...
As the Talon Army and Cardian Assault Forces swiftly retreated from the Tyouko Plains, the 13th Regiment assembled with urgency, transported to their designated guard posts.
"Highest alert status!" Yao'en's voice cut through as he patrolled amongst his hundred troops. "Prepare yourselves—combat is imminent!"
Each of the soulless soldiers of the 13th Regiment listened in silence, their advanced teleportation protection devices vibrating faintly within their power armor. These systems, constantly primed, would automatically engage the moment the regiment was teleported.
The 13th Regiment bore such protective devices for a reason; their purpose was to confront demons and handle supernatural phenomena, where they had to rival the speed of teleportation itself.
In the physical universe and the subspace realms alike, the Talon weren't the only ones who excelled in the art of swift movement.
"Why were only we transported here?" one soldier wondered aloud, checking his coordinates: 332, 111. His bio-scanner showed no allies nearby.
The soldier felt a pang of disquiet; it would be reassuring to have reinforcements for the coming battle. His words drew the gaze of others, for in any world, soulless soldiers were often warned not to ask too many questions.
Perhaps this was due to the disdain others held toward them, or perhaps certain truths were best left veiled.
"Because some things only we can handle—like cleansing those loathsome subspace creatures," Yao'en replied frankly, his tone sparing the soldier any rebuke.
From the moment he had received the command from Qin Mo, Yao'en had foreseen what was likely to come—demons, or perhaps anomalies in the psychic field. The deployment of the 13th Regiment here indicated that Qin Mo preferred any impending threat to be swiftly neutralized, hidden from the eyes of ordinary men.
Hearing Yao'en's answer, the soldiers grew solemn, adjusting their armor to maximize power flow into their weapon systems.
"Ask questions."
As they prepared for battle, Yao'en suddenly uttered three words over the comm channel.
"It's fine to ask—just don't speak too much," he added, taking his place at the head of the formation. "Our kind is privileged to know more than others."
The soldiers nodded thoughtfully.
Yao'en stood at the front, his sentinel-grade power armor's shoulder cannon whirring into sentinel mode, the barrel rotating to ensure no direction was left unguarded.
Minute by minute, they waited, until at last, after about fifty minutes, Yao'en's bio-processor pinged with data from the armor's detection array—subspace energy was spiking.
An instant later, twenty meters above, a figure flashed into existence, eyes ablaze with madness, screaming incoherently about losing control.
But the soulless soldiers' innate abilities nullified the intruder's psychic powers, and he plummeted to the ground, spine snapping on impact, vomiting uncontrollably from the intense discomfort.
"I thought he'd die on impact," Yao'en remarked, gripping the chainsword bestowed by Qin Mo and stepping forward to dispatch the helpless psyker. "His psychic aptitude must be impressive."
A psyker who could maintain some semblance of consciousness around the 13th Regiment was certainly rare, but in the end, he was still cut down with a single blow, without Yao'en even needing his shoulder cannon.
But Yao'en's vigilance did not waver; he continued his watch.
Moments later, a hundred more psykers materialized in the sky, strands of visible energy weaving among them, forming a psychic field just potent enough to hold back the intense nausea from the soulless presence below.
But they, too, fell swiftly, slain by Yao'en and his troops in less than three seconds.
"Bring it on," Yao'en murmured to himself, gazing skyward.
Then, another wave of psykers appeared—countless, blotting out the sky. From the plains below, only a seething mass of psykers could be seen, bodies fusing and twisting grotesquely together.
Against this tide, even the 13th Regiment's abilities could not suppress the psychic onslaught. Within moments, the psykers opened a portal through which demons poured forth in waves, engulfing Yao'en and his troops.
In a single instant, the soulless soldiers were incinerated by a blue inferno, summoned by a psychic spell. Yao'en barely escaped the blaze, glancing toward the spell's caster.
It was a two-headed bird-like being, wielding a scepter topped with a tome.
One head darted about, surveying the surroundings, glancing over Yao'en as though he didn't exist.
Yao'en leapt forward, gripping his chainsword and cleaving the bird-man's left head clean off.
"My head's been chopped off!" the severed head shrieked.
"I appear to have dodged an attack," the remaining head replied calmly.
Dealing with demons always had its peculiarities, and Yao'en was neither surprised nor curious about why one head spoke truth and the other lies.
Clearly, the bird-man knew his head had been severed, and, somehow, he teleported a kilometer away in an instant.
Yao'en moved to give chase but found himself surrounded by an endless horde of demons, the grotesque pink and blue imps lunging at him, along with their avian, fearsome brethren.
"The two-headed demon is called Karos."
Qin Mo's voice echoed over the comm channel, and flames surged along Yao'en's chainsword.
Divine power flowed into the weapon, channeled through the medium Yao'en bore.
Gazing calmly at the demonic tide, Yao'en plunged his chainsword into the ground.
A 360-degree inferno burst forth, immolating every demon in his vicinity. From space, the Tyouko Plains appeared scorched at the center.
"One of Karos' heads speaks truth; the other lies. One perceives the future, the other, the past."
"It can't see the present—so it cannot see you, because both in the past and future, you are already dead."
Hearing Qin Mo's words, Yao'en was reminded of the battles against demons on Talon II, and of the title Qin Mo had once bestowed upon him:
Karos-Slayer.
"It can't see me, can it?" Yao'en muttered, feeling a spark of grim satisfaction. "Guess that means I could slice it a hundred times over, and it wouldn't know a thing."