On the other side.
On the surface of Terra, atop the walls of the Imperial Palace.
Roboute Guilliman stepped out of the temporary command post and arrived at the front lines of the war. The Primarch's hands rested on the wall that had weathered ten thousand years of storms, his gaze sweeping across the vast plains ahead toward the distance.
Behind Guilliman, the Victrix Guard, reappeared in the world from the era of the Great Crusade, stood in solemn silence. Blades and spears gleamed, cold and motionless. Before them, beyond the walls and as far as the eye could see, was the Hive City closest to the Imperial Palace—the Eternal City.
But now, in the wide expanse between the two cities, unsettling shadows were surging. It was a tide of daemons from the Warp.
Guilliman narrowed his eyes. With his superhuman vision, he could see everything clearly. Countless daemons belonging to different Chaos Powers seethed across the plains, their twisted forms flickering between reality and illusion, each breath exhaling sulfur.
It seemed the Chaos Powers behind the veil had finally reached a consensus. Now, because of a sudden variable that had appeared outside their plans, they had formed a brief alliance.
Guilliman, having returned to the Imperium, was naturally prepared for this. Soldiers to block the coming generals, earth to dam the encroaching water. It was as simple as that.
However—
"Something is wrong," Guilliman spoke suddenly at the front of the formation, his voice echoing in the open space.
"Yes, it is indeed wrong," Thiel spoke immediately, his voice earnest.
Forget being a hero of the Ultramarines from the Great Crusade era looking down from a height; even a person with no military knowledge could see something was amiss. Within that daemonic tide, the scarlet representing Khorne was still surging, the purple of Slaanesh remained seductive, and the blue of Tzeentch continued to flicker.
Only the loathsome green was conspicuously thin.
Guilliman's gaze swept through the tide, his brain working at high speeds. "Nurgle's main force is not here."
It was an obvious conclusion. However, despite the worry in his heart, Guilliman spoke decisively: "Proceed according to plan."
Since they had successfully lured these Warp daemons here—both to prevent them from wreaking havoc on the Eternal City and to provide a justification for the upcoming drastic reforms—he could not change the plan now. At this moment, Guilliman had no way to support Adam, so he could only have faith.
The Victrix Guard nodded slowly. They were prepared to fight side-by-side with their Primarch once again, ten thousand years later.
At this very moment.
On the Phalanx.
Adam's sensation was incredibly wondrous. The world had changed.
The Foundation once had a popular analogy, using sand to represent Hume levels—describing whether the strength of reality was stable. Reality strength, or Hume value, was the density of the sand. In any given space, it was dense in some places and sparse in others.
The ability of a Reality Bender was to use their hands to manipulate that sand—compacting loose grains to make the beach firmer, or conversely, digging the sand up to build various shapes of sandcastles.
Previously, Adam was merely a child. Although he could use his hands to shape the sand according to his will—pinching out castles, digging trenches, or piling up dams—all of it relied on his own two hands, his own strength. How sturdy could a sandcastle built by a child be? A gust of wind might knock it down. A wave might wash it away.
But now, it was completely different.
Adam didn't even need to do anything intentionally. Simply by existing, by thinking, by moving slightly, the surrounding sand would be reshaped according to his will.
This was... a Class IV Reality Bender.
Adam exhaled softly. The breath escaped his lips and lingered in the air for a long time, like the Divine Winds from ancient Terran myths. All matter, including the remaining corpse of the Great Unclean One, dissipated like a dream or a bubble before it.
Adam watched this scene with calm eyes. Then, he took a step with some difficulty. It was like an adult suddenly walking into a room filled with delicate building blocks. If he accidentally bumped into anything, those blocks would collapse.
As Adam stepped forward, the air began to warp, like a water surface ripples when a stone is thrown in. Those ripples spread outward; wherever they passed, light began to bend, colors shifted, and even time seemed to become unstable. The gravitational field grew erratic.
The floor beneath his feet, which should have been hard metal, now rippled like water. Debris rose from the ground, hovering in mid-air, rotating slowly before finally turning into fine powder.
Class IV Reality Benders were so powerful that such individuals had almost no human rights in the Foundation. Within their area of influence, objects could be shaped entirely at their whim; they were essentially immune to harm, could create humans or anomalous items at will, could make people vanish and reappear, and could turn an entire containment site into a plush toy...
Now, Adam had simply failed to control his thoughts for a moment, thinking briefly, "I am very strong now," and the surrounding reality began to lose control.
Fortunately, having ascended step-by-step from a Class I Reality Bender, Adam's self-control was outstanding. It was simply a matter of controlling his thoughts, restraining his mind, and pulling back those stray ideas one by one. If he couldn't do even this, Adam wouldn't have survived until now; he would have been killed by his own abilities long ago, like countless other Reality Benders.
The anomalies around him began to slowly dissipate. Adam opened his eyes, his gaze as calm as water.
Internal Reality Strength: 300 Hume —> 500 Hume.Environmental Reality Strength: 40 Hume —> 30 Hume.
I lack nothing now.
Even though Adam sensed the movements in the space around him coming from behind the veil, he felt no fear. Since he had already spoken harsh words to another, how could he not keep his promise?
Under his indifferent gaze, a rift opened in the air, and a gargantuan figure appeared before Adam.
It was a massive form encased in dark green power armor, the plate covered in rust and mold, emitting a sickening dark green light. The moth-like wings on his back were tattered and broken, and the iconic scythe in his hand dragged on the ground. Dark green slime coagulated on the blade; wherever it dripped, small pits were instantly corroded into the metal floor.
The newcomer's face was covered by a respirator mask, revealing only two cloudy eyes.
Mortarion.
The Primarch of the Death Guard, Nurgle's chosen, was now staring fixedly at Adam with those malicious eyes.
Adam sighed. It was him, as expected. There wasn't much to say. Since that Grandfather was resentful, he would naturally go all out, sending his most powerful Daemon Primarch to attack.
But how should one put it? There was still much that could be said.
In the past, he might have had a verbal exchange with this long-traitorous Daemon Primarch—mocking him for being the "Liberator" of Barbarus only to kneel in Nurgle's Garden; mocking him for being completely corrupted yet still clinging to the belief that he was a product of science, using a plausible-sounding numerology to explain his own fall; mocking him for claiming to hate the Emperor while being more like a son desperate for a father's approval than anyone else.
Furthermore, with just a thought, he could summon the Great Crusade heroes and Grey Knights who had already converged in the distance to his side.
Nathaniel Garro had been slain by his Primarch father in life. This time, to better play the role of a fallen Death Guard, he had specifically switched to a scythe he rarely used, perhaps waiting for this very moment. And Draigo had a blood feud with Mortarion. During an exorcism, he had even paid a great price to carve his master's name into Mortarion's heart—it was the enemy Mortarion hated most and his deepest shame.
As long as Adam gave the signal, those people would immediately rush forward to fight a life-and-death battle with this Daemon Primarch, washing away ten thousand years of hatred with blood.
However, Adam suddenly felt bored. He had ascended; he was now a Class IV Reality Bender. His gaze should pierce through the shell before him and look directly at the Chaos Powers controlling everything from behind. He was to duel the Four Gods themselves; those gargantuan existences peering from the depths of the Warp were his true enemies.
What was there to say to a puppet controlled by them?
Mortarion spoke slowly. His gargantuan body moved forward, each step crushing the metal floor beneath his feet and leaving behind footprints of toxic smoke. The horrific plague radiating from him seemed to blanket everything; the air became viscous, and every breath felt like consuming rotten meat.
"You should kneel before the Grandfather. You should not be our enemy," his voice was hoarse and muffled, coming through the respirator with a sickening hum. "I served under the so-called Emperor for countless years. He is a liar full of falsehoods. You should not be like this..."
"That's enough."
Adam raised his hand slightly and gave a gentle wave, as if brushing away a noisy fly. The voice stopped abruptly.
Intense pain suddenly descended upon Mortarion. The massive figure swayed slightly. Then, he looked down blankly at his waist.
An extremely thin, almost imperceptible line had appeared there. That line had cut through Mortarion's long-corrupted form, through the shell blessed for countless years by Nurgle, through that precious Daemon Primarch body.
In the next moment, his form was severed in two. Starting from the waist, the upper half and lower half suddenly separated. The massive upper torso fell heavily backward.
Boom—
The heavy thud shook the entire chamber. Mortarion lay on his back on the floor, his mind a complete blank.
What just happened? I was... cut in half?
This is impossible. In this galaxy, even if I was careless upon arrival, where could an enemy come from who can one-shot a Daemon Primarch? This does not fit numerology!
Then, the strangest thing happened. Under the influence of some power, Mortarion found the inspiration to speak with difficulty. His voice was raspy and broken.
"Sorry..."
"For not making Lord Adam use his full strength..."
"This was truly a dull fight, Mortarion," Adam said. "I'm afraid I'll forget you very soon."