Alexei did not know how to use the disgusting, twitching head in his hand, nor did he understand its true purpose. Once freed from the suppression of the Hive Mind network, the flesh on the skull immediately revitalized, beginning to crawl up Alexei's arm.
Fortunately, Alexei himself was unaffected by the Warp within the physical universe. He simply brushed off the clinging, rotten meat with an expression of pure loathing.
He traveled via an Overlord to the Astra Telepathica hub world within the system. Atol had originally intended to follow, but Alexei refused. This was not a battle Atol could survive, so Alexei had him picked up and returned by a Medivac.
Inside the atmosphere, the Overlord's altitude steadily dropped. At a safe distance, Alexei dropped from the creature's ventral sac toward the ground. With a thunderous crash, he slammed into the earth. As the dust cleared, Alexei emerged from the crater unscathed. He shook the dirt from his body, gripped his power sword in one hand, held the rotting head in the other, and began to walk forward.
This planet, once the bustling communication hub of the sector, was now eerily silent—so silent that Alexei could hear his own heartbeat. A macabre atmosphere pervaded the air. Everything he encountered was in a state of decay, rot, and stillness. Whether it was massive machinery or the corpses lining the road, everything had lost its essential spark: vitality.
As Alexei moved deeper toward the source of the psionic signal, the rotten skull in his hand became increasingly bizarre. The putrid flesh upon it even began to manifest spontaneously in the surrounding air without needing a physical surface to cling to.
This shouldn't be happening. Logically, a C'tan shard should be sufficient to stabilize the veil of reality in the surrounding space; such active Warp phenomena should be impossible.
The psionic signal was now very close. Suddenly, Alexei stopped. He felt a slight breeze brush past his body, seemingly carrying something away, though the sensation of loss was instantly refilled.
Aboard the Leviathan in the distance, Abathur's gaze suddenly shifted to a corner where dozens of previously lively Zerglings had just turned into ash, their biomass unrecoverable.
Alexei's expression grew increasingly grim. The piles of ash on the ground became more frequent until he spotted a familiar figure. It was a Ghost agent lying on the ground. He rushed forward, set his items down, and carefully examined the soldier's condition.
Seeing that the Ghost appeared to be alive, Alexei breathed a sigh of relief and carefully removed the man's mask. However, the face behind the visor was not that of a fit young man, but a grey, withered mask of decay. The skin, like a layer of dark ash, clung tightly to the skull, and the eyes had shriveled away into hollow voids.
Sensing Alexei's presence, the Ghost warrior let out a faint, wheezing sound. A withered, branch-like arm trembled as it rose, giving Alexei's leg a weak push—a silent plea for him to leave. That single movement seemed to exhaust his final spark of life. In the next moment, the Ghost's entire body crumbled into dust before Alexei's eyes, leaving only a suit of equipment collapsed in the dirt.
Alexei retrieved the identification tags from the ashes and stood up, expressionless. He clenched his teeth so hard they nearly broke, fighting to keep his rage from overriding his reason. Gripping his power sword and the rotting skull, he stepped into the interior of what was once the sector's largest telepathic hub.
The moment his feet crossed the threshold, countless silver glows flowed before him. The massive hub building collapsed instantly, turning into endless dust that blanketed the planet's surface.
Alexei stared fixedly at the towering figure ahead. It was a humanoid entity composed of countless branch-like structures, with silver-white light flowing through it, eventually forming a set of facial features at the top.
"You... are unique," Its voice seemed to come from everywhere, echoing in Alexei's ears. "Such vast vitality. It brings me surprise."
The light flowing across its face suddenly froze, as if it were staring intently at the small human. "I shall devour your life. You will assist me in returning to perfection." Its form shifted and grew like a silver celestial tree. "We are the incarnations of the rules; this universe was born for us. I am the dissipation of all existence, the shadow of fading. I am Tysakra the Withered."
Tysakra the Withered. Alexei finally realized which C'tan stood before him—a powerful deity who had been lured into the Warp by the Necrons and blown into fragments.
"In light of the fact that you have proactively provided me with such majestic life force, do you have any final words?" Tysakra asked haughtily, as if granting a final wish to an ant.
"Can I... eat you?" Alexei's pupils turned a brilliant gold. He spread his arms and laughed wildly, the rotting skull and power sword trembling in his hands.
The silver light on Tysakra's body paused for a moment. "Insolent insect." As the words fell, an infinite, majestic power descended upon Alexei.
Under this overwhelming force, the power sword in Alexei's hand turned directly to ash, and his body began to wither and crack. Yet, in the next instant, his form snapped back to normal.
"Eh?" Tysakra watched the scene in surprise. Alexei stopped laughing and pulled back his arm, hurling the rotting head with all his might toward the C'tan shard.
Just as the entity prepared to disperse its form to dodge, a familiar power enveloped it. Tysakra's body and consciousness suddenly slowed for a fraction of a second. It felt the familiar energy in shock. "Time! Zakhulash! You devoured Him?! You wretched ant!"
Accompanied by Tysakra's furious roar, the rotten head of the Living Saint exploded in mid-air. Countless ulcerated, foul-smelling fleshy tentacles lashed out toward the C'tan shard. Tysakra frantically used its power to absorb everything, but this was life essence corrupted by Nurgle. The god of the physical dimension began to be eroded by the Warp. The silver light on its body dimmed; just as it had in the past, it was about to be suppressed by the Warp and shattered into endless pieces.
Amidst Tysakra's agonizing wails, Alexei walked slowly toward the entity. Looking at the weakened shard, he began to smile again and pressed his left hand onto the dimming silver form.
"No, no, no!" Tysakra roared in fury. It felt its body being devoured by the insect before it. It had never encountered such a situation. Pressed by both the power of the Warp and Alexei, even with its mastery over the laws of reality, it could not escape its final fate.
"NO!!!" With a final, unwilling scream, Alexei withdrew his hand. The profane fleshy tentacles surged toward him, but in an instant, everything nearby froze. The tentacles were entirely absorbed by the power Alexei had just acquired. Unlike the C'tan, he did not fear the Warp—he devoured everything.
Looking at the new crystals, new power, and new abilities on the interface before him, Alexei remained silent for a moment, then turned and walked away.