[Your angry roar still echoes through the vast temple as the charge continues.]
[Except for a portion of battle-brothers tasked with maintaining suppressing fire, their weapons hammering at the Lychguard formation in coordinated volleys, almost every remaining Astral Knight picks up the xenos weapons clutched in their palms.]
[They roar continuously as they surge forward behind you, voices blending into a war cry that shakes dust from ancient walls. Their boots hammer against the metal floor in thunderous rhythm, the sound of ceramite on living metal creating percussion like war drums.]
[At this moment, they harbor no fear whatsoever of the Necron Overlord or its elite Lychguard protectors. Death has become irrelevant. Only the mission matters now.]
[Even when battle-brothers' tall bodies are obliterated by the enemy's terrifying particle beams, reduced to scattered atoms that shimmer green before dispersing, the charge does not falter. Warriors simply step over the spaces where their brothers stood seconds before, maintaining momentum.]
[You forcefully drive your power armor, its ceramite casing now so severely damaged that underlayers show through in multiple places. Warning indicators you've long ceased acknowledging flash constantly. You slam bodily into a gap in the Lychguard formation, using your mass and momentum as weapons.]
[The hyperphase sword gripped tightly in your palm moves like fleeting green lightning. The blade flickers through the air almost too fast to track, continuously slicing through the Necrons' metal bodies. Living metal parts like water before the phase technology, each stroke perfectly executed despite your exhaustion.]
[You charge with reckless abandon toward the Necron Overlord, your focus narrowed to a single point: the ancient being commanding this planetary weapon.]
[But Heqiroth is not passive prey.]
[You suddenly register danger and stop short, instinct screaming a warning. You forcibly wrench a coffin-shaped dispersion shield from the metal limb of a nearby Lychguard, the guard's grip breaking with a sharp crack. You raise the shield just in time.]
[Streaks of energy lightning, brilliant blue-white and crackling with barely contained power, erupt from the Necron Overlord's Staff of Light. They arc through the air toward your position with frightening speed.]
[Your tall body is almost entirely engulfed by the energy barrage. Lightning crawls across your armor in branching patterns, seeking weak points. The heat is overwhelming, enough to make your remaining eye water. The smell of superheated ceramite and cooking flesh fills your nostrils.]
[If you hadn't seized that shield in time, you would already be nothing but charred carbon scattered across the temple floor.]
["CHAPTER MASTER!" The cry comes from multiple throats simultaneously, raw with desperate concern.]
[The battle-brothers following behind you charge forward with absolute commitment. They throw themselves at the Lychguard with suicidal fury, trading their lives for inches of ground.]
[They actually fight through the gathering elite guards to create a fleeting attack corridor for you. A gap in the formation, held open by warriors who know they're dying to maintain it. Blood and scattered armor components mark the passage.]
["HEQIROTH! DIE!" The roar tears from your throat with all your remaining strength.]
[You drive your power armor forward desperately, the already damaged casing taking further punishment as particle beams score new grooves across your back and shoulders. You can feel the heat through failing armor seals.]
[Wielding both hyperphase sword and the captured coffin-shaped shield, you forcefully break free from the Lychguard formation. You burst through the last line of guards and launch yourself without hesitation toward the Necron Overlord himself.]
[The next moment unfolds with terrible clarity.]
[A massive warscythe blade, easily the length of your arm and glowing with its own phase field, cuts sharply through the air. The weapon descends toward your head in an executioner's arc, moving with mechanical precision and devastating force.]
["HUMANS! EXTINCTION!" Necron Overlord Heqiroth somehow squeezes the Imperial Gothic words from beneath his metallic faceplate. His voice is a synthesized rasp, each syllable clipped and cold. It's an extremely frigid response to your battle cry, delivered with the absolute certainty of a being that has witnessed the death of civilizations.]
[You raise the coffin-shaped dispersion shield with apparent desperation, angling it to intercept the descending scythe blade. Your posture suggests a purely defensive response, a warrior forced to block rather than attack.]
[But just as the green-glowing metallic surface of the shield is about to make contact with that terrible blade, microseconds from impact, you act.]
[You suddenly release your grip on the coffin-shaped shield entirely, letting it tumble away. Your hands re-grip the hyperphase sword in a two-handed stance, knuckles white beneath ceramite gauntlets.]
[After stepping forward inside the Overlord's reach, exploiting the opening created by his committed downward strike, you use every ounce of your enhanced strength. You sweep the hyperphase blade horizontally with explosive force, aiming for the Overlord's legs.]
[The sword connects with Heqiroth's shin with perfect technique.]
[Even the Necron Overlord, whose living metal is far more robust than any warrior or guard, proves utterly unable to withstand the hyperphase sword's terrifying molecular disruption. The blade doesn't cut so much as unmake, severing atomic bonds with contemptuous ease.]
[His tall body is split cleanly in two in the blink of an eye. The upper torso, still gripping both Staff of Light and warscythe, falls heavily onto the ground with a resounding crash that echoes across the temple.]
[You don't pause. Don't savor the moment. You continue swinging the hyperphase sword without the slightest hesitation, each movement flowing into the next with the precision born of centuries of combat training.]
[You swiftly sever the Overlord's rising metallic arm, the one attempting to aim the Staff of Light for a final strike. The limb tumbles away, staff still clutched in dead fingers. You cut through the other arm holding the warscythe with equal efficiency.]
[Finally, you bring the blade down in an overhead chop. You successfully sever the Necron Overlord's metallic head from his torso. The skull bounces once against the floor before rolling to a stop, its eye sockets flickering from bright green to dim amber to nothing.]
[At this moment, the controller of the World Engine Borsis, Necron Overlord Heqiroth, is completely annihilated. Destroyed beyond any hope of resurrection or repair.]
[The next second threatens to undo everything.]
[Countless Canoptek Scarabs, their numbers beyond counting, surge toward you like seawater crashing against rocks. The metal tide rises in a wave that would bury you entirely, mechanical mandibles clicking with hungry anticipation.]
[But the insect swarm is immediately seized by an invisible, powerful force. You feel it rather than see it: reality itself bending around the Scarabs as the C'tan shard's will manifests.]
[The Scarabs pivot mid-flight with impossible synchronization. They turn instead to launch a terrifying devouring frenzy upon the surviving Lychguard, overwhelming the elite guards in seconds. The constructs tear through living metal with the same efficiency they would use to repair it, disassembling the guards into component atoms.]
[When all the fighting temporarily ends, when the last Lychguard has been reduced to scattered parts and the temple falls into eerie silence broken only by clicking Scarabs, you take stock.]
[Only eighty-eight battle-brothers remain standing around you.]
[Eighty-eight. From over eight hundred who began this mission. The mathematics are brutal. Ninety percent casualties. An entire Chapter reduced to barely a company's worth of warriors.]
[You find that almost every surviving battle-brother is exhausted and severely wounded. Their armor is barely holding together, great sections simply missing or fused by heat. Blood leaks from multiple breaches. They sway on their feet, remaining upright through willpower alone.]
[You frown deeply and raise your head, ignoring the pain that radiates from your ruined eye socket with every movement.]
[Your gaze fixes on the silver shield still present in the sky far above, visible through gaps in the temple's ceiling. The barrier continues pulsing with energy, unaffected by the Overlord's death. It shows no signs of stopping, no indication of failure.]
[You release a faint sigh that carries the weight of worlds.]
[You firmly shoulder the hyperphase sword, the blade's weight suddenly feeling heavier than it should. You drive your power armor with its damaged ceramite casing forward, walking to stand before the assembled survivors.]
["Astral Knights." Your voice emerges hoarse but clear, carrying to every warrior present. "The Necron Overlord is dead. We achieved that objective."]
[You pause, letting them absorb that small victory before delivering the harder truth.]
["But the World Engine's shield device still shows no signs of stopping. And the battle-brothers we sent to destroy those generators have transmitted no information. No success confirmation. No status updates. Nothing."]
[Your jaw tightens, the muscle jumping beneath your skin.]
["Perhaps their efforts have also failed. Perhaps they lie dead in some forgotten corridor, their mission incomplete."]
[You sweep your gaze across their faces, meeting each warrior's eyes in turn.]
["For the Imperial citizens of the Vidar Sector, billions of souls who depend on us, and for the ultimate victory of our Astral Knights Chapter, for our legacy to mean something... I intend to fulfill the secret agreement I made with that xenos ally."]
[Murmurs ripple through the survivors, confusion mixing with dawning understanding.]
["But for your peace in these final moments, so you may face the Emperor with clear conscience, this mission will be completed by me alone. I will not ask you to share in this burden."]
[You're silent for a long moment, then suddenly bark an order.]
["All melta bombs. Hand them over. Every single one."]
[The battle-brothers hesitate only briefly before complying. One by one they detach the fusion charges from their armor and power packs, passing the cylindrical devices forward. The pile grows steadily.]
[You methodically secure each melta bomb to every available spot on your power armor. Mag-clamps on thighs, waist, chest. Where magnetic attachment points don't exist, you forcibly tie the bombs on with cable and chain, jury-rigging mounting points. You become a walking arsenal of fusion charges, each one capable of vaporizing a tank.]
[The battle-brothers' desperate pleas begin immediately.]
["Chapter Master, you cannot—"]
["My Lord, let us accompany—"]
["This is not a burden for one man alone—"]
[You cut through their protests with a raised hand and a voice that brooks no argument.]
["Stand by here. That is an order. Tend your wounds. Remember our fallen. And if I do not return... Soshyan leads what remains. The Chapter continues."]
[You turn away before they can argue further, before the grief and determination in their faces can weaken your resolve.]
[You walk alone, following the continuous guidance of a massive swarm of Canoptek Scarabs that flow across the floor like a metal river. They lead you toward an unknown destination, deeper into the World Engine's ancient heart.]
[Soon after beginning this solitary march, you encounter more Necron forces scattered throughout the World Engine's vast interior. Warriors patrol in small groups. Immortals guard key junctions. The constructs seem disorganized now, their coordination degraded without the Overlord's central command.]
[You attempt to continue moving forward without alerting them, using cover and shadows where available. Stealth has never been a Space Marine's strength, but desperation makes you careful.]
[However, with the ultimate demise of Necron Overlord Heqiroth, something has changed within Borsis's systems. Control protocols have failed. Containment measures have collapsed.]
[Many insane Necron monstrosities, things hidden deep within the World Engine's darkest sections for good reason, have completely lost their restraints. They quickly reveal themselves before you with terrible enthusiasm.]
[At this moment, a colossal monster bursts through the ground directly ahead. Metal plates buckle and tear as the thing forces itself upward, debris raining down around it.]
[Its entire body is composed of rusted Necron components welded and fused together in horrifying amalgamation. Flayed One chassis mixed with Destroyer parts, the whole thing towering four meters tall and twice as wide. Green optical sensors burn with mindless hunger across multiple heads.]
[It releases irrational roars and howls at your tall body, the sounds more animal than mechanical. Drool that might be coolant or lubricant drips from grinding jaws.]
[You don't have time to ponder what this monstrous thing represents or why it exists. Some Necron experiment gone wrong, perhaps. Some punishment for failures long forgotten.]
[You don't even raise your hyperphase sword. Instead, you casually pull a melta bomb from among the many festooning your armor. Your fingers work the activation runes with practiced speed.]
[You set an extremely short detonation time. Three seconds. Maybe four. You hurl the fusion charge toward the monster while immediately turning and running backward with all your remaining strength.]
[Your power armor's servos scream in protest as you push them past recommended limits. Damage indicators flash urgently.]
[The melta bomb detonates in a sudden burst of explosive fire and waves of terrifying heat that wash over your back. The temperature spike is enough to make warning klaxons wail inside your helmet.]
[When you risk a glance back, the unknown Necron monster has been completely melted. Pools of boiling, high-temperature molten metal, orange-red and still bubbling, flow across the ground where it stood. The heat is so intense that nearby wall sections begin to soften and sag.]
[But the next moment steals any satisfaction from that small victory.]
[You inadvertently see more Necron monstrosities forcefully breaking through the ground at multiple points not far away. Five. Ten. Twenty. The floor buckles in a dozen places as they claw their way up from whatever pits contained them.]
[They brandish extremely terrifying rusted metallic limbs, claws designed for flaying flesh rather than honest combat. They converge quickly toward your position, moving with disturbing speed for things so malformed.]
[You subconsciously widen your sole remaining eye as far as the swelling allows. You gasp involuntarily, the breath harsh in your damaged throat.]
[You immediately drive your power armor to change direction, pivoting hard right and accelerating down a different corridor. Behind you, the horde of monsters gives chase with howling enthusiasm.]
[A large group of Canoptek Scarabs quickly recalculates, their collective intelligence processing the changed situation. They plot a new guidance route for you in seconds, redirecting you around the growing threat.]
[You sprint without hesitation toward the control center. Toward the place where you can release the C'tan shard called Yggra'nya.]
[Toward the fulfillment of your desperate bargain, and whatever fate awaits beyond.]