Chapter 285: Mortarion's Judgment
From the very beginning, Mortarion had only one goal—
He wanted Konrad Curze to feel pain. To feel the same ultimate agony that he himself was enduring.
Blades or words, truths or lies, none of it mattered. So long as they could leave scars upon that monster named Konrad Curze, Mortarion would not hesitate to grasp the hilt of his weapon.
Pain could only be repaid with pain.
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A violent tearing of the air split the silence, followed by a deafening crash of metal. Sparks erupted, illuminating two faces twisted into madness.
"What are you doing, Mortarion?!"
Curze screamed, nearly rabid, his lightning claws slashing wildly, their eerie blue glow crackling like thunder.
"You don't understand! You don't see it! None of you believe what I say! I'm not lying to you!!!"
Curze lunged forward, his agile form vaulting over Mortarion's head. He wanted to break through, to drag Sevatar away, to escape—
No, no, no, no! That wasn't how it was supposed to go. Not Sev!
But the Lord of Death's heavy scythe swung down at him with brutal finality. The haft slammed into flesh with a dull, crushing thud, metal groaning under the strain.
The strike carried the weight of a thousand tons of fury.
Konrad was hurled back, tumbling across the floor in a storm of dust. The mighty primarch steadied himself quickly, baring his teeth at Mortarion like a beast cornered.
For a moment, the two primarchs stood off, each gauging the other's next move.
Mortarion chuckled darkly. He unhooked the censer dangling from his armor, yanked it free, and let it clatter against the floor with a sharp clang.
A hiss followed—the censer spilling noxious vapors that drifted outward, spreading a thin haze across the deck.
The acrid stench clawed at Curze's nose. His pupils contracted involuntarily as the fumes curled around his armor. Wherever the mist touched, faint sizzling whispers spread along the metal.
As the haze thickened, Sevatar—lying limp on the cold floor, already half-unconscious—let out a weak, involuntary groan.
Curze's breath quickened.
"Your little bat won't die."
Mortarion's voice came slow and deliberate, almost savoring Sevatar's death-throes.
"At least not right now. But…"
"Look around, Konrad. This place is drowning in poison. I can't say for certain whether he'll still be alive in a few moments."
"That depends… on whether you can get him out of here. Can you defeat me, brother?"
As he spoke, Mortarion slowly lowered his gaze, reaching toward the munitions at his belt—
In that fleeting instant when Mortarion's eyes left him, the Night Haunter struck!
Every muscle in Curze's body coiled to the limit, his claws tearing through ceramite, ripping flesh from the wound without mercy.
And then—
Mortarion's grip clamped down on his wrist, dragging him closer with inhuman force.
In the Lord of Death's other hand sat a grenade—tiny, almost delicate compared to a primarch's scale.
Mortarion smiled.
"I see it well enough. But I want you to keep seeing it too."
The next moment, the Lord of Death crushed the grenade in his bare hand!
But instead of a thunderous blast, only a searing white flash erupted. Ash billowed around them, scattering in a storm.
Konrad froze.
For a primarch, that pause was long enough. Mortarion released his grip, pulling back to widen the distance.
He watched with grim satisfaction as the pale powder drifted down, settling upon Konrad Curze's wild black hair, leaving it streaked with white.
Inside the grand hall, the strength of the warp energy suddenly surged and flickered.
"Well? Did you see how your little bat died?"
Mortarion taunted.
His words were met with Konrad Curze's meaningless, pain-ridden shrieks. Like a beast suddenly blinded by a searing light, Curze howled and retreated once more into the shadows, burying himself among the stacked racks of torture devices.
Beneath his gas mask, Mortarion's lips twisted into a grin so wide it was nearly a tear.
He had guessed correctly.
Konrad Curze possessed unstable foresight—tied directly to the warp.
But what delighted Mortarion most was that prophecy brought Curze agony.
And for him, that was enough. He now knew exactly what to do.
Standing tall in the center of the hall, Mortarion listened to Curze's wails, to Sevatar's faint, labored breaths. The haze of poison thickened around him. His theory confirmed, in that moment the Lord of Death was already standing in a position of absolute dominance.
The heavy string of munitions at his belt seemed to agree.
The next instant, Curze burst from the darkness once more, his eyes bloodshot, his movements desperate, lashing out with a claw in a frenzy that looked more like a plea for death than an attack!
Mortarion welcomed the strike, fixing his gaze on Curze's pupils, which trembled unnaturally, and let out a sharp, derisive laugh—
In the blink of an eye, the clash of metal roared like a storm beating against the walls, each strike falling as fast and relentless as driving rain. Blow after blow, strike after strike, sharper, faster, harder. The two demigods blurred, sparks illuminating the hall as their shadows flickered in furious motion.
Between the flashes of steel, Mortarion hurled words as barbed as blades:
"What did you see? He isn't dead, is he? Otherwise you wouldn't still be attacking me."
"But I'll tell you this, Konrad Curze—you can't even decide the fate of your own son!"
Curze's answer came in furious, wordless howls. His claws slashed harder and harder. Unless he defeated Mortarion, he could never leave here, could never save Sev!
"You're nothing but a blind fool—gloating! Clinging to pathetic little tricks just to salvage your miserable scraps of pride!!!"
But Mortarion locked eyes with him, relentless. Did those eyes still reflect visions of his offspring's death?
"Pathetic tricks? You're wrong!"
In the next moment, another grenade was already in Mortarion's grip. But this time Curze, anticipating it, immediately withdrew into the shadows. White light flared—Curze snarled and ducked back into cover among the racks of instruments. Just another ambush from Mortarion, and now he was ready for it.
He glared at the half-mad figure, bracing himself for the burden of prophecy. The fractured visions would not slow him—they would show him how to strike, how to kill the enemy standing before him.
He concentrated every shred of focus, the faint phantoms of possible futures already shimmering at the edge of his sight—
And then the ash burst forth, burning his mind, searing his fragile clarity into chaos—
No—! His foresight—it was being suppressed!
In the instant of Curze's shock, Mortarion's scythe and his words fell together, and the two primarchs clashed amidst the clutter of torture devices.
"Now you're blind too. How does it feel!!!"
Mortarion roared with laughter, his great scythe tearing through the devices as he pursued Curze. Sharp blades and jagged steel ripped into his armor, but he ignored the damage.
"Blind? I see more than you ever will!"
"You're insane, Konrad Curze! A rotting wretch to the core!!!"
"Do you still think your lofty primarch's throne will buy you peace? That the price should only be the lives of your spawn?! No—no, no, no! You will pay in full—with your very soul!"
Curze howled as he darted between racks of instruments, trying to counterattack. But the munitions clinking at Mortarion's waist warned him clearly—closing the distance recklessly would only bring a new round of agony.
"I have long since fallen into the abyss of suffering. The guilty must be punished—I have already seen my destined judgment! But you—what right do you have to judge me?!"
Mortarion's expression remained cold as stone. He reached out and crushed another censer in his hand, the metal shattering with a screech. Thick, cloying vapors spilled forth, so dense they beaded moisture on the plates of their armor.
"What right?"
He breathed in the haze swirling around him. Beyond its numbing and dulling effects, it was laced with hallucinogens and compounds that sharpened every nerve's sensitivity.
"The right of a victim's friend. What do you think of that?"
"Have you ever felt it—the vengeance of the innocent dead who suffered under your hands?!"
In the next heartbeat, two grenades landed at Curze's feet, bursting into twin blossoms of blinding light.
Konrad Curze twisted away with impossible agility, springing free of the blast zone. He shrieked as he turned, colliding headlong with Mortarion, who was already charging to meet him.
The grenades left his vision blurred, but not enough to halt the Night Haunter's assault.
He struck first. He clung to Mortarion's bulk, his lightning claws pinning down the hand that reached for more grenades, while his other talon darted toward Mortarion's throat.
But Mortarion twisted sharply, slamming the clinging Curze against a rack of brutal iron instruments. Jagged spikes ripped through the join of helm and gorget, tearing flesh and drawing a hot gush of blood.
Yet Curze did not recoil. He did not yield to the pain.
At last Mortarion discarded his cumbersome scythe, too long and unwieldy for the grapple, and raised his arms to block Curze's frenzied raking.
The two primarchs tore into one another amidst the heaps of torture devices, blood and flesh flying with every strike. In their madness, all restraint was lost—every savage motion was meant to kill.
The heavy racks shattered around them, splintered to scrap beneath their fury. Blood slicked the hall, spreading until the floor seemed to drown in it. Still they fought on.
Time itself seemed to stretch.
At last, from the wreckage and the shadows, one figure staggered upright. Reeling, swaying, but still refusing to fall.
Konrad Curze dragged himself toward Sevatar's body. The first captain's chest no longer rose and fell. His breath had stopped. From the wound in his chest—pierced through by the Lantern—an unhealthy green rot had begun to spread.
No. No, no, no, no! The prophecy said Sev wouldn't die! Why? Why?! Why??!
They had agreed—he and Sev had agreed on their path. So why this end?
Was this truly the future he had chosen?
Covered in wounds, his mind swimming, Curze could no longer hold himself up. He collapsed beside Sevatar's corpse, unleashing a howl like a wounded beast.
The pain surged like a tide. He had ruined everything. He had failed to slay the monster, and worse—he had cost his own First Captain his life.
The Midnight Spectre never wept. Yet Curze's sight blurred, pale motes blooming across his blackened vision. They grew brighter, swelling until they consumed him in a flood of white.
Lost in the brilliance, Curze blinked in confusion.
He found himself adrift in a sea of torture devices, ash falling like rain all around.
He opened his mouth.
That—just now—that had been a vision!
He spun, and there it was: Mortarion's scythe haft, swinging into his vision, swelling monstrously large—
Curze's pupils contracted violently.
A rasping sound. He blinked awake.
Mortarion's ragged cloak filled his sight. He was being dragged across the ground.
No. No. He tried to struggle, but his body refused to move.
Sensing his consciousness, the monster turned his head back—and smiled at him.
Darkness swallowed him once again.
Pure darkness. It enfolded him, filled with murmuring noise. Yet it did not shift into visions, nor dissolve into nightmare. Rare indeed—for even the Lord of Night could not command a dream so empty, so utterly black.
"Trash. Wake up."
A faint voice drifted from the distant shore.
Curze was submerged in absolute darkness, unwilling to acknowledge the sound that instinctively made him retch—
The next moment, his entire face burned with searing pain. A violent suffocation seized his throat; he felt the flesh of his airways peeling away, clogging his windpipe—
Curze broke violently through the darkness. He tried to gasp for breath, but it only worsened his agony, as though claws were raking his insides, tearing at his organs, screaming curses upon his life.
His vision gradually sharpened. A pair of yellow eyes stared down at him with keen interest.
Directly above him, Mortarion gazed upon him with a smile, the cracked scars at the corners of his lips visible—
Where was the mask?
Curze's eyes trailed down Mortarion's arm. The metal tube attached to the mask coiled loosely around it. The mask itself was pressed against Curze's face, and his flesh had rotted away so badly that bone gleamed through.
Curze screamed. He tried to struggle, to strike Mortarion, to break free. But his heavy body refused to muster even the faintest strength. He discovered his limbs were pinned to the ground, nailed in place by shattered batons.
Mortarion licked his cracked lips.
"Awake?"
Curze glared at him with murderous intent, trying to kill Mortarion with nothing but his eyes. But the Lord of Death was unfazed. With almost playful interest, he peeled the toxic mask away.
Curze watched as flesh, cartilage, and fragments of his nose clung to the mask, torn from his own face as it was wrenched away.
"I neglected to bring a stimulant—that was a mistake."
"Later, I realized my own air could create the same effect."
Mortarion's gaze remained sharp, unwavering, as he casually tossed the mask aside, the metal tubing tearing away with a screech of broken steel.
"First, your whelp will not reach you. The gas has already spread. All they know is that you still draw breath—nothing more."
He smacked his lips thoughtfully.
"Second, you are alive. Your whelp is alive as well. Quiet now—listen."
Mortarion pressed his filth-stained hand firmly against Curze's ruined mouth. Curze's teeth cracked under the force. Then, with a twitch of mania, Mortarion raised a finger to his own lips in a grotesque gesture of silence.
Curze was forced into stillness. For a brief second, he heard it—the pounding of blood through his veins, and beneath it…
The faintest sound of breathing. Breathing that belonged to neither primarch.
"See? He lives. Now we may begin the trial."
"In your quarrels with Horus, did you not always cry for judgment? Since you love trials so much, brother, I will grant you one in the form you prefer."
Mortarion withdrew his hand from Curze's mouth and wiped it with disgust against his brother's armor. Muttering, he retrieved a vial from his belt.
"I am not without reason… Compared to you, Konrad Curze, I only want you to know my pain. I only want vengeance."
"The trial is simple: the pain you inflicted upon me, I will inflict upon you. There—trial complete."
Mortarion narrowed his eyes, flicking the vial in his grasp.
"But clearly, Sevatar alone is not enough."
"You are not suffering enough."
"He was not even your dearest companion upon your wretched homeworld."
Konrad Curze's eyes widened. He tried to speak, but his vocal cords had long since been corroded away. Only a guttural whimper escaped—Mortarion had ensured it.
Feigning irritation, Mortarion glared at his brother.
"What is this? Did you never have any friends in your own world? Not even subordinates? What were you doing there, Curze? Were you so loathsome that even the primates of mankind would not draw near you? Did you rely solely on that pitiful gene-seed of yours to ensnare a few ignorant, innocent whelps?"
Mortarion gazed "gently" at his "brother."
"So, given that you are a wretch without even a single friend, I am forced to seek other means to balance my suffering."
He fell silent. Curze could not move at all. In that brief pause, Sevatar's ragged breathing grew sharper, more grating—each rasp threatening to collapse into silence at any moment.
"You enjoy prophecy, don't you?"
Mortarion began to inject Curze with the vial.
"I already know—you struck at my commander because of your damned visions, didn't you?"
Curze's breathing quickened, pupils dilating. Mortarion's voice distorted, distant, as if drifting away through the haze.
"A touch of hallucinogen. A little gift for a 'brother.' No disrespect—after all, you gave me such a… surprise."
Mortarion carefully propped Curze upright, half-reclining, so he could properly see Sevatar's broken body.
Swollen, filthy flesh bulged obscenely from the gaping wound that pierced Sevatar's chest.
With no change of expression, Mortarion raised a grenade before Curze's eyes.
Boom!
Then a second.
Boom!
A third.
Boom!
A fourth, a fifth, a sixth…
"Now, tell me, brother—if I walk away right now, will your Sevatar still live?"
But Curze did not seem to hear. He sat slack, muscles twitching unnaturally, as though prophecy itself had dragged him down into an endless hell.
"Konrad Curze? Konrad Curze?!"
Smack!
Mortarion struck him clean across the face. The skin there had already been flayed by the grenades' proximity, leaving little but raw, weeping tissue.
"Is Sevatar still alive?"
Curze trembled. His eyes bulged as though they would burst. Mortarion could feel the pulse racing in his brother's body—so fast it seemed ready to rupture, spraying his blood in an instant.
So, he drove another sedative into Curze's flesh.
"Is Sevatar alive? Do not test my patience, Konrad."
Curze stared back at him, unblinking. Blood seeped from the corners of his eyes, trickling down his cheekbones.
Still too much pressure, Mortarion thought quietly.
He administered another injection.
"Give me an answer. Otherwise—"
Mortarion raised the white grenade in his hand.
Curze began nodding. Then shaking his head. He thrashed it wildly, incoherent, clearly lost to confusion and delirium.
Mortarion savored his torment. It pleased him.
When at last Curze fell still, Mortarion leaned close, almost tenderly wiping the blood from his brother's ruined face.
"Now, we proceed to the second step."
He spoke, tilting his head slightly so his height did not break the lock of his stare. His eyes burned into Curze's.
"Apologize to my commander."
Mortarion lifted a vial in his hand. He glanced once at Curze, then shifted the vial to hover before Sevatar's broken body.
"If you claim righteousness, then why would a criminal not apologize when standing before the victim's dearest friend?"
"You may refuse. But in doing so, you choose at least one future."
"Now—apologize."
Curze convulsed again, his body jerking like a broken marionette. The repetition of his agony no longer entertained Mortarion; he looked away, almost bored, toward Sevatar, waiting for the third step.
At last, Curze's lips stirred. Mortarion did not know whether he yielded to prophecy, to Sevatar's failing breath, or to some phantom of a justice that had never truly lived within him.
But he recorded the moment. Later, he would show Hadis.
"And now, the third step."
Mortarion pressed a vial into Curze's gnarled, trembling hand—fingers too weak to hold it properly.
Then, into the other hand, he set a grenade.
"Now you hold the means to save your bat-spawn. Without it, no one can."
His smile fell away. His face was once more the pallid mask of Death itself.
"But I cannot say whether it is antidote… or poison."
"Two paths lie before you."
He gestured idly toward the grenade in Curze's fist.
"This is a White Round. Approach Sevatar, open it, and let your cursed foresight tell you the truth."
"Or—trust me. Trust Mortarion, Lord of Death, that I am not filth like you."
"Now then. Farewell."
Rising, he brushed the dust from his corroded armor with casual disdain.
"You may continue waiting for the Imperium's judgment upon the Night Lords."
He kicked away the steel pin that had nailed Curze's right hand. The primarch's arm twisted into an unnatural angle, but Mortarion did not so much as glance at him. He simply walked away—taking with him the weight of Curze's torment, and his forced apology.
Down the cavernous corridors of the Nightfall, dead laughter echoed. The poison of the corpse followed him, seeping into the air. None of the Night Lords dared to approach.
From Hell had crawled a revenant of vengeance—and it would become one of the Night Lords' deepest, most unshakable terrors.
In the darkness Mortarion abandoned him to, Konrad Curze dragged himself in broken, twisted motion to Sevatar's side.
The world dissolved into chaos before his eyes, blurred beyond reason.
He laid his ruined arm across Sevatar's body. He must… he must…
Mortarion had not merely pressed his psychic might upward—each time Curze sank into the deepest pit of prophecy, some malign darkness yanked him back out, hurling him onto the shore like a fish left to suffocate.
He stared at Sevatar.
He saw. He did not see. Dead. Alive. Seen. Not seen. Not what he saw! Couldn't see! Didn't want to see!
The hand clutching the charge trembled and spasmed, twitching in madness—
And then, a touch dragged him back to reality.
Sevatar was not yet gone. His eyes opened, faint as the last light of a dying star. With trembling strength, he closed his fingers around Curze's hand, the one holding the grenade.
He shook his head.
Curze had already shattered within, but the poisons and serums lacing his blood left him unable to flee, unable to escape this place. He could only watch Sevatar's life ebb away.
Sevatar's gaze shifted to the vial.
He looked at Curze, saying nothing, but his eyes spoke. He did not want to die.
He did not want to die.
Curze trembled, forcing all the courage left in him to hold his stare on that vial.
Sevatar's breath grew steadier. Curze pressed himself down beside him, whimpering like a child.
The Night Haunter never wept. But blood streaked down his face as if they were tears.
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