"Angron, I'm going to end your suffering!"
Eden braced his boots against Angron's colossal daemon-body. With both hands he seized the horrifying "locks" of hair—those Butcher's Nails—and wrenched with everything he had.
Those ghastly strands were like cables, studded with barbs, burrowing from the scalp deep into Angron's brain. From a distance they looked like thorn-wire "hair."
Under Chaos pollution, that relic-tech had become even more feral and loathsome, writhing like a living thing.
The Chaos Gods had anchored it inside Angron. It was terrifyingly secure, and ripping it out was abnormally difficult.
Worse—
The moment it sensed danger, the Nails began to struggle, the barbs stabbing into Eden's hands and drinking his blood.
It was resisting.
The abominable machine's motion inflicted unbearable pain on Angron. The self-awareness feedback also disrupted the gods' authority inside him, shaking their control.
Angron howled and smashed everything around him. Daemons were flung away by the bone-axe's sweeping shockwaves, even the ship-engine wreckage was overturned, and plasma-energy erupted into wild turbulence.
Soon, the beast abandoned the bone giant-axe in agony and reached out to seize the Savior.
"Stop him. Execute Contingency Three!" Perturabo had been tracking the fight the entire time.
He immediately directed automatons and weapons platforms. The machines fired volleys of auramite chains, driving them deep into Angron's arms and body.
The goal was to restrict his movement long enough for Eden to pull out the Nails.
This was likely the monster's weakest moment.
Then the Lion and the Khan surged in—one to each side—grabbing the auramite chains and wrapping them around themselves.
Together with Perturabo and the machine-constructs, they bound Angron's arms.
Roar—
Angron's hands were locked down by thick auramite chains. Unable to touch the Savior, he began to thrash violently.
The pressure on the primarchs was immense.
"Parasites… I will not let go. I will not kneel to you!" Veins rose across the Lion's body. His already-ruined armor shattered completely, leaving him bare-chested as he forced every ounce of strength into the restraint. Sweat mist rose from his skin.
In this moment he wasn't just wrestling Angron.
He was wrestling the gods of the Warp.
As the Nails loosened, the parasites' will began to waver, their control starting to crack.
On the other side, the Khan was wrapped in auramite chains, driving the relic mechanical wings on his back to maximum output—deep blue exhaust flaring.
The wings overheated under extreme load. They turned red-hot and sparked.
"This has to be reimbursed too!" the Khan snarled, pushing even harder, letting the flesh on his back scorch.
He felt something inside him loosen—some latent state shifting—so he planted himself, locking down Angron's right arm.
Then the anomaly struck.
The rifts in the void seemed to be sliced open by a god's hand, and a tide of Chaos surged in.
They were stopping the Savior from destroying the weapon they had cultivated for so long.
"Daemons!" The Lion and the others saw it and felt despair.
They had no capacity left to deal with the incoming horde. Dodging alone was becoming nearly impossible.
They could only watch as daemons lunged at them, teeth and claws flashing with lethal intent.
Even so, the Lion and the others did not release the chains.
Even one extra second would give Eden a better chance to win.
For the Imperium. For mankind.
The Lion's breathing became sharp and tight. He braced his body. The chill of incoming claws made his hair stand on end.
Several daemons reached him. Claws tore open ugly wounds across his body.
He still didn't move—until one daemon raised a poisoned, filthy weapon toward his heart.
The Lion realized that weapon could cripple him, even kill him.
Bang—
The daemon's head exploded.
Its corpse fell, and the Lion saw a warrior standing in the distance, wreathed in flame.
The warrior's armor was black, decorated with motifs of bone and fire. A strange light seeped from his plating, and a ring of fire burned beneath his feet.
"For the Emperor."
The flame-warrior gave the Lion a slight acknowledgment and moved to intercept other daemons.
He did not fear claws. Every motion was cold and efficient.
He fired burning bolt rounds that tore through daemon armor with ease, dropping them one after another.
Across the layered wreckage-zone, fires ignited—one after another—as more flame-warriors appeared.
They held broken corridors, stood atop rubble, and moved through Caliban's forest, blocking daemons pouring in from every direction.
The Emperor had gained an advantage in the higher-dimensional war against the gods and had dispatched his Cursed Legion into this domain.
"Good. At least the old man can still hold…" Eden saw this and finally exhaled.
The Emperor's "darkening" had been worsening for some time. Being able to provide even this level of support was already not easy.
But support was support. It eased the pressure.
"My brothers are holding. I can't give up now!"
Eden endured the pain and yanked again, dragging the Butcher's Nails farther out.
His hands were drenched in blood. The Nails crawled along his palms into his forearms, continuing to corrode.
It was affecting his thoughts.
This forbidden relic-tech was vicious beyond description.
Angron, before the Nails, had been dull in certain ways due to head trauma—but he had a gift: he could sense and absorb the negative emotions of those around him.
He could truly empathize.
He could understand.
And he could reduce people's suffering.
That was why, even as a slave inside the arenas, Angron still cared for and protected others.
He took on the slaves' pain and gave them comfort.
He earned their respect and loyalty.
But Angron had refused to kill his adoptive father in the pits.
For that defiance, they forcibly installed the Butcher's Nails.
That forbidden relic-tech constantly stimulated and tortured his brain. Only violence could dull the neural agony.
From Eden's point of view, without the Nails, Angron might have been one of the kindest primarchs—an earnest, warm-hearted big fool.
Instead, after the Nails, he fell into endless suffering and lost the ability to absorb negativity.
"No wonder the gods wanted Angron trapped in tragedy and tightly controlled."
Eden suspected it was a deliberate Chaos plot. Angron's nature—dissolving negativity—was a direct threat to the gods.
Because Angron could always unite those around him and earn love and loyalty.
More than that, the primarchs all had flaws—warped personalities, heavy shadows—and Angron would have been the perfect binder.
He could have held the brothers together, soothed their pain and darkness.
In that sense, Angron might have been even more beloved than Horus—maybe even pushing the Emperor himself into the background.
"Who wouldn't love a big fool who takes care of his brothers and sisters… and would die for them?"
Eden gritted through the agony, suppressing corruption as he thought.
In truth, even after the Nails, Angron had retained a great deal of awareness.
He had even led his gladiator "siblings" in rebellion.
Then the Emperor arrived, negotiated "peace" with the world's rulers—and abducted Angron.
As part of the bargain, the gladiator slaves—Angron's brothers and sisters—were executed.
That was the true fuse of Angron's fall.
He had wanted to live and die with them.
The Emperor destroyed that—coldly—and refused them even a shred of mercy.
That planted the root of Angron's hatred.
"The Emperor's brain must've been full of sewage," Eden had once muttered after learning this history.
At that time the Emperor was likely an arrogant tyrant—self-assured, ruthless, convinced everyone should naturally obey him.
Everything for humanity's "great cause."
He forgot that people have feelings.
For Angron, all he had to do was save the slaves too—apply gene-augmentation if necessary—and let them fight together, happy, conquering the stars.
Wouldn't that have eased the darkness?
Wouldn't it have prevented the fall?
But the tragedy was already sealed. Nothing could be undone.
If pulling out the Nails restored Angron, that was best.
If not, then the only mercy was to end him—grant him release.
Eden tightened his grip and pulled again.
But the twisting, hideous Nails crawled along the flesh of Eden's arm, as if aiming for his skull.
"So this thing is either in his head, or in my head—those are the options?!"
Eden's mind went blank.
But he didn't let go.
Fine. Let it come. He could take it.
Worst case, he'd get a few thorn-cables as hair.
Under his force, the Nails were dragged out halfway.
ROAR!!!
Angron's struggle worsened, power surging, stretching the auramite chains to their limit.
Snap—
The chains began to fail in sequence. The Lion and the others were at their own breaking point.
The Khan's relic wings were near total failure from overload.
Eden saw it and grew more frantic.
But it got worse. In the next instant, Angron tore the auramite chains apart and backhanded the Lion and the others into the wreckage.
A monstrous hand reached for Eden.
"This is it…"
Eden knew it. This was his last chance.
He nearly bit through his teeth and summoned the greatest strength he had ever forced out of his body.
"Up. Now!"
The Butcher's Nails went taut again. More tore free. They hit the limit—
BANG—
With an explosive crack, Eden was flung backward, slamming into debris.
He stared at the small portion of Nails in his hand, stunned.
Before he could react, the remaining Nails bored into his skull, detonating nerve pain beyond description.
Agony.
"Damn it… I'm finished."
Eden's brain turned to paste. That was the only thought left.
It meant the Nails were still active.
It meant the damned thing could self-repair.
The extraction plan had failed.
On the other side, Angron's pain also hit the ceiling.
He dropped to his knees, clutching his head, screaming, pulverizing everything in reach.
"No… get out… get out… I belong to no one! I am nobody's slave!"
Half-conscious, Eden only felt as though countless ten-thousand-ton hammers were smashing the ground around him.
Several times he nearly got hit. His head rang, as if something was pounding inside it.
But he had enough authority and will to suppress pain and corrosion.
Hope Sun. Diablo the Destroyer. Greenskin authority. If he "figured" it could hold, then it could hold.
Huff—
Eden finally regained clarity and immediately touched the cables on his head—countless lines running down to his back.
He now had Angron's hairstyle.
Eden recovered and retreated from the danger zone at once, regrouping with the Lion, Perturabo, and the Khan.
All of the primarchs were gasping, exhausted, running on fumes.
And the Cursed warriors were disappearing one by one. Even the Emperor seemed to be struggling to maintain support.
After all, this was the gods' domain, and he still had to spend most of his power restraining his own dark side.
Providing even this much help was already difficult.
Eden and the others watched Angron warily as he convulsed and fought himself. They did not attack.
They could tell: their fallen brother's mind was struggling against the Chaos Gods. Any interference could trigger consequences no one could predict.
Angron still had residual selfhood.
That, at least, was good news.
"The scheduled time is up. Your equipment is arriving now."
Perturabo sent the message to Eden via psychic channel—another piece of good news.
Eden's heart lifted.
They had little combat power left, but with that equipment, their odds would rise.
Even if Angron didn't fully recover, they would have a countermeasure.
Victory was tilting toward them.
Eden was about to move when an indescribably evil voice echoed in all their ears—like multiple overlapping beings speaking as one.
"No, primarchs of the Imperium… you have no chance."
Eden and the others felt their blood run cold. They turned toward the source.
Angron quieted, slowly lifted his head.
His gaze was no longer beastlike rage.
It was filled with evil intelligence.
In that layered stare, Eden saw four wicked eyes.
His scalp went numb.
It felt like he had played himself and caused the Chaos Gods to… log in.
They had barely survived fighting an Angron who fought like an unthinking beast.
Now they were facing the Chaos Gods controlling that body with full intent.
That was far worse.
Then Eden remembered something even more lethal and looked toward distant voidspace.
Humm—
A massive forge-platform finished its Warp transit and emerged into the region.
His armament.
At the same time, the "daemonized" Angron looked over, then turned back with a cruel, satisfied smile.
The overlapping voice spoke again.
"Savior… that platform is important, isn't it? What exactly is inside?"
Damn it.
Eden realized the danger. He immediately used psychic sorcery to build a passage to the platform and stepped into it without hesitation.
That was the foundation of his confidence—being able to reach the platform at will, then equip the armament forged over so long.
But in the next instant—
He was struck by something and fell out of the passage, crashing back into the same zone.
"Lion!"
Eden didn't hesitate. He looked to the Lion—who also had the ability to bring him into that forge-platform.
The Lion moved instantly, tearing open an entrance to Caliban's forest.
But before they could enter, they saw the forest erupt in an unprecedented volcanic outbreak.
Khorne's magma burned Caliban and sealed the exit.
Using Angron as the ritual-node, the gods' Warp power surged into something truly horrific.
They had sealed the space.
They had cut off the primarchs' mobility.
Then, under Warp influence, the surrounding wreckage fused and folded inward, encircling the entire zone.
Gurrrk—
The rotting maw in daemon-Angron's belly vomited digestive slurry and filth. More tiny daemons—Nurgle's imps—appeared.
They visibly grew larger in seconds and lunged at the exhausted primarchs.
It was both spatial and physical interdiction.
After finishing this, daemon-Angron spread his massive wings, whipped up a storm, and flew toward the forge-platform.
He had sensed the threat radiating from it and intended to destroy it—ending any chance of failure.
The primarchs were hit waist-high by filth, barely able to stand. Daemons added further pressure from every direction.
They were at the breaking point, nearly out of combat power.
"This is a total loss…"
Eden stared at daemon-Angron streaking into the void, panic spiking. Was there still any chance to turn this around?
He forced himself to think through the stabbing pain in his skull.
If Guilliman could arrive now, he might help a bit—but it would be limited.
Eden needed speed.
The fastest possible speed to reach the platform.
But in their current state, they could barely hold their footing. The stench alone was enough to make them dizzy.
Nurgle's daemons were disgusting and clingy—like walking mountains of meat, blocking every route.
"Damn it!"
The Khan struggled upright. His relic wings drooped, ruined by overload and daemon strikes.
He hated himself for failing to protect them—because if he still had them, he could have carried Eden to the platform.
He was desperate.
And, absurdly, his thoughts flashed to his beloved vehicle—the Pale Eagle.
He needed a ride.
He needed speed.
Real speed.
Thud—
The Khan was smashed away by a chunk of wreckage.
When he rose from the filth, he saw what it was.
The front end of the Pale Eagle.
Boom-boom-boom!
A Great Unclean One approached like a meat mountain, staring at the Khan while scooping filth into its mouth.
A "gift" from Grandfather.
It grabbed the filth and, along with the Pale Eagle's remnants, stuffed them into its belly maw—then spat the wreckage out with disgust.
"Indigestible trash…"
It crushed the wreckage underfoot.
For the Khan, it was humiliation beyond endurance.
In that instant, the Khan detonated.
Power surged through his body. He erupted into speed beyond imagination, dodging the Great Unclean One's attack—
Then he drove a single punch into it and smashed it down!
At the same time, a certain Warp shackle shattered completely, accepted at last.
White psychic radiance spilled from the Khan's body—the sign of his essence awakening.
"Khan's Warp nature awakened?!" Eden stared in shock, then in pure exhilaration.
A primarch's nature always reflected his greatest strength, desire, or worldview.
And the Khan's greatest strength was speed.
Which was exactly what Eden needed.
The Lion's nature was Caliban's forest.
Corax's was becoming a flock of ravens.
So what would the Khan's be?
A Chogoris battle-eagle?
"Come forth—Chogoris's warhawk!" Eden stared at the Khan wrapped in light, anticipation burning.
If the Khan could become an eagle, maybe he could carry Eden to the forge-platform.
But when the light faded—
Eden saw a motorcycle so outrageous, so violently "overclocked," that language barely applied.
It radiated Warp aura like an eagle among the stars.
Some kind of psychic construct, rebuilt from the Pale Eagle's wreckage.
It might have been the most dazzling vehicle in the entire galaxy—an absurdly cool machine, born of speed itself.
"Khan brother, what are you waiting for? Get on!"
The Khan sat astride the bike, his surprise still on his face.
He twisted the throttle.
The engine roared.
(End of Chapter)
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