Prologue

The Thunderhawk shuddered violently and rocked harder than I had ever felt it before on any flight. Asuna gripped Little Horus firmly to her chest, her tears never ending as she cradled the corpse of their son. Victoria, our Daughter, applied what medical supplies we had to Klien, his mangled body barely holding on while it tried to stop the bleeding. Suguha, Dale, Silica, Saul, Nathanial, and Garviel stood back and watched in silence as the best Apothecary among them looked over the White Scar. Kizmel and her Banshee Sisters sat alone and mourned the losses of their sisters. The shattered remains of their soul-stones sat loosely in their hands.

The Bucking Thunderhawk then became even more tumultuous as the ship began to cant wildly to the left and right.

"Mayday Mayday! This is Imperial Thunderhawk 'Lunar Blitz', we are going down, repeat, Lunar Blitz is going down! Engines have gone out and stabilizers have failed!"

All of us in the Thunderhawk looked among ourselves and braced for the inevitable crash that would herald our end.

We had killed the Chaos Gods, all of them, and we had ended the horror that was the Eye of Terror. Some of our forces had already made it out, so it would not be an endeavor that those back home would never know about.

Akihiko Kayaba would at least be able to get everyone home…

"It's been an honor to know each and everyone of you…," Nathanial Garrow made the sign of the Aquila over his breast plate and bowed his head. Each of us, even the Eldar among us, returned the gesture.

The klaxons going off inside the Thunderhawk suddenly cut off and the lights cutout and darkness swallowed the entirety of the interior. When the lights and the klaxons came back the sounds coming from outside the Thunderhawk were very different.

Just as the pilot was about to speak again the Thunderhawk bucked harder than ever before and a purple field passed through it. In but a moment we were all gone. I was the last to go, which allowed me to see that everyone was swallowed up by whatever foul indigence this was.

Pain unfathomable wracked my body and sent me into a blackness that I had thought to never recover from. Not even my genehanced body and fortified mind were able to hold out for even a moment before the world tore itself asunder in my senses and broke upon the dam that was reality.

Eons passed over in seconds and seconds passed over in eons, death broke into life and the world gave a mighty jubilant scream. Life hissed and gave rattle of woe upon which it breathed its last.

Daemon and Mortal alike dashed their skulls upon the fabric of immateria, shattered their minds on nothing, and garnered a flash of sanity in the void that once had been emotion given form. The Warp gave way and Void took its place. Order Begat Chaos and Chaos Begat Order. Death Begat life and Life Begat Death.

Where untold trillions died in the waning of the Eye, trillions more rejoiced as the Terror closed for good.

A singe vessel of Man spat forth from the collapsing rend in reality, crew numbered only in the lower hundreds instead of the thousands it once carried. On blackened white wings did they travel, their message of joy tinged with more lament than cheer.

Seven thousand Players of the Great Crusade Online Imperial Faction had marched in with Ten Thousand Astartes and Sorroritas, five million Astramilitarum, and a pair of Titan Legions. A total of seven hundred Imperial Star Ships had been their chariots across the stars. Of that, of all of that might, only seventy Players remained with a hundred Astartes and Sorroritas, and less than fifty Astramilitarum personnel. Including the crew of the Gothic Class Ship, Lupercal's Wrath, a grand total of three hundred and seven individuals had survived the Siege Of The Eye and the subsequent flight from its death-throws.

Of those of note left in alive, Rosalia, Cannoness of the Blood Titan, and one of it's longest surviving members. Keita, Third Captain of the Ultramarines Legion, now interred in a Mars Pattern Glorian Dreadnaught. Lastly was Agil, Iron Father of the First Company, First Among Equals, sole leader of the Iron Hands now that Ferrus Manus is dead.

Those lost included Kirito-Kazuto Kirigaya, Asuna-Asuna Yuuki, Leafa-Suguha Kirigaya, Klien-Ryotaro Tsuboi, Issin-Kaji Fuzuki, Dale-Danial Furtz, Silica-Keiko Ayano, Victoria Kirigaya, Dauntless Kirigaya, 'Little' Horus Kirigaya, Nathanial Garro, Garviel Lokken, Saul Tarvits, Kizmel Ulthran, and many others.

Upon returning to Terra the ship's most senior officer, Agil, sent out a vox transsmission to the Vengful Spirit. The heavily damaged Glorian battle ship hung over Terra as a living scar, burned and maimed as it was.

"Iron Father Agil, it is good to see you again, and so soon after you all left… Where is the rest of your fleet?" The scarred and worn face of Akihiko Kayaba smiled painfully through the vodcaster.

"I will dispense with the mission first… WE did it. The Four are dead. Kazuto killed them, which has caused the Immaterium to destabilize and close the Warp Storm known as The Eye Of Terror. Mission accomplished." A cheer could be heard over the vodcaster, but it only made the darkskinned man glower ever harder.

"What is the matter Agil?" Kayaba asked, kindly as he could. The cheers stopped and a weary silence filled the air. "Where are my Swords? Where are my Shields?" Kayaba asked, relating to the whole of the Kirigaya family. They had risen to the very top and taken on the defacto charges of Champion and Shield of the Warmaster. They had been his left and right hands in nearly all things as the Crusade went on, and Agil was not sure he was strong enough to tell him the truth.

"Warmaster Horus," He stared Kayaba in the eye, his only remaining eye, and let his own tears roll for the first time in a hundred years. "Kazuto Kirigaya, Asuna Kirigaya, Dauntless Kirigaya-

"No…," Akihiko leaned back, aghast and horrified.

"Victoria Kirigaya, Suguha Kirigaya, Ryotaro Tsuboi, and the rest of the First Assault Fleet have been killed in action."

In nearly slow motion the face of Horus, who held the care of Akihiko, turned into the thing that had terrified the masses when he marched upon the field of battle. His face paled and his eyes glowed with internal power. He rose from his chair, broken body not even a hindrance.

"Dead! They can't be dead! They are mine! What is Mine May Never Die!" He shouted, and the fabric of reality tried to answer his declaration. Instead of doing anything, the world turned on its head and back again faster than any of the superhuman beings could fully right themselves.

"What was that!" Rosalia demanded, her half bionic face telling all there was needed to know about her devotion to the safety of humanity.

"They are not Dead, Iron Father, Cannoness… They are lost to us, yes. Though they are not dead. We must leave this place! We are free of its hold now and we may return to the world we lost when we found ourselves trapped here. Five years among the Mortals and nearly Four hundred years for us! We are going home!" The Warmaster, champion of a hundred thousand campaigns, First Among Equals and Master of Mankind. Titles gained by sheer devotion and the pure spite the man had for their collective situation. Every man, woman, and child, would follow him to the ends of the Galaxy, which they had. Now, now he was leading them home.

Only one other man could have contested the titles bestowed upon the Lupercal, but he was lost and far from home. Agil knew that their next quest was going to be. Bring back those lost beyond the veil, to bring. Them. Home.

This story is something I have been working on for a long time. I recently, in the past two years, became very interested in the WORM books by Wildbow, which has grown in my own interest in SAO and WARHAMMER 40,000. Just to preface things, SAO and WARHAMMER are technically apart of the same universe in this story. The explanation for that is this; instead of Sword Art Online being the first major DeepDive game made available, it was instead a collaborative work with Games Workshop. This culminated in the game 'The Great Crusade Online'. It had a run time of a year before things went pear-shaped and over two millions players were trapped in the new universe.

It is a culmination of temporal dickbaggery and biological time manipulations that then allowed all 2.4 million players to experience nearly five hundred years in the span of years. Save for a few that are mentioned in the story above where they spent an extra two hundred plus years in the WARP kicking ass and wrecking names.

he main reason this story is coming out first is that the one this is derived from is having issues with getting kicked off. I just have an easier time writing this than the other one for some reason. Please give me your feed back! IS this a story that you would all like to see continued, is there anything that makes little to no sense, should anything be changed? Give me your best shots! :D