"Blood for the Blood God!"
A long whip shrieked through the air, followed by a muffled explosion.
Flas sowed death in every direction. With each furious roar from the Bloodthirster, the encroaching Tyranid swarm lted away in agonizing shrieks.
Viewed from the sky, the forge world that once brimd with chanized beauty had literally been reduced to an inferno, a burning hellscape.
The chanical shells designed to filter out exhaust and dust had vanished without a trace. The production lines that once supplied all manner of equipnt to the entire sector had collapsed. Highly flammable materials burned fiercely as towering pillars of fire belched pitch-black smoke, the intense temperature differences whipping the surrounding air into howling gales.
"Soulless puppets, co! Let drown you in this inferno."
In the center of the chaos, Ka'Bandha stretched out his shattered wings.
As the skeletal fra extended, tendons and fascia rapidly regenerated. In the blink of an eye, the wings were reforged anew within the molten fire.
Scanning the surroundings from his vantage point, not a single construct of civilization remained. There was only endless magma and roaring flas, as though he stood in the heart of a blazing volcanic crater.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Heavy footsteps shattered the cooling magma as a towering, twin-horned behemoth strode forward.
The Norn Assimilator shook off the severed, massive biological weapon from its arm.
Whoosh—
A spore cyst plumted from the sky and burst open. A weapon-symbiote dropped out, quickly climbing onto the stump of the Norn Assimilator's arm. It rapidly grew, grafting itself to the creature's nervous system. Soon after, a brand-new psychic blade began to pulse with a deep, eerie glow.
The effectiveness of ranged weapons was exceedingly poor. Even the psychic blast organs could do little more than tear at those flimsy wings; they could not even scratch Ka'Bandha's armor.
A truly troubleso enemy.
If Romulus was a tactical master who caused endless trouble for the Hive Mind's advance through outrageous command skills and enigmatic unit deploynt, then Ka'Bandha induced a profound sense of powerlessness in the Hive Mind through sheer, unadulterated martial prowess.
After fighting for so long, concentrated ranged attacks proved useless. Swarm encirclents capable of leveling mountains and filling seas proved useless. The Deathleapers sent for assassination had their heads casually ripped off in retaliation.
Over the course of two months, the Hive Mind dispatched all manner of units, yet none could halt the entity's rampage. Instead, they lost massive amounts of biomass in the process, leaving the human defensive lines standing firm despite prolonged sieges.
At this stage, by gathering data on the daemons erging from those portals, the Hive Mind realized the only way to banish this creature was to defeat it through a ritualistic duel.
Otherwise, it never would have commanded the Norn Queen to incubate a Norn Assimilator—such an agonizingly wasteful combat unit in terms of biomass.
These daemons of the Warp were truly damned!
The Hive Mind felt it was taking a massive loss, but burning biomass to kill a relentless invader was far better than being stingy, failing to defeat the enemy, and losing everything in the end.
The Norn Assimilator brandished its four arms and imdiately charged forward.
However, this ti, the indomitable behemoth across from it offered no response.
"Yes, my Lord! You have given guidance. I will seize the Angel for you! I will march to a far more glorious battlefield!"
Ka'Bandha raised his head. Bathed in the fury of war, he completely ignored his opponent and gazed toward the north.
In his vision, a bright sar of blood-red light rose from the other side of the planet, piercing through the barriers of steel, crust, and magma.
The crimson blood of the Blood God had already climbed onto the Angel's weapon, acting like a torch cutting through the fog to guide the faithful, simultaneously outlining the silhouette of the torchbearer.
Ka'Bandha fell into a state of absolute ecstasy.
Ah, this bloodthirsty instinct!
Ah, this boundless fury!
"The Angel!!!"
Ka'Bandha unleashed a deafening roar, then spread his wings and took to the skies, completely abandoning his opponent.
For the sake of his Lord's goal, what did it matter if he abandoned a re war?!
This formidable enemy—who had inflicted countless casualties upon the swarm over the past two months and forced the Norn Queen to expend colossal amounts of biomass to hatch a Norn Assimilator just to contend with him—had actually chosen to leave?
The Norn Assimilator stood frozen once more. Faced with such a scenario, the Hive Mind suddenly found itself unable to process the situation.
It realized that although this planet was rich in biomass, it was plagued by one bizarre, logic-defying enemy after another.
Tenacious humans, disruptive daemons.
Hiss—Roar—
The Norn Assimilator let out a low growl, its thermal exhaust vents spewing scalding steam. Imdiately after, its massive fra lunged forward, giving chase in the direction Ka'Bandha had flown.
Humans, daemons.
Those existences that obstruct my quest to satiate this unending hunger.
I will kill you all!
Inhale—
Rases took a deep breath of the free-floating matter in the Warp, unsure if it could even be considered air.
From his perspective, he watched as the blood-stained spear from the Blood God's domain struck down, instantly marking the deep-red Angel. He then saw the Bloodthirster, which had been locked in brutal combat with the swarm, depart the battlefield solely to intervene in a duel.
'Khorne is really going all out, huh. As expected of our second brother.'
Generous enough, and decisive enough!
Without Khorne, this situation would have been truly difficult to resolve.
The Greater Daemons of Tzeentch simply had too many little tricks up their sleeves.
Clack.
Rases placed his piece down, the white stone landing in an area no one had anticipated.
A dead move.
"You have lost."
Carlos placed his piece.
Rases clearly had no idea how to play Go. Throughout the ga, Carlos had been deliberately feeding him pieces to keep it going, but since the man was actively seeking death, he was truly beyond saving.
Naturally, Carlos was not panicked. Instead, he looked forward to seeing how things would unfold next.
He could sense the other party's effortless composure.
"Yes, I have lost."
The sorcerer appeared exceedingly calm.
This unsurprised acceptance of the result made the surrounding Lords of Change cast sidelong glances at him.
It was worth noting that this sorcerer had acted completely indifferent even when he realized they were secretly exerting their influence over this half of his soul.
Such composure usually ant he either had a foolproof plan, or he was just a pure idiot.
Then, ten pairs of eyes went wide as if they had just witnessed sothing utterly unbelievable.
They watched as the soul gradually blurred, turning into fine sand that drifted up with the tides of the Warp, like a clay sculpture slowly dissolving in the ocean.
Wait, was he really this hardcore?
Seeing Rases's soul reaching the brink of dissipation in the blink of an eye, the Lords of Change instantly panicked.
They had just co to recruit a new colleague for their master. They weren't trying to take his life! Was this really necessary?
This wasn't like Magnus, who could shatter into fragnts and still have a chance to be slowly pieced back together, mixed with so extre Warp magic to harvest a brand-new Greater Daemon. For a person to shatter like this—referencing Sanguinius or those Thousand Sons who triggered the Rubric spell—without the authority of death, they were absolutely beyond saving!
A few of the Lords of Change hastily cast spells of creation, but it was already aningless.
All attempts were in vain. The soul was rapidly turning ethereal, its residual energy fading at a blinding speed.
"Do you have any last words to say?"
Carlos asked mildly.
He once again found himself unable to see the present.
"Of course I do."
The dissipating soul solidified for a brief mont, then rapidly dived into the Go board.
"???"
Seeing this, the Lords of Change instantly realized they had been played. They hurriedly unleashed their proudest spells, attempting to drag the escaping sorcerer back.
"Hahahaha!"
As the daemons poured their energy in, a hearty burst of laughter echoed from within the board. Soon after, the Lords of Change felt an intense pulling sensation.
"Embark on a journey, gentlen."
This is bad!
Sensing sothing was wrong, the Lords of Change imdiately withdrew their hands.
However, Carlos and three other Lords of Change were half a beat too slow.
The ritual spell latched onto the power they had just poured out, binding them without offering the slightest chance to resist, and dragged the masters of that power toward another world.
Carlos raised his eyes. He saw the past of this Go board, born from a sourceless creation. Then, he saw the future: a long whip draped in skulls swinging violently toward him.
"Hmm?"
Carlos tilted his heads in confusion.
He recalled that it seed to be Ka'Bandha's whip.
The board unfolded. Mixed with the shattered soul of the sorcerer, the power of several Lords of Change poured into it, forcibly tearing open a ritual conduit connected to Pierde.
At almost the exact sa mont, Carlos, along with the Lords of Change who had just finished casting their spells, completely vanished.
————————
On Pierde, several azure cots plumted from the sky, directly smashing into a soaring crimson teor.
Carlos felt as if he had slamd into sothing flying at high speed, imdiately followed by the distinct sensation of being injured.
Am I bleeding?
Then I must have arrived in the material realm.
Carlos observed his future, then continued to deduce his present.
"Carlos!!!"
It was the furious roar of one of the eight Bloodthirsters most highly regarded by Khorne.
Carlos finally realized what had happened. He was currently on the very battlefield where he was face-to-face with Ka'Bandha.
But why had they appeared here?
"Damned Lords of Change!"
Ka'Bandha rose from the ruins, shaking off the dust and rubble from his body. He flicked the blue blood off his long whip and glared at the three giant blue eagles before him, whose forms had barely materialized.
The mont he saw these wicked sorcerers, he knew he wasn't going anywhere.
These servants of the Deceiver, these loathso sorcerers... More than once, they had ruined the Blood God's magnificent wars, tainting the purity of the bloodshed.
The Bloodthirster exhaled a breath of roaring flas.
No wonder. No wonder the great Blood God had marked the Angel for him and even urged him to abandon a battlefield of honor.
It turned out the most glorious battlefield was right here!
He absolutely could not allow these minions of the Deceiver to lay a finger on the Blood God's most prized collection.
Ka'Bandha leaped high into the air, wielding his battleaxe for a devastating downward cleave.
"Wait, this is a conspiracy! A trap woven by our prey to make us kill each other!"
"Upon my honor, I will offer your skulls to the Blood God!"
He bellowed!
The Blood God's bravest warrior would never listen to the nonsense of Tzeentch's daemons and lose the Blood God's favor like the exiled Skarbrand.
A conspiracy?
Ka'Bandha gathered all his strength and instantly cleaved off the head of that naless Greater Daemon on the spot.
As long as he hacked these Lords of Change to death, there would be no more conspiracy!
"I will make you bleed! The only thing your wretched mouths will spew is blood!"
He would claim victory, then carry these four skulls to find the Angel, presenting the most subli gift to the Blood God.
"Carlos!"
This was the roar of one of the eight Bloodthirsters most highly regarded by Khorne.
"Tzeentch!!!"
Within the Crimson Realm of Blood, the Blood God's roar echoed across the heavens.
"Hehehe—"
Within the Crystal Labyrinth, the Changer of Ways gazed at the millions of reflections refracted by the mirrors, exuding boundless joy.
Excellent! What an excellent play!
He simply loved this kind of audacity—staking one's very soul on the board.
This world was actually very fair. If one wanted to achieve their goal, they rely needed to offer up their soul.
The value of a soul was supre, though mortals were often oblivious to it.
Furthermore, the sorcerer had actually managed to win the gamble.
Using half of his soul, the sorcerer had conducted an unprecedented sacrifice, pulling a grand joke that forced two gods into direct confrontation.
So, what about next ti?
The Changer of Ways clutched the fine sand, revealing a sense of profound anticipation.
Until the sorcerer swallowed the bitter fruit of knowledge and gave the Changer of Ways a reason to mock him, He would feel nothing but pure delight.
There was no one who did not wish to win.
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