Leticia's palm touched that cold metal.
It was a rough sensation, mixed with bloodstains and sweat; the metal's edges had become blunted from years of impact, yet it still radiated a bone-deep ferocity.
The power of the [Vitality] authority surged forth without reservation the moment they made contact.
It was not a torrent, nor was it a flash of lightning.
It was like a cool spring rain quietly descending upon a desert of eternal, scorching heat.
It had no form, no sound, yet it carried an irresistible, silent will that permeated everything, piercing through his scorching skin and hard skull, seeping into the chaotic mental world of Angron—a landscape already scorched into wasteland by endless pain and anger.
Angron's massive body stiffened suddenly.
The next second, it was a volcanic eruption.
"Get out—!!!"
A shriek that did not belong to Angron himself, constructed purely of a will for destruction, exploded deep within his mind!
That was the will of the "Butcher's Nails."
This metal parasite, which had lived in symbiosis with him for hundreds of years, felt the arrival of its natural enemy for the first time.
That green power, representing "rebirth" and "peace," was the absolute opposite of the "pain" and "anger" it relied upon to survive.
It was afraid.
It was counterattacking madly!
Hum—!!!
In Angron's mind, the ceaseless, agonizing pain and roaring—like billions of metal locusts gnawing on his nerves—were amplified tenfold, a hundredfold in an instant!
It was an ultimate torture capable of completely tearing a soul apart and grinding it into powder.
His eyes, which had just lost some of their blood-red hue due to bewilderment and sadness, were once again swallowed by an extreme crimson.
His bulging muscles seemed as if lava had been injected into them; veins twisted and erupted frantically on his neck and arms, as if they were ready to burst through his skin at any moment.
His arm, stalled in mid-air and holding his chainaxe high, regained its strength once more.
He had to kill her.
He must kill her!
Kill this woman who dared to use that damned "peace" to profane his "sacred pain"!
However, the axe still could not fall.
Because the hand pressed against his forehead did not move away.
Leticia's complexion paled slightly under that violent mental backlash.
Deep within her pure black eyes, it seemed as if a storm was gathering, but her hand and her body remained as unmoving as a pillar rooted in the origin of the world.
More [Vitality] power surged from her palm.
If the counterattack of the "Butcher's Nails" was a suddenly erupting volcano, then Leticia's [Vitality] power was a gentle and vast ocean covering the entire world.
Lava rushed into the ocean, stirring up monstrous steam and violent hissing.
Pain and peace.
Destruction and rebirth.
Two diametrically opposed forces, originating from the source of the world, engaged in the most primitive and cruel tug-of-war within Angron's brain.
Angron felt as if his skull was about to explode.
Half was the burning of hell, the other half was the ice spring of heaven.
Under the tearing of these two forces, his body began to spasm violently and uncontrollably, like a giant being repeatedly electrocuted.
Sweat mixed with blood seeped frantically from his pores, instantly soaking the sand beneath his feet.
He opened his mouth wide, but no sound could come from deep within his throat; there was only a dying wheeze, like an old bellows being forced open—"Haa... Haa..."
On the sidelines, Terrania covered her mouth tightly with her small hands, her golden eyes filled with tears.
She could feel the pain erupting from Angron, a pain that almost condensed into substance, causing her pure soul to feel waves of knife-like stabs.
The surviving mortal veteran had long since collapsed to the ground; watching that blood-colored statue trembling madly in place, and watching the black-robed woman who held this world-destroying behemoth in place with just one hand, his brain had completely lost the ability to think.
A god.
This must be a god.
Only a war between gods would look like this.
This silent war lasted, who knows how long.
It might have been a century, or it might have just been an instant.
Finally.
That gentle, boundless ocean, with its unshakable absolute resilience born from "life" itself, began to gain the upper hand.
The volcano's eruption gradually weakened.
The crimson of the lava was cooled, covered, and submerged by the emerald green of the seawater, inch by inch.
In Angron's mind, the gnawing sound of billions of metal locusts began to grow distant... blurry...
The agonizing pain that was enough to burn through his soul seemed to be wrapped layer by layer in cool gauze, gradually becoming... dull.
Then.
It was as if someone had flipped a switch.
The world...
...quieted down.
...
...
...
Angron's body gave a sudden jolt.
Immediately following that, a second time, a third time...
He was like a drowning person breathing air for the first time; or like someone who had lived for hundreds of years in eternal white noise, entering an absolute soundproof room for the first time.
This sudden "silence," absent for hundreds of years, did not bring peace.
What it brought was a... fear, ten thousand times stronger than the most intense pain.
And an incomprehensible... emptiness.
He was used to the roaring, used to the agonizing pain, and used to using endless anger to counter that pain.
That pain was his bones, his flesh, his entire proof of existence.
But now...
They... had disappeared?
Angron's massive body stopped spasming.
He stood frozen there, like a statue weathered in an instant.
He blinked slowly, incredulously.
In those crimson eyes, the blood-red color was fading away at a speed visible to the naked eye, revealing the pupils beneath—which should have been sky blue but appeared dull due to years of pain.
Inside them, there was no more anger, no more hatred, no more tyranny.
There remained only an extreme, bewildered, fragile look, like a child who had just woken up from a nightmare lasting hundreds of years.
He could no longer feel his own body.
The power born from pain that supported him in battle, supported his destruction, and supported him to live on, had been drained away.
An unprecedented feeling called "exhaustion," like a breaching flood, instantly submerged every corner of his body.
The twin-linked chainaxe in his hand felt as heavy as a mountain at this moment.
His fingers, which once could easily tear open the hull of a starship, could no longer close.
Clang—!!!
A dull, heart-stopping crash.
The hideous giant axe, symbolizing endless slaughter and anger, slipped from his powerless fingers and slammed heavily onto the sandy ground of the Colosseum, kicking up a cloud of dark red dust.
The weapon... fell.
Angron looked blankly at his own empty hands, which were still trembling slightly.
Then, he slowly raised his head again.
His gaze pierced through the dim and murky air, focusing on what was in front of him.
Focusing on the black-robed woman who still had her palm pressed against his forehead.
He saw that her face, perfect and unlike a mortal's, was still calm, though her lips were a shade paler than before.
He saw that her pure black eyes were still deep, though the compassion flowing within them now seemed even richer than before.
For the first time in hundreds of years, the first glimmer of true peace had descended.
It was like the sharpest key, opening the most solid prison cage that Angron had forged with anger and pain.
But at the same time, it stripped away all the armor he relied upon to survive.
His mental defenses completely collapsed in the face of this unbearable "peace."
He looked blankly at Leticia and opened his mouth, as if wanting to say something.
But his throat could not emit any sound.
He was like a lost child who had seen a road sign home for the first time, yet because he had been lost for too long, he had forgotten the direction of home.
Just at the moment when this peace, fragile as if it would shatter at a touch, had just been established.
Outside the Colosseum.
"Roar ahhhhhhhh—!!!"
One roar, then another, and then hundreds and thousands more!
Countless roars of fury, restlessness, and filled with unease and the desire for destruction came thundering from all directions, like a landslide or a tsunami!
Boom! Rumble!
The entire Colosseum, along with the earth beneath their feet, began to tremble violently.
That was the most insane charge, launched simultaneously by thousands of World Eaters Space Marines!
Between them and their Primarch was a twisted psychic link originating from the "Butcher's Nails."
They could feel each other's anger and share each other's pain.
But just a moment ago, that "source of pain" belonging to their father—the one they were most familiar with, as majestic as a god—had suddenly...
Disappeared.
For these berserkers who had long regarded pain as their faith, this made them feel more fear and madness than hearing news of their father's death.
Their god... had been extinguished.
Must go!
Must go to his side!
Go see what happened!
Go kill the blasphemer who dared to extinguish their sacred flame!
Go use the enemy's blood and wails to reignite their father's anger!
The sky-shaking roars and the rumbling of the earth, like a tide of death, were surging toward this solitary Colosseum with an unstoppable force!
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