paper, shattering at the slightest touch.
The flames burned all, consumed all.
The Primarch stared at the sea of fire. Hundreds of thousands of Hrud vanished instantly, without even a moment of burning.
He turned the uniqueness in his hand, thinking silently.
'Even Magnus and Malcador's psychic flames could not instantly incinerate a hundred thousand Hrud.'
'And this is just from my limited use of the uniqueness's power.
'If I could wield the full power of the "Red Priest," only a complete Burning One could rival me in the domain of fire.'
As he thought, in the void of the Gurgan system, Ulthran staggered backward. Two Aeldari caught him.
"Farseer, what happened?" A voice, muffled by an elegant mask, spoke in Aeldari.
"Twisting spacetime... black hole... singularity... destruction..."
"Silence... flames..."
Ulthran said weakly. The Aeldari were stunned. The Farseer's words were contradictory, incomprehensible.
"We must... leave... immediately."
Ulthran gripped his scepter, straightening.
"The humans have not replied."
"They need no warning." Ulthran swept his scepter. A shimmering portal slowly formed in the light.
His eyes stung. The thread of fate he had glimpsed seared his soul with pain.
"Be'lakor encounters..."
He could not describe that terrifying flame. It transcended the bounds of mortal and Warp fire.
"Flames," he said vaguely, "will only bring destruction."
Ulthran raised his scepter. His psychic power expanded.
THUD, THUD, THUD...
The humans on the ship collapsed. Their memories were erased by his psychic power.
The moment Ulthran led the Aeldari through the portal, leaving the Gurgan system, the Dreadnoughts were awakened by song.
Some "Bards" in the Fourth Chapter and "Light Suppliants" in the Second Chapter offered hymns to the honored Dreadnoughts.
Ancient Dreadnoughts, fallen during the Unification Wars, their shattered bodies encased in semi-organic, semi-mechanical shells, had been given a new name in the Fourth Chapter: Senegal.
Sealed within their armored sarcophagi, emotions they had never felt before plagued them. They hated their death. Longing for their complete bodies made them angry and berserk.
They hated this cold, hollow second life.
But when Senegal awakened this time, he felt warmth and strength.
"Father, is this the new change?" Senegal's speaker crackled. Every time he awakened, he sensed changes in the Chapter.
From Reapers lost to slaughter, to Shadows of Order, calm and self-controlled, seeking enemy weaknesses.
The Legion had gained many Court Brothers, granted power by theri Father, displaying abilities that amazed him.
His internal timer told him four years and seven standard months had passed since his last scheduled awakening. This time, he had awakened to a warm song.
"Honored Dreadnought, yes." The "Bard" replied. Few Court Brothers in the Fourth Chapter had received their Father's gift; most of the Chapter disliked sunlight.
For this reason, the Chapter Master had assigned them the duty of singing for the Dreadnoughts.
"My duty is," Senegal checked his display, "to kill xenos. The Hrud."
"Let's go, young singer."
"Very well, honored Dreadnought." The "Bard" sang again, following the Dreadnought.
The Dreadnought's drop pod landed one kilometer from the battlefront. Following orders, Senegal activated his thermal imaging system and quickly located pulsing patches of yellow and red.
He knew from the logs that this was the thermal radiation from the overclocked atomic activity within the Hrud's entropic fields.
He switched to auspex. As the logs said, he saw only blurred shadows.
He switched back to thermal imaging, raising both arms, aiming at the yellow and red masses.
For this mission, the Techmarines had modified his weapons. Both arms were now equipped with twin-linked lascannons.
Laser beams struck the Hrud's entropy fields. Then, light, unhindered by physical limits, exploded.
Four holes burned through the Hrud's obscuring layers. Four Hrud were cut to pieces.
Senegal turned. He saw a Shadow of Order struck by a xenos wielding a lightsaber.
Mark III power armor aged and shattered instantly. As it fell, bones scattered.
The Shadow of Order seemed to have slept longer than he, a million years.
Senegal's arms turned faster than before. Beams crackled.
In the songs praising him, warmth and courage replaced anger and cold.
The "Bard" followed the Dreadnought. Walking through the dust, he picked up a piece of pale, black-spotted, rotting leather.
It was a power crystal, granted by Father to the Court Brothers. It was the only thing that survived the Hrud's temporal currents.
Recovering power crystals was the duty of every Court Brother.
He pocketed the leather and hurried after the Dreadnought.
As the sky over Kraven began to lighten, the Hrud, unusually, did not retreat.
They continued their frenzied assault on the stasis device, only withdrawing when the starlight was fully visible.
Nareth, who had been reinforcing various fronts, glanced at the now-deactivated stasis device.
'The potion materials harvested here are far fewer than on Golghis.'
'Still, the Hrud are uncountable. They are my most abundant source of potion materials, surpassing even the proliferating hive-city rats.'
'Hmm... speaking of which, Hrud have tails too.'
He looked at the black gold pillars.
'Overall, the ritual was successful. Seventy to eighty percent of the Hrud perished in this mad night.'
'The twisted fields of the onrushing Hrud tore apart more of their own kind than I collected or the Shadows of Order killed.'
'But, from a ritual perspective, the same problem occurred as last time.'
Nareth's brow furrowed. 'The uniqueness's power exceeds my own status, making it difficult to control.'
'If I use it in the same way against the largest Hrud world, Gurgan Prime, with its hundreds of millions of Hrud, unpredictable consequences could occur.'
'It might even trigger a worse disaster than what Perturabo faced.'
Unwilling to give up on the ritual, considering the thousands of Shadow of Order casualties it had averted, he thought.
'Hmm, perhaps I can design a more complete ritual. Even if I cannot perform it, I can use the Dice of Prophecy.'
'While making more Silent Talismans, I will design the ritual and divine it in a year.'
As he thought, his communication bead buzzed. He pressed it. Arsena's voice sounded.
"My Lord, I investigated that Imperial ship. The crew's memories have been erased. The Librarians could not obtain any information."
Nareth's furrowed brow tensed further.
'Who would come just to issue a warning, then disappear without receiving a response?'
After three seconds of silence, he thought of the Aeldari warning the Imperium would receive when they first arrived here.
'Hmm, it was likely the Aeldari. I wonder who.'
He reined in his thoughts and instructed.
"Settle that ship's crew on Golghis as the first colonists."
He couldn't let them leave. Sak'trada Deeps must not be known to the Imperium.
After the campaign, he would need colonists anyway. Settling them here was the best solution.
"Order the four Chapters to clear the remaining Hrud from Kraven."
.....
If you enjoy the story, my p@treon is 30 chapters ahead.
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