Selene was committing robbery and arson in the [Warp].
Yes—literally robbery and arson.
Like a supernova crashing into a pond, Selene burned away every living thing along her path.
Whether it was a 2,000-mile-long Warp creature such as a Void Whale, or the many Warp demons that spawned there, Selene blazed through everything in her way, announcing her arrival to the entirety of [Warp] in the most ostentatious fashion.
Standing amidst the vast storm of Warp—a maelstrom filled with blood, frenzy, decay, and debauchery—Selene stood immovably firm. Her radiant eyes, shining with the brilliance of a dying universe, opened slowly, and a refined smile curved upon her lips.
"Hey! Hey! Hey! Remnants of the old age, the new era has arrived!"
"This is My gift!"
Through the eerie, silent, and fragmented haze of the upper layers of [Warp], Selene had already reached the solid domain deep within—the endless dimension divided roughly into four dreadful colors, interwoven like jagged fangs.
As she had expected, in terms of efficiency, her ideal foothold was indeed that place.
Feeling satisfied, Selene dismissed her distractions and turned her gaze toward the corrupted realm where countless spots of Honkai erosion light flickered—a land piled high with toxic waste and filth comparable to the contents of a cesspit: the Garden of the Chaos God [Nurgle].
To her eyes, it was a living swamp made of black stars and dying worlds, a rotting galaxy composed of colossal, twisted nebulae.
Plagues devoured all flesh, transforming everything into grotesque remains amid endless hunger and decay. It was the dark reflection of the fall of the wind of life.
At first sight, Selene almost shut her eyes and turned away immediately.
Stench!
Such stench!
Far too foul!
This wasn't mere disgust anymore—this called for a heavy hand!
Very well, you it is.
You, the so-called merciful one, less ruthless than your three peers.
Since I'll burn everything eventually, might as well start with the hardest.
Whoosh—!
A gorgeous tide of violet-red imaginary energy surged forth from Selene's fingertips, flowing like an endless ocean.
The vast, prismatic starlight formed towering walls of flame—burning, annihilating, purifying, resetting—staining the very fabric of [Warp] beneath her feet with her own hue.
The tried-and-true method.
Selene was making her claim and asserting her right over [Warp].
When facing an infinite extradimensional world capable of mutual destruction, external brute force was always the last resort. What little one could gain that way would be but scraps. But Selene was greedy—she wanted it all.
Whether it was to preserve the maximum integrity of the physical universe or to devour all of [Warp] whole—to become its sole and absolute Chaos deity—this was the necessary step.
[Warp] itself had no will. It merely absorbed the souls, psionic energy, emotions, and faith of all living beings in the real universe.
Once, there had been balance between [Warp] and the physical world.
In those days, before the rise of the Four Great Evils, [Warp] was a tranquil void—a divine frontier untouched by corruption. Warp travel was safe, convenient, fast, and efficient, even without the Geller Field.
But that peace was shattered sixty million years ago.
The disasters that followed included, but were not limited to:
The war between the Necrontyr and the Old Ones, the war between the Star Gods and the Old Ones, the war between the Necrons (after their mechanical ascension) and the creations of the Old Ones such as the ancient Eldar and the first Orks, the war of the Necrons slaying the Star Gods, the Necron dominion over the galaxy—all collectively known as the 'War in Heaven,' a cataclysmic apocalypse.
Balance collapsed.
For millions of years, under the shadow of endless galactic war, the negative emotions of countless intelligent species—destruction, murder, extinction, ruthlessness—flooded into [Warp], nurturing the awakening of certain extradimensional chaotic wills.
From then on, the consciousness of Chaos took form and began to encroach upon the physical universe.
As the Necron dynasties—the once supreme rulers of the galaxy—fell into slumber after suffering catastrophic losses during the "War in Heaven," the ancient Eldar Empire rose to power, flourishing and expanding. Yet, in an age without external threats, the Eldar grew lost in their own excess.
Pleasure, arrogance, indulgence, and decadence became the norm of the Eldar civilization. The pursuit of stimulation and depravity intensified day by day. The moral degradation and hedonistic frenzy of their entire species spread through their empire faster than any faster-than-light drive could hope to match.
One decline and one rise—and so, as everyone knows, the end came.
The Eldar Empire exploded.
Through their unmatched psionic potential and boundless indulgence in sin and lust, the Eldar birthed an unsolvable crisis upon the material universe—a young Chaos God: [Slaanesh].
From that moment onward, the balance between [Warp] and the material universe was completely and irrevocably lost.
In the aftermath of the Eldar Empire's fall, humanity's Imperium rose to inherit galactic supremacy—but it would forever be forced to clean up the mess left by its predecessors. And of course, humanity had plenty of its own. The endless wars between the stars, the ceaseless slaughter and fanaticism, continued to feed [Warp].
Whether one wished it or not, this was an unending cycle of negativity.
Once, the Emperor had a chance to break it. During the birth of the new god—when [Warp] shifted from the dominion of three Chaos Gods to four—the ensuing reshuffle brought a fleeting moment of instability, a final opportunity for change.
But the gods of Chaos played the better move. The [Horus Heresy] shattered the Emperor's dream.
And now, into this chaotic, lawless higher-dimensional realm, Selene had intruded. If one possessed the essence of a higher-dimensional being—capable of existing within [Warp]—then acceptance was automatic.
Whether one lived or perished, or whether one could claim the emotions and laws of the material universe, was entirely one's own affair.
Unfortunately for the locals, Selene already had worshippers in the material universe—and they were native-born believers!
With the Sacred Selene Empire's expeditionary forces entering the material realm, the countless magnificent statues of Selene erected upon Cadia, and the skull-offering rituals held by Astartes warriors after butchering Chaos Space Marines—did anyone think those acts were in vain?
After the victory at Cadia, the defeat of the Black Legion, and the death of Abaddon the Despoiler, countless Cadian shock troopers and Imperial Guard regiments stationed across the Cadian Gate offered sincere prayers to the statues of Selene.
Human nature is prone to blind faith. Even if the rational ones—such as the Inquisitors—harbored doubts, the common soldiers did not care for such nuance.
And that was precisely the "wedge" Selene needed.
Suspicion from the Inquisitors? That was fine. As long as their doubts were directed toward Selene, the emotional feedback of such suspicion within [Warp] would fall upon her nonetheless.
A "wedge" authenticated by the native population—it need not be strong, only not too weak. The devout faith of a portion of the Imperial garrison stationed across the "Cadian Gate" sector was just enough.
Sufficient for Selene to complete her "claim" and "lawful recognition."
Perhaps these emotions already belonged to other entities within [Warp], but it mattered little. [Warp] was a place of mutual entanglement—where "you are in me, and I am in you."
It was merely that four great powers of destruction occupied the majority share, while the rest of the gods hid in some dark corner of existence, idling away eternity.
In a sense, Selene had merely diverted a small fragment of humanity's devotion to the Emperor.
But it was enough.
The rest would be competition among peers.
...
It is said that when calamity and plague ravage the mortal world, leaving lands barren and dead, the Garden of [Nurgle] thrives and expands in response.
Contrasted against the tormented reality filled with suffering and anguish, the daemons of Nurgle—bearing the kindly air of a grandfather—respond with heartfelt compassion to every pitiful plea from the material world. Within the corruption of life, countless bacteria, viruses, insects, and carrion creatures flourish.
In that boundless garden—so sickeningly sweet that one might vomit out their intestines from a single breath—the joyous laughter of Nurglings and Plaguebeasts echoed constantly. The loving, paternal figure of the Great Unclean Ones lumbered through the muck, sometimes gentle, sometimes stern, their booming, grotesque laughter resounding like thunder.
Vibrant, lively, overflowing with twisted joy—an abominable parody of life's abundance.
But today, within [Nurgle]'s Garden, the usual laughter, play, and joyous noise were gone. The bells of the Great Unclean Ones and the chimes of the Plague Garden's halls tolled mournfully. The daemons of Nurgle wept endlessly.
The air buzzed with the sound of countless furry flies, forming dense black swarms that darted up and down frantically, as though echoing the sobs of the Nurglings.
"Oh… my little darlings, who has made you like this?"
Splash—
From the foul, stinking swamp—a thick mixture of plague water, half-digested flesh, and the most corrosive bile of all realms—came the sound of massive bodies stirring the mire and trampling through the sludge.
Broken, moss-covered antlers emerged faintly amid the haze of flies, towering over all the daemons below.
A rotting face, marked with lines like dead wood and ridged with swollen veins like the grooves of a bloated corpse, bent down gently. Two short, pudgy arms carefully scooped hundreds of Nurglings from the plague water—each of them covered in flickering violet-red burns that hissed and smoked.
The little "sprites," usually cheerful and laughing, now wailed in agony. The sizzling, corrosive glow that marred their bodies was clearly the cause.
It was obvious—these Nurglings were the same daemons who had manifested on Cadia during the Black Legion's sacrificial rites, hoping to spread Grandfather's gospel. But they had failed, been banished, and now reborn within [Warp].
For some reason, the strange power that destroyed them had followed them even here.
"What are my rotting kin doing? To let my sweet children suffer such vile and shameful torment…"
The Great Unclean One, who had not been summoned to the battle of Cadia, mumbled sorrowfully—it felt as though its heart were breaking.
In its grief, yellow-green motes of light scattered from its massive maw; plump maggots tumbled between its cracked teeth, and even the greasy flesh of its enormous, pustule-ridden belly quivered.
"May the Cauldron of Grandfather bless them."
The Great Unclean One's beady yellow eyes, squeezed by folds of fat, blinked in prayer. From its festering wounds leaked its diseased ichor and mucus, mixed with its own viscera, which it gently sprinkled upon the trembling little Nurglings, their tiny bodies still glowing with violet corrosion.
This was their favorite scent. Normally, Nurglings and Plaguebeasts loved to frolic within the Great Unclean One's boils. It hoped, from the depths of its paternal heart, that this would ease their pain—that they might recover.
As the Great Unclean One fumbled about, preparing to brew a thicker, richer plague broth to comfort its beloved children—
the swamp began to boil.
The plague water turned a brilliant, glowing green, its light illuminating the decaying faces of the crying daemons—revealing, beneath the rot, a strange shimmer of pink and white.
Gently caressing the Nurglings, the Great Unclean One realized—one of its kin, once banished in the material universe, was being reborn within Grandfather's garden.
Splash!
The viscous bile erupted as a colossal form began to rise.
First came a pair of antlers. Then a pair of vile eyes, a nose, a mouth—and then, a horrific glowing wound that split its decaying bulk.
"Oh… my poor kin. I regret ever complaining about you."
Cradling the still-crying Nurglings, the Great Unclean One lumbered forward, sorrow in its gaze.
It reached out one thick, mucus-coated finger, dripping with bile and maggots, toward the glowing, sunken wound—intending to soothe and heal its suffering relative.
The next moment—BOOM!—
The wretched Great Unclean One suddenly jerked upright from its slumped posture. The abrupt movement sent its vast, sponge-like body crashing into the bile pools, splashing filth in every direction and nearly knocking over another Great Unclean One that had approached.
"Really now…" the creature grumbled, shaking its head—then froze.
Its "poor kin's" outer flesh had ruptured. Chunks of decaying meat flew outward, and from within the splitting carcass, a radiant mass of pink-white light burst forth—expanding at a speed that defied all biological sense.
The gigantic white creature kept swelling, its body studded with glowing pink nodes of unknown origin.
The Great Unclean One knew instantly—this was not Grandfather's power!
A dreadful realization struck it. Its beady eyes widened in horror as it looked down at the silent, motionless Nurglings and Plaguebeasts nearby.
"No, no, no…" it croaked, like a trembling old father—and in that instant, as if the words themselves were a signal—
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!—!!
[Nurgle]'s Garden exploded!
A majestic violet-red geometrical veil of distortion descended upon the realm.
"ROOOOAAAAAAR—!!"
At the same time, from deep within the twisted halls of the Plague Garden, a furious voice echoed through the black, endless palaces. The rotting timbers smoked; the shingles—each the size of a dying world—fell from the quaking roofs.
"What hast thou done to My children?!"
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