"Log personal status." Ignis activated his power armor's recording function.
"It's been roughly several Terran hours since I was flung from the Battle Barge. The internal chronometer is damaged; I can only estimate the time based on subjective feeling."
"Vital signs are stable. That damned Beast of Nurgle didn't cause me any significant harm, but my Purity Seal is probably malfunctioning."
"During the rampage inside that monster's belly, my flamer's fuel ran out. Now, the only weapons I have left are a few grenades and my power fists."
"Fortunately, the power pack uses nuclear fuel and can even recharge via solar power. I'm not worried about power for the short term."
The Space Marine from the Salamander's Chapter sighed, his massive frame not much shorter than the train carriages around him.
"I'm surrounded by a platform, tracks, and trains. It looks like a civilized world, or at least one that once had civilization."
He reached out and touched the train's outer shell, seeing his reflection in the window glass. He stared at the green dragon's head emblazoned on his orange-red shoulder guard.
"Although I'm not particularly fond of that cold, golden sun, I still have to thank him. Him being half responsible for me still being alive right now isn't too far off."
Pulling his attention from the window, the giant turned to survey his surroundings.
It looked like a switching yard. Dozens of parallel tracks were strewn with metallic serpents twisted and overturned everywhere, as if some colossal creature had run amok here.
"It's too quiet here, almost no sound at all. The machine-spirits of these rail transports are completely unresponsive, seemingly dormant for a long time."
Ignis activated his Fire-Sight, attempting to detect any residual heat signatures, but his view was filled only with cold, dark hues.
"I wonder how my battle-brothers are faring. Volkanic was a loyal warrior, a good superior. If the Old Man Emperor granted protection even to an unbeliever like me, He surely wouldn't have forgotten him."
He advanced through this desolate, uninhabited area. Besides his own muttering and the hum of the power plant, there was no other sound.
Soon, his gaze was drawn to a unique cluster of crystals.
They looked like clusters composed of many cubes, entirely black but veined with faint, bright green lines. In texture, they somewhat resembled obsidian or glass.
Most importantly, these things were emitting some kind of energy radiation, causing his helmet to flash a red warning.
Dismissing the annoying alert, Ignis reached out and touched the peculiar crystal.
"Strange crystals, clearly not artificial. They're growing from the ground, the walls, even from inside the trains."
"Perhaps they are what caused the civilization's disappearance."
Just as the Salamander was observing these crystals, his ears picked up a sound—the noise of something organic stepping on metal.
The HUD in his helmet immediately displayed red indicator arrows pointing toward the source of the sound.
The Space Marine instantly entered a combat stance. He turned, raising his power fists defensively.
There were several bizarre humanoid creatures. Their bodies were hunched and they staggered, their forms entirely black with green lines tracing across them.
Its right arm was severed at the elbow, and its entire left arm was specialized into a blade-like shape.
The strangest thing was its head, or rather, where its head should be, was a black, hole-like void.
"Witnessing unrecorded xenos. Appears to be mostly organic. Damn it, where am I? Is this even within the galaxy?"
Three, five, more and more of these xenos dropped down from the wreckage of an overturned train and charged towards Ignis.
Warriors of the Salamander Chapter never fear xenos, especially ones less than half their height.
The Mark X Gravis Power Armor moved. The warrior giant, over three meters tall, crashed into the midst of the enemy. The immense impact force shattered the foremost ones into piles of fragments.
The shrapnel from the live grenade explosion momentarily stalled the xenos' group charge. The disruption fields on the Aggressor's fists flared to life.
Ignis felt the machine-spirits of his power fists awakening, thirsting to destroy these xenos.
Blue electrical energy enveloped fists larger than the xenos' bodies. A mere sweeping punch smashed several more into broken scraps.
"In Vulkan's name!"
The acoustic matrix in the Salamander's helmet projected a roar. He attacked like a storm of dark green lightning and energy.
In the blink of an eye, the entire group of xenos was reduced to fragments.
"They look a bit like Tyranid Hormagaunts. Both have blade-like upper limbs and this fearless posture."
He held the last xenos in his hand, examining it closely.
The xenos' blade scraped against his arm armor a few times, only managing to produce sparks and faint scratches on the sturdy ceramite plating.
"Doesn't seem to pose much threat to me, but for civilians, they would be dangerous."
Saying this, Ignis exerted force with his hand. His tendon-coil enhanced physique unleashed astonishing strength. The final xenos was crushed flat and discarded like a piece of trash.
"No bleeding. Seems somewhat inorganic, but different from Necrons—no power cells or conduits. A truly strange species."
He knelt on one knee to study the fragments further, but they dissolved into the air and vanished.
Ignis's nerves immediately tightened. This disappearance into thin air was far too similar to Warp Daemons being banished from realspace.
"Damn it, could they be some kind of Warp entity? I really hope I haven't fallen into a Daemon World." Ignis felt like the power armor's temperature control system might be faulty, giving him a chill.
After all, he was just a warrior from a Salamanders Reserve Company, not a legendary figure like Kaldor Draigo. If he truly had fallen into a Daemon World, he'd be nothing more than a delivered meal.
But he couldn't just wait for death. There were traces of past civilization here. Ignis decided to look around, hoping to find some fuel to get his flamer operational again.
Suppressing the unease in his heart, Ignis muttered "Old Man Emperor protect me," his blasphemous words trailing along the railway tracks.
After all, these machines must have had places to refuel. At least from their appearance, they didn't seem purely electric.
But after more than ten minutes of walking, Ignis realized something was wrong here.
Even though Aggressors, as heavy infantry, had far inferior mobility compared to their brethren, the striding Space Marine felt like he hadn't actually covered much distance.
He tried using the power armor's marking function, but the space here had some kind of interference. The rangefinder for the marked target point kept fluctuating erratically, rendering it useless.
"Damn it!"
The ceramite-clad giant punched a nearby train carriage, blasting a large hole in it.
This venting of frustration suddenly gave him an idea. This hole could serve as a marker. By causing a little destruction every time he ran a certain distance, he could at least ensure he wasn't walking in circles.
He started to run. The warrior, over three meters tall and weighing more than a ton, made the ground tremble. Although he couldn't match the running speed of sixty kilometers per hour achievable by warriors in standard power armor, his pace was still far from slow.
After a brief advance, he confirmed it—the space here was indeed problematic. He saw in the distance the hole he had made earlier appearing on a train carriage.
"The spatial structure here is chaotic. It's highly likely I've been going in circles."
Ignis felt somewhat frustrated. He wasn't a Chaplain or a Librarian; he couldn't rely on litanies or psychic powers to extricate himself from this predicament.
"I am Anby Demara..."
The Salamander's enhanced auditory systems picked up a sound—language, and one he could understand.
"Is the Warp starting to create auditory hallucinations for me now?" he muttered quietly, reactivating his power fists. He began to worry about which evil power might manifest. Hopefully not the purple and pink one.
"...a full-time employee of the 'Cunning Hares Agency'. Due to an accident, I have fallen into a Companion Hollow."
It was a young female voice, her tone calm, as if describing a very ordinary matter.
"Quite a detailed backstory," Ignis was speechless. Are the Warp powers these days this elaborate? Setting up personas just to fish for souls?
"I do not possess a 'Carrot' or have a 'Proxy' assisting me. The probability of being lost in this Hollow is 96.4%."
Her voice remained calm, devoid of much emotional fluctuation.
"The number isn't precise enough," Ignis continued listening, while his HUD already indicated the source of the voice. "What the hell is a 'Carrot' and a 'Proxy'? It seems having these two things would aid in successfully leaving."
"I will record the experiences of this journey via audio log. This way, even if I meet an unfortunate end..."
Although the subsequent words were too soft to catch clearly, Ignis had completely lost his composure.
"Damn it! How come this setup is so similar to mine? Both lost here, both using audio logs. Are you plagiarizing me now?"
"Whatever it is, I need to investigate," the Salamander resolved. "I can't stay here waiting for death. If it's a daemon, I'll kill it. If it's truly a human or some intelligent being I can communicate with, then I'll learn about the situation first."
"Old Man Emperor above, if I successfully escape this predicament, I will definitely offer you three sticks of incense and a xenos head. I beg you, Sir, please ensure I don't encounter anything powerful that I can't defeat or escape from."
Spouting blasphemies that would make a Chaplain faint, Ignis changed direction and advanced, following the HUD's guidance.
Whether it was overturned trains, collapsed building ruins, or scattered cargo containers, none could hinder a demigod warrior taller than a single-story house.
The power fists cleared a path through this wreckage. This was familiar work; he had breached enemy defenses in confined environments more than once, opening paths for battle-brothers and mortal soldiers.
Occasionally, some xenos jumped out, only to be promptly knocked down with a couple of solid punches.
These insignificant attacks only made him more agitated. Ignis feared he was being targeted by Warp daemons and increased his pace of clearing the path even further.