Chapter Forty-Eight: Magnus

Magnus recognized the two men beside Wang Ming—Fogrim and Xing Jian. One was his familiar brother, the other a favored Chosen of Chaos with whom he had shared many conversations in the Realm of Chaos.

“You are not Fogrim, even though you look exactly like him,” Magnus said, fixing his gaze on Fogrim. He had discerned that this Fogrim was not the true one.

“Even if I am not the real Fogrim, I am loyal to our father. Magnus, you despicable traitor!” Fogrim raised the Blade of Flame and pointed it at Magnus.

“Why bother talking so much? Let’s get him together!” Suddenly, Wang Xiaofa darted out from behind Wang Ming, followed by a throng of transmigrators, all charging forward with him.

They rushed straight at Magnus, hundreds of power swords in their hands shining like glow sticks at a concert.

“Admirable courage,” Magnus sneered as he watched the hundreds of Astartes rushing toward him.

Magnus lifted his staff, and wicked psychic flames appeared from the void, instantly incinerating the foremost transmigrators to ashes.

Those behind halted abruptly, raising their bolters in unison and pulling the triggers. Hundreds of bolters unleashed their full firepower, pouring everything they had into Magnus.

Bolter rounds struck in front of Magnus, but instead of exploding, they vanished, enveloped by waves of psychic energy.

Ranged attacks were utterly ineffective, and the psychic flames barred the transmigrators from approaching for close combat.

“Magnus! Are you afraid of close combat? Come on, don’t be scared!” At that moment, a voice shouted from the crowd of transmigrators.

Even in the vacuum, Magnus could hear the sound through his psychic power. Upon hearing it, he raised his staff and instantly plunged into the crowd.

Magnus was furious. He had actually been taunted by an Astartes.

His speed was astonishing—he smashed through dozens of transmigrators in the front row in an instant, his target clearly the one who had just dared to mock him.

Magnus was a Primarch first and a sorcerer second. His body, blessed by the gods of Chaos, was simply beyond the transmigrators’ ability to withstand.

He closed the distance in a flash, appearing before the bold transmigrator, and with the sharp tip of his staff, impaled him clean through.

Magnus lifted the transmigrator atop his staff, bringing him before his eyes.

“You are very brave,” Magnus said, gazing at the transmigrator impaled upon his staff. To taunt a Primarch for not daring to fight in close quarters—one must be either insane or a fool.

Even among the Primarchs, those weakest in melee, like the Thirteenth, could not be taken down by hundreds of Space Marines in hand-to-hand combat.

“I think so too,” the transmigrator atop the staff replied weakly to Magnus.

Strangely, though the transmigrator seemed frail, Magnus heard nothing in his tone that would suggest someone on the verge of death.

Suddenly, Magnus noticed his surroundings. At some point, the ship around him had become deserted; even those he had just smashed aside were gone.

Now, only Magnus and the transmigrator hanging from his staff remained in the vessel.

Magnus surveyed the empty space, and a sense of foreboding surged within him.

“Hahaha…” Suddenly, the transmigrator atop the staff began to laugh.

Magnus regarded him curiously, unable to fathom how one so near death could laugh.

He removed the transmigrator’s helmet. In Magnus’s enormous hands, the Astartes’ helmet was no more than a delicate toy.

With his helmet stripped away, the transmigrator’s head was exposed to the vacuum.

The lack of air made him suffer, and only those transmigrators who had endured death many times could withstand such agony.

Magnus saw the radiant smile on the transmigrator’s face and felt an ominous chill settle in his heart.