Virtuous Iridescence [Terrarian Calamity SI In 40k]

[Black-Aengel-01]

AN: Well... let's see how this goes. Time to jump into this bandwagon again...






Virtuous Iridescence [Terrarian Calamity SI In 40k]

Chapter 1

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"What is wrong with you!? What made you think that was a good idea?!" He shouted, holding the fool who had dared to partake in the forbidden fruit that ought never to be taken.

"But we consumed stuff after pouring it in Shimmer! Why would a glowing fruit be bad?" It was such a seemingly innocent act, considering what else they had done in these mystical caverns. They had made use of its precious bounty for one many a thing. Arcane and Vital Crystals. Even an Aegis Fruit was created, in spite of the difficulty of acquiring the Life Fruit that was required.

But what the man had done… it was the thing that none should take, for it was akin to drinking the Shimmer itself! There was a reason why statues of men and women littered the caverns!

Of failed experimentations and forbidden intake of things mortals were never meant to ingest.

"That's Ambrosia, you fool! And… and…" A pause, as he waited for nature to run its course. But he did not feel petrification on the flesh of his cohort. He did not see the other man's eyes glow with arcane energy, his mind shattering as his soul burned up from within. No… he was… he was alive. Living and breathing still. "…You're not dead?"

"Uh… no? Should I be?" Such an innocent question.

Such vast implications behind it.

To partake of the fruit of the Gods whilst still of mortal composition… and still breathe.

He could be just what's needed to change the world. "You should. But you may be just what we need to change the course of this world."

And so, the man who was only known as the Guide, took it upon himself to create a warrior that would match the power of the Jungle Tyrant himself and undo the countless wrongs of this cruel world.

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-Pew! Pewpew! Pew!-

Hour… Sometime around the afternoon, I guess. Not quite used to the different spin rotations. Day… even less of a clue. I have no idea if this bloody planet follows the same 365-day orbit that Earth does, and I am sure as hell it doesn't. Year… Mid Forty-First Millennium. No inkling how accurate that is, considering I received two completely different dates from the equipment I ravaged off the corpses of Imperials, but I am certain I am at least a century away from the galaxy splitting in half from Abby's tantrum on Cadia.

My only wish is that when that happens, I am as far as humanly possible from the blast site because I am not going to become the Chaos Gods' chew toy, even if the Emperor comes down from his throne and asks nicely.

He can even bring a chocolate cake, and I would still say no. Then, flip the table on him.

No. Actually, I would flip the table and then say no.

With that little side tangent over, I haven't bothered learning much else, given my current situation of being forced to survive five near-death experiences back-to-back all within the span of the ten days since my arrival.

I mean… near death to one side of me.

The other would have considered a Tuesday, but going all out was very much unadvisable.

I had to learn how to get pretty good at hiding in the middle of an active battlefield, sometimes right under the combatants' noses.

Thank goodness for all those years I had in keeping a low profile while being hunted by Yharim's forces. Comes in handy when you don't want the Imperium to know you're stealing stuff right underneath their noses.

-Boom!-

Case and point; a Sentinel just blew up a few hundred yards away from my nice and cosy position. Good. I have a Sentinel frame now. Bad for the poor sod inside of it, however. Now, if only that bloody Meganob were to show up before the line broke.

The timer's ticking, and the green screaming murder mushroom is still out of my range of effect.

God! Why did I have to be born a summoner?

"Frak! They're going to overrun us!" I hear a poor man on the verge of mania shouting from the distance.

-BLAM!-

And he's dead.

Fuck that Commissar's bolter gun has some volume, Jesus! No wonder no one's running away.

Even when they should, because they are clearly being overrun by a much, much larger force! Fucking Imperials and their love for last stands and all their wasteful nonsensical forced heroic shit the commanders so love doing!

No wonder this galaxy is going to hell on a handbasket.

Now where is that fucking Megano-ah… there he is.

Showtime.

I crawl through the diminutive hidey hole in the wall I have managed to squeeze myself into mere minutes prior this whole ordeal began -fucking orks always messing up my plans to steal from the Imperials, didn't let me even set up a proper Slime trap and all that shite- and took aim down the scopes of the Rust Musket.

My finger graced the trigger as I took in a deep breath, filling my lungs with air, my heartbeat stilling, yet the blood in my vessels flowed nonetheless as an incorporeal core pushed it along the channels of life around my body. My mind honed to a monomolecular edge, completely immersing itself in the shot I was about to attempt in the dual hopes of saving these fools from their undeserved fate and my acquisition of assets to aid in my continued survival.

I beheld my target through the sights and… -click-

The commissar's head flew off as his neck detonated when a super dense bullet streaked through flesh and bone.

Immediately, as if suddenly breaking off the lid of a pressure cooker, the Guard's growing panic, once repressed by the commissar's presence, now exploded into unfiltered fright.

"The commissar's dead!" Shock. "Sweet Emperor!" Despair. "Run!" Terror. "We can't hold the line!" Panic. "We must retreat!" Desertion. "Emperor, save us!"

Their cries amplified off one another's dread, growing in frantic vigour as it finally reached a point where it could not be held back any longer and soon men began to flee in droves as the Ork horde approached with their own manic cries of murderous glee.

And thus, the second part of this equation was at hand.

Closing my eyes, discarding all physical stimuli from my perception, my mind's Eye opened and intuited all that needed to be sensed across the vastness of space that encompassed this battlefield. My body's ritualistic powers, the nature of my injected experiences, amplified by arcane energies derived from the soul-stuff of thousands of dead, the life essence of gods and dragons, powered the Nebulaeic fragments that pulsated deep within my soul's core and crawled through the spaces between my mind like tendrils of thoughts made into factual action, all of that channelled through the Skull Amulet that acted as a focus for my next spell. From it, I reached forth and invoked one of the more common forms of arcana in Terraria upon the closest of dead bodies.

Necromancy, an art so commonplace that even the very world of Terraria itself enacts it as a blind reflex, rousing the slumbering dead to action without prompt, cause or reason.

Magic loathes to remain still and thus finds anything and everything to cling on to continue the cycles that exist within its sublime interception of order and chaos.

My hand mimed the action of my recently animated puppet, and with that.

-Boom!-

A melta charge goes off, destroying a Killa Kan's entire half side. Three orks die in the emergent explosion as fitting collateral, and a gretchin ends up dead when the heap of metal and weapons topples on top of it, crushing it like an overripe fruit and spilling its entrails upon the rocky gravel.

Another motion of my arm, and another corpse moves.

-Boom!-

Ten orks die, their battle wagon having rolled over a moving corpse with a live grenade waiting to go off.

A bit more focus, and then my arm moves yet again.

-BOOM!!-

And the Meganob is no more, swallowed in a bright flash by the simultaneous convergence of three grenades upon its person.

"Wut!? 'Ey, Korkharg iz ded!" One ork shouts out. "Who threw dah grenadez?! Wus it you Ghornag?" Another asked, confused, angry. "Wusn't me! Honist! I ran out of grenadez!" Another responded. "Datz a lie! But thankz anywaiz! Now I'z the boss now!" "Nuh uh! I iz! I wuz dah second in kommand! Now I iz first!"

And while the large orks were mid-arguing/fighting, I converged the tendrils of my power not only upon the human corpses scattered about the bloody field of the dead, but also on the green figures on the ground. One hand gesticulated in movement.

Several others followed in unison under one will.

Several grenades of various makes flew skyward.

There was a split second of rumbustious shouts and gunfire, the thrum of war lust of the Ork mob, then a loud cacophony of explosions and raging destruction, followed by a subdued and timid silence.

I could not quite count how many orks died in the event, but I knew it was enough to cripple their numbers, enough so that the humans, had they been of a cannier predilection, could have slaughtered them all right here and now if they seized their chance.

But I could not let them realise that their victory was well within reach.

There was too much work to do, and a golden opportunity like this one is unlikely to repeat itself with frequency.

I could sense their life sparks slowing down in motion. The rout was over, paused by the sudden miracle that had just been enacted, and slowly, in their place, I could sense the once flickering fire of hope growing steadily.

But before it could become a bonfire, I moved my hand once more and decreed a greater degree of motion from my vessels.

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Lieutenant Ernest Roilas watched as the orks slowly began gathering their wits about them as his retreat ceased.

His prior moments were one of heated battle that would have seen his squad and what remained of his platoon's souls delivered to the Emperor in a casket had morale not fully broken the moment the commissar's head flew off its shoulders.

A mere tenth of a platoon holding the line against an entire army of over two hundred orks was insanity. Nothing but pure and unadulterated frakking insanity!

But then the explosions, praise the Throne, began, and well over half of the orks were gone! If they played this right!

His grip on his lasgun tightened. There was a chance they could win this fight! "Fighting positions! The orks are dazed and we can push them back to-" then his words died right upon his lips when he saw a figure stand up and swing its huge cleaver of a weapon upon the head of one of the orks, splitting its skull in half and spilling blood and brain matter all over the ground.

The other orks who had managed to recover reacted to this figure by attacking it, firing their crude guns and ripping it to shreds, but even as they did this, the flesh that was being blown off knitted itself together again and the thing ran at them and started ripping all the orks in front of it to bloody ribbons.

But eventually, it was too much, and the thing was struck down and slain after sustained injuries that left it little more than a bloody smear on the gravel.

And then the first ork it had killed stood up, head split open, blood pouring out of its mangled skull, and bellowed out its unholy wail before resuming the job of the prior figure had left unfulfilled.

And then another…

And another.

Ernest's bravery faltered, and what rallying speech he was about to voice died a cruel and abrupt death.

Dead orks… walking.

The dead orks… were standing back up and killing each other.

"We're retreating!" He shouted, a fresh new wave of fear flooding his veins, one borne not out of the threat of imminent death but one that emerges when man bears witness to that which should not be and cannot be explained, for it wears a proud visage of much darker powers than the xeno.

Ernest immediately turned heel and ran, cursing, bellowing orders of retreat and whispering unceasing litanies of prayer to the God Emperor.

His Captain must know!

They have to know this!

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Shit was being weird! Real weird!

Ragskul was having such a fun scrap killing 'umies, and then the explosions happened all over, and he was left on the ground with his arm gone. He didn't like missing an arm.

But on the bright side, now he'll get to have an arm with a gun! So, nothing really lost in the end.

That is until the dead orks and 'umies started getting up and killing his boys. Or at least the ones that remained. There were lotta dead boys though, and the more they killed the more the weird ones will have on their side!

That would be for a fun scrap.

But Ragskul wasn't stupid. He wasn't Korkanghal dah Limb Splittah's best Nob for nothing.

There is a big difference between having a fun scrap and dying because everything went boomy beforehand, and having a fun scrap and winning! And orks are made for fighting AND winning!

This is not a fight that the boys will win. Especially when the Meganob was on pieces all over the ground.

"Retreet!" He bellowed out. "We's gonna come back for a propah scrap with guns to beat theez weird orks! Ya hear!?"

Some lowly boy aimed at Ragskul with their shoota and shouted back with a, "Sod off!" right before one of the weird orks hit him with a big choppa that ripped his back open. Ragskul simply moved ahead before the weird 'un fixed its stance and ripped off its arm, choppa and all.

Now he has his big choppa. It's Ragskul's now.

And then he used it to slice the weird ork's other arm off.

"Any othah objectchuns?" He asked amid the fighting. No answer came. "Good! Letsa go!" And so, he directed his boyz out of this failed scrap because it was not fair when dah weird got his boyz to fight on its side.

It's not right and proper!

He's gonna tell the Boss about this when he gets a chance.

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Hundreds of bloody corpses meandered about among a littering of the still dead and spilt blood.

Their mindless groans as they awaited instructions from a higher power to give their vacant stares meaning, to bestow their cold hands purpose, to grant them some manner of will and function beyond meagre decorations in a field of devastation and red.

Unfortunately for them, said higher power was too busy pushing himself out of a hole he had made in a wall. "Come… on…!" He groaned as he tried to pull himself out of the hidden den.

And fail in the attempt.

"Come on! I didn't get fat in the half hour I was hiding in there, God damn it!" Something snapped in his latest push and as if liberated from an unseen force holding him within the pit of his making, he fell out and rolled on the dirt before coming to a stop in the middle of his undead horde.

Sitting up to clear out the dust from his face, he looked at his modified las-rifle holstered to his side and grimaced.

The scope broke.

Again.

He knew it was a shoddy construction, that scope's addition. But he didn't get much time to make it up to his quality's standard before he was made aware of the Imperials moving through his territory, so he had gone off on the hunt long before he was fully prepared.

But that didn't matter because he got an amazing prize for his troubles!

"Fuck yeah! I got a Sentinel!" He turned to the army of undead orks waiting for his command. "And for once you ugly gits managed to be of use with your belligerent presence!"

Now he just needed a way to disassemble what parts he could salvage off the Imperial walker before having his newfound orks move the pieces back to his home base. That, and whatever extra little thing he could get his hands on.

His 'time' as the Terrarian of Calamity had made him quite the kleptomaniacal tinkerer, and the more stuff he has to experiment with, the better. He was also terribly aware of how messy his workshop got very quickly, so he needed to make emphasis on expanding and organising it before the hoarding creep catches on to him and he has to spend hours moving from chest to chest looking for that one component piece at the bottom of a pile of weird crap and weapons.

Such was his life 'then', and here in 40k, it would become worse.

He just knew it.

"Alright." He said, rubbing his hands together. "Start grabbing everything you can get your hands on. Any useful scraps of metal and technology. Some bodies too. You lot, come with me." He instructed even as the undead orks moved ahead to perform his orders, even before he had begun decreeing them. It was an unneeded ritual, but one that helped centre the budding necromancer. "Help me move the Sentinel. I have to disassemble its parts before we can-"

"Uuhhh… Emperor… who's… there…?" A voice, a human voice, groaned.

Just above a deathly whisper, but enough so to be heard amidst the war-torn windy plains of this world.

A moment of silence passed before the voice called out again. "P-please… Throne... please… someone… help… me…"

The silence was interrupted by most of the Ork corpses falling to the ground, akin to marionettes with their strings cut as the arcane threads that kept them up and walking abruptly were cut off.

With part of his focus freed from maintaining the mobility of the walking dead green brutes, the Calamitian groaned as his connection to the Nebula stretched out and sensed the weak flickers of a still living mind.

One… then two… then three and counting until he had a total head count of the survivors whom he now had become aware of.

"….Shhhhit." He cursed, knowing that there were nine souls still clinging to life scattered in this pit of blood and corpses.

"…please…" The Guardsmen who had called out, delirious from bloodloss, but still aware enough to cry out -or mumble- for help, groaned again, and right there and then, the Catalyst of Terraria was forced to make a decision.

"Fucking hell… This is going to bite you in the ass Zach…" He cursed before pushing his mana to reanimate some of the dead orks he had deanimated moments prior. "You fuckers better not cause me too much trouble, you hear?"

"…please…" Weakly called out again the dying guardsman.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm coming."

Seconds later, cold dead hands began moving rubble, rescuing the still living humans from the grip of death.

Zachariah knew that dealing with these people was gonna suck a lot. But that was for later, it was time for him to build a makeshift emergency stretcher. He should have brought some healing potions.

Oh well. Nothing some healing magic can't hopefully remedy a bit.

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To be Continued…

 

[KazKhan]

I am always a fan of your work even when I know absolutely nothing about Terraria. This looks to be a fun story you've got going on here.

 

[Black-Aengel-01]

I am always a fan of your work even when I know absolutely nothing about Terraria. This looks to be a fun story you've got going on here.

Click to shrink...

I appreciate it. I honestly do. But I fear now that its not gonna be that long lived as a result of Terraria being such a niche game. Its not small by any stretch of the word. But its community doesn't tend to grow much even as time passes.

 

[Black-Aengel-01]

Calamitian Esoteric Abilities and Spells

Making this for people to see how far I have gone into this damn rabbit hole of studying every little nook and cranny of this bloody mod.
Hope you enjoy and understand how much the Imperium will NOT like having him around. Not everything is explained in extensive detail, but that's because I want to leave some wiggle room for myself.


LORES and MAGICKS

Having plundered the vast libraries of the Dungeon, studied under the tutelage of the Old Wizard and, later on, Permafrost, Zachariah has amassed a wealth of arcane lore that he readily employs in the further development of his own spells and magical artefacts.

However, said lore comes into use more often than not through talismans, staves and foci, among which, spell tomes are included. His innate mana state is non conducive to rapid mana transmutation, and this makes his spell casting relatively slow without the use of an active foci to automate that process for him.

However, this serves him well in another field, for whilst he cannot cast and alter the mana around him at a rapid pace, he is able to instil a piece of his will into every spell and esoteric manifestation, thus, making him a skilled Summoner.

Whilst most mages would cast a spell before changing the nature of it mid flight to confound their opponents, Zach may cast a meagre fireball, and release it, knowing full well that it will hit its intended target, no matter how much the foe may struggle against it, for it has his will inside it, and bears an annoying degree of autonomy.

[Key: if any of the following it's Underlined, then it means, it's a Post Moonlord Spellbook and its highly complex lore can only be cast under VERY particular circumstances, a ritual, long focus or a foci. Mostly because he is a mid-tier mage and can't transmute his mana well enough to cast Subsumming Vortex without it blowing up on his face like a nuke of exotic arcane energy]

• Lore of Ilmeris{Tomes: Coral Sprout, Waywasher, Poseidon}
  • Shape and Grow Coral into various Tools and Equipment. Requires Coral.
  • Create Sea Prisms. [Sand 10]
• Lore of the Earth {Tomes: Beneath the Sands, Relic of Ruin, Song of Sand, Primordial Earth, Primordial Ancient}
  • Sand Manipulation. [Shaping and condensation into Sandstone, Sand Spikes]
  • Sand Construct Manipulation [Forming weapons and imbuing will into them]
  • Rock Constructs
  • Withering Dust [Dust Storm, Dust Constructs, Great Dust Storm]
• Lore of Liquids {Tomes: Waywasher, Water Bolt, Poseidon, Golden Shower, Serpentine, Slithering Eels, Everglade Spray, Razorblade Typhoon, Nuclear Fury}
  • Water Bending. [Water Bending, Water Bolts, Water Condensation]
  • Water State Manipulation [Walk on Water, Make it Denser and Heavy, hardened into sharp blades]
  • Poseidonic Typhoon Rune [Causes 'Autrophication' and weakens the body]
  • Ichor Manipulation [Liquid Form only]
  • Water Constructs [Imbued with will]
  • Acid Constructs [Imbued with will]
  • Perennial Fluid Manipulation [Liquid Form only]
  • Cosmic Liquid Manipulation [Hardens and sharpens as it moves]
• Lore of Air{Tomes: Veering Winds}
  • Cast wind waves to push away enemies.
  • Wind mobility [Double jumping]
• Lore of Fire{Tomes: Fire Bolt, Cursed Flames, Frigidflash Bolt, Forbidden Sun}
  • Fire Manipulation [Flames, Fireball, Extreme Flame Explosion]
  • Cursed Flames [Flames, Fireball]
  • Thermal Isolation [Can burn and freeze at once]
  • Melt Rock
• Lore of Ice{Tomes: Veering Winds, Frost Bolt, Frigidflash Bolt, Shadecrystal Barrage, Winter's Fury}
  • Frostbite Casting [Frost Air, Frost Bolt]
  • Ice Constructs [Creation]
  • Thermal Isolation [Can freeze and burn at once]
  • Create Cold Shadow Glass
  • Instant Freezing
• Lore of Thunder {Tomes: Magnet Sphere, Rogue Slash}
  • Electricity Constructs [Discharge their energy outwards]
  • Red Lightning Manipulation [Unleash it in unstable waves]
• Lore of the Dead{Tomes: Book of Skulls, Wrath of the Ancients}
  • Reanimation [Revenants]
  • Spirit Summoning [Howling Skulls]
  • Spirit Rune [Wrathful Spirits that haunt an area]
• Lore of the Cosmos {Tomes: Star Shower, Book of Fates, Augur of the Elements, Lunar Flare, Event Horizon, Subsuming Vortex}
  • Astral Stars Casting [Inflicts Astral Blight]
  • Cosmic Entropy [Manipulate the Entropic State of the Cosmos: Key to Creating other Cosmic Fragments]
  • Elemental Energy [Unstable lashing discharges]
  • Lunar Energy Discharge [Beams, explosions]
  • Gravitational Well Casting
  • EXO-Energy Discharge [Blasts]
• Lore of Hallow {Tomes: Crystal Storm, Tears of Heaven, Light God's Brilliance}
  • Hallowed Crystal Manipulation
  • Holy Fire Light Bolts Casting
• Lore of Light {Tomes: Tradewinds, Focusing Grimoire, Light God's Brilliance}
  • Sunlight Shaping [Feathers]
  • Laser Light Discharge
  • Light Construct Casting [Beads of Holy Light]
• Lore of the Infernal{Tomes: Burning Sea, Seething Discharge, Lashes of Chaos}
  • Brimstone Fire Manipulation [Flames, fireball, deadly Brimstone Explosion]
  • Brimstone Spirits [Visages]
• Lore of Darkness {Tomes: Demon Sythe, Shadecrystal Barrage, Tome of Fates, Recitation of the Beast}
  • Darkness Constructs [Blades, Waves, Beast Blades]
  • Shadowflame Manipulation [Flames and fireballs]
  • Shadecrystal Manipulation [Shards and Crystals]
  • Viscous Darkness Constructs [Short-lived, consuming]
  • Uncontrollable Vortex of Scything Blades
• Lore of Slimes{Eldritch Tome, Abyssal Tome}
  • Eldritch Slime Manipulation [Fluidity, Impalement, Manipulation]
  • Abyssal Slime Manipulation [Explosives, Constructs, Absorption]
  • Slime Transmutation [Create]
• Lore of Plants {Tomes: Everglade Spray, Biofusillade,}
  • Plant Manipulation [Grow, shape and mutate plants]
  • Gamma Life Energy [Unstable Life Energy shearing and disruption]

INNATE POWERS

Due to the strange things he has partaken into his very being, Zacharia has some semblance of innate skill with manipulating mana into forms analogously resonant to the following listed. Magic regarding this fields are simply easier, though no less necessarily ponderous.

• Vitae Herbalmancy: Blood Orbs, Living Shards, Life Alloys, Uelibloom Bars, Mantrapper Bulbs.
• Sanctic Pyrokinesis: Unholy Essence, Divine Geode, Uelibloom Bars, Yharon Soul Fragments, Solar Fragments
• Cosmic Nebulamancy [Has ties to Psionic abilities]: Meteoric Bar, Astral Bar, Nebula Shards
• Necromantic Spiritmancy: Blood Orb, Necroplasm, Ruinous Souls, Souls of [Fright, Sight, Might], Ascended Spirit Essence
• Craftsman's Haze: Ambrosia

 

[Sunwheel]

I do hope that this, and the tale of a cruel world, will spawn a terraria fanfic proliferation.

 

[Black-Aengel-01]

I do hope that this, and the tale of a cruel world, will spawn a terraria fanfic proliferation.

Click to shrink...

A man could dream.

 

[Black-Aengel-01]

I'll post the next chapter in about two days. Enjoy this one in the meantime.



Virtuous Iridescence [Terrarian Calamity SI In 40k]

Chapter 2

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I withdrew my hands from the bare flesh of the soldier I had just healed with a bit of magic, deactivating the warm glow that radiated healing energies onto his body, remembering the journey 'I went through' to gain this knowledge and power.

I had studied the Relic of Convergence from Providence's Guardians extensively and made frequent use of it during my battles, right when my body was still recovering from the mildly toxic properties of healing potions I chugged down in the middle of heated confrontations.

Even Providence herself, when I faced her, was irritated when I simply refused to die, thanks to the stolen power I claimed from her servants. I think that made her all the more invested in ensuring my death. That I was so brazenly insulting her with her own Relic.

Too bad that was what sealed her fate in the end.

Now, while the mechanisms behind the Relic have been known to me for some time, I cannot make use of the same healing powers during battle without the artefact. My mana flow is like sludge. Slow, dense and hard to transmute at the best of times. I have, however, learned to replicate the arcane formula to enact it at any time and place without the need of the Relic itself, and it only demands a short ritual to channel the right energies into a target body. Be it my own or someone else's.

Six of the nine Guardsmen I had found were stable, at least for now. Half of those were in far worse shape than the rest, and I was relieved that my 'experiences' committing mass scale slaughter on undead, murderous thieves and aliens have made me immune to the sight of mutilated bodies.

They are alive, if only thanks to the healing spell I had enacted upon them. I am uncertain if they will survive the trek to my base or if I will be able to provide further aid to them beyond keeping them stable for some time before they begin wasting away. My grasp on non-arcane cybernetics is lacking for the most part, and I doubt I will have an easy time finding any bionic replacement for missing intestines. Nor do I have nanites in stock.

As much as Draedon's work was horrific, I wished the amoral android were here. Nano Plague Cells could have offered up a way to make the implants compensate for my lack of experience in that department. Alas, such musings were a moot point.

This would leave organ transplants, but the risk of rejection is ever-present. Unless I were to tamper with the darker arts.

A risky thing.

If they were of Terrarian stock, whose bodies are steeped in the ambient mana of that realm, I could make it work with little issue. But these people's bodies glow with only the smallest of vital embers, and I fear that enacting my theoretical spells on them could do them more harm than good.

Thusly… I would need to lean heavily on my expertise in Blood Magics and my skill with living forces to get their bodies to work with potentially dead tissue.

I really hope this works.

I'll need samples, though. Loads of them.

I go for the next Guardsman, one that doesn't look too bad, at least when compared to my prior patient. Massive loss of blood, like the rest. No surprises there, considering that his right arm's gone, along with a large part of the shoulder. Scapula might as well not exist anymore, considering the damage. Some broken ribs poking out of the dismemberment area. Damage to the lungs is, thankfully, minimal.

I lift my hands, and the glow of restorative magics pulsates from them, bathing the man's body with vitality and life forces as the same part of me that is behind my ability to create weapons and armours made to contest against gods quickly worked on the flesh, transmuting small sections of it to minimize infections and seal the open wounds.

The blood loss, however, is not an issue I can address. Not without a Philosopher's Stone or any of its derivative accessories in hand. Also, my Blood type, despite being O, has been stripped of its donor qualities by the fact that it is so thick with mana that it might as well kill him in any one of three ways.

Or worse.

… No.

It would definitely be the worst of the possibilities if I were to try and perform a transfusion.

I have no idea what manner of horrid havoc the Life Alloy infusion would enact on his body, to say nothing of the other, far more potent, things flowing through my system.

Alas, I do not have the right materials for testing out the various blood types of my patients, and it could all come down to whether or not this humanity, with its thirty-eight thousand years of biological diversity, has changed to the point that I can recognise what I am working with at all.

My ability to get a feel for things, as powerful and invaluable as it is, has a limit. Especially with mundane objects.

Thankfully, after only a few moments of work, he neatly falls on the 'not on the edge of death' side of the aisle, so his chances of survival are relatively high. I remove his vest and use it to… What's this?

A collar. Not a piece of fashion, I wager, considering how thick it seems, to say nothing of how uncomfortable it must be to wear. Care to think of it… I think I have seen those same collars on a handful of soldiers.

Could they be…?

I looked at an ork Revenant that grabbed one of the human bodies I had begun storing on a wagon and removed their vest. A collar just like this one.

Not all of the soldiers have them.

A pattern seems to have emerged here, and I, for one, am not fond of it.

I wonder if I could remove it from them without it potentially going off.

Hmm… Later.

Hopefully, someone somewhere doesn't press the button for that and causes several folks' heads to detonate while I have them in a medical ward.

Speaking of…

That same Ork Revenant goes for the headless commissar's body and finds amidst his fancy outfit a number of devices. One of which could be the remote detonator for these collars. Better stash them carefully.

I head for the next Guardsman, seeing their… her, injuries. Hmm… not good. Not too terrible, however. Three large bullet holes on the torso. One lung collapsed. Source of most of her blood loss, but I can work with that a bit. I immediately get to work sealing her injuries and seeing if I can't make the body reabsorb the blood back into the system. I remove her vest as I assess her injuries.

No collar.

Better gear than most, if what I am feeling off them is any indication.

Perhaps a sergeant then.

I idly took note of the weapon she was handling when the Ork Revenants retrieved her. Different lasgun pattern. Hotshot maybe? Bah. I can't remember.

My 40k lore is more on the wider phenomena and obscure shit. Things like lasgun patterns and basic things are too… milquetoast for my usual interests. Alas, there is a great deal that is lost when one ignores the common subtleties of the world they invest themselves in.

It is akin to my personal thoughts regarding many fantasy settings. Most focus on the dragons, the spectacles they bring and the stories of horror they enact, whilst forgetting the day-to-day minutia of what magic and life would have to dance in order to keep the world cycles in motion.

But commonalities such as these are not yet of immediate matter. There were things of greater importance at hand, and I could not be distracted in my task. Already, juggling twenty dead Orks and healing these people was hard enough as it was.

My last patient was… oh… fractured skull. Caved in, actually. Extensive brain damage. Deep in a permanent coma or moments away from total brain death. Alive only because the brainstem is keeping the lungs moving.

But it won't be for long.

I pressed my hand to his forehead, about to fire a small flare of Nebulaic energy into his skull, but decided against the act at the last moment. Instead, I performed some healing on his brain, what sections I could, that is, and let his body rest.

Even if he cannot be saved, which I doubt will be possible, having a living cadaver around would have its uses for experimentation in this new realm I have found myself in.

Done keeping the humans from dying, I turn to what I came here and kill a commissar for.

"Alright, let's get the Sentinel disassembled." I needlessly instructed my Ork Revenants. I literally control them like a puppet master, I have no need to give them audible instructions. But the action helps focus my mind on the task, given that I do not have with me my various Summoning Artefacts.

Man, I wish I had the Nucleogenesis.

Well, not something I can change right now, now, can I?

Time to get to work. I have an ork battlewagon to fix up.

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RumbrrrumbrrrrrrumbrrrrumbrrrrrRRRUUUmmmRUUMmmmrummmmmbrrrrumbrmbrr-rrr-rrr-rr-POOF!

I blinked.

And groaned.

Not again!

I glare at the Ork Revenant driver next to me. "You know how much I have grown to hate you guys' technology, right?" It says nothing. Maybe it's the lack of a lower jaw that has something to do with it. I don't know. "Six times!" I growl. "Six FUCKING times I have to get off this-" And I jump off the oversized metal murder box on wheel to perform field repairs yet again, wondering and whinging out loud about what broke this time round.

I lift the engine compartment up to see what's wrong, and I get greeted by a puff of black smoke and the worst stench I have experienced in my life.

"By Silva's tits!" I jump off back down to have a coughing fit far away from the noxious fumes. Even the Sulphuric Sea was not this bad! Smells like something died in there. Then exploded and got cooked with engine oil before being left to ferment and shat on.

Gods!

I take off my shirt and put it over my face to hopefully ward off the toxic fumes before I jump back on the truck's engine compartment.

It still makes my eyes water.

But I have to push through this.

Alright, what's wrong now?

This thing's fine. That doohickey is fine, too. Oil pump is working. What of the…? Oh, leakage there. Fixing no-OUCH!! Motherfuck-Grrrr! I look at the ork driver, making sure that the engine battery is disconnected.

It is! Or at least, it's meant to be!

Which means something with the battery's up. Where exactly? There! I use my Nebulaeic telekinesis instead to disconnect the cables before I toss them off. Where is that smell coming from?

I reach out and… dead baby Squig. Charred down to the bone.

Why was a Squig in here? I look around in with my… I sigh. I rip out the squid-sized hamster wheel before tossing it on the dirt.

How on Earth did I miss it on the first look-over?

Ork teknologi. I'll just leave it at that.

Now, to cool this scrap pile off before it explodes like that first time. Thank goodness the orks had a replacement engine or else we'd all be boned.

I focus and start releasing a soft downpour of Eleum into the heap pile of bits and machinery that dares call itself an engine motor while a Revenant exits the battlewagon with a toolbox full of useful scrap.

"Size six wrench." I say, hand out, waiting for the thing I need.

The Revenant provides it.

"Cables."

I received cables.

"Blowtorch."

And the Revenant continued to serve faithfully. I shall call it Igor.

If I haven't eaten it by the end of the week. What? There's nothing else to eat in this hellscape! Yeah, it's bloody nasty when you think about it! But I've drunk gallons of processed Lunar Blood, and no one's complained about it!

After ten minutes of work, I look up at the driver Ork Revenant, and he punches the box before flipping a switch.

VroomvroomvroomVROOMVROOMVROOOMMMMMMMMRRRR- I closed down the engine compartment and hopped off, taking off the shirt off my face and putting it on popper again.

The hopefully to be named Igor returns to the Battlewagon before I jump in next to the driver's seat again.

"Alright. Time to head…" I drew silent when my eyes noticed something approaching our position in the distance. "…off… Mhhh…." Deepening my Greater Sight, my perception grew tenfold, and through such augmented senses, I managed to observe the distantly approaching form of three -no, four!- red smeared blotches of ramshackle machinery and screaming lunacy. And more emerging from the dust cloud that the front vehicles created.

Five Warbikes and two Warbuggies, one with a missile pod and… is that a screaming Gretchin strapped to the front of the buggy?

I blink at the ridiculousness in the distance, but I shake it off as typical ork absurd brutality.

Still. I am in trouble.

Not the first time I encountered a group of Speed Freaks on the fields, and I am certain it won't be the last. However, there is a slight problem that has me questioning the merits of engagement.

That buggy has a missile launcher.

And I am carrying passengers on top of precious cargo.

…Shit.

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To be Continued…

 

[Black-Aengel-01]

Well... I lied. I said it was gonna be tomorrow.

Here it is.





Virtuous Iridescence [Terrarian Calamity SI In 40k]

Chapter 3

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There was a constant strum of rhythmic pain all over her body… every breath was laboured and anguished, not made any better by the constant vibrations that kept the discomfort ever-present and all-encompassing. Every spark of consciousness was one lanced with agony that forced her back into dreamless slumber with cruel and repeated effortlessness. But as she forced herself back to the world of the living and the wake, Lisa McGrath found her most recent rise to consciousness a sliver more whole, yet no less filled with pain.

Her eyes creaked open to hazy shapes moving back and forth in a silence that could only exist when all subtle sound is drowned by the ceaseless roaring heart of a war machine.

She could only hear the engine and her breathing.

But she could feel everything else.

And she felt cold.

So very cold.

Had she been rescued?

Had they won the battle?

And why is there so much Ork blood stench?

Were they still in the wastes?

"What is happening?" She mumbled… or at least that's what she had attempted to voice.

Alas, the noise that emerged from her lips was but a smattering of mumbles. Little more than whimpering sounds from a woman pulled out from the very edges of death. But it elicited a reaction, and as her eyes slowly began to adjust, the figures began to take a cohesive shape mere instants before she heard a sound from outside.

"Oi! Wut'z dis battlewagon doin' here?"

She gasped. Orks!

That instant realisation flooded her system with what little adrenaline it could spare, and it was enough for her to finally realize her situation when her vision returned fully. Orks! More orks! She was in an ork vehicle!

She made to do something, yell, stand, fight, kick, her body didn't know, and her mind knew less in its suddenly awakened state. All she knew was that she needed to act! But before she could, a large, meaty hand clamped down on her mouth and muffled what little sounds she could muster. She tried to fight it, use what strength she had, but her grip felt weak and utterly pathetic before the vice-like grip of the ork standing over her.

And then she saw its face.

Mangled.

Disfigured.

Mutilated with missing eyes and its skull split open with nothing but a dark void held within!

It was not natural! It was something unnatural! Supernatural and unholy! Dead things should not walk!

That realisation more than any other intensified her efforts, even as her body doubled over with agony. But she did not give in. She tried to kick and claw at the thing holding her down, but a second hand grabbed her legs and forced them to still. Its look… that dead walking carcass of an Ork staring down at her… she could feel its gaze upon her, what nefarious and vile thoughts behind its empty eye sockets!?

Throne! This can't be how she dies, can it?!

But then, instead of her head being crushed or her neck snapped, she saw the form of a lasgun slide its way into her vision, and when her eyes turned to the holder, surprise more than anything else overtook her mind, blasting her panicking alarm into deafening bewilderment.

That… other Ork. It had eyes and a mouth, but most of its neck was gone, somehow with its head held upright upon its large shoulders by little more than strips of flesh and bone. It presented a lasgun close to her with one hand while the other was by its lips, doing a motion that she recognized.

'Be silent.'

"Oi! Why'z dah drivah ded? Dah waggon is runni'n so wot'z diz?" An ork voice from outside the vehicle bellowed out, before another one, far deeper, shouted back. "Sum weird thing for shur. Open up dah waggon and see what'z inside!"

She then looked at the undead ork that had offered her a lasgun. What in Terra's going on here?!

+Servitors+ A voice creaked into her mind. Foreign. Distant, yet close. One and at the same time made of many. Something with the tinge of golden stars, a smell of burning ice and feeling of fresh leaves… somehow? A witch was here… +Hide+ It was a soft command, but a command nonetheless. However, given all the context she had been presented with, Lisa came to realise more or less what was happening as she noticed that she was not the only human in the vehicle's cargo.

There were others, all of them injured severely, and they were being gently placed behind a pile of junk to hide their bodies.

Now she understood.

She was still confused how this situation had come to be, how these… ork corpses were still moving as if alive -no doubt something vile and malevolent, for she could find no origin of machinery on them- and how she'd found herself in this position, but she could tell the orks outside were a more immediate concern than the ones inside.

The latter had not killed her yet, but the former would definitely do so the moment they looked upon her.

She would need to play this smart.

So, Lisa did just that and played along.

A nod and the pressure holding her down eased. The lasgun was brought closer to her, and she was allowed to take it with no trouble.

The three, five… no, six, dead ork servitors -at least, according to the witch- in the battlewagon then began taking positions. Three converged on the doors, whereas the rest hid elsewhere in the wagon, beyond her sight. The closest to her, the one who had made sure she had not made a noise, gently took her down and hid her along with her men.

Now hidden behind some measure of cover, she could see what was transpiring from the relative safety of her place. Unexpectedly, however, she bore witness to the servitor orks laying on the vehicle's floor, acting dead as if they had been killed by an unknown assailant.

Yet, each of them was well within reach of their weapons.

A trap, she realised.

All she needed to do was to watch and wait for an opportunity to arise for her to act. But what shall he do when that opportunity arises? What could she do? She moved into position, taking aim from the junk pile she was placed behind, and she felt her every bone complain with agony.

What would she even be able to do? "Alrigt, boss! I'm openin' dah door." A moot point now.

She heard a clank, the door to the vehicle being pulled open by large, green hands and an ugly head with piercings reared in, scanning the innards of the battlewagon with a grim and curious expression.

"Uh… boss… everyun 'ere'z ded." The piercings ork called back.

It stepped aside, letting a much larger ork walk up to the door. This one had an ugly toothed thing on its shoulder that looked at everything with abject terror. The ork, for its part, just gave a glance inside the wagon and then smiled. "Do you'z know what diz meanz?"

"Uh… a miztery?" Piercings wondered, before getting summarily smacked on the face by the boss.

"We'z got a waggon fur ourselvz! We'z takn' it to dah mekk! Have to kustomize it to-" But before he could continue, the corpses suddenly sprung up and fired all their weapons at the boss, ripping his face and chest open before the brute fell to the ground, dead and bloody.

Piercings took out his gun and started firing. He didn't see the mechanical claw that swung overhead from outside and hooked through his skull, lifting the ork out of sight.

And then the undead ork servitors jumped out, before gunfire and ork roars echoed beyond.

And then the battlewagon began moving.

And the engine roared louder.

And louder.

And faster.

An explosion echoed from outside, and she managed to catch a glimpse of one of the other orks inside the battlewagon fall to the ground on its head, limp and unmoving. While the battlewagon kept getting faster and faster!

Oh Throne!

What in the Warp is going on?!

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The walking dead were performing their duties excellently.

The main leader of this contingent of Speed Freaks had been eliminated, but that didn't mean the rest of their ilk would not fight.

The Revenants that moved outside held onto the Battlewagon wherever their hands could find purchase and pelted the ugly things on their war bikes.

One bike down.

Four more to go.

The missile buggy, however, was fast on the take and had moved out of the way faster than I had managed to make the turrets on top of this ramshackle construct turn. By the time it fired, a missile was unleashed from its pod.

Split seconds before it made impact, something happened, and all the Revenants outside the battlewagon fell to the ground, as if marionettes with their strings cut. Their connections to me completely severed in an instant.

Like a bladesman releasing their main weapon from their grip, creating an opening for a dagger to strike, I played my hand just in time.

In the place of the Revenants, something took the blow that was meant for the battlewagon and exploded in a mass of spectral bones.

Alas, my invocation did not simply see the Revenants outside fall like discarded dolls. My driver was also out, and I could not get it back up. Not with my other active incantation running. And the Battlewagon was stuck on max speed.

Oh hell!

I reached my hand out and, with a bit of arcane effort, gave naissance to an eldritch invocation.

A reddish mass of hardened slime tendril blossomed from my forearm and blasted the driver revenant out of the battlewagon, along with the vehicle's door.

Thank goodness for simple spells!

Good news: I could grab the steering wheel and control this puppy!

Bad news: I destroyed the door that would have given me protection from bullets.

Worse news: My legs can't reach the breaks!!

FUCKING HELL!

-Boom!-

Better news: At least the missile Warbuggy was gone. I could get rid of the rest of these green gits if I stopped the Battlewagon!

Come oooonnn!

There-clank!- MOTHERFUCKER! Why did the break jam all of a sudden!?

I looked down and saw the reason for it.

Piece of scrap got in the box.

I looked at the front for any obstacles and turned the wheel on this hulking pile of metal to a more even path before I headed down under to get rid of the thing jamming the breaks.

Then my shoulder burst into agonising heat as I felt a bullet rip through my flesh and out into the cab, smearing the window with my glistering blood.

I poked my head out to see the culprit, ignoring how my shoulder was already almost fully healed.

And then the green git that shot me had the gall to look confused when I didn't fit his long established stereotype of a big green buffoon on the driver's seat. "A humie?!"

Yeah gonk head! A Humie!

His Warbike exploded from a Nebula blast, turning the ugly Ork on it into a mass of sparkling ash on the ground.

Three more bikes to go. The other buggy still remained.

-Trunk!- Wait… that came from right behind. "I'm commin' to get yah!"

Ah, crap, we got boarders!

Ah well.

The little gremlins had done their job with the Missile Buggy.

Time to see if they can buy me some time.

I held the blood-soaked, skull-adorned focus on my belt I ritually crafted from the remains of my very annoying and very verdant enemies, channelling mystical power into its manifestation matrix.

When I threw away my hold over my Revenants over this, I made sure that it could compete with them.

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Bruggah held on the Battlewagun for dear life as he stood on the roof of the big vehicle. It was a good one, he thought. Big, loud and very orky. Not something some humie git should be driving!

So, he had jumped off the buggy and crawled over the roof like a crawly squig and got closer to the drivah's place as he took a bomb from his back bag. He was gonna make it go boom and then his buddies were gonna have a whole Battlewagun for themselves!

Their mekk will be very happy to tinker with it, he was sure!

So goal in mind, Bruggah got into position to make a good explosion that would get him loads of teef.

But as he reached the driver's place, something suddenly shot out of there like an angry, biting squig. Except it wasn't a squig. It was white and glowy and weird and with sharp claws and teeth, and it looked like a gretchin that was nothing but bones!

"What in Gork's name ar yuz!?" He shouted at the thing, mere instants before it clambered all over his face and started clawing and biting like a snotling that had too much wubshine to drink. "AAH! Youz dam ting! I'll crump ya!" He shouted and swung his big, meaty arm with-

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-BOOM!-

Lisa's head turned skyward in surprise when the top of the battlewagon suddenly exploded. Where once a ramshackle roof existed, now a gaping hole revealing the overcast skies above stood in its place.

Pieces of flesh, blood, bits of metal and fragments of strangely glowing bones rained down on the floor and near her.

What in the Warp had happened?!

She gripped her lasrifle all the tighter, waiting with bated breath when the next explosion would come, unknowing whether or not it would be the one to end the ork vehicle and seal her fate.

But as she contemplated these thoughts, a spark of movement caught her eye's attention, and she followed it with her sight.

But then, her knuckles became white the moment she saw what had beckoned her attention.

Pieces of ghastly glowing bone moved together in unison, converging at the centre of the battlewagon's cargo space like a swarm of vermin congregating upon a piece of discarded meat.

With each inch they drew close, the bone shards grew larger and more whole.

And when enough finally met, they began to clump together, assembling themselves into a mockery of life. Clawed fingers came together and became a hand before being raised into an arm.

A scapula formed from two fragmented bones and locked into place behind a growing ribcage. Disjointed vertebrae materialised multiple spines that connected the ribcage into a forming pelvis.

And when it grabbed its head before placing it upon an awaiting neck, Lisa snapped from the suspended dread that had stunned her into inaction.

She forced herself out and took aim at the forming abomination of bone and unholy magics before firing an opening salvo upon it.

That thing wasn't natural! That thing was sorcery! Witchcraft of the most vile and profane order!

She knew something wrong was afoot, but to behold immediate confirmation of its depths of sin?!

She silently thanked and cursed the orks for this! Thanked them for forcing this sorcerer to show its hand and cursed them even more so than she already did for putting her in this situation in the first place!

"RAAAGH!!" She fired again and again and again.

Each streak of light impacted the monstruous bone creature and blew off osseous matter time and again.

Its head came off first, then its arm. Its torso followed, being blasted open, with white, howling bone splinters flying off from the abomination.

Again and again and again, until only smouldering splinters remained.

But the bones did not cease to move, and they kept trying to reform.

She would not let them!

So, she pushed herself out of her hiding spot fully, emerging from a heap of scrap and onto wobbly and uncertain footing. One that would damn her in this forsaken ride when the battlewagon hit something and caused the vehicle to stagger, forcing her, in turn to fall to her knees and hands.

"Frak! Frak! Emperor frak all of this!" She cursed, and from her near prone position, she took aim again with her lasrifle and started firing at the collection of bones that simply refused to stay dead!

Why wouldn't it die!?

Then, the buggy staggered again. The rapid up and down motion sending her airborne for an instant before smacking her jaw upon the hard metal floor.

Dazed and with her body's aches redoubling from all of this, she had lost her grip on her weapon.

Lisa's eyes opened, flashing in and out of consciousness as the pile of bones took the opening and began redoubling their efforts to reform into the abomination.

She tried to use her meagre remaining strength to reach for her weapon.

Too far.

And the battlewagon's movements kept making it vibrate away from her!

"Emperor…" She prayed. Breathing deep and heavy. "Give… me…" She weakly limped towards her weapon. "…strength."

"Oi! I'z found a hole!" A sound, from high above. An ork!

No! Nonono!

Not now!

She managed to grab her weapon. Yes!

She heard the sound of something heavy land not too far away from her.

NO!

But then her world lurched, direction shifted, and she was flung aside, along with a gargle of scrap and a confused ork, before she felt her head slam against the wall.

And darkness rushed in to consume her.

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To be continued…

 

[KazKhan]

Ahh a most accurate representation of what happens when the average imperial comes into contact with absolutely wild things beyond their comprehension. Hopefully she wakes up in a safer place than an active battlefield with the Boyz.

 

[Black-Aengel-01]

Ahh a most accurate representation of what happens when the average imperial comes into contact with absolutely wild things beyond their comprehension. Hopefully she wakes up in a safer place than an active battlefield with the Boyz.

Click to shrink...

She should. Also, it was a rightfully appropriate one. I mean, if you were in this mad universe and suddenly you saw this kind of crap happening in front of you, what would you do? Go up to it and offer it tea?

Sure, it may actually work to confuse the thing. But make sure you smack it on the head with the coffee holder and pour that hot liquid on it for good measure.

I know its a waste of perfectly good coffee... but the insult must be made apparent.

 

[Black-Aengel-01]

I wonder if posting this on RoyalRoad may get better views... Eh, no reason as to why not give it a try.



Virtuous Iridescence [Terrarian Calamity SI In 40k]

Chapter 4

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The orks jeered as the Battlewagon came to an abrupt halt. Greed, bloodlust and jolly filled murder painted their loud snarls. Much like a pack of ravenous Komodo dragons approaching a wounded animal to devour whilst still alive, they began to circle the unmoving vehicle, before they dismounted their own roaring steeds of scrap and violence and made their approach proper.

The wagon's engine sputtered and belched black, toxic fumes like a dragon coughing its pyric entrails as its engine kept running with loud, panicked vigour.

To any human observer familiar with the secrets of technology, the battlewagon was an injured animal in its dying throes. However, to any living being familiar with what absurdity passed as the Ork's technology, they understood that this constant loud wailing of machinery, even while the structure itself was motionless, was well within the margins of normality.

This terminating of movement came not from a malfunction in the wagon's bizarre and haphazard craftsmanship.

Far from it.

It was of deliberate design.

The approaching orks giggled and cackled at the prize in their hands. The twinkling of greed in their eyes, their giggling imaginations at the carnage they would create with their newfound prize.

A Battlewagon was no measly vehicle to steal. It was a large, heavily armoured and hideous thing. A construct of welded metal and sharp edges, decorated with metal teeth for the purpose of intimidation and made all the more fancy in the eyes of the greenskins by the various knick-knacks adorning its steely hide. Its custom-made engine, a beast of cacophonous noise, and its armament indeed was one made for the art of slaughter.

And then a pair of boots landed on the wasted, gravel-filled soil.

A human in all regards. Armed with nothing but his bare hands, he was wearing nought but heavy pants, boots and a dirty white shirt that had seen far better days.

A meagre prey to the likes of the brutes now approaching him. Even if he were a witch.

Fear was a foreign notion to the ork race.

The first ork laughed and ran ahead to cleave this little human in twain.

The first blow came, a downward arc aimed at the human's shoulder to rip him through the crotch.

The swing came through, the ork felt his axe hit and finished his downward strike.

Except… when he realised, his weapon was no longer in his hand. He looked at the human, and his eyes widened in confusion when he saw his weapon's edge being stopped dead in its tracks by the mere hand of a human.

He only had a split second to see the golden shimmer in the human's eyes to recognise the error he had committed. Golds like honeyed sunlight, blues so cold as to chill the flesh down to the bones and violets so vibrant that they threatened to make even the roiling tempests of the Immaterium pale in comparison.

The ork that had made the first blow fell to the ground in a heap of dark green blood, his entire torso cleaved open, exposing the organs within to the stale air beyond. The beast's original weapon, now covered in the blood of its once master.

"Urgh… you..z gonna pay fur-" That's as far as he got before a horizontal slash split his head from the eyes up.

The instrument of his final demise, spinning rapidly around the human's outstretched hand, was a disk of glistering liquid that seemed to sharpen with every turn of its axis. This was no psychic energy, not in the traditional sense.

This was sorcery unbound by the rules of the powers in the Warp and following the dictates of something else.

Something deadly and profanely holy.

The orks bellowed their warcries, their signature "WAAAGH!" as they charged at the newly revealed threat.

And then the human replied in turn.

An unearthly roar escaped his lips, something that echoed with the distant shrill of a bird of prey, yet too deep and guttural. The air turned too hot and too cold at once. Sparkles of nebula crawled up at the edge of the vision of the greenskins, and the shadows elongated as if being pulled by in by something from the depths of the void.

Something akin to discomfort descended upon the first ork, unable to realise his torso was missing a lung and arm, he only saw a trail of shimmering liquid passing through him.

The not-human was upon him before he even landed on the ground.

He reached out.

The un-human did the same.

Both hands locked. Jagged thorns and flowers blossomed across the entire forearm of the greenskin before motion shifted, and he was slammed against the nearest of his kind.

Two bodies converged, one broke, the other fell.

The blade of astral water returned, and the bellows of another greenskin were silenced when the blade when the Razorblade Typhoon sliced his ugly head off his shoulders.

Two more beasts shouted and struck.

One a cleaver, one a claw.

The not-human lowered beneath the first. The second caught his arm.

A bloody grin and the pincer pressed with the force to crush steel and bone alike.

It exploded into a smear of black, vile ooze. He only had a split second to see the un-human's swift turn. He felt a blow on his chest and fell back, spitting the same dark ooze as his entrails melted into ooze by Entropic Meld Fields.

The cleaver came down again.

It met the un-human's own.

By the time it came back down again, both his arms were missing.

A green head rolled on the ground, its expression one of rage and shock. Another victim of the disk of liquid.

More would follow.

Gunshots echoed.

The un-human did nothing. All bullets had missed. He snorted, half amused, half pitying, all mocking.

The cleaver in the imprecise ork's head did not.

One more came.

A punch and the greenskin's back exploded as nebula energy tore its way through.

Lastly came a warbike. Its engines wailing with black smoke as it came in to ram the not-human.

He evaded it with impossible grace, leaping high above the warbike before landing with nary a sound.

Just as the greenskin turned to attempt the action again, he caught a glimpse of something swift by the corner of his eye.

The not-human merely sidestepped the warbike as it fruitlessly raged on in its path. Its headless driver, not doing much to give it any semblance of aim, would vanish with its bike into the horizon within a few minutes.

Finally, peace reigned. The only sounds in the surrounding being that of distant winds coursing through the war-scarred wastes, and the Typhoon disk orbiting the un-human like a planetoid spinning under its parent star's gravity.

As a summoner, it would not go away any time soon. The mana that held it together, being of a much denser and wilful nature, would ensure that it would persist for perhaps an entire hour if left to its own devices.

But it need not be.

So, Zachariah reached for it, and the arcane watery projection lost its disk-like structure, submitting into an amorphous state ahead of returning to its master.

The Godslayer held the spell in his hands before shaping it into a different archetype through his studies of cosmic arcane lore. Stretched it, condensed it, before it began to scintillate with the elemental energies of the universe.

He aimed at the Battlewagon and released it before hearing a pained cry of a greenskin within as his body disintegrated from an elemental symphony.

All threats eliminated.

He sighed.

Good.

Time to leave.

There was much work to be done and too many green nuisances around for him to do any of it.

Zachariah flicked his fingers, and a number of the ork corpses got up to replace his prior lost Revenants. Wordlessly, he instructed them to get on the Battlewagon as he himself floated into the Battlewgon through the hole on its roof.

As he descended, he found that Guardswoman on the floor, blood pooling out from her brow.

God damn it. He would need to fix her up again.

Scanning around, he found that the other humans were still where he had instructed the Revenants to place them before all hell broke loose. Good. He'll have to check up on them later.

But first, this woman.

Taking her in his arms, he began channelling healing energies upon her body. Hopefully, no permanent brain damage has happened, but one can never know.

Those tended to be hard to deal with at the best of times. Still, it was time to go to base. There he will see what he can do.

The Revenant, on the driver's seat, punched the gearbox, twisted some component and flipped a switch and then the -POOM!!Vroomvroomvrooooomm……….poohhf…-

"… FUCK!"

Not again!

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Bruggah slowly woke up.

His head hurt.

A lot.

Like if a nob had used it to play Gretchen ball, and had metal boots to boot. Heh. Funny.

Bruggah lifted his hand to rub his head, but got confused when no arm came. "Wut?" He sat up, looking at his right arm, or what was left of it.

When did this happen?

Oh!... "Oh right! I'z smacked dat skelly git with a bomb…" That was a dumb thing to do.

Oh well, he was alive at least, and he had his lefty, so he can get back to crumping more gits later. Next time he won't be using a grenade to hit things with. They are made to throw, not whack! Remember that for next time, Bruggah.

Also, where was he now?

He looked around, finding himself in a small ditch. He poked his head out, seeing no one around.

Oh, that sucked. He wanted to crump something to make him feel better.

Or a bike. Speaking of bikes! Where's everybody? Did they all just leave him?

Now that made Bruggah mad.

That's not very nice of them!

He got out of the ditch, snarling. Why he oughta smack all of them when he finds them. With his choppa!

There should be a warbike somewhere. Hopefully.

Otherwise, he'll have to walk all the way back to the Ork Settlement. And that would be horrible! Bruggah didn't like walking! He liked going fast on his wheels!

Oh! There it's one bike. Toppled over and in a ditch too.

He ran towards it and found it in great condition!

Just a little bloody, but Bruggah liked it that way. Gave it character.

Uh… wait. He knew this bike! This belonged to Dreffjaw! Oh he always had such a nice bike. But where was Dreff? He didn't want the big lug to catch Bruggah stealing it.

He caught one of the boys trying to steal his bike and it didn't end well for them. Better look around just in case.

So Bruggah looked around, hoping to find the bigger ork somewhere.

He saw a rock… and lifted it to look underneath. "Hey Dreffjaw! I'z not stealin' ur bike!" He waited for a response… none.

Nope. None.

He wasn't there, that's for sure.

Dreffjaw was a sneaky git. But he weren't that sneaky.

So Bruggah kept looking for a bit more.

Under another rock? Nope. Maybe under this metal plate? No. Oh maybe in this ditch! No, that's just a headless-Wait! That was Dreffjaw!

He was dead!

…That meant that Dreffjaw wasn't gonna crump Bruggah for stealing his bike! Thank Mork and Gork! "I'z got a brand new bike!" He was gonna crump so many skulls with it and decorate it with teeth and knick-knacks!

He mounted his new warbike and cackled when he turned on the ignition.

He was going to his mek. Hopefully, he has seen the boyz.

And then he'll smack them with his choppa!

"Woooh!" Driving with one arm is hard.

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To be Continued…

 

[MinerFrags]

NEWZ BOIKE!!!!!

 

[Sesparra]

Nice job getting across how bullshit Terrarians are in combat<3

 

[ptbptb]

Worse news: My legs can't reach the breaks!!

Click to shrink...

The MC needs a break.
The MC's legs need to reach the brakes.

Why did the break jam all of a sudden!?

Click to shrink...

Still 'brake'.

 

[Black-Aengel-01]

Nice job getting across how bullshit Terrarians are in combat<3

Click to shrink...

And he's a shit mage. Imagine he was an actual mage. He'd only need to give the orks a mean look and they would have burst into Brimstone flames.

The MC needs a break.
The MC's legs need to reach the brakes.

Still 'brake'.

Click to shrink...

Thank you mate.

 

[Black-Aengel-01]

A Calamity Upon the Stars [Terrarian Calamity SI In 40k]

Chapter 5

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After what felt like a day's worth of travel, we finally came to a halt at what was, at some point, a human coastal settlement. Now, all that remained were war-scarred ruins.

Broken down houses, shattered buildings, decayed vehicle parts that have, for the most part, been picked apart by prior ork looters, abandoned and empty shops, run down fisheries and what remained of what could have been an administrative building. There were lingering pieces of WAAAGH banners here and there. A scrap yard connected to a haphazardly assembled shop that once belonged to a budding mek.

There were bones here and there, scattered about and picked clean by scavengers, before the sun bleached them dry and white. Both of human and Greenskin origins.

The only life that remained in this dreary place was that of fungal pods emerging from the soil periodically to remind me that this place has long since been made subject of the greenskins. Even the seas had lost a large percentage of their natural biomass to the orkish infestation, with the presence of squig fish and squig sharks occasionally showing their presence, hunting more of their fellow orkoid organisms to feed.

The end result of Ork spores hard at work. Stubborn bastards that have, more than once, forced me to pay attention to their development if I want to avoid another orkish settlement to develop here.

It was odd when I started seeing little red angry things emerge from the ground that one day without warning. Those squiglings did not waste any time in attempting to attack me the moment they became aware of my presence.

When I had first arrived at this place, there were Gretchins already herding Squigs and preparing the dead town for a fresh new wave of Ork Boyz to add their number to this damnable conflict.

I exterminated them all and found the growing pods of their larger morphs gestating with massive foetuses the size of full-grown men.

Most of their bodies were used as research materials of varying kinds.

How long has it been?

How long has the Imperium been fighting these brutish creatures that the Greenskins had the time to set up a forward base in this settlement, be killed off and allow their spores to develop into producing Gretchin still?

My mind turned to the cargo at the back. More precisely, the eight humans who resided within, waiting for further treatment inside my base of operations.

They could provide answers I sorely need to understand the dynamics in this system and what my next move would be.

An Imperial conflict with the orks that spanned years could pertain to many things. None of them particularly bodes well for the Imperials in any capacity, but could still offer me some leeway. From general, corrupt incompetence, to this planet being the converging site of a massive Waaagh that has yet to be defeated, any of these two scenarios presented opportunities I could capitalise on if I used my cards right.

Escape had been on my mind since day one. But attaining FTL travel in this universe may be a challenge in of itself that I may be ill-prepared to face. Not with the current amount of resources I had at hand, even if I was better placed than most to amass it if given the chance.

However, any plans must wait until after the upcoming interrogations. And the latter must, in itself, come after I have these Imperials in better physical condition to speak.

Thusly, first and foremost on my list of things to do is transporting my acquisitions to a safer location.

I got off the Battlewagon, wordlessly instructing the Revenants to offload the looted machine parts and bodies I acquired. The wagon itself will be torn down into more useful scrap metal before processing it later.

I first needed to open the way to my place of residence.

Stripping down to my underwear, I hovered off towards a large well near one of the run-down houses, one I had marked with a rune only I recognised and then floated down into its depths.

I did not float down for long before the relatively narrow hole straight down opened into a wide, cold cavern filled almost to the brim with murky water. I could tell a few fungal spores here and there, growing at the edge of the basin, and with a flick of my hand, Brimstone fire seared the ever-present nuisances into crimson-tinged ash.

I followed my eye towards one of the cavern edges I knew to look for and made my way there, before lowering down and making contact with the water.

A shiver ran up my spine at the cold liquid's touch.

I ignored the sensation before holding my breath and submerging myself fully, and then, with magic-aided swimming, made my way into the other side and emerged out into another cave, this one lit by artificial lights and the hum of technology.

I got off the watery pit and floated to the door before grabbing a towel I acquired from one of the empty houses, and started drying up, as I removed my underwear for cleaning and drying.

A blackened, bony hand reached out to grab the offered clothing article, and the Charred Wight then made its way out to the cleaning station after I handed it over.

I observed the thing as it went.

Once a regular undead Revenant, like the creatures I now have working on the surface, but reduced to enchanted charred bone. Using a mixture of necromancy and brimstone magics in much the same way the damned spirits of Azafure have been made to forever walk that accursed place until they find final death, or the hundreds of bone revenants in the underground and dungeons, these constructs are fully self-sustaining, and have no need of my direct mana flow to keep themselves animated. But unlike the creatures that haunt the Brimstone Crag, these servitors are bereft of any will of their own and only know servitude under my name.

They are the defence system I trust to ensure no ork spore enters this sacred realm of my making.

It took three days of unending and sleepless work, but I managed to carve out a cavern of my own that I have built over with everything I could gather from the surrounding places.

Three more days, and it was a decent base of operations that had everything I needed to build almost anything requiring mundane materials.

Nothing of note, to be frank, but this place is built for functionality, not appeal.

It could not hold a candle to the settlement me and my… sigh… my friends built back whilst hiding from Yharin's army.

I miss them… their insights and their banter… and… I miss my parents…

I didn't get to say goodbye.

At least my friends back on Terraria, assuming everything my memory holds of back then is genuine and true, managed to voice their farewells just before the Witch showed up, whilst I was battle weary from that fight I had.

My hand clenches into a white knuckled fist. Barely coming out of that fight alive… and the destruction that it wrought as a result.

That time… that time I had no fucking control of the situation!

Fool… fool that you are!

Experimenting with half-forgotten secrets of things that were made missing for a reason.

Permafrost warned me against such a course of action, but my arrogance and curiosity demanded answers!

And now look where I/we are!

In a place arguably worse than the worst Terraria could offer.

At least I should be thankful that I have metaknowledge on this universe / a body and experience that could fight against creatures that could threaten whole worlds!

Whichever of the two lives is real however…

Sigh… later. Later.

Open the hatches, get dressed and get to work. Existentialism won't do us any favour now. There are people up above who need medical aid.

So, snapping out of my inner turmoil, I made my way towards the workshop and flipped the main switch, setting the various arrangements of machinery online. A few minutes of powering up and loading later, my display terminal lit up properly, and the desktop menu showed up.

I will not get enough out of Imperial tech.

It's both very high quality and weirdly put together. So much stuff works through wetware cogitator engines that it drove me mad when I had to find a workaround.

Thankfully, zombie brain matter can do just the trick if you know what you're doing.

Magic is bullshit.

And the Fingers of Creation even more so.

I began drying my hair as I consulted the battery capacity and grimaced at the numbers.

Thirty per cent. Not bad, but not as much as I hoped it would be filled by the time I got back.

Ilmerian Crystals produce too little electricity if they are too small, only generating decent quantities when and if they are of substantial size. And at only one ton, it's a pitiful thing, woefully unable to satisfy my energy demands. I really need to get around to building that damnable Navyplate reactor.

But I am still in the process of so many other things that it slips me at times.

Sigh. Regardless, I do not have the energy demands for getting everything done today, so I'll have to prioritise.

I reached out for a key lever and a horizontal gateway on the cavern roof dilated open, dust and bits and pieces of rocks fell down into the waiting waters below, and as it did, chains began lifting a cargo platform to meet with my Revenants.

They already had the instructions, as they all share a link with my psyche.

The Wight bore a different connection, one that allowed some manner of autonomy, but more akin to established machine protocols than actual free capacity for limited agency.

A simple set of instructions, and they would not attack the humans on sight any longer. I will need to change their protocols somewhat for later, now that there may be guests around for some time, and I would not want them to find themselves in undesired areas that could get them killed.

Or more infuriatingly, incline them to want to kill me.

Looking around at the various, very clearly heretekal and highly esoteric, scraps I have gathered here, I may have to amend my earlier statement.

I ought to have said, 'incline them further to want to kill me'.

But only the Emperor knows if these people can be sensible.

Not very likely, considering the indoctrination since birth that all these people are subject to, but a demigod can dream. Not that I blame them one bit. It's the Chaos Gods' fault after all.

And the Ecclessiarchy's.

And Lorgar's.

And the Emperor.

And the Eldar.

And the Necrons.

And the Old Ones.

Bloody Moon, this chain of blaming goes deep, doesn't it?

Anyhow, the Revenants have begun placing the wounded guardsmen on the platform whilst the Wights await their descent at the bottom of the shaft.

I should get dressed.

Getting medical attention from a doctor in nothing but his birthday suit may be the intro to a terrible adult entertainment film, but it's highly uncouth.

So as the wounded cargo made its way down, I made my way to another section of my base of operations.

I grabbed one of the chains nearby and reduced gravity's hold on me before using it to launch myself up into a semi-hidden rise in this place of mine. Vaulting over the rise, I landed on where I had made my sleeping quarters, overseeing all beneath.

Grabbing a set of clothes from the drawer, I clad myself in something clean whilst I overlooked my place of residence and work.

A literal junk pile of scrap and components to the right of the chamber. Pieces of ork gear, Imperial household technology and a handful of servitor pieces that I didn't get much use out of yet.

Thankfully, most filth is kept from compiling thanks to the lone Androomba I managed to scrape together. The poor little guy's been working so hard to keep the place all tidy and neat… despite the futility of it all.

If it were a living person, it would deserve a six-month paid vacation leave for how diligent it has been.

I really shouldn't have given it a cute face. I'm starting to get attached.

Aside from the lone Androomba scouring the area of any grime it can find, I have managed to construct Ten Wighs, all of which were crafted from ork corpses.

Further ahead was the workshop, where I had managed to forge a hideous mechanical amalgam of servitor components and computer systems to act as a very crude and absurd-looking armoury assembler. If I didn't know better, I would wager that the Greenskins are affecting my choice of craftsmanship.

My Ilmeris Prism power plant down under the workshop, and the battery beside it, may give credence to that theory.

Alas, it's immediately proven false by the architectural style of the Ritual and Alchemy chamber deeper down.

Alright. Now that I am presentable… I shall start by providing some aid to my new patients. Then I'll tie them up nice and good before building up a medical ward/interrogation chamber.

This is gonna be fun.

My sarcasm knows no bounds.

I leapt down, hands slowly coming into light with gold.

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To be Continued.

 

[zack omega24]

Thanks for the chapter

 

[LazyDragonsGaze]

Looking forward to seeing the MC interact with people.