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Chapter Text

He expected many things from today, but this certainly was not one of them. As he looked around himself, he saw that he was in a place that couldn’t be described, and only seen in dreams. For one, there were random everyday objects in the air, spawning and disappearing in no particular order, the sky above him was nothing more than clouds of different colors, never staying in the same shape for too long and before changing by the non-existent winds that couldn’t be felt. He could make up a fuzzy ball of light that could have been the sun, but that didn’t last long.

His attention fell to a necklace that looked like prayer beads that appeared right in front of him. He tried to grab it, but his body didn’t obey his command. After a few more tries he realized that he could not feel anything, not even his body!

That snapped him out of his daze. He tried to scream, to call for someone to hear him, but no sound came out of him. So he stopped when he realized it was pointless. He looked around again, and that’s how he realized that he was doing something despite not having a body. Did he do so instinctively? So he planned to think and focus on his desire to move forward.

To his joy, he slowly moved forward for a few centimeters, even though almost everything in his surrounding was inconsistent, the stable-looking ground under him was a good reference point.

He looked at the prayer beads, he tried to focus on the want of them floating towards him, but no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t get it to come to him. Annoyed by the lack of results, he began to theorize that if he has a point of view, perhaps he still has a body but can’t see it, like how a camera can’t see itself.

This time, he focused on reaching out to the prayer beads. Trying to reach out to them and grab them with his hand, and to his surprise, it was working! But that wasn’t what surprised him.

It was his arm. It was not his arm or any human arm for that matter! It looked like a see-through tentacle made of some sort of colorless slime. The surprise caused him to lose his focus as the limb got absorbed back into him for a lack of a better term as it disappeared.

He once again tried to reach out, to “lift his head” and to “look down at himself”. He wanted to see what had happened to him. And it worked as his “body” appeared in his view.

He… was an amoeba! A giant amoeba!

Stopping looking at his new slime-like body, he started thinking over what had happened to him. He doesn’t remember being hit by something, nor does he remember eating anything funny. The last thing he remembered was going to sleep on his bed. So either he’s dreaming, or something did happen to him and he’s not remembering it.

Looking at the prayer beads again, he once again reached to them and grabbed them with a tentacle arm and looked at them good. They didn’t look similar to the ones he always saw, but they were still familiar. He had seen them being used in Japan.

He also could feel something from them, it felt weird, like an emotion, familiar but not his.

The ground below him was a lovely stone road, but the stones changed their shape every so often. Looking back he saw that he was right under a Torii gate.

That made him confused, thinking back, he tried to remember what they were for, aside from being in temples. They were gates between the living world and the world of the dead? Did he die, and this slime amoeba-like body was his true self that his soul took before he got judged? He looked around again, and he couldn’t see anyone there, so maybe he was to move forward himself.

The prayer beads in his grip crumbled to steam as they disappeared like many other items around him did. Taking an internal sigh, he decided to move down the road to see where he would reach. If this was a dream or the afterlife, he was curious to see where it would lead him.

He slowly moved down the path, it was more complicated than it seemed even in a relatively straightforward way like this so it was practice for him, getting him used to this weird method of movement until he reached a dead end. There was no more road. Or land for the mather.

The best he could describe it was a cliff, with all that was remaining were the same clouds that were in the sky, both forwards and downwards. He looked to his left and right, but all he saw was more of the cliff.

As he began thinking of what he should do next he noticed something ahead, a boulder, no, a small floating island, with a street lamp, was coming over from his left. He thought over how he could go on the thing. He couldn’t float, at least, he didn’t know how, and he doubted he could jump there either.

Looking at the street lamp, an idea came to him. He once again pulled out a tentacle and extended it. As he kept stretching it out, he for the first time felt something, and it was an unpleasant feeling of stain that came over him. He saw the limb get thinner and his main body smaller as he kept stretching the limb until he managed to grab the street lamp.

Finally having a hold of it, he began to pull on it as hard as he could. His main body left the ground and flew towards the island until he collided with the base of the street lamp. Satisfied by his result, he looked back to where he came from. From there he could see that where he had come from also was a floating island, except much bigger.

His attention went back to the street lamp, and the emotion that he could feel from it. This felt much more familiar to him, the feeling of safety, just like the relief from lighting up a dark place to reveal that there’s nothing there to fear.

He had a good guess where he was. And it horrified him.

He was in a world where thoughts are reality, a world mirroring the real world, one he knew a fair amount about.

This place went by many names: the Immaterium, the Empyrean, the Ether, the Sea of Souls, the Othersea, the Realm of Chaos, the Warp-space, and also the Warp.

He felt himself shiver for the first time he came here. If he is in Warhammer, then he is screwed. The fact that he has not been attacked and devoured by a Daemon of Chaos is a miracle.

He calmed himself down. Now was not the time to panic, if he wanted to survive, even if he was probably dead and this was his soul, he needed a plan, and before making the plan, he had to figure out his situation.

So he is in the Warp, but something is off, where is Chaos? Where are the Daemons? He once again looked around. He could still see items appearing and disappearing possibly from the people's collective thoughts in the real world. But this is the weird part: why are they items of his age?

No, not his age, many of them are very old-school. From just before his birth even. the 1990s? But this doesn’t make any sense, these things should not be in the minds of humans of Warhammer. Technology in that world is very screwed up. While they do have spaceships that can travel faster than light, by entering here he might add, and guns that shoot lasers, a lot of everyday items for the common people are lost.

Sure, this dimension existed outside the concept of Time, but with the state of the Warp has become since the War in Heaven, Chaos destroys everything.

This same reason is why this wouldn’t make sense even if he is in a time where it is the second millennium in real, as Chaos came to be way before then. Unless…

‘I have to find the Emperor.’ He thought to himself.

Yes, it all made sense now, it’s probably the Emperor’s doing to keep Chaos away from Earth. He lights up the whole galaxy with a boost from the Golden Throne, surely he can protect one planet without it easily.

If… if he can go and find him, perhaps he could warn him of the future. To save humanity from everything that happens in the future.

He looked around again, he tried to feel the soul of the Emperor, and to his joy, he felt something. He could feel powerful and intense thoughts coming from a direction.

With his destination set, all he needed to do now was to get there!

But he had one problem:

‘How do I get there?’ he thought to himself.

Moving from one island to another nearby was a big task for him, there is no way he could move further than this.

If only he could fly, he could move freely anywhere he wants to, but he didn’t know how to fly. Perhaps there was a way to shut down his gravity? No, even if that is possible, it would just make things worse and prevent him from anchoring to anything and cause him to hover around aimlessly and get lost.

There was the option of wings. Every human knowing that Wings equal Flight could work to his advantage here. But that left the problem that he had no form, literally.

Grumbling to himself, he began thinking of how he could get off this giant floating rock. But then, right under the street lamp, he got an idea.

He extended a tentacle to a corner of this floating island and began to pull as hard as he could. It took him a few tries until he managed to get a piece of it off.

He focused on it. As far as people were concerned, this was a stone. Stones are solid, they had to be otherwise they’ll be magma, and to be solid you need to be made of substance. Stones are hard, any child and their pet monkey knew that. And he could feel these same thoughts coming from this piece of broken cement in his grip.

He extended this focus to more than this rock, but to himself too. As he focused on what this rock represented, he also focused on taking those concepts and giving them to himself.

As he was doing this, he felt the rock shrink, Warp Energy that used to make it up unraveling itself as the concepts that held it together came off from it.

At the same time, he felt his body changing, he began to take form, and his slime-like amoeba-looking body hardened up as it gained solidity. By the time the stone was gone, he felt unable to move due to his new form.

Okay, he now had the new problem that he couldn’t move at all while in this form. But at least he managed to gain a new form, and more importantly, solidity. He counts that as a win.

Focusing on himself again, he unraveled the concepts he took from the stone, causing him to change.

He thought over how he could get this to work. Maybe he has to learn to partially transform so that he could have an internal skeleton? No. That wouldn’t work, it would be too much hassle. What about tossing himself like a rock? Not that either, he still doesn’t know how to jump, and even if he did, gravity would be a problem for going too far.

He looked around himself, thinking that maybe one of the items spawning around him would hopefully give him the answer.

He waited for a while as he looked at cordless phones and lava lamps ‘Were they still a thing in the nineties? I thought they were a seventies thing’ until something interrupted him

“ tweet! ’

He turned to where he heard the sound from and saw a small fluffy white bird sitting on the top of the lamp and looking down at him.

He was confused, why was a bird here? Was there a rift and it flew in? No, chaos or not, this dimension wasn’t very habitable for organic beings. No air, and no consistent laws of physics. Then how?

The bird flew away as the lamp lighted up. As he followed its direction of flight, he got his answer. Another floating island, one that was moving past his, or was his moving past it? It had a park bench and a couple of trees, and some birds on the ground pecking the dirt looking for food. If he had to guess, people were probably enjoying a day in a park.

This was it! He had to get there! But there lay the problem that this floating island was far more away from him than the previous one. Looking back, he couldn’t see the one where he had appeared on it anymore.

If he doesn’t do anything, the islands will fly past each other without being near enough for him to reach the park.

He looked around with haste, there has to be something, anything , that would let him change the course of the island’s movement.

He saw an electric fan that had just appeared near him, and reached for it and grabbed it with two tentacles, and pulled it towards him. Noticing a price tag on it which was scribbled in jibberish, he thanked whoever was shopping for this fan and placed it on the ground facing away from the park. He pressed the button that meant On and to his joy the blades started spinning.

Unfortunately, it was not changing the course of the island. He extended a tentacle to the front of the slowly spinning blades, and he felt a gentle breeze coming from it.

Deciding not to question how a fan can produce wind when there is no air, he thought about how to make the fan spin faster. Maybe if he could supercharge it… ‘Hmmm… CHARGE!’ He looked at the street lamp.

The lamp itself was covered in a protective cover that looked like a small lantern, but there was no doubt that this was an electric lamp. He moved to it and extended a tentacle towards the lantern-like cover and grasped it. He began to pull as hard as he could. Finally breaking, he saw it coming down and he could see two comically red and blue vires attaching the lamp to the top of the pool.

He grabbed the wire and pulled it out of the lamp, but as soon as it was out, he felt his entire body shake in pain as he got electrocuted.

Pulling his tentacles back, he looked at the wires in fear. That felt painful to him, he was surprised that electricity still worked the same way there. But he wasn’t touching the metal interior, why did it electrocute him?

Extending a tentacle again, he gently and carefully poked one of the wires. It didn’t do anything, and he slowly grabbed both of them again. Seems like being careful was causing them to act differently. Deciding to think about this later, he moved to the fan and poked the two vires’ metal tips into the plug of the fan.

The fan made a louder humming noise as its fans started to move faster than possible.

What’s more, he could see that the park-island was slowly coming towards him.

If he had a mouth, he would have whooped in joy.

The two islands came closer and closer, until they collided with each other, making a loud noise. The birds all panicked as they flew out of the trees.

He left the cement-like ground for the grassy one. It felt different to him for sure. He could feel a lot of things. From the calmness of appreciating nature to the tickle of standing barefoot on the grass.

Looking back at where he came from, he saw the small island with its broken lamp slowly fade away as it turned into Warp energy and flew away to the invisible winds of the Warp.

He looked around. This place was a lot bigger than it looked before. Moving over to the park bench, he began feeling the relief of sitting after a tiresome walk. And the enjoyment of the view of nature. Touching it makes him feel those emotions even more intensely. But those were not his emotions.

He once again heard a chirp. And looked up at a bird that was sitting on a tree branch.

It was fascinating. For there to be life, or at least something closely mimicking life, made out of pure Warp energy, shaped and created by the mere thought of humans.

Truly the Warp was infinite in potential.

Being done with appreciating his surroundings. He slowly extended a tentacle to the bird. But the bird quickly flew away before he got even near to it. Right, he almost forgot that birds do that.

If he wanted to learn how to fly, he needs one of those birds to get it. Not just for the flight, but how to become tangible by mimicking a living being. And that was literally out of his reach because wild birds fly away when you get close to them.

Disappointed, he moved deeper into the island, wanting to see if there is anything else for him to find.

After some time, he reached a clearing. He saw a picnic blanket lying there in the middle. Moving over he touched it. He could feel the comfort of laying down on it.

Deciding that he could at least rest here for a while he just stood there and tried to relax.

His mind went back to when he got electrocuted. What could have caused it? When it comes to electricity, parents are known to scare their kids away from it by always warning them. Or maybe it was from the workers who repair and maintain those lamps, they know what will happen to them if they don’t do their jobs safely.

He had already learned how to make his body, no, his Warp Presence, mimic stones. Could he mimic the electrocution he felt from the wires?

He extended a tentacle and looked at it. He focused on the feeling he got when he was being electrocuted. He tried to call it up again and kept his focus on it. After some trial and error, he felt a feint shaking all over himself, but he tried to focus it on the tip of his tentacle. The sound of buzzing slowly came out as he saw sparks forming. He once again felt something graining out of him and stopped it quickly. Unlike before where he felt fine after he compressed himself again, this time the feeling of fatigue didn’t go away. When he waited for a moment, he felt that it was going away, but at a really slow pace.

At least now he knows that trying to generate lightning would cost, if he guessed correctly, his Warp energy.

Suddenly he felt really strange like he wasn’t alone. He looked behind himself and saw two lumpy veils of mist were also on the blanket. There was a moment where they almost took the shape of a couple who were gazing at each other before it became fuzzy again.

He looked away. ‘Awkward…’ he thought to himself.

Trying to distract himself, he looked at the basket that had spawned next to him. He looked inside it and saw it was full of a fair amount of food.

Taking out an onigiri, he started sensing the feeling it gave off. He could feel the taste, the concept of Sustenance, but most interestingly, the concept of Absorption and Assimilation.

He tried to make a hole in his warp presence and placed the onigiri inside it. He tried his best to ‘eat’ this chunk of warp energy that was mimicking food. The Onigiri slowly unraveled itself as it slowly turned back to raw warp energy, but as it was doing that, he tried his best to absorb that same warp energy and add it to his own.

He felt the fatigue that he was feeling slowly go away as he ate the onigiri. Happy that this worked, he began picking up more and more food from the basket and began eating them. It’s not like their owner would lose this food back in the real-space.

Once he was done eating most of the food he felt like all his lost energy had returned and then some. He even was slightly larger than before, by a few centimeters in diameter.

He wanted to see if he could do the same with other stuff. He moved to a nearby tree and placed his tentacle on it. He tried to unravel it and consume the energy it was made of. He saw that a small part of the tree was slowly eroding, but most of the energy was flying away, only a tiny negligible amount was being absorbed into him. Seems like it is only easy if the things he tries to eat already are meant to be edible.

Disappointed by the result, he meant to go back to the blanket, but once again a noise of a tweet made him stop. Looking up, he saw some birds up in the branch. Oh, how he longed to learn how to fly, or at least, to mimic living beings capable of movement. No human had formed properly, so he never had the chance to feel like what they are made of. Trees are made of wood, all they would give him would be a form as immovable as his rock form.

That thought gave him an idea. He once again went to the blanket and picked up another onigiri. He moved over under a tree and slowly began transforming himself into a small bolder. with the onigiri placed on top of him. If he knew something about birds, something that almost everyone knows, it is that they always come for food, especially when no one is nearby.

After a few minutes, or what felt like minutes, time didn’t have much meaning here anyways, a bird came down and stood on him as it pecked on the rice of the onigiri. Soon more and more birds of different kinds followed and came to eat the onigiri.

Excited, he began studying the feeling the birds on him were giving off. They felt weird. There was a faint feeling of the concept of life similar to the grass, and of the tree before, but there was much more he was feeling from them. With this many complicated thoughts and imprints he was feeling from them, it was no wonder they could mimic their real-life counterparts so well.

Seeing how difficult reading them was, he took his time, trying to learn every bit about them.

Once the birds were done eating the food, they one by one began flying away. The rock slowly melted as it took a slimy shape again.

Feeling confident about this, he began focusing on himself and many of the things he had recently learned. His warp presence slowly took the shape of a bird, it solidified itself as the warp energy began mimicking flesh and bones. Finally having flesh and skin again, he got his sense of touch back, and he felt itchy as black feathers began to grow out of his skin and take form. By the time he was done, he had taken the shape of a large dog-sized crow.

Giving this new body a few tests, he checked his new eyes and his neck by rotating his neck in any direction he could, then he slowly and cautiously took a few steps forward. Lastly, he opened his wings and gave them a few flaps. They seemed to work fine too.

He felt excitement growing inside him. If this works, he would be flying!

He began running as he started flapping his wings, but he couldn’t leave the ground before he reached the trees at the end of the clearing. Turning he started running again and he kept flapping his wings. He kept this up for a while, and each time he got better at it as he corrected what he did wrong. He got to the point where his legs left the ground for a few moments before he fell again.

As he was doing another turn he felt the ground under him shake, and a large crack began to form under his feet. He jumped in panic as the ground opened up, revealing the clouds underneath. In his panic, he flapped his wings as hard as he could as he flew up a tree and hugged a branch with his wings.

He looked down at the ground, he saw that the tree he was on along with the ground surrounding it had broken off from the rest of the park and was slowly drifting away.

He tried to calm himself down when he realized where he was. He managed to fly up the tree! But, he still couldn’t do it consciously, and there was no more ground for him to practice.

Looking back at the slowly shrinking park, he frowned as he decided on what to do. He opened his wings as wide as possible and fanned his tail. Taking a deep breath of the non-existent air, he jumped as hard as he could.

Keeping his wings open, he shook as he almost lost his balance but he kept himself facing forwards and glided towards the park. He managed to get the solid ground of the park under him, so feeling more confident, he flapped his wings, and he felt himself rising a little, he did it again and again, until he started gaining altitude. He tried to aim for a tree branch to land on, but he missed and passed it. He tried to dodge a tree trunk by tilting to the right, then lost his balance and fell.

Fortuany the landing wasn’t painful. But he was too happy with what he did to care for that.

Later, he was standing on the edge of the park, looking in the direction where the Emperor should be. He looked behind him and saw how more of the park had broken off and faded away. He took another fruitless breath, after his success with the gliding, he had practiced more, and it didn’t take long until he got the necessary basics of flight down, at least, he thinks that he did.

Opening his wings, he took a few steps back and ran forwards, and jumped off. He flapped his wings as he flew towards his destination.

Flying in the Immaterium was not like a normal flight. The physical direction of the real-space didn’t have any meaning in dimension, because just like Time, Space is also messed up. You could move in a straight line and end up moving in circles, or move in a greater distance by taking a shorter path, up was left then it became forwards, and right was backward and downwards at the same time.

Thankfully he didn’t have to rely on his normal senses for his flight. All he had to do was to move towards where he sensed the strongest feelings were coming from.

He was so excited, he was going to meet the Emperor of Mankind! Dozens of different scenarios were playing in his head of how this meeting will go. He hoped that the Emperor at this period was more congenial, or at least willing to lend an ear. He mostly hoped that being close to his soul wouldn’t accidentally burn him, so he had to be careful with that.

He began to see something appear on the horizon, he flew towards a nearby island that was made of the pieces of a living room and landed on the carpet.

Panting from his long flight, he slowly lost his crow-like shape and returned to his original amebae form. He stared at the horizon. For once, there were more than just clouds to be seen. He could see some vague shapes in the distance.

Something happened, he could feel a new sensation, something he never felt before being here. It wasn’t the random thoughts associated with the stuff that appeared here, it was… more. It felt everchanging, complete, and very strong. And it was right behind him.

Turns his point of view back, and sees something he has never seen here before. It was a small ball of light, barely the size of a coin, shining with light like a star. From them, he could feel the conscious emotions of a person.

‘Is… is this a Psyker’s soul?’ He asked himself. Moving over he began inspecting it. It certainly was stronger than anything nearby, it felt like a lot of warp energy had compressed to this one point.

Letting his curiosity get the better of him, he extended his tentacle and gently gave it a poke. It felt amazing, he could almost taste it. He tried to give it a little push, but it failed as he felt his tentacle go inside it. It felt like putting one’s arm inside a tube. He pulled it out and looked at it with worry.

That tube he felt was probably the connection the psyker had with the immaterium, had he gone into it, he might have entered that psyker’s body and possessed them. ‘Am I, am I a daemon?!’ He thought with horror.

No, he couldn’t be a Daemon, he wasn’t born from Chaos, he just couldn’t, he was a human, he… He looked at his tentacle again. There was no denying it, he was a Warp Entity. But how? He was a human before he appeared here, and he was certain that he was no psyker. Unless… no, if he lived in the Warhammer world, then the Emperor certainly would have seen a tabletop game that told people of his past and their future.

He gives the soul another look. There was also the matter of psykers, From what he remembered, after the Shamans had all killed themselves to be reborn together as the Emperor, there was no human psyker until the middle of the Dark Age of Technology, it’s both too late and too soon for there to be any psykers around.

He decided to leave this soul be, as it was impossible to touch living souls anyways, and using it as a conduit to possess that psyker isn’t something he was keen on doing, at least not yet. He didn’t want to give a wrong first impression after all.

Thinking this was rest enough, he begins transforming back into his crow form, but as he was doing it, he got much more experimental with the form. After some tries, he managed to grow a second pair of legs grow out of his chest, making his body look more like a small griffin of sorts. Testing his new set of “arms” first, he flaps his wings again and jumps towards his destination.

After closing in, he encounters the weirdest structure he had ever seen in this dimension. It was a large cluster of clouds, and they were moving around like an angry storm. He tried to get a feeling of what they represented, but there were so many different emotions clustering together that he couldn’t pinpoint anything. They did put a sense of dread inside him. He could see a large tube meant for sewage overflow poking out of one part of the cloud, and he could feel that the nearest path was through there.

Flying to the opening, he looks inside, seeing nothing but darkness. Reassuring himself, he lands inside and begins walking in.

It sounded cliche, but he felt like he was inside a horror story. He could not hear anything but the sound of his breathing. It was until he heard a deep hum nearby and turned to look, but found nothing there. He shook his head, this was a world where thoughts were reality, of course sounds that one would hallucinate would manifest here as physical sounds, good thing it took a lot more to create actual monsters here.

Continuing, he began seeing the ending of the tube, but as he was nearing the exit, he felt something, it was unfocused but very strong, very powerful, he could feel sadness, worry, depression, horror, and mourning for those dear to them. As he moved more and more of those same feelings were being replaced with worse ones, he could feel pain, suffering, and terror, and they were all concentrated right in front of him.

To make it worse, he could smell a nauseating stench. He would have gaged if he still had the reflex.

‘What happened there? What could have caused this?’ He thought to himself. He finally exited the pipe and dropped into a giant chamber, but his eyes widened when he finally came face to face with the source.

He was face to face with a living nightmare, a terrifying nightmare, he could hear them, echoes of the screams, the cryings, the whimpers. He could see the blood, the organs, the bodies, all taking the form of some sick piece of art. And the smell, the SMELL!

His mind couldn’t take it anymore, he leaned down and let out short and rapid raspy screams, his very mind forcing his form to manifest the reflexes to empty his stomach, but nothing would come out as he didn’t have a stomach to empty.

He closed his eyes and brought his left front talon to his head, but it slowly morphed into a tentacle the right side of his face got distorted as he was losing his focus to this despair that was taking over him.

He let out a scream as he got up and ran as hard as he could. He ran past everything, he even ran through the fire that was burning there without stopping, until he collided with a wall.

Opening his eyes and looking up, he saw a hole in the collapsed ceiling. Opening his wings, he flew upwards and out of that hell.

He flew out of the hole and landed on a stone ground. He panted as he held his claw to his aching chest. He looked at his left limb in its unstable state, it was slowly beginning to change its form back to a bird’s talon.

‘What happened there? Who could have done such a thing?’ He thought to himself ‘Are they the work of Chaos Cultists? Khorne? No, that could have been his doing. It must have been Slaanesh, yeah, that sounds like something her worshipers would do…’ As he remembered what he saw, he fisted his talons and prepared for another pain from his stomach, but thankfully, it didn’t come.

If there are Chaos cultists who had time traveled to this age, Earth and humanity would be in danger! He didn’t want to think who could be sick enough to do such things without the influence of the Chaos gods.

He fisted his talons harder. ‘Whoever they are, if I ever get my hands on them, I’ll tear them to pieces!’ He thought to himself.

Looking up, he could see the state of the place, and he didn’t like what he was seeing. While outside, the state of the immaterium was like a calm ocean, this place looked like a thunderstorm. The energies of the Warp were flowing around with great speed like storm clouds, he could even see some signs of thunder every now and then.

He flapped his wings and jumped in the direction where he could feel the strongest emotions, which to him seemed to be at the center of this mini-warp storm.

As he was flying by, he was surprised to see another psyker’s soul, he flew by it and noticed yet another one. ‘Two in a row? Interesting…’ he thought.

Continuing on, he reached another structure, stopping a moment in midair to see what it was. It looked like a pit, and getting a little closer, he could hear the crawling of insects echoing out of it, he could see little shadows of worm-like things deep in there too, but nothing compared to the wave of feelings that were coming out of it.

Shuddering, he quickly flew away from there as fast as he could.

After passing a third psyker soul, and turning around to avoid a nasty-looking bright flashing cloud that looked ready to strike a bolt of lightning at anything that came nearby, he reached his next obstacle. It looked like a wall of purple mist blocking his path, from it, he could feel different things, from worry to a feeling of urgency to malicious joy.

Seeing that the only direction forward was through there, he flew in with caution.

As he was flying there, he looked in all directions, trying to be ready for anything that might target him. It didn’t take long before he saw a faint shadow appear in front of him. It slowly became clearer and darker, and he gasped as he dived down, just in time as he saw a giant tentacle many times his size pass over him.

Feeling scared, he restarted flying to his destination with haste, thinking that whatever targeted him probably already knew of his position. As he kept going, he noticed another shadow, and this time he didn’t get time to dodge as it hit him really hard and caused him to be sent spinning. Righting himself, he once again flew to where he sensed his destination was as fast as he could. He could see the faint shadow of something really big far away from him. Guessing that that thing was the creature was what the tentacles belonged, he did his best to go around it as far as he possibly could without losing his path.

He saw the end of the mist and flew towards it. Flying out of the mist, he landed on a small island with grass along with some water at its corner, he breathed heavily to make himself calm down. Finally calm, he let out a sigh of relief. He was finally out of that place.

Releasing one last breath, he looked around. Whatever he was sensing was here, so he hoped he could see the Emperor’s soul. But no matter where he looked, he couldn’t see anything resembling a powerful psyker’s soul.

At that moment, he felt a soothing breeze flow through his feathers. It made him fill good, it made him full of hope, of dreams. That! That was the confusing feeling that drew him in!

Looking at the ground, he could see tiny golden dust coming out of the grass under his feet and the small body of water next to him. They were very feint but now that he was paying attention to them he could see them.

The bright golden dust was being drawn towards a direction in which its view was blocked by an upturned floating island. Following the dust, he went over that tilted island to look at the view it was blocking. His eyes widened.

It was beautiful…

He saw a river flowing through a land, everywhere in the air was filled with the lights of bright golden dust hovering around. But the sight was nothing in comparison to what he was getting. He could feel the hopes and dreams of countless soldiers who lost their lives but held on to their belief in their last breaths, the desire for a better world, the promise of better times, and the goal to obtain the ever-distant utopia.

He didn’t want to leave this place ever, he so desperately wanted to just sit here and watch this view for an eternity, but he knew there was someplace that he needed to go.

With great reluctance, he walked through the grass before he jumped and flew over the river. It was obvious that the Emperor was not there. So he looked around to see if there were any other signs of him.

He could see a golden glow shining from the horizon. Confident that this time that must be the Emperor of Mankind, he flew towards the light.

As he kept on he reached another landscape. This one was a giant desert, he looked around, it was very big, and it didn’t seem to have an end. When he looked down he realized something, were those people? Actual humans?!

Losing altitude to get a better view, he could see that those were indeed humans, what’s more, they were all dressed in armor, and they were charging toward something. He landed behind a pile of sand and looked at them as they passed by. From them, he could sense a strong loyalty, of how they had given their lives in devotion to someone who will take them towards their joined goal.

As he was thinking over what this could mean he felt a sudden jolt as the ground shook. Jumping up, he could see that originating from a red explosion, a shockwave flowed through the land, and the sands themselves cracked open and began swallowing the army into the abyss below.

His eyes widened as he shook his head at the horrifying sight. The whole land was being destroyed in a matter of seconds! He flew away as fast as he could to get away from the land and whatever that was erasing everything it stood for.

He went on and on, as more of the ground below him became one with the storm clouds of this world. But suddenly he was hit by new unpleasant thoughts.

That made him lose focus as he collides with something. ‘What was that? What was all that anger?’ He thought. Before he gets to look around to see where he was he felt his talon-like hand being wet, so he brought it up. Blood. Looking at where he was sitting, he was at the base of a huge pile of bloody corpses of medieval warriors.

Shouting in horror, he flies up to get away from the, but all that does is give him a better view of the land, a land covered in dead armies.

‘Wh-What is this?’ He asked ‘What is going on in here!?’

That was when the place lighted up in a radiant golden glow. He blinks, before slowly turning to face its source.

A gigantic eye was hovering there, and it was colored red and the pupil was slit, it was half-lidded, refusing to look at anything, uncaring of anything happening to the world around it.

That was NOT the Emperor!

Just at that moment, the sky above him darkened. Looking up he saw what can only be described as a giant ball of pure black, radiating an ominous red light. He couldn’t understand what he was feeling from it, but it was overwhelming him.

‘WHAT IS GOING ON!?’ He asked again!

On the other side, he saw a psyker’s soul, which had become visible since the golden light had dampened. He flies towards it and looks at it for a moment before he held his out his talon to reach for it. When he felt it sink into the soul, he let himself go through the narrow pathway to the real world without fighting it. The last thing he felt was the overwhelming sense he was getting from his surroundings before he lost consciousness.

When he opened his eyes again, everything felt different. It felt… normal. He brought up his hands to his face and saw that they were the hands of a small child. A human child.

At that moment he felt a sense of danger washing over him. He looked up and saw that he was standing in front of an open window, and in the sky… there was the same black orb as he saw before, only much clearer. The cloud surrounding it was circling around it and he could hear the wind blowing.

He knew this image! He knew where he was!

Suddenly the orb started pouring down its black mud, and in mere moments, the mud was flowing everywhere, including in his direction!

He never realized that from his throat the scream of a small girl came out because as he stepped back the mud poured in through the window and began burning his body.

He retreated back out of the world in the same way he came, and in the next moment, he was back in the immaterium.

The land around him was hell itself. An abyss of flames and destruction. And at the center of it all, was a lump of black mud moving around. It began compressing itself into a more humanoid shape, large in size, as it began taking the form of a horrific fusion of a woman and a boy.

It looked around before its vision fell on him, then it smiled.

His beak opened as he talked out loud for the first time. “Angra… Mainyu…”

Chapter Text

He flaps his wings as hard as he can, before grabbing a piece of a broken wall and jumping from it to change his direction. He dared for a moment to look back and saw that the monster is still in his pursuit, the mud somehow flowing like a river on nothing as it changes its direction toward him consuming the broken concrete in its way without slowing down.

He cursed as he kept flying away. He saw the giant purple mist that he passed through before, it was clear to him now that it was from the final fight with Caster. He went right in without hesitation, with the black mud soon after.

As he was flying, he made sure to look in any direction that he could, it would be disastrous right now if he was grabbed or blown back right now. He saw a tentacle from above him, so he stops for a moment as it misses him by swatting where he would have flown, then he restarted his flight.

He hears something behind him, looking back he could see a group of thinner tentacles following him with great speed, mouths and tongues wailing with broken teeth, begging for his flesh, his help, so he may receive salvation.

He grunts in distaste, the invading wrongness pushing his body to try harder. Flying in every direction he could in the hazy, but the tentacles continued following him. Worse yet, their voices were getting closer.

He felt panic starting to creep over him as they almost reached his legs “No no no no no nononono!” he kept repeating until he felt something in his hand as the tentacles burst into flames. They screamed in an almost uniform way as they lost their speed, and from his view, he saw them slowly retreating.

A slight relief came to him. He looks at the thing in his hand. It was the soul of the psyker he had possessed earlier. The fact that it was tangible now was a sign that she was dead, and thinking quickly, he grabbed it and flew away from Angra Manyu as fast as he could. The reason he did it was ironically similar to why the Servants of this war wanted to keep Caster’s monster away from the people: If Angra Manyu eats it, it will have a source of power. He wasn’t worried for the other souls around them that were apparently here in Fuyuki, because they were intangible due to being alive, their connection to their body made their souls intangible. But not this soul now that its vessel in Real Space was dead.

He saw the ending of the mist in front of him, ‘Good, looks like trying to feel the exit didn’t fail me.’ He thought.

He heard the bubbling sound of the mud coming from behind him. He cursed again. It looks like he couldn’t lose Angra Mainyu in the mist.

As he got out of the mist, he looked around for the exit point and found it, but as he began flying towards it, the mud appeared right in front of him.

He screamed before landing on a small island. The mud came down and landed in front of him, blocking his view to his front. Then it began surrounding him.

He looked around in panic, but all he could see were the distorted horrifying faces of screaming human-like heads, eyes appearing and trading over with other faces, broken mouths screaming and whispering, even mauling at each other, he could hear the screams and whispers of help or cursing. The horrid smells of burnt corpses filled the non-existent air.

Then, from his front, he saw a much more horrifying sight, it began as a small lump, then it got bigger and bigger, and took the shape of a disfigured fetus. It was so nauseating, he once felt his chest ache as the fake reflexes of vomiting were forcing themselves on him again.

Slowly more mud came and began covering the fetus, forming a womb, then more mud appeared and began covering it, and took the form of the upper body of Angra Mainyu, the distorted face that partially resembled the woman that used to be the vessel to the lesser grail had a vicious grin as it crept toward him.

He took a quick step back, which made it stop for a moment before it brought its hand up to its mouth and giggled as if his fear was the source of her amusement.

He desperately tried to look for an exit, but all he could see was the dome of mud that was getting smaller and smaller, the horrifying ugly faces getting closer and their voices getting louder, the smell of burning flesh and poison and rust that were coming out of the mud was overwhelming his senses. He looks at the soul, then down at the ground, and gets an idea, if he can’t find an exit, he’ll make one, but he’ll need time.

He pointed at Angra Mainyu’s face before a spark of lightning jumped out and hit it in its eyes. It didn’t seem to do anything, but that moment of it closing its eyes was what he needed.

He kneeled, put his free hand down, and began unraveling the ground beneath him. It caused a hole to form under him he fell down and back into the freedom of open space.

He didn’t waste any time and flew away as fast as he could. He heard a guttural scream behind him and looked back to see that the mud was violently coming towards him with far more force than before. It took the shape of a giant maw as it came closer.

But just as it reached him, before it could chump down on him, it lost its density and became misty, causing it to harmlessly pass through him. He turned back and saw that once more it had taken the form of its avatar as it looked at itself becoming more and more incorporeal. The avatar looked at him and waved him goodbye with a sad face, twisting its head, and turning its frown into a monstrous smile, the wave turned into a claw pointing at him.

The intention was clear: I see you soon~

Then it disappeared completely, dissolved back into the Warp.

He reached for a roof and landed on it, bringing a claw to his chest as he calmed himself down. He looked up and groaned. That was the worst experience he ever had in any of his lives, but at least he succeeded, Angra Mainyu’s warp presence had dispersed before it could eat him or the soul. He looked back, there was no way he could stay in Fuyuki’s imprint on the immaterium, even with Angra Mainyu gone it was still too dangerous, and the deaths caused by the fire had made it even worse.

He became happy as he looks at the soul in his grip, at least he saved someone too. But after looking some more, dread fell on him. The soul in his grip was slowly losing its power, barely holding on to the currents of the Warp. It looks like the psyker that this soul belonged to wasn’t powerful enough to have her soul be strong enough to maintain its existence in the immaterium independently.

There was no way for him to find a means to make it reincarnate quickly enough before it dissolves. He thought of something before he shook his head. No, he couldn’t do it, it was horrible! But, if he doesn’t do it then nothing will remain of the psyker.

He closed his eyes and felt great painful remorse for what he was about to do. “I’m sorry.” He said to the soul.

He opens his beak and shoves the soul down his own throat, and swallows it. For a moment, he felt nothing, then he suddenly feels a great power.

The soul of a psyker, like anything else in the immaterium, was made from Warp Energy. But what made them different from anything else, aside from carrying the psyker’s imprint, was that not only it was extremely dense in energy, but also much purer in form, letting them be the most efficient thing in the immaterium for a Warp Entity to absorb.

He felt his warp presence overwhelm the soul as it slowly converted it into more of him, and it felt good, really good. He felt unstoppable! He could now understand why daemons always wanted to eat the souls of mortals. He even felt himself grow a slight amount as the power began changing him.

But once the high was over the guilt came, he leaned down and screamed, and punched the ground as hard as he could. But then he saw that fist was on fire. That made him feel even more guilty, it seemed like he had also obtained the Soul’s psychic power of Spontaneous Combustion.

He closed his eyes and looked down. He tried to imitate breathing to calm himself down. As the fire on his claw stopped burning, looked at it again.

He growled as he fisted his talon. That girl, the moment he possessed her, they had temporarily become one and he felt everything she did, she was as real as anyone else, and she, along with hundreds of innocents had all died because of Angra Manyu! he looked back at the messy storms behind him.

Once again he began screaming, cursing Angra Mainyu, for all of the hundreds of people who lost their lives because of it, for making him eat an innocent soul, for playing with him like he was prey for it to eat!

‘I vow to myself, that I will stop you, Angra Mainyu! Next time we meet, I will be ready for you!’ He went back and began walking towards the same hole in the ground which he came out of, and jumped in.

After some walking, it didn’t take long for him to jump out of the pipe and fly away.

At that point, he was just aimlessly flying and thinking of his situation ‘Fate, Fate! Why did it have to be Fate?!’ he thought ‘Sure, Type-moon is not as bad as Warhammer, but it’s still bad in its own way, there are so many world-ending threats here, like that thing I just faced, the Types, the Beasts, and Gilgamesh!’ He stopped for a moment, realizing that the giant eyeball was Gilgamesh’s warp presence. As far as he knew, Gilgamesh was never mentioned to be psychic, how big was his ego to have such an effect on immaterium to have that big of a Warp Presence?! He shook his head and continued ‘Not to mention that out of all magic systems ever created, this one sucks the most, I mean… wait...’ He realized something ‘I can manipulate the Warp just fine! That means I still have Warhammer’s magic system, but that girl’s power, she must have been Psychic, that means the Psychic here is the same as Psykers?’

As he was thinking over it, he hit his head on something hard, “Agh!” he backed off a little and rubbed his head “Ow, what was that?” He opened his eyes and what he saw baffled him, it was the Eiffel Tower, standing there with all its glory, and he swore that he heard the first few seconds of the national anthem of France play, but looking around he saw no instruments anywhere, aside from that accordion floating over there but that was playing another song.

‘Did… did I fly all this way from Japan to France?!’ He thought in surprise, ‘What the heck!? I knew the immaterium makes no sense but this is ridiculous!’

He saw a bottle of what was no doubt alcohol floating by, he grabbed it and pulled the cork out, and brought it towards his beak before he stopped, he was a being made of pure thought energy, drinking something that is associated with destroying minds is not something he wants risk finding its result out.

He threw the bottle at the tower, causing the glass to shatter before he sighed and flew down to the ground below him. Looking around he could see a lot of stereotypical french stuff floating around. He grabbed a bag that was floating nearby, it had three sticks of baguette in it. Feeling hungry, he took one and bit from it, which was awkward because of his beak, and felt its taste. It tasted really fresh, and you couldn’t go wrong with fresh bread.

‘I guess it wouldn’t hurt to look around. I always wanted to visit Paris.’ He reasoned.

So after looking up at the tower once more, he began walking away from it to see if anything else has manifested here.

He had to admit, it was kind of fun looking at all the stuff that had manifested around him, from buildings and tools to historical monuments, but his favorite thing was the food because right after he ran out of baguette, he found a Croissant on a plate and took it as fast as he could.

As he was walking by, his attention fell on a wave of complex emotions coming from his right, looking in that direction, he saw an ever-twisting alley that was giving off an ominous vibe with its darkness.

Choosing to investigate it, he walked in and kept his eyes open for anything dangerous. The alley was getting even more crocked, the twisting walls taking vague shapes of scary faces. He stopped for a moment, remembering the last time he saw faces like that. Shuddering, he continued on, until he saw a small source of light.

His eyes widened “What have we here?” He came over and looked at it more closely, It was the soul of a Psyker, or should he say psychic? “Are you what I felt? Why do I feel like you were calling for me?”

He could feel strong emotions coming from it, fear, distress, and an unhealthy lack of hope, what little hope it had, which was what called for him, was fading fast.

He got worried, that wasn’t a good sign, so doing the only thing he could, he dropped his bag and shoved his head into the soul.

When he opened his eyes again, he was greeted with a crook holding a knife to his throat, with the body he was currently inside holding the guy’s wrist and trying to push the knife back.

He didn’t expect this to be his second view of the real space, but he had to do something or this poor psyker would die!

He didn’t want to take direct control, he wasn’t used to it, it might cause his host’s hand to lose its fading straight for a moment, which would mean instant death.

There was something else he could do, he focused on his host, and began giving the soul his own emotions, his own will, and the desire to stay alive, along with a pinch of anger.

The results showed themselves, felt his host growl as he gritted his teeth the hand getting new straight as it began pushing the crook’s arm back. But something else also happened, he felt warp energy transfer itself from the Psyker's soul to the real world and his host yelled as he pushed, and it sent the crook flying to the opposite wall of the alley.

He felt the Host’s confusion as the Psyker looked at his own arms and wondered how that happened.

But it wasn’t over yet, as the crook brought up the knife that was still in his hand and ran towards the Psyker.

Decided at that moment that he had to intervene if he wanted to keep the Psyker alive, he fully took over his host’s body, and high on adrenaline, he called the power of Spontaneous Combustion as he jumped forwards and punched the crook’s face with a literal flaming fist.

The crook fell down as he began holding his burning face and screaming.

Not taking any chances, he ran over and kicked the crook’s face to get his hands down then stomped on his right wrist, then knocked the screaming man out with a second kick to the face.

He panted with real air as all he could hear were the heartbeats of his new body. Thinking quickly, the leaned down and took the knife and put it in the pocket of his host’s coat, and then opened the crook’s coat and looked for money. He found a wallet full of cash, which he emptied and put back, and put all the money in his host’s pocket.

He quickly ran away and kept running until he saw the end of the alley and the street. He saw people walking around so he decided to avoid attention by walking out of the alley and choosing a random direction.

A few minutes of walking later, he felt confident that he was far away from any danger, so after finding a bench, he walked over and sat on it.

Taking one last breath, and finally feeling the adrenaline in the body gone, he let go of his control over the body.

To his host’s credit, he didn’t scream, instead, he started panting in fear as he looked at his hands, then started to pat his body to look for any injuries, and feeling pain from a few bruises on his body “Wh-what-what happened?!” He heard his host ask himself. He felt a certain amount of fear, as his host was trying to come to terms with the fact that he had almost died in that alley.

Oh, it looks like he could comprehend French, he noted to thank his host for being a translation filter later ‘Nothing much, just saved your life.’ He talked into his host’s mind.

That was a mistake, as his host flinched, which was very painful before he looked around “Who said that?!” He asked out loud.

‘Quiet!’ He whispered ‘People might think you’re crazy if you talk out loud.’

That actually caused his host to be taken aback “Sorry?” he whispered. But then the Host realized what he just said and looked around again. “Wait no, I mean what happened in there? who are you?!” he asked in a much quieter tone.

He tried to make a good impression, given how this was the first human he had met ‘ hello! No, I mean Bonjour! Sorry, French isn’t my first language.’

He could feel skepticism forming inside his host about that “Where are you?” the Psyker looked around “I can’t see you, I can’t even hear which direction you are.”

He thought over how to inform this as logically no one would take something like this well. He decided to go with the rip-the-bandaid approach ‘How do I break this to you… to answer your question, I am your head.’ He answered with straightforwardness.

But it didn’t work well, because it all at a rapid pace, first he felt his host’s confusion as he tried to comprehend his words, then some more skepticism about its possibility, then felt his host's panic rising as he remembered both how he lost his control in the alley and how the voice had no origin. He got up from the bench and gripped his head. ‘No! Please get out! I don’t want to be possessed!’

Now he was starting to panic too, the last thing he wanted was for his host to be sent to an asylum, or worse, found out by one of the supernatural groups. He once again focused, he tried to eat from his host’s panic emotion, and feed him some feelings of calm.

That didn’t work, if anything, it made things worse, as he felt his host’s panic level rising, cursing at himself for being too stupid for even attempting to manipulate someone’s emotions he tried to talk him down ‘Hey, please calm down! I’m sorry, but please! Just sit down and breathe! I promise I won’t do anything to you.‘

Much more gently than before, he tried to give his own feeling of calmness, but this time in a more empathic way, like one does when holding someone’s shoulders, and solely encouraged his chest to take deeper breaths without working against him.

That seemed to have worked as he felt his host’s panic level slowly go down, feeling his knees get weak before he dropped back on the bench.

‘Sorry,’ he apologized ‘I shouldn’t have said it like that, with what you had just gone through a few minutes ago.’ Almost dying in an attack like that wasn’t a pleasant experience. ‘Are you better now?’ He could feel everything his host felt, but he asked anyways to make his host feel better.

“Yeah…” The Psyker brought his hand up to get his hair straight.

‘Listen,’ He began ‘I don’t mean harm to you, I just came over, saw you needed help, and in a way jumped in to save your life.’

He felt his host’s confusion, “You saved my life?”

‘Yes, I did.’ He affirmed.

“But why?” The Psyker asked “Why save me? I’m a nobody.”

He tried to be honest ‘Well, I heard someone’s call for help, got curious and went to investigate, then saw you in that situation and I jumped to the rescue.’ he answered ‘And don’t you bring up the I’m nobody thing again, I saw someone in trouble and just saved them, don’t question someone’s empathy.’

“But…” The Psyker loudly began, but he whined when he got shushed by the thing in his head so he said it again more quietly “But I didn’t call for help.”

‘Yes you did, that desperate feeling you get when you want someone to help you, I heard it. I can hear feelings.’ He informed

The Psyker looked at his hands again “Then what happened there in that alley, that was you?” he felt conflicting feelings inside his host “Thank you for saving my life.”

He felt awkward ‘You’re welcome, but it was only partially, me, specifically the fire. That part where you threw that creep away, that was your own doing, I just gave you a little push.’

“Me? But I can’t…” The host began, but he was interrupted.

‘Yes, you can.’ He stopped his host ‘You got extrasensory powers, you know… E.S.P.? P.S.I.? Psychic! You’re Psychic.’ He informed.

“I… I see…” His host said with some skepticism. He felt his host going through another thankfully calmer whirlwind of emotions as he replayed what happened and more distant memories. After a minute of silence between them, he sighed “That explains why I sometimes hear my tools dragging themselves on surfaces. But…” He took a breath “...once again, thank you for saving my life, and my name is Damien Duret. What’s yours?”

He was about to answer, but then he stopped. He remembered that Daemons had something called a true name and that anyone who had it could control that Daemon. Is his name now his true name? If it is he has to make a new one for himself.

He tried to remember a name that he could use for himself until he remembered a name that would fit him. ‘Call me Amar.’

The newly named Amar brought his head out of the soul and sighed, he decided to stay here for a while, at least with a psyker here he could learn Demien’s Telekinesis. he didn’t know why but he felt like something was going to happen soon.