Having shackled himself to a soul-debt, Kratch Doomclaw successfully negotiated a Gnawhole connection from the subterranean empire of Vigilus directly to Skavenblight. Though this was primarily a gambit by the Great Horned Rat to seize control of the galaxy's most vital artery, Clan Rictus viewed it as a divine boon, convinced that ten thousand souls a day was a bargain of legendary proportions.
With the Gnawhole stabilized, Clan Rictus reverted to the mercantile ruthlessness that had enriched them in the World-That-Was. Kratch, feeling the surge of newfound leverage, began negotiating the "Ironclaw Warrior" collaboration project with Clan Mors from a position of relative strength.
Upon receiving the news, Gnawdwell fell silent for a moment before sighing. "The fates of ratmen are varied indeed... but Mors relies only upon its own kin and the blades in our paws."
Having uttered this rare sentiment, he immediately transitioned into a clinical, flawless orchestration of the partnership. He simultaneously managed the strategic deployment of the entire Clan Mors apparatus: thousands of vassal clans and nearly a hundred billion skaven spread across the Eight Peaks System's three stars, eight habitable worlds, and over twenty resource moons.
No other skaven in the clan possessed the cognitive capacity for such a feat, yet Gnawdwell, armed with his absolute autocracy and cold intellect, personally directed the war against the Goff Orks, the Hive Mind, and the Clan Angrund Alliance.
At that moment, Queek Headtaker and his Red Guard returned, their heavy footfalls echoing through the hall. Queek was drenched in gore, and the trophy-heads impaled upon the plasteel spikes of his trophy rack had been refreshed once again.
On a battlefield of such scale, Queek relied on his personal martial prowess and his schizophrenic ability to converse with the severed heads of his victims. This madness allowed him to pierce enemy deployments and identify weaknesses at critical junctures. Even an Ork could not "fink" of a foe who consulted the dead; to Queek, the tactics and secrets of his decapitated enemies were shared with the ease of old comrades.
"Father, I have return-returned!"
Queek snarled, his teeth bared. He gripped several duardin heads by the hair, while the spikes on his back were laden with the skulls of Goff Nobz. To any other skaven clan, Queek would look like a warlord on the verge of mutiny. Yet, the hundreds of Ironclaw Warriors surrounding Gnawdwell, clad in dark-crimson power armor, remained perfectly still, their gaze fixed forward in eerie silence. They had seemingly conquered the twitching palsy and hyperactivity inherent to their race.
Gnawdwell looked up at Queek, who now loomed nearly twice his size. "The result?" he asked calmly.
"Good-great foes! Yes-yes! Stunties and Green-things... all good-great foes! A slaughter-joy!" Queek strode to Gnawdwell's side. Despite being able to look down upon his adoptive father, he maintained a posture of ingrained respect. He glanced at the stacks of war reports before Gnawdwell, loathsome parchment covered in skaven script, with a look of impatient disdain.
Gnawdwell nodded with fatherly pride. "As expected of my greatest asset. Shadowhorn is secure."
"Heh-heh-heh! No, Father... Queek must kill-slay more! Take more heads!" Queek shrieked, his voice reaching a fever pitch. "For Mors! Yes-yes!"
But Gnawdwell shook his head. "No, Queek. The number of Ironclaw Warriors is currently insufficient to sustain further fronts. Your Red Guard requires replenishment. But fear not, my foster-son... you shall have all that you desire."
Had anyone else attempted to restrain him, Queek would have eviscerated them on the spot. Before Gnawdwell, however, he merely stamped his feet in agitation before nodding. "Yes, Father, of course... but Queek… will not rest long!"
"Go. Sharpen your blades."
As he watched Queek depart, Gnawdwell immediately drew a new line across the Shadowhorn theater.
In the Warp, Lucius observed this display of "filial piety" with genuine amusement. It was an anomaly among verminkind; perhaps only Clan Mors could truly maintain control over these "Rat-startes." Nevertheless, he intended to grant Mors no special favors. This struggle was the crucible Gnawdwell required. The deal with Rictus was merely a minor variable.
As Mors solidified its hold, Lucius saw in them his future Astartes-equivalent recruitment world, his own "Legion of Death."
He then shifted his gaze toward the second most powerful skaven faction, whom he had not observed in some time: Clan Moulder.
At present, Moulder had completely overrun the Keilia System and a dozen neighboring worlds. The Imperium had originally dispatched a task force to purge these "unknown xenos," but the initial defenders had already been consumed by the Tyranids and Moulder. Most remaining Imperial reinforcements had been diverted to the Nachmund Gauntlet, leaving the remnants to serve as raw material for Moulder's laboratories.
Under the direction of Throt the Unclean and other Master Mutators, and at the cost of countless lives, they had successfully deciphered portions of the Tyranid genome. They had isolated the scything talons of Genestealers, chitinous plating, and even the "chameleon" stealth genes of Lictors.
These genetic sequences were stitched into rat-beasts like modular upgrades. They produced Rat Ogres with chitinous carapaces and psychic-infused talons, skaven fused with Gargoyle wings, and their most prideful creation: an abomination born from merging a Brood Mother with a Tyranid Hive Queen, capable of birthing a literal tide of monsters directly onto the battlefield.
In a crowning achievement of bio-engineering, an accidental breakthrough allowed them to graft a captured Hierophant into a Hell-Pit Abomination, transforming the mountain of flesh into a Moulder "Bio-Titan" controlled by the central nervous system of a veteran Packmaster.
Yet, this was not Throt's ultimate goal. He sought to manifest the aspect of the Great Horned Rat known as the Twisted Breeder, a mythic horror said to possess a hundred billion tails, a formless mass composed of every rat to ever exist.
Throt believed that by recreating this horror, the Great Horned Rat would grant the ultimate boon, allowing Moulder's twisted faith to saturate the universe.
To this, Lucius thought: Please do not associate the deity with the fanatical delusions of the followers.
Regardless, Clan Moulder now possessed the confidence to challenge the supremacy of Clan Skryre. Having exhausted the biomass of their current star systems, Throt turned his sights toward the territories of the Imperium and other powers.
In that direction lay the Five Hundred Worlds of Ultramar.
——————
If you want to read ahead of everyone, go to my pat-reon: pat-re-on.c-om/magnor (remove the hyphen to access normally)
For more free additional chapters, throw some power stones!
100 PS = 1 Chapter.