Davin Temple

Astartes from three Legions arrived at the vast basin enclosed by jagged crater walls.

Drop pods tore through the sky as Thunderhawk gunships and Stormbirds crossed the clouds, descending here in massive formations.

Both augury arrays and psychic divination showed that there was nothing in the basin’s ravines below. The surroundings were terrifyingly quiet, utterly lifeless.

"Inform the troops to establish defensive positions. We must be fully prepared." Guilliman issued the order.

For this expedition, the Ultramarines had brought more than fifty thousand Astartes. Combined with the Dark Angels’ twenty thousand and the Blood Angels’ thirty thousand, roughly one hundred thousand Astartes had gathered in the Davin system.

It was a force sufficient to sweep across the eastern galaxy, yet throughout the Davin system, the power capable of matching it had remained unseen.

With the temple at the center of the basin as its core, a chain of fortifications rose at a visible pace. The STC templates generously sponsored by Lox demonstrated their proper capabilities, saving enormous amounts of time and effort.

Thunderhawk gunships and Stormbirds continually patrolled the skies, remaining alert. Vast swarms of drones spread across the planet to survey its precise condition.

Lox had long since become adept at this. Whenever she arrived at a battlefield, she first used these three opening moves, scattering her cards across the board to gather intelligence.

Heavy armored vehicle units poured from the transport ships. At the head were Baneblades, followed by all manner of Leman Russ tanks and Sicaran tanks, along with Chimera troop carriers carrying mortal auxiliary forces, their engines roaring to life.

These products of martial aesthetics gleamed with cold metallic luster. Fully armed mortal auxiliaries would coordinate with them in infantry-armor formations.

If the terrain here had not been too narrow for Titan war engines to deploy, Guilliman would not have minded airdropping the accompanying Sunfire Titan Legion directly onto the ground.

Tech-priests of the Mechanicus carried sacred oils and incense, diligently blessing these creations of the Machine God. At the same time, Skitarii forces reached the battlefield, and those dangerous figures radiating intense radiation were stationed in the most distant area.

The Second Imperium’s three primarchs, along with Lox and the temporarily paroled Konrad Curze, stood before the shattered, cracked plaza of the Davin Temple.

Lox wore a specially designed suit of power armor. Davin’s environment had been altered by colonists in the distant past, but no one knew whether this seemingly lifeless place harbored any unexpected dangers.

The power pack behind Lox roared. She could feel the texture of Davin’s ground beneath her, and everything here seemed no different from any other death world.

Except for the temple before them.

This temple, called Delphos, was a colossal octagonal structure. Viewed from space, it resembled a blood-red eight-pointed star branded into the planet’s surface.

From a symbolic perspective, the eight-pointed star was a mark of special significance. During the Battle of Calth, the Word Bearers had made extensive use of it.

"The scanning arrays indicate that the enormous red stones of this temple, over a hundred meters tall, were carved entirely by hand and stacked to form the temple’s main structure."

Entirely by hand. No one knew how many Davinians had died to create this magnificent temple. Those blood-red stones might even have been watered with Davinian blood.

The drone swarms compiled every inch of nearby ground into data and uploaded it to the Cogitator systems in orbit. A complete holographic projection was taking shape.

A tall tower stood at each corner of the octagonal temple, while a massive domed structure occupied its center. At that moment, the tops of two spires had already collapsed, and the grand dome had cracked under tectonic shifts.

Ash-like dust, or perhaps the remnants of something burned to nothing, covered the entire plaza. Deep darkness spilled from within the magnificent dome, making its interior impossible to discern.

Beyond that, tall pillars stood in symmetrical rows on either side of the stairs. Countless exquisite serpent sculptures coiled around the stone columns, their lifelike giant snakes gazing deeply at the gathering humans.

"Let us bring this destiny to an end," Sanguinius said, taking the lead toward the temple’s rusted iron gates.

Fine serpentine engravings covered the gates. Two enormous snakes coiled around a great tree, forming a structure resembling a genetic double helix. The left gate stood open, and its hinges were already damaged. Someone had clearly come here before them.

Everyone knew who that person was: the former Wolf Lord, the Warmaster of the Imperium, and now the arch-traitor, Horus Lupercal.

Beyond the iron gates stood countless neatly arranged braziers and candleholders. Yet the flames that had once burned day and night had long gone out, leaving only ashes after all sound had fallen silent.

"This temple doesn’t seem any different from outside. Everything is thoroughly dead, ash everywhere. Who could have known that Horus’s war, which set the entire galaxy ablaze, began here?"

"A tiny planet tucked away in some backwater corner of the galaxy, a ridiculously insignificant shrine to heretical faith, yet it was enough to make the Wolf Lord stumble here."

Lox sighed. From the perspective of symbolism, this temple was linked to the trillions of lives that had died across the galaxy. Every brick and tile here was steeped in boundless sin and bloodshed.

The skull planet above their heads and this abandoned, ruined temple seemed to declare that everything had already perished.

That was right. According to the intelligence reports, Davin had still possessed a flourishing primitive civilization before Horus came here. Yet this temple had decayed into this state in only a few short years.

Horus had been struck down in the year 004 of the thirty-first millennium, while Lox and the others arrived in the year 010 of the same millennium. Only six years had passed, yet this place had become more decayed than it would have after a thousand years of rot.

This was undoubtedly the Warp’s work. Horus’s corruption had brought unknown consequences.

Lox kicked Veronica’s leg. Konrad Curze had not uttered a word since landing on the surface, and he was clearly brewing some new malicious scheme.

A mortal body naturally could not harm an Iron Men, but Veronica had received the command. Its leg module suddenly contracted and tightened, and Curze’s scream immediately rang out through the speakers.

"I know nothing. I cannot see anything here. This is some kind of junction in fate. The future here is nothing but void."

"Sanguinius knows I am not lying. He cannot see it either."

Curze spoke between gasps. He felt as though his leg had been crushed, and though it was only a minor injury for a primarch, that did not mean he would feel nothing.

The others were somewhat disappointed and simply stopped paying attention to the prisoner.

The temple seemed to have endured the erosion of countless ages. The doors to its chambers had rotted away, and the few surviving murals revealed a faint trace of their former splendor. The lingering imprints seemed to whisper, and Lox vaguely felt that the eyes in those remaining images were moving.

Everything here… was deeply unsettling.

The accompanying Invictor Guard, Sanguinary Guard, and Deathwing Space Marines searched every corner of the temple. Yet they found only ash scattered across the ground. Heavy footsteps echoed everywhere, but there was not the slightest trace of anything useful.

Sanguinius closed his eyes. Suddenly, he seemed to see something.

"Over there. Follow me."

The Angel came to the very center of Delphos, directly beneath the vaulted dome overhead. The Space Marines had already searched this place, and there was nothing here.

Yet when Sanguinius reached out, his hand touched a door that did not exist.

This invisible door stood in empty space, like a mirror within a mirror, a lake within its own reflection. It shifted between existence and nonexistence, yet the Angel had detected the trace of its presence.

Lox and the others followed Sanguinius into the nonexistent chamber. It was an altar, with a massive slab of pure black stone placed at its center. Its surface seemed caked with grime left behind by dried blood.

In a daze, everyone saw a vision. Once, a great figure had been carried to the center of the altar by his sons. He bled without end, the wound left by the anathame unable to heal, until certain entities performed a blasphemous ritual upon him.

This was where Horus had suffered, and the turning point of his fate. Here, Horus the Wolf Lord had died, and Horus, leader of the traitors, had been reborn.