Cain had assimilated the full spectrum of Emprik's soul, yet unlike every other life-form he had consud, he had been unable to access the mories of the Champion of the Root.
They were present-he could feel them-but they remained locked, requiring imrsion rather than simple absorption. And given what he had learned from Apex, there was enormous danger in fusing his mind with mories born from an entity of the Emptiness.
But ti would not wait for him. Hesitation was a luxury he could no longer afford.
His consciousness soon reached the heart of the Primarch of Conquest Leviathan, the inner core that embodied the Scarlet Throne. The very instant he stepped into that ntal realm, he focused his senses on the new structure resting within it.
It resembled a wilted flower, one that had endured countless eons yet never truly died. It existed in a perpetual state of decay, slowly rotting but unable to reach an end. The sight of it stirred sothing cold in Cain's mind.
Even after falling to the power of the Scarlet Throne, the nature of The Root still manifested, showing how perseverant it was.
A final flash of resolve crossed his eyes. Cain extended his consciousness and plunged into the structure forged from Emprik's mind and soul.
At first, nothing. Only darkness and suffocating silence.
But as Cain pressed deeper-forcing his mind into the depth of the Root's mory-the darkness began to thin. A faint, distant glimr erged. He pushed further. Then further still.
Until a sudden explosion of blinding light tore through his senses. For a few monts, the radiance was so intense that it overwheld
everything. Slowly, shapes ford within the brilliance.
The first thing he saw was a tower. A colossal, impossible tower rising into an endless nothingness. It was so vast, so majestic, so ancient, that its re presence defied reason. At its peak burned a radiant red sun, exuding a power that surpassed Cain's comprehension.
The Crimson World was the first thing that ca to his mind-after all, that universe too had been forged like a tower. But Cain instantly dismissed the notion. The structure before him, its grandeur and magnitude, dwarfed the Crimson World by leagues beyond asure. Static abruptly tore through his vision.
When it cleared, Cain found himself witnessing a being standing at the tower's edge.
A colossal figure woven from ancient roots, its entire body resembling a living monunt to creation itself. Light erupted from its crown like a divine beacon, marking it as sothing older and greater than any known existence.
Its bark-like flesh twisted with ageless strength, untouched by the erosion of ti. Vast wings made from roots unfurled behind it, shedding fragnts that drifted like burning embers across the crimson sky.
Cain's eyes widened in shock.
This was not Emprik's mory.
He was witnessing the mories of the Root itself.
He had no ti to react. Another figure appeared before the Ancestor of the Root. His form was bathed in white and black lightning. Though the luminous veil obscured his body, Cain could discern the essential features: three faces, six arms, and a crown of eighteen golden suns encircling his forehead.
The Ancestor of the Root turned his vast, root-forged head toward the lightning-clad being. Hatred and defiance radiated from him.
Power surged from his body, and an ocean of roots erupted forward, thundering toward his enemy.
Cain could not comprehend the magnitude of that power. Instinct alone told him those roots could swallow entire Empyrean Worlds- and yet all of it was unleashed against a single foe.
The lightning-bathed being sneered.
"Barely omnipotent, and you dare defy an Eternal?" As he spoke, he raised a single finger. A tiny golden sphere-no larger than a grain of rice-materialized at its tip. Then it shot forward.
The ocean of roots surged to et it. For a mont, it seed ludicrous: a universe-devouring tide crashing against a speck of light. The collision proved otherwise.
The golden sphere detonated. It transford into a colossal sun whose blaze obliterated the roots in an instant. The solar inferno continued forward, crashing into the Ancestor of the Root and blasting his titanic body into the distance-far away from the tower, hurled across the void like debris.
Static flickered again.
Cain now saw the broken, drifting remains of the Ancestor's imnse form as it floated helplessly through what he could only assu was the Emptiness. Its power struggled to rebuild itself, to heal, but the lingering golden fire was too strong. It burned, consud, and destroyed the Root's flesh the mont regeneration began.
In the end, only a single fragnt remained.
A single root.
It rotted endlessly, trapped in ceaseless decay. Yet within that lone, dying strand, Cain sensed the last echo of the Ancestor's will-its
most primal, immutable instinct:
To live, no matter the cost.
The fragnt continued to decay. But instead of resisting, it accepted
that cursed state. By embracing decay, it found a way to survive. It beca sothing that could never truly die, sothing that could endure the eternal burn of the golden fla.
What remained afterward was a piece of the Ancestor-broken, corrupted, stripped of wisdom or self. All higher thought had vanished. Only instinct remained. Only hunger. Only the desperate
desire to exist.
Static rippled again.
The fragnt drifted across the Emptiness for ages uncounted.
Eventually, it reached a universe.
Static.
Light returned-and Cain saw with horror what had beco of it. The universe had been twisted, transford into a grotesque labyrinth of roots and decay-a cursed existence clinging desperately to life, refusing to die even as it corrupted everything it touched.
He wanted to understand, but he had no control over the mories
flashing through his mind.
Cain now beheld the Heart of the Root-the very one that had reached his universe. And then, as if the mories reached their chronological end, he witnessed his battle with Emprik.
Finally, the mories faded, dissolving into darkness. That was all he received. No thoughts. No knowledge. Only events- cold, raw, and unfiltered.
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