"Die!"
The blade of the Sword of Fealty stabbed toward Lorgar's throat without warning.
For Lion El'Jonson, a so-called fair duel was never a consideration.
Honor?
That was something only other Primarchs cared about.
The savage years in the Calibanite forests had long since forged the Lion into a pure beast, while the Emperor's will and the slaughter of the Great Crusade had honed him into the sharpest weapon of all.
A weapon needs no honor.
A weapon needs only to eliminate the enemy.
Nothing more.
As for launching a sudden sneak attack right in the middle of exchanging pleasantries with a long-lost brother—to the Lion, that was standard operating procedure.
During the Horus Heresy, he had done the exact same thing to his traitorous brother Konrad Curze.
One sword thrust, straight on target, punching a clean hole through the Night Haunter's chest.
Thus, this single sword thrust was merely history repeating itself.
However, the sword struck empty air.
Lorgar Aurelian seemed to have foreseen everything.
He took a calm step backward, lightly redirecting the lethal strike with his psychic force staff wrapped in Chaos runes.
'That's it?'
One could only say that trying to pull a face-to-face sneak attack on a traitor who turned his back faster than flipping a page—and who had orchestrated the Betrayal at Calth—was simply too naive.
Lorgar smiled, a trace of mockery surfacing on his expressionless face. "Lion, you haven't changed at all."
The Lion narrowed his eyes.
He instantly realized that the opponent before him was no longer that jumping clown, Erebus.
Though...
Lorgar's reaction speed and physical strength were far weaker than he had imagined.
"Your martial skill is even more pathetic than I thought. Are you truly a Primarch?"
The Lion spoke coldly. Seeing his ambush fail, he seamlessly shifted tactics, letting a smooth stream of banter flow. "Ten thousand years, and this is all the progress you've made? Is this what you sacrificed everything for—betraying our Father and betraying humanity?"
Before his words faded, a storm of attacks poured down upon Lorgar.
The Lion surged forward, the transitions between his sword and shield fluid and seamless, devoid of any flaw.
Attack, attack, and attack again!
Lorgar parried with his force staff with great difficulty, his form dodging and shifting across the ground, looking as disheveled as a player attempting a boss fight.
"Show me some real power, traitor!"
The Lion roared.
Accompanying this roar, the Sword of Fealty burst forth!
A flash of sword-light erupted like a bolt of thunder!
With a crisp snap, the psychic force staff in Lorgar's hands was severed clean in two.
Stumbling back several steps, Lorgar looked down at the broken staff. Yet there was not a trace of panic on his face, only thoughtful composure as he casually tossed it aside.
"Not bad, brother."
Lorgar's tone remained calm, carrying even a hint of genuine praise. "It seems that although your physical strength has somewhat declined, your sword technique has been refined to be even more lethal."
The Lion stood with his sword held low.
He did not relax in the slightest. Even with the upper hand, his vigilance was dialed straight to maximum.
Based on what the Lion knew of Lorgar, the man would never stand before him so calmly without absolute confidence.
"What twisted tricks are you going to draw upon next?"
The Lion's voice echoed among the ruins.
"Speaking of which, you asked me a question earlier."
Lorgar slowly raised his head, his hollow eyes staring straight at the Lion. "You asked me what I have accomplished over these ten thousand years."
"You will find out very soon. After all, not everyone slept away ten thousand years like you did, brother."
'What?'
Before the Lion could digest the meaning of those words, he saw Lorgar open his mouth.
He uttered a single word.
Yes, one single word.
Yet the phonetics and semantic depth of that word were so immensely complex and profound that they surpassed even the limits of a Primarch's superhuman hearing to fully parse.
It did not sound like a voice produced from a throat, but rather a primordial term that had existed since the dawn of the universe.
A word of creation.
The fundamental source code of reality.
Enuncia.
'Bang!'
The Lion was instantly sent flying backward.
He instinctively raised the Emperor's Shield at the very last moment, yet that terrifying force still penetrated the aegis, slamming him heavily onto the ground.
'Gah!'
A mouthful of blood spewed from the Lion's mouth.
All the Risen froze in shock.
These veterans who had survived since the Great Crusade were completely lost in confusion.
'How is this possible?'
'What on Earth was that?'
"If you had ever read the works I authored, you would know that all I ever sought was the truth," Lorgar's voice echoed intermittently, sounding directly inside the Lion's ears.
"This is what I have researched over the course of ten thousand years—Enuncia. A very ancient name."
Lorgar paced forward slowly. "Though it is a language, it was not created for communication, but as a weapon. Simply reciting it bends reality itself, unleashing a force far beyond psychic power."
"And the price... is merely permanent damage to the speaker's lips and throat."
At this point, he seemed unable to hold back and let out a soft chuckle.
"For these ten thousand years, I have been consumed by the exploration of this ancient power. Deep within the Warp, researching Enuncia became a part of my very existence.
"It is a glorious feeling. As for that so-called spirit-descending technique earlier... it was merely something I developed to better manifest the power of Enuncia."
Lorgar continued, "To be honest... I have wanted to do this for a long time."
His gaze swept over the surrounding ruins. "Unleashing this language without restraint... this feeling... heh, truly unforgettable."
"Heh... you haven't won yet."
A cold sneer came from the ground as the Lion slowly pushed himself up using his shield.
Blood dripped down his graying beard, but his eyes burned bright in the dim micro-light of the Webway.
"Why don't you look down at your feet?"
Lorgar lowered his head thoughtfully.
Not far from his feet, an ancient device had rolled over at some unknown moment, its faint blue light pulsing rapidly.
The next second, a sky-blotting swarm of nanite flesh-eater scarabs erupted frantically from within!
This was a terrifying creation from the deepest recesses of the First Legion's forbidden armory—an ancient nightmare capable of devouring every living soul on a planet within ten brief minutes.
Countless micro-mechanical constructs converged into a torrent of destruction, sweeping toward Lorgar with a fine, buzzing hum.
Lorgar's expression did not change.
He simply uttered another single word.
The power of Enuncia descended once more.
That rushing tide of nanites seemed to be pressed down gently by an invisible hand, freezing midair before silently dissolving into dust and vanishing.
"Is that all?" he chuckled softly.
What answered him was a wall of overwhelming suppressive firepower.
A full thirteen Excavator Automata were deployed simultaneously!
These tortured, insane Abominable Intelligences unleashed deafening roars, each mounted with multiple ancient weapons classified as taboos of war.
They closed in from all directions—neural disruption guns, atomic pulse cannons, graviton wave projectors—every form of destruction human intellect could conceive woven into an iron veil that dropped down toward Lorgar.
Lorgar raised his head calmly and simply recited once more.
The power of Enuncia descended a third time.
Those thirteen Excavator Automata, along with the torrent of firepower they unleashed, were erased directly from the canvas of reality, dissolving into nothingness.
"Is there really nothing else—"
Before Lorgar could finish his sentence, he cut off abruptly.
A razor-sharp point of the Sword of Fealty burst straight through the center of his chest.
Unnoticed, the Lion had appeared behind him like a phantom.
With an unmerciful backstab, the Sword of Fealty had pierced straight through the heart of Lorgar's vessel.
"I see... I didn't even notice...?"
Lorgar looked down at the blade protruding from his chest, a rare trace of surprise finally emerging in his tone.
However, he reacted instantly. Choosing not to recite Enuncia again, he unleashed his boundless psychic power with full force. An invisible wave of monumental force erupted, blasting the Lion backward.
The longsword embedded in his back was yanked free, drawing forth a spray of airborne blood.
The Lion flipped midair and landed on his feet without a moment's pause.
At this very moment, he completely abandoned the idea of a direct frontal clash.
Since fighting head-on against that strange language offered no chance of victory, he would pivot to assassination.
Coincidentally, he was equally well-versed in the arts of hunting and silent killing!
The battle that followed completely shattered the comprehension of everyone present.
Forbidden weapons from the Secret Vaults of the First Legion were drawn, activated, and projected by the Lion with exquisite timing.
Singularity bombs, phase-rift fields, psychic annihilation warheads—and even ancient relics whose names had long been deliberately erased—each making its appearance with a deeply ominous hum.
Lorgar, meanwhile, stood rooted like a statue of a god, unleashing psychic powers strong enough to sweep away everything while continuously uttering words that warped reality.
Every utterance of Enuncia negated an attack capable of destroying an entire fleet, but that host body belonging to Erebus was also visibly collapsing.
His lips turned charred and cracked, spiderweb-like fissures spreading across his throat. Every word he spoke caused pitch-black smoke to spill from his mouth and nose.
This was a war between two sons of the Emperor.
The destruction of Enuncia clashed with forbidden technologies, sweeping across all directions.
The blackstone-paved plaza cracked and caved in; the walls of the Fortress-Monastery crumbled layer by layer like sandcastles, burning away alongside the crawling Chaos runes etched upon them.
The entire camp groaned and shattered under the shockwaves of their clash, ultimately being flattened to the ground on a physical level.
"Emperor above..."
Even the veteran Risen, who had fought in countless wars and witnessed the most horrifying atrocities, were forced to fall back again and again.
The White Scars had pushed the engines of their anti-gravity bikes to the limit, frantically opening up distance.
Reflected in everyone's eyes were those two figures clashing and entangling continuously amidst the ruins.
One pounced endlessly like a wild lion, while the other chanted words of destruction like a withered tree.
They fought.
To the death.
Just like ten thousand years ago!
"So these are... the sons of the gods."
Shadowsun stood dazed at the edge of the battlefield, her face completely frozen.
Her battlesuit emitted sharp, continuous alarms under the vibration of energy shockwaves, yet she seemed completely deaf to them.
Her gaze was locked dead onto the center of the completely flattened ruins.
She wanted to intervene, wanted to do something.
Yet it was all entirely meaningless.
The surrounding Risen roared as they tried to force their way forward, only to be thrown backward by invisible psychic force fields the moment they drew near.
Not a single soul could approach that battlefield.
Not the Risen, not the White Scars, and certainly not the T'au...
They could only watch helplessly as that battlefield turned into scorched earth.
"Is all of this... truly achievable by mere mortals?" Shadowsun muttered under her breath.
Then, an absurd thought flickered through her mind.
Could it be that the Imperial Creed created by Terra's humanity actually possessed some merit after all?
She naturally did not know that of the two sons of the Emperor fighting before her, one happened to be the very source of the foundational ideology of that Imperial Creed.
Had she known, the expression on Shadowsun's face would undoubtedly have been even more spectacular.
Finally.
Everything ground to a halt.
Dust surged across the sky before slowly settling down.
All observers widened their eyes, their hearts pounding violently.
Who won?
Upon the ruins, two figures stood simultaneously.
Lion El'Jonson stood calmly with sword in one hand and shield in the other. Countless fine cracks crisscrossed his deep-green armor, yet his posture remained straight and proud, maintaining the effortless composure of a Calibanite knight.
Lorgar Aurelian before him, however, was in far worse shape.
That vessel originally belonging to Erebus was collapsing into ultimate ruin at a pace visible to the naked eye.
Patches of Chaos runes peeled away, exposing the charred bones underneath. His lips were almost entirely gone, his throat split wide open, and pitch-black smoke billowed forth whenever he slightly parted his mouth.
He looked like a battered puppet, swaying on the verge of falling.
"Shall we continue?" The Lion took a large step toward him, raising the Sword of Fealty once more. "It seems you've reached your limit as well."
His tone was cold and harsh, but his pace was intentionally slow.
The Lion was on guard—wary that this might be Lorgar's final trap or lingering reserve.
Based on his understanding of this brother, Lorgar was never one to sit idly and await death.
However, Lorgar merely nodded with calm composure.
"...Then until we meet again."
"Giving up just like that?"
The Lion narrowed his eyes as he approached, his blade's tip locked onto the target's vital points. "I see you still have some strength left. If you wish to defeat me, by all means, try."
"No need."
Lorgar Aurelian let out a strained smile.
"Engaging you in battle, running a brief test, and confirming your existence... this is already a fine outcome for me."
He slowly retreated half a step, and the surrounding air suddenly began to vibrate in a strange manner.
"Now I must take my leave. Remaining here any longer might prove somewhat inconvenient."
The Lion's pupils contracted. Almost instantly, he raised the Emperor's Shield, his muscles tensing to the absolute limit. However, the expected attack never arrived.
Lorgar opened his mouth without hesitation, uttering Enuncia once more.
Yet this time, the target of that ancient word—endowed with the power to manipulate reality—was himself.
There was no sound.
There was no light.
That vessel belonging to Erebus vanished from the spot in an instant.
It silently turned into a handful of ash, scattering into the cool currents of the Webway.
"...Suicide?"
The Lion was perplexed, his brows furrowed tightly, his sword and shield still held high.
However, he very quickly learned why Lorgar had done so.
A lamenting voice sounded from behind him.
"What a pity... to arrive one step too late."
"Who's there?"
The Lion turned abruptly.
His movement was like that of a beast suddenly bristling with rage. The Sword of Fealty lashed out instantly, sweeping toward the figure that had appeared behind him at some unknown moment.
It was an instinctive strike delivered without holding anything back.
And then, the blade stopped.
The Lion forcibly checked the blow mid-swing.
The extraordinary reaction speed of a Primarch displayed itself here as he realized something in a fraction of a second.
Sheathing his sword, the Lion took half a step back.
He narrowed his eyes slightly, taking in the uninvited guest standing before him.
If he was not mistaken, it had to be that person.
The "human" he had never met in person, yet had heard countless rumors about.
The so-called other Omnissiah, who had brought such earth-shattering changes to the entire Imperium.
Adam paid no mind to the Lion's knee-jerk reaction.
He merely walked past the Lion's side, coming to a halt before the ashes that had yet to fully scatter, and cast a glance down.
How to put it...
Burnt exceptionally clean.
Adam could not help but sigh with regret in his heart.
A miscalculation.
He truly had not expected Lorgar to be so decisive.
Knowing full well that an active god existed in the physical universe, that fellow still had the nerve to act so recklessly—even jumping right in front of the Lion to fight this duel.
Had he known earlier, he would have created an avatar to trail behind the Lion.
Then again, how could he have anticipated that the Lion's progress would be so fast?
It had probably been less than two hours since the man entered the Webway, and he had already confronted Lorgar head-on.
At that very same moment earlier, Adam had still been in the Black Library, engrossed in a rather deep conversation with Isha.
What a coincidence.
To have missed it just like that?
"Are you... that Omnissiah?"
A deep voice sounded from behind.
Adam turned around slowly, snapping out of his remorseful thoughts.
And then he saw the Lion, Lion El'Jonson.
Adam nodded slightly.
He had met three Primarchs before this, but each one gave off a distinctly different feel.
Although the Emperor's parenting skills fluctuated wildly between genius and disaster—leaving much to be desired—his craft in sculpting beings remained beyond question.
Greatness speaks for itself!
"Hello, Lion El'Jonson."
Adam offered a greeting. His gestures were casual, his tone gentle. "That's right, I am Adam. Pleased to meet you."
The Lion fell silent for a brief moment.
Faced with such a polite opening, the Primarch—accustomed as he was to letting his sword do the talking—was momentarily at a loss for how to react.
He watched this so-called deity, renowned throughout the Imperium and worshiped day and night by countless faithful, standing before him just like an ordinary person.
Utterly unremarkable.
Whether in height or build, he was as ordinary as any mortal.
Almost instinctively, the Lion compared the person before him with the Emperor of the 30K era.
He realized that this man possessed neither a towering four-to-five-meter body, nor a golden radiance emanating from every inch of his form, nor that hypnotic aura capable of driving mortals, Astartes, and even Primarchs to lay down their lives without hesitation.
In the end, he reached a conclusion.
If this mortal-looking fellow were to utter one of the Emperor's classic catchphrases—such as "I am no god"—it would undoubtedly sound vastly more convincing than when coming from the Emperor himself.
There was practically zero sense of contradiction.
"How did you know what was happening here?"
The Lion's second question slipped out, his tone laced with unhidden alertness.
"Did you orchestrate something behind the scenes?"
"Corswain told me."
Adam did not hesitate, raising a hand to point off to the side.
The Lion followed his finger.
Standing not far away was naturally the First Company Commander of the First Legion, Corswain, who was currently shifting his weight with a touch of unease.
Facing the searching gaze of his genetic father, the old veteran反而 composed himself and straightened his posture.
This was due to Adam's habit.
For certain elite figures from the era of the Great Crusade, he would typically elevate them into reality warpers.
Their martial prowess and strength of will—in either aspect—were more than sufficient to make them exceptional reality warpers, rather than letting them be controlled by reality-warping power in turn.
Corswain, naturally, was no exception.
The Lion slowly nodded.
In truth, it was not as if Corswain had never reported this matter to him before.
It was just that he truly had not expected their connection to be powerful enough to cross the barriers of countless star systems—and even penetrate the Webway's boundaries—to transmit information out.
"Next question: how did you get here so fast?" the Lion pressed further.
"Because I go wherever I please," Adam said with a shrug.
Choked by the response, the Lion remained silent.
Forget it. No need to say too much right now.
Seeing that the Lion had no further questions, Adam turned around, refocusing his gaze on the pile of ash.
"Let me make one final attempt," he said, "though I don't hold much hope."
Adam reached out a hand, closing his five fingers tightly toward the pile of slowly dispersing ash on the ground.
In an instant, without any warning—
The drifting ashes gathered together like a reversed recording.
Time rewound, structures reorganized, and the vessel that had been erased from the canvas of reality by Enuncia reappeared in an impossible manner.
Then, a bewildered and thoroughly baffled figure materialized on the spot.
Erebus opened his eyes and looked around in utter confusion.
The greatest schemer in the galaxy—the instigator who had personally orchestrated countless calamities—now had a face written all over with complete bewilderment. His consciousness was still stuck at the moment he had been double-crossed by his own Primarch.
Before he could even process the humiliation, he found his surroundings entirely transformed.
Opening his eyes, he saw a field of ruins, saw the sword-wielding figure of Lion El'Jonson, and saw the fortress-monastery leveled to the ground in the distance.
And one more...
"Heh, Lord Unbound Distortion."
Seeing the Warp true god he had been pining for appear right before his eyes, Erebus squeezed out a hideous smile.
"I believe I could also make some contributions to humanity—"
Adam did not give him so much as a glance.
"I can't be bothered to talk to you."
His tone was flat, yet every word carried an unhidden contempt.
"You are unworthy to listen."
Then, he made a heavy sweeping motion with his hand.
Erebus did not even have time to utter a second sentence.
His form collapsed once again, dissolving into ashes far finer than before.
Adam was indeed somewhat annoyed in his heart.
That so-called Enuncia clearly had something to it.
It was direct manipulation of the reality universe's underlying architecture, an entirely different system from psychic power—and precisely because of that, he was unable to pull Lorgar's consciousness back from time.
It was even difficult to track down his precise location.
As for Erebus...
Adam's gaze swept across the ashes drifting away with the wind, without a flicker of emotion in his eyes.
Dammit, just thinking about that name makes my blood boil.
Kill him?
That would be far too lenient for this vile bastard whose crimes knew no bounds.
At the exact moment he erased Erebus's vessel, Adam cast a curse upon the remaining fragments of his consciousness.
An ability that once belonged to the Aftermath entity from the Foundation universe—he had consumed that entity, seized its core characteristic, and used reality-warping power to perfectly replicate it onto this fellow.
Right now, Erebus had not truly died.
His consciousness would forever, ever, and always be trapped inside every single elementary particle that comprised his body.
Every single particle bore his full sensory perception and thought processes.
He would feel endless, infinite agony—an eternal loop that would never cease.
Adam had even thoughtfully applied a constant state to his consciousness, ensuring that Erebus would never completely collapse or slide into insanity from the immense pain.
He had to remain lucidly aware through it all.
Forever.
This was a vengeance—long overdue—for the atrocities committed over those ten thousand years.
Having done all this, Adam clapped his hands and turned around.
The Lion opened his mouth as if to speak, then hesitated.
Adam spoke first: "Now, you look as though you have a great many questions you'd like to ask."