Titus, battle-brother of the Ultramarines, once led a commando strike force that slew an ork warboss during a brutal greenskin incursion—long before the return of the Lion.
He later tore a Daemon Prince apart with his bare hands.
During that execution, he had been fully exposed to the Warp's twisted energies, his body momentarily wreathed in an unnatural golden light.
It was that very incident that led a newly inducted neophyte to report Titus to the Inquisition, fearing Warp corruption. In strict accordance with the Codex Astartes, Titus was investigated thoroughly. It was only after the return of Roboute Guilliman that the matter was laid to rest. Titus has since undergone the Rubicon Primaris, reforged into one of the Emperor's finest—stronger, faster, more resolute.
Now, on the plague-choked world of Vigilus, Titus calmed his breath as he assessed the battlefield. His wounds, grievous though they were, began to knit beneath his armor as he centered his will. Around him, plague daemons surged from the muck, a tide of rot and ruin.
But Titus did not falter. As an Ultramarine, as a son of Guilliman, he would not allow his brothers to perish in these diseased swamps, choked with rot flies and miasma, before fulfilling their duty. He would not disappoint his Primarch.
With bolstered resolve, the Ultramarines under his command rallied and counter-charged, cutting through the corrupted ranks with bolter fire and steel.
Then came the vanguard—a Greater Daemon of Nurgle, bloated and putrid, lumbering through the filth. It wielded a rusted cleaver the size of a tank tread, trailing sickness with every step. A true engine of entropy.
Titus did not hesitate. He charged, his power sword flashing, and their weapons clashed in a thunderous impact that sent shockwaves through the swamp.
"Out of my way, abomination!" Titus snarled.
"You're not going anywhere, little bug," the Herald of Decay gurgled in laughter, thick pus spewing from its split-open flesh.
Vigilus was now perilously close to the Immaterium. The barrier between realspace and the Warp had thinned so greatly that daemonic entities could manifest with nearly unrestrained power. It was here that Titus met his match.
"Begone!" he bellowed again. This time, golden light burst from within his armor.
His azure-clad fist, crackling with power, struck the daemon's skull. With a sickening crunch, the creature's head exploded, and its grotesque body was hurled backward like a sack of meat.
Titus stood still, panting lightly, unsure of what had just occurred. The Warp-spawn writhed on the ground, its regeneration stalled. Even a daemon of Nurgle—infamous for its tenacity—struggled to rise.
With a growl, Titus raised his chainsword to finish the job—
—but before he could act, the daemon's skull was crushed beneath a steel boot.
It was not the footfall of a Space Marine. The boot was far smaller—by at least a third.
Titus's eyes narrowed as he followed the silhouette upward.
A woman. A black-haired warrior clad in ornate ceramite armor, bloodied and resolute.
He recognized her instantly.
Shivara, Captain of the Warmaster's personal guard—an elite Sister of Battle of the Order of the Heart. Her demeanor was sharp, cunning—traits rare among the noble Adepta Sororitas. But Shivara was no ordinary Sister. Her presence alone demanded attention.
Behind her, more Sisters emerged from the haze, cloaks crimson, bolters roaring. The sudden arrival of Shivara's strike force turned the tide. The Ultramarines, until moments ago surrounded, now found the weight of the battle lifted.
Titus, however, was puzzled. How had these Sisters deployed so close without triggering any auspex scans?
Shivara's armor was slick with gore. Her power blade shimmered with fresh daemon ichor. Whatever battles they had fought before arriving here, they had been brutal.
Titus considered stepping forward to speak—to understand their mission, their intent.
But the battlefield granted no such luxury.
From the horizon, a thunderous roar echoed. The Great Unclean One, a true scion of Nurgle, lumbered into view, accompanied by a fresh swarm of plague daemons.
There would be no time for parley.
Shivara stepped up and gave Titus a firm shove on the chestplate.
"Don't just stand there," she said curtly. "Get your men to the evacuation point. We'll hold the line."
Titus bristled. The sons of Guilliman did not abandon the battlefield while allies bled.
But Shivara's next words cut deeper than a chainsword.
"Captain of the Ultramarines," she said in a low voice, "you don't want the Inquisition hearing about that golden light again… do you?"
Titus froze.
That golden flash. He'd convinced himself it was nothing—a hallucination brought on by battle. But she had seen it too.
And if she had, others might as well.
If the Inquisition caught wind of this... again...
Titus glanced once more at the battlefield, then at Shivara. The look in her eyes told him she was not bluffing.
He gave a stiff nod, signaling to his squad. They would live to fight another day.
And the golden light? That would have to wait.
But not Titus. He shared the uncompromising discipline of his Primarch, Roboute Guilliman—unyielding, rigid, and ever faithful to the Codex.
He turned the Sister's words over in his mind, weighing them with the same gravity he would a battlefield maneuver. Then, finally, he spoke:
"If that is your command, then so be it. But I will not abandon my allies on the field."
Shivara's eyes, half-veiled behind her helmet's visor, glimmered with amusement. The inflexible honor of the Ultramarines was ever predictable. Yet she responded in a voice as firm and solemn as any Inquisitor.
"This is an order, soldier. We all have our missions."
Without waiting for another word, she turned and led her Sisters of the Heart into the inferno.
As Shivara and her warriors charged the lumbering bulk of the Great Unclean One and its pestilent host, Titus hesitated—but only for a heartbeat. Then, understanding the window they'd bought him, he barked a command to his squad.
"Advance! Break the line. We push through, now!"
The Ultramarines surged forward, their ceramite boots pounding through the noxious sludge. They followed their captain with unwavering resolve. Above them, Shivara danced through the miasma, her power armor shining like a divine specter.
The warp-tainted air, the acidic fog—none of it could penetrate her will. Her psykic shield shimmered around her like the barrier of a living saint. Her life-field surged—its force measured in the hundreds of thousands—as she vaulted through the daemonic ranks.
In mere moments, she was face to face with the Great Unclean One.
Her foot crashed into the bloated daemon's gut, toppling it like a mountain felled by divine wrath. Other Plaguebearers surged to defend their lord.
Meanwhile, Titus' strike force slammed into the daemon lines. A disciplined hammer blow. They burst free of the ambush, their momentum shaking the very crust of Vigilus.
Crimson fire pillars erupted from fissures in the corrupted ground, searing away the unclean. But for every daemon slain, ten more clawed their way through the veil. Still, they could not stop the Ultramarines—not when the evac site was within reach.
Titus risked a glance back. With the augmented vision of a Primaris, he saw them—kilometers away, the Sisters locked in brutal combat, wreathed in gore and glory. Shivara led the charge, her armor soaked with ichor, her blade singing through flesh and ether alike.
Then came the artillery.
Daemon-forged shells rained down, tearing apart the battlefield in indiscriminate fury. Smoke and warp-fire cloaked everything. The Sisters vanished into the inferno.
Grief knotted Titus' gut, but there was no time to mourn.
He led the Ultramarines through the ruins at the edge of the wildlands, reaching the evacuation point. A scattered warband of traitor marines made a final stand—but they were no match for the combined force of defenders and newly arrived Ultramarines. The traitors fell swiftly.
They crossed crumbling bones and shattered stone, guarding the waiting transport. Survivors were pulled from the rubble and loaded aboard. Titus' strike force was the first to breach the siege and reach the evac zone. And they assumed its defense without hesitation.
This ground was hard-won—and now it was their responsibility.
Titus watched the refugees stumble forward, ragged and terrified. He swore to protect them, to hold this lifeline through the wilderness until every last Imperial soul was safe. It was his duty. It was Guilliman's will.
And it was the least he could do, for the allies who had bled for him.
Far away, where the firestorm had scorched the red-lit sky, deep beneath Vigilus…
The duel of demigods had reached its climax.
Dukel detonated the power of the Eternal Fire. The released force was so cataclysmic that even Mortarion—the Death Lord himself—felt dread gnaw at his soul. Not fear. Not exactly. But something deeper. Something final.
He staggered back, cloak ablaze, armor blackened and cracked. His breathing rasped through his helm, body riddled with wounds. And what truly unmade him was this:
The sword Dukel held… vanished once again.
The arcane equations of numerology, Mortarion's sacred weapon against destiny, had turned against him. They screamed impossible outcomes—his doom written into the very weave of fate.
He would be undone. Not just slain, but erased. No place in life. No place in death.
He reached out again to the numbers, to the equations that had never failed him.
But destruction closed in.
Dukel's voice rang like thunder across the cavern:
"Mortarion! With this blade, I shall hunt your sins to their end. You will find no escape."
He thrust the sword—inevitable, prophetic.
Wounds tore open across the Death Lord's form, even before the blade landed.
Dukel prepared for the final stroke, the execution that would seal Mortarion's fate.
Then—
His brow furrowed.
A portal ignited before him without warning. Black and gold, outlined in radiant power. Ancient runes flared, and light from beyond creation spilled through.
From the gate stepped a towering figure. A crown adorned his head, etched with burning script. Runes coiled around his form like chained gods. In one hand, a brutal hammer pulsed with dark, unruly power. In the other, an archaic war club of scarred metal that seemed to hum with forgotten wars.
His blue eyes shimmered—still proud, still terrible.
Then he saw Dukel.
And he saw Dukel's sword aimed directly at him.
Behind Dukel, Mortarion—wounded, yes, but still alive—stood ready to strike.
The golden giant's pride gave way to rage.
Lorgar: "…"
Without hesitation, the golden giant swung both his hammer and war-club in a devastating arc, striking toward Dukel's chest with the fury of a god.
Behind him, Mortarion exhaled slowly through his respirator, the sound a grim sigh of relief.
With the insight granted by daemon-augmented numerology, the Lord of Death had foreseen this moment. Now, it was Dukel who faced the impossible choice: to complete the execution, or to preserve his own life.
If he plunged the blade forward, Mortarion would die—but Dukel would take the full force of Lorgar's divine blow. If he hesitated, if he retracted the sword, Mortarion's wounds alone wouldn't be fatal. He would survive.
In this no-win scenario, the arcane paths of fate had revealed one final chance for the Plague Primarch.
And yet—Dukel did not waver.
Even Mortarion's eyes widened in disbelief as he witnessed the impossible.
Dukel drove his blade home.
"SHRAKK!"
The sword pierced into Mortarion's torso. Reality buckled with the sheer force of the blow. The Lord of Death howled, a raw, soul-splitting scream, as the blade of the Incarnation of Flame completed its path.
But at the same instant, Lorgar's weapons struck Dukel's chest with the fury of a collapsing star.
The detonation of raw kinetic force and empyric backlash from the hammer's strike was louder than thunder, more primal than any spoken word. The valley was obliterated in an instant. Everything within several kilometers fractured and fell into ruin.
At the heart of it, the dragon-like sigil on Dukel's armor—the single, slitted eye—snapped open.
In that moment, as metal met flesh, and fate collided with fury, the world shattered.
Mortarion was hurled like a corpse caught in a storm. Though mangled and near-death, he did not die. Dukel's killing stroke had been real, but the divine intervention of the Word Bearer had altered his fate.
The Lord of Death had escaped annihilation—barely.
Mortarion rose again, broken wings twitching with pain, pustulent breath spilling in ragged coughs. With a sweep of his ruined limbs, he released a dense cloud of plague mist, concealing his corrupted form.
Hidden in the toxic veil, he fled.
He found Lorgar amidst the rubble—collapsed, half-buried beneath cracked obsidian stone, his armor shattered in places, stained with ash and sacred blood. A chasm had opened in his chestplate, leaking burning ichor. Debris filled the fractures in his war-plate, and his divine aura flickered like a dying star.
Dukel's blade had not merely cut through Mortarion—it had wounded Lorgar too.
Perhaps that was the only reason the Lord of Death still lived.
The Archprophet of Chaos lay unconscious, but not at peace. His body was broken, but his mind fared worse. Within the ruins of his psyche, the echo of a draconic roar reverberated endlessly.
A storm of knowledge—chaotic, forbidden, scientific—tore through Lorgar's thoughts like warpfire through parchment. Ancient technologies. Truths never meant for mortal minds. Equations that cracked logic. All of it surged in waves, unbidden, relentless.
Meanwhile, Dukel—struck down by a blow that could shatter mountains—rose once more.
He emerged from the ruins, a deep crater dented into the chest of his armor. The golden metal convulsed unnaturally, almost alive, reshaping, healing. The dragon eye emblazoned across his breastplate blinked once more, unshaken.
He lived.
No grievous wound marked him. Only that lingering dent—the remnant of divine fury.
Massive spectral eyes materialized around him, scanning through the war-torn mist. They pulsed with psychic light, cutting through the fog like a god's gaze.
Dukel advanced, blade in hand, slicing through a daemon formed of miasma—one of Mortarion's constructs, half-real, half-plague. With a single stroke, it was dispersed.
And just like that, the fog vanished.
So too had Mortarion and Lorgar.
The two Daemon Primarchs—wounded, furious, but alive—had vanished into the warp-shadow.
The battlefield, once alive with war and prophecy, was now still.
But Dukel stood in the silence.
Unbroken. Unyielding.
And the hunt was not over.
...
TN:
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