Chapter 332: Honor to Lork, Honor to the World Eaters
He was not yet completely broken. His blood was still flowing.
. . .
The former Legion Master of the World Eaters, now First Company Captain, Lork, had once believed that after his transformation into an Astartes, he had lost the ability to cry.
But now, scarlet liquid was running down his cheeks.
"Lork, you're our last chance. Take our father out of here… or… kill him. Don't let him suffer like this."
The last surviving psyker—Chief Librarian Vorias—spoke softly, as if afraid to disturb the beast whose head rested unconscious upon his shoulder.
The nails driven into the beast's skull were humming faintly. Blood flowed from his towering nose, and his massive body lay limp and senseless upon Vorias's shoulder, while the Chief Librarian tried, as best he could, to hold their Primarch in his arms.
A hazy, pure white psychic radiance enveloped Vorias—the final glimmer of the Chief Librarian's power, faint yet inviolate.
Lork opened his mouth. His throat was raw; blood and words spilled from it together.
"…Alright."
He heard a faint sound of laughter. Perhaps Vorias had smiled, but with the Chief Librarian's back turned, Lork could only see the blood streaming down their father's face.
A soft, steadfast white light bloomed before his eyes—a sight he had witnessed countless times before. Wounds sealed, nightmares faded, and the twitching of the Primarch's eyelids slowed to stillness.
Vorias simply stood there quietly. Around them lay the corpses of countless fallen World Eaters—common Astartes and psykers alike. Their blood had soaked the ground.
Slowly, everything dimmed.
Vorias reached out weakly, fumbling to wipe the blood from the Primarch's face—a futile, almost comical gesture—and then his hand fell.
A faint scraping sound echoed as Vorias sank to his knees. The Primarch slid from his shoulder and lay still upon the red sand.
Vorias lowered his head. Blood dripped from the Chief Librarian's face, falling upon the sharp-carved features of the Primarch, then down to the ground.
Lork said nothing. He stepped forward, laboriously heaving the Primarch onto his back. Dragging Angron, he moved toward the next chamber—a place filled with enemies and monstrosities, while molten rock surged behind them. They could not linger in any one place for long.
Vorias knelt there, watching them fade into the distance.
. . .
After that—how many battles did they fight? Seven hundred? Eight hundred? Lork could no longer remember.
Sometimes he dragged the unconscious Angron—felled by the nails' torment—as they fled the rising magma. Other times he awoke from a despairing faint to find the Primarch himself carrying him, running, and when Angron saw him alive, he would grin.
They fought endless hordes of crimson, frenzied monsters. The timing was always cruelly perfect—just as they finished cleaving through yet another wave, when their legs were barely steady enough to run again, the roar of molten fury would sound behind them, forcing them to flee onward to the next chamber.
Rest was brief. At first, Angron devoured the flesh of those crimson beasts to replenish his strength, but that flesh was poison to an Astartes. So Angron made Lork drink his blood instead.
A chainsword split the skin; blood ran freely from his palm.
The Primarch's blood gave him strength. Perhaps that was the only reason Lork still stood, swaying but unbroken.
He had nailed his life to this place—to the edge of death itself—and in his haze of exhaustion, Lork understood: his stubborn will to live was the last thread keeping his Primarch's sanity tethered to this world.
If he died—if the last World Eater to stand beside their Primarch fell—what would become of Angron?
Would he be swallowed whole by rage and despair, become one of those crimson monstrosities they had fought again and again?
Lork already knew the answer. Even as he coughed and spat blood, he thought that perhaps death would be a kind of release for him.
But not yet. Not now.
The vast, mocking presence that toyed with them seemed to realize Lork's interference.
In battle, he came to the brink of death over and over again—and each time, he dragged himself back by sheer will alone.
He had thought, more than once, of killing Angron—granting their father peace, just as Vorias had asked of him.
But slowly, Lork began to understand: in this place, death could not bring the Primarch rest.
On the contrary—some essence of him would be taken away.
Death here meant defeat.
Defeat meant submission.
And the victor always claimed the right to execute the vanquished—soul and flesh alike.
For the living, there was only one choice left: to fight.
But Angron's suffering grew worse—and worse still.
Lork could not sense the psychic currents of this realm, but he could hear the truth in the Nails: their buzzing had grown more violent, more frenzied.
Fragments of brain tissue replaced blood, running from Angron's nose. The Primarch wiped it away without care—yet after that first surge, he never again fed upon the corpses of the crimson beasts.
Lork said nothing.
Among the World Eaters, only the Librarians had studied the Butcher's Nails in depth.
They had used their powers to strike Angron's will into brief unconsciousness whenever he began to lose control—granting him, for a moment, a fragile peace of the soul.
But such a technique came with a price: each use drove the Nails deeper into his skull.
Before they were trapped here, the Librarians had rarely dared employ it—not even when Angron himself begged them to.
Yet within this warped realm, where psychic storms raged like an endless sea, the Librarians' power was gentle by comparison.
They could even dampen the Nails' agony, shield Angron from the worst of the psychic torment.
That final light Vorias had released before his death—it had been that same Librarian's art.
The oldest of the World Eaters' psykers had poured his life into one last protective glow, to ease his Primarch's pain for as long as possible.
But as the blood spilled and dried again and again, that fragile light faded.
Vorias was long gone.
Angron was reaching his limit. Even if endless battle had not taken him, the Nails' furious hum would soon end his life.
More than once, Lork had thought—in pain that hollowed his soul—if only the Legion had arrived sooner.
Or even… if only I could take his suffering upon myself.
But it was far too late now.
Every path had been erased.
All that remained was battle.
. . .
This would be the last time.
He was going to die.
Lork struggled, clawing to pull himself back onto the ship of the living, but all he could hear was the hopeless scraping of his nails along its hull.
"Lork! Lork!"
He heard his Primarch calling to him above the water's surface.
Lork tried to open his eyes wide, but darkness was all he saw.
Perhaps he was already dead.
Or perhaps, just before death, the mind lingers for a while—though to the outside world, he must have looked utterly lifeless.
Because Lork felt Angron let him go.
He felt the Primarch rise, roaring, bellowing—blood and spit striking the ground like rain.
"Every time! Every single time!!"
Angron's cry was pure despair. He swung his axe wildly through empty air, as if locked in mortal combat with an unseen foe.
"Damn these cursed Nails!!! The one they should have killed was ME—not my teacher! Not my sons! Not my brothers!!!"
"Damn it all!! WHY?! WHY!!!"
Unbelievably—for the first time—the Lord of the Red Sands let go of his axe.
The blood-red weapon struck the ground with two heavy thuds.
Angron screamed in agony.
He thrust his hands into the thick mass of nails that crowned his skull like braided hair, and then—
He pulled.
"AaaaaaAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"
The Primarch's scream split the air—shrill, raw, unrestrained.
The pain was so unbearable that Angron dropped to his knees in an instant.
The Nails writhed between his fingers like living worms, twisting and burrowing, while blood and bone fragments exploded from his skull.
His entire body convulsed uncontrollably, jerking like a corpse struck by lightning—yet his hands did not relent for even a heartbeat.
He gripped, and fought, and tore at his unjust fate with all the strength he had left.
No… no… Father… no…
Lork's eyes were half open.
He could hear the Nails' violent, near-bursting hum.
No… don't do this to yourself, Angron.
We chose this… of our own will…
His lips moved faintly, but only a ragged breath escaped—no words.
Angron's blood splattered all around him, as if in ritual offering.
Flames erupted suddenly.
Voices rose from within the fire—the guttural language of daemons.
Lork began to struggle.
He cursed his broken, failing body; rage boiled within him.
He understood, then—it had all been a lie.
Their father had been the one hurt most of all.
How dare they?! How dare they mock the World Eaters—mock Angron—like this?!
But still, he lay motionless, unable even to cry out.
Before Angron, the ground began to melt.
From the molten fissure rose a blood-drenched colossal axe, its eight skulls staring down at the Primarch with hollow, burning eyes.
+Take me.+
It spoke.
+I will grant you release—skulls, and blood.+
But could there still be any shred of reason left within the Primarch's mind, now that the Nails had driven so deep?
Angron ignored the axe completely, roaring as he wrestled with the Nails burrowed in his own head.
As if realizing Angron's defiance, the ground trembled violently.
A scarlet beast emerged—massive, horned, its hooves cracking the earth—and it turned its horns toward Lork, eager, hungry.
+Take me, Angron—or your son will be defiled.+
Angron gasped for breath, his chest heaving.
He lifted his head sharply—and saw the blasphemous creature, poised to strike.
"No… NO!!!"
His hands trembled as he pulled them away from his head.
Slowly, painfully, the Primarch rose to his feet.
Saliva and shredded flesh dripped from his mouth.
No. No. Never.
He glared at the monster, teeth bared—then reached down toward the nearest axe before him—
But as his fingers brushed the weapon, something was wrong.
The feeling was different.
He looked down.
A pair of hands—white-armored, blood-stained—were already there, gripping the axe.
Not seizing it, but blocking him from taking it.
"Lo… Lork?"
Angron's voice broke into a whimper of anguish.
Before him stood his son—wreathed in blood and flame—silent, unyielding.
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