Deep within the Eye of Terror.
The Vengeful Spirit, a steel leviathan dormant for ten thousand years, hovered in dead silence at the very center of warp turbulence.
Unholy runes crawled across its massive hull, its engines spewing a twisted light spectrum that squeezed and distorted the surrounding void.
Sixteen decks down lay the restricted bottom level—a place Black Legion veterans would rather board an enemy vessel than approach.
The four walls of the inner sanctum were stitched together from hundreds of human skins flayed alive.
Rough, blood-stained stitches pierced the subcutaneous fat, while un-dead nerves twitched and writhed uncontrollably inside the wall structure.
The sweet, pungent iron stench in the air could not be purged even with the rebreather systems running on overload.
Ezekyle Abaddon stood bare-chested in the middle of the sanctum.
Rarely had he shed his iconic Terminator armor.
That flesh, stripped of ceramite protection, possessed a towering silhouette rivaling that of a Primarch, his chest and arms covered in hideous scars left behind by ten thousand years of war.
Every single one originated from a bloody struggle capable of crushing an entire Chapter.
Apart from those, his flesh was flawless, without a trace of Chaos mutation—no extra limbs, no festering sores, and no twitching, sinister compound eyes.
Only when he raised a hand and brushed it over the blood pool before him did the power of the Four Gods flash across the depths of his eyes: the crimson of Khorne, the bright blue of Tzeentch, the rotting green of Nurgle, and the vivid purple of Slaanesh.
The four powers flowed smoothly through his body like four rivers merging into an abyss, never encroaching upon one another, ultimately submitting to his will.
He was the only one who controlled Chaos, rather than being controlled by it.
Drach’nyen—the daemon sword sealing the concept of humanity’s “First Murder”—was thrust upright into the bottom of the blood pool.
Abaddon had refused any guards or sorcerers from observing.
This was a psychic divination reserved exclusively for the Chaos Warmaster before the army set out.
He closed his eyes.
Without any unnecessary movements, his warp power surged down the hilt of the daemon sword, connecting directly to the channel at the absolute lowest floor of the abyss.
Viscous bubbles surged violently across the surface of the blood pool.
Nurgle’s whispers circled his ears, promising that as long as Cadia fell, the entire galaxy would be planted with a carnival of plagues; visions from Tzeentch exploded before his eyes, where among countless tangled timelines, only one led toward the throne of Terra; Khorne’s roars shook his soul, as the Blood God prepared endless skulls and thrones for him; and Slaanesh’s decadent melodies wrapped around his body, promising that after the Corpse-Emperor fell, he would be granted the ultimate bliss echoing across the galaxy.
A moment later, Abaddon opened his eyes.
Drach’nyen emitted a long, shrill sword cry from within the blood pool.
At that moment, Chief Sorcerer Zaraphiston appeared silently.
The old creature could hardly be considered a normal living being anymore—his spine folded backward at a bizarre angle, and thick tentacles had completely replaced his lower limbs.
Zaraphiston’s ruined body trembled violently, his voice sounding as if scraped from the lowest depths of the abyss as he spat the final prophecy to the Warmaster: “On the thirteenth crusade, your boots shall crush the Corpse-Emperor’s bulwarks.
The spires of Cadia are the final link in the chain; when they collapse, the Eye of Terror shall swallow the entire galaxy whole!” “Your Blackstone Fortress shall become the giant axe cleaving reality.
When it slams down onto the soil of Cadia, the warp storm shall drown everything.
The Great Rift is about to open, and your long campaign will finally reach its grand climax.” The outcome was decided.
Cadia was destined to shatter.
The Imperial dam that had blocked him for ten thousand full years would soon be smashed into pieces.
A galaxy-spanning Great Rift would slice open the wound of sepsis like a blade, roughly tearing the territory of mankind in two!
He, Ezekyle Abaddon, would personally accomplish the supreme glory left unfinished by his genetic father!
But immediately after, the sorcerer added another sentence.
“Upon the chessboard…
a strange piece has fallen.” The sound squeezed from the old sorcerer’s windpipe was like two pieces of rusted iron desperately scraping together.
Abaddon didn’t even cast a glance at him, his entire mind still replaying the trajectory of the Great Rift he had just foreseen.
The mouth on the old sorcerer’s belly opened and closed weirdly, adding: “Outsiders from beyond this realm have descended upon this world, beyond the sight of even the gods.
He brings new variables, summoning the Corpse-Emperor’s most loyal warriors.
The pale wolf shall manifest beneath the full moon, accompanied by the son of the Lion.” Dead silence hung in the sanctum, save for the subtle twitching of nerves within the skin walls.
Abaddon tilted his head slightly.
A pale wolf?
Likely some stray dog running out from the Space Wolves Chapter to bark.
A son of the Lion?
One of the Dark Angels.
If this were the Legion era ten thousand years ago, perhaps they could amount to something, but how much of a wave could they make now?
As for “outsiders from beyond,” that was even more of a joke.
Eight out of ten times, it was another ancient xenos crawling out from an underground catacomb, or a crude illusion spun by those pointy-eared Aeldari in the Webway.
Only that phrase—”the Corpse-Emperor’s most loyal warriors”…
A sneer rolled from Abaddon’s throat.
How tedious.
For ten thousand years, the fools shouting “For the Emperor!” while rushing to throw their lives away couldn’t fit on a roster.
What did two or three extra clownish performers matter?
Could they possibly turn the tables?
The Warmaster’s mind flicked through hundreds of potential threat names like turning pages in a book.
Inquisitors, Chapter Masters, Living Saints.
Yet he missed the single most impossible correct answer.
At the very bottom of his consciousness, he hadn’t reserved even half an inch for “Horus.” That name should have been swept into the trash heap of the warp along with the disgrace of that failure long ago.
Erased by the Corpse-Emperor’s own hand, even his soul burned to ash.
A weak loser who led his own Legion astray was dead and buried long ago; mentioning him now was dirtying his mouth as Chaos Warmaster.
Even in the wildly improbable event that someone ran up to tell him that Horus had not only returned from the dead but crawled back into reality, Abaddon wouldn’t even bat an eye—he would rush forward, snap that fragile spine, and kill him all over again.
“Can these so-called variables from beyond break Cadia’s final defense line?” Abaddon asked.
Zaraphiston’s twisted neck swayed in a shake.
“The outcome remains unalterable.
Those three are at best onlookers at a grand funeral.
A mere ripple upon the water’s surface—they cannot stop it.” “Then that is enough.” Abaddon didn’t bother wasting any more words.
He extended his broad palm and gripped the hilt of Drach’nyen tightly.
Blue veins bulged on the back of his hand like gnarled tree roots.
His wrist snapped with sudden power.
The sword was pulled from the pool!
The thick blood clinging to the crossguard could not withstand the extreme heat of the blade’s surface, vaporizing on the spot into a cloud of pungent crimson mist that scattered away.
Carrying the daemon sword upside down, the Warmaster strode outward.
The sanctum doors, constructed from layers of pieced-together human bones, slid open to both sides with utmost tact.
The assembly servitors waiting outside immediately stepped forward, numbly carrying heavy black-and-gold components.
The mounting procedures for the Terminator armor activated one by one.
Servo-motors let out an ear-splitting roar.
Heavy plates of ceramite locked his muscles away once more, and massive pauldrons snapped firmly into place.
He transformed back into the terrifying figure that made the entire galaxy tremble.
Abaddon strode onto the bridge command platform, looking down from above.
“Connect to all-band broadcast.” The static noise from the open channel instantly drowned out the roar of the lower engines.
“Pass down my order.” The sound waves blasted indiscriminately through the fleet arrays toward all Black Legion fleets anchored nearby and representatives of other Chaos warbands.
“Muster all forces.
The Thirteenth Black Crusade begins now.”