Kairos' four eyes locked onto the Corpse King's minion dubbed "Spaceking."
"A name that's practically a felony!"
Kairos felt a malicious curiosity spark inside him. He had to wonder what expression those pleasure Daemons would make when they learned the names of the Corpse King's minions. It was going to be priceless!
The Fate Weaver could clearly sense that Spaceking had the blood of the Thousand Sons Legion running through his veins. There was no shadow of a doubt—this was a genuine Thousand Sons warrior.
As Kairos continued his search, he found several other of the Corpse King's pawns who also carried the Thousand Sons bloodline, pure as the driven snow—no taint, no mutation.
Kairos, the two-headed bird with blue hair sticking up, cocked his heads thoughtfully.
The Thousand Sons Legion, created by the Corpse Emperor, had always been dominated by Psykers.
The problem of flesh mutation was there from day one. To try and save his sons from that fate, Magnus the Red traded his own right eye to the Lord of Change, temporarily easing the mutation crisis.
After the Horus Heresy, however, the Legion's mutations came back with a vengeance, becoming far more severe.
Ahriman, the Chief Librarian, desperately searched for a cure. After burning the candle at both ends with research, he assembled the Legion's most powerful sorcerers into a secret cabal.
They went over Magnus's head and used the Book of Magnus, a tome containing immense power and countless universal secrets, to cast the Rubric of Ahriman. Ahriman's goal was to put the kibosh on the flesh mutation forever.
The spell was only a half-win. It stopped the mutation, sure, but it also turned most of the Legion's warriors into dust. Their souls were sealed inside their cursed power armor, transforming them into mindless, animated puppets. Only a few Thousand Sons sorcerers survived the change and emerged with even greater power.
When Magnus learned what happened, he was so furious he almost offed Ahriman right there on the spot. It was only after the Lord of Change stepped in that Magnus cooled off, deciding instead to exile him.
Since leaving the Sorcerer's Star, Ahriman had been wandering the galaxy for ages. He even attempted a second Rubric, planning to reverse the first one—at the cost of Magnus's life.
Magnus sensed his son's extraordinary filial piety, showed up, read him the riot act, and gave him a thorough beatdown. He also transformed the spell into a soul-siphoning mechanism, allowing him to absorb scattered soul fragments to complete his own fractured being.
Two defeats didn't knock the wind out of Ahriman's sails. He was still determined to reverse the Rubric and save his brothers.
"Ahriman is going to go gaga for these pure Thousand Sons," Kairos mused. "Perhaps we should lead him to the Calixis Sector and see how he tests the Corpse King's little errand boy."
With that thought, Kairos wove a psychic letter, summoned a Horror, and sent it to deliver the message to Ahriman.
At that moment, Ahriman was en route to Commorragh, the Dark Eldar home base. He was looking for information on the Aeldari Death God, Ynnead.
After the successful formation of the Ynnari (the Death Army), Ahriman heard Daemonic whispers that the Aeldari had discovered a power that could flip the bird to death—a way to resurrect souls still lingering in the Warp.
Ahriman realized this might be his golden ticket to saving his boys. He led his forces to ambush the Death Army, led by Yvraine, in the Webway. The weak-sauce aliens were beaten to a pulp and were ready to throw in the towel and sing "Conqueror."
At the critical moment, Yvraine offered a trade that she knew would get Ahriman's attention. She used the power of the Aeldari Death God to restore the bodies of a dozen Rubric Marines and tossed them out of the Webway.
To retrieve his brothers and break out of the ambush, Ahriman chose his battles and gave up the chase. He knew the Aeldari Death God was the key to reversing the Rubric. His plan now was to find out everything about the Aeldari Death God and restore his brothers who had been turned to ash.
The courier Daemon quickly delivered Kairos's letter to Ahriman. Ahriman wouldn't touch the letter with a ten-foot pole, threatening the Daemon to scram or become his newest soul-slave.
Ahriman hated Kairos's guts because the failure of the first Rubric was all Kairos's fault. The two-headed, blue-feathered bird had shape-shifted into the Daemon Aforgomon, teamed up with the Slaanesh champion Lucius the Eternal, and pulled the rug out from under Hathor Maat, the Thousand Sons captain. That betrayal ultimately led to the failure of the entire spell.
Kairos must have anticipated the cold shoulder. Just as Ahriman finished his threat, the psychic letter sprouted a mouth and yelled, "Ahriman! You've got brand-new boys! They're pure and flawless!"
Since it concerned his brothers, Ahriman swallowed his anger, snatched the letter, and began to read.
"The Corpse Emperor's mouthpiece... a pure Thousand Son, no signs of mutation?" Ahriman muttered, frowning.
"That's good news. Even if I can't find a way to reverse the Rubric, I can still snag some pure gene-seed and restore the Thousand Sons Legion's strength." Replenishing the Legion was a bear of a task. After the first Rubric, the ash-filled warriors couldn't provide gene-seed.
The gene-seed in the chests of the surviving sorcerers could only be harvested after they died in battle, and they were prone to variation, making most of it useless.
If he could get his hands on pure gene-seed, the Thousand Sons might rise from the ashes.
"But what scheme is Kairos trying to cook up?"
Ahriman didn't believe for a second that Kairos was up to anything good. He knew the Daemon just wanted him to do his dirty work, which is why he "leaked" the news.
"First, stick to the playbook: research the Aeldari Death God, then hit the Necron Dynasty for that time-reversal gadget, and finally head to the Calixis Sector," Ahriman decided.
He had no intention of switching gears. He'd go to the Calixis Sector, but he'd do it on his own schedule, not Kairos's.
Meanwhile, the official Warhammer OL forums were boiling over. The battlefield videos shot by Chosen Alpaca and other Power Armor players were all over the site.
The video of Mordecai charging the endless Daemons like a hero, sword drawn, single-handedly crashing the party in Tzeentch's territory, was an instant classic.
He was shouting bizarre slogans and fighting in the tidal wave of Daemons, saving the world from the evil Tzeentch. It was the definition of "If I must walk through hell, I'll walk alone."
A man spends his whole life searching for a grand finale. Mordecai had just found his in the game.
"So sick!"
"Dude, that's nuts! First player to solo break into Tzeentch's lair!"
"Even if he doesn't really die, that has to be painful. Those Horrors and Changelings are giving me the creeps."
"Look at that vid, there's even a Chaos Spawn. My brain is short-circuiting just looking at it."
"What kind of player is he in real life? Throw him into a horror movie and he'd probably walk out seven times!"
"Seven times in and out of Sadako? You're going to get someone banned; I just managed to quit doomscrolling for one day."
"My brother in the Emperor, how did he have the sheer guts to charge that many Daemons with just a sword? Bravery is an understatement."
"Khorne, give this guy a thumbs up before you leave!"
"Please accept my knee that took an arrow in Whiterun."
"Did you guys see the most stubborn person in the universe? The one who keeps shouting that 'This is all part of the plan!'?"
"No wonder he's running that ID. You gotta be built different to pull that off."
Mordecai, sitting at his computer, couldn't wipe the grin off his face as he looked at the comments. He typed quickly in the forums and chat groups.
"Just business as usual, folks. No sweat."
"A little rough-and-tumble, that's all. Nothing to make a big fuss over."
"Seriously, there's nothing to be afraid of. I think the Lord of Change is a total poser."
Midnight Lord: "Darn it, I thought I had the prize locked down. But you're a savage, dude. You just rushed the Crystal Maze solo for the top spot."
Master Warmaster: "Why didn't it trigger the special punishment? Let this guy get trapped in Tzeentch's domain for hundreds of years? [gnashing teeth.jpg]"
GuillimanRules: "[Kill them all.jpg]"
Whether the players were cheering or fuming, Daniel was suddenly swamped. His original plan was to get the planet Atomal back on track, then bring forces to reinforce Macragge.
But the Colin family stirred the pot so hard they sparked a full-scale civil war in the entire Calixis Sector.
Daniel had to push through an emergency military expansion bill overnight, putting Atomal on a war footing and going all-in on military production. At the same time, he had to coordinate with everyone on the situation in Calixis.
Shalatath and the Punishment Fleet officers wanted Daniel to step up and take the reins of the Imperial forces to turn the tide.
Daniel was burning the candle at both ends, and his neck was stiff. Under the high pressure, his mental state started to hit the skids.
He retreated to the lounge next to the strategy room to meditate and recover. After a short while, he drifted off and had a nightmare about Guilliman and the Lion.
Mordecai's grand finale certainly shook things up! Given that Daniel is now dealing with a sector-wide civil war and Ahriman is planning his arrival, what part of the upcoming conflict are you most interested in seeing next?