Naturally, Duanmu Huai had no idea that someone was preparing a trap for him. But the deeper he went, the more he felt that something was not quite right.
Because the demons he encountered were… somewhat different from the ones he knew.
Generally speaking, as an Inquisitor, Duanmu Huai was very familiar with the demons serving the four Chaos Gods. Yet the demons he met here were not servants of the Chaos Gods at all. Instead, they looked more like… primordial demons?
Heh, now this is getting interesting.
Contrary to popular belief, the Chaos Gods had not always existed in the Warp. In the beginning, they were merely… hmm… entities without self-awareness or physical form, something like raw psychic energy.
At that time, the Warp was calm. Apart from demons formed from the emotional projections of living beings, there were no particularly powerful entities.
One point must be made clear: the Warp itself had no order or flow of time. Looking at it through the human concept of time was meaningless. Simply put, when a Chaos God was born, it simultaneously existed in the Warp's past, present, and future—one, singular, eternal existence.
However, that did not mean the time it existed was the same as the time it was born.
Take the God of Desire, for example. It was the youngest of the Chaos Gods, born from the Aeldari—the cousins of the elves. Like elves, they were long-lived, powerful, and held dominion over their worlds. In their endless lifespans, the Aeldari lost the ability to feel joy from simple pleasures, so they began to chase ever more extreme experiences, craving more violent and intoxicating emotions.
Eventually, these twisted, depraved, and corrupted emotions condensed together, birthing the God of Desire. Its birth screamed across the entire Warp, and it devoured the souls of nearly the entire Aeldari species, becoming one of the Chaos Gods.
And from the instant it was born, it existed simultaneously in the Warp's past, present, and future. Which meant that even though the God of Desire came into being because of the Aeldari, once it was born, it also existed in eras long before the Aeldari themselves.
The same was true of the other three Chaos Gods. From the perspective of human time, they were not primordial deities born with the universe, nor creators of the world. Rather, on the day they came into existence, they immediately became unique, eternal presences across all of time.
But for clarity's sake, let's keep describing them through the human concept of time.
According to player discoveries, during the era when the Old Ones explored the universe and constructed the Webway, the Warp was still calm and devoid of Chaos Gods. Only weak, minor demons existed then—the so-called primordial demons. They were projections of emotions too, but since life's emotions at that time were less intense, no Chaos Gods arose.
So, one might ask: if that was the case, how did the Chaos Gods come to be?
Players had no conclusive proof, but evidence pointed to the Old Ones. Records and ruins suggested that when the Old Ones first entered the Warp to build the Webway, it was peaceful. But later, they encountered the Necrontyr, a short-lived race that craved the Old Ones' near-immortality. Naturally, the Old Ones refused.
Who the hell do you think you are? Barging in and asking me for eternal life? Not even a toad would agree to that.
The Necrontyr grew furious: If you won't give it, we'll just take it!
Thus began the war between the Old Ones and the Necrontyr, known as the "War in Heaven."
Of course, compared to the Old Ones, the Necrontyr had no real strength. It was like a ragtag band of mountain bandits with rusty weapons facing a fully armed Imperial Guard regiment. The Old Ones crushed them. But the Necrontyr refused to bow, and instead, they sought a patron—the C'tan, the Star Gods.
At that time, the C'tan already existed in the universe, but they were little more than cosmic shut-ins basking in starlight. The Necrontyr forged physical bodies for them, giving them self-awareness and material form.
Then one C'tan made a suggestion: Since you fear death so much, why not abandon your frail flesh and embrace mechanical ascension?
Wouldn't that grant you eternal life?
The Necrontyr thought this was brilliant. So, they followed the C'tan's advice, discarded their bodies, and transferred their consciousness into living metal. But this sealed their fate—they lost their souls and their lives, leaving only thought.
Thus the Necrontyr vanished, and the Necrons were born.
Whether Necrons still counted as living beings became a heated debate among players. Some argued that though they lost life and souls, they still had self-awareness, emotions, and thought—so they qualified as life.
Others claimed Necrons were nothing more than robots who thought they had self-awareness, just following programmed emotions and logic. To those players, Necrons weren't even "undead"—just machines.
Can something without life or a soul really be called life?
Their strongest evidence: Necrons could be infected by viruses, which corrupted their logic and turned them into "Flayed Ones." That fact alone proved the point.
Well… not that it matters now.
In short, after the Necrons gained the C'tan, they waged all-out war against the Old Ones. The War in Heaven intensified, and the Old Ones fell into retreat. Many believed it was this galaxy-spanning conflict that destabilized the Warp, where the suffering, anger, and despair of countless species gave birth to the Chaos Gods.
As for the Necrons, after defeating the Old Ones, they turned on their C'tan masters, shattering and sealing them away. But this betrayal cost them dearly. To avoid vengeance from surviving races (especially the Old Ones' "favored sons," the Eldar), the Necrons retreated into their tombs to sleep—waiting for time to erase all other life, so they could awaken into an empty galaxy.
Though, by then, they no longer needed to breathe at all.
By logic, nearly all demons of the Warp now served the Chaos Gods. These "primordial demons" were something Duanmu Huai had not seen in a very long time.
Which made him suspect this might be a fragment of the Warp leading to a demon world not yet touched by the Chaos Gods. The Warp was theoretically infinite, while the Chaos Gods were finite. Even the so-called omniscient, omnipotent God of Deceit was not truly omniscient or omnipotent—it only made others believe so. Therefore, it wasn't strange if a fragment world of demons had grown unnoticed.
At least that meant he didn't need to worry about accidentally stepping into the domain of one of the Chaos Gods.
That would be far more troublesome.
"Bang!!"
Duanmu Huai swung his Warhammer once more, smashing it down onto the massive monster before him. It was a giant spider with the upper body of a human—like something out of a myth. The spider wasn't particularly strong, but it was absurdly fertile. Duanmu Huai had wasted more time stomping on the endless swarm of little spiders it spawned than fighting the spider itself. If the creature hadn't insisted on challenging him in the name of "How dare you harm my children!" he'd have had no real way to draw it out.
But now…
The Warhammer crushed its head flat, sending its body collapsing to the ground. Then Duanmu Huai drew his Chainsword and slashed, the glowing blade cutting the human torso clean from the spider's abdomen. Stepping forward, he brought his armored boot down hard on the half-human torso.
"Splurt!!"
Blood sprayed, and at once, the remaining spiders scattered in every direction. Without sparing a glance at the pulped corpse beneath his boot, Duanmu Huai marched forward.
"Eugh——!!"
Watching through a monitor, Dr. Bled went pale. He thought he had grown accustomed to demons' cruelty and savagery. But seeing this armored monster so effortlessly slaughter one of his strongest demons filled him with indescribable terror.
No matter! He's almost at the Teleportation Chamber!
Clenching his fists, Dr. Bled braced himself. As soon as the monster entered the chamber, he would activate the portal and send it straight into Hell. There, it would never return. The demons would tear it apart, reducing it to the same ugly, miserable fate as the others…
"BOOM!!!"
But before he could act, the chamber's heavy steel doors were smashed open, flung across the room to crash against the wall with a deafening bang. Dr. Bled jumped, his trembling finger hovering over the activation switch. His wide eyes fixed on the doorway—then he saw the massive figure emerge from the smoke.
Even though he had seen it on the monitors, seeing the monster in person overwhelmed him with indescribable fear.
Black, heavy, alien armor, adorned with white skulls and blood-red crosses. In Dr. Bled's eyes, the towering figure was no longer human but a colossal beast of shadow, covering him completely in darkness. Just staring at the armored figure made him feel unable to breathe.
The suffocating aura wrapped around him like tangible chains. It was as if an invisible hand had clenched his heart, strangling its beats. His vision dimmed, the world fading away until only the terrifying silhouette filled everything. His mouth opened, trying to gasp, trying to scream, trying to vent the crushing terror—
—but he was bound, like a man tied to a stone and thrown into the sea. His lungs convulsed helplessly, clawing for air that wasn't there.
And then… his limit broke.
As the monster's eyes flared red and turned upon him, Dr. Bled's heartstrings snapped. Darkness swallowed him whole.
[You used Intimidate on Dr. Bled]
[Dr. Bled attempts to resist Intimidate… Resistance failed!]
[Dr. Bled is Overcome with Fear — Dr. Bled cannot resist Overwhelming Fear]
[Dr. Bled has Died Suddenly!]
The hell?! What the hell was that?
Duanmu Huai stared dumbfounded at the system prompt. My Intimidate skill is that strong? I didn't even take off my helmet—I just looked at the guy, and he died of fright?
Seriously?!
While he was still complaining, Dr. Bled's frail body twitched, then collapsed forward onto the console, smashing down onto the control panel.
"Beep—beep—beep—"
At once, the strange device before Duanmu Huai lit with a blinding yellow glow. Before he could react, everything around him plunged into blackness. Then, in the next instant, he stood in a vast, blood-soaked wasteland.
Volcanoes roared, spewing fire and poison into the skies. In the distance loomed eerie stone fortresses, twisted and grotesque. All around him, hideous demons turned their heads toward him, snarling and howling with rage.
Clearly, they did not welcome Duanmu Huai's arrival.
But… Duanmu Huai didn't need their welcome.
"Looks like I've come to the right place."
With a cold laugh, he tightened his grip on the Warhammer.
"Then let's slaughter to our heart's content!!"
(End of Chapter)