901.M30.
After receiving reports from the Fifth Chapter's fleet, Nareth selected the Viziole system, with its dimmest starlight, as their target.
Nocturnal Hrud preferred dim stars. Viziole likely had the highest Hrud population.
Under the grey sky, black ships, one after another, emerged from the Mandeville point. One side of each ship was emblazoned with a star.
On the bridge of the Starcaller, before the full-length viewport, Santiago Borgkamp stared into the void.
On either side of him stood five canisters, each containing alchemical blood mixed with various species, in different colors:
Deep blue: kraken blood mixed with seawater.
Pale blue: Saharduin blood.
Red: salamander blood mixed with magma.
White: raft spider blood mixed with silk.
And the most precious, rainbow-colored: World Serpent blood.
He set down his brush. Its handle was made of dual-numbered black gold.
The tip was made of cold stone, which did not affect the alchemical blood.
During the voyage, the Daemonologist had been following the Black Emperor's command, charting the stars in the most primitive way.
"Auspex to full power. Commence scanning!" He ordered, then rolled up a bundle of star charts and placed them in a cylinder.
He took the star charts and hurried to his quarters.
He used his gleaming staff to tap runes of various shapes, triangles, squares, activating the "Euclidian Runes" as his psychic energy spread.
After the Sea of Souls receded like a tide, he paused for a few seconds to acclimate to the loss of power, then used his ritual knife to create a psychic wall.
He arranged the star charts on the altar, then knelt on the obsidian, clasped his hands with fingers pointing downward, and prayed to the Black Emperor.
On the third repetition, black mist churned. An ethereal gate opened.
The star charts, drawn by an invisible force, flew into the gate.
In the fourth layer of the Kingdom of Disorder, Nareth caught the star charts.
As he turned them, his eyes deepened.
'Star charts drawn with alchemical blood are ready. The "Traveler's" potion ingredients are complete.'
'The trouble is the advancement ritual. It's too dangerous. In some ways, it's even riskier than my advancement to "Mentor of Disorder."'
The "Traveler's" advancement ritual required establishing four special coordinates in the Warp's depths, in four completely different, distant locations.
Santiago, a Daemonologist skilled in teleportation, a seasoned "Astrologer" adept at divination and counter-divination, and with a "Record" of many extraordinary abilities, was capable of traveling the Warp.
But the problem was, as a powerful psyker, he was a beacon in the Warp, attracting all sorts of entities.
Prayers required time to be answered.
Though advancing to "Mentor of Disorder" had increased his permissions, he still needed to be present to hear prayers and pull people into the Kingdom of Disorder.
This meant he might be unable to do so immediately if occupied in reality.
'If I accompany Santiago personally, I can handle most threats, but I might also draw the attention of the Four. After all, I am quite attractive to Them.'
'Though the eleventh layer allows me to be reckless, that doesn't extend to Santiago.'
'If the Four decide to act, on Their home turf, it wouldn't be easy to pull Santiago into the Kingdom of Disorder.'
His thoughts raced. Considering events during the Great Crusade and his own plans, he had an idea.
'The pocket dimensions of the Hrud Source, the underworld of Sondheim VIII, even Fenris's underworld, all are pocket dimensions of the Warp. They should meet the requirements.'
The Hrud Source was the main ingredient for his advancement to "Earl of the Fallen." They existed simultaneously in the Warp and reality. To obtain the potion material, he had to go to the Source's dimension.
'Hmm, the webway entrance at Argos would also work.'
'But I would need to go with Magnus. We could fight together, and Tzeentch's attention would be on the most perfect Primarch in its eyes.'
He thought of Argos's strange deadstone and the drumbeat melody that could seal the psychic powers of Ahzek Ahriman and all the Thousand Sons.
'Deadstone might be a potion ingredient. "Mytery Pryer" and "Listeners" might gain insight from the drumbeat into the Aeldari's methods of sealing psychic power, the webway entrance, and Chaos.'
'Argos is worth a visit.'
As he thought, he began to formulate a plan to help Santiago complete his advancement ritual.
He waved his hand. The star charts vanished, appearing in a separate palace in the first layer.
As Nareth returned to reality, under the grey light of Viziole, the 5th Chapter's fleet deployed as Santiago had ordered.
He stared at the hololith. Frigates and destroyers, like bait, lured the Hrud ships.
His gaze fixed on a bait destroyer. The most critical reading was temperature, the most obvious indicator of being caught by an entropy beam.
32.18, 34.85, 33.96...
Scattered neutrons' radioactive pulses battled with the auto-recharging void shields.
Atoms, dispersed, recombined under the force field.
After the Gugann campaign, the Legion had accelerated improvements to the Phallian auto-recharging void shields.
Cypra Mundi's shipyards, rivaling Mars, had upgraded all ships.
Cruisers deployed on the flanks, using celestial bodies as cover, resisting the time rays from the blisters.
The Hrud ships were dispersed. The aggregation effect of their entropy fields was insufficient to tear apart the celestial bodies.
All macro-cannon batteries were dormant. The black ships, broadside, fired their laser cannons.
Blazing beams pierced the layered time fields, revealing the blurred ships.
The battle barge Starcaller and the battleships, broadside, carried Rangdan shadow-strike beams, targeting the exposed ships.
The radioactive beams created electromagnetic explosions around the Hrud ships, to avoid being annihilated like solid rounds by the distorted spacetime currents.
The shockwaves from the explosions pierced the blisters, turning ship after ship into ominous shadows.
Gaps appeared in the Hrud's petal-shaped defensive formation.
The missing ships accelerated the formation's collapse.
The relic-class Starcaller, from its prow, fired its Fra'al aethercannons. Two colorful beams lanced out, striking from beyond the reach of the temporal currents.
The xenos ships drifted lifelessly. Flames, within their failing entropy fields, burned with bizarre rapidity.
Santiago recalled the dangerous battles at Gugann. The danger had clearly decreased.
The auto-recharging void shields had greatly reduced the threat of the xenos' temporal weapons.
As he marveled, a ship with entirely different readings rose from Viziole Prime.
He glanced at the viewscreen. Multiple ships, their various auspex imaging systems, combined by the Simulus Chamber, produced a barely recognizable form.
It looked wrapped in a strange, fungal-like aggregate.
A migration ship.
The team led by Primarch's Aide Arsena Dunn, after reading and analyzing the Hrud's mycelium books, had a deeper understanding of the xenos.
The seasoned "Astrologer" calculated the migration ship's trajectory in a second.
He ordered, "Turn to 4-9-6. Aethercannons fire in sixteen seconds."
The Punisher-class reactor surged, powering the ship's turn.
Two colorful aetherbeams shot from the relic-class ship's prow.
The beams, from the long-range strike array, crossed the void battlefield and struck the target.
Within ten thousand kilometers, layers of temporal waves rippled across the fungal outer layer.
The aetherbeams, which ignored all shields, were dispersed and broken down into pure light in the layered ripples: red, green, blue...
The split, colored beams, like rain, struck the fungal aggregate, rapidly fading and vanishing.
Santiago watched the fleeing migration ship, thinking silently.
'Hrud in sufficient numbers are really troublesome.'
He frowned. The number of Hrud on the migration ship was extraordinary. If it escaped, it would be a huge hidden danger for his future territories.
'It cannot be allowed to escape.'
He ordered.
"Prepare for teleportation."
Standard Imperial teleportation could not penetrate Hrud fields.
But the Starcaller's teleportation platform was built by Shadows of Order's premier psychic artisan.
...…
Term Correction Gurgan system - Gugann system
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