You are not ssstrong enough to ssstop it, my Ssson, hissed a voice in Basil's head.
He glanced around but did not see where the voice came from. He only saw the dead and living, the latter each gathering with their own kind and wary of the other, but all were staring at him. He reached out into the Warp with his senses. It was wild and disturbed, a result of his battle as well as the battles of those around him, but he recognized no trace of the voice's source. Show yourself! Basil demanded.
He felt a presence enter the chamber.
One moment it was not there and the next it was. The Masque of the Horned Serpent stood tall and at attention in its vantage along the chamber's perimeter. Movement caught Basil's eye, a flash of gold. Basil glanced beneath the dais to see a slender serpentine form crawling out from under the wreckage of the Avatar of Khaine. The slender form kept crawling from under the slag heap with no end in sight. Its head raised high and up to the top of the hexagonal dais where Basil stood. A golden triangular head with a horn behind each eye came to rest just above the surface of the dais plateau and looked up at him.
Is this your true form? Basil asked.
Thisss form isss as good as any, replied the Serpent. The Serpent emitted a low hiss that resembled a sigh. It wasss my desssire that you and Druthact could work together to help each other…and the people I created you for. As it spoke, the Serpent inched its way closer to Basil and he lowered his armoured hand to it in a gesture to stop. I made him capable of ssso much more but hisss fear of She Who Thirsts dominated him. Compelled him to chase ssselfish dreams that endangered those he ssshould have desired to protect. Now, it mattersss not. With a tiny flick of its head, the Serpent motioned toward the black spheroid sitting in the crystal dish behind Basil, the reservoir of Asuryan's power. To be strong enough to bring the Ritual to a ssstop, you must accept the gift I had gathered for him…as the first ssstep. I will guide you.
Basil stared down at the Serpent, his hand still gesturing it to stop, and answered, I accept.
The golden Serpent struck forward impossibly fast and latched onto his wrist, fangs extending and penetrating through his ceramite armour as if it were not there. He pulled his wrist back but to no avail as the golden Serpent simply stretched out with him. A deep burn flooded into his body as the Serpent injected it venom. But Basil recognized the venom was not actually a poison. It was genetic material, Aeldari genetic material. The psychic power of the Serpent engulfed him, immense power handled with remarkable finesse. He felt the Serpent bind the genetic material to his and he felt himself change and, as he changed, Basil felt the reservoir of power behind him come alive, activate. The power flowed into Basil to the point of bursting, yet did not stop. When Fynn had injected Basil with the geneseed syrum and it reacted with his perpetual genetics, he knew that it had made him something more than human, more than even a space marine, something akin to a Primarch, but this was different. It was making him something other than human, a chimaeric blend of super human and super Aeldari genetics.
Now, place your handsss upon the Condenssser, the Serpent commanded as it released his wrist.
Basil turned to face the Oculus and the Condenser attached to its base. Through the Oculus he saw the Chimaera's Breath Warp storm growing, ready to engulf the four worlds. He saw, and felt, the Exodite souls being pulled from their damaged World Spirit by the Ritual. Saw the thousands of human psyker souls locked into the Ritual as they orbited Abalus in the Black Ships. Saw the fiery wasteland that the four most populous worlds of the Reach had been reduced to. And he saw the immense scope of the psychic energy released by that reduction, saw how it had started a chain reaction in the Warp. A reaction that would only grow as the souls of the human psykers and Exodites were added to it.
He placed his hands upon the Condenser.
Power filled him, touched him to his core. The Serpent sprang forward and wound itself around his armoured leg, then his torso, until its golden head was face to face with his. Take hold of the Ritual, it commanded. Deny it the souls it strives for, deny the Primordial Annihilator what it desires, by calling them to you. Now!
Basil did as he was commanded. He reached through the Oculus and strove to control the Ritual. But he could not. Realization dawned on him. She said take hold of the Ritual, not control it. He complied and through the Ritual drew the souls to him. And they responded. The Ritual did not falter, but instead, its power followed the souls to Scholomance. What now? Basil asked the Serpent.
Now, your sacrifice. You must give up what you are, the Serpent answered. Its fangs dug into Basil's neck, again passing through his armour's gorget as if it did not exist. This time the venom which entered his body was not genetic material but rather psychic power, power that touched his mind and began to reforge it.
Basil grasped the psychic power of the Ritual with one strand of his will and the human psyker and Exodite souls with another. He drew the souls to him and used the psychic power of the Ritual to integrate them into his soul, following along what he had sensed the Serpent had done to him when it integrated the reservoir of Asuryan's power into him. Pain and sensation filled him. He saw their lives, Exodite and human alike. Saw the loves they had and the loss they felt. Two Aeldari lovers walking together. A human mother crying for her dead child. He felt pain and loss, memories of being psychically shackled in the Black Ships. And as he did so, the Serpent reforged his soul and mind. Reforged them so as to be able to comprehend and manage that scope of power as well as the sensations which came with it.
And then it was over.
The souls of the human psykers from the Black Ships and the souls lost from the damaged Spirits of the three Exodite worlds were a part of him. The Ritual was drained of its power and ended. But something was missing, a void filled the chamber. The presence of the Cosmic Serpent was no longer with him. Where have you gone? Basil asked. He received no answer. He turned around to face the combined crowd of humans and Aeldari that stood before him on a floor littered with their dead. Did they even see or hear the Cosmic Serpent? Basil asked himself. The humans nervously shuffled their feet. Basil felt their fear and awe. He eyed the Masque which still stood at attention. Whether or not they saw the Serpent as he had, the Masque of the Horned Serpent silently stared at him, just like all the rest of the Aeldari. Stared at him like a god.
The Phoenix Reborn.