"What happened?"
The Death Guard looked toward the chaos erupting in front of them with something approaching bewilderment. They could not understand why the new warriors had abruptly turned on themselves. Were they not all children of Grandfather? Were they not battle-brothers? And Nurgle was the most unified of all the Ruinous Powers. Not like Khorne. Not like Tzeentch. Internal betrayal was virtually impossible. So...
What exactly had happened?
"Do not panic. We still have other options. Lord Typhus, what....."
But in that same moment, the commander registered a surprise. New intelligence had come through directly from Grandfather, and it gave him pause.
"Give praise to Grandfather. There is a warrior here whom Grandfather holds in great esteem. To bring this warrior into our family, he has sent me ahead early."
A voice. Typhus himself, Nurgle's walking emissary, and supreme commander of the Death Guard Legion who looked down on his own Daemon Primarch.
Nurgle had perceived something he had wanted for a very long time. A being who could simultaneously embody life and corruption, creation and wither, death and vitality. And in that moment Nurgle understood something. This person might be able to bear the single Authority Nurgle least wanted for himself. The one he had always refused.
Death.
Just as the Emperor of Mankind suppressed his own divinity and placed himself within a peculiar state of existence, Nurgle too had his own concealed vulnerability. And that vulnerability was the Authority of Death.
So if someone existed who could receive and carry that Authority, Nurgle wanted them with an urgency that left no room for patience. He had already accepted that Rotigus's plague rain had achieved nothing. He was beginning to grow anxious. He arranged for Typhus to consolidate every significant asset available and swept two entire warships through a Warp storm directly to the planet.
In truth, among the five most powerful entities in this part of the galaxy, the four Chaos Gods and the Emperor, none of them could be called entirely reckless. But the one most willing to gamble was Tzeentch. Because in his view, even failure constituted a form of change.
Of course, throwing a Warp storm around at will carried a price. Tzeentch noticed it immediately. In the cascading interaction of two Chaos Gods' maneuvering, Nurgle was forced to watch the greater part of the fleet get shredded. All he could do was protect what little remained.
It had always been said that the Imperium was a rotten and crumbling institution. But compared to Chaos, the Imperium was swimming in resources.
In the end only one vessel had made it through. Typhus's flagship. Though....
"Captain, detecting a spatial disturbance. Something is attempting to breach into realspace. Shall I intercept?"
"Snipe it. Shatter that cesspool."
Zhou Ye did not hesitate. The Iron Warriors' ship was on the other side of the planet. His actual concern was that those people might decide they had nothing to lose and call down an Exterminatus or an orbital bombardment. He himself was not worried about that, but he had invested far too much into this engagement to let it simply detonate. A sudden bankruptcy was not an experience he had any desire to have.
What Zhou Ye did not know was that Typhus had no intention of bombarding the surface either.
"Finally out."
Typhus looked back at the Warp storm churning in his wake and allowed himself a quiet exhale. Even for someone of his standing, operating inside the Warp required a Gellar Field. Without one, the entities dwelling there were perfectly capable of harming even the servants of Chaos.
Then he looked at his Plague Flagship and permitted himself another moment of relief. They had brought something of considerable weight on this voyage. A genuinely rare Warp artifact. Powerful enough to tear open a substantial rift in a localized area, sufficient both to allow a Daemon Primarch to descend and to deploy Greater Daemons en masse.
He had to be honest with himself: he was not entirely comfortable with this mission. He had never had much patience for his own Daemon Primarch. That figure had spent ten thousand years retreating into Nurgle's garden and done virtually nothing of consequence.
"Great Grandfather has said there is a being here he finds particularly suited. This being must be located and brought before him, to bear the Authority of Death. What kind of person could carry a burden like that."
Typhus found himself genuinely curious. He had some understanding of the situation. Grandfather had always refused one specific Authority. Death.
Every Warp god had their particular complication. Nurgle refused death. Tzeentch could not probe the Eternal Well. As for Khorne, that one he genuinely did not know. And Slaanesh was entangled with both the Aeldari and a nascent deity that had not yet been born.
A being capable of carrying that weight. Typhus turned the thought over and could not arrive at an answer. But this was also something Mortarion himself could not accomplish. Enough. The situation was what it was.
"What is the current situation on the surface?"
"Grandfather's blessings have failed. We are being flanked by the Iron Warriors, the Orks, and the Aeldari."
"Iron Warriors?"
"Lord Typhus, based on our observations, the Imperial defensive works appear to have been constructed by the Imperial Fists. However the Iron Warriors are currently pressing our lines continuously and I cannot reach them."
"Allow me to handle this......"
As Nurgle's appointed voice in the mortal realm, Typhus carried enough weight to make that particular overture work. So...
"Imperial Fists?"
The Iron Warriors currently trading blows with Nurgle's forces stopped the moment that reached them. Every one of them felt something ignite in the blood. There was no more appealing target in the universe than the Imperial Fists.
Ten thousand years. They had been tearing at the Imperial Fists for ten thousand years.
If the Imperial Fists were here, that changed the calculation entirely. The Iron Warriors swung their weapons around and turned directly toward the Imperial position.
"Clearing the Mandeville Point...wait. Shields up!!"
The moment he came out of the Warp, Typhus saw something that made every dead nerve in his body fire at once. A Battle Barge directly ahead, building power.
And then....
Boom!!
A beam drove straight toward his flagship, punching clean through the Void Shield and slamming into the hull with devastating force. The shock and impact sent the entire vessel spinning.
"You absolute...!!"
Typhus looked at his flagship with a pain that was almost physical. Chaos factions were all running lean on resources, and Nurgle's faction was the leanest of anyone. His flagship was the product of ten thousand years of care. How had that beam gone through his Void Shield. He had opened it a fraction too late....
At least the hit had not been powerful enough to crack the hull entirely.
"The macro cannon system and long-range strike platforms are heavily damaged. Do we attempt a boarding action?"
"Negative. Which sector has ground fire support? Drop both Warlord Titans directly!!"
Typhus gave the order through clenched teeth. They had invested heavily in those two Plague Titans. What they had sacrificed to acquire them had not been trivial.
Then from the corner of his eye he noticed something. A few ships coming in from the distance. He did not deliberate. He drove his flagship straight into their formation.
If Zhou Ye could have gotten a clear look at those vessels, he would have said two words:
"Oh, it's Adeptus Titanicus. Nothing to worry about then."
"Unfortunate that I could not bring it down outright. But if it was any other ship I might have punched straight through. Nurgle's ships. Truly inconvenient. The health on those things....."
Zhou Ye looked at the plague-encrusted vessel retreating to a safe distance and let out a quiet sigh. Pulling it down would have been ideal. But the result was still acceptable. According to Ai-chan's analysis, the macro cannon system had been completely knocked out.
No orbital pressure from that angle then. Though it also meant he could not perform a straightforward orbital bombardment in return. The Hyperion and the Space Wolves' vessel were both primarily troop transports. Their direct firepower was limited.
More importantly, the Warp energy saturation around this world had reached a point where conventional orbital bombardment would struggle to achieve meaningful results. At the level they were dealing with now, even an Exterminatus might not function properly.
"Report. The enemy has dropped two Plague Titans."
"What?"
Zhou Ye blinked. And almost immediately after that, his entire position registered a shift in atmosphere. Because at the edge of visibility, two colossal shapes covered in rotting flesh were slowly walking toward them.
Their metal hulls were split with cracks from which tumorous growths had pushed outward in dense clusters. The Titan heads had warped into screaming human faces, twisted in permanent agony.
The handiwork of Vashtorr the Arkifane. Reshaped by Nurgle's personal benediction. What had once been sacred Mechanicus war-engines now dripped with profane iconography. But....
"Titans......"
The Commissar of the Aestia Regiment breathed in slowly.
"We need to evacuate now, immediately!!"
"Everyone prepare. Every one of us can die here and it does not matter. We protect the Dreadnought Ancient and we get him out."
Volvok was already shouting across his command channel at the sight of those things.
Every member of his squad dying was acceptable. The Ancient must not be harmed.
"We shall not dishonor the blood of Sanguinius."
The Lamenters looked at those approaching shapes and made their peace with it. For warriors still serving their Penitent Crusade, dying here was without question the most worthy end available.
But....
"Blasphemy. That is blasphemy."
Apothecary Beta's voice came through the channel with fury barely contained. The Apothecary chassis was currently a machine Zhou Ye had fabricated. No amount of careful observation would reveal the truth of it.
And then everyone turned.
Behind the fortress, something that resembled an Aeldari Webway Gate tore open. One by one, enormous machines stepped through it. Then, surrounded by a retinue of Imperial Knights that looked small only because of what stood at its center, a colossus over one hundred meters tall walked out.
Zhou Ye was well aware that an Emperor Titan ideally operated with a Warlord Titan escort. But you worked with what you had. A collection of Knights and a single Warhound Titan would have to serve as the supporting retinue.
"Emperor above......"
The Colonel of the Aestia Regiment let out a sound of pure awe. He did not notice that his Commissar had already quietly placed his name badge in his mouth.
Every person present, Astartes included, looked up at that vast presence.
An Emperor Titan.
"Everyone stand back. The field of the God-Machine has been claimed."
The Emperor Titan's massive and utterly cold eyes swept the entire battlefield. Then a voice descended from that towering form like a weight.