"Advance, endure, expire."
---
"What is your sin?" the Commissar asked, his voice cold and clipped as he inspected the newest regiment of the Death Korps of Krieg—soldiers prepared to be shipped off to Emperor-knows-where.
"The betrayal of our forefathers," the Sons of Krieg answered in perfect unison. The cadence of their voices was precise, mechanical, emotionless. Each man stood perfectly still, clutching his Lucius Pattern lasgun with reverence and discipline. They resembled an abominable intelligence more than a regiment of mortal men.
"What is your redemption?" the Commissar continued, his eyes scanning the rank and file, seeking the faintest flicker of hesitation—there was none.
"To die in the Emperor's name." The answer came again, flawlessly timed, without pause.
To the Sons of Krieg, they were already dead. What remained was service—unflinching and absolute—until the Emperor claimed their souls at last.
"What is your sin!?" the Commissar bellowed, his voice echoing like a thunderclap across the mustering ground.
"The betrayal of our forefathers." The reply came, unwavering.
"What is your redemption!?" he roared again, a demand.
"To die in the Emperor's name." Their response did not change. They displayed no emotion—for they had none—but the conviction was visible.
"WHAT IS YOUR SIN!?"
"The betrayal of our forefathers."
"WHAT IS YOUR REDEMPTION!?"
"To die in the Emperor's name."
...
"What is my sin...?" Guardsman-38912-K muttered under his breath as he choked a mutant woman to death, her frail hands clawing helplessly at his arms. Each of her desperate struggles was answered with a tightening of his grip, an unwavering application of judgment.
Her eyes were wide with pure terror, locked onto the monster that was killing her. The light in them faded slowly, extinguished as life drained from her.
Once 38912-K had dealt with the false gods, he resumed his righteous purge—executing heretics, xenos, and mutants alike. Not even the "pure" humans among them were spared. To tolerate traitors, after all, was to be complicit in it.
But 38912-K struggled to understand what to do next. There was no Commissar to order a mass march, no vox-caster to receive divine command, not even a trench to dig and die in. Only this strange city and its wretched chaos.
Especially after witnessing that abominable proclamation from a so-called god about "absolute evil" rising in this city—this "Orario"—38912-K was lost. Confusion, an unfamiliar sensation, gripped him.
What he did understand was this: he was stranded in a Chaos-infested world, alone and severed from the Emperor's light.
As he noticed the final gasp leave the mutant woman's lips, his mind returned to his earlier question.
"What is my sin?" he asked aloud, though none were present to hear. The voice of the Commissar echoed from memory—the repeated question, hammering at the soul, branding duty into the flesh.
"Lookie here!" A voice snapped him back. A heretic emerged from an alleyway, robes soaked in blood. "Friedrich! We got a little adventurer over here! Sound the whistle—get everyone here!"
Friedrich, now identified, blew the whistle without hesitation. The sharp sound cut through the corrupted air, summoning reinforcements from the surrounding alleys.
For the first time in his life, 38912-K truly thought. He did not act out of direct orders from a Commissar. He did not respond to a chain of command.
He simply thought.
"Hey, pal!? You just gonna keep staring at that corpse? What a freak!" one heretic jeered as he approached, joined by more scum drawn to the sound.
"My sin... is my forefathers' betrayal," 38912-K finally declared, indoctrination snapping him back to his core, anchoring him.
"What was that?" the cultist asked, confused. That confusion died with him—literally—as 38912-K raised his laspistol and shot him clean through the skull.
"What the fuck is that!? A magic sword!?" one shouted in alarm. "We can't beat a magic sword wielder! We are just level ones and some don't even have falna!"
"My redemption..." 38912-K stood, lifting his lasgun, conviction burning like solar fire behind his dull mask of discipline. "...is to die in the Emperor's name."
He fired again—one heretic down.
"Charge!" a voice barked, and the cultists surged forward, crude weapons raised high, believing sheer numbers would break the lone warrior.
38912-K pulled out a fragmentation grenade and lobbed it.
"A bomb!?" a heretic cried, disbelieving that an adventurer could possess such a thing.
BOOM!
"Aghhh!" Screams tore through the air. Shrapnel shredded flesh and shattered morale.
38912-K did not pause. As the wounded staggered and the foolish regained their footing, he resumed firing into their broken lines.
One cultist collapsed. Then another. A third's head burst like overripe fruit.
"What is that magic sword!? Isn't it supposed to break after so much use!?" one screamed in desperation as the lasgun continued its wrath.
But 38912-K did not stop. In fact, he marched forward, and that simple step sent a shiver down the heretics' spines.
"Cozet! Forgive me!" screamed one from behind him. A suicide bomber, his grip tightened on the igniter, lunging toward 38912-K.
With inhuman reflexes, 38912-K caught his arm, almost fracturing his own bones with the force, and threw the bomber into his comrades.
BOOM!
The explosion turned the alley into a meat grinder. Three blasts in total—a chain reaction as more bombers detonated unwillingly. Over a dozen heretics died instantly. Blood and gore painted the cobblestones red.
38912-K, ignoring the pain in his arm, calmly reloaded his lasgun. The action alone sent terror through what remained of the cultists.
"Overwhelm him now, before it's too late!" their leader ordered.
Fifteen remained. The rest were dead or too crippled to fight.
38912-K completed his reload.
One shot. One heretic down.
Two more to the left—dead.
Five to the right—slaughtered.
"AHHHHHH!" one screamed as he lunged toward 38912-K, reaching for the detonator strapped to his chest.
38912-K fixed his bayonet.
A sharp thunk—the cultist's eyes widened in shock as the blade pierced his gut.
Without pause, 38912-K fired two more shots behind the dying man, the red beams punching clean through the corpse and killing the heretics it blocked.
The remaining four finally reached him, forcing him to abandon the lasgun.
"Take this, you freak!" the closest yelled, swinging his crude blade.
38912-K blocked the strike with his shovel, parrying steel with steel.
"Now, Gyro!" the cultist shouted to a nearby ally, who lunged in with his blade.
"Hyaaah!" the heretic screamed as his weapon bit deep into 38912-K's side, blood gushing freely.
"Take this!" another cultist stabbed him in the back with a knife, drawing a grunt of pain.
"Hahaha! Not so tough now without your fancy magic sword, huh!?" the first cultist jeered.
"Finish him off!" he ordered the fourth, who approached with a wicked grin.
"Gladly."
It seemed like the end. A pathetic, blood-soaked death in a nameless world forgotten by the Emperor's light.
But it was not the end.
They did not know what it meant to face a son of Krieg.
With unholy strength, 38912-K performed a sudden backwards headbutt, shattering the nose of the heretic behind him.
"Agh—!" The cultist barely had time to cry out before 38912-K shoved the parrying enemy aside and swung his shovel in a wide arc—decapitating the rear attacker and continuing into the stomach of the one stabbing his side.
"You fucker!" the parried heretic shouted, charging again—but 38912-K drew his laspistol and fired two rounds into his gut.
"Agh—!" He collapsed, coughing blood.
38912-K allowed himself a breath. But then his eyes caught him.
The last cultist had managed to get close.
"If I can't kill you, I'll take you with me!" he screamed, hand already on the bomb's igniter.
38912-K kicked the heretic away.
"Agh!"
BOOM!
The blast hurled 38912-K into a wall. Bones cracked. His coat caught fire. Skin blistered under the armor.
Then came the fall—his body slammed into the ground, nerves screaming.
...
Yet 38912-K lifted his head, if only barely. Smoke billowed above the streets, but through it, he saw the rising sun—its light bleeding through the filth.
Blood, flesh, and fragments of heretics coated the road.
38912-K dragged himself toward his lasgun, each movement a scream of pain. His side bled freely. His back burned. One leg gave out entirely.
But he did not care.
"My sin... is the betrayal of my forefathers," he chanted, forcing his broken body onward, using the lasgun as a cane.
"And my redemption..." he whispered through cracked lips, dragging himself forward on ruined limbs, "...is to die in the Emperor's name."
A vow. A truth. A threat to the unclean world he now found himself in.
The Emperor's loyal servant would not stop.
Not until death came.
---
The second day
---
"This area is a waste of time," Kaguya muttered with a sigh, straightening up after lifting a collapsed rooftop off a crushed building. Her eyes fell upon yet another gruesome sight—squashed remains of people caught beneath the rubble.
Smaller remains, unmistakably those of a child, lay beside them.
They had been clearing the streets of debris and trying to rescue anyone who might still be alive beneath the destruction. The previous night had been a hellish one for all of Orario, and the city needed to recover quickly—if it ever could.
"You're telling me," Lyra replied, her tone laced with sarcasm. It wasn't bitterness—more of a feeble attempt to lighten the suffocating mood around them.
Behind them, their usually cheerful—though now visibly drained—captain, Alise Lovell, placed a comforting hand on the shoulder of the trembling elf beside her.
"Leon, why don't you go rest with the other girls? You must be exhausted," she suggested gently, her voice filled with concern for her familia member's mental state—especially after witnessing the death of her close friend.
'Ardee…' Alise's heart clenched with the thought. She, too, was mourning the loss. But they couldn't afford to be paralyzed by grief—not while thousands had perished and countless others were still trapped beneath the shattered city.
Ryuu shook her head. "No, Alise. I need to help. I need to uphold justice… just like all of you," she said, voice steeled with determination.
That determination made Alise smile, even in the midst of death and ruin.
"Hey! Quit chatting like lovebirds and move it already! We need to check this street too!" Lyra shouted, standing beside Kaguya as the two waited impatiently.
"Coming!" Alise called back, grabbing Ryuu's hand and pulling her along. "We are the followers of justice, Leon!" she said with a grin—a grin that shone with a warmth, like the sun that still hung in the sky above… though no one could see it, hidden behind the smoke that was choking all of Orario.
Ryuu mirrored her smile. Maybe there was still hope. Justice wasn't lost. Justice still prevailed.
"What the fuck happened here?" Lyra blurted out, her expression shifting to surprise as her eyes scanned the bloodied street before her.
"What a barbaric arena," Kaguya muttered with disdain, pulling the sleeve of her kimono over her face to shield herself from the stench.
Alise and Ryuu joined them—and their eyes widened at the grotesque sight.
Body parts were strewn everywhere. Scorched and severed heads, arms, and legs filled the street. Corpses lay mangled, many bearing precise holes burned straight through their bodies, some wounds still sizzling with heat.
"This is… something," Lyra said, struggling for words. "Welp, at least they're Evilus fanatics." She gestured to the white robes the majority of the bodies wore, trying to keep the mood from sinking further.
"Not everyone…" Alise pointed at a body slightly ahead—a cat woman, her neck bruised and stained a chilling shade of blue, as if she had been choked to death.
"Who could be responsible for this?" Ryuu asked, her voice trembling as her eyes stayed fixed on the carnage.
"Damn if I know," Lyra answered honestly.
"It doesn't concern us, elf. It's likely the work of another adventurer," Kaguya said dismissively, her tone cold and uninterested.
"But what about the woman?!" Ryuu pressed, unwilling to let the subject drop. Something about this scene didn't feel right.
"Must be the work of Evilus. Who else would kill an innocent person in the middle of a war they started?" Kaguya countered logically. Who else but murderers would commit murder? To her, it was simple arithmetic.
"Alise!" Ryuu turned to their captain, who stood silently, her expression troubled as she examined the street.
'The fight here had been brutal—intense. Could it have been one person? A cornered group? There were no signs of casualties on the defender side… or maybe their bodies had been taken by the survivor?'
...
Alise turned to Ryuu, who was waiting anxiously for an answer.
She opened her mouth. "Like Kaguya said, it's not our business," she declared at last, then turned away.
"Let's go to the next street. People are still trapped under rubble and need our help!" she added with forced cheer, a hopeful smile forming on her face.
The girls nodded and marched on, leaving behind the grisly battlefield as if it were just another part of the city's broken landscape.
All except Ryuu.
She lingered for a moment longer, her stomach twisting with unease.
Something about that scene wasn't normal at all…
---
"Master, I beg you! I had no part in it!" Olivas cried out to his dark master, Erebus, his eyes tearing from a blend of terror and pain as the Level 7 adventurer tossed him around like a ball.
"Now wait, Zald. I didn't say you could eat him just yet." Erebus raised a hand, instantly halting the annoyed-looking Zald from toying further with the worm squirming at his feet.
Maybe he shouldn't have accepted the job from Erebus. This is so annoying.
"Thank you, Master! Thank you!" Olivas called out gratefully. Despite his high rank within Evilus, that status offered no protection from the judgment of the dark god who led the entire organization.
"Now... say that again. And clearly." Erebus looked down from his throne, his eyes sharp and focused, piercing through Olivas like a hawk eyeing prey.
"Have you had any involvement—any knowledge, any connection—to the deity who took out six gods last night without my command?" His tone was like a blade: precise, unforgiving. This wasn't a question. It was a divine demand—and when a god demanded, answering wasn't an option. It was an order.
Olivas shook his head in desperation. "No! No! I don't know who did it! I have no connection to whoever did it!" he cried frantically, practically collapsing in a bow. "I only serve you and follow your orders, my master!" His voice cracked as the Level 7 looked down at him with cold, disgusted eyes.
A silence hung in the air. Erebus sat still, considering what the quivering lieutenant had just admitted...
"Ahh... sorry, Olivas. Hah." Erebus let out a chuckle, reclining slightly. "I just figured—you're the most fanatical one. I thought it might've been you!" He grinned at the terrified Evilus officer.
Olivas managed a shaky smile, unsure if it meant he was spared or merely being toyed with further.
"Now shoo~" Erebus flicked his hand dismissively, already bored. "And don't cause trouble until I say so!"
Olivas nodded frantically and scrambled out of the chamber, nearly tripping over himself as he fled.
"Can we leave now?" Zald muttered, clearly annoyed. "I'm growing tired of these small fry. I'd rather be drinking than tossing maggots around."
Beside Erebus, Alfia sighed, her ashen hair catching the dim light of the room's gloomy atmosphere, giving it an almost ghostly sheen. "Are you that paranoid, Erebus? I thought you said you had everything under control... wrapped between your fingers."
Erebus placed a gloved hand over his mouth, thoughtful. For a moment, the room was silent.
"I want the two of you guarding me for now," he said at last. "There might be a rogue god among our ranks… and after everything I've worked for, I won't let myself get assassinated now."
His voice was flat, serious—far more so than usual.
Both Alfia and Zald rolled their eyes in unison.
Their contractor, it seemed, was indeed paranoid.
---
The end
---
AN: the indoctrination scene is inspired by the "What is your duty?" Space Marine indoctrination video.
The first day is over, the second day is now here!
Might do a time skip.