TO THE GENERAL PEOPLE REGARDING THE P-WORD: While I won't say that Shirou is a Primarch...I won't say that he isn't.

And in response to everyone clamoring about the "Sakunids"...deal with it. I'll explain later.

O.K. Here's the general run-down, and in the style of gabriel blessing, here's what's what. And beware; there may be SPOILERS! And yes, it is a pretty long chapter, but if you have a problem with it, take it up in a review. I'll try not to spoil it as much, but these are just my author's notes/opinions about stuff. And for those who don't like me posting my notes before the chapter, just scroll down to the disclaimer and work your way from there, k?

1) I think I'm going to be doing something similar here like in DoZ, except the narration is something like a "prologue" to the main meat of the chapter. It jumps from person to person (Shirou to Kane to Tessa to etc.) before settling back into the sporadic narrations of the characters. And if it hasn't been apparent yet, Shirou had armor on his person when he was sent into the future. Think "Archer/EMIYA" armor, but without the red. You honestly didn't think I would be sending him into battle in his blue/white shirt and jeans, right?

2) For the Tzeentch Horrors, use the 3rd/4th Edition appearances. I don't like the monochrome color of 5th Ed, even if you claim that they look more "intimidating". As for the TYPE-Moon aspect of things, I believe that Shirou only needs Byakuya and Kanshou to take care of Lesser Daemons, but not "destroy" them entirely. And I know that Pink Horrors change into Blue Horrors when "killed" and that the subsequent beasts that spawn must die. I say that B&K completely bypass that stage and return the Pink Horrors to the warp when they "first die", k?

3) I had to open up my Appocalypse rulebook to look this up, but after comparing blast templates to the blast radius of certain Noble Phantasms... yeah, things are going to get messy. And I know that I may be taking liberties and using some of the {sacred} gabriel blessing materials, but bear with me. It's been a while since I've played FSN's Unlimited Blade Works path.

And while I'm aware that [Censored] can easily punch through Power Armour even without being Broken, it can't do that unless aimed directly at a being wearing such a thing. So yeah, Ustaroth and his remaining Rubric Marines managed to survive the explosion. Sure they were knocked off their feet and their armour was scorched, but other than that, the're still combat ready. As for the daemons, cultists and mutants...

...well, that's another story. And if anyone wants to bitch about how Archer fired the damn thing at Caster without as big of an explosion here's the rub. IT WASN'T BROKEN.

4) Now, I felt like I had to end the chapter where it was because of the fact that I felt...overwhelmed after reading the entire thing. Gabriel Blessing can write without overwhelming his audience, sticking in as much exposition and theory as he needs to in his fight scenes, but I'm nowhere near that level. The best I can do is give it to you guys in two parts. I promise that I will wrap up the fight between this raiding force and Shirou next chapter, k?

DISCLAIMER- sayain673 does not own Fate/Stay Night, any of its affiliates, or Warhammer 40k. They are, respectfully, owned by TYPE-Moon and Games Workshop.

P.S. If anyone has a Photoshop app or something of the like, I would like to place a request for a title picture for this fiction.

Tessa stumbled out of the smoking Arbites bunker, coughing and hacking as she passed through the cloud of dust that had settled around the entrance to the settlement. Rubbing her already-watering eyes, she managed to find a crate that hadn't been destroyed in the attack and she sat down, gasping for the Emperor's (somewhat) clean air. She looked down at her white dress and, to her dismay, large splotches of blood had found themselves on her cotton garb. It would have been alright if it had been her own blood (at least it could be washed and saved) but it was the blood of men who turned to Chaos. There was only one fate for clothing tainted with the essence of Chaos: the furnace.

Now that she had time to properly think about it, it had been mean of Shirou to leave her in the holding cells, though she couldn't deny the warm and fuzzy feeling that spread through her body as he took time to comfort her. He held her close, patting her back as she sobbed into his shoulder. The carnage that he had caused disturbed her to the core and she almost pushed him away, horrified that his murderous gaze would turn to her. But she didn't, and she allowed herself to cry her eyes out into his warm embrace.

During that time, Tessa's mind had flashed back to the first time they had met, with her finding his unconscious body at the entrance of Iron Angel's sacred cave. She dragged him to her family, who were first shocked by the sudden appearance of the boy but began ministering to the fever that he had. When he had come out of his stupor, he was unable to communicate with them, speaking in an off-world language that couldn't have been a distant dialect of Low Gothic. It had taken him a week to learn the language, something that she took her hardest endeavors to do, but in that time, he had to make do with the small vocabulary of words and a series of hand gestures. He had offered to cook for them when he was able to stand, and though he first struggled with the ingredients that were obviously foreign to him, he managed to create a feast for her family, worthy of the Planetary Governor himself (had he the time to look beyond his lavish lifestyle and come to the settlements).

Her mind had gone on to remember more of the events before everything went to the warp. He was laughing as he played "Iron Angels" with her younger brothers, wrestling the fiery grox-heads to the dirt. She remembered teaching him the finer points of Low Gothic and being taught in turn about the finer nuances of cooking. Her father pushed the plow as Shirou pulled the farming device through the land, the latter's toned body glistening with sweat under the sun. She remembered blushing furiously when her younger sisters and, surprisingly, her mother suggested to him that he become bonded to her. Then there were the long walks, only him and her, through the forests outside the settlement, exploring the nooks and hidden wonders of the Emperor's planet laughing and talking about the oddest things.

The memories ended when he said that he had to go and join the fight. With a tight hug and a quick kiss on her cheek, he had sprinted up the stairs and out of the holding cells. She was too busy trying not to explode with the sudden increase of blood to her face to stop him.

She knew that she should have been horrified, disgusted even, at the fact that Shirou turned out to be some sort of "psyker". She knew that she should have been devastated that it was the kind-hearted boy with the eyes of gold who caused such unimaginable carnage within the span of a few seconds. She knew that she should have been terrified that she had been living with a dangerous killer, that at any moment, he could have cut her family and herself down at any opportunity.

But oddly, she found herself disappointed when the comforting contact of his body and hers ended, before he gone off to join the Thunder Fists in battle; she was wishing for more time-

She shook her head, trying to shake off what her subconscious was suggesting to her. It couldn't be; there was just no way! Emperor forbid-

Her breath caught in the back of her throat as she failed to swear the oath in her mind to the Father of Humanity. Only then acknowledging the sobering truth that came with another large flush of red spreading across her face. But it was still hard for her to believe that such a thing had happened to her...

...that she had fallen in love with Shirou Emiya.

Chapter Three: From the Ashes- The Third Awakening

[Released 6/21/13]

The Gates of Phearus Settlement, Balaam, Behien-Moor Sub-Sector, Gothic Sector

The cultist's head snapped off of its shoulders as I casually backhanded him with the Reinforced pommel of Byakuya. His head had not even landed on the bloodstained soil when I brought the black and white blades in a devastating circular slash, sending more of the bastards with their leader to the depths of hell. I barely had time to react but I flipped backwards in time, dodging more of the yellow fire from another one of the blue-gold giants.

These had to be the elite "Space Marines" that Tessa's younger siblings had mimicked in their afternoon playtime after working the fields, though the ones attacking me had to be the Chaos variant. I must admit that when I heard the two words joined together for the first time, I was expecting something less...overbearing, if that was the right word that fit my dilemma. The last time I had seen a marine was on one of Fuji-ni's military posters, covered in green camouflage fatigues and clutching an automatic rife as he stared defiantly into the camera lens. The regiment defending the settlement seemed to resemble this very closely, albeit holding energy weapons instead of automatics.

These "Chaos Space Marines" looked nothing of the sort. Massive pauldrons were perched on their shoulders, adorned with the icon of an eight-pointed circle and a fiery dragon encircling it. Their arms were covered by thick blue gauntlets, studs of metal running along streaks of gold and edges. Thick pieces of leg armour adorned the lower halves of their body as they contemptuously charged my position.

But what disturbed me the most about the giants was the aura that they were giving off. I said that the gallomping beasts of twisted had unnerved me to the core, but I didn't expect to feel what the giants' aura possessed. It was as if they were...hollow, if the dust inside the armour was any other key indication of the empty nature of their existence. The one key thing that stuck out from the cultists, the mutants and the beasts was a sickening feeling of emptiness, of void. Each aura of the remaining giants was tied towards a single blue-gold giant, who was immediately distinguishable by the two heads of fork-tongued serpents sticking out of his pauldrons. The massive sword with flames running along the edges and robes in the fashion of a traditional magus helped too.

I had little time to dwell on the subject, though. The first wave of the beasts gallomped towards me, screeching in an ear-piercing keen and contorting their flesh into unthinkable poses. These were monsters, though they were unnatural occurrences in the normal realm. I already had the anti-monster tools in my hands when the first one leaped at me.

The blades danced and the monster screeched as three of its limbs were sundered from its body, spraying blood across the chest piece of my armour. Oddly, it didn't smell of the metallic scent of iron. Wax was the first substance that jumped to my mind. I quickly dodged a strike from one of its horns, slicing both natural weapons as I returned my focus to the enemy. It had no time to counter as I drove Byakuya through its maw of jagged teeth, puncturing its skull and sending the tip of the blade out of its head.

With a gurgling wail, it dissolved into nothingness, fading away to join the ash that girdled the dust-choked battlefield.

The thing's companions screeched at the death of the monster. Roaring incomprehensibly and frothing from countless maws, fire sprung to life in their hands.

Shit. That wasn't good.

But what the hell?! These things could use magic- no, it wasn't magic. The unearthly energies circulating in their hands couldn't have been od nor prana. Its aura screaming of the damned and unclean. Therefore, without using mana, it logically couldn't be magic. But if not, then what fell power was it that fueled its attacks? And more importantly, what in the name of the Root were these things?! Monsters, that much was obvious, but they weren't anything that Clock Tower archives had any mention-

Wait.

The cultist I bisected earlier this morning said that he would "summon a daemon" if I had come any closer. Were these daemons, then? I still didn't know what the term meant. I only knew that they were things of evil, to be loathed and hated, and to be afraid of in the darkness of the night. The late Confessor, who was actually a nice person, was responsible for preaching those things everyday. It was a long shot in the dark with a pebble, but I think that if these were not daemons, then I had no idea what they would be.

Either way, I still had to dodge the incoming firestorm from the monsters. The shots were uncoordinated, thrown in rage and abandon in the hopes that they would strike me. I used this to my advantage as I danced around the missiles, weaving and flipping to dodge the attacks.

I found my opening when the monsters paused, confused at why they missed me. I crashed into the closest one towards me, giving it no room to maneuver or launch another fireball. The blades in my hand sliced through the twisted flesh, as a knife would go through hot butter, rending the creature into a bloody mess. Without missing a figurative beat, I threw the blades towards another pair of monsters that were preparing more infernal missiles to throw at me, embedding the Noble Phantasms in the center of whatever passed as their ocular sensors.

Already having Traced another pair of the Chinese blades, I dodged another volley of energy blasts that came from the other squads I had yet to deal with. I charged another monster, weaving past its whirling hands and maw as I ran up its body. I jumped off of its shoulders, Rienforcing my legs to boost my jump height and slicing its arms off and stabbing its head as I did so.

For a moment, I was weightless, taking in the scene of the battle from my position in the air. The defense regiment was pushing back the tide of invaders, fighting with more vigor than before I entered the fray. For every man who fell to a cultist, two more came to avenge their comrade, spraying energy shots indiscriminately at both mutant and monster. They had not given into fear at the sight of Captain Kane suffering a grievous injury and instead used it to fuel their stamina and rage.

But it wasn't enough.

There were still too many Chaos raiders for every soldier in the trenches and despite the valiant efforts of the defenders, they would be overrun by the overwhelming numbers of the enemy that were pressing in. The tank was supposed to be the main line of defense against the Chaos infantry, but when that had been turned into a wreck of twisted metal, the defenders lost their main advantage. And even with my combined aid, there would be some gaps where cultists could run past my slaughter and breech the defenses.

I had to do something about that, and I had just the thing for it.

Stretching out my hands, I banished Byakuya and Kanshou, turning into golden shards of mana as they dissolved into nothing. A cocked hammer went off in my head as Od flowed through me. The image of a bow came into my mind and I Traced it immediately, grasping the black weapon that a certain white-haired Counter Guardian had been so fond of using.

Oh, Archer...if you knew that your weapon was helping me kill hundreds to save thousands...well, technically the Chaos raiders were aggressors so...no harm, no foul, right? These people were beyond saving and had to die.

About fifty feet under me, the leading giant shouted for his soldiers to take aim at me.

"Trace on," I toned, opening the palm of my right hand to comfortably receive the weapon. With a shimmer of light, a sword appeared in my awaiting hand. It was a double-edged, a sight common from the weapons of my Reality Marble. But what separated it from the other weapons in my arsenal was the series of waves that rippled down its length, affecting the width of the blade.

"Alteration." At my word, the shape of the sword changed, twisting and becoming more aerodynamic as it took a new shape. I still hadn't figure out how to do this on my own, but I had seen this sword in both forms, allowing me some leeway in Altering its structure and shape. Either way, the end result of said Alteration was akin to a giant screw.

The raiders took aim at my mid-air form.

I raised my bow, fitting the twisted blade in my hand to the string as I prepared myself. Kyudo, the art of the bow, was instilled into me by Mitsuzuri of the Archery Club, and she drilled the eight steps to properly firing an arrow into my cranium: ashibumi, dozukuri, yugamae, uchiokoshi, hikiwake, kai, hanare, and zanshin. But in my urgency, I was going to have to throw *some of* her lessons out the metaphorical window because of this weapon. I wasn't aiming at anything specific, unless the blob of cultists and raiders counted. That and the fact I was "aiming" with the intent to not hurt any of the Thunder Fist soldiers. I would take care of the giants later; what was more concerning was thinning of the horde.

And with this weapon, I could do it better than any tank could ever hope to accomplish.

"My core is twisted in madness," I said as I notched the weapon. I charged it my od, pouring more than it could handle, making it fragile, making it dangerous.

Making it Broken.

"Caladbolg." I released the string with a dissonant twang.

Caladbolg, the legendary weapon of Fergus mac Róich, a hero from the Ulster Cycle of Irish mythology. Archer had called its twisted form the "Fake Spiral Sword", a name befitting a weapon whose curve caused it to spin with an intensity that rivaled the most powerful of drills. Alongside a penetration power that could punch through the most powerful of materials, the extra Od I pumped into it gave the projectile an explosive side effect that would reveal itself on impact.

It cut through the air, almost faster than my eyes could track. Only after it had been gone for half a second did the noise of its passing actually meet the ear, a high-pitched shriek as it twisted towards the designated target(s). It spun with impossible intensity, the force of its turning so great that just its passing struck the world around it like a physical blow. Even when Archer had missed with this blade, the distortion its path created almost ended Caster.

A thunderous detonation went off at the site where the projectile had landed. The fiery dome of light that always accompanied its firing expanded from the site of impact, a searing heat wave that roared as it grew. I heard screams of anguish from both Chaos raider and beast alike as they tried to flee from the expanding radius, only to be swallowed by the encroaching heat. Red-orange flame soon followed in the wake of its destructive path, consuming those who had been too unfortunate to be within the template of its detonation.

I'd been more lucky. I had timed the release of the Broken Phantasm at the point where I would be the furthest away from the semi-spherical blast zone. The wave of heat never hit me; the gale-force wind did, sending me flying through the air. I landed on the ground, twisting my Reinforced body to comfortably stick the landing without breaking my bones. I Traced the Chinese swords in both of my hands, jabbing them into the ground to slow my landing speed as the wave of the explosion drove me back towards the first of crude barricades twenty meters from the trenches.

When my gaze finally turned towards the field, hell filled my vision.

Fire crackled madly along the plains, dancing as dust and debris fell from the already ash-choked sky. The monsters were no longer gallomping, a fact backed up by the sight of their corpses dissolving into ash, mingling with the essences of innumerable fallen enemies. I let out a breath of relief; their strange aura was no longer unsettling my body. Whatever they were...they were now dead.

Mangled bodies of raiders were smoldering in the crater the impact of the Broken Phantasm, each contorted in their own throes and features of anguish. Several were mere chunks of flesh and blood. There were some who still lived, despite the fire and explosion. I saw one figure clutching its entrails in a futile attempt to keep them from spilling out. Another stared incomprehensibly at the ragged stumps of his legs, blown off from bellow the mutant's twisted appendages.

But despite the carnage, there was no sign of the yellow-green uniform that identified the Thunder Fist PDF among the scores of bodies that were burning.

-Scene Break-

Human emotions did not trouble the mind of a Chaos Space Marine. No lesser mortal could truly understand what went on in the mind of a Thousand Son, let alone a Loyalist Space Marine, without becoming one, for the rules of the weak had no sway over them. They were bred to be the finest warriors of the galaxy, having purged most emotions that a normal human would have. Even further for his kind, for Thousand Sons were attributed to be cold, tactful and strategic in the name of the Changing Way, never giving into their baser emotions that their kindred of Khorne displayed in battle.

Nevertheless, Ustaroth was definitely angry.

"Filth!" he roared at the red-haired mortal who had decimated his strike force with a single shot. "I will have your soul!"

Feeling the power of the warp wash over his soul, the Aspiring Sorcerer gave voice to his vitriol in the form of a gargantuan roar. For the first time in several centuries, the Thousand Son abandoned his command post from the rear of the attack force and charged forward, bellowing praises to Tzeentch and curses to the false emperor as he trampled past the broken forms of his army.

He saw the remainder of his Rubric Marines, three husks of possessed power armour, raise themselves from the position that they had fallen. Good; his "brothers" were still among the "living", if such a word could be used to describe their existence. The Defense Forces that were in combat with the surviving mutants were unaware of the danger until an officer's torso exploded from a Bolter round. Only then did he see them turn to the charging giants, fear blossoming on their features. He joined in the slaughter, unsheathing the Dark Blade at his side. Proceeding to plunge the thirsting blade into the stomach of a hapless soldier, he ripped out a torrent of entrails as the daemon residing inside it devoured the mortal's soul.

What was happening?! The augury had revealed that city -Settlement number Thirteen, according to the thoughts of a nearby soldier- was supposed to be an easy target, defended only by a [Pathetic] Defense Force. Casualties were expected- cultists were not soldiers and had a reputation for not having the sharpest aim nor the keenest of senses- but tolerated. It was even foretold that the defenders possessed a Baneblade, a notable concern, but that was quickly set aside as they armed their most durable mutants with explosives charges.

But nowhere in the spew of intestines did the ritual fortel of a warrior who would butcher the cultists like grox before a chainsword! Nowhere in the gore did any sign warn of the sundering of his daemon Horrors! Nowhere in the trails of blood was any mention that the warrior had the power to destroy a sizable portion of the raiding force!

The mortal had power, that much was obvious to him. The way his swords spoke in battle and his efficiency in slaughtering his troops said more than any report or divination ever could. The Witch-Sight proved that he had "warp presence"; there had been no pain upon seeing him through the Sight, marking him as not a Null. But what perturbed him was the fact that he felt no disturbance or displacement of warp the when he had unleashed those attacks, save for the daemons when they had been sent back into the Imaterium.

Ustaroth did feel...something when the mortal created swords from thin air, but it had definitely not been warp energy. It was far too "mild" compared to the more clamorous energy that fueled the powers of the psyker, but there was the presence of energy. And when the mortal caused the explosion that decimated his ranks...Was he a new type of soldier that came from the false emperor's throne?

"Die, Chaos scum!" Ustaroth's thoughts were interrupted when the bayonet of a lasgun skewed off of his pauldron. Snarling at the impudence, his counter cleave tore the man from groin to gullet, splashing his armour with the crimson vitae of the mortal. The daemon weapon laughed maliciously as it feasted upon the screaming spirit of the warrior.

-Scene Break-

"Get back!" I shouted to the surviving Thunder Fists engaging both the Chaos Space Marines and the cultists. The soldiers outside of the trenches were getting slaughtered by the combined onslaught that they were up against, completely encircled by the forces of raiders and unable to flee. Even as I sprinted, I felt the distortion of air where bullet fire raced towards the flanked soldiers. A part of me was incredulous at the fact that the entrenched 'Fists would fire into the melee and risk hitting their own, but another part of me was touched at the fact that they avoided firing in my general vicinity.

I had long banished Byakuya and Kanshou, the need of a quicker singular weapon overriding my preference of the chinese swords. Firing Caladbolg II again was no longer an option because of the close proximity the soldiers were in with the Marines and the mutants. From that, melee was my only option in finding a way to create a path for the soldiers to retreat while I engaged the Chaos raiders on my own.

Heh. Once, Rin had been adamant in scolding me fiercely about charging recklessly into a battle without regard for my own life. "A hero complex", she had called it. Mine was a warped ideal, its inception centered at the moment Kiritsugu saved me from the fire. I had given up trying to survive, to escape, to live that day. The fact that someone had been there to save me, an act that at then was a miracle...

And she did have good reason to be angry with me, that day in Einzbern mansion.

It went against the natural order of things to put the lives of other human beings, strangers even, before my own life. I did know that my "borrowed" ideals could, at any moment, break me irreparably both physically or mentally. But I was happy living and fighting for others as long as I had strength to swing a sword or Od to trace a weapon. I was happy saving others when no one else would save them, even though I could not save them all. It made no difference, whether or not I was on earth or on a distant planet.

Because after all, there's no way that wanting to help people can be a mistake.

"I am the bone of my sword..."

Digressing from my thoughts about the fiery tsundere, I was going to trace the weapon that was most suitable for carving my way through, no pun intended, the raiders to liberate the flanked soldiers. There were countless weapons already inside of the Blade Works that could have fitted the bill for a quicker weapon, but I wanted to try something completely new, a weapon that my eyes had laid eyes on not a few hours ago. Though the seven step process inside the jail cell had been interrupted by Tessa and my liberation at her antics, I still could pull it off, most likely without a hitch.

"Trace on!"

-Scene Break-

"Give the bastards hell, Trooper!" Sergeant Persyn screamed, pulling the pin to one of many krak grenades strapped to his chest as mutants tore at his body. "The Emperor-"

Whatever message the Emperor wanted the Thunder Fist officer to deliver to Trooper Solomon Bardt was lost in the fiery explosion that consumed the fallen soldier and his killers, showering both friend and foe alike with a deadly wave of heat and barrage of shrapnel. The teenage soldier was knocked off of his feet for the second time that day, falling onto the bloodstained soil of what used to be an grain field and dropping his lasgun in the process.

He was weeping openly as he scrambled to pick up his weapon and he was not ashamed to let the tears fall from his eyes. He was going to die on this battlefield, a green rookie with not even a full year of service as a member of the Planetary Defense Forces. He was going to die, his body torn to bloody pieces of meat by the talons of mutants and his soul feasted upon the malignant daemons of the warp. He was going to die, a fool for leaving his family against his parent's wishes of staying on the farm.

A shadow loomed over his vision and he looked up in horror to see the hulking form of a mutant leering at him. He fumbled to bring up his lasgun but a powerful sweep of the abomination's arm knocked the weapon out of his hands and sent him reeling back a few feet. Scrambling backwards, his hands desperately propelled his body backwards but it was too slow to avoid the meaty fist of the abomination grab him by the throat and hoist him into the air.

"Emperor save me..." Solomon whispered as the mutant laughed contemptuously in his face. His mind had long abandoned the supplementary Litany of Hate and the Prayer of Perseverance he was instructed to memorize in the barracks. He was not a coward, but at that moment, he was truly terrified of what awaited him after death. Would he go to the Emperor's Throne or would he be banished to the warp and become fodder for daemons? He needed "to sell his life dearly", as Captain Kane had said to him on his first day of training, but he could do nothing-

Something hard and rigid pressed against his hips and his eyes widened in realization. If he could not kill the beast, he would at least cripple it and minimize future damage done to the rest of the forces. It would not seem that way to the officers or the clerics, but was it not said that the Emperor was always watching and judging every man by his actions?

"Go to hell, you inhuman bastard!" Solomon managed to shout as he unsheathed the combat knife hidden inside his pocket and drive it up towards where he hoped the mutant's arteries were stored in its wrist.

It gave a tremendous shout as its life fluids exploded out of the jagged opening, splashing his carefully pressed and folded uniform with black ichor. He managed to get in another few inches before the handle became slick with blood and slipped from his grasp. The grip tightened on his throat and he struggled to breathe as the now furious mutant began to crush his throat. With its other hand, it unhooked a pistol hanging from its side alongside other grisly trophies of war and level it point blank at the Trooper's chest.

In a moment, Solomon could see everything with surprising clarity: the drool dripping from the bloody fangs of the monster, the unholy and profane symbol of an eight pointed star seared onto its chest, the hate-filled crimson eyes, the dirty finger of the hand tightening on the trigger-

A sudden shrieking noise broke the Trooper's trance as well as the mutant's concentration on the kill. Before it could turn to investigate the source of the noise, its chest exploded outwards, showering the thirsting ground and Solomon's uniform in more blood and vitae. It stared incredulously at the blade sticking out of its chest, a battered green sword with adamantium teeth pointing towards the sky as blood ran down the sides and staining a symbol of the Imperial Aquila The shrieking began anew and the mutant joined in the cacophony, adding its screams of pain as the chainsword cleaved the mutant and exited out of its head. It wobbled drunkenly, two misshapen halves of the perverted template of the human body spurting blood before it fell to the ground with a mighty crash.

"I'm not your 'Emperor'," his savior said as he severed the appendage that was constricting his throat, allowing Solomon to take in deep breaths of air in haggard gulps and swallows. "You don't have to kneel before me."

-Scene Break-

Purring in my hands like a crouching tiger was Captain Kane's chainsword, Orkbiter, poised and ready to rend the enemies of justice. Crafted as a nameless sword by Tech-Priest Quintos of the Adeptus Mechanicus and forged in the fires of Manufactorum Pices on Mars, it was bequeathed to Kane when he had attained officer ranking at the death of its previous owner. The blade had gotten its name when Lieutenant Kane served in the Imperial Guard's Steel Legion, waging war against the greenskins in both local skirmishes against feral orks and against their space kindred in the Second War for Armageddon, his home-world. And in that time, the blade's teeth learned to crave the flesh and blood of the ork species, and as a result, the blade would cut deeper and more viciously when wielded against the alien which it had been so fond in rending.

I have no idea of what I just said...erm...thought. Machine spirit and Orks? Steel Legion? Why would someone name their planet "Armageddon"?

You know what? I'm going back to my fallback comfort that I usually used in situations like these.

I blame the Root for this. And that old man, too...

Truth be told, while I was sure that I could bring it out of my Reality Marble, I wasn't sure that the weapon itself would work properly, in regards to the whole "rotating chains" idea. The weapon had a power source cleverly built into the hilt of the weapon that gave energy for the finer bits of machinery to turn when the activation rune was pressed. The closest thing that I could relate to the source of energy itself was some form of heat-based power, found in the magazines of the Planetary Defense Forces and fired out their guns. I wasn't sure if I could Trace the motor and the battery itself, but when I did, there didn't appear to be any electrical energy stored inside the device like the power tools I had been used to seeing. After all, if there were many useful things that I learned at Homurahara Gakuen, energy could not be created nor destroyed, only converted from one form to another- all according to Sir Isaac Newton. Therefore, it was completely logical that the chains would not turn when I activated the weapon because I could not Trace energy within the machine's battery.

Yet I had been shocked when it began to siphon off of my Od as the chainsword roared to life at the touch of the activation rune. It was...similar, in a weird sense, to Noble Phantasms that required my Od for the special abilities to properly function, such as Rule Breaker's ability to sever contracts and bounds of the ethereal. The drain of Od was continuous as long as the "chains" were shrieking, but it was not a torrent of energy that was being siphoned from my Magic Circuits. If the laws of physics were still applicable here, it seemed that it was taking my Od and converting it into electricity, something that the weapon would normally not do but now did because of the nature of my abilities. The conversion/drain was a slow trickle, easily fueled by even a single one of my limited Circuits and very cost efficient for the results it produced, despite the fact that the blade itself was fighting the forces of Chaos and not that of the orks...whatever the hell they were.

"Go!" I had to shout while simultaneously parrying and countering the blade of a cultist to be heard over the din. "Gather the survivors and run back to the trenches. They're too much for you to handle at your level!" I hoped he could tell that I wasn't being condescending when I compared his comrades and the man himself to those of the obviously stronger mutants and Chaos Space Marines. But I couldn't afford to give a further explanation in the thick of battle.

I moved onto the closest enemies without waiting for his answer. The soldiers that were locked in combat with Orkbiter's new targets were desperately fighting for their lives, unloading energy beams into the bulks of three Chaos Space Marines, all of who simply shrugged it off and blasted two men into bloody chunks with a roar of the bulky gun they were clenching. A group of soldiers were backed up against a man, presumably an officer, who was waving a banner depicting a fist clenching a lightning bolt as he frantically blasted apart any cultists who were getting too close for firearms maneuverability, all the while shouting inspirational prayers to his men. That wasn't very subtle of him, marking himself and his men as obvious targets to the giants, but who was I to talk when I was swinging a chainsword?

The weapon itself turned out to be actually lighter than the appearance made it out to be. I once repaired a chainsaw for a friend's dad, a construction worker who had been in charge of building a new memorial for the victims of the Fukyuki Fire. The power mechanism for the chainsaw was the bulk of the weight, though the chains and the actual "blade" of the tool did contribute. I thought that the now od-powered power source would make the blade imbalanced and as impractical as a sword made from pure gold, but to my surprise, there were no negative side effects on the weapon itself. The total weapon weighed no more than a heavy broad-sword and I could easily slash through targets with only one hand. Despite my preference for the Chinese swords, I could just as easy wield a single weapon with two hands, as I had thought that the chainsword would be too heavy to wield without the aid of an extra appendage. It almost made me want to Trace another chainsword, just to see how two of the magnificent instruments of death would efficiently slaughter the Chaos forces, and by extension, the enemies of justice...

Almost.

The screaming of the chains preceded its swing as the sword ripped through the midsection of a gargantuan mutant that was in my way, easily knocking past a clumsy attempt to block the thirsting weapon. It's thick skin was first to give in, scattering into bloody pieces of flesh as they were churned into a foul mess. Fibrous muscles, thick and strong, came next as their owner's brain began to register the pain. The organs proceeded, some familiar while others appeared to be a mutation of unknown origins, all rupturing into messes of destroyed meat and spilled viscera. The spine was last, splintering into broken pieces of bone as the chainsword finished its grisly work, exiting out of the left side as the mutant howled in agony. Orkbiter exploded outward in a spray of black ichor from the monster's corpse.

Oh sweet Root, this weapon was glorious!

The monster hadn't finished toppling over, upper torso sliding off in a behind direction and lower extremities slumping forward when I moved past it, surprising the now-alert cultists. Their eyes widened in fear as they saw me sprinting towards them, the chainsword in my hands shrieking for blood. Three more fell in a single stroke as they fumbled to bring about their weapons to bear, shifting targets from the trapped soldiers to my advancing form. Their screams reached a fever pitch in harmony with Orkbiter's ripping keen as I butchered my way through the trapped soldiers, rending mutants into bloody chunks of ruined flesh and cleaving cultists into uneven halves of corrupted meat.

I finally exploded from the ranks of the enemy, coming from behind the Thunder Fist survivors as I sent more Chaos raiders to their deaths. Several of them turned to see me, surprised that something had came out of the enemy ranks that clearly wasn't a mutant. The officer had his pistol trained at me, but I could tell that it was an action done out of pure reflex with no malicious intent towards my person, but rather towards those who bore the stigmata of Chaos. They were quick to change their opinion of me, however, as I was quick to defend a downed soldier from a pack of savage mutants, both saving another man from death and affirming my loyalties to their side.

At my arrival, the Chaos Space Marines began to slough their way through the masses of their raiders, uncaring whether or not they knocked aside an errant cultist or crushed a wounded raider underfoot. They were my high-priority targets, the enemies that took precedence in extermination, just as I was undoubtedly theirs. Their leader was still dozens of meters behind the giants but he was quickly advancing at the second his glowing eyes locked onto mine of gold, radiating hatred and malice that I could feel a mile away. I had to make this quick before he arrived, as he was clearly the sentient that was giving orders to the three mindless behemoths before me and was, obviously, the more powerful of the giants.

Orkbiter clashed against the first giant's armour, easily knocking past a slow attempt to bring up its bulky gun to defend itself. The impact of its teeth against the Space Marine's armour caused the angry roar it emitted to become a high-pitched shriek as the adamantium edges began to slowly eat its way through its defenses. A spray of ash rewarded my efforts as the weapon tore through the giant's chest armour, the slash amplified when I added another hand to the appendage wielding the weapon. The following reverse strike took the blue-gold helmet off of the already-damaged chestplate. I moved past it, already sprinting towards the next giant as I saw the soldiers behind me swarm the fallen armour and proceed to stab, blast and hack at the still-twitching corpse of metal in order to fully bleed it of its essence.

While I was slightly disappointed that they didn't take my opening and run back to safety, I felt an odd sort of...pride, if that was the right word, for instilling the will to fight on against the foe. I wasn't one to lead others, preferring to go into combat alone like "master chief", as Lord El-Melloi the Second had told me. Truth be told, I had no idea what the man was even referencing during that lunch, probably some obscure literary character that seemed to like fighting alone. Even in the Fifth Grail War, I only "lead" Saber, the Servant I summoned, but that was completely different from leading a squad of men into battle. If I was to be summoned into a Grail War, Root forbid, I don't think I'd exactly have a high Charisma rating, like Iskander the Great or Saber, the King of Knights, both of who could lead men into the pits of hell and back.

But still...it felt nice.

The remainder of the two mindless drones ceased their advance as they saw their comrade fall, instead lifting up their weapons and drawing a line of fire on my body. I was already moving by the time the catch of the gun was cocked, my reinforced body putting as much speed as I could to throw off their aim. Whatever their leader was shouting them to do was obviously orders to lay down fire -something that I instinctively knew I had to stay away from with the utmost prejudice- to buy him time to reach our position. By the time his shouting were complete, they proceeded to unload the full salvo of their shots towards me. I had to nearly throw myself to the ground to avoid the scything fire, streaking past the air and aiming vertically to where I was before.

Structural Analysis immediately kicked in as my eyes tracked the rounds. Stripping away the outer layers to reveal the basic structure of the object was the pinnacle of Structural Grasp Magecraft and the foundation of my own Tracing. Normally, this ability was something that instinctively added new swords to my Reality Marble, but even before I gotten around to realizing that fact, it was something just used to aid me fix something by revealing the object as a rendered blueprint. It's a shame that Kiritsugu was dead, though. Had he been alive, I wouldn't be above pointing a finger at him and saying "HA!" in a counter to his dismissal of Structural Grasp.

Even as I dodged, I could already see the details of the "bullet" I was studying. Lacking tungsten, steel and lead that was more commonplace in firearm ammunition, this type of shot was composed of a smorgasbord of substances that I was barely able to comprehend. A composite form of industrialized diamond tipped the round, probably enabling a deeper penetration against heavy armour, on top of what appeared to be a small amount of combustile substance. Depleted uranium, a substance that I was surprised to find that I could register, separated an inner chamber of explosives in addition to providing weight and stopping power to the shot. But what surprised me the most was the fact that the goddamn thing was rocket-propelled, evident by the plumes of fire that it spewed from its base.

That metal round flying through the air wasn't a bullet.

That thing was a -pardon my language- fucking rocket propelled grenade.

One stray round hit an unlucky cultist and I watched, mildly fascinated, as a secondary flare erupted from the back of round, accelerating it towards its unintentional target. It penetrated his chest with little effort as it drilled through his body with a ferocity -while was impressive, did nothing to match up to the drilling penetration power of Caladbolg- and exploding mere milliseconds after entry, evaporating the mid-section of the target while sending a fine mist of vitae and a splurge of intestines streaming down from the sky.

Well, shit. No wonder my sixth sense was screaming at me to dodge them; I highly doubted that even my reinforced steel armour could prevent that kind of damage.

"Note to self," I muttered as they proceeded to reload their weapons, "Avoid exploding bullets at all costs." Yes, Shirou- being hit by explosive bullet equals BAD; dodging explosive bullet equals GOOD. Shaking my head from the latest installment of my insanity, I took advantage of the giant's fumbling attempts to slide the sickle-shaped magazine into their weapons, using their reloading phase to sprint at them with all the speed that my reinforced body could produce. By the time they had locked the magazine into the weapon, it was already too late.

Orkbiter tore through the first giant's gun with a single cleave. A reverse strike tore through its owner's midsection, sending a keening shriek and a spray of ash when the chainsword exited through its side, bisecting the metal construct. As it fell, I continued the blow as my legs carried both my body and the strike through the first Chaos Space Marine and into the companion behind it. Adamantium armour gave way to prana-Reinforced adamantium teeth, tearing off the arm at the shoulder and splitting its helm down the middle as soot exploded from the terrible wound it had been dealt.

Upon seeing the remainder of the mindless constructs fall, the cultists and some of the mutants with a higher processing power within their heads threw their weapons to the ground and either fled or begged for mercy as the now-galvanized soldiers came up behind me. Those who took the latter option were received with the discharge of laser weaponry that turned their bodies into cooked meat and silenced their screeching permanently. On principal, it was a good idea, not just because they were shooting at me and the soldiers earlier, but because they could still prove to be a threat even unarmed. I wasn't petty in dealing execution blows and, from the looks of it, neither were the soldiers. It all boiled down to a matter of precaution.

"Face me, dog of the Emperor! Or have you not the courage to fight a disciple of the dark gods?!"

The guttral cries rang out from the last of the giants, the one clad in a more ornate set of armour, as he charged towards my position, crushing fleeing cultists underfoot and blasting apart mutants with an unknown power. Again, the smell of wax pervaded my senses along with the burning stench of an unquenchable flame. This was no mere Space Marine, but something else entirely, with powers that disturbingly reminded me of the daemons that I vanquished. Though not magecraft, it seemed that both the beasts and the man drew from the same sort of power source to fuel their powers. What source it was, I knew not, save what I already knew: that it was neither prana nor od.

But this giant was no longer a man in control of his emotions. The apparent destruction of his army had unhinged him enough to come out from his command post to throw down the gauntlet and challenge me to one-on-one. While this wasn't exactly the outcome that I was hoping for, it was still something that leaned in favor towards my side of the battlefield. Single combat was something that I had mastered before learning how to face multiple opponents. Though the lessons from the blonde Heroic Spirit still give me nightmares to this day, they proved useful in dealing with opponents that had the advantage over me (which was somewhat of a slight bruise to my masculinity if a girl, despite her true identity as King Arthur of Britian, could beat the crap out of me). In this case, the advantage of strength and height was probably going to be used against me more than the other mindless Marines used.

But while we both brought dangerous powers to the battlefield, I held the belief that mine would play out to my victory.

"Get your men back to the trenches," I said to the banner officer behind me as he tried to approach me with a warning. "This isn't a fight that you can watch from the sidelines, let alone handle. But if you really want to help, keep the last of the cultists off me." Ignoring the blustering response that followed my request, Orkbiter shattered into fragments of prana on my command. By the time I was running to face the Chaos Space Marine, two familiar swords of contrasting color had already formed in my hands.

-Scene Break-

The dark blade clashed against the swords of black and white, sending a cascade of sparks that showered the two combatants in flickering light. One was a giant among giants, a Chaos Space Marine, a Thousand Sons Aspiring Sorcerer who had the powers of the warp at his beck and call and the cunning savagery that all followers of the Ruinous Powers had. The other was a mortal, a young man who had the ability to conjure swords out of thin air, swords that could explode, swords that could shriek for blood, swords that gave hope to the defenders of the besieged town.

The soldiers had thought that they would lose at the apparent destruction of the Tank and the subsequent injury done unto their captain. They had thought that their families, friends and loved ones would become sacrifices to the dark gods of Chaos as the army of mutants and cultists would trample over their bodies, defiling them even in death. It would have been better for them to blow the explosives wired within the walls of the bunkers as soon as the first mutant set foot in the underground, better to grant the civilians a swift death by caving in the structure rather than having their souls suffer in eternal anguish as playthings of the Ruinous Powers.

But that was then. And this is now.

"He's doing it!" an ecstatic lookout cried, the same one who had screamed at the sight of the Chaos forces. "The lad's holding his own against a Space Marine!"

"By the Emperor!" exclaimed a Junior Officer as he passed the magnoculars to the men under his command, who promptly began to argue amongst themselves as to who would be first to see the combat through the device. "Never have I seen anything of the like! A psyker with a strange ability matching an entire strike force of Chaos in warfare!"

The Tech-Priest assigned to the maintenance of the trench guns was undergoing conniptions of his own kind. "How...how is it that he can conjure up structures of the Machine God's sacred work? Metal blades would not be of any concern, but the fact that he created a chainsword...paradigm shift commencing; evaluating and readjusting life goals. Top precedence is to be directed towards the understanding of this...this sorcery..."

"Lads!" Jorgenson, Kane's right-hand man, roared as he waved the tattered banner of the Thunder Fists high above the trenches. It was well known that he would fly into zealous glorification of the Emperor and his works, despite his status as a tank driver. People often told him that it was a shame he wasn't a part of the Ecclesiarchy or the Commissariat, as he would have made either an excellent cleric or inspiring commissar, but he would not budge from his assignment under Kane. That, and there existed another secret reason with the ex-Steel Legion captain as to his stubborn determination not to join either organizations.

"Because of that man, that brave soul who fights the Ruinous Powers, has secured the life of our captain, who awaits his return for the life-saving treatment! If this psyker...this witch will go as far as to prove his worth to the Emperor, despite his stigma, who are we to stand idle while he battles the foe?!

Though the time is dark, our faith shines through! The Emperor has sent us a champion to guide us through the shadows and strike it at its very heart! We may have been hostile to him at first, but that was because we were afraid! Can it be said now that we still feel fear?!

The psyker strikes the foe with the wrath of the righteous! Ignore his stigma, for if the Emperor chose a psyker to aid us, who are we to deny and question Him?!"

The soldiers went wild after the tank driver's fierce rhetoric. Some dropping to their knees, weeping shamelessly as they thanked their God-Emperor for such a magnificent blessing upon their humble world. Other began to chant their hero's name, as they rose from the trenches to launch a counter-assault on the lingering remnants of the cultists and mutants scattered to the flanks of the battlefield.

Confessor Enoch was furious. How dare they...how dare they uplift an escaped psyker to the status of a champion of the God-Emperor! This...this was heresy! But there was nothing he could do at the moment. Wait for the battle to be over, he ordered himself as his bolt pistol liquified a mutant that the witch had torn in half. Wait for the battle to be over, wait for the rogue to slay the Chaos Space Marine...and then he would make his move in the name of the Emperor!

"EM-I-YA! EM-I-YA! EM-I-YA! EM-I-YA! EM-I-YA!" the soldiers chanted as they scourged the heretic, suffered not the mutant to live and purged the Chaos that they could without interfering with the duel of ages.

[CODEX ENTRY: Planets]

Balaam

Population: 4.2 Million
Tithe Grade: Exaxtus Median
Geography: Temperate climate (Recent discovery of solar radiation may be cause of an increase of extreme shifts in summer and winter temperatures). Two main continents- Forest/fertile plains and mineral-rich mountains (Settlements 9, 10, 11, 12 and 13) and Temperate landmass (Capital city and Settlements 1, 2, 3, and 4). Two archipelagos- (Settlements 5, 6, 7) and One man-made structure afloat the sea (Settlement 8). Remainder of surface is covered in ocean (relatively clean, flourishing fishing stocks).
Government Type: Adeptus Terra
Planetary Governer: Lysiast Horst
Adept Presence: Adeptus Terra, Adeptus Ministorum, Adeptus Astra Telepathica (Astropathic Choir at Capital), Adeptus Arbites
Military: Balaam Thunder Fists (Medium/High quality force, based around all settlements)
Trade: As an agri-world, Balaam is a major exporter of raw materials and foodstuffs for the Bhein-Moor sub-sector. It is also one of the few agri-worlds that has a reputable planetary defense force and a population of tough, adaptable Imperial Guard recruit sources. If necessary, Balaam can support itself with the food supplies and handful of munitions manufactorums scattered across the planet.

Admentum

*No. 1- The population of Balaam is spread over its capital city and thirteen subsidiary "settlements" that have remained in use ever since their colonization during the Great Crusade. The settlements' population produces the bulk of exported materials to be sent to the capital for trade and export with the nearby systems and neighboring sectors. In return, the capital promises protection and security.

*No. 2- The settlement names, main produce and population are following (^):

0) Horstion (Capital City)- Trade [1,000,000]
1) Primus- Soldiers [437,500]
2) Sephiris- Firearms [437,500]
3) Carnus- Meats [525,000]
4) Tarsus- Meats [300,000]
5) Oceanus- Fish/Marine [300,000]
6) Panemus- Fish/Marine [300,000]
7) Aegis- Iron [300,000]
8) Argum- Metals [300,000]
9) Naclorum- Salts [75,000]
10) Rohanus- Wheats/Grains [70,000]
11) Eragus- Wheats/Grains [80,000]
12) Oblion- Wheats/Grains [140,000]
13) Phearus- Wheat/Grains [10,000]

(^) Updated 986.M41. Numbers include locally stationed PDF troops.

On a side not, all the lore debates that are flooding my PM box are giving me a headache...TYPE-Moon, y u no make things simple?! I have created a forum for all the users to debate and help me find connections to the Nasuverse and 40k worlds. It is called "The Lost Son's Workshop". Don't hesitate to debate.

If you have any comments, threats, flames, criticisms, etc. please don't hesitate to PM me or post a review. I will accept it with my head held low and my body and mind humble. Just try not to overly curse me if I did anything overtly stupid.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter.