The champion of excess, Gaerki, slammed headfirst into the Warp rift in a surge of manic excitement.
Behind him poured the entire Corpse Brotherhood, along with a vast host of Slaaneshi daemons.
In the next instant, they set foot on Alaitoc's ground, and the Aeldari scent in the air was intoxicating.
Panic was everywhere.
The Dark Prince's favored loved corrupting Aeldari.
Compared to other life, the Aeldari were sweeter prey, and easier to seize.
When the favored faced Aeldari, they acted without restraint.
They knew these people feared them, and that fear strangled most of their fighting strength before a battle even began.
The sudden appearance of the Warp rift and the Dark Prince's minions triggered terror throughout the Children of Alaitoc.
"The skein of fate… has it stopped sheltering this world?!"
Fashimel stared at the roiling tear and the daemons clawing their way through it, a suffocating dread rising in her throat.
Worse still, the rift had opened inside a residential district, bypassing every prepared defense.
That meant Alaitoc's perimeter had failed.
The enemy was less than ten kilometers from the Dome that housed the Infinity Circuit.
"What do we do?!"
Fashimel and the Guardians were frantic. Their numbers in this sector were far too small.
And they were being heavily suppressed. The Dark Prince's minions projected sonic waves and tainted Warp-energy that left them dizzy and unsteady.
Boom, boom, boom—
Gaerki hefted his Blastmaster and fired sonic pulses into the surrounding buildings. The noise spread like a moan made into a weapon.
Those waves carried filth and power, smashing structures apart as they rolled outward.
Behind him, noise-chariots poured out even more polluted Warp-energy, striving to taint the craftworld as broadly as possible.
Against Alaitoc—whose people lived and died by the integrity of their inner worlds—this kind of attack was devastating.
Warp-tainted sound and hallucination were fouling their minds.
Gaerki didn't even particularly enjoy killing.
What he enjoyed was forcing others to witness the profane "art" he created.
A true pervert. A walking contamination engine.
That was exactly why Eden had chosen him: low lethality, maximum humiliation and corruption.
The Aeldari caught in the sonic weapons shook under the torment of noise and illusion, their bodies going slack, their will to resist dissolving into helpless tremors.
The front-line Guardians suffered the worst of it.
"No… stop. Stop this."
Fashimel's cheeks flushed, her whole frame trembling.
Her mind was breached. She saw the ugly silhouettes of excess-daemons, and scenes so blasphemous her stomach lurched.
The sheer filth was unbearable. She couldn't even keep her weapon steady in her grip.
"Behold my art, you wretches!"
The Aeldari's fear only made Gaerki more excited, more twisted.
He pushed harder.
Noise Marines were terrifying even at the best of times, and this unit—reinforced by the Burning Legion's Chaos tech-adepts—was worse still.
And this time it was a coordinated strike from within and without, perfectly positioned, perfectly timed.
Hope Sun's dark side applied part of its illusion-projection authority. Statues of "Asurmen" raised throughout the districts, along with the spread of sonic weaponry, formed a precise system for broadcasting polluted hallucinations.
In plain terms: this "savior," Asurmen, was projecting countless obscene visions across the craftworld—visions designed to shock and violate.
For a people like the Alaitoc craftworlders, whose defense against corruption was purity of mind, it was simply too much.
They relied on spiritual clarity to resist taint. Once that line broke, the backlash was even more severe.
"Sigh. I didn't expect I'd start looking more and more like a Dark God myself…"
Eden looked down on the battlefield through Diablo the Destroyer's authority-vision, feeling a faint, complicated pang.
Compared to the Chaos Gods, he was only weaker in raw authority, and still retained humanity.
A reduced version of a god.
If one day he ever abandoned his humanity and began corrupting his own faithful, he could likely stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the Chaos Gods.
Maybe even stronger—strong enough to smash one of them into the ground.
Meaning: Eden already had the ability to step onto the stage of the Great Game.
It was simply a question of whether he wanted to.
Of course he did not. The price was too high, and the loss of humanity alone was unacceptable.
Eden intended to dominate the galaxy and the Warp as a human.
He was advancing toward that goal step by step—and he had reached a critical node where he needed blackstone as a core resource.
The same prize certain ancient species coveted.
Such as the Necrons.
Eden focused on Alaitoc's virtual tactical map, where red markers flared across the core zones.
This Chaos incursion had roughly a dozen target sites—each one a teleport insertion that bypassed defenses and landed in vital districts.
His directive to the noise units was simple: damage infrastructure, pollute the mind, then drive hard toward the Dome.
That would minimize casualties on both sides.
Of course, the current attack was only the appetizer.
It was a "performance strike" by his own forces, meant primarily to manufacture panic and pressure.
Most of the damage was aimed at buildings and at spiritual contamination.
The truly lethal threat was the Dark Prince's main daemon host, which would soon be bearing down.
Eden had to resolve every obstacle and seize control of the Infinity Circuit before that host arrived—claiming this world completely.
Then he could draw on Hope Sun and the Goddess of Life Isha to strengthen the Infinity Circuit's veil-shield, sheltering the craftworld together.
"The pressure still isn't enough…"
Eden considered, then projected more of Hope Sun's dark-side, Slaaneshi taint.
The craftworld's air grew heavier, clammy, unnaturally damp.
At the same time, the dozen-plus Chaos strike groups intensified their assault toward the Dome, tightening the noose.
Once Alaitoc's pressure reached a certain threshold, his role as the "savior" could begin.
…
Newly repaired structures in the Central District collapsed again. Tainted tendrils crept along the streets.
The Guardians' resistance was pitifully weak; even their thrown shuriken lost accuracy.
"Where is Asurmen's force?! The Guardians are being severely corrupted. We can't hold against the Dark Prince's minions!"
The burly Guardian leader fought with difficulty and shouted despite himself.
He had always opposed Asurmen. Now he was begging for help.
Asurmen's warrior detachments could resist these filth-soaked daemons far better than they could.
But the Commorragh kin seemed delayed by some unseen obstacle. They still hadn't arrived in this sector.
As the lines broke and the Dark Prince's minions closed in, the Guardians tasted death in the air.
"Skein of fate above… are we returning to the Infinity Circuit?"
Fashimel clutched the brilliant soulstone at her chest, realizing their unit didn't even have the strength to run.
Their bodies were going soft.
But what she didn't expect was that the daemons didn't seize the chance to slaughter them.
Instead, they surged straight toward the Dome.
"Skein of fate… the daemons' target is the Infinity Circuit!"
That realization drove Fashimel and the others into deeper despair.
The Infinity Circuit was Alaitoc's foundation.
Could the seers truly withstand the Dark Prince's corruption?
In truth, the seers' situation was worse than anyone imagined.
They were already desperately weak under Slaanesh's influence.
Now, with the Dark Prince's favored inside Alaitoc, converging on the Dome from multiple directions, it became a pincer attack from front and rear.
…
Within a wraithbone dwelling, High Farseer Elarai bore the greatest pressure.
Her mind was linked to the Infinity Circuit and, through it, connected to many sectors of Alaitoc—so she received the heaviest flood of debauched taint.
Those profane hallucinations rampaged through her inner world.
The holy farseer had always kept herself pure. She had never endured such violation.
Her entire body trembled, burning hot, as vision after vision assaulted her—images she could not bear, including grotesque, humiliating scenes of herself with "Asurmen."
"Skein of fate above… is this truly Alaitoc's destiny?
What should I do to turn this back…?"
Elarai's gentle voice shook as she tried to resist the taint, but there were too many breaches.
Her psychic power could not seal it all. The high seers were retreating step by step, failing faster with each moment.
In their psychic sight, the Dark Prince's minions were already closing on the Dome—an unprecedented crisis.
If the Infinity Circuit was damaged, Alaitoc would face annihilation.
Elarai gathered the high seers. If the daemons broke into the Dome itself, they would use the altar to summon a god's avatar for a last stand.
"Where is Asurmen's force?"
"We must ask the Commorragh kin for aid. They can resist these daemons…"
The high seers whispered among themselves. The strike had been too sudden. Guardians across the craftworld couldn't disengage, and no reinforcements could arrive in time.
The only one they could rely on was Asurmen.
Faces stiff with embarrassment, they turned their eyes toward Elarai's beautiful, strained expression.
Some among them had openly or covertly opposed Asurmen and clashed with him.
Perhaps only the High Farseer could ask for aid in Alaitoc's name.
"I have already sent the request to Asurmen. But I do not know whether he will agree."
Elarai's grief was heavy, her tears held back by sheer force of will.
She knew Alaitoc had accumulated too many conflicts with that presence—and had stained his goodwill.
Without warning, another humiliating flash of "Asurmen" crossed her mind, and her psychic defenses faltered further.
That was the horror of a Dark God: corruption ignored distance. The ancient Aeldari Empire had fallen under that same rapidly spreading taint.
"Why was Chaos able to breach Alaitoc's defenses so easily?"
The blind seer was furious, and he spoke his prophecy aloud:
"In the skein of fate, I saw the shadow of a distant kin.
Only that Asurmen could have worked with the daemons and sabotaged our veil-shield from within.
He is the culprit. He will never aid us!"
The high seers' expressions shifted.
It was not an absurd possibility: the Commorragh kin becoming slaves to the Dark Prince was entirely plausible.
If that were true, everything suddenly made grim sense.
"My friends, Alaitoc can no longer afford to enrage that presence."
The old seer looked even older. He let go of something he had clung to for too long.
"Instead, we must show as much goodwill as we can, and beg for his aid."
"But—"
The blind seer bristled, trying to object, but the old seer cut him off with a stern voice and the conclusion none of them wanted to hear:
"If Asurmen has truly become the Dark Prince's slave, there is only one outcome waiting for Alaitoc—
Total extinction."
The high seers fell silent.
Fear spread through them like a leak they couldn't patch.
They didn't want that fate.
And, without realizing it, the scales in their hearts tilted as they prayed to the skein of fate—
Prayed that Asurmen was not corrupted, that he would send reinforcements instead of letting Alaitoc die.
Some even felt a thread of regret.
If they hadn't pushed Asurmen away…
Could they have avoided such a terrible ending?
This Chaos incursion forced these proud craftworld seers to face an ugly truth: they had no trump card left, and no room to choose freely.
As time dragged on and one defensive line collapsed after another, their nerves stretched to the breaking point. Despair fermented in the air, and even the skein of fate turned hazy.
The strike had been too precise, too sudden.
Even if they summoned a god's avatar to smash the invaders, the remaining psychic power would still be insufficient to uphold the veil against the Dark Prince.
They would slide, slowly, into the abyss.
Not only the seers—more and more Children of Alaitoc were praying for Asurmen's rescue to arrive.
Suddenly, joy flickered across Elarai's face.
"Asurmen is personally leading his forces to block the Dark Prince's minions. He swore to drive back every enemy!"
The high seers' emotions lurched like a roller coaster—hope flooding back so hard it almost hurt.
Some even managed a faint smile.
Alaitoc was saved.
…
In Alaitoc's Central District, Eden received the High Farseer's pitiful plea for help, then surveyed the battlefield from above.
He nodded with satisfaction.
"My role as the savior is due."
With the command of the great Asurmen, black-armored warriors appeared in the streets.
With exquisite technique, they cut down the invading daemons as if the taint couldn't touch them.
For these elite Drukhari, fighting daemons was routine.
Back when the Redemption Satellite Zone was still a satellite district, it had endured dozens of daemon incursions. The great Asurmen had even captured daemons and released them into the streets to purge the Drukhari's fear by force.
Watching gladiators fight daemons in the arenas was standard entertainment.
So the warriors had accumulated immense experience against daemons—especially these elite black-armored troops.
The battle felt easy for another reason as well.
Under the Dark Prince's name, Eden issued a withdrawal order to the Burning Legion units that had invaded.
They were to evacuate Craftworld Alaitoc as quickly as possible.
Gaerki and the other champions of excess were unhappy, but they didn't dare disobey that presence.
They fought while retreating toward the rift, making it look as though they had been driven off.
Eden also organized rescue operations aggressively.
He urged the Children of Alaitoc to evacuate immediately toward sectors where statues of the Goddess of Life Isha stood, where protection would be strongest.
Isha's blessing could shelter them from the polluted hallucinations.
And this was the perfect opportunity to demonstrate the advantages of Isha's faith—to make that belief take root completely.
As for the Aeldari's so-called goddess Lileath, she could stand aside.
If she couldn't even protect her own faithful, what right did she have to claim a place here?
Eden commanded from a luxurious sail-barge, "parading" through district after district. Wherever he went, daemons fled wailing, scrambling to retreat.
Calm and unwavering, he broadcast a speech to the entire craftworld:
"Children of Alaitoc, my kin. I am Asurmen, heir to an ancient bloodline. The Dark Prince has invaded this world with cruelty, and all life now faces the risk of being devoured.
But we will not yield. I will lead you…"
A sudden boarding strike became, in Eden's hands, an extinction-level crisis—then he used it to flood the craftworld with his presence.
He had no choice. The noise incursion had caused a tremendous uproar, especially the sonic weaponry, which had blanketed a vast area.
A dozen elite Chaos strike teams exploited defensive gaps and, through sheer spectacle and timing, created the impression of a full legion's onslaught.
That was exactly the moment for propaganda.
In the face of disaster, a ruler had to appear, project strength, and consolidate support.
If you hid away like the Seer Council, you could never forge real authority.
With Eden's posture, a level of prestige never seen before began to form.
While the high seers hid within the Dome, it was the great Asurmen who stepped forward and saved the Children of Alaitoc.
They began to believe—
That presence truly was the Aeldari's savior.
(End of Chapter)
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