Nareth looked up, locking his gaze on the highest point at the rear of the battlecruiser, the Fra'al command chamber.
From their position, it was only three more decks upward.
"Follow me."
As he spoke, he swung his heavy halberd. It sliced through six Fra'al warriors like wheat before a scythe, severing them cleanly at the waist.
Their upper halves slid off slowly. Deep purple blood sprayed through the air, yellow fibers stretched like thread, trying to reconnect their bodies, while white fluids secreted in a desperate attempt to fuse them back together.
But their death throes lasted mere seconds. The Fra'al's evolved regeneration was useless against the destructive power of a Primarch.
Without slowing, Nareth climbed the spiral stairs of violet metal.
Fra'al soldiers poured in from all directions, agile and fast, swarming the four of them.
Maria had already witnessed Nareth's terrifying strength. She knew it didn't matter how many came to the giant, they were lambs to the slaughter. All they had to do was guard his back, making sure he wasn't distracted.
"Tsvetana, Dementieva, hold the rear!"
Dementieva, a muscular woman with the build of a man, pulled out a syringe and plunged it into her left wrist.
Her body swelled with power. "RAAAHH!"
Shield in her left hand, she charged down the stairs.
A dozen Fra'al were hurled aside like rag dolls. Her chainsaw-axe roared as it split the head of one that came at her from the right.
Suddenly, a Fra'al wielding twin daggers lunged from the flank. His many eyes focused sharply on his target.
A beam of searing light shot through his right eye, exiting from the left. The assassins moved in perfect coordination, driving the Fra'al back.
Nareth moved like Death itself. Each casual swing of his halberd took a dozen xeno lives.
The Fra'al stared at the giant in horror. They had pillaged dozens of star systems but had never encountered a war machine like this.
Paralyzed by fear, they hesitated and then began to fall back.
Nareth tore through the spiral staircase with ease. As he prepared to ascend further, a loud clang rang out the hatch burst open.
A Fra'al commander clad in deep violet armor emerged with his troops.
He shouted furiously at his cowering kin.
The retreating soldiers rallied, ready to charge, but suddenly, they felt a mountain crash down on them.
The Fra'al commander was shocked. Dozens of his soldiers had been slaughtered in a single charge.
These weren't weaklings. Every Fra'al aboard a flagship was a trained void fighter, yet they were butchered like livestock.
His eyes widened in disbelief. After a stunned pause, he snapped back to action.
Twin blades in hand, the commander rolled and weaved, searching for weaknesses in the giant's defense.
At the same time, he activated his throat communicator, barking rapid xeno phrases to the bridge.
Nareth, all the while, had been picking up fragments of their language during the fight, enough to recognize words like "terror" and "reinforcements" in the commander's message.
He gave his halberd a flick. The tip launched like an arrow, piercing the throats of 27 of the commander's elite guards in an instant.
Maria drove her serrated dagger into a Fra'al's skull, then kicked him away with her right leg, sending his body crashing into two others.
She happened to catch sight of Nareth using the sixteenth strike of the Otsberg-Vaya technique, a style of swordsmanship from Vostroya. She had trained in it under a swords master since childhood.
It was a technique she also excelled in. Even with a curved blade and combat stimulants, she could at most unleash thirteen strikes in a second. Nareth had just executed over twenty, with a halberd, each thrust hitting the enemy's throat.
'Power, speed, and technique in perfect harmony. His attacks are unmatched.'
Maria's eyes gleamed. His image filled her thoughts.
Inspired, she pushed off with both legs, leapt at the aliens, and struck with the sixteenth form, throat slashes, one after another.
One, two, three...
She synchronized her curved blade with the rhythm of a halberd thrust, managing five strikes in a single burst, a new personal best without any stimulants.
She dodged an incoming attack, sliced off an xeno's arm, seized his dagger, all while silently admitting to herself:
'The gap is enormous.'
Landing, she looked at Nareth again. He was fending off rapid twin-dagger stabs with a clean, crushing halberd swing that smashed into an xenos's chest.
'The twenty-third strike! He found the single gap in the enemy's flurry and delivered a perfect weak-point hit!'
She asked herself: 'Could I do that, make a flawless strike in the blink of an eye?'
'Maybe… but never with his ease. What would the Magdan people call this?
Effortless strength.'
The commander's death shattered Fra'al's morale again, not just among crewmen, but among warriors too.
Nareth was unstoppable. He climbed another deck.
A gate opened. A line of Fra'al emerged wearing purple-gold robes, each holding a staff, surrounded by swirls of warp energy.
At the same time, over a thousand warriors charged from the deck below.
Nareth knew the Fra'al had mastered dreadful psychic arts. Back in the Great Crusade, even Space Marines had suffered losses fighting them.
In the campaign to bring Serapis into compliance, the Salamanders and Word Bearers fought the Fra'al. Word Bearer Edicar had been so wounded that he was entombed in a Dreadnought.
Even the infamous Alpha Legion saboteur, the Terran veteran Nihaelon, was interred in a Dreadnought after a battle with the Fra'al.
Nareth inhaled deeply. Air spun through his lungs, then he let out a deafening howl.
A dozen psykers clutched their heads in agony. The sonic shriek bored into their brains, vibrated with an ultrasonic hum. They vomited blood, fainted, and fell.
Nareth cut them down with his halberd as they fell unconscious, then looked up.
Some of the Fra'al psykers had survived, shielding themselves a moment before the howl with psychic defenses.
[Fra'al excels at foresight. Still... "Howl" is only a Sequence-8 Beyonder power acquired from the lung spider. As a Primarch, I far surpass Sequence-8 users in raw strength, but my lungs weren't specially enhanced for it. The power hasn't evolved... They also clearly have telekinetic spells that block sound.]
Even as his thoughts flickered, Nareth crouched and launched himself upward.
He appeared before one of the Fra'al in an instant, smashing two psykers with his right-arm halberd.
His left hand shot out, grabbing the last psyker's head.
The telekinetic shield burst like paper, it couldn't even hold back the Primarch for a second.
Nareth squeezed, and the shark-like head burst, spraying a mist of deep purple blood.