The gifts of the Dark Gods of the Warhammer universe have never adhered to mortal logic. They may be conjured in response to maddened, sanguinary sacrifice — or they may be bestowed for no more than a single, unguarded choice.
Righteousness and depravity have never been determinations entrusted to mortals.
In Khorne's case, the Blood God is the embodiment of war and slaughter — yet He also holds dominion over valour and glory. Historical annals contain no shortage of records pertaining to mortals who, simply by virtue of their desperate yearning for the courage to oppose tyranny, inadvertently attracted His beneficence.
However, within the dung-heap cosmos of Warhammer, the 'blessing' of a Dark God signifies only one thing: you have become His prey. Your will shall be progressively perverted — from a warrior sworn to shield the defenceless, to a zealot who craves nothing but skulls and blood. Ultimately, you shall destroy, with your own hands, every article of your erstwhile oath, and consummate your existence in self-annihilation and boundless fury.
This is the terminal destination of the overwhelming majority of recipients. It is also, in part, why many later-founding Chapters instituted the office of Chaplain. An absence of faith is an invitation to the Warp's predations; the Astartes Chaplain is the first and final bastion against the taint of Chaos.
(It is, of course, essential to acknowledge that the fundamental premise underlying this doctrinal formulation is that your Chapter does not number among its ranks any celestial malignancy analogous to Erebus.)
The bulwark of pure, incandescent flameoscillated in the void. The entrained blessings of Khorne were progressively purged.
This resistance, however, did not discouragethe Blood God. It stimulated His 'interest' with augmented intensity.
Khorne:For the two anchors — an additional disbursement of 'SUPER-LIGHTS'!
A further torrent of crimson immaterial energy erupted from the Warp's profundity, assaultingthe purifying field Nyx strained to maintain. Ominous undulations propagated across its perimeter.
Damn it. I can barely sustain this...
Enough... A man must never concede!
Nyx's dentition compressed. He maximallyactivated his puissance. He registered, with acute disquiet, that the perimeters of his once-sanctified argent flame were beginning to fray— corrupted filaments of baleful crimsoninsinuating themselves into the interstices.
"Nyx..."
Curze's regard was fixed upon his brother — who strained, with evident desperation, against the Blood God's importunate solicitation. His ungual extremities had perforated his own palmar integument.
Both were Primarchs. At this juncture, however, Curze could only observe.
BOOM——!
A fulgent golden phantasm traversed the firmament with devastating velocity, deliveringa catastrophic golden impact directly to Khorne — who remained enthroned upon his Brass Pane, 'generously' dispensing his beneficence.
"You hemiplegic canine degenerate! You derive amusement from intoxicating my progeny?!"
The Golden Giant was incandescent with wrath. He had not anticipated that this partial-canine entity would descend to such profoundly immoral conduct — engaging in a 'tug-of-war' with Nyx.
"The accursed are my favourite playthings! I shall do precisely as I please!"
"Are you prepared to receive my (sustained High Gothic imprecation) ?!"
The divine conflict between the Emperor and Khorne recommenced, as was, by this juncture, customary. The great blade, aflamewith psychic pyre, and the battle-axe, drippingwith immemorial gore, collided once more within the Warp's tempestuous profundity.
"MAGNIFICENT! This is truly magnificent!"
"The Emperor shall compel Khorne to genuflect and tow Holy Terra back to the stars!"
The Emperor's arrival afforded Nyx and Curze a transient aperture through which to observethe divine conflict within the Warp.
Curze, though in his thoracic profundity he concurred with the essential substance of Nyx's declaration, nevertheless deprecated his brother's excessively vernacular formulation.
Had the Emperor not engaged Khorne at this critical juncture, Nyx would, in all likelihood, have been immediately reclassified as an ornamental acquisition of the Brass Citadel.
Khorne:I must possess you, Nyx!
The divine conflict within the Warp continuedwith undiminished ferocity. The duel upon the plaza had, by this juncture, been universallysuspended in favour of this transcendentspectacle.
The Captain had been unaffected by Khorne's beneficence.
Nyx's regard, however, when it traversed to Sevatar, underwent immediate, catastrophicrecalibration.
I'M SORRY — WHY IS HE EMITTING CRIMSON RADIANCE?!
Sevatar had, regrettably, been unable to completely evade Khorne's compulsoryinfusion.
Fortunately, his transfiguration had been effected via the Saint Egg protocol. Additionally, Nyx had expended the overwhelming majority of Khorne's ordnance in his interdiction.
The prospective Khorne-Chosen could, at present, barely retain a vestigial residuum of cognitive function.
"Is there... another recourse, Nyx...?"
Curze's delivery was saturated with an atypical affective register: anxiety. He was acutely cognisant of the consequences of Chaotic corruption.
Observing Nyx's protracted, agonisedcogitation — and his subsequent silence — Curze's countenance settled into terribleresolution.
"I shall... I shall dispatch him. Personally. I shall render his termination... free of distress."
His delivery was horrifyingly composed. Denuded of personal affect.
Curze advanced upon Sevatar. His superior extremity elevated. His verdict was pronounced — and it was without appeal.
"Father..."
Sevatar's consciousness remained lucid. He appeared to comprehend his own corruption.
His survival instincts screamed at him to resist.
Yet, encountering Curze's abyssal regard, he inclined his cranium. He accepted his sentence.
"His portion... I shall adjudicate it. Together."
BOOM!
The iron fist — capable of shattering lithic substrata — descended.
And was arrested — a single digit's breadth from Sevatar's cranium — by another iron fist.
Curze's cephalic orientation recalibrated. His regard encountered Nyx.
"Do not be so precipitate. I comprehend your abhorrence of Chaos. Sevatar, however... is salvageable."
"He is a warrior of my own fabrication. So long as I withhold my imprimatur, even should a Dark God manifest in person — he shall not be appropriated."
(There was, perhaps, an element of performative bravado in this declaration. Nevertheless, Nyx had confirmed that the essential substrate of the Saint Egg within Sevatar's corporeal configuration remained uncontaminated.)
He was, indeed, salvageable.
"What is your intention?"
"I shall... extirpate the corruption. Through application of my inherent capacities."
The instant Sevatar registered Nyx's approach, his affective disposition underwent sudden, dramatic recalibration.
The crimson radiance enshrouding his corporeal configuration surged.
His cognitive architecture was assailed by a cascade of humiliating imagistic recollections.
Sevatar — in this moment — resolved to exact comprehensive retribution for the violation of his 'gene-seed'.
"Lord Nyx! I... I hereby challenge you to single combat!"
Utterance complete, universal astonishment pervaded the assembled multitude.
Nyx had anticipated that Khorne's blessing might pervert Sevatar's cognitive processes. He had not anticipated that his 'son' would manifest such... audacity.
"This..."
Nyx's regard traversed to Curze. Curze responded with a barely perceptible cephalic inclination.
At this juncture, Curze's affective disposition had crystallised into a singular, unambiguousformulation:
I should very much like to terminate this 'beloved firstborn' with my own hands.
The Captain — who had, until this moment, been entirely omitted from the proceedings — exercised exceptional tactical judgement. He withdrew from the epicentre of contention with studied, imperceptible retrograde motion, re-integrating himself into his four-man command element.
"May the Space King forgive his blasphemous importunity."
The Captain deprecated Sevatar's contumacious conduct with comprehensiveunderstanding. The youth was, after all, a fellow retainer — his cognitive faculties were, at present, temporarily compromised by Dark God intervention.
A brief regimen of correctional corporal discipline would, in all likelihood, expedite his cognitive recuperation.
"Chestnut. What is your assessment of the temporal interval required for my father to resolve this disciplinary exigency?" The Captain's enquiry was addressed, in subauditory modulation, to his adjacent battle-brother — who had, likewise, been silentlyoffering propitiatory intercessions on Sevatar's behalf.
Chestnut did not verbally respond. He simply elevated a single digit.
"One minute? He is, it seems, possessed of respectable fortitude." (The Captain, interiority.)
The subsequent instant, however, invalidatedthis projection with extreme prejudice.
*BOOM——! *
Sevatar — who had, moments prior, been engaged in protracted, equilibrated conflict with the Captain — was instantaneouslyreclassified as an atmospheric projectile.
His corporeal configuration traversed the firmament with alarming velocity.
Chestnut: That is to say: one blow.
Nyx's striking posture remained immaculatelypreserved. His regard tracked Sevatar's still-ascending trajectory.
His interiority was absolute, crystalline void.
He had not anticipated that Sevatar — augmented by Khorne's beneficence — would prove so... fragile.
He had, observing the youth's confidentoffensive commencement, projected a requirement for sustained engagement.
"Ah... I had intended to exercise restraint. Would you credit this assertion...?" Nyx's regard, when it traversed to Curze, was tingedwith embarrassment.
I merely employed a modest degree of magnetic field rotation. Your son elected to achieve escape velocity.
Curze did not verbally respond. He simply vaulted into the firmament with grimdetermination and retrieved his descendingfirstborn.
Khorne's beneficence was, in the terminal accounting, comprehensively excised from Sevatar's corporeal configuration by Nyx's ministrations.
This outcome could, with some charitable interpretation, be characterised as a blessing concealed within misfortune.
The incident had, however, sounded a clarion. Khorne's importunate attentions had impressed upon Nyx the urgency of his present circumstances.
The regard of the Dark Gods. The traitorousEighth Legion, lurking within the umbrae. Innumerable additional, unquantified threats.
All converged upon a singular, ineluctableconclusion.
Nyx: Well then. Let all Nostramo be consumedwithin the revolutionary conflagration.