Khazad Varum burned.

  Not with fire, but with fear.

  The death of Elder Threxor sent a psychic shockwave through the remaining Verminthar forces. The warp-like link of the horde buckled. Cohesion fractured. Where there had been unity, now there was panic. Without their leader, the Varminthar prioritised their own survival. They retreated down alleys and tunnels, trampling those that lost their footing. Others attacked blindly, shrieking in grief and rage.

  From the ridge, the Steel Legion watched it all unfold — and advanced.

  *********

  “Form into echelons,” Reinhard commanded, voice like a falling bde. “Sweep and Clear.”

  The ridge spilled steel. Over 1,000 men surged down fortified ramps and stairways carved into the stone. Engineers moved first, colpsing side tunnels and pnting backflow traps. Autocannons and Pak 40s were repositioned for maximum coverage of the undercity, so they could provide covering fire.

  Panzergrenadiers stormed the city in disciplined ptoons, rifles raised, advancing building to building, alley to alley. They moved like ghosts through the dust and fire — every burst deliberate, every movement synchronized.

  Reinhard wasted no time and summoned the armoured cars and half-tracks that accompanied the grenadier ptoons. The vehicles were smaller and manoeuvrable enough to coordinate effectively with their grenadiers. They provided suppressive fire down streets and pzas, enabling grenadiers to advance.

  Resistance was fierce but unfocused. Warlocks tried to regroup. Remnants of siege teams fell back into half-destroyed strongpoints. But their spells were erratic, rushed — and met with volleys of disciplined fire and coordinated artillery.

  In 12 hours, the upper city belonged to Reinhard.

  The Legion pnted their fgs into crumbled towers and mounted autocannons on the ruins of dwarven battlements.

  Khazad Varum’s surface was theirs.

  But Reinhard wasn’t finished.

  As his men secured the high ground and cleared the st holdouts from the manufactorums and what seemed like rail stations, scouts returned with the real prize:

  “Sir. There’s a significant Nether signaturs below. High-density. Nested in the core yers. Possibly… the primary forge-node.”

  Reinhard looked down a spiraling tunnel, its walls lined with long-dead dwarven steel, now corrupted with pulsing Netherstone veins.

  “We cleanse it,” he said. “Root and stem.”

  Strike Team Composition:

  3 × Panzergrenadier Ptoons2 × Engineer Ptoons (with fme units and breaching charges)2 × Heavy Weapon SquadsWarden Drone Escort (x4)Combat Command: Reinhard, HartmannThe tunnel was bck — not just in light, but in essence. The deeper they went, the more reality bent. Voices echoed wrong. Gas masks fogged from within. The walls seemed to move.

  The Warp Forge wasn’t a factory. It was a wound. A bleeding pce of stone, metal, and soul-debt. And it was alive.

  They emerged into a chamber the size of a cathedral — built by dwarves, defiled by Verminthar, now pulsing with nether energy and semi-living machinery.

  Chains writhed. Gears turned with no source of power. Flesh was bolted into the walls — screaming faces, maybe once dwarves, maybe once men.

  In the center: a warp-forge core, a pilr of molten Netherstone, held in pce by magnetic rune-seals and surrounded by six chanting Warlock-Forgebinders, each tethered to the core with spinal cables.

  “Kill the casters. Burn the core,” Reinhard ordered.

  Gunfire erupted.

  Panzergrenadiers dropped two Forgebinders in the first volley — their bodies tearing free from the cables with wet pops. Engineers rushed forward under covering fire, pcing charges along the core’s magnetic stabilizers.

  But the forge fought back.

  One drone exploded mid-flight, overloaded by raw warp backsh.A Warlock surged forward with a chain-scythe and split a grenadier clean in half before being burned alive by a fmethrower.Two men colpsed screaming, bleeding from the eyes as the forge whispered names they had forgotten they knew.Reinhard moved through it all like a revenant. One hand on his rifle. One eye on the core.

  The charges were set. The Warden drones hovered silently above the fractured forge core, scanning its structure as the Panzergrenadiers secured the final approach.

  The warp energy bled from the cracked Netherstone like mist. It wanted to break. But something in Reinhard’s mind pulsed — not warning… but invitation.

  His HUD flickered. Then a new prompt appeared.

  [Tier 3 Soul Anchor Detected] [Designation: Corrupted Warp Forge Core] [Stability: Unbound – Hostile] [Status: Dominance Possible]

  A subtle vibration spread across his gauntlet. Not from the environment — from the soulbound systems. He felt it in his spine.

  “Hold the detonation,” Reinhard said, prompting Hartmann to lower the detonator.

  “Sir?” Hartmann blinked. “That thing will surge again any second—”

  “Not if I take it.”

  Reinhard stepped forward, alone, toward the pulsing core. The heat was unreal. The warp energy bent space around it — stone rippled like water. Voices whispered things no human should know.

  He reached out, gloved hand extended.

  [Initiate Soul Anchor Conversion?] Cost: 3,000 Soul Points Warning: Anchor Tier 3 – Will permanently alter local region and link to command infrastructure Anchor Alignment: CORRUPTED / UNCLAIMED

  Proceed?

  [Y/N]

  Reinhard answered without hesitation.

  “Yes.”

  The world screamed.

  The core convulsed. The warp essence fred — and was caught.

  Chains of golden light erupted from the ground, wrapping the Netherstone spire like a divine cage. Sigils burned in midair — glyphs of command, loyalty, conquest.

  The forge fought back — it showed him visions of madness, failure, fire — but Reinhard refused to break. He stood inside the maelstrom, unmoved.

  He didn’t destroy the forge.

  He subjugated it.

  [Tier 3 Anchor Secured] Status: Linked to Commander Reinhard Stahl Effects:

  Passive Soul Point Generation +1 SP/minReinforcement Costs -10% (Local)Unlocks Advanced Constructs & Artillery VariantsProvides Warp-Resistant InfrastructureAnchor Powers: Forge Respawn Beacon | Heat-Shielded Bastion Core | Soulbrand Weapon UpgradesThe forge’s glow changed.

  What had once been a swirling vortex of green warpfire now pulsed with cool blue pulses, disciplined, reguted power — soulbound energy, leashed, refined, and integrated into Reinhartd’s system.

  The chamber cooled. The pressure lifted.

  The Steel Legion didn’t just win.

  They conquered reality.

  Reinhard walked out of the depths, his cloak gone, his uniform scorched and torn, but his will intact.

  The banner was raised over the city — bck, white and red with an iron cross, the sigil of the Steel Legion.

  Khazad Varum was not just a ruin. Now, it was a fortress. A soul anchor stronghold. And Reinhard Stahl — its master.