While the four Chaos Gods were struggling desperately within the Warp and falling into decline, Chaos's progress in the material universe wasn't going much better.
Cadia Surface Level
A ritual altar built from twisted flesh and shrieking skulls suddenly exploded apart.
Countless blue runes burst outward like startled locusts, and immediately afterward, a crimson beam of blood-red light erupted from the center of the ritual.
Amid the smell of smoke, blood, and fire, a terrifying crimson demon with curved horns stepped out from the heart of the light.
Its hoof slammed heavily onto the ground, shattering the rock beneath it.
"I am Skulltaker U'zhul! Champion of Khorne, the Blood God's most loyal exalted Bloodletter!"
Its roar rang out like a brass war horn, sending visible shockwaves rippling through the air.
Skulltaker's scarlet eyes slowly swept across the battlefield before it like a predator surveying its hunting grounds. It inhaled deeply, savoring the scent of gunpowder and rust in the air, and a savage smile spread across its face.
This was exactly the kind of battlefield it craved.
As one of Khorne's champions—a legendary being who had once fought alongside the Daemon Primarch Angron during the First War for Armageddon—it had always maintained extremely high standards for those who summoned it.
If the summoners failed to provide a slaughter worthy of its status, it wouldn't mind taking their heads first to consecrate its arrival.
Its vicious gaze swept the surroundings before settling on a nearby group clad in blue-and-gold armor.
The leader slowly removed his helmet, revealing a deathly pale face with ghostly blue psychic fire burning within his eyes.
Skulltaker snorted disdainfully.
So, the Thousand Sons.
Those weaklings devoted to Tzeentch were utterly revolting.
But then Skulltaker suddenly realized something was wrong.
Its body… wouldn't move.
An invisible force coiled around its limbs like a massive serpent, locking it firmly in place. The power was precise and cold, like a trap prepared long in advance just waiting for it to step inside.
Instinctively, Skulltaker struggled. The fury blessed by the Blood God surged roaring through its veins.
But to its horror—
The boiling aura of blood and fire surrounding its body actually withdrew itself, not daring in the slightest to damage the chains restraining it.
How was this possible?
Unless—
A horrifying realization flashed through its mind.
Could this… be the Blood God's own will?
Skulltaker's eyes widened in terror.
Meanwhile, the Thousand Sons sorcerer standing before it nodded in satisfaction and gazed gloomily into the smoke-covered distance.
When he spoke, his tone carried the exhausted despair of someone spiritually dead inside.
"Finally, one with an actual name and reputation. Hopefully you'll be at least a little useful."
Then he raised a hand and stuffed something black and metallic into the Bloodletter's palm.
Skulltaker instinctively looked down.
It recognized the object.
It was… a melta bomb.
What the hell?
I am Skulltaker U'zhul, divinely appointed executioner of Khorne himself.
My infernal blade can kill the most savage enemies in a single strike. I lead entire hosts of blood legions into war.
I am not cannon fodder!
The Thousand Sons sorcerer gave it no time to react. He shoved Skulltaker forward roughly, motioning for it to charge toward the front lines.
The gesture was as casual as driving livestock to slaughter.
Stumbling forward, Skulltaker looked up—
And its eyes widened to their absolute limit.
Before it, a curtain of death slowly unfolded.
All kinds of super-heavy tanks advanced proudly across the battlefield.
Their treads crushed the broken terrain beneath them, throwing dust high into the air as they surged forward at a speed even battle-hardened Skulltaker had never witnessed before.
Baneblades. Stormblades. Shadowswords.
War beasts so rare that even during the Great Crusade they had been considered precious assets now formed an iron wall stretching across the horizon itself, charging like ancient cavalry formations with unstoppable momentum toward the Chaos lines.
And behind them, even more terrifying entities slowly rose over the horizon.
First came the towering cathedral spires piercing the skyline.
Then the colossal metallic giants themselves entered view.
One after another—Emperor-class Titans.
They marched nearly shoulder to shoulder, every footstep causing the earth itself to groan beneath the unbearable weight.
The barrels of their plasma annihilators slowly rotated, gathering the light of destruction.
They advanced with overwhelming force, like a moving mountain range crushing forward.
Skulltaker lifted its gaze toward the heavens.
The sky was blackened by countless swarming dots, like storm clouds or migrating flocks of birds.
Thunderhawks. Voidravens. Marauder bombers.
Aircraft of every imaginable type filled the sky so densely that they blotted out the heavens.
Some models even Skulltaker couldn't identify. But every single one was extraordinarily valuable—airborne harbingers of death rarely seen on ordinary battlefields.
This was a three-dimensional tidal wave.
Steel. Fire. Death.
All layered together into a crushing avalanche.
Skulltaker suddenly smiled in acceptance.
At last, it understood why those Thousand Sons sorcerers had looked so utterly despairing earlier.
Even as Khorne's greatest exalted Bloodletter, even having once fought alongside a Primarch, individual martial prowess had long since lost all meaning before an army of this scale.
This was not an enemy that could be slain through skill at arms.
This was a tsunami forged from steel and destruction.
And in the next moment, volleys from the Mechanicus grand artillery batteries screamed in from the rear lines, and fire consumed everything.
Skulltaker U'zhul—and the Chaos forces beside it, all equally filled with despair—were instantly reduced to ash in the blazing shockwave.
The damage-reducing blessings granted by the Chaos Gods provided absolutely no protection before such overwhelming firepower.
And the iron flood did not stop for even a moment.
It rolled over the battlefield and continued rumbling onward into the distance.
Its treads crushed demon remains and shattered armor alike, as though they were nothing more than dirt beneath its tracks.
Rear Command Headquarters
Magnus slapped his face heavily with one hand and covered his eyes in silence.
His crimson skin was filled with exhaustion and frustration.
Around him, Ahriman and the other senior members of the Thousand Sons remained equally silent. The command center had fallen into suffocating stillness.
Originally, Magnus had believed his plan to be flawless.
By infiltrating through warp entities and using sorcerous corruption personally crafted by Tzeentch, he intended to spread massive chaos throughout Cadia.
Then, using the Warp turbulence caused by that chaos, he would descend upon the battlefield, open a rapid transit corridor to the mission objective, strike swiftly, and withdraw before that iron-brained opponent could even react.
This was the kind of warfare Magnus loved.
Solving everything through knowledge.
Using psychic mastery with precision and flexibility to achieve the greatest objective at the smallest cost—elegant, sophisticated, bloodless.
That was the true art of war, not the crude brutality of simply piling up steel and flesh.
And then the enemy had taught him a very solid lesson.
Magnus stared fixedly at the battlefield before him, thinking through possible countermeasures.
The Psychic Null Zone.
This was completely beyond Magnus's expectations. Honestly speaking, he couldn't even understand how the device functioned.
The Warp and the material universe might appear separate, but they could never truly be severed. Human souls themselves projected into the Warp. If the Warp were entirely blocked off, humans should become mindless husks devoid of consciousness.
So how had they done this?
How could the "Psychic Null Zone" operate normally while still preserving their own awareness?
Could this thing somehow only suppress Chaos unilaterally?
How could something so absurd possibly exist?
Magnus didn't understand.
But he was profoundly shaken.
"So… what do we do now?"
At that moment, it was Ahriman who finally spoke, breaking the oppressive silence.