40K: When evil spirits appear

Karik Kedor's funeral, along with those of the candidates, was held as scheduled.

Inside the council hall of the Dragon Slayers of Dalian, all the torches and braziers were lit, and even the fireplaces, which usually only had two burning, were filled with a large amount of wood, with eight flames blazing fiercely. The priest's remains lay in an ice coffin, next to the twelve candidates, placed at the deepest part of the hall.

They could have achieved something great, or they might have died before that during rigorous training and selection, but they lost that opportunity because of that frost dragon.

The original long tables and chairs in the hall had been moved out in advance, and even the carpets had been removed, revealing the weathered stone bricks once again. These bricks, once exquisitely carved, were covered with various intricate patterns and designs, carrying a long-standing tradition.

Surrounding the dead, the wolves sat on the ground in distinct layers. At the innermost layer were the wolf guards of the Dragon Slayers' Dalian and their battle brothers who were most familiar with Kedor, followed by other representatives sent by Dalian, while at the outermost layer were the warband servants who belonged exclusively to the Dragon Slayers.

The person in charge of the ceremony was Ulric, and no one else was qualified to do so; he was Karik Kedor's guide. The old priest was still wearing his signature black and gold robe, but now he carried a simple stone staff in his right hand.

After looking around, he stood in front of the dead and spoke in a calm tone.

"Karrick Kedor was born into the Frostbone tribe. At nineteen, he passed the trials to become a Bloodclaw. After forty-six years of war, he rose to become a Grey Hunter, becoming one of the dragon slayers. Twenty-four years later, I led him to the path of the priest. He once guarded his seriously wounded brother in the middle of the icy sea, fighting a sea dragon alone; he also fought a bloody battle against the frost trolls on Troll, one of the seven peaks."

"His bravery is undeniable, but his achievements as a wolf priest deserve even greater recognition. He successfully brought 162 new blood to the pack, 49 of whom are still alive. Karik Kedor never feared, never retreated, never abandoned his brothers. His death was the death of the wolves, and his name will be sung by us. He will be remembered forever."

Ulric solemnly raised his stone staff and struck the ground, producing a sound that resembled thunder.

"Whose memory holds his story?" he asked.

The first person to raise their hand was Krom Dragon's Gaze.

Today, the fierce-eyed man's chest was bare, revealing a body filled with scars and tattoos. Unarmored, yet still terrifyingly robust, his posture as he rose and walked could easily be mistaken for a giant wolf standing upright. He approached the old priest, who brought him a small bowl emitting white steam. The priest then used two fingers to scoop up a black substance from it and meticulously smeared it on the wolf lord's face, outlining the emblem of the Dragon Slayer Dalian's Blazing Sun Wolf.

Then Ulric approached him and asked, "Who will sing his name again when he is almost forgotten?"

"Me," said the Wolf Lord. "Krom Dragon's Gaze."

The old pastor nodded, stepped aside, and moved to the side.

The man with the fierce eyes turned around and began to tell his story.

He recounted Kedor's solo battle against the sea dragon. It turned out he was one of the wounded men the deceased wolf priest had once protected, and he added many details. For example, the priest's curses, the roar he let out when struck by the sea dragon's tail, and his disbelief when he seized an opportunity to attack, only to have his chainsaw axe slip off the dragon's scales due to the wrong angle...

At this point, Krom laughed and said he would always remember that expression.

But Kedor ultimately won.

He was already exhausted and bleeding from many places. At this moment, Crom, the only one among the wounded who was still somewhat conscious, made a suggestion. He advised the priest to throw them overboard to feed the sea dragons, while he himself quickly sailed back to Et, and could avenge them later.

He expected to be berated for his words, but to his surprise, the priest seemed inspired. He threw down his axe, grabbed two fragmentation grenades, and deliberately let the sea dragon bite him. Taking advantage of the moment, he detonated the grenades and threw them into the sea dragon's mouth.

The shockwave knocked Krom unconscious. When he awoke, he found the priest half-swallowed by the sea dragon, his body lodged in its fanged mouth, dripping with blood. The beast's severed head lay alone on their deck, its body nowhere to be found, and the surrounding seawater was stained crimson with blood.

"We ate its flesh for fourteen days before we finally made it back to Et in that wrecked boat that had run out of fuel," Krom said. "Luckily, its head was big enough."

After him, a continuous stream of narrators followed.

One by one, they stepped forward, bowing as Ulric painted the emblem on their faces, and then told a story about Karek Kedor. These weren't always heroic tales; some even sounded rather sordid, such as the one told by a wolf guard of Kedor's generation. He said that the priest, before becoming a Bloodclaw, had wanted to drink mead, but after only half a sip, he lay in bed for four days, vomiting constantly...

The story elicited a burst of laughter; the wolves seemed unwilling to let the funeral be filled with sorrow.

As the story unfolded, mead and roast meat were gradually served. Time passed slowly, and people kept coming forward to pile up spoils of war or old armor plates around the coffin. These things would later be sent into the fire along with the coffin so that the dead could take them to the underworld.

Sitting among the dragon slayers, Ald listened in silence, gradually forming a rich, albeit incomplete, understanding of the wolf pack and their way of life. He was an excellent listener, able to remember every pause in the story and even grasp the unspoken words hidden within them.

Therefore, although he had never met Karik Kedor, he had a mental image of him, knew his preferences for weapons, and even his drinking habits...

At that moment, he finally understood why Logan Grimner had said that wolf packs did not need books to pass on knowledge.

A moment later, after another story had ended, he raised his hand.

Olde had not forgotten why he was there.

Facing hundreds of pairs of golden, vertical pupils, he slowly rose and walked towards Ulric, who was waiting. As was customary, the wolf priest had painted a black emblem on his face. It must have been an extract of some plant, carrying a peculiar scent.

Olde sniffed the air gently, turned to look at the pack of wolves in front of him, and spoke without hesitation.

"I have never met Karik Kedor or any of the other dead, so I have no stories to tell about them. I am not a member of the Wolf Pack or the Dragon Slayers of the Great League, and by rights I should not even be here for this solemn funeral. But Lord Crom invited me, saying I must tell a story at the funeral, so I will."

Among the wolves, one with fierce eyes, now covered in fur, chuckled softly.

"I come from a long-vanished civilization, its last remnants buried deep within the world you call Fenris, and I am its last inhabitant. When I was young, I visited a floating city in the desert on my journey to travel the world. Its inhabitants were deeply immersed in a martial spirit, so much so that they even restored an ancient arena."

Upon hearing this, Ulrik cast a long, fixed gaze at him.

Old's background was neither a secret nor a taboo within the wolf pack; the alpha wolf hadn't chosen to hide it and had already told all the other wolf leaders about it. After all, the pack wouldn't trust someone with a mysterious past. But the old pastor truly hadn't expected Old to choose to recount his past in such detail.

He had assumed the Dragon Slayer was a man of few words, but now it seemed that was not the case.

"They held tournaments there, day and night, with everyone participating and the prize money was huge. I needed the money, so I stayed and learned martial arts from everyone I met in the city. I thought I would only stay for a while, fight a couple of matches, get the money I needed, and then leave, but I was wrong. I stayed in that city for a full ten years."

"At first, the skills I learned and the matches I watched and participated in seemed like child's play, but things quickly changed. Many combat techniques that we had long forgotten were restored from ancient books, and countless weapons that had long disappeared in the long river of history were reborn in the furnace and put into our hands."

"I am deeply drawn to these things, but not to the violence involved. My civilization does not, like a pack of wolves, try to remember every dead person and their story to preserve history and tradition. We are blinded by a magnificent tapestry woven from numerous achievements, so we are too lazy to look to the future, nor do we bother to look back at history..."

"When I stood on the streets of that desert city, watching those ancient traditions, which may even have originated in Terra, being regained and passed down by us, I felt a surge of emotion. I knew I would stay, and I would remember it all. Even now, I don't understand why I thought that way back then, but I did remember it all."

Ald paused for a moment before uttering his final words.

"So, perhaps that's the meaning of what I did back then: remember, and then pass it on... I think that's how humanity got to where it is today. That's all I have to say."

He was met with a long silence until he returned to his seat and sat down again, at which point someone gently patted his chest with their right hand.

The story then continues.

This long narration continued throughout the day until night fell and the wolf moon appeared in the sky, at which point it finally ended.

Ulric struck the ground with his staff again, causing the wolves to howl.

What began as just this hall later spread throughout Et, carried away by the gale that swept across the entire wolf den, scattering to the seven peaks. One by one, the wolves rose, silently forming ranks, and marched into the depths of Et. A squad of wolf guards clad in black armor carried the coffin, followed by the warband servants who carried the offerings for the dead.

At the end of the road they were to travel, flames would take everything away. The Fenris believed that the bodies of the dead should not continue to exist, otherwise the soul would not be free...

Old did not follow; he retreated to the very edge of the hall as the pack of wolves rose to their feet.

Ulric had told him before the funeral that he didn't need to participate in what followed, and that if he didn't want to, he could find something to do after the story of the wolves was over.

Unfortunately, he didn't know what he should do now.

After waiting a while longer in the hall, he turned and walked out the door, only to run into Logan Grimner, the alpha wolf who seemed to have been waiting there for quite some time.

"How is it?" he asked.

"It has benefited me greatly."

Logan looked somewhat surprised, as if he hadn't expected such a response: "Really? Very well... Now come with me."

"What are you going to do?"

The alpha wolf smiled mysteriously and replied, "Your armor is ready. The chief steel priest says it's the most unusual suit of armor he's ever made since he picked up the forge. Don't you want to give it a try?"

Old did not object.

A moment later, in a small armory, he saw his armor. It lacked the knots, insignia, or furs typical of wolf armor; instead, it was a stark gray-blue, much like the wolf pack. Logan Grimner stood beside him, examining the armor as closely as he did, and after a moment, he let out a sigh of admiration.

"They actually did it... By All Father, if this gets out, I'm afraid the Red Robes on Mars will send out strong protests."

Old turned around and asked, "What do you mean?"

"It's nothing, Ald. It's just that your armor isn't quite the same as ours. You're not an Astartes, and you haven't had any modification surgery to implant a black shell, so I had them make you a scout's suit of armor using materials and basic designs for power armor. It basically... retains the disadvantages of both."

The more Logan talked, the more absurd the whole thing seemed, so he simply walked over to the armor and pressed a button on the wall. Several mechanical arms extended from behind the armor frame, disassembling it piece by piece to armor Ald, while the alpha wolf began to explain the process himself.

"Look here, it doesn't have a powered backpack or any built-in power unit, but it's made of ceramic steel and alloys, so it's not as lightweight as reconnaissance armor, nor does it provide the extra speed and power of powered armor. And look here, the greaves and boots, see this extra plate? They did a height-increasing design inside, so you look as tall as us, so they added an external plate for concealment... By the Father—!"

As the alpha wolf spoke, he finally couldn't help but burst into laughter.

"I bet the Iron Priests had a lot to say about me when they were forging this! And you, Ald, if you weren't the dragon slayer who killed a dragon with two punches, putting you in this armor would be tantamount to murder!"

With a soft thud, both shoulder armors were installed. Ald looked down at himself and said, "I don't think there's a problem."

Logan narrowed his eyes, looking at the young wolf in front of him, his smile growing even brighter.

He said softly, "Of course there's no problem... Now, you look exactly like us."