The daemon seemed to have no desire to entangle itself with Hurkha; it vanished into thin air with ease beneath the pressure of the Chief Stormseer's psychic assault.
As a Stormseer of the Legion, Hurkha possessed a vast understanding of all manner of Imperial wargear. During the Great Heresy, they had faced the renegade Titans under the Warmaster Horus in open battle. To destroy a Titan, the optimal methodology was always to launch an assault from within, detonating the colossal reactor housed inside the chassis to trigger a catastrophic secondary explosion.
Yet, breaching the interior of a Titan, especially an Emperor-class Titan, was an undertaking of unimaginable difficulty.
Though Hurkha loathed to believe the daemon's words, a creeping dread gnawed at him that this nightmare might yet become reality. If Jaghatai Khan truly perished at the hands of a Chaos Titan, then he, the one who had guided the Legion into this place, would be a sinner beyond salvation.
To prevent such a fate, Hurkha resolved to undertake a desperate, potentially suicidal, yet necessary action.
Whether dealing with an Imperial Titan or an engine of Chaos, attempting a psychic teleportation without a clear warp-beacon risked the pilot being materialised directly into the chassis, fused permanently into the God-Machine.
Regardless of the peril, he had to try.
Hurkha procured a damaged scimitar jetbike, overloading its chassis with melta bombs and plasma charges. He rigged the detonation mechanism to a countdown timer that could only be aborted manually.
If his warp-jump placed him inside the Titan but out of position, he would manually halt the countdown and utilize the damaged jetbike to force his way as close to the command cockpit or the plasma reactor chambers as possible. If he met a grim fate and materialized fused within the bulkheads, the abort sequence would never trigger. In that event, the sheer concentration of melta and plasma fire would still be more than sufficient to grievously cripple a section of the Emperor-class Titan, buying the Khan a window of opportunity to escape.
This was the only penance he could offer.
The other Stormseers offered no grand protestations upon hearing Hurkha's decree; they merely inquired if another should take his place in executing the task. But Hurkha knew all too well that this sin belonged to him alone. He could not abdicate his responsibility.
Refusing the offers of his battle-brothers who were more than willing to die in his stead, Hurkha mounted the jetbike. Beneath the brilliant, flickering shroud of psychic light, he vanished from sight.
Yet none noticed that this time, the cerulean hue of his psychic manifestation bore a faint, deep undertone of corruption.
As his vision returned, Hurkha scanned his surroundings with haste, discovering to his astonishment that he had been translated directly inside the reactor chamber. The titanic plasma core thrummed right before his eyes.
Positioning the jetbike flush against the reactor's housing, Hurkha immediately channeled his warp-craft, attempting to tear open a rift to escape. To his horror, the oppressive weight of the Ruinous Powers within this engine was so absolute that not a single fracture could be rent in reality. The psychic aura flickering around his form guttered and died completely, failing to respond.
Realizing there was no retreat, Hurkha's features hardened into a grim expression of fatalistic acceptance. He violently wrenched a storm bolter from the jetbike's mountings, leveling the barrel toward the access hatch, standing vigilant against whatever foes might breach it.
Whether he survived this hour or not, victory was his.
"Great Emperor, protect the Khan. If it must be, I will bear whatever damnation this transgression commands."
Hurkha silently intoned the Emperor's name, offering his final prayer.
The expected counter-assault never came. Instead, the timer on the ordnance ran dry. A tempest of incandescent fire engulfed everything in an instant, incinerating Hurkha's form into ash.
Deep within the Empyrean, a gargantuan, shifting blue silhouette curled its lips into a satisfied smirk.
"All transpires as destiny ordains. Every mutation is a delightful surprise... Khekhekhe!"
"Aieee!"
A piercing lance of golden radiance cleaved through the infinite void, striking the manifestation of Tzeentch with sudden, violent fury, drawing a shriek of agony from the Architect of Fate. In the next instant, a cohesive soul-echo was violently torn away from the heart of the detonation at a blinding velocity.
"That soul belongs to me!"
A colossal, azure claw plunged through the void, straining to seize the rapidly receding soul before it vanished entirely. Yet, a faint, pure golden light erupted from the deepest recesses of the soul's essence, searing the Lord of Change once more.
"A fanatic of the Anathema?!"
In that single moment of hesitation, the phantom soul vanished completely into the depths of the Immaterium. Tzeentch narrowed his eyes, surprise flickering across his features before dissolving into a sudden, twisted amusement.
"Everything is a manifestation of fate's design."
Turning his gaze back, he looked out across Wyrmwood, where the webway had ruptured in an uncontrolled cascade. Perhaps the portents of destiny were far from concluded.
Within the colossal webway breach, the corruption of Chaos continued its relentless upward crawl. The sheer scale of the devastation meant the ancient automated control systems of the Old Ones would require a protracted period to initiate repairs.
The detonation had shattered countless webway trans-dimensional veins, violently tearing open a localized anomaly akin to a secondary Eye of Terror. Naturally, given time, the masterwork of the Old Ones would eventually mend the fracture, and this massive spatial void would gradually seal itself. However, for now, across both the Warp and realspace, the hidden webway network lay entirely exposed, serving as a volatile buffer zone between the two realms.
Jaghatai Khan was currently racing against the surging tide of empyric energy, leading the remaining eight-thousand-plus sons of his Legion. Through the yawning chasm of the spatial void, they could see the familiar vista of realspace stars.
Undeniably, this was their finest opportunity to break free from the webway. Once they crossed into realspace, they could swiftly establish vox-contact with the Imperium, allowing massive fleets to blockade the sector while the Adeptus Mechanicus conducted their ponderous studies. After that, he could finally seek out Leman Russ for a long-overdue drink.
Yet, just as they were on the verge of plunging back into the material universe, the sudden appearance of a silver vessel gave every warrior pause.
The gargantuan starship possessed a displacement comparable to the Gloriana-class battleships of the Khan's memory, yet its hull was uniquely contoured, boasting an impossibly sleek and smooth profile. The aura of oppressive power radiating from the vessel struck a chord of profound unease even within Jaghatai.
Judging by its vector, the vessel had clearly navigated into the anomaly directly out of realspace. Yet in all of Jaghatai's recollections, the Imperium possessed no such design class.
Was it a xenos vessel? Had a xenos empire encroached deep into Imperial territory, or had their exit point emerged in the heart of an alien domain?
A myriad of calculations flashed through the Primarch's mind. Regardless of the uncertainty, Jaghatai issued the only logical command available to him.
"All forces, prepare for boarding actions. If that vessel manifests any intent to open fire, launch boarding strikes immediately."
No sooner had the Khan relayed the order than a completely unfamiliar, synthesized electronic drone crackled across the vox-bead network.
"Identity identified: Personnel of the Imperial White Scars Legion, including Gene-Primarch Jaghatai Khan, and eight-thousand three-hundred and eleven substandard gene-forged legionaries."
"Information identity verification complete. Data retrieved from the Imperial Inquisition and the Adeptus Astartes records. Data cross-referencing finalized. Confidence index: 71.33%. Authorized for acceptance."
"Inquiry: Is this anomalous spatial rupture the result of authorized Imperial operations? The anomalous dilation of the spatial rift has resulted in the destruction of one Inquisitorial Black Ship and one Guardian-class integrated vessel. Collateral losses incurred will be compiled and submitted to the Imperial Regent, Roboute Guilliman, for executive authorization."