Chapter 1:
Desolation
'If left unchecked, impurity spreads through a soul with frightening efficiency, corrupting the mind with blasphemy and thoughts of resistance and deviancy. These unsavoury thoughts spread through the population of society like pox, infecting the otherwise pure and free of sin. Many small steps can lead to such a fate, and to a figure of authority, the population can descend into indulgence and blasphemy at an instance, seemingly blossoming out of nothing and rotting the very core of the lifegiving structure. When the populace of the world has been corrupted to such a degree, the holy ordos of the Inquisition deem the situation already lost, and only violence can halt its viral spreading.'
Thus, violence was employed against the heretic on Demethor II. In the solar autumn of M39.453, the Fists of Thunder were sent to smother the taint of chaos, the Emperors' thundering fist coming down to smite the corrupt and impure. But unbeknownst to the Astartes chapter of the lightning-wreathed sons, their coming was too late, for the traitorous took the terminal steps on the path to total ruination. Rites and rituals were taking place in honour of the ancient empyrean, and the eyes of the four gods were locked on the vast cities of Demethor II.
So when the legion of a thousand posthuman Space Marines made planetfall, they knew not of the magnitude of their foe. Yet, a thousand craft burned through the noxious and corrupted atmosphere surrounding the damned world, bringing with them the equipment, support and engines of war. First amongst them was Chaptermaster Thorbaddon Thunderhand, leading the initial assault onto the primary target, the great city of Nurlunth, capital of the dark powers under the new rule of the eight-pointed star. With him, he brought the first company terminator elite, the incorruptible, led by none other than the first captain Aurelius Silverskull wielding the legendary spear of the first Chapter Master himself, a company heirloom passed on through generations.
Amongst the lesser-known Astartes committed to the war on Demethor II, there was Gundad Thule, Sung of in no songs and venerated by none except himself. Gundad fought in the seventy-fifth tactical assault squad in the eleventh company, deployed on the outskirts of Nurlunth, the cursed city. Shadows stalked what remained of the wartorn manufactoria centres and habitation blocks. Now, all that remained was burned-out husks, the empty shells of old infrastructure. Brittle bones laid in charred piles on in corners and I doorways where the inhabitants of the city had tried to escape the inferno. Their remains crunched as the Astartes marched through their remains, leaving their footprints in the thick layer of ash that spread across all surfaces, like fresh snow on a winter day.'
"It is a grim scene," Said Aldon, the senior sergeant walking at the speartip of the battlegroup formation, scanning the surroundings with his augmented helmet as he led the squads through the carnage.
"It is not the bleak ash that bugs me the most Aldon, it's these damned flies. I cannot even make sense of what they feed on in this charred waste." Said Obryn, carrying his modified bolt rifle with one hand as he swatted a bloated insect with the other, sticky ichor running down his armour carapace. "They make my damned skin crawl"
Behind the front row of warriors, Gundad walked alone, scanning the surrounding buildings through his helmet lenses, searching for anything that could impose a threat, listening to his brothers' chatter over the vox. The deeper into the city they wandered, the thicker the density of flies, their numerous presence leaving an ambient buzz, drowning much the Astartes sense of hearing in a wall of noise. Gundad felt as if he was being watched as he pushed onwards with the rest of his squad, like a hundred knowing eyes peered out of the shadows, whispering amongst themselves of the battlegroups whereabouts.
Gundad cared little for the workings of the warp, and what little of the occult education he had been given had hardly stuck of the years. But now, he felt as though he knew nothing, striding deeper and deeper into the unknown, surrounded by beings of a nature that was beyond him. He felt oppressed by the nature of this place, his heart rate steadily increasing, his two hearts beating ever faster. Then there was the distraction of these damned flies. Now their number had grown to such an extent that he couldn't bother ridding himself of them, letting the little beasts crawl across his power armour, leaving their filth in a layer upon his pristine carapace.
In the corner of his eyes, he thought himself see movement, something crawling in the shadows amongst the ashen ruins, but as he turned his helmet to investigate, there was nothing but dust or more of the flies. More insects had started to appear, large overgrown centipedes skittered across walls into crevices where they disappeared. Shining black beetles moved through the ashes on the grounds, their shells reflecting the gloomy sunlight through the noxious sky. Now, the city grew denser, the buildings taller and the industrial complexes vaster. But the changing landscape also came with a stench. An overpowering odour of decay and rot pierced even the rebreather systems of the power armour helmets, plaguing the Astartes with its vileness.
"We will regroup with the rest of the eleventh company on the square." Sergeant Aldon said into the vox, the buzzing of the flies echoing in the background. The street opened into a wide plaza, large complexes standing on all sides, their looming shadows creeping over the open space. In the middle stood a podium that once had carried a statue of the God-Emperor, but the marble figure had been toppled, laying in pieces to the side of the podium. In place of the Master of Mankind, the heretics had erected a morbid monument in honour of their own deprived gods. Upon a superstructure of steel, the flesh of a hundred men, women and children was fastened in an abomination of faces and limbs, some stretched beyond mortal capacity whilst others had been crunched into impossible poses. Many still had the expression of excruciating agony on their faces, frozen into the deathmask of their last moments.
"We should burn it'' one of the marines suggested, nodding towards the abominable monument. "We cannot let such blasphemy fester in such a sacred place." Many amongst the group were inclined to agree, but as they took their first steps into the grand plaza, they saw their fellow marines encroach from the other streets, connected by the open square. First to walk the charred tiles of the plaza was Venerable Volbur Thuum, captain of the eleventh company, encased in the venerable coffin of a dreadnought, lumbering forth on great hydraulic legs. The hulking machine was ornamented in gilded gothic script and embellished with the traditional heraldry of the chapter. On the right side, the dreadnought was armed with a spear, the lightning lance glistening with unseen electric power as it waited to discharge its electric current into the flesh of the enemy. On the left, he carried a rotary autocannon, the ammunition belt filled with high-calibre explosive bolts, ready to feed the hungering machine-cannon with projectiles.
Following the Venerable captain came the assault marines of the primary strike squad, armed with jump packs and power spears, ready to descend upon the foe with deadly efficiency. Aldon saluted the dreadnought in the customary ways of the Fists of Thunder, banging his clenched fist two times against his ceremite chest plate. But as the seventy-fifth tactical squad started their walk across the partially chattered tiles of the square, something changed. The flies, who had until now flown in drowsy irregular patterns suddenly seemed to wake up, picking up their pace and moving in great swarms. But worse of all was the horrid smell, the putrid odour growing in intensity. Green fog had started to seep in from the ruins beyond the open square, serpentine tendrils almost swimming across the ceramic tiles towards the repulsive monument at the centre. The monument had also started to shift, the corpses moving as if animated by some daemonic power. A hole had started to grow in the centre of the grafted corpses as the monument slowly turned inside out, revealing a new dimension within.
Inside of the monument hung a grand clock, a bell of monstrous proportion, attached by flesh and bone protruding from the rotting superstructure. The bell seemed to be in a state of decay with big spots rusted down and reshaped by decomposition. At first, it stood still, but after the hole was fully open, and the bell revealed for all to see, it silently began to move. At this stage, all the marines of the eleventh company had formed a defensive phalanx, the Astartes readying themselves for a confrontation.
The bell picked up speed, swinging back and forth as the fog grew ever thicker around it. Then suddenly, the first metallic clang came, piercing the air with its ungodly chime, reverberating and echoing through the putrid city. The first ringing of the great bell felt as if the noise pierced the very body of the Astartes, at least to Gundad as he felt the sound piercing his mind with intense pain. Then the bell tolled again, filling even the gene-enhanced posthuman Space Marines with dread. For every time the chime sounded, a wave of dark invisible energy pulsed throughout the city awakening its daemonic inhabitants with the symphony of the plague god.
Seven times the great clock of the putrid monument tolled, seven times for the lost and the damned of Nurlunth. Where once there had been only death, life now sprouted and grew, but now in a cursed and deprived form. Plagueridden flowers sprouted between the tiles of the square, blooming into displays of rapid decomposition as they withered away and became feasts for myriad insects. The fog was dense now, and the Marines of the eleventh company struggled to make sense of what happened beyond the monument as the clouds of noxious fog grew thicker around them. Now, more chimes could be heard ringing across the city, more cursed clocks answering the call of the abominable instrument crowning the centre of the square. Things could be seen moving in the distant fog, shapes congregating into beings.
Gundad loaded his bolter with incendiary rounds, readying himself for the battle to come, his twin hearts beating hot blood around his body, adrenal glands working overdrive to ready every muscle for combat. All his senses were sharpened, except for his nose which felt numb from the noxious stink. He saw more forms emerge from the fog, the entire horizon of the square now lined with a cohort of shadows. They came in all shapes and sizes, smaller ones rushing at the forefront whilst behemoths lumbered in the ranks behind, obscured and almost invisible as they were still deep within the mist.
Gundad felt a slight annoyance at the apathy of the warriors. He wished to fight, blade against blade, fist against fist, but now he stood here in the defensive cowardice customary of the chapter. At the forefront of the phalanx, on the very tip of the spear stood Volbur Thuum, his lance charged and wide arcs of lighting hopping from the coils attached to the shaft of the great spear. Now, more sense could be made out of the shapes marching towards them through the dense mist. What had resembled a host of deranged men at first, turned to be something much worse when one could discern their true nature. Maybe, once they had merely been men, but now they had changed into death and decay made manifest. Their bodies were bloated and malformed, their rotting skin decaying and hanging in great sleuths of their putrid bodies. Some of them had grown horns or antlers, bones protruding from random places. They were now more akin to daemons of rot than human beings. But worse yet where the beings that lumbered behind them, some as great as buildings, the very ground shaking as they encroached. These behemoths had since long lost their humanity, some might not even have been human at all. These were truly daemons, manifestations of everything that is vile and unholy given form and now marching their pestilent march towards an entire company of Space Marines.
Most grotesque and abominable of them all was the daemon that called itself Slithlox Blacktounge, herald of pestilence in Nulrunth. A terrible sacrifice had been made to summon the monstrous beast to the realm of the living, but now he walked amongst them, and like a shepherd, he drove his plaguelings and pox walkers onwards. Slithlox himself was twice the size of the Dreadnought, his heavy form drooping with puss from numerous open wounds. His gluttonous shape lumbered forward on two bloated feet, talking one haphazard step after another. On what resembled his head, he wore a great helm, heavily corroded and corrupted by the decay of his patron god. The daemon wielded a flail of almost impractical size, three large chains hanging down, attached to great orbs shaped like heads, the three faces crying as they were dragged along the withered tiles of the square.
As the great Slithlox joined his daemon brethren in the front ranks, the lessers among them seemed to surge with renewed energy, some of them chattering and squealing amongst themselves, excited to be in the presence of one as revered as the great Blacktongue. Slithlox arrived at the final column of his army,
menacingly staring down the Space Marine phalanx, who now stood closer than before, waiting in vigilant anticipation for the daemons next move. The little sunlight that escaped through the green atmosphere gleaned off the great helm worn by the favoured Slithlox, reflecting an unholy light on the company. He looked almost satisfied there for a while, content and delighted by the sense of imminent battle. He could feel the sense of dread encompassing the company, and he revelled in it like a swine in the muck. Slithlox slowly raised his free arm, rotting with the gifts of his patron god, a finger pointing towards the Astartes formation. He spoke.
"Blind! The servants of the corpse Emperor are blind!" He spoke in a vile mockery of language, some words more akin to a guttural gurgle, his voice the manifestation of morbid sickness and unholy blight. "The deluded warriors have come here to die!" The daemon laughed, the brutal coughing noises reverberating through the square and the noise echoing throughout the city. "There is nothing here for them" He continued after collecting himself from the joyous outburst. "This is already a garden. My garden! A beautiful manifestation of both life-" He raised his other arm, the flail lifted up from the ground and the heads facing the marines with all their despair. "-and death!"
When the last word was spoken, another outburst of wretched laughter followed, but this time it was drowned out by the screaming and thundering of daemonic advance. Hundreds of the plague lords servants had begun their approach, like a tidal wave of rotting undeath, an onslaught of the paranormal, cursed and damned.
"Stand fast, sons of lightning!" Now the Dreadnaught spoke, Volbur Thuums machine voice speaking out over the vox net, broadcasted to every marine in the eleventh company. "Stand fast, for the chapter-" His voice sounded not only in the company vox but now also from the various speakers placed around the dreadnought walker, blasting the foe with his words. "-and for the Emperor!"
Gundad pressed the trigger of his bolter, unloading an entire magazine of mass reactive rounds into the very face of death. His fellow marines did the same, and the first line of the foe disintegrated into a mist of putrid blood and blighted flesh. Some of the creatures took only one bolt round before collapsing and finally giving in to death, whilst others took multiple blasts whilst still staggering towards the defended line.
The Dreadnought had begun firing at the daemonic host, his autocannon devastating the horde with a hailstorm of mass reactive bolts. The rotary barrels ran hot with the kinetic output, the chambers spitting glowing hot casings in a steady flow of brass. But no matter the number of abominations they slaughtered, there were always more. Hundreds more. Now, the more exalted plague servants had begun appearing in the ranks of the enemy. The cohort of Blacktounge, carrying the symbols, heraldry and banners of the lord of decay. With this new force, more elite creatures began their assault, and they quickly showed to be more resilient than the cannon-fodder beings that had preceded them on the battlefield. The cohort of plague servants had formed a spearhead, protruding out of the horde with haste. In their midst lumbered the Herald of Pestilence himself, his great black helm lowered in the fashion of a Stag on the offensive.
Gundad and his kinsmen saw the renewed offensive and redirected their efforts in an attempt to thwart the new attack, but their bolters did little to these armoured beasts, the enemy taking the punishment in a show of disgusting resilience. The only one unaware of the enemy attack was Volbur Thuum, his mind still occupied with mowing down the overwhelming horde of lesser daemons chanting battle rites to himself, and to the others in the company in an attempt to heighten their morale. The Dreadnought captain almost seemed to be in a form of battle trance, his mind fixated on his task of eradication.
"Captain! Enemy to the approaching on the phalanx left flank-" Senior Sergeant Aldon communicated through the vox, but his words were in vain as the Captain Dreadnought continued his onslaught humming to himself as he revelled in the slaughter. Suddenly the autocannon stopped firing, and with a final click, the ammunition feeds ran dry. Only then did Volbur snap out of it, but too late.
A beast of monstrous proportions slammed into the side of the dreadnaught captain, thrashing violently as its head connected and burrowed its antlers into the durasteel armour. The beast, to Gundads eyes, looked like one of the tundra grazers he had hunted in his youth, before his ascension. But this, this was a mockery of that. A rotten mimic of a gracious animal, this beast reeked of overgrown blight. It rose on its back hooves, relieving even more force into the dreadnought in an attempt to topple the machine, but the dreadnought stood fast, although having to take a few steps back not to lose his footing.
Some pieces of the beast's antlers had broken off in the assault, whilst the rest had managed to rip a gash in the side of the dreadnought. It was a rotten and unholy wound in the metal skin, already festering with the ailments of degradation and rust in the manner a wreck sees after decennia of abandonment in a scrapyard. A moment later, the Volbur had reassessed the situation and slammed the daemon beast with his empty autocannon, the heavy metal barrels impacting the monster with a crunching noise of brittle bone breaking. The beast howled and staggered back, leaving the Dreadnaught just enough time to charge his electric lance, and when the beast attacked again, he impaled the daemon and unloaded an enormous electric charge into its flesh, bolts of lightning dancing and searing the hide as it burned. The Lance burrowed itself deeper into the underbelly of the daemon until the very tip of the weapon could be seen protruding through its back. And in a final show of victory, the Dreadnaught lifted the beast of the ground, his hydraulics hissing with effort until he held it high above him, the still-living monster howling in agony until with a snap, Vobur Thuum released the last electric charge deep into the hideous being, letting its innards boil before finally it burst into a cloud of rotten animal viscera.
"I am not so easily broken-" He declared, his thundering voice echoing over the cacophony of battle. "Let them come!". And they did. Gundad watched that the enemy's number had grown, and now their soldiers in both the mortal and daemonic emerged from every adjacent street connected to the battleground. As he had been distracted by the spectacle of the captains beast slaying, Blacktounge and his cohort and broken through the Astartes phalanx, and the battle formation had turned into a desperate deathmatch where every posthuman fended for himself against the ever-intensifying threat of the pestilent horde.
In the midst of the battle stood Slithlox himself, sweeping his flail around him, creating a perimeter of carnage which borders none transcended unharmed or unmutilated. All three of the flail's iron heads grimaced as they crushed their master's foes, their faces covered in the blood of the Imperiums servants. Desperation had begun tainting the Space Marine contingent, spreading from mind to mind. The daemonic horde grew tighter and more ravenous around them, the combat growing less refined, and more brutal, as the Astartes deviated from standardized combat protocols and formation, descending into the carnage with primal and animalistic bluntness, ripping, tearing and crushing the incoming foe sometimes with their ironclad fists, as bolters emptied and knife dulled or shattered. Casualties had already been sustained, but more were wounded as plate cracked and rotting iron-tipped spears pierced ceramite carapace in dussins of bleeding wounds, killing transhuman warriors like beasts in the hunt, daemonic hunters killing for both the joy and for the glory of the eight-pointed star.
In the epicentre of battle, Gundad stood, fighting in a brawl against an exceptionally virulent and abhorrent daemon-man, the thing clad from head to toe in crude power armor, not unlike the one on Gundad himself, but small and crafted for unaugmented warriors. Gundad traded blow after blow with the ironclad daemon, its surprising swiftness and strength overwhelming the Space Marine at first, until Gundad comprehended the flow of battle, dancing with it in the duelist's dance of death, waiting for an opening in the enemies guard, finding it, and splitting the half-life from neck to groin, disembowelling the thing with his large combat knife, spilling its rotting intestines onto the marble tiles before it fell to its knees in a clank, dead.
"Where are the reinforcements!" Aldon shouted in the vox, his voice scrambled by interference from the battle. "Where are the other companies?" But as the last word was spoken into the closed channel, Gundad was blinded by a radiant light, followed by a deafening boom. Lightning had struck, and with it thunder, leaving a scorched circle in the midst of the battlefield. Daemons had evaporated, some charred clawing forms still burned into the ground below. But in the midst of the ashen circle, the silhouettes of warriors, dark shapes in contrast to the receding brightness. As the light faded, the forms grew clearer until Gundad could make up what it was. The terminator elite of the Incorrubtables, led by none other than Aurelius Silverskull. Teleported into war, they stood ready to fight, their armour still in the gleaming silver that marked their stature as elite. The horde around them receded, drawing away from the blinding aura. They screamed, covering their eyes in despair as their rotting flesh withered and skin burned, but with encouraging howls and beckons from their brother never-born, they gathered the courage to fight again.
Like a tide, they rushed against the terminator contingent, a wave of rotting flesh breaking against the cliff's edge. And the terminators retaliated with such might Gundad had never seen, sweeping edges of swords and axes rending the daemons into pieces, separating limbs and parting entire bodies in two. But fiercest of them all was Silverskull, the tip of his relic spear swishing through the air with deadly effect, cutting and thrusting with lethal intent. Thunder cracked as hammers smote some of the foes into dust, grandiose Swoopes arching only to end in earth-shattering strikes. Carnage, complete and destructive in its full glory.
The Bell was tolling again, the sound rousing the daemon horde to more and more fury, and the lord of the host had grown more violent in his outbursts. Slithlox was the bloated giant of a corpse, his armour and flesh filled with so many boltholes and cuts it was a marvel Blacktounge could still continue his path of destruction. But he did, for the power that animated his hulking force only grew greater, and the hand of plague guided him well. He sang Gundad could hear, a foul hymn of rot and decay. He sang of the ends and beginnings, death and life, and of how maggots would eat the world.
Although the Astartes contingent had been bolstered by the terminators of the first company, their numbers still dwindled, and one by one they were consumed into the host of foes. Hacked, slashed and pierced by a hundred cursed projectiles and blades. Nothing could stop the decimation, and as time passed, this simple truth grew clearer and clearer. Gundad could not let this dull the last sharp weapon he had, his inner strength, and swung his knife as if every blow would be the one that won the battle. His armour was withering as he fought, chunks of ceramite falling off, revealing hydraulics and cables. He noted that the servos in his left gauntlet had gone limp and that now only his strength of muscle could shape it into a fist. His visor holographic display had begun twitching, and the layer of ichor and blood on the lenses made it hard to see. Others had taken theirs off mag-locking them to their armour instead.
Suddenly the tight ranks of stinking never born and heretics dispersed in front of him, moving out of reach. He had them now, thought Gundad, he had them scared. Just as the thought passed through his mind, the three heads of the great flail came rushing towards him, the great shadow emerging from the green shroud. His enhanced reflexes gave him just enough time to move out of its way, letting it pass and batter the daemons who stood away to his side. A gurgling laugh could be heard before the flail came thundering again, this time from above.
"You are fast, welp, I will give you that-" The sour voice of the great Slithlox could be heard, his foul words shaking Gundad to the bones. The deep rotting voice of hell. "-But speed is not all-" A rotting foot was set down in front of Gundad, rotting and blubbery, barely ten feet away. "-You must also learn the power of strength and resilience. The true virtuous of the warrior."
Gundad looked up to see the corroding helm of the Herald, dimples and holes having withered it down through the war. A gash had been cut across the middle and a large yellow eye could be seen through it, the pupil jolting back and forth, before finally landing on Gundad. The Daemon had not killed him, he saw, it had let him live. And now it was leaning over him. Talking to him.
The petty warriors of the plague host had retreated further clearing the way for their lord. The Herald of Pestilence drew a breath, like a beast sniffing the air for its prey. Flies were dragged under the great helm of the crouching plague lord until finally, he released it, the abhorrent breath of Slithlox piercing Gundad with its rank foulness, seeping through every gash, hole and crevice in his armour. No filter or visor could stop it, and the stench could be felt in the soul.
"Yes-" Said Slithlox to the petrified Marine. "-You" Gundad could not move. Every fibre of his being wanted to grasp the bolder and empty the magazine until every bolt had detonated in the daemons rotting visage. But he could not. "Take off your helmet, welp. Let me see what the gods have bestowed upon you-" Gundad felt his arm reach for the helm, animated by a force stronger than his will. The mask hissed and clicked as it was removed, clanking as it was tossed on the dirty marble tiles. A large hand came towards him, oily yellow fingernails stretched towards Gundads face. They caressed him, leaving an odour that would kill a mere mortal.
"Aaah-" Said Blacktounge. "-I can sense it-" Gundad noticed how the surrounding battle had grown distant it was only the mist and the daemon. "There is such power here, such strength within you." The daemon leaned closer, the air smelling like that of the very garden of Nurgle. "It must be tamed, tended and harnessed. Like any force. You are like the seed of a beautiful flour-" Gundad was torn from his trance as something large and metallic lunged into the side of the Daemon, the ground shaking as the shapes tumbled in front of him. It was Volbur Thuum, the Dreadnought captain. He stood again, readying his spear with another fatal charge. Slithlox roared, as his helm had split in two. Now the Daemons mouth was showing, a gaping maw filled with rotting teeth, rows upon rows. A tongue, black and slick hung down past purple lips, gobs of saliva dripping to on the tiles below. With a grunt of tension, Slithlox swung his flail in a wide arch, the three heads screaming with terror as they crunched into the ceramite-plasteel hull of the Dreadnought. Three deep grooves were left and cracks had formed in the superstructure of the machine, but the captain stood. The barrels of the autocannon begin spinning before a furious barrage of heavy fire burst from the muzzle, the cannon spitting mass reactive bolts into the flesh of the enemy, bursting and rending a gaping crater in the belly of the beast. Bloodblennded ichor splashed in all directions, and fragments of old bone flew like shards of shrapnel. The speakers of the dreadnought could be heard bellowing a battle cry, a sound of such strength and honour befitting the end of a hero. He took steps towards the Daemon beast, his last steps, not letting his aim nor the continuous barrage halt for a moment. He had dug so deep into the gut of Slithlox, that through the cloud of ichor and blood, the spinal cord could be seen. But the rotation of the barrels slowed, and at last, the firing ground to a halt, the air again filled with relative silence. Slithlox, with a final wheeze, collapsed in on himself, bones cracking and guts spilling onto the ground with a wet thud.
The Dreadnought who had expended his last energy fell kneeling to the ground, shattering the ceramic tiles underneath in a violent crunch. The light radiating from the visor slit behind which the revered brother Thuum had been housed began to fade, sparks washing from severed calves and ruined servo-joints. A metallic cough rang out across the last functioning speakers before finally, with a hydraulic hiss, the dreadnought collapsed. At last, his duty had ended, thought Gundad. His service to the Emperor had come to an end. A solemn feeling came upon him. Rare sadness for the loss of his captain and old mentor. But there was no time for mourning, as the shroud that had separated them from the battle began to fade giving way to the cacophony outside. Thousands of daemons hollering and screaming like a million birds. A wall of sound. Gundad felt tired, so tired. He thought that his enhanced physique would make fatigue of this kind impossible. He remembered when he was another man, before his ascension. When this kind of weariness was common. He stumbled, his armour and legs powerless to hold his weight. And then he fell. Without blood and without pain. A numbness washed over him like a milky bath of forgetfulness, emptying his enhanced mind of all thought. The world faded.