Upon hearing the merchant's words, a surge of anger welled up in Valen's heart.
He felt as if he had been played for a fool by the other party.
This damned merchant had been toying with him from beginning to end, leading him around in circles.
"Go to the fortress and chant a ghost-banishing spell? Do you know the consequences if you're discovered?" Valen said, "The Imperium would never allow such blasphemous behavior to occur. Everyone who does so will face the most terrible punishment."
The merchant smiled faintly and shook his head, "My Lord, everything you do is out of loyalty to the Emperor, loyalty to the Primarch. What is this small risk compared to that?"
"What's more, with your status, entering the fortress to chant a single spell won't take any time at all. As long as you're quick enough and careful enough, there won't be any problems. Such a minor spell is insignificant; no one will suspect you. To ensure you can continue to serve the Emperor, some have already paid the ultimate price. Are you going to let all that effort go to waste?"
Valen clenched his fists. He didn't want to continue.
A voice inside him told him that this was wrong.
But then he thought of the deceased Yak and his own responsibilities.
After an internal struggle, Valen still agreed to the merchant's proposal.
To continue serving the Emperor, to continue serving humanity, a small sacrifice was nothing.
Tens of thousands of light-years away, in an unnamed star system.
Magnus, using his immense power, watched as Valen gradually succumbed to corruption.
Seeing this man, who was so devoted to his father, prepare to go to the Lighthouse Fortress to chant the spell.
Magnus' smile grew even wider.
He knew his plan was about to bear rich fruit.
The positions of stars in the real universe are not fixed.
To perform long-distance instant teleportation, a beacon is essential.
And planetary governor Valen had now become Magnus' beacon.
He would go directly to Pharos, bypassing the Imperium's defenses, and appear within their territory.
"Prepare the ritual. Let us open the passage to Pharos," Magnus said, looking at his capable assistant, Sharo.
"Understood, my Lord."
Sharo walked outside.
In the abandoned hive city, a colossal altar had already been prepared.
Various lost runes were etched onto the altar, and a large number of terrified, weeping humans were caged, awaiting sacrifice.
"Begin," Sharo said loudly.
The sorcerers picked up sharp daggers, dragged the humans from their cages, slit their throats, and threw their bleeding bodies onto the altar.
The despair and agony of these lives before death would help Magnus better leverage the aetheric power of the Warp, creating a path to the planet Pharos for his daemon legions and his subordinates.
"I'm coming," Magnus smiled.
planet Pharos.
Inquisitor Leah, accompanied by Stormtroopers, went to investigate the Chaos incident as per Clovis' instructions.
To execute missions better and faster,
Inquisitors possessed extremely high authority.
The Imperium allowed them to use any means to efficiently complete their tasks.
With her exceptional Inquisitorial intuition, Leah keenly sensed the connection between the missing persons cases and the Chaos incident.
To obtain clues, she arrested six security officials in whose jurisdictions multiple disappearances had occurred.
When arrested, every security official claimed to be innocent.
Leah didn't have time to investigate their claims of innocence; she had her most skilled interrogators handle them.
Five of them were indeed innocent, but one admitted to colluding with an underground organization, providing them protection for kidnapping people.
Leah didn't waste time and went straight to that underground organization.
As for the six security officials...
Unfortunately, no one ever survived an Inquisitor's torture.
When Leah left, the interrogation room contained only six disfigured, bloody corpses.
The location of that underground organization was somewhat remote.
Worried about encountering strong resistance, Leah requisitioned a Stormbird.
Inside the cabin, she had the Stormtroopers prepare for action.
The Stormbird gunship was very fast.
Upon reaching their destination, the Stormtroopers air-dropped directly, saving time on landing.
The outer perimeter of cultists was quickly brought under control.
They seemed to have no issues, and the building appeared normal, filled with shrines and scriptures dedicated to the Emperor.
However, using scanning equipment, Leah still discovered anomalies underground.
"How do we get in?" Leah asked a cultist, pointing her gun.
"I don't..."
Leah didn't let him finish, shooting him through the head.
"You tell me," Leah said, pointing her gun at another man.
The man was terrified by Leah's ruthlessness.
He had never seen anyone so cruel, who would shoot without even waiting for an answer.
There was no such thing as loyalty among the corrupted.
Under Leah's threat, the man led the Inquisitor and her team to the entrance.
The entrance was hidden within a massive shrine to the Emperor.
"Disgusting cultists."
Seeing the Emperor's shrine slowly part to reveal the dark tunnel entrance to the underground, Leah could not hide her anger.
Those cultists doing such things behind the Emperor's shrine were unforgivable.
Leah and the Stormtroopers charged in.
Blasphemous, evil Chaos runes covered the basement, confirming to Leah that she had not come to the wrong place.
The cultists had also received news from the surface.
They picked up their weapons, attempting to resist Leah and her Stormtroopers.
Unfortunately, such foolish behavior was undoubtedly self-destructive.
Using infrared combat gear, Leah could easily pinpoint the cultists' positions, even in the dimly lit basement.
She fired decisively, a laser pulse instantly killing one cultist and leaving another wailing and screaming on the ground.
The Stormtroopers, relying on their training, quickly slaughtered the enemies in the basement.
The basement was complex, with many rooms.
This kind of environment might be tricky for other units.
But for the Inquisitorial Stormtroopers, it was child's play.
They showed no mercy, and after suffering the cost of one Stormtrooper severely wounded,
They slaughtered all cultists who dared to resist.
In the vast basement, only a richly dressed merchant and a robed old man remained.
They trembled, their faces filled with fear.
Leah did not perceive the power of the Warp, nor did she possess psyker abilities.
Yet, she could feel the corruption of these two individuals.
Their souls exuded a foul stench.
Without even needing to look, one could feel their rotten, disgusting souls.
"Tell me everything you know, and I will grant you a small mercy," Leah said in a cold tone.
"You won't learn anything!" The old man tried to be defiant.
Leah grabbed his hair, cut off his ear, and threw it in front of him, "I think you didn't hear me clearly just now, so I'm helping you."
After speaking, she injected a serum that enhanced organ sensitivity into his body, amplifying his pain.
The emaciated old man immediately let out heart-wrenching screams.
Several of Leah's interrogators stepped forward, using various instruments to maintain the old man's agony, making him continue to scream in torment.
Stubborn traitors deserved no mercy.
Leah turned to the merchant, "Can you tell me what you know?"
Seeing the other party's dripping dagger, and that terrifying gaze, with the old man next to him screaming in agony and no one responding to his pleas for mercy,
The merchant, who claimed allegiance to the Dark Gods, was also psychologically broken by fear.
He confessed everything he had done, one by one.
Learning that the planetary governor had already performed a Chaos ritual, Leah immediately felt a sense of dread.
She ordered these two individuals to be taken back for thorough interrogation, to see if more could be extracted from them.
She herself, with a guard squad, headed straight for the governor's mansion, intending to apprehend Valen first.
Upon reaching the governor's mansion, she was unexpectedly informed that Valen had gone to the Lighthouse Fortress.
He claimed there were some logistical matters that required his personal attention.
After interrogating several of the governor's close servants, Leah obtained the coverless book.
It contained records of various terrifying sorceries.
She turned to the ritual the governor had performed.
Leah immediately recognized that this was not a ritual of life transformation, but a ritual to beg for the attention of Warp entities.
In other words, planetary governor Valen had now become a beacon.
A beacon for Warp daemons in the real universe.
Leah relayed this information to Grey Knight Librarian-Clovis, who was on guard duty in the Lighthouse.
When Clovis and his Grey Knight squad found Valen in the fortress,
Valen had already recited the ghost-banishing spell the merchant had told him.
With his incantation, the aether in the Warp surged, and the long-unsettled storm became incredibly violent.
A terrifyingly malevolent will let out a sinister, utterly malicious laugh.
The entire planet Pharos, both the side facing the star and the side facing away, was plunged into darkness.
A spectacular, planet-spanning fissure appeared before the populace.
Chaos had arrived.