Terra, the Eternal City.
The Underhive.
After a grueling battle, the Lucifer Black took the victory, successfully seizing the desecrated fortress and establishing a foothold for their advance. To continue tracking the heretics' movements, the Lucifer Black naturally dispatched forward reconnaissance units. Among them was the sergeant who had just finished commanding his squad in combat.
At this very moment.
The battle-hardened sergeant lay flat on the edge of the ruins, his eyes wide, his binoculars nearly slipping from his hands.
What... is that?
In the distance, within the deepest chasms of the Eternal City, darkness was churning. It wasn't ordinary darkness—it felt as if countless pairs of eyes were hiding within that thick black mist, watching the material universe with extreme greed.
The sergeant's fingers began to tremble. He wanted to lower the binoculars, to run, to close his eyes and pretend he had seen nothing. But his well-trained body seemed frozen, stiffly maintaining its posture.
Then, he heard a sound.
...Footsteps.
The sound of countless feet striking the ground simultaneously, mixed with the piercing screech of claws scraping against rock and the wet, sliding sound of something viscous slithering forward. The noise grew closer and louder, as if the entire abyss were squeezing toward their position.
The sergeant finally regained control of his body—he tremblingly lowered his binoculars and pulled out the portable vox-array from his coat.
"All units... all units, maximum alert!"
His voice was so raspy it barely sounded like his own. Soon, the uninvited guests were exposed to everyone's sight. Binoculars were no longer needed. It was, in a literal sense, a tide of daemons.
First to meet the eye was red—a violent, deep crimson. Countless Khornate daemons, clutching bloody melee weapons, charged at the very front with fanaticism. The warped bodies of the Bloodletters were covered in hideous scars and spikes, their Hellblades vibrating with a hunger to tear through the flesh of all living things.
Following closely behind was green. Plodding Nurgle Poxwalkers moved forward with sickening, wide-open maws. Pus dripped from their bodies, and rotting chunks of meat fell away with every step, only to squirm and reconvene upon hitting the ground. A toxic fog spread around them, corroding even the rocks as they passed.
In the air above, blue shadows circled with high-pitched giggles. Flamers of Tzeentch flapped their wings, throwing fireballs toward the defensive line below. Those fireballs traced eerie arcs through the sky, accurately striking every soldier exposed outside of cover.
And purple lurked in the shadows. The forms of Slaaneshi daemons flickered in and out of sight, their sharp, alien weapons gleaming with lethal light in the darkness. Trophies hung from their waists—human heads with hollow eyes that still bore the fear and despair of their final moments.
"What... what are these..."
In the defensive position, a Lucifer Black soldier murmured to himself, his boltgun nearly slipping from his grasp. He had undergone the most rigorous training and fought countless heretics and mutants. But this scene exceeded all his understanding. Those things, those monsters surging from the abyss, were not human, not xenos, not any creature that could be comprehended.
They were nightmare itself. Monsters from myth and legend. Things that fundamentally should not exist in the real world.
Thanks to the tireless efforts of the Inquisition, any records of Chaos daemons were wiped from eyewitness reports, kept from the knowledge of ordinary Imperial citizens. This was not the era after the Great Rift where daemons invaded reality on a massive scale; the Lucifer Black stationed on Terra could not be as world-weary and knowledgeable as certain Astra Militarum units on the front lines.
An entire company of Lucifer Black froze in place. No one mocked their weakness—because at this moment, every soldier wore the same expression. That expression was terror. It was the most primal human reaction when facing a horror that could not be understood at all.
"For the Emperor!!"
A roar like a thunderclap exploded over the battlefield. The Commissar raised his bolt pistol, aiming at the sky, and fired three shots in succession. The roar was like a heavy hammer slamming into the mind of every soldier.
They snapped out of it. Elites remained elites; even in this situation, their daily, rigorous training and courage provided them with the strength to resist. Frozen figures began to move; stiff hands gripped weapons once more.
"For the Emperor!" "For Terra!"
The roars rose one after another, echoing across the battlefield. Leman Russ Battle Tanks roared to life, their heavy treads crushing ruins as turrets turned to face the surging daemon tide.
BOOM!!!BOOM!!!
The tank muzzles roared. Shells poured out like rain, exploding amidst the daemon hordes and sending flesh flying. Those daemons were indeed terrifying, but they could also die. The combined arms formation pushed forward layer by layer, the roar of boltguns and the hum of plasma weapons weaving together into a symphony of death.
However, the daemon attack was like a tsunami. Before the first wave was fully torn apart, the second had already surged up. A Bloodthirster swung a massive axe, slamming it into a Leman Russ. The armor, capable of withstanding most weapons, was torn open like paper before the daemon axe.
The tank exploded. Shredded metal shards sprayed out like a curtain of rain, hitting the soldiers behind, clattering against their helmets and their terrified faces.
"Hold! Hold the formation!" the Commissar's voice rang out again.
But this time, his voice was drowned out. Monstrous Chaos Spawn crashed into the defensive line. Those twisted creations had long since lost all reason, leaving only pure bloodlust. Their tentacles swept and claws tore; wherever they passed, severed limbs flew through the air.
Plasma cannons shrieked across the sky, blasting molten holes into the Chaos Spawn. But the thing still did not fall. It continued forward, continuing to kill, until it was finally brought down by the concentrated fire of three Leman Russes.
The war had suddenly reached its most fevered pitch. But the Imperial lines were retreating step by step.
"This is a massacre."
Through his reality-warping abilities, Adam's vision bypassed layers of rock and debris, landing on that tragic battlefield. His eyes narrowed slightly. The situation was indeed grim.
"How is it? Are the investigation results out?" Adam spoke, his voice ringing in Sibyll's mind.
Sibyll, still investigating at the bottom of the Eternal Hive, immediately looked up, her voice calm and clear. "Reporting to Lord Adam, our investigation is complete. Those Chaos daemons utilized a certain xenos creation to open a passage and are continuously invading the material world. But we cannot get close—their defense is extremely tight."
So that's it. Adam pondered for a moment. He recalled his conversation with the Emperor.
Well, well. So that 'Webway War' you mentioned, Emperor, wasn't just a metaphor? I thought you were only comparing the scale, but I didn't expect even the methods to be identical.
Are we about to fight a Second War Within the Webway?
However, in this case, it was indeed impossible to defend against. After all, the problem this time did not lie with the Inquisition or any other Imperial institution—those departments that usually lagged behind or messed up had done nothing wrong this time. The problem was on the Aeldari side. The Imperium had no way to guard against creations of that nature.
But Adam wasn't particularly worried. Because at this very moment, the Primarch of the XIII Legion, Roboute Guilliman, had taken over command, overseeing all Imperial military units on Terra. Under his leadership, the Imperium would surely handle this small issue.
Moreover, front-line observation reports showed that no "named" units had been found among those daemons. None of the chief Greater Daemons or Daemon Primarchs under the Four Gods had appeared. It seemed the Chaos Gods were still wary of the Emperor's Sword. If it were just some nameless Greater Daemons, they were, at most, speed bumps for a Primarch.
Memes online were one thing, but did anyone really think Guilliman—who defeated two traitor Legions, the Word Bearers and World Eaters, with the strength of a single Legion during the Heresy—was just playing around?
But now—
Adam's gaze shifted slightly toward the boundless deep space above Terra. More importantly, his target had finally appeared.
"Little Vashtorr, you've finally arrived."
I've missed you to death!