Faced with the intel provided by William, Miller couldn't shake a growing sense of dread.
This bizarre and mysterious event made him feel like he had stepped into the role of a character in a sci-fi thriller—one where disaster could strike at any moment.
His instincts told him to walk away immediately, but the higher-ups clearly wouldn't allow that.
After thinking it over for a moment, Miller's expression turned solemn. He asked, "If that ship has been missing for seven years, where has it been during that time? And how did it make its way back?"
William answered directly, "That's exactly why we're here—to find out. Although we're not sure if there are still any survivors onboard, the Space Agency did receive a transmission."
As he spoke, he moved his hand over the control panel and tapped a certain option.
The next moment, an eerie cacophony of wailing and sobbing came from the speakers.
It sounded like a chorus of countless tortured voices—screaming and crying in anguish—all layered together in a way that sent chills down everyone's spine.
But as they listened more closely…
They could barely make out fragments of what seemed like human speech.
One of the crew members frowned. "What the hell is that?"
William calmly replied, "The headquarters in London has already filtered the signal several times. Buried within it is a fragment that resembles human language."
"'Libera me'?"
The ship's doctor hesitated as he listened to the distorted audio. "Part of it sounds like Latin… something along the lines of 'Free me' or 'Save me.'"
The group began to discuss the possible meaning.
Only the Purgators observing from the sidelines knew what it truly meant.
In fact, the correct translation wasn't "libera me," but rather "libera te."
The full phrase was "Libera te tutemet ex inferis"—Latin for: "Save yourself from hell."
But hidden within it was a malevolent intent from an unknown dimension.
What it truly meant was unclear. Did it imply that the Event Horizon—the missing ship—needed to be freed to wreak havoc again? Or was it referring to something else entirely?
Either way, whatever that thing was, it clearly wasn't friendly.
At this realization, a few of the Purgators turned pale.
A place that could be called hell or the underworld, that turned both people and spaceships into monsters… was certainly no place for the living.
And this type of unknowable, otherworldly evil—no matter the time or place—was always the most dangerous kind of enemy.
———
After exchanging a glance, the deputy team leader gave the captain a small nod.
It was a silent signal: Tsar Bomba—Big Ivan was fully prepared and ready to be detonated at any time.
The captain finally exhaled in relief.
Those several Big Ivans were their ultimate trump card—each equivalent to 200 megatons of TNT.
If detonated successfully, they could annihilate entire nations.
With temperatures reaching into the hundreds of millions of degrees, theoretically, they could incinerate anything.
At this point—
Even if they knew next to nothing about their enemy, or how it operated, the Purgators firmly believed in one thing: "When in doubt—nuke the hell out of it."
Just like how, in countless horror movies, some inexplicable force always stops characters from continuing to tempt fate inside haunted houses…
After several near-death encounters, the Lewis and Clark—like a doomed horror movie protagonist—finally docked with the Event Horizon.
Thus began the mission none of them wanted to be on, but were forced into by orders from above: a suicide run they had no choice but to take.
Compared to the naive main characters who didn't know any better…
The Purgators were under far more pressure. In their eyes, the so-called Event Horizon was nothing less than a floating hellscape.
Long ago, the ship had been twisted into a living nightmare by that alien dimension.
The captain tried to reassure his team:
"Hold steady. Just follow the protagonists for now. The early stages should be relatively safe…"
According to the movie plot they had watched beforehand, once onboard, they would pass through a fairly long corridor without incident.
The real danger wouldn't begin until one of the crew members encountered trouble in the engine room—and Dr. William was mentally corrupted by the Event Horizon. That would be the true start of the nightmare.
As the airlock door slowly opened, the captain stepped in first to boost his team's morale.
But the moment he caught sight of the interior, his body flinched instinctively.
According to the movie, this corridor should have been just a narrow passageway—nothing unusual.
But now, it was covered in gore and limbs.
Countless dismembered corpses clung to the walls, as if they were a part of the ship's very structure.
The Event Horizon's cold steel interior was lined with hundreds of mutilated skulls—embedded like decorations.
Their empty eye sockets stared directly at the intruders in eerie silence, screaming without sound.
An opening shock!
Utterly soul-crushing!
"…Shit."
The captain, who had just taken a step forward, immediately jerked his leg back.
As members of the advance team, Captain Miller and Dr. William—who had entered right after him—were equally horrified.
In just one second, they were nearly scared into wetting themselves.
Without hesitation, Miller slammed the button to close the hatch and screamed:
"FUCK NO, FUCK NO, FUCK NO, FUCK NO, FUCK NO, FUCK NO!!"
"This goddamn place is worse than a haunted house! If a few demons from hell crawl out of that hallway, I'd believe it!!
Cut the link with the Event Horizon! Right fucking now!!"
"Screw the mission!!. Where we came from—THAT'S where we're going back!!"
In the original story, Dr. William was supposed to be the one stubbornly pushing forward.
But now, after seeing that hellish scene, he nodded furiously. "Go! We need to get the hell out of here!"
If they had at least made it through the hallway safely, only to be betrayed later, that would be one thing.
But just seeing the entrance was enough to make any sane person flee.
The truth behind the Event Horizon? The integrity of scientific inquiry?
None of it mattered anymore.
Survival was the only thing that mattered.
Even the main characters and the eventual antagonist—who were supposed to have a dramatic ideological clash later on—now shared one united opinion:
"We're out. This hellhole is beyond saving."
The pilot, who hadn't seen what was inside but saw the sheer terror on his commanders' faces, instantly realized something had gone very wrong.
He frantically worked the console.
A few minutes later—
He shouted in despair, "We can't disconnect! The docking mechanism's jammed! Someone has to go onto the Event Horizon and blow the coupling point—we won't break free otherwise!"
In other words: a whole lot of effort had been absolutely useless.
A few minutes later—
With countless eyes watching them—protagonists, side characters, extras, even villains—regarding them like noble martyrs…
The Purgators gritted their teeth and marched out of the Lewis and Clark.
They had no choice. Their mission was to eliminate the Event Horizon, or more accurately—the thing now inhabiting it.
They had to go, whether they wanted to or not.
"Goddamn Matrix…" the captain muttered.
Walking through the ship, stepping over corpses littering the floor, he clutched his weapon tightly and cursed the Matrix Purgatory with every breath.
But even as he raged, he still did his job and tried to reassure his team:
"Keep your nerve. I don't care what kind of hell this is—two nukes will blow it straight to oblivion."
Then he opened the engine room doors.
According to the plot, what awaited inside should have been a gravity drive composed of several concentric rings.
And indeed—it was still there.
But it didn't quite match the version shown in the film.
The most striking difference was a bone-crafted insignia suspended at the center of the device.
It looked like a rune formed by an X with a crossbar at the bottom—composed entirely of skulls.
In addition, the walls of the engine room were covered in twisted writing.
Among the Purgators was a Mage.
The moment his eyes landed on the symbols, he instinctively recognized them—his eyes glazed over, and he began to recite the words unconsciously.
Realizing what was happening, the captain—who also understood the symbols—lunged to stop him.
But it was too late.
"Blood for the Blood God, skulls for the Skull Throne."
As those cursed words were spoken aloud, a sinister, blood-scented wind began to howl throughout the chamber.
The captain stared blankly, murmuring to himself in despair:
"Warhammer…? A Daemon from the Warp?"
__
T/N:
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