The battlefield was already screaming.
Emerald fire rained down from Necron monoliths, cutting through the ash-choked air.
The ground shuddered under the synchronized march of a thousand phalanxes.
Above it all, the Silent King's dais hung suspended like an omen — flanked by three C'tan shards, their fractured forms leaking power that twisted the air into impossible shapes.
Shawn stood still.
For a breath.
Observation Haki rippled out from him in waves, painting the battlefield in a thousand living threads.
Every ally. Every enemy. Every choice.
The smell of ozone from Eristan's plasma forges. The thunder of Valdor's charge. Guilliman's clipped, precise orders.
And beneath it all — the cold, methodical pulse of the Silent King's will.
He's not here to fight me, Shawn realized. He's here to erase me.
His jaw tightened.
Not out of fear — but because he could already taste the blood that would be paid.
"Valen," he said into the comm-link, voice steady. "Cut the Crypteks first. Don't let them reshape the terrain."
Valen's reply was almost drowned in the roar of his psyker lightning: "Already on it."
The first C'tan shard moved.
A jagged silhouette of obsidian and starlight, bending reality into a spiral of blades.
Space folded, and Necron warriors blinked inside the Custodes shield wall — their gauss flayers already rising.
"NOW!" Valdor's voice roared, Armament Haki flaring black across his halberd.
One sweep.
Three dismembered Lychguard dropped in perfect unison, the Custodes line sealing shut behind him.
Shawn didn't move toward the shard — not yet.
Instead, his Spirit Projection burst from him in a surge of gold, a second self wielding twin Haki-clad blades.
It cut through the phalanx ahead, clearing the path for Guilliman's spearhead.
Guilliman hit like a thunderbolt.
His Conqueror's Haki pulsed in rhythmic bursts — not to crush, but to break formation.
Necron warriors staggered, faltered, lines crumbled, and Ultramarines poured into the gap with bolters barking.
"Push them back! Cut them off from the monoliths!" Guilliman's voice was iron, his presence unyielding.
The Silent King finally spoke — his voice a cold, perfect monotone that carried across the chaos.
"Your spirit burns bright, Shawn Newman. Let us see how it fares in the dark."
The second shard moved.
This one was all fire and gravity, the air itself becoming molten weight.
A Grey Knight squad screamed as their armor melted around them, gauss fire pinning them down.
Valen appeared in the inferno — Armament Haki coating his body, psyker shields flaring blue under the heat.
He hurled a spear of pure will into the shard's chest, shattering the gravity field long enough for the Knights to regroup.
When he looked back toward Shawn, his expression was wordless but clear: I can hold — you kill the King.
Shawn stepped forward.
Every strike from his Spirit Projection now mirrored in his real body — twin streams of golden steel weaving through the battlefield.
He carved a line straight to the Silent King's dais, each kill a single, perfect movement.
Every muscle in his Primarch-forged frame burned with control, every breath laced with Conqueror's Haki to keep the Necron lines from closing around him.
The third shard descended.
This one didn't attack with force.
It rewrote the battlefield.
Mountains appeared where there had been flat plains.
Allies and enemies switched positions in a blink.
Even time faltered, freezing bullets midair.
For a heartbeat, the war stilled.
Shawn's eyes narrowed.
Observation Haki surged — harder, further — until he could feel the truth beneath the illusion.
One slash from his Spirit Projection cut the false terrain away, reality snapping back like a broken chain.
"Your tricks," Shawn growled, "don't work on me."
The duel began.
The Silent King moved like a shadow given will — warscythes sweeping, reality folding with every step.
Shawn met him blade for blade, each impact shaking the dais.
Shawn's Armament Haki didn't just block — it injected will into the King's weapon, cracking the Necron's grip.
His Spirit Projection slipped past a guard, cutting deep into the King's shoulder — a wound that bled liquid metal and light.
But the C'tan shards surged in unison, binding the wound in streams of alien fire.
"You will exhaust yourself," the Silent King said.
Shawn's lips pulled into the faintest smile. "So will you."
Below, the war turned desperate.
Eristan's war machines were reduced to slag under concentrated gauss fire.
Custodes fought three-on-one, black Haki flashing as they refused to yield ground.
Guilliman's armor was cracked, his left pauldron shattered — but his voice still cut through the vox, guiding every counterattack.
Valen's aura burned so bright it was painful to look at, Warp lightning and Haki cutting swathes through the enemy — but his breath was ragged, every movement costly.
On the dais, Shawn drove his heel into the King's chest, sending him skidding back.
His Spirit Projection swelled to three times his size, blades shrouded in Liquid Haki that hissed and smoked as it touched the air.
The shards lunged.
One sweep — two shattered into a million pieces of starlight.
The third staggered under the weight of his will, its form cracking apart under the Conqueror's Haki pouring from him like a storm.
The Silent King's eyes — if they could be called that — widened.
For the first time, he hesitated.
"You… are not of this galaxy."
"No," Shawn said, stepping forward, every word a hammerblow.
"But I'm going to save it."
His Spirit Projection pierced the King's chest.
The sound was not of flesh or steel breaking — it was the sound of command ending.
By the time the dais crashed to the ground, the Necron lines were in full collapse.
Guilliman led the final push, Valdor at his side, Custodes and Grey Knights advancing as one.
Valen's lightning tore down the last retreating phalanx.
The Silent King's body disintegrated into ash and light.
But above the battlefield, the remaining fragments of the C'tan swirled — unbound, dangerous.
Shawn looked up, chest heaving, sweat and blood streaking his face.
Not done yet.