War Hammer: The reality Bender Chapter 63 63: Flayed Terror

Jolting awake from his groggy stupor, Yarrick's eyes snapped open.

Looking around, it was blindingly obvious that he was no longer trapped within that Greenskin-infested Warp realm, but had returned to the Materium.

Surrounding him was the familiar, ruined landscape of the Hive City. Rowan was still seated calmly across the wooden desk, looking as though he hadn't been waiting long at all.

"You're awake?"

Rowan looked Yarrick up and down. "It seems you experienced quite a wondrous journey."

The trial Yarrick had undergone upon accepting the Waaagh! Field was no re hallucination; it was a genuine crucible within the psychic reflection of the Greenskins in the Immaterium.

The evidence was undeniable: just monts ago, Rowan clearly felt his own reality-bending dominion absorb a substantial number of powerful souls, inching his own ascension progress bar slightly forward.

"Yes. I have returned," Yarrick murmured, looking down at his own hands. "Is this... is this what those Ork Warbosses feel?"

It felt as though an inexhaustible, terrifying well of kinetic power saturated every single fiber of his muscles. Although his physical dinsions hadn't changed, Yarrick possessed the distinct, intoxicating illusion that he could punch an Ambull to death with a single strike!

He slowly extended his left hand, flicking a single finger against the wooden desk.

CRACK!

A solid corner of the wooden desk was violently sheared off, instantaneously disintegrating into a fine cloud of sawdust mid-air.

Witnessing this, Rowan nodded in deep satisfaction.

"So, what do you say? Are you willing to formally join my retinue?" he asked solemnly.

"I am. I will join your ranks and purge every enemy that threatens humanity," Yarrick nodded firmly.

"Excellent."

Without another word, Rowan reached into the empty air and materialized a thick, leather-bound to. "This contains the intelligence you will require upon joining us. It will clarify my origins, my true nature, and our overarching objectives."

Yarrick reached out to accept the physical book, but Rowan rely smiled and thrust his own hand into the to's cover.

His hand passed through the solid parchnt like a phantom, pulling out writhing, ethereal threads of black data. With a gentle motion, Rowan tapped these illusory strands directly against Yarrick's forehead.

A torrential flood of raw data surged directly into Yarrick's consciousness. The sheer cognitive impact left him montarily dizzy and reeling.

After violently processing the information dump, Yarrick finally possessed absolute clarity regarding Rowan's true identity.

Like a phantom observer, he had just rapidly experienced Rowan's entire journey, from his manifestation aboard the Lunar-class cruiser all the way to the present mont.

"I understand now... A Reality Bender?"

Yarrick murmured, slowly rising to his feet to offer Rowan a profound salute of respect.

"Do you have any further questions or concerns?" Rowan asked.

"I do. I would like to resolve a personal matter first... or rather, a lingering sequela."

Yarrick shifted his gaze to his right arm. He violently marshaled his strength, straining to exert control over the limb.

Yet, despite his newly forged, transhuman constitution, he found himself struggling to perform the simplest of motor functions.

A bizarre, agonizing phantom pain clung to the arm like a bone-deep parasite, accompanied by a hollow sensation of profound absence. Yarrick could vividly feel the excruciating pain of the amputation he suffered in the Warp, completely overriding his ability to freely control the physical arm still attached to his body.

"Oh?"

Rowan raised a hand, preparing to utilize his reality-bending dominion to effortlessly purge the psychological trauma and heal the nerve dissonance.

But Yarrick shook his head. "There is no need. I have a different proposal. Could you... forge a chanical power klaw?"

The mont the words left his mouth, he imdiately noticed the bizarre look Rowan gave him.

"I can. But may I ask why?"

Montarily stunned by the sheer, surreal absurdity of the request, Rowan paused before asking.

"During that crucible, upon entirely absorbing the Waaagh! Field, I vaguely assimilated fragnts of xenos technological intuition and kboy knowledge," Yarrick hesitated briefly before offering a pragmatic explanation. "They currently exist within my mind as loose, disjointed threads of inspiration. Therefore, I wish to utilize this Greenskin technological paradigm to forge a superior prosthetic. Furthermore, if it isn't too much trouble, I would also like to replace one of my eyes with a bionic optic."

"To borrow the parlance of those abhorrent xenos... it is simply more Waaagh! that way."

Hearing Yarrick's deadpan rationale, the Custodian and the Living Saint standing nearby imdiately cast deeply disturbed, highly complicated glances at the Commissar. Rowan, however, rely halted his healing intent and nodded enthusiastically.

"Of course you can."

In fact, Rowan was practically overjoyed.

To think there would be such an unexpected, lore-accurate bonus!

anwhile, in a different theater.

Deep within the planetary Governor's Palace at the peak of the Hive City.

Gripping her force sword tightly, Cybia moved swiftly through the opulent, gilded corridors, her eyes darting vigilantly as she scanned her surroundings.

Upon extracting the intelligence regarding the xenos artifacts, she had imdiately dispatched a telepathic vox-pulse to Rowan before rushing here to investigate the vaults.

As an Inquisitor, Cybia understood the absolute necessity of speed. There was a highly probable chance that the Greenskins had already ransacked the Governor's private collection. Those xenos loved nothing more than looting shiny scrap to kustomize, entirely uncaring of where said "scrap" originated or what apocalyptic danger it might pose.

However, a glaring anomaly presented itself.

The deeper Cybia ventured into the Governor's Palace, the more profound her sense of unease beca.

It was entirely too quiet.

There was absolutely no sound, nor any ambient signs of biological activity.

Before arriving, Cybia had fully anticipated carving a bloody path through lingering Ork patrols, intending to offer their tainted souls as a sacrifice to the Emperor.

Yet, while she had slaughtered a few mobs on the approach to the palace, once she breached the interior of the structure, the Greenskins had seemingly vanished into thin air.

What is going on here?

As she advanced, Cybia's brow suddenly furrowed.

Is that... the stench of blood?

She quickened her pace, striding rapidly through a series of grand hallways, entirely ignoring the priceless tapestries and aristocratic portraits that had already been violently defaced by Ork vandalism.

Eventually, Cybia arrived at her destination.

It was the chamber from which the suffocating stench of gore emanated.

"Emperor above..."

Cybia grimaced, staring into a room that perfectly resembled a macabre, industrial slaughterhouse.

Massive piles of dismbered corpses—a grotesque mixture of Greenskins and human PDF troopers—littered the floor. It was glaringly obvious that they had been systematically butchered by monomolecular, hyper-advanced blades; the sheer cuts through flesh and bone were as smooth as polished glass.

Furthermore, what deeply unsettled the Inquisitor was that the skin of nurous corpses had been ticulously, entirely flayed off, leaving behind only the glistening, wet musculature and exposed tendons.

What manner of xenos did this?

As a Daemonhunter of the Ordo Malleus, her expertise lay in combating the denizens of the Warp. Consequently, she wasn't an encyclopedia on the specific M.O. of every xenos species in the galaxy.

Wait, what is that?

The hyper-attuned senses of a psyker caused a fleeting, ethereal premonition of death to flash before Cybia's eyes.

Trusting her absolute, ingrained instincts, she imdiately whipped her head around, staring down the adjacent corridor.

At that exact mont, at the far end of the darkened hall...

A grid-like, eerie green dinsional portal was silently tearing open the fabric of reality.

A horrifying, tallic monstrosity slowly stepped out from the erald light.

The creature was severely hunched over. Its physical chassis resembled a skeletal fra forged entirely from living tal alloys. Its elongated fingers terminated in razor-sharp, surgical flaying claws that pulsed with malevolent green energy. The hollow, lifeless ocular cavities of its skull-like face slowly pivoted, locking onto its newly acquired prey.

"How utterly blasphemous..."

What truly disgusted the Inquisitor to her core was that this tallic monstrosity was draped in a grotesque, macabre cloak of rotting human skin. Thin, viscous strings of fresh blood dripped continuously from its skeletal chassis, pooling onto the marble floor with a sickening drip... drip... drip...

What in the Emperor's na is this abomination?

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