The Sea of Souls stretched endlessly before Servius, the path behind him dissolving into nothingness as though it had never existed. The deeper he traveled, the stranger the landscape became—less tangible, less grounded in any semblance of reality he could recognize. Where once there had been grotesque forests of bone and rivers of roiling ichor, there was now only... emptiness.

  It wasn’t the absence of substance that disturbed him—Servius had come to expect such things in this accursed place—but rather the absence of malice. The oppressive weight of the Chaos Gods’ presence, the familiar stench of decay or the mocking laughter of the Warp’s whispers, had begun to fade. The further he walked, the quieter the world around him became.

  Quiet, but not peaceful.

  The path was no longer a path, at least not in any sense Servius could understand. Each step forward felt less grounded, less connected to the concept of movement itself. It was as though the act of walking no longer carried him anywhere—it simply… happened, an echo of motion without the certainty of progress.

  The ground beneath him had become translucent, shimmering faintly like oil on water. He looked down and saw nothing—no depths, no sky reflected back, just a faint suggestion of light far below, flickering weakly as if struggling to exist. It felt as though he was walking on the surface of an endless abyss, the thin layer of reality separating him from oblivion growing thinner with every step.

  Servius paused, crouching to run a gloved hand over the surface. It was cool to the touch, unnervingly smooth, and it gave no resistance to his weight. Yet it didn’t feel solid either. It was like walking on the surface of a bubble, delicate and unnervingly fragile. He imagined it could pop at any moment, plunging him into the nothingness below.

  “It’s getting quieter,” he muttered to himself, his voice barely audible in the stillness.

  The oppressive noise of the Warp—the whispers, the howls, the maddening symphony of chaos—had faded to a faint hum in the distance. The silence wasn’t a reprieve; it was a vacuum. It pressed against his ears and crawled under his skin, making his fur bristle. Every sound he made seemed to echo endlessly, the empty expanse mocking his every breath and step.

  The sky—or whatever hung above him—had transformed as well. Gone were the writhing clouds of impossible colors and the bleeding stars. In their place stretched an infinite void, pale and featureless, like the surface of a blank canvas. It neither moved nor shimmered; it simply was, stagnant and oppressive.

  Servius had seen countless horrors in the Warp, from landscapes made of screaming faces to rivers of molten bone. But this emptiness unnerved him in a way that nothing else had. It was too blank, too still, as though the Warp itself was holding its breath.

  Yet, the void wasn’t entirely devoid of activity. Occasionally, a faint ripple would disturb its surface, like the echo of a long-forgotten scream. These disturbances didn’t follow any predictable pattern. One moment, the world was deathly still; the next, the void would tremble, and faint distortions would shimmer in the distance before fading again.

  Servius’s sharp eyes scanned the horizon, tracking the ripples as they came and went. He couldn’t shake the feeling that they were watching him, or perhaps waiting for him.

  He stopped walking and stood still for a moment, his ears flicking back and forth, searching for a sound—any sound. His tail swayed behind him, a subconscious expression of unease. His muscles, honed through years of war and survival, were taut, ready to spring into action at the first sign of danger.

  And yet, nothing came.

  Servius exhaled slowly, forcing his breathing to steady. The void was testing him, though he didn’t know how or why. Was it meant to break his resolve? To lull him into a false sense of security? Or was this simply another layer of the Warp’s endless madness, a meaningless transition into something worse?

  The Cat’s thoughts drifted as he continued walking. For the first time in what felt like hours—or was it days?—he found himself thinking of home. Not the war-torn trenches of the 182nd, nor the doomed campaigns he had fought for the Inquisition, but the cramped, grimy corridors of the Sullen Arrogance.

  He could almost hear the creak of the ship’s hull, the low hum of its ancient engines, the distant laughter of its crew. He could almost feel the warm, worn fabric of the vents where he’d hidden as a child, the smell of machine oil and unwashed bodies filling the air.

  The memory was fleeting, but it struck him harder than he expected. For a moment, the void around him seemed less oppressive, less alien.

  But then the memory faded, slipping through his mental grasp like water through his fingers. Servius clenched his jaw, his ears flattening against his head.

  “Not helpful,” he muttered to himself, his voice sharp. “Keep moving.”

  It was then that the first real change occurred.

  The ground beneath him rippled—not subtly, as it had in the distance, but violently, throwing Servius off balance. He stumbled, catching himself with one hand, and his claws scraped against the translucent surface, leaving faint marks.

  The ripple spread outward, distorting the empty landscape around him. The horizon twisted and stretched, folding in on itself like a reflection in a shattered mirror. Servius stood, his eyes narrowing as he scanned the warped expanse.

  Something was coming.

  At first, it was just a shimmer—barely visible, like heat rising off asphalt on a distant summer horizon. The distortion hung in the air, shifting and pulsing with a rhythm Servius couldn’t quite track. It wasn’t light or shadow, but something in between, a presence that defied description.

  As Servius squinted, the shimmer began to take shape—or at least, the illusion of one. A long, sinuous figure coiled in the air, its edges flickering and inconsistent, as though it were being painted and erased in the same instant. It was vaguely serpentine, but its contours shifted every time Servius tried to focus on them.

  More appeared. The shimmering figures emerged from the void like ripples on water, growing in number and complexity. Some were tall and humanoid, others squat and insectoid, and still others were impossible amalgamations of shapes Servius couldn’t even classify. None of them were real—at least, not in the way he understood reality.

  The Cat tightened his grip on his bolt pistol, his sharp eyes narrowing as he slowly turned to take in the encircling forms. They weren’t advancing, but they weren’t retreating either. They hovered just beyond his reach, their formless bodies writhing with an alien fluidity that made his stomach turn.

  He aimed his weapon at the closest one, his finger hovering over the trigger. “Do you need something,” he said dryly.

  The shape didn’t respond—not with words, at least. Instead, its surface rippled violently, and for a brief moment, it seemed to solidify. A face emerged, one that bore no features other than empty, hollow eyes and a mouth stretched too wide. It opened that mouth, and a voice, layered and distorted, spilled forth like a corrupted vox transmission.

  “You are alone,” it whispered, the words twisting unnaturally as they echoed in his mind.

  The other shapes began to move now, their forms shifting and overlapping in ways that defied geometry. Some shrank to the size of insects, crawling over the translucent surface of the ground. Others expanded, their limbs or tendrils stretching endlessly into the pale void above.

  Servius’s tail flicked sharply, a reflexive expression of irritation. “Alone, am I?” he muttered. “That’s new. I don’t think anyone’s told me that before.”

  One of the shapes darted closer, its movement so abrupt that even Servius’s finely-honed reflexes nearly faltered. It stopped just short of him, its head—or what passed for a head—tilting in a way that felt unnervingly human. Then, with a sound like tearing fabric, it began to split apart.

  The process was grotesque, and yet there was no gore, no viscera—only the illusion of tearing. Its body peeled back like layers of old parchment, revealing smaller shapes within, each one writhing and growing as though feeding off the fragments of itself. The new shapes were smaller but no less horrifying, their flickering edges giving the impression that they were simultaneously coming into existence and being destroyed.

  Servius held his ground, his pistol steady. He didn’t fire—yet. Whatever these things were, they didn’t seem to have a conventional form. Shooting them would probably do little more than waste precious ammunition.

  “Is this supposed to scare me?” he asked, his voice flat.

  The creatures responded again—not with words, but with a chorus of overlapping sounds that were somehow worse. The noise wasn’t loud, but it was invasive, worming its way into Servius’s ears and down into his thoughts. It was a mixture of whispers, screams, and what sounded like mechanical grinding, each sound layered over the other in an incomprehensible symphony of chaos.

  Servius grimaced, his sharp hearing turning against him as the noise grew louder. He wanted to block it out, to cover his ears, but he knew it wouldn’t help. The sound wasn’t coming from outside—it was inside him, crawling through his mind like a parasite.

  “You are a crack,” the voices said, blending into a single, unified tone for a brief moment. “A fissure in the stone. A fragment pretending to be whole.”

  Servius bared his teeth. “You’ve got a lot to say for something without a mouth,” he growled.

  The shapes seemed to respond to his defiance, their movements becoming more erratic. They began to shift again, their forms growing into never before seen shapes

  The figures writhed and twisted, their movements more frenzied now, as though his defiance had injected chaos into their already incoherent forms. One moment, they towered over him, massive and oppressive; the next, they were small enough to skitter along the surface like insects. Their constant, fluid transformations made it impossible to tell whether they were encircling him, retreating, or closing in.

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  “You mock the truth,” the voices echoed, layered and hollow, their cadence disjointed. “Yet the mirror does not mock the one who looks into it.”

  Servius’s tail flicked again, the motion sharper this time, betraying his growing frustration. “Let me guess,” he said dryly. “This is the part where you show me some big, life-altering revelation? Some deep truth about myself?”

  The air around him vibrated, the shapes beginning to converge. As they moved, their overlapping forms created strange patterns, like a kaleidoscope fracturing into infinity. Their edges flickered with faint, multicolored light, but it was the kind of light that hurt to look at—an unnatural, searing glow that defied the logic of color and form.

  One of the creatures began to solidify—or, rather, something within it did. From its amorphous, flickering body emerged a long, jagged limb that tapered into a thin, claw-like appendage. Then another limb sprouted, and another, until the thing resembled a twisted amalgamation of bone and sinew.

  Its hollow sockets stared at Servius, though they burned with no fire, no light—only emptiness that somehow stared back. When it spoke, its voice was quieter than before, but no less invasive.

  “When does the chisel shatter the stone, little beast?” it murmured, the words sinking into his mind like weights. “Is it the first strike? Or the thousandth?”

  Servius exhaled slowly, his sharp gaze fixed on the creature. “Philosophy from a pile of... whatever you are?” His voice was calm, but his grip on his weapon remained firm. “Let’s skip to the part where you try to kill me. It’s what these things always come down to.”

  The creature tilted its head—no, it split its head, the entire upper portion of its body fracturing into jagged shards that radiated outward like shards of glass. Its form broke and reassembled, a deliberate mockery of movement, until it became something else entirely. Now, it resembled a monstrous feline—a warped reflection of Servius himself. Its fur was a patchwork of black voids, its claws glinted like shattered stars, and its grin stretched far too wide.

  It crouched, circling him with unnervingly fluid movements. When it spoke, its voice was not its own but a mirror of Servius’s—dry, sharp, and tinged with sarcasm.

  “You call this defiance?” it asked. “A cracked blade that cuts only itself? You are a weapon dulled by its own wielder.”

  The cat’s ears flattened slightly at the sound of his own voice thrown back at him. “That’s cute,” he said, his tone cool but with an undercurrent of irritation.

  The warped feline let out a low, distorted purr, its teeth glinting in the pale, non-light of the void. “Laughter is the sound of a cage rattling,” it said, stepping closer. “And your cage is small, little fragment. A crack held together by glue and will. What happens when it widens?”

  The creature lunged, its movement impossibly fast and fluid, a streak of darkness that closed the distance in an instant. Servius dove to the side, his reflexes honed from years of battle barely keeping him ahead of the strike. The thing’s claws sliced through the air where he had stood moments before, leaving faint ripples in its wake.

  Rolling to his feet, Servius raised his bolt pistol and fired. The round struck the creature dead center, exploding into a burst of light and shrapnel. For a brief moment, its form wavered, splitting apart into dozens of smaller fragments that scattered like embers.

  But it didn’t die. The fragments coalesced, re-forming into the same shape, though now its edges shimmered faintly, as if the attack had only sharpened its presence.

  “A strike without purpose,” it said, the mockery in its tone unmistakable. “Do you fight to win? Or simply because you do not know how to stop?”

  Servius didn’t answer. He fired again, then again, each shot striking true. The creature dissolved and reformed with each hit, its body breaking apart like glass only to pull itself back together. Each time it re-formed, it seemed more solid, more real, as though his attacks were feeding it instead of weakening it.

  The creature lunged again, and this time, its claws connected. The blow wasn’t physical—there was no wound, no blood—but Servius felt it all the same. It was a cold, hollow sensation, as though something had been torn from him. He stumbled, clutching his chest instinctively, but there was nothing there.

  The creature crouched a few paces away, watching him with unblinking eyes. “Do you feel it, fragment?” it asked softly. “The weight of yourself slipping away? A shadow cannot outlast its source.”

  Servius’s sharp eyes narrowed, his breath coming in short, controlled bursts. “Is that what you’re after?” he asked. “You want to take something from me?”

  The creature tilted its head again, its jagged grin widening. “Then perhaps you will survive,” it said cryptically. “A hollow blade does not shatter, for it is already empty.”

  It lunged again, faster this time. Servius didn’t dodge—instead, he sidestepped just enough to let the attack miss, spinning as he drove his power knife upward. The blade sank into the creature’s chest, its glow flaring brightly as it made contact.

  The creature howled—not in pain, but in what sounded like laughter. Its form unraveled again, the jagged shards scattering into the air before vanishing entirely.

  Servius stood amidst the silence, his breathing steadying as the last vestiges of the creature dissolved into the empty air. The warped expanse around him was quiet again, but not calm—there was no calm in this realm. It was the quiet of anticipation, of something unseen holding its breath.

  He holstered his pistol slowly, his ears twitching at phantom noises that might not have been there at all. The creature’s words still echoed faintly in his mind, woven through the unnatural stillness like a melody half-remembered.

  “A shadow cannot outlast its source.”

  The phrase twisted through his thoughts, its meaning unclear but persistent. The Cat exhaled sharply, trying to push it aside. But the words wouldn’t leave him. They clung to the edges of his consciousness like cobwebs, brushing against memories he didn’t want to revisit.

  He glanced down at his shadow, half-expecting it to be gone altogether. But no—it still stretched out behind him, faint and thin from the earlier trial, but present. It hadn’t changed. It hadn’t disappeared. Not yet.

  But the words... they had left a mark. Not on his body, but on his mind.

  I kept moving, because moving gave me something to hold onto. Direction. Momentum. Call it whatever you want, but it was better than standing still in this abyss. The ground underfoot twisted and bent with every step, warping like molten glass, but it held. That’s all I needed it to do.

  The horizon—if you could even call it that—never stayed in place. It stretched, folded, rippled like water. I hated it. The constant shifting, the sheer impossibility of it all. And yet, I realized with a grim kind of clarity: this was as close to stability as the Warp ever got. Disorder was the only constant here. Maybe it was the only thing I could rely on.

  The thought didn’t comfort me. It pissed me off.

  And then there were the words. Those damn words. The creature’s voice crawled back into my head, twisting around my thoughts like a serpent. I couldn’t ignore them, no matter how much I wanted to. They’d meant something—I knew they had. The Warp didn’t bother with empty threats.

  “You are a crack. A fissure in the stone. A fragment pretending to be whole.”

  I frowned, my eyes scanning the warped expanse around me. Broken, fractured—was it wrong? I had been torn away from everything I knew. My regiment. My comrades. My purpose. Thrown into this nightmare. Sure, I was still breathing, still walking, still fighting. But how much of me had I left behind along the way? How many pieces had I lost without even noticing?

  Sabine’s face flickered through my mind like a ghost. She’d been a fighter, too—strong, skilled, unyielding. And yet, in the end, the weight of it all had crushed her. The betrayals, the constant struggle, the feeling that everyone and everything was against her. She couldn’t take it anymore.

  What made me think I was any different?

  My jaw tightened, and I forced the thought aside. No. I wasn’t Sabine. I wasn’t Abbey. I wasn’t anyone else. Whatever this place was, whatever it wanted, it wouldn’t break me. I wouldn’t let it.

  But the thought lingered, gnawing at the edges of my resolve. The creature’s voice—it had sounded like me. Dry, sharp, cutting. That wasn’t an accident. The Warp didn’t deal in accidents.

  It had been showing me something. Forcing me to confront something.

  I thought back to the whispering fog. The voices, the faces dredged up from my past. The shadow that tried to steal my form, mocking me at every turn. And now these shapes, spewing riddles that felt like accusations.

  Each trial had been more personal than the last. Each one digging deeper into the cracks I tried to ignore. The Warp wasn’t just trying to kill me. It was trying to unravel me. Piece by piece.

  My hand drifted to the bolt pistol at my side. I still had ammo—enough to handle the next threat, maybe the one after that. But how many shots had I already wasted? How many more would I need before this was over?

  If there even was an end.

  The landscape around me began to shift again. The translucent ground darkened, faint cracks spidering out beneath my feet. They glowed faintly, like embers in a dying fire. The horizon blurred, the pale void giving way to an impenetrable darkness that pulsed faintly, like it was alive.

  I slowed my pace, scanning the shifting expanse. The air grew heavier, thicker, pressing down on me like a lead weight. The subtle influences I’d felt earlier—the sickly whispers of Slaanesh, the stench of Nurgle, the oppressive rage of Khorne, even a feeling of golden light—were fading. Replaced by something else. Something deeper.

  Something older.

  I couldn’t place it, but the sensation was unmistakable. I was moving beyond the reach of the gods. Past their little games and petty rivalries. Into a part of the Warp that didn’t care about them. Or me.

  It wasn’t freedom. It was something worse.

  The cracks beneath my feet glowed brighter with each step. The trail narrowed, the darkness ahead pulling at me like the gravity of a dead star. It wasn’t just black—it was the absence of light, a void that swallowed everything. It wasn’t inviting, but it was waiting.

  I stopped at the edge of the trail, narrowing my eyes as I peered into the void. My breath fogged in the suddenly frigid air, visible even in the faint glow of the cracks. I glanced down at my shadow, half-expecting it to do something strange. But it stayed still, faint but unbroken. Just a shadow. Just mine.

  “Of course,” I muttered. “It’s always one more step. One more path.”

  I adjusted my grip on the pistol, its weight familiar in my hand, and stepped forward into the dark. The cracks beneath me faded, swallowed by the void. The air grew colder, the silence deeper. Somewhere ahead, something waited.

  Whatever it was, I would face it. Just like I had faced everything else.

  The darkness began to change as I moved. It wasn’t lifting—it was twisting, shifting into something else. A faint glow appeared in the distance, sourceless and pale. Shapes emerged, their forms writhing faintly as though they couldn’t decide what they wanted to be.

  The air grew heavier, tinged with a metallic tang that clung to the back of my throat. It was faintly familiar—like blood and old steel.

  I crested a hill, stopping at its edge. Below me, a settlement stretched out in the void. It was unlike anything I’d seen in the Warp so far. Stable, but wrong. Purposeful, but alien.

  I exhaled slowly, my breath fogging in the cold air. “Well,” I muttered. “I’ve found the neighbors.”

  And with that, I started down the hill, toward whatever waited for me there.