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Chapter 250: The Ritual Warships
🕑 Added 2025-08-28 15:21:32 +0000 UTCChapter 250: The Ritual Warships
Abaddon was surrounded by the elite of the Black Legion. The veterans of the Long War stood ready to accompany their Warmaster in conquering the world beneath their feet. As reports flooded in, he was made aware of the chaos sweeping through his fleet. Even the Vengeful Spirit had suffered a momentary system failure, and a strange, guttural scream had echoed through its ancient corridors.
Lucan's power had inflicted a deep agony upon the warship's machine-spirit. However, the Vengeful Spirit had been steeped in corruption for far too long; there was no possibility of it ever returning to its former state. The disruption aboard the mighty Gloriana-class battleship was quickly suppressed. The blessings of the warp it had received were far beyond those of a conventional Chaos vessel, allowing it to resist the intrusion of Lucan's Purification Code.
Listening to the reports from his Warpsmiths, Abaddon grew grim. How could followers of Vashtorr not recognize the nature of this power?
"How could a mortal human master the power of Vashtorr?!" one of them raged.
Was this not the exact same tactic they had used against Imperial warships for millennia, only in a different form?
Abaddon had no time to dwell on it, nor did he possess a countermeasure. The Chaos fleet could only rely on the raw power of the warp and the daemons bound to their ships to mitigate the effects. At the very least, the Black Legion's fleet had not been completely crippled.
Meanwhile, the Chaos Sorcerers who had forced a landing on the surface were now in position. He had come too far to turn back now.
Gazing at the planetary shields still shimmering over Cadia, seemingly indestructible, Abaddon gave the order for the final assault. The presence of Lucan's SCVs meant that as long as a single shield array remained operational, it could eventually be repaired. Therefore, the attacks were launched simultaneously against three key targets: Kasr Kraf, the shield generator arrays, and, most importantly, the Plains of Blackstone.
If either the shield arrays or the Pylons on the plains were destroyed, Chaos would claim victory. This forced Castellan Creed to spread his already thin forces even thinner.
Abaddon himself, surrounded by his elite Chosen, stepped through a newly opened warp portal.
The Blackstone Fortress moved to engage the Phalanx, the single greatest threat, while the Vengeful Spirit also targeted the ancient battle-station. The rest of the Imperial fleet could do little more than harass the Chaos landing forces. Fortunately, Lucan's interference had significantly reduced the number of troops Abaddon was able to deploy.
From the command deck of the Phalanx, Captain Garadon watched helplessly as countless drop pods and even traitor Titan Legions descended upon Cadia's surface. He was powerless to stop them. All of the Phalanx's solid ammunition weapons were nearly depleted. When he attempted to use its energy weapons to destroy the approaching forces, the Blackstone Fortress would maneuver to block its line of fire. Energy weapons were simply too inefficient at breaking through void shields.
However, the fleet commanded by Guilliman was smashing through the enemy lines like a tidal wave. Seizing the opportunity created by the chaos, they tore the enemy formation to shreds, with a dozen warships plunging deep into the heart of the enemy fleet.
"Cawl, Pavian, your work here is done," Lucan said. "I need you to go to Cadia. Especially you, Cawl. We need your expertise to decipher the Blackstone Pylons. Activating them will be the key to our victory. As it stands, the current number of active pylons is not enough to contain the expansion of the Eye of Terror."
"Lord Lucan, I am gratified by your trust in me," Cawl responded, "but it is impossible to decipher Blackstone technology in such a short amount of time. I would require years, decades even! The technology of the Necrons is far more complex than you can imagine. I believe I would be of more use here, assisting Lord Guilliman in winning the void war. That would grant me the sufficient time I need!"
"Don't worry," Lucan assured him. "Once you begin studying the blackstone, a certain Necron with a penchant for collecting 'miniatures' will surely find you. He will attempt to tell you how to activate it. Though, at this point, I'm not sure what kind of deal he will propose. Pavian, if his terms are not too outrageous, you may agree on my behalf."
"'Collecting miniatures?' A Necron?"
In the end, Cawl and Pavian boarded a Gorgon transport and made for Cadia.
Just then, a development that Lucan and the others had feared the most began to unfold within the enemy fleet. Having confirmed that the Imperial fleet was thoroughly entangled with their own and could not disengage, several Chaos warships began to execute their own dark plan.
At the rear of the enemy formation, dispersed and away from the main battle, the final stages of a blasphemous summoning ritual were nearing completion. These ships had deliberately stayed out of the fight, positioned far beyond the effective range of conventional Imperial weaponry. When Lucan's Purification Code swept through the Chaos fleet, these ritual vessels were largely unaffected.
The warp energy within them had already accumulated to the point where it was practically tangible. Daemons of all shapes and colors, devoted to their respective gods, were materializing on board without any need for a formal summoning. The ships were almost entirely devoid of a mortal crew.
The internal structure of these vessels had been drastically altered. Bulkheads had been torn out to create vast, open spaces. A number of slaves far exceeding the ships' normal capacity had been crammed inside—soldiers, civilians, loyalist psykers, and even a few captured loyal Astartes.
The more powerful the soul, the more potent the sacrifice. The souls of the faithful were now fuel for a Chaos ritual.
The ceremony began. Chaos runes, painted in blood across nearly every surface of the ships, began to glow, efficiently harvesting the souls of the living within. One moment, the prisoners were screaming, struggling, desperately searching for an escape; the next, their bodies began to disintegrate as their souls were violently ripped from them.
A Chaos Sorcerer looked down at a Black Templar Astartes, stripped of his power armor and chained to a sacrificial altar.
"Such a devout soul, sworn to the Corpse-Emperor," the sorcerer hissed. "The Gods will be most pleased!"
A ritual dagger plunged into the Astartes's chest. The sorcerer then reached in and tore out both of his still-beating hearts.
Soon, mountains of corpses piled up within the ritual ships. Rivers of blood flowed, soaking every inch of the deck plates. The blood-drenched runes pulsed, spewing raw warp energy into the chambers. For a time, the interiors of these four ritual warships were directly linked to the Empyrean.
The remaining mortal cultists, their bodies already being twisted by the energies of the warp, laughed with ecstatic madness. In defiance of physics, pools of blood began to rise from the floor. Countless unnatural phenomena manifested within the ships.
The cultists and sorcerers circled the bodies, chanting incantations taught to them by the Dark Gods. They were heralding the arrival of the Daemon Primarchs. For this purpose, these slaves to the Ruinous Powers were willing to sacrifice everything.
As the final syllable of their chant died away, the cultists and sorcerers raised their own ritual daggers. Without hesitation, they plunged the blades into their own hearts, slit their own throats, or even decapitated one another. With their own lives and souls, they completed the final step of the ritual.
Massive, eight-pointed stars of Chaos materialized in the void, blazing upon the outer hulls of the ritual ships. Warp rifts, large enough for a battleship to pass through, began to tear open, anchored to the blasphemous rituals taking place on board.
The moment these rifts appeared, both Guilliman and Ferrus Manus frowned.
They could feel it. The presence of their traitor brothers had arrived.
