…
Five days later.
A deep sense of fear and despair weighed heavily upon every crew member in the Na'ghul fleet scattered throughout the galaxy. Some had attempted to flee, only to be crushed by the grim discovery that their Warp engines lay dormant, unresponsive. Even near the Mandeville Points within the system, the celestial interference resembled gravitational pull, growing steadily more potent and pervasive.
Every warship had lost its combat capabilities, oblivious to a shroud of darkness skimming across the desolate surface of the blackened planet below. The ominous mist coalesced along the equator, forming into a towering metallic figure, standing ten meters tall.
A shard of Azagorod, the Shroud King, had arrived.
The fragment, tenaciously believing itself to be the essence of the Shroud King himself, surveyed its surroundings with a touch of surprise. The land was barren, with not an enemy in sight.
According to the Shroud King's calculations, his emergence on this world—the simulacrum's domain—would have incited armies across the planet to lie in wait, poised to capture him. But strangely, the enemies were absent, perhaps due to negligence, or simply by chance.
Could it be that the simulacrum was never here at all?
The Shroud King closed his eyes to perceive his surroundings. The long-digested powers of a certain ancient Star God granted him a formidable sense, one that assured him of the simulacrum's presence on this very world, hidden within the dimensions.
"Pitiful race of slaves, wretched, frail kin," he murmured.
"Why aren't the wretched metal slaves here? I will eradicate every traitorous one of them!"
"Isn't it better this way, without any foes?"
"Look! A fleet within the system!"
The Shroud King's mind teetered on the brink of madness, as the voices of other Star Gods, each manifesting contradictory thoughts, echoed within him, their whispers twisting his words. Occasionally, they provided him with insights, the most recent of which drew his attention to the distant fleet in orbit.
The ships were inactive, but the flesh fused with their metal hulls animated them. This fleet, insignificant to the Shroud King, had seemed inconsequential until his presence ignited an old hatred, stirring memories of the metal slaves buried beneath the planet's surface.
"Disgusting filth," he muttered.
Those ships, tainted with fused flesh, paled in comparison to the loathsome metal skeletons his memory dredged up. It wasn't the fusion that revolted him, but rather the warp-tainted energy those ships radiated.
"This is a sacrilege."
"No, it's a provocation."
"Indeed, it's a provocation—slaughter them!"
Voices of varying tones resonated in agreement around him, unified in their purpose to cleanse the galaxy of this accursed fleet. Raising his hand in a gripping motion, the scorched soil transformed into metal, merging to form a massive scythe. With the intent to confront, he vanished from the planet's surface, reappearing near the Mandeville Point, standing squarely before the loathsome fleet.
"Many are already dead."
"We merely entered the galaxy, and they crumble in terror and despair."
The Shroud King's gaze fixed upon the fleet. These ships were shells of their former selves, and before he had even arrived, crew members had begun taking their own lives, only the most resolute still clinging to life. Yet, in his presence, even these survivors were powerless. One by one, his piercing gaze claimed the lives of the weak creatures within, their foul-smelling souls violently ripped from their decaying bodies.
The Shroud King devoured these souls, and though he found the taste revolting, he thought, *I've fallen far enough that I cannot afford to be picky.*
The entire crew—tens of thousands of souls—perished under his gaze, stripped of life. Whereas other Star Gods might unleash a torrent of lightning to obliterate a mortal army, the Shroud King required only a glance.
"Let us do this universe a favor," the voices whispered.
"Annihilate their fleet."
With a sweep of his arm, a massive black vortex materialized above the fleet, tentacles emerging to drag each ship into the void. With the filth banished into his personal dimension, the Shroud King returned to the planet below, ready to fulfill his purpose.
…
The entirety of this scene played out in real-time through the illusionary powers of the simulacrum. To it, the Shroud King's display of strength was unremarkable, merely standard fare.
Qin Mo, however, found it a fitting yet unexpected turn of events.
The Na'ghul fleet, tragically, had wandered right into the lion's maw. For the Shroud King, a mere glance was enough to end the crew's lives; his mere proximity induced nightmares and despair to the point of suicide. This was simply his nature. Had another Star God's shard appeared, things might not have ended so swiftly.
While observing, Qin Mo assessed the power of this Star God fragment. Each piece of a Star God varied drastically in strength. The weakest Shroud King fragment might be spooked by an Astartes Captain wielding a mere melta-bomb. The strongest, however, could command the Necron dead, compelling even his sworn foes to find his scythe. There were shards that could even rend world engines asunder or transform mountains into molten rivers with a wave.
The fragment before them fell somewhere in the middle.
"I feel doomed," the simulacrum, now in the form of a shield, trembled as it spoke.
Its fear was not entirely baseless.
The Shroud King had delved beneath the planet's surface, searching for the Necron tombs where his ancient foes lay dormant, hidden by advanced fields and dimensional pockets. These barriers would buy some time, though only briefly.
It was hard to tell how intact the dead Necron armies were—after all, the fragment had laid waste to the Na'ghul fleet above. It was baffling that the Necron skeletons had yet to stir.
"Don't worry. You're far from doomed," Qin Mo assured, brimming with confidence. "Even if I had to face that fragment in open space, it wouldn't mean my defeat. Besides, I'm bringing everything I've got."
At this, the simulacrum adjusted the scene, shifting the vision from the Shroud King to the outer reaches of the Tyrone system's space.
In the distance, two massive satellites known as Space Fortresses orbited a metallic planet still under construction.
"This thing's far from complete, isn't it?" the simulacrum asked with a hint of doubt.
"Of course not," Qin Mo nodded. "If it were, it wouldn't be called a fortress—it would be a Celestial Engine. But trust me, with Leviathan, the Hyper-Dimensional Sky Dome, and a few other tricks up our sleeve, bringing down the Shroud King will be the least of our problems."