Yuki was also completely bewildered.
The Arx Angelicum was a colossal military fortress—a sprawling hive city unto itself—forcing even the Tyranid swarms to divide their assault across multiple key sectors.
Yuki had fought his way in from the outer perimeter, aiding the surviving bio-units along the route to maximize offensive pressure.
Yet, when Yuki led his strike force into the inner precinct, he froze in utter disbelief.
Angron was there. Harlequins were dancing through the carnage. Wraithtitans from the Craftworld Aeldari were locked in combat alongside Imperial Titans that had somehow escaped destruction elsewhere. Remnants of the Skitarii legions were holding the line, while a horde of human warriors surged forward, bathed in golden aura and blood-red rage.
The Necron presence was equally formidable, commanded by Immortals, Royal Wardens, and legions of Lychguard.
The Tyranids, in response, were deploying their apex forces: Neurotyrants, Maleceptors, Hive Guards, Hive Tyrants, Swarmlords...
Normally, a single Swarmlord would serve as Dante's ultimate rival. Here, six of them were fielded simultaneously, alongside three Norn Emissaries and a phalanx of Bio-Titans.
Yet despite the fortress grounds being choked with armies, the human forces were stubbornly holding out.
Where was Yuno?
Yuki attempted to establish a synaptical trace to locate Yuno, intending to hunt down Dante together. As the supreme commander, terminating Dante would declare absolute victory for the campaign.
"Dante? I am currently engaged with the Silent King."
"Where are you two fighting?"
"Szarekh locked down the local space-time continuum. Do not worry, my love—let me test the limits of his absolute capability."
Yuki felt his cognitive processors nearly short-circuit.
Death was locked in a duel with Angron; War was wrestling down the Imperial Titans; Pestilence was entangled by Harlequins and Aeldari Wraith-constructs; and Famine was bogged down fighting Crypteks and Overlords of the Szarekan Dynasty, whose hyper-advanced technologies were somehow managing to bind Famine in place.
Compared to their predicted timeline, every single god-tier force the Tyranid swarm had brought into this battle had been completely stymied by unexpected reinforcements from every corner of the galaxy.
Dammit all.
A wave of intense frustration washed over Yuki. It felt as though an invisible hand of fate was actively manipulating the battlefield parameters against him.
No. He had declared it repeatedly: the Battle of Baal must end in absolute victory, and at the very least, Dante must fall!
With his resolve hardened, Yuki focused his strategy on a single, unmistakable objective: terminate Dante.
"I leave it in your hands, my love," Yuno's thought echoed gently across the synapse.
"I will succeed."
Yuno sensed the sudden, overwhelming surge in Yuki's aura. After a momentary flicker of concern, she refocused her attention on the localized pocket of space surrounding her.
"Szarekh, these childish dimensional tricks are utterly tedious."
"Childish or not, you remain unable to sever the anchor, do you not?"
Szarekh felt a cold tremor in his necrodermis. His communication with Yuno was occurring solely because she had forcefully breached his quantum networks to project her absolute will into his consciousness.
"Yet you cannot maintain this barrier forever, can you?"
The Silent King and the Hive Mind were trapped within an isolated dimensional pocket—an ancient, forbidden Necron technique whose blueprints had been deliberately incinerated by rival dynasties.
The genius of the technology lay in its ability to temporarily render any hyper-dimensional entity incapable of interacting with realspace.
The cost, however, was absolute: a entity of equal magnitude had to enter the containment alongside the target to maintain the seal.
In short, Szarekh had sacrificed his own mobility on the battlefield to seal away the Great Devastator.
Yuno observed Szarekh. Though impatience tugged at her thoughts, escalating the conflict inside the pocket was pointless.
The Silent King's technology was no trivial matter, and he unquestionably harbored emergency stasis protocols to preserve his frame. Furthermore, her own current vessel could not sustain severe structural degradation.
"Great Devastator... why does a shard of the Void Dragon submit to your directives?" Szarekh inquired, probing cautiously for data.
"You are welcome to ask the C'tan shards in your own vaults—assuming you possess the courage to wake them."
Szarekh realized that variables beyond even the Silent King's knowledge were unfolding across this theater.
"Still, I must offer you some measure of praise, Szarekh. To seal my primary frame, your race has proven itself truly worthy of standing on the battlefield against me."
"Look! Lord Commander Dante has entered the breach!"
Harriman and the surviving remnants of the Angels Numinous had secured a partially functional artillery bunker that still contained usable ordnance and kinetic shells.
Leveraging this hard-point, they had managed to hold their line for two brutal days.
"Tell me, why did Lord Commander Dante paint his armor pitch-black?"
"Perhaps he wanted a taste of what it feels like to march with the Death Company. After all, a warrior of his standing rarely gets that chance."
"Boss, is this really the time for dark humor?"
Harriman turned to the last ten battle-brothers of the Angels Numinous. Removing his battered helmet, he offered a quiet laugh. "Things have reached this point; there's no sense clinging to sorrow. Let us unbind every emotion they suppressed within us."
"Brothers?"
"As expected, Commander... your attitude is something the rest of us could never emulate in a hundred lifespans."
Harriman's smile turned bitter. "Come now. A few short weeks ago, our Chapter stood whole. Now we are reduced to this handful of souls. If our fallen brothers are looking down on us from beneath the Golden Throne right now, they wouldn't want us dragging our feet in agony. We must march into the dark with joy in our hearts, fueled by the craving for death and the thrill of cutting down the enemy! Is that not who we are?"
A wild, unhinged gleam flared in Harriman's eyes. This was their ultimate purpose. The absolute reason for an Astartes' existence was to purge the enemies of Mankind!
"It might sound absurd right now, brothers, but try your damndest to stay alive!"
Harriman refused to waste time reflecting on his past. As he watched the Tyranid swarms launch yet another relentless wave, one of his battle-brothers voiced a thought he hadn't anticipated.
"Chapter Master... we want to fight alongside Lord Commander Dante."
"Hmm?"
"This bunker has lost all tactical utility as a defensive position. Dying here is no different from dying out in the courtyard, is it?"
Harriman nodded slowly. Deep down, had he not always harbored a desire to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the legendary Dante?
At this stage, conventional strategy and tactics had ceased to hold meaning. The only option left was to rely on raw strength and drag as many alien abominations into the abyss as physically possible.
"Move out! To Dante's position—join the Sanguinary Guard!"
Harriman charged out into the center of the battlefield.
He knew he would likely die in this red dust, unless the God-Emperor Himself interceded.
He also knew the odds of reaching Dante through the roiling Tyranid horde were impossibly slim. In fact, he could see a Swarmlord striding directly toward his line, ready to end his story right here.
"Dammit all... nobody told me a single hive fleet could field this many Swarmlords!"
Harriman swung his power sword with all his remaining strength.
In that fleeting second, a dark whisper echoed from the depths of the Warp into his mind:
"Come... accept my gift. Do not refuse me as you have before, or you shall miss this grand spectacle entirely..."
Khorne?
Harriman let out a ragged breath, completely abandoning the temptation.
If his time was up, he would simply make sure his final tally of dead xenos was as high as humanly possible!