The Long Night Part One: Embers in the Dusk: A Planetary Governor Quest (43k) Complete Sequel Up

Forged in Defiance of Fate


How would one describe the attack of Astartes?


Terrifying…unbelievable…inhuman.


These are all words that have been used to describe them and well they should, for the most part the attack of Astartes is all these things. However, it does not truly do them justice. A single Astartes let loose among even the greatest soldiers can reduce killers who can fight on par with any mortal and even some immortals to bleeding piles of meat upon the ground, who may not have so much as glimpsed their foe, such is their speed and precision.


Perhaps, this is why so few actually saw the Knights.


Four Astartes is a deadly force, but it is less than insurmountable. Millenia ago, in the age of the Imperium, a single Astartes could kill entire divisions before bad luck or ill timing allowed them to be hit by one of the rare weapons that could pierce their armour, few of which were even designed to target anything smaller than a vehicle, but times had changed.


No longer did the common Guardsman have a weapon that would splash against the plate of power armour like rain, they now had the Impaler that could pierce the plate and harm the immortal within. Neither, too, were the soldiers themselves poorly trained and unversed in the subtleties and art of war—the darkening of the galaxy had lead to a breed of Guardsmen that would have been able to brush off their antecedents as if they were but a poorly trained militia.

And yet against the Knights it was as if nothing had changed.


Four Astartes, clad in massive armour baring only the slightest resemblance to the Terminator armour of old slaughtered their way through the ranks of Soldiers. Soldiers that were the remnants of the Golden Legion, the mightiest human veterans the Crusade had to offer each with countless battles to their names.


And they were not enough.


Their forms flickered and distorted as technology added to the mist that they brought with them, bodies moving faster and smoother than any Astartes should have the right to do as they lept from place to place seemingly without pause, their feet leaving no impression upon the floor, their footsteps making no sounds as they moved.


From their outstretched arms sprang fire and light that cut tanks in twain, as their long black halberds did their bloody work as they moved in eerie harmony.


But, to those they fought this was all secondary. In their presence they felt their brands burn. All of them were marked, the stamp of the Star Father burned into their heads and hands at birth, marking them as His and bestowing upon them a slight measure of His blessing. And now they burned not with the power of their god, but with a righteous fire, of tightly constrained anger and vengeance.


The simple Guardsmen felt this burning and was thrown off by it, but the officers? Those more blessed? Some were reduced to weeping shadows of their former selves, their gifts and blessings turning against them in the presence of the Grey Shadows.


Soon enough the final man lay dead as behind the Knights the Guard of Avernus attacked. The Knights had left them behind, their skill and speed outclassing them utterly. Better that the Guard serve as a distraction while the Knights dealt with the true threat within.


There were no words spoken between them, there was no need, as they were linked on a level beyond mortal words.


The final guardians of the ritual was an Archangyel of the 5th circle and its retinue. It was stronger than all of them individually, its army was ready. And yet it fell so fast.


A simultaneous blink left it with no time to react as the draining power of the runes they bore slammed into Daemons, staggering them as the Justicar presented to their leader its reward. A Vortex Grenade.


The detonation ripped it apart, while its retinue was torn asunder as they reeled, some falling back to the warp without the Knights having to make a single attack against them, such was the power of their presence.


Within a second, they entered the room, a twisted parody of an Ecclesiastical church. All around them was the sweet singing of cherubs, in perfect tune to the dull thuds of bolt pistols. Men in the caps of Imperial Commissars slowly and deliberately shooting the sacrifices in the back of their heads in perfect executions. On a high dais was the Sorcerer Lord, clad in white robes directing the ritual as all the room his lesser joined him in devotion.


Their appearance put an end to that.


The Justicar blinked in and a seamless motion cleaved the head from the Sorcerer Lord, his wards and armour reduced to nothing, as all around them the ritual stalled and slowed.


Sluggish from their efforts the Witches could do nothing as their mutations turned upon them, the Daemon Hunters among them in a flash, their peerless abilities letting them cut through fallen Astarte and Corrupt Human alike.


In a matter of minutes, the Sorcerers were dead.


Standing together in the centre of the hall the Knights turned their minds to the task at hand. Their minds joined together as they focused upon the ritual still taking place within this accursed hall.

Their minds left their bodies and they saw!


The ritual laid bare within the warp, a mighty thing, a glowing network that's purpose was simple. To funnel souls and weaken the warp.


The Sorcerers present did not have the time nor the ability to bring in an Exalted, an Arch Daemon, so quickly. So, they didn't.


They watched in disgust as the sacrifices arrived, their souls instantly caught and tortured. It was as if the Daemons cut away their arms and legs, burning them to the core while placing them to worship…to genuflect upon the being their prayers were to bring in.


And what a being it was.


It stood above the world shrouded in a halo of light, taking the form of three circles that somehow occupied the same space, covered in eyes that saw all and nothing at the same time.


The Knights tore their "eyes" away from the sight, for they had to focus on the task at hand for the time had come.


Close by they could sense the Nyne Queen Lulana had moved into position, prepared to feedback into the ritual, to obliterate it and deny this creature any hope of entry into reality. Further away they could feel another group, the brave Primaris psykers of Avernus…and a fourth.


A fourth mind, ancient and powerful, stronger and more skilled than any they had encountered. For a second, they could feel it gracing their minds and were shocked to find that it could enter their minds. Not far just on the edges, but further than any being save themselves had ever crossed. And then it was gone leaving behind a sensation of reassurance and a promise of explanation.


Then there was light.


The Exalted had seen them. Its infinite eyes were affixed upon them as a sensation of rage settled upon them. Rage that should be impossible for any creature to feel as strongly save for the Daemons of Khorne itself.


Yet their appearance inspired it. It knew instinctively what they were, their relationship with the Emperor that had birthed it's God.


In a moment it changed, no more was it rings, now there floated a creature that stayed on the right hand of a God.


Six pearlescent wings, eyes of gold, a flaming sword and a whip that could split worlds. It screamed and reached out it's hand, for the first time adding it's own power to the ritual attempting to hasten its completion.


Too little, too late.


With finality the four disruptions came at the same time as the structure of the ritual buckled and broke.

---

Grey Knights are OP

@Durin

Thank you @Reynal for betaing