A few days later, Kian had a fully enclosed cage constructed in the Underhive's strategic reserve depot — walls of half-tre-thick plasteel, sealed on every side.
anwhile, General Zeppelin had secured him an Aeldari warrior. Female. Delivered as requested.
She stood two tres tall, slender and striking, with short hair.
Around her neck sat an explosive collar, detonatable by remote — one press of the button and her head was gone. Her wrists and ankles were fitted with shock restraints rated to drop an elephant.
Kian shoved the Aeldari warrior into the cage, stepped in himself, and had the door locked behind them. The two of them, alone.
The Aeldari warrior curled into a corner and began to sob quietly — a delicate, breakable thing, like porcelain that had already begun to crack.
Kian drew a plain iron curved blade from his hip and tossed it across the floor toward her.
The tal rang against the ground.
He took a two-handed greatsword in his own grip and fixed his eyes on her.
"Get up. Cut down — or I cut you down."
Yes — the fastest path to strength Kian had identified was to die fighting.
There's a saying in the world of Warhamr 40,000: all tactics converge on lee. Two mighty void fleets clash in the dark between stars — and the outco isn't decided by who has the bigger warships or more guns, but by whose commanders board the enemy vessel and win it hand-to-hand. lee is the foundational competency. Without it, you don't even get a seat at the table.
Kian's thod for learning swordsmanship was, accordingly, his own.
Normal people learned to swing a blade, found a training partner, drilled techniques until they beca muscle mory.
Kian's approach: locate an Aeldari warrior and fight her to the death. Die. Resurrect. Fight again. Die again. Resurrect again.
With unlimited lives and the experience drawn from each death, the rate of improvent would be exponential. Simple maths.
The greatsword in his hands was a custom piece — extended blade, heavier stock, full length including hilt at 1.6 tres. An imposing weapon by any asure. At 6 kilograms, it felt in Kian's grip roughly the way a standard 800-gram combat sword feels to a normal soldier — the heaviest blade he could swing while still maintaining speed and precision.
He spun a couple of flourishes with both hands, then shifted to one-handed, levelling the tip at the Aeldari warrior.
"Listen up! Standing before you is the future legend of the galaxy, Kian the Sword Immortal — so co on, xenos, raise that blade and give a good death!"
The Aeldari warrior did not pick up the blade. She stayed huddled in her corner, arms wrapped around her head, weeping.
"Everyone's going to die… they're all going to die… why…"
She cried in earnest — tears streaming, genuinely distraught — and Kian's expression creased with mild irritation.
"Hey. This isn't so romance scenario, I'm not here to sweep you off your feet, I just want to have a sword fight with you. Can you maybe channel your inner fierce warrior woman? A little pride? A little fire?"
The Aeldari warrior wiped the corner of her eye and pressed herself further into the corner.
"Everyone died… they're all gone… they're all dead…"
Kian was stumped.
She wasn't going to fight. His dream of ascending to sword sainthood — carrying on the legacy of the great Sigismund — was about to shatter before it began.
(Sigismund: legendary Astartes swordsman, Champion of the Emperor, peerless in single combat, eventually slain by the Chaos Warmaster Abaddon — who, out of respect for the fallen warrior, returned the body to the Imperium.)
He tried a different angle.
"If you don't pick up that sword and fight , I'm pulling a hundred goblins out of the webnovel next door and making your life very unpleasant. Don't test ."
The Aeldari warrior flinched — full-body — and stood up.
She took the curved blade in both hands. Her long legs pressed together. Her arms were trembling.
Kian stared.
"Co on. You're a Howling Banshee. With that attitude, how did the Aspect Temple even let you in? Did you get a diversity bonus or sothing? Is there any fight in you at all? Do you need to pull up so motivational content on my terminal?"
She still looked fragile. Pitiful. Like she'd fall over in a strong breeze. Kian felt his enthusiasm draining.
He had no choice. He reached into his gear and produced the war mask, then slid it across the floor toward her.
The Aeldari were like this. Their emotional architecture ran deeper than any human's — extraordinarily, almost overwhelmingly sensitive. So Aeldari won simply were like this: soft, prone to grief, undone by loss.
But put the war mask on, and the war-self takes the wheel. Then it's the enemy who does the crying.
Kian had wanted to start without the war mask — easy mode, build up experience gradually. But without it she had nothing. So the mask it was.
The Aeldari warrior saw it and lunged forward imdiately.
She knew. In this state — exposed, grieving, overwheld — she couldn't cope. The mask was escape. Let the war-self take over. Let the primary self go sowhere quiet and wait.
The mask touched her face.
The soft-eyed girl was gone.
Her body went rigid for half a second — then every muscle locked into precision tension at once. The slouch vanished. The curved blade swept through a crisp, efficient arc. She pivoted sideways, presenting her profile to Kian.
Kian's eyes sharpened with delight. Side-on — minimising her target profile. The technique, the instinct, the posture — this was a veteran Aeldari warrior through and through.
"Yes. NOW we're talking."
He surged forward with a roar, greatsword swinging.
"CO ON — LET'S DANCE!!"
His triple-human physicality detonated all at once — every muscle across his body firing in perfect coordination.
In an instant, he was there — closed the distance to the sideways-standing Aeldari warrior in a single explosive movent, and brought the greatsword down with everything he had—
Slash—
"Hm?"
Kian jolted. His eyes snapped open.
Above him: a familiar ceiling. A familiar incandescent light.
He sat up on his Sanctum cot, slightly dazed, and looked around at the familiar Emperor's shrine, the fabrication bench, the intelligence station.
"…I got one-shotted?!"
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