"Can this Redemption Armor my elder brother made... still hold?"
Feeling the constant heat radiating through the suit, Dorn drew a deep breath.
He could not help feeling a trace of worry.
The unnatural Chaos flames Magnus had summoned had already surpassed the limits of physical law itself, to the point that even detection systems had fallen into disarray.
And the special alloy covering the outside of the armor had indeed begun to melt to a certain degree.
That meant the armor might not be able to withstand an attack like this forever.
If Dorn lost the protection of the Redemption Armor, then he would have to face the combined assault of several fallen Primarchs with nothing but his flesh and blood, all while the traitor Horus loomed nearby.
There was every chance he would be beaten down under their brutal attacks.
Worse still, if he fell or died, then no one would be left to stop those traitors. The entire situation would become irretrievable.
Anyone facing a predicament like this would feel crushing pressure.
"Move, damn you!"
Dorn strained with all his might, trying to tear free of the Death Lord's fungal restraints so he could escape the crimson flames.
But no matter how he struggled, he remained locked firmly in place.
The restraints of that fungal abyss did not seem to exist in physical reality at all. They were more like a kind of temporal imprisonment.
That confinement forced the armor to remain fixed in the same point of space.
"Warning. High-intensity sorcerous threat detected. Initiate emergency response system?"
Just as Dorn was grappling with the severity of the situation, a new prompt suddenly flashed across the armor's internal display.
The machine-spirit of the armor system was asking whether he wished to activate emergency countermeasures to help the suit escape the extreme environment.
It was an integrated foolproof emergency handling system, capable of using various technical methods to deal with special attacks from Chaos or xenos threats.
"System... activate!"
Dorn did not hesitate for even a moment. He immediately turned the system on to deal with the crisis at hand.
He felt almost moved.
The Redemption Armor his elder brother had forged was simply too comprehensive. It could even analyze and respond to complex sorcerous attacks.
In the old Imperium, they had possessed almost nothing that advanced. Most problems had to be handled through individual knowledge and experience.
In truth, this foolproof integrated system had been designed mainly to compensate for the Savior's pitifully limited knowledge of xenos technology and sorcery.
His Majesty's battle record was astonishing, and his psychic power was immense, but he had almost no formal knowledge base in those fields.
He had put all his skill points into management and nation-building.
As a result, his combat technique, his handling of unusual situations, and his knowledge of sorcery were all well below average. Even his use of psychic power tended to be for close combat, things like giant golden psychic fists.
Put simply, in these areas he had basically no technique at all. He dealt with enemies through raw numerical superiority.
Plain and uncomplicated.
Of course, in the New Imperium, such matters were forbidden knowledge. No one was allowed to spread them, lest they damage the image of the great Savior as omniscient and omnipotent.
In most cases, the Savior relied on various systems, technologies, or the help of the Machine Goddess to deal with complicated situations.
That had generally prevented major problems from arising.
Now, with the integrated system in the armor, Dorn's own lack of sorcerous knowledge was no longer a weakness.
And the sheer number of solutions built into the Redemption Armor left him deeply astonished.
Just for escaping the current restraint, the system offered three different options.
And if even those failed, he could use the internal communications module to urgently contact the appropriate think tank for a solution.
At last, Dorn understood why the armor was so huge.
Most of the bulk existed so more things could be packed inside it.
The Redemption Armor was the crystallized wisdom of more than a dozen senior Mechanicus magi, powerful psykers, and several xenos technical experts of the highest level. Even Ork mek expertise had contributed no small amount.
This was the Savior's way of dealing with problems: solve them with technology, and use outside support to compensate for your own shortcomings wherever possible.
Hum.
Dorn reacted instantly.
He found the solution at once, pulling out a relic-grade sacred rune from one of the armor's built-in storage compartments.
The moment it activated, the fungal strands wrapped around the feet of the Redemption Armor, those strands that seemed to exist outside normal spacetime, began to destabilize and gradually become solid.
Then the fungal strands seemed to suffer tremendous damage, releasing silent screams as they withered rapidly beneath the Crimson King's flames.
Not only that, the flames even followed the fungal strands back toward the fungal abyss hidden somewhere beyond.
"Magnus, stop your sorcerous fire!"
Mortarion sensed the danger threatening the fungal abyss and was immediately stricken with alarm.
That was a domain tied directly to the essence of his authority. If it were damaged, the loss would be severe.
"Apologies, my brother.
"The only thing we can do is destroy the Savior's armor, then drag Dorn out of that turtle shell."
Not only did Magnus refuse to stop the flames, he made them burn even harder.
He reminded the fallen Primarchs:
"That bastard has used sorcery to escape the restraints. He's about to break out of the fire. Stop him!"
"Damn it!"
Mortarion ground his teeth.
But he still kept his reason and chose to cooperate with Magnus and the others, resolving to deal with Rogal Dorn first.
After all, if he disrupted this campaign and caused the plan to seal away the Cursed One to fail, he would suffer the Plague Father's terrible punishment.
Rumble.
Mortarion and the other fallen Primarchs unleashed all their strength at the region engulfed in crimson fire.
Their hateful attacks nearly covered the entire area.
The warp-power and destructive force released by those mighty fallen beings were so lethal that the entire platform shuddered violently.
The Imperial defenders, meanwhile, were pinned down by greater daemons and had no chance to come to Dorn's aid.
The savage bombardment from the fallen Primarchs churned the crimson flames into a storm. Even the alloy beneath them melted into a massive crater, from which thick smoke rose in waves.
The mixture of so many different forms of warp-energy rendered all senses and all machine detection useless. No one had any idea what was happening inside.
The bombardment continued for several minutes, until the chaotic energy sustaining Magnus's large-scale sorcerous formation finally ran dry and the crimson fire gradually began to fade.
Only then could people finally see the appearance of the area that had been swallowed by flames.
"What?!"
Mortarion and the other fallen Primarchs held their breath as they stared into the crater, but a moment later their eyes widened in shock.
At the bottom of the crater, the black armor more than eight meters tall still stood there motionless, upright and proud.
And it still looked more or less intact.
"Traitors, is this really all your attacks amount to?"
Suddenly, Rogal Dorn's voice rang out, filled with mockery and surging battle intent.
His body trembled slightly, his emotions running high.
The Redemption Armor made by his elder brother, the Savior, was even stronger than he had imagined.
Earlier, under the suppressive force of the traitor Primarchs' attacks, Dorn had no choice but to activate every force shield on the armor.
Only then had he realized that what had melted before was merely an outer decorative armor layer.
That was something the Savior had added purely for aesthetics.
The true core armor of the Redemption Armor had taken almost no damage at all. The total damage level was under 0.1 percent.
In other words, the Redemption Armor had endured the combined offensive of several Primarchs without being destroyed.
It was nothing short of a miracle.
Though in truth, the result was inevitable.
The entire suit had been forged from True One alloy and Blackstone, mixed with a vast quantity of powdered Emperor-bone. Those were materials found nowhere else in existence.
Chaos attacks could not damage them easily.
Boom.
Dorn suddenly leaped up from the bottom of the crater and crashed down before the fallen Primarchs, the cloud of dust from his landing sweeping across their faces.
In a single moment, he overwhelmed them in pure presence.
Mortarion and the others stood there taking that dust head-on, all of them feeling slightly numb.
They had never expected armor forged by the Savior to be so troublesome. It seemed no less than a divine relic.
Even the false Emperor's old True One armor had not been this durable, had it?
That meant the battle ahead would become even more difficult.
To the fallen Primarchs, it no longer felt like they were fighting Rogal Dorn.
It felt like they were fighting the Savior himself.
Whoever stood inside that suit, the result was more or less the same.
Magnus tipped his head back and swept his gaze across the Redemption Armor, then let out a cold snort.
"You've lost your shields and your weapons. How exactly do you intend to answer our next attack?"
"Who told you I have no weapons left?" Dorn was not worried in the slightest.
As he spoke, streak after streak of blazing objects began falling toward them from above his head.
Roar!!!
An abhorrent bellow shook the entire region, and the outer gun turrets were hurled away with ease.
Angron had arrived.
That being, revived through cloning technology, stood only slightly shorter than the Redemption Armor itself, his daemonic body overflowing with the authority of the Blood God.
"Slaughter!"
Angron cared about nothing else. Gripping his gigantic blood-axe, he hacked down at Dorn as if he meant to split everything in existence.
It was pure physical force in its most absolute form.
Even with the Redemption Armor, if Dorn took that hit without force-field protection, he would not come away unscathed.
Yet the mighty blow crashed instead into a thick drop-pod hatch and was further impeded by force fields.
The Destroyer's fully charged strike was temporarily blocked by a high-intensity assault pod and several layers of force shielding.
That was part of the standard support loadout for the Redemption Armor.
"Yes. This is exactly the feeling..."
Watching the scene, Dorn's eyes almost watered.
He remembered how his elder brother had once beaten him senseless by using endless waves of supporting wargear in exactly this way.
Only now it was he who was wielding such ferocious armament against the fallen traitors.
"Big brother really is the best!"
Dorn's reverence for the Savior only deepened.
He drew a deep breath and, just like the Savior had done before, calmly stepped into the drop pod to load a new layer of external armor.
It was all relic-grade armor and weaponry, complete with fresh shields.
By the time Angron tore open the drop pod's alloy hatch, what stood before him was Dorn already outfitted in the new add-on armor.
His frame had become even more monstrous.
If Angron was a brute, then Dorn now looked like some superhuman mountain of muscle, overwhelming him in sheer presence.
Crackle.
Force-field lightning danced across Dorn's heavy gauntlet as he drove a punch straight into Angron.
The blow was so violent that it actually stunned the Destroyer, the Red Angel himself. Teeth flew from his mouth.
"Traitor, sometimes fighting with flesh alone is not enough. Resources and backing matter too."
Dorn was having the time of his life now, and he wholeheartedly agreed with his elder brother's philosophy.
As he spoke, he drove one massive cannon-sized blow after another into Angron's body.
The heavy plasma hammer infused with sacred psychic power smashed into the Destroyer until Angron howled without any power to retaliate.
As for the attacks from the other fallen Primarchs, they were blocked by such a dense forest of force fields that it was dazzling to look at.
"Traitors, is this really the full extent of your power? Is this all the strength you gained by becoming slaves to Chaos?"
After battering Angron senseless, Dorn roared and charged straight at the others.
Relying on the constant stream of support weaponry, he pursued all of the fallen Primarchs by himself.
Beating them back step by step.
Alpharius collapsed fully and lay unconscious. Magnus took several sacred psychic slaps to the face. Mortarion beat his moth wings frantically as he retreated again and again.
The Lord of the Bastion was ferocious beyond compare, practically unstoppable.
The Imperial defenders and Chaos beings in the outer sectors stared in complete disbelief. No one had expected things to turn out like this.
This would be a duel recorded in history, an unprecedented triumph for a loyalist Primarch.
The fallen Primarchs were so aggrieved they could spit blood.
Rogal Dorn, protected by the Savior's armor, was shrugging off most of their attacks.
Meanwhile, they could do nothing but take punishment. At this rate, they could never win, nor could they seize this vital core position.
"Face me!"
While attacking Omegon, Dorn casually hacked down another greater daemon.
He threw back his head and roared, on the verge of shouting, "Who's next?"
What, I'm supposed to avoid the edge of the chosen of Chaos and the Dark Emperor?
I'll take ten of you at once!
Boom!
Seizing an opening, Dorn threw a full-power punch at Omegon's head, aiming to kill him on the spot.
But a black daemonic shadow appeared abruptly and intercepted the fatal blow.
That full-force punch slammed into the newcomer's vambrace, triggering a violent explosion of air and force.
Dorn felt as though he had struck a thick, utterly indestructible wall, only to be hit by an even greater rebound force and stagger backward several steps.
Yet that black shadow also failed to hold perfectly and was driven back one step.
"Heh. Nice armor. It even seems to carry a trace of the false Emperor's aura."
After blocking the blow, Horus let out a cold laugh.
Black flames burned around the Dark Emperor's body, and the moment he appeared, his presence spread across the entire region.
Even Dorn's previously surging momentum was reduced.
Every eye turned toward him.
No one dared underestimate him in the slightest.
His arrival would decide the outcome of this duel, and perhaps the entire war.
When the Imperial defenders saw the Dark Emperor's figure, their hearts grew heavy at once, as though something had gripped them in a merciless fist.
Even breathing became difficult.
His very existence alone was enough to create an overwhelming threat.
"Horus. So you've finally come."
Dorn switched into a new pair of relic gauntlets and hefted a legendary blade.
He knew that only by stopping Horus, or defeating him, could he protect Holy Terra and his father.
"You think these things will let you defeat me?" Horus stared at the Lord of the Bastion and spoke slowly.
His tone was utterly certain.
"A pity the one wearing that armor is you, not the Savior.
"The moment you put on that suit, humanity had already lost. Nothing can stop me now."
This armor had clearly been tailored specifically for the Savior. The materials as a whole possessed powerful psychic conductivity, allowing them to draw out far more power from the Warp.
In the Savior's hands, that would produce an absolutely terrifying enhancement.
Even Horus would not dare say with certainty that he could defeat the Savior while the Savior wore this armor.
But the one wearing it now was Dorn.
He did not possess a higher-dimensional connection to Warp power, and therefore could not bring out the armor's true strength.
More importantly, this armor was already the Savior's greatest wargear.
If Horus destroyed it, it would be like cutting off one of the Emperor's arms.
That would erase the most dangerous factor in the entire war.
Horus's expression twisted.
Without the boost from this special wargear, the Savior's own power would be nowhere near enough to face a Dark Emperor carrying the combined might of all four gods.
That was the one conclusion reached by the Changer of Ways after factoring in nearly every variable.
In other words, once this armor was lost, even if the Savior managed to return to the Sol System, it would already be too late.
He would no longer be capable of facing Horus, the Dark Emperor.
"Then let's find out!"
Having switched loadouts, Dorn immediately activated every shield field at his disposal and charged straight at Horus, slamming into him head-on.
The two figures blurred together in combat, moving so fast that even veteran Astartes could not clearly follow their motions.
The region where they clashed erupted with violent shockwaves. Chaotic energies intertwined in every direction, and the steel machinery around them was destroyed by the aftershocks of the battle.
Even Blackstone itself developed faint cracks.
Boom!
Rogal Dorn was sent flying and crashed into a nearby machine structure.
He climbed back up almost at once and hurled himself at Horus again.
The Lord of the Bastion roared:
"Again! I can do this all day!"
Dorn's fighting spirit remained unbroken. He firmly believed that he would not fall easily, and that he could still hold this position.
He would not fail his elder brother or his father.
The fierce battle erupted again, leaving the ground littered with wreckage from shattered equipment.
...
"Big brother... I can't do this anymore..."
No one knew how much time had passed before Dorn, panting heavily, lost strength in his legs and dropped to his knees with a thud.
He was completely spent.
And the Redemption Armor was in terrible shape too, covered in damage and gaping breaches. In some places, you could practically see the Lord of the Bastion's ass through the openings.
This strongest wargear of the Savior, forged with vast amounts of the Emperor's bones, was now nearly wrecked beyond use.
Equipment based purely on raw stats could not handle a Dark Emperor empowered by Chaos and tempered by immense combat experience.
"My pitiful brother, you will not live to see Terra's destruction."
Horus walked over, kicked Rogal Dorn onto his back, planted a foot on his chest, and tore open the armor plating of the Redemption Armor with brute force.
Then he raised Worldbreaker high and smashed it down toward Dorn's head.
(End of Chapter)
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