Lorgar's plan had succeeded.
Together with him, Horus ventured into the Supreme Central Realm, seeking relics so powerful that even the gods could not claim them.
Now, all that remained was to fully assimilate this treasure. Once he did, everything would fall into place—just as they'd hoped.
The two returned triumphant and activated the one-way teleportation array they had prepared in advance.
Before stepping into the portal, Horus—his figure radiating power—paused. He turned to look one last time at the world they were leaving behind and spoke in a low, resolute voice:
"Next time, I will set everything right."
With that silent vow, he stepped into the light.
Belia IV – Ground Warfront
Dukel lowered his head slightly, deep in thought. His expression was complex—a mixture of wry amusement and resignation.
When Curze had first told him of Lorgar's scheme, Dukel had felt a strange sense of déjà vu.
Now, the feedback from the virtual realm confirmed it completely—he knew why it felt so familiar.
So, Lorgar and Horus had gone to such lengths, all to gain entry into the virtual realm?
They had succeeded. For the first time, the virtual domain welcomed outsiders.
Horus had struck a bargain with the entity known as Ultimate Truth—just as the Emperor, long ago, had brokered his own pact with the gods.
Both had acquired what they desired.
But in the grim darkness of the far future, nothing is ever free.
What is borrowed must one day be repaid. This immutable law governs even the Immaterium.
Not even the Master of Mankind could escape its grip. If he dared deny the debt, he'd have been broken and dragged—half-paralyzed—back to the Golden Throne.
Dukel found himself wondering how Horus would respond when the Ultimate Truth came to collect.
"Dukel, what are you thinking about?" Curze's voice broke the silence, snapping Dukel from his reverie.
"I was wondering," Dukel murmured, "was it like this when the gods first made their pact with the Emperor? Is this how the last ten thousand years of tragedy began—destined from the start?"
Only now did he truly understand why the Emperor had often doubted the righteousness of his own actions during the creation of the Primarchs… why he had once even considered snuffing them out before they could be born.
Perhaps He had always known that any bargain struck in such imbalance could never truly be won—only delayed. The price would come, with interest.
When a force becomes so vast that it defies all resistance, it earns the name of fate.
The moment the Emperor completed the deal, he had sealed his fate—and that of his sons. He had foreseen it all.
But perhaps… he had still hoped for a miracle.
"What?" Curze asked again, confused.
"Nothing," Dukel replied, lifting his head as his eyes flashed with resolve.
"No matter what Horus's final plan is, I will defeat him. His downfall is inevitable. And my victory—inevitable."
Curze didn't comment.
"Brother," came a voice laced with sarcasm from the shadows, "sometimes I envy your blind confidence."
It was the Midnight Ghost. Before Dukel could even throw him an annoyed look, the figure had already slipped back into the darkness.
But Dukel didn't mind. His thoughts were already elsewhere.
What would Horus do next?
The Emperor had made his pact to create the Primarchs.
Could Horus's new transaction in the virtual realm be part of a similar effort… to create cloned Primarchs?
He knew the truth about the original Primarchs. He had traveled through time and witnessed the Emperor fusing Warp-born essence with engineered flesh to create them.
A monumental project.
And the gods had invested in that creation, which in turn made the galaxy a playground for daemons for ten thousand years.
In Dukel's view, however, the gods had been too stingy.
It was like four penniless friends scrounging together just enough to co-invest in a startup.
By contrast, Dukel's Virtual Realm was an infinite credit consortium.
As Lorgar once said—they got everything.
When Horus struck his bargain with the Ultimate Truth, every resource of the virtual realm was opened to him. No reservations. No restrictions.
But to blame the gods for stinginess was unfair. After all, their power was painstakingly gathered—one soul at a time.
The Virtual Realm, by contrast, harvested the Immaterium itself.
The Warp doesn't create energy. It is merely the vessel.
And in the virtual realm, there is no concern for debt evasion.
Because the Ultimate Truth is debt incarnate.
It will come. It always comes.
Efilar descended, her burning wings folding behind her as she landed beside Dukel.
As the administrator whose authority ranked just below his, she had witnessed the whole affair.
She knew what kind of bargain Horus had just made—and she had seen the doom it invited.
"You're far too kind," she said quietly, gazing up at Dukel's face.
Even though what they had done was, in a sense, toying with Horus, she felt no guilt.
The Primarch would've been manipulated by the gods regardless. Better it come through Dukel's hand—at least this way, he might still serve the Imperium in some form. A future remained.
"You are his benefactor," she concluded, her voice steady.
Dukel nodded, satisfied.
That's what he liked about Efilar.
She always saw through the chaos and found the one person still standing in the light.
This kind of foresight is rare among the countless ignorant stars that still shine in the void.
"Come, my girl. It's time we ended this war, once and for all." Dukel placed a firm hand on the nun's armored shoulder.
"My brothers will not stop. They will keep delivering the enemies of the Imperium to our doorstep. We must act with greater haste."
"Your will is obeyed," she replied solemnly.
Meanwhile, aboard the Spirit of Vengeance, Horus and Lorgar returned in silence.
Without hesitation, Horus ordered the ship to depart the Belia system, abandoning the daemonic legions and corrupted warbands he had once used as pawns. Their usefulness had ended.
Only once the ship had left the warp-tainted system did Horus's "friends" reappear—beings who claimed to serve him, but whom he had begun to doubt.
The four watched Horus in silence. Then, like well-rehearsed actors, they offered him consolation.
"Change is the nature of fate, Horus. Our plan will succeed," said the scholar in flowing cobalt robes.
"A true hero accepts his failures," added the grizzled warrior. "There's no shame in defeat, only in surrender."
"Even the smallest life can topple an empire," the obese merchant chimed in cheerfully. "You've done more than enough."
"There will be more pleasures in the days to come," said the Beautiful One, voice dripping with seduction. He licked his lips lightly, his beauty so unnatural it would make stars dim in jealousy.
But Horus no longer needed their words.
Once, upon awakening to his grim destiny, their empty reassurances had soothed him.
Now, he saw them for what they were.
He fixed them with a cold stare. "Where were you?" he asked simply.
"Horus," the scholar answered, "we are your friends—not your slaves. Even we have tasks of our own."
Horus gave a curt nod. He didn't press further.
He rose from his throne and strode toward his private sanctum. Lorca—Lorgar—walked at his side.
"Wait," the scholar said quickly. "You've yet to form your next plan. Should we not return to Moloch? Reopen the portal? The gods' treasures will be more than enough to rebuild your legion. You could forge anew your sons."
"No," Horus said without turning. A renewed sense of purpose burned in his voice—the voice of a commander restored.
"No need to beg the gods. I've found something better."
He turned and locked eyes with Lorgar. "You'll help me, won't you?"
"Of course," Lorgar replied without hesitation. "We are brothers."
Their steps echoed down the corridor as they left the chamber, united in purpose.
Lorgar had already achieved his goal within the virtual realm. He could have left matters be.
But he had seen it: the deal Horus struck with the True God—Dukel—in the virtual realm.
If that was the will of the divine, Lorgar would give his all to see it fulfilled. He would prove his devotion.
The two Primarchs walked on, spirits burning bright.
Behind them, the four "friends" exchanged uneasy glances.
"Since when did he stop listening to us?" the Beautiful One whispered, biting his lip, his eyes shimmering with eerie light. "Perhaps we should tighten our hold."
"Distortion is part of growth," the merchant said, voice cheerful but laced with malice.
"Change is necessary," the scholar murmured, shaking his head. "Everything is proceeding as planned."
The warrior merely growled in assent.
Back on Belia IV, war raged on.
With Horus's retreat, the daemons and corrupted warbands lost all cohesion. Chaos turned upon itself.
The battlefields descended into madness.
Amid the slaughter, an unexpected group thrived—an alien mercenary force under the Black Legion banner. More precisely, an Ork mercenary warband.
The green tide, unshackled and without leash, roared its battle cry:
"WAAAGH!"
While humans screamed and daemons howled, guttural laughter and savage cheers echoed from the edges of the warzone.
The greenskins charged in mobs, swinging scavenged weapons and barreling through the defense lines once maintained by Black Legion servitors.
These Orks had been recruited—or rather, captured—by the Legion's mad Magos Biologis.
Fascinated by the greenskins' resilience, the hereteks experimented freely, modifying and studying them. By accident or design, a Warboss emerged among them.
An Ork with a Warboss is a different creature entirely.
Leadership turned chaos into crude order. And now, unleashed onto the surface of Belia IV, the Orks had no interest in plans or schemes.
They only wanted war.
They laughed and cheered as they smashed through trenches, using battlefield scrap to cobble together ramshackle trukks and kustom weapons.
At first, the Imperial Guard focused on containing daemonic threats and traitor insurgents, dismissing the Orks as a lesser concern.
That proved a mistake.
Unchecked, the Orks thrived.
Their unique biology—half animal, half fungal—allowed them to photosynthesize like plants. Their very presence polluted the biosphere with latent genetic spores. Every drop of sweat, flake of skin, or stray hair could root into the soil and sprout new Orks.
Reproduction by warfare—life through conflict.
Some ancient Mechanicus lore even suggests that the Orks, like the Eldar, were weapons of war engineered by the Old Ones during the War in Heaven. Their genes, laced with cryptic xenos technology, granted unparalleled adaptability.
And now, thanks to the Black Legion's recklessness, they were growing unchecked—again.
The Orks' bizarre physiology granted them the ability to bend the laws of reality itself.
Most of the time, Orks were dumb—barking and brawling with little thought. But deep down, they somehow understood that sometimes you needed a smart one. And so, through the collective psychic field of the waaagh!, they simply willed one into existence.
These so-called Mekboyz or Weirdboyz could, without formal training, grasp languages, engineer crude but effective technology, and outwit even the most cunning of Imperial governors. During the infamous Beast Wars, Orks who came to Terra for "negotiations" wore ill-fitting suits and spoke High Gothic well enough to rattle the Twelve High Lords themselves. At one point, they bluffed so hard, the High Lords nearly surrendered Terra to the green menace.
Now, another warboss was making history in his own way.
Ironclad, known among his kin as Da Iron Boss, had captured one of Khorne's Daemon Engines. The daemon inside had perished—ripped from its iron shell by sheer brute force and careless waaagh! energy. Ironclad admired the empty chassis like a prized trophy, then bellowed an order to his Meks to fix it up.
"WAAAGH!" Ironclad roared, thumping his rust-red chest plate.
His boyz answered with thunderous bellows of their own.
The battlefield knew what came next.
Ironclad was gearing up for a real fight—one for the sagas. He revved up his newly "refurbished" red chariot, its crude plating stained in drying blood and the insignias of conquered foes. It was time to teach the so-called "shrimps" a proper lesson.
Dozens of wartrukks and buggies growled to life, churning dust and sludge across the ruined plains of Vigilus. At the front, Ironclad stood tall in his battle armor, waving a jagged chainsword the size of a man. One unfortunate fart spirit—a confused daemonic wretch—found itself in his path. Ironclad booted it into the mud with a delighted snort. The creature rolled like a rag doll, earning laughter from the watching greenskins.
"Oi, wot now, lads?" one yelled from a pickup thundering by.
"Iron Boss is stompin' again!" another cackled.
"We da biggest! We da baddest!"
"WAAAGH!!"
They raised their slugga guns—each one a cobbled-together monstrosity with extra barrels, spikes, or sometimes a mug attached for good measure. But notably, no one fired.
It was a rare moment of restraint among the Orks.
Ever since one of their number blasted out a ship window while aboard the Black Legion's cruiser—accidentally spacing their old boss—the boyz had gained a primitive understanding of vacuum exposure. Apparently, there was a reason ships were sealed.
The poor git had been yanked into the void, flailing and screeching until silence swallowed him. A lesson learned... for now.
Ironclad bellowed again, the excitement bubbling in his voice like a power core on the edge of overload.
"Let's go loot da shrimpz' base! Dey'z got all da shiny bitz!"
Lately, the gear used by the T'au—or "shrimps," as the Orks called them—had grown flashier and more exotic. Ironclad couldn't hold back anymore. His waaagh! surged with anticipation.
The red tide was coming, and it was hungry.
…
TN:
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