Abaddon's projection appeared aboard the Gloriana-class flagship of the Sons of the Phoenix with zero suspense.
This was facilitated by a Thousand Sons psyker named Khayon, who had been captivated by Abaddon's capability and charisma, leading his own remaining handful of brothers to join Abaddon's newly reformed Black Legion.
This was also the reason Abaddon had managed to scrape together such a large force again in just a few short decades. The resurgence of the Sons of Horus was one factor, but far more people had simply been duped into joining by Abaddon's sales pitch.
The Black Legion's name was trumpeted loudly, but the Ultramarines and anyone with half a brain knew that this collection of slacker-bums could never accomplish anything truly grand.
For starters, what kind of legion master relies on living in someone else's territory, shouting that he's going to rebuild his legion to play big boss, and then march into Terra to slay the False Emperor?
A fatherless bastard—who would pay any mind to you?
Did you think you were the Fists of Thorn or Fists of Pain, those quiet, stoic types? At least those guys could earn a living with the Dark King, possessed genuine skill, could fight and defend, and even work as Techmarines.
The Black Legion? What even was that?
A rabble of rotten fish and shrimp, a crew made of absolute nobodies; if a bunch like that could achieve anything, one might as well place faith in rejoining the Empire to become a Chapter Master.
In truth, it wasn't entirely impossible. After all, the Blackshields among the Word Bearers and World Eaters were quite famous, especially that Kossolax, who fought his former brothers with terrifying ferocity. Khârn himself had said Kossolax was another sworn enemy second only to Erebus.
Regrettably, Khârn didn't yet know that Erebus was already dead, and he would never get to avenge Argel Tal.
Thus, very few truly responded to the call; most were just defeated stragglers fleeing through the galaxy who drifted in without knowing the full picture.
Yet sometimes, shouting loudly enough to be heard really was important. For instance, before setting out, a force thirteen thousand strong had already gathered under Abaddon's banner.
Even though the vast majority were opportunistic freeloaders who joined the Black Legion with the mindset of grabbing what they could and running if things went south...
When numbers swelled, the momentum genuinely felt different, and a few small warbands with minor reputations ended up coming along to run with Abaddon.
As momentum snowballed, the fame grew ever larger, to the point where even some Great Company Captains among the Ultramarines were slightly startled by the development of Abaddon's momentum.
This was also why Abaddon felt he had the backing to venture out into the galaxy.
The Black Legion provided him with enough confidence, and combined with his own abilities, he believed taking out an imperial chapter was well within his grasp.
As long as he didn't run into powerhouse chapters like the Black Templars, Iron Fists, or Dark Knights, or those parent legions led by Primarchs, wouldn't he be invincible across these galactic sectors?
However, Roboute shattered Abaddon's illusions. The Sons of the Phoenix Chapter scattered the morale of the Black Legion he had painstakingly assembled, and as for those high-as-a-kite Emperor's Children warbands, they were instantly jolted wide awake.
Everyone had heard Akurduhna's name, and nobody wanted to run into that master of swordsmanship.
This was one of the exceedingly few individuals among today's galaxy-spanning Space Marines who could still contend for the title of the absolute strongest. Who would be suicidal enough to pick a fight with him?
So Abaddon acted. Before the battle even began, he turned most of the leaders and captains of the warbands he had gathered into pile of slag, seizing control of their forces in the process.
Khayon's powerful psychic abilities helped him force a connection to the imperial fleet, though this was by no means easy on Khayon.
The Empire's application of anti-psychic equipment had always been formidable; he couldn't hold out for long, but it didn't matter. This time was merely for Abaddon to show his face and utter a few words.
"Even though I've ended up like this, I still haven't forgotten that dish you cooked for me back then. I swear, fermented bean paste stamped out by an old woman's bare foot on Cthonia tastes ten thousand times better than the trash you made."
Even after being sealed inside a Dreadnought, Abaddon could never forget that meal—a single bite had made his plasteel-laced bones shudder inside his body. He genuinely found it hard to imagine how anyone's culinary skills could be so utterly abysmal.
At the time, he had desperately wanted to ask: did that damned recipe include actual garbage mixed into it?
Abaddon's voice was muffled, but the contempt in his words was unmistakable. The Sons of the Phoenix, who should have stood united against the external threat, fell into a rare silence.
Although the immediate priority was figuring out what this traitor was up to, and they were normally quite adept at using verbal sparring to extract information, this time they kept quiet. They were terrified that saying a single word might turn them into their Chapter Master's next guinea pig.
"How did you hijack the comms here, Abaddon?"
Akurduhna recognized the Dreadnought; after all, Abaddon's legendary flight for survival was famous across the entire Empire.
Nor would he forget that towering figure who single-handedly held together the Luna Wolves after his father's death. The existence of the traitor standing before him was nothing short of the ultimate insult to Abaddon's past self.
The logic engine had already locked onto the Black Legion's position. Within a matter of seconds, Akurduhna executed a series of hand signals behind his back. The crew understood immediately, and the Sons of the Phoenix warships began closing in on the Black Legion.
A muffled laugh echoed from the Dreadnought's sarcophagus.
"Care to guess how I managed it?"
Abaddon gave no straight answer; he was here to provoke the Sons of the Phoenix and lay the groundwork for his plan.
Taking the Sons of the Phoenix head-on was clearly an unwise move. Abaddon knew the raw strength of his own legion all too well; even if they somehow won, the losses would be catastrophic, and he would still come out on the losing end.
So it was far better to rile them up—not necessarily to shatter their discipline entirely, but at least to get them hot-headed enough to overlook minor details, allowing his upcoming plan to proceed more smoothly.
The Black Legion had already concealed itself within a nearby asteroid belt. Once the Sons of the Phoenix located Abaddon's flag vessel, they would undoubtedly launch a sudden ambush.
Though an asteroid belt was dangerous, that had never been a deterrent to the Empire. Abaddon understood this truth, but he also knew that he absolutely could not afford to pass up this opportunity.
The day for the true resurgence of the Sons of Horus hinged entirely on this campaign. If he could pull off a victory, his path forward would become immensely easier.
So he put himself in harm's way, employing a strategy to bait the enemy into a trap. He would serve as the bait himself, while the others would rapidly form a encirclement and launch boarding actions the moment the Sons of the Phoenix moved in to surround them.
Furthermore, based on Abaddon's understanding of Akurduhna, the man wouldn't be able to resist launching a personal boarding action onto his vessel to decapitate the traitor with his own hands.
Abaddon was exploiting this exact trait. He was gambling—gambling that Akurduhna would personally take the field, and gambling that his allies could hold down the rest of the Sons of the Phoenix.
Abaddon didn't overthink things. A plan was just a plan after all; no matter how thoroughly considered, the moment battle was joined, at least half of it would be rendered useless anyway.
As long as a strategy maintained its core direction, the rest came down to whether fate was on his side.
Abaddon gambled that he had fate on his side, and he believed he could pull it off.
"We've only crossed blades once before, Akurduhna. I spared you back then, did you know that? You probably didn't."
"Every time you swung that weak, feeble sword in front of me, I had countless opportunities to slice you in half at the waist. But I didn't do it."
"Now, I won't hold back. After I sever your head, I'll mount it high on the banner behind me. I will remember you forever—a brother whose cooking was deadlier than a poison strike."
"My legion won't spare the rest of you either. You will become our sacrifices. We will utterly exterminate you, tread over your corpses all the way to Terra, slay your weakling father, and wring the False Emperor's head right off."
Abaddon boasted extravagantly on his end, but the Sons of the Phoenix paid no mind, simply speeding forward along the coordinates calculated by the logic engine. Akurduhna drew the two phase swords from his waist and stared coldly at Abaddon.
Shortly, he would make this traitor—who, even as a Dreadnought, insisted on decorating his sarcophagus with red silk tied into a top-knot—regret ever opening his mouth.
Abaddon's side felt little about the speech. Virtually every traitor had heard lines like these hundreds or thousands of times; they had long grown sick of it.
All they cared about was "profit"—they had joined the Black Legion to grab loot, so they remained completely indifferent.
Khayon, however, was different. He had been duped into this exact fanatic state by Abaddon back then. Even his Dark Eldar girlfriend could distinctly tell that Khayon had been pushing boundaries more and more lately.
The transmission was forcibly severed. Khayon lacked the strength to maintain a communication link for Abaddon under such intense anti-psychic suppression.
Abaddon didn't mind; his goal had been accomplished. Turning to nod at Khayon, Abaddon settled in to wait.
He knew this battle would be brutal. The terrifying firepower configuration and abominable intelligences of the imperial fleet would cause the Black Legion to crumble the instant contact was made.
Abaddon couldn't keep this rabble together, but that didn't matter. He only needed to buy enough time—just long enough for him to cleave Akurduhna in two. That was the entire plan.
A crude plan, yet one that worked reasonably well in the Warhammer universe. Abaddon had been refining this style for many years; from the Great Crusade all the way to the present, he had wielded these brute-force tactics with practiced ease.
Back then, whenever there were matters his father wasn't suited to handle publicly, it was always him, the dutiful son, who stepped forward to settle them, relying on his not-so-clever brain to steamroll through every war.
Few opponents could measure up to the Empire back then, so Abaddon's tactical approach was widely applicable and highly familiar to him.
Yet he had forgotten that without Horus and those primarch brothers backing him up, the things he did were actually easy for others to exploit.
This was Abaddon's fatal weakness to date. He had virtually no experience commanding large-scale wars entirely on his own, leaving him deficient in that domain.
And this caused him to misjudge today's Empire in key areas, just as he had completely misjudged Akurduhna.
"Chapter Master, the lance batteries and nova cannons are locked and loaded, and the heavy gauss cannons are ready to fire. In less than half a minute, that bait ship will be completely eradicated."
A commander reported to Akurduhna. Clearly, everyone saw through the crude trap, yet Abaddon assumed they would recklessly charge straight in.
After all, that was the signature trait of the Emperor's Children. In a sense, Abaddon wasn't wrong in his line of thinking, but though he had gathered snippets of information about the Empire through various channels, his tactical mindset had failed to keep pace.
Akurduhna had no intention of boarding. Even if a boarding action were to take place, he would send the abominable intelligences instead. As Chapter Master, his duty was to minimize unnecessary risk.
That was the true purpose of a Chapter Master's existence, rather than spending all day boarding ships to engage in one-on-one duels. Though Akurduhna was confident he wouldn't lose, the nature of the battlefield was entirely different now.
By comparison, Akurduhna far preferred this modern method of warfare. Only those who had experienced full-spectrum firepower saturation understood how laughable their previous reliance on melee combat truly was.
A volley of macro-cannons, a volley of lance beams, a volley of plasma bursts, an electromagnetic nova cannon shot, and finally a heavy gauss cannon blast——
If these could only be fired individually, they might not seem so terrifying; but when all that firepower was packed onto a single warship, it could cycle twenty times in a single second!
And this was practically standard firepower across every chapter; for certain specialized chapters, their firepower was even more staggering.
The Sons of the Phoenix were explicitly such a chapter, possessing truly horrific firepower.
"Tell the brothers to hit them hard. We take no prisoners."
"Understood."
"Have you sealed off the escape routes for Abaddon's ship?"
"Fully sealed, Chapter Master."
"Very good. Hit them with everything we've got! Don't stop the gauss beams for a second! I want that ship completely erased from the galaxy within thirty minutes! Entirely! Gone forever!"
"Understood."
Abaddon was still wondering why the Sons of the Phoenix hadn't launched their assault yet, but he soon had his answer.
Countless beams of destruction flooded toward him, filling the augur displays and his field of vision.
Beyond the viewport, space was consumed by lance beams and energy rays of every color, while the electromagnetic nova cannon disrupted the surrounding spatial fabric itself.
Abaddon knew his ploy had failed, though he couldn't quite fathom why.
A trap so transparent, executed by a warband that had spent time roaming the galaxy—and even contained cowardly elements—should never have been played so recklessly.
Yet Abaddon was caught right in the middle; decades of isolation had left him disconnected from modern warfare.
"I thought you would have made some progress, Abaddon. I didn't expect that after all these years, you're still at this level."
Akurduhna forcibly established a comms link, his words echoing through Abaddon's command bridge.
This was also the final sentence Abaddon heard amidst the chorus of wailing sirens and dying screams.