A silence deeper and more profound than any they had yet experienced fell over the cramped corridor. The ever-present groaning of the Hulk's structure seemed to fade, and even the distant, psychic whispers of the Warp were muted. All that remained was the low hum of power armor and the oppressive presence of the sealed bulkhead before them.
"Brother Valerius, what are your readings?" Corvus's voice was a low growl, his hand shifting to the hilt of his force sword.
"Nothing, Librarian," the battle-brother reported, his voice tight with confusion. "Auspex shows a solid wall of an unknown alloy. No energy readings, no life signs. It is… inert."
"It is not inert," Rimuru corrected softly, his golden eyes narrowed in focus. He took a step closer, placing a hand on the bulkhead's cold, black surface. It was unnaturally smooth, without a single seam or weld. "It's sleeping. And it's made of a living metal that's repairing micro-fractures at an atomic level."
Sergeant Cassian hefted his bolter. "Living or not, it's in our way. A Melta charge should suffice."
"Negative, Sergeant," Corvus countered, trusting the being's impossible senses over their own technology. "If this is a door, we do not know what awaits on the other side. A controlled breach is necessary." He looked at Rimuru. "Can you open it?"
Rimuru tapped the wall thoughtfully. "Destroying it would be easy, but messy. This door isn't locked by a mechanism. It's… conceptually sealed. There's no keyhole. The very space it occupies is a lock."
<
So, less like a door and more like a stubborn computer. Got it, Ciel.
"Stand back, please," Rimuru requested politely. He pressed two fingers against the wall. A faint, dark energy, barely visible to the naked eye, coalesced around his fingertips. It was the power of Void God Azathoth, scaled down from a universe-ending cataclysm to a surgeon's scalpel. He didn't brute-force the door; he simply introduced a tiny point of non-existence directly where Ciel had indicated the control node was.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then, with a sound like grinding dust, a perfect, rectangular section of the wall began to retract into the ceiling, its edges glowing with a faint emerald light.
The air that wafted out was ancient, sterile, and cold beyond measure. It was the air of a tomb that had not been disturbed for sixty million years.
Before them lay not a derelict corridor, but a chamber of impossible geometry. The walls were black, obsidian-like material, arranged in perfect angles that seemed to hurt the eyes. Lines of eerie green light pulsed rhythmically through the floor and ceiling, illuminating a vast, silent hall. In alcoves that lined the walls, metallic, skeletal figures stood in silent ranks, their forms skeletal and alien. In the center of the chamber, a raised dais held a larger, more ornate sarcophagus.
Corvus and his men knew instantly what they were looking at. Every Space Marine was drilled in the litanies of the Archenemies of Man.
"The Soulless Ones…" Sergeant Cassian breathed, his voice a mixture of hatred and dread. "Necrons."
"Hold the line!" Corvus commanded, his force sword igniting with a crackle of blue psychic energy. "This is a tomb of the Ancient Evil! For the Emperor, let none escape!"
As if in response to his cry, the green light in the chamber intensified. A low, monophasic hum began to build. One by one, the skeletal figures in the alcoves stirred. Their single, glowing green eye lenses flared to life. They raised their long, arcane rifles, and began to shamble forward with a slow, implacable gait.
"Lesser life-forms detected," a synthesized, emotionless voice echoed through the chamber, seemingly from the walls themselves. "Intrusion into sovereign tomb-space. Eradication protocol initiated."
The first volley of Gauss fire stitched across the doorway. It wasn't an explosion of kinetic energy, but shimmering green beams that struck a battle-brother's shoulder pauldron. The Marine grunted as the outer layer of ceramite simply vanished, stripped away atom by atom.
"Their weapons flay a target from existence! Find cover!" Corvus bellowed, returning fire with a bolt of psychic energy that slammed into a Necron Warrior, staggering it but failing to put it down. The bolter fire from his brothers impacted the metallic skeletons with concussive force, knocking one apart, but its severed limbs were already beginning to crawl back toward its torso, surrounded by a sickly green energy.
Reanimation Protocols.
Rimuru watched the scene with detached fascination. <
<
"Efficient indeed," Rimuru muttered as another volley of green energy forced the Space Marines back. He saw their bolter rounds were having minimal long-term effect. This wasn't a fight they could win through attrition.
With a sigh, he stepped forward, moving past the Ultramarines and into the doorway of the tomb.
"Rimuru! Get back!" Corvus yelled, thinking the being was naive to the danger.
A dozen Gauss beams converged on Rimuru's position. But they never touched him. A translucent, multi-layered barrier shimmered into existence before him. The green beams struck it and dissipated harmlessly, their deconstructive energy utterly negated. It was the Absolute Defense of his Ultimate Skill, Covenant King Uriel.
Rimuru lowered the barrier and looked at the advancing ranks of silent, skeletal machines. "My apologies," he said, his voice echoing in the sterile chamber. "My new friends and I are just passing through. We don't want any trouble."
The Necrons did not reply. Their only answer was to raise their weapons and fire again.
"I guess not," Rimuru sighed. He raised his hands, and from his fingertips, hundreds of razor-thin, black threads shot forward. They were nearly invisible, threads of pure energy spun from his own body and imbued with the properties of Void God Azathoth.
The threads moved faster than the eye could see, weaving a complex web through the Necron ranks. They didn't just cut; they severed the very energy that held the living metal together. A Necron Warrior, raising its rifle, suddenly fell into a dozen perfectly sliced pieces, the green light of its reanimation protocols sputtering and dying as the threads severed its internal power source.
In a matter of seconds, the entire first wave of Necron Warriors was reduced to inert piles of metal, bisected and trisected with surgical precision.
The chamber fell silent once more. The Space Marines stared, their bolters lowered, at the utter ease with which Rimuru had dispatched an enemy that could bog down entire Imperial Guard regiments for weeks.
From the dais at the center of the room, a new figure rose. It was taller than the others, clad in ornate, segmented armor and carrying a great, bladed staff. Its single, cyclopean eye glowed with a cold, analytical light. It was a Necron Lord, or a Warden of the Tomb.
It observed the dissected remains of its warriors. It observed the stunned Space Marines. Then, its gaze fell upon Rimuru, and for the first time, its synthesized voice held a new inflection. Not emotion, but pure, high-level calculation.
"Anomaly detected," it stated. "Power level unclassifiable. Threat matrix… infinite." The Warden raised its staff, but not to attack. A vortex of emerald energy began to swirl around the dais. "Tactical withdrawal protocol engaged. Preserving tomb assets. The Silent King will be notified of this… irregularity."
With a flash of green light that forced the Marines to shield their eyes, the dais, the Warden, and every remaining sarcophagus in the chamber simply vanished, phasing out of reality.
They were left standing in a vast, empty, and now truly inert room, the silence a testament to a foe that had deemed them, or more specifically Rimuru, too dangerous to even fight.
Corvus slowly deactivated his force sword. He looked at the dissected Necron parts, then at the empty space where the Lord had been. He turned to Rimuru, his voice heavy with the weight of a thousand shattered doctrines.
"What in the Emperor's holy name," he said, his voice barely a whisper, "are you?"