Warhammer 40: Doom

Chapter 290 Shadow Ritual
The compassionate mother wriggled her colorful body, coiling around the edge of the psionic array, her tentacles inscribing demonic characters in her mind, guiding the shadow overlord to descend upon the humble mortal world.

The incantation from her lips was no longer obscure and difficult to chant; its tone and rhythm themselves transformed into a beacon guiding the void, summoning the demon prince Birac.

As the incantation was chanted, in the warp, Birac sensed something, and within His obscure and boundless realm of shadows, a magic circle burning with black flames lit up.

Birac laughed. That lowly insect had done it, pointing the way for the demon army.

With a "gate" and definite coordinates, the next step is to build a bridge to connect the two different fields.

In the real universe, on the mantle of the planet Ghana, the benevolent mother calmly prepares for the human great psionicists to be deployed into the array, offering sacrifices to the Shadow Overlord.

"You need to hurry," the loving father urged, wriggling his body to support his children in battle.

Humanity's advance was too swift; in just twenty-four hours, they had reached the mantle from the Earth's surface, their advance never ceasing.

Compared to those superhuman warriors, the silkworms, about five meters long with their front half raised two meters high, were no different from the worms crawling on the ground.

They would all die upon contact!
From the moment humanity launched its attack, the loving father sensed through his nerve tendrils the endless wails and utter despair of his offspring, who were utterly powerless to resist.

Within the intricate tunnels, humanity once again employed biological agents, their destructive power even surpassing that on the planet's surface, leaving the filarial warriors with nowhere to escape.

There were also human-controlled automated weapons, scattered throughout every passageway, clearing every corner to ensure no one survived.

Twenty hours into the human home planet's timekeeping system, billions of filarial worms were wiped out. The benevolent father could sense the suffering of his offspring, whose hateful souls lingered, unwilling to leave.

The father's bloated body writhed forward, taking one last look at his partner who was casting a spell. They had spent a thousand years together; it was time to say goodbye.

Without the slightest hesitation, his majestic face was resolute as he headed towards the direction of the gunfire to block the humans.

Seeing her partner leave, the loving mother quickened the pace of her spellcasting. The summoning circle on the ground emitted dark shadows and black smoke, and then ignited with a heatless fire.

With a flick of her nerve tendrils, she cast the human psychic into the array, whereupon the black flames immediately enveloped him, burning away his psychic energy.

Even without intelligence, psionicists can still feel pain, and they instinctively struggle in the black flames, trying to escape the source of the pain.

The loving mother showed no pity on her face. As the threads moved, the psychic's hands and feet were severed to prevent him from straying from the center of the magic circle.

"Lord of Shadows! King of Torment!" The Mother raised her head high, her voice rising from a murmur to a roar, signifying her emergence from the shadows. She called upon her master's name: "The Eternal Chosen One, the Exalted One..."

As she chanted like a poem, the black flames of the magic circle burned even more fiercely, devouring the powerful spiritual energy of the psionicist.

The shadow cast by the loving mother's body twisted and deformed within the magic circle, dancing a passionate and fervent dance, as if welcoming her king!
Her colorful body gradually lost its brilliance, returning to its original transparency, but then gradually dimmed, as pure shadows devoured her body from the inside out.

At this moment, the loving mother is no longer a "believer" who seeks the concept of subspace and believes in subspace itself.

The powerful beings of the warp infuse their followers with power and declare ownership. The Mother of the Silkworms, after a thousand years of searching, becomes a servant of the Demon Prince.

"Come down from the shadows, step on my back, wield your boundless power, and bring destruction upon the enemies of this wretched servant!"

The loving mother prostrated herself, displaying utmost submission, willing to use her own body as a blanket to offer her devotion to the demon prince.

"The first cursed one, the forerunner, the bearer," she finally uttered the name of that being in words of humble devotion: "The First Demon Prince—Bilak!"

Rumble!
As the call subsided, a thunderous roar echoed in his heart. The darkness of the demonic magic circle devoured everything, and jet-black lightning appeared out of nowhere.

The psionicist's soul was completely consumed by the black flames. Behind the veil, Bilak licked his lips, narrowed his eyes, and savored the soul.

"Hmph!" He let out a disgruntled snort, startling the demons beneath the throne who folded their wings, wondering why their king was angry.

Birac raised his chin, and his pair of enormous spiral horns, symbols of authority, fell backward, his gleaming golden eyes burning with fury.

That lowly worm offered what appeared to be delicacies, but in reality, it was just tasteless wax.

This soul possesses immense power, yet its interior is filled with confusion and emptiness, devoid of any waves of pain or ecstasy.

This lowly insect dares to pass off inferior goods as superior ones and desecrate the majesty of Birac!

Suppressing the anger in his chest, Bi stretched out an arm, and in his palm emerged the humble soul of a silkworm. He spoke to his servant in a long voice, "Not enough."

not enough.

The Demon Prince never concealed his greed.

The souls of psionicists are powerful, even for Birac, they are a potent tonic, worthy of His promise to His servant.

But that wasn't enough, because as Bilak twitched his nostrils, he smelled an incredibly delicious aroma. Anxiety, fear, pain, resentment—countless tiny emotions emanated from him, like tantalizing delicacies tantalizing his taste buds, making the demon prince unable to resist.

So He made a request, an incredibly greedy request.

"not enough……"

Birac's will transcended boundaries, resonating deep within the servants' souls, making no attempt to conceal its pointed meaning.

The loving mother knew, of course, that the Sovereign desired souls filled with emotion—the souls of her children, whom she had given birth to and who were now rapidly dying.

The mother insect hesitated for half a second, and Birac saw this hesitation. Behind the curtain, He stretched out His tongue to taste the painful emotions caused by the choice.

But the Demon Prince was in no hurry; He knew that the only mission of a servant was to obey his master.

"I should give you everything!" After a half-second hesitation, the loving mother made her decision. She would give everything to pursue eternity; it was time to say goodbye to the past.

The loving mother curled her long tail, the silk threads flashing past, and cut off the ovipositor at the back of her body, placing it in the center of the magic circle.

She cast her spell again, her chanting incredibly gentle, calling for the wandering souls to return. The mother insect sacrificed herself as a concept of "mother," summoning the souls of her offspring who had died tragically at the hands of humans to return.

All wanderers will eventually return home to their loving mothers.

The incantation was long and peaceful, carried along every string and echoing in every passageway.

To humans, it is merely an unusual tremor of the silken string, but to the silkworm, it is a call to return home.

Countless invisible specks of light appeared among mortals, tainted with negative emotions, and headed towards the direction of their mother's call.

They were very confused, but following the warm guidance in their souls, they returned to the warm embrace of their nurturing mother.

The points of light converged into a dazzling stream of light, which flowed into the dark magic circle and into the connected subspace passage.

Behind the curtain, Birac tilted his head back and opened his mouth wide, enjoying this rare feast under the greedy gazes of the demons.

So happy!

The bilak cow's tail swayed from side to side, reflecting its owner's relaxed mood.

Billions of souls ravaged by war should have gone to the throne of Khorne, but they were stolen by Bilak and made to drink the food that evil gods would enjoy.

The Demon Prince groaned contentedly as his soul nourished his towering demonic body, causing his power to continuously increase.

Having swallowed the souls of billions of silkworms, Birac lightly clenched his fist, the violent power crackling as he felt an unprecedented strength.

He rose from his throne, drew the longsword stuck in the foot of the throne, pointed the tip at the ever-growing demonic magic circle, and roared: "Shadow Demons, march on the mortal world!"

"call!"

Witnessing Birac drinking souls, the demons under His command could no longer contain themselves. Upon hearing the king's command, they rushed into the magic circle to go to reality and harvest mortal souls.

When the warp rift appeared, Doom, who was rushing through the tunnel, noticed it, and his Judgment Sword snapped out of its blade, wanting to drink the demon's blood.

"Speed ​​up and keep moving forward."

He gave a low shout, his voice drowning out the roar of gunfire and reaching the ears of every soldier.

After a long march and the deployment of personnel, Doom was left with only the Imperial Guard, Destroyers, four hundred Night Guards, and six heavily armored Iron Men.

At that moment, the Iron Man's cold notification sounded: "Warning: Alpha+ level psionic energy fluctuations detected approaching."

"Watch out for psionic shocks," Doom warned, then drew his Judgment Sword and charged forward, sensing the change in psionic energy.

A powerful psychic has appeared.

The temperature inside the tunnel dropped rapidly, and water molecules began to condense, hanging on the surrounding silk cocoons and then forming strings of ice beads.

At the corner of the passageway, a mottled saw-like worm dragging its massive body appeared; it was the father worm, one of the leaders of the Ghana worms.

An Alpha+ level psionic being possesses power at the pinnacle of the material world, the limit of subspace power that living beings can withstand, capable of reaching for the stars and the moon with a mere gesture.

Psionicists of this level cannot be understood by common sense; their existence is no different from the "gods" in the minds of ordinary people.

(End of this chapter)