The Hammer God

Thunderstone Reach belonged to the beast.

Down from Gharrentia Mesa had the Stormvault toppled, dislodged by the wild magic of the necroquake. That hadn’t stopped the children of Gorkamorka. Amidst the horror of the Crawling Pits, titanic arachnids hunted the web-filled ruins. But this hadn’t slowed the rampaging armies of the wilds.

Not even the Hammer God’s warriors had been able to stand before the Waaagh!.

Well, no. That wasn’t quite fair, Urgak Gitcracka mused as he watched the maroon-armoured human struggle beneath his boot. The lightning warriors had fought well; this one, a chief judging by her long cloak and the markings covering her armour, had battled on even after the Megaboss had crushed her legs. The warrior tried to reach for her fallen sword, numb fingers scrabbling weakly against the grip. A frustrated snarl left her as she accidentally knocked the blade further away. The lightning warrior shot a glare at the towering orruk. Her teeth were gritted, eyes burning with anger amidst a woad-daubed face.

‘You won’t win, greenskin,’ she spat. ‘Gharrentia will be your tomb. Our hunters roam the wastes even now, bringing death to your mongrel kindred.’

‘Maybe,’ said Urgak. Thick pig-iron plates clanked together as he shrugged. It was true that plenty of the Great Waaagh!’s outriders had been ambushed amidst the ruin-scarred wastes and caverns of Gharrentia; Urgak didn’t know how those battles had gone. Neither did he care.

‘Maybe they krump us. Maybe we krump dem. Don’t much matter to me.’

‘The God-King will punish you!’ The lightning warrior snarled. ‘I’ll be there to see—’

‘Oh shut it,’ the Mgaboss grumbled as he stomped a foot down onto the human’s skull. The bone crumpled easily, her body falling limp. In moments the warrior discorporated into brilliant azure light and shot heavensward; Urgak stumbled back with a grunt as the scouring beam singed his face, piggish eyes following the departing soul-energy. He liked to imagine that it noticed the crude gesture he shot it.

With the foe dispatched, Urgak returned his attention to his immediate surroundings. All the cunning spell-traps and arcane defences put in place by Thunderstone Reach’s creators had been eradicated by sheer bestial will. Ironjawz guffawed as they broke open vestibules and lopped the heads off statues. Painted Bonesplitterz charged down web-strewn tunnels, bellowing nonsense war-songs. Troggoths swallowed priceless relics whole while ogors rummaged amidst the loot for gaudy valuables. Everywhere, grots scurried about, be they Moonclan wretches daubing obscene graffiti across the walls or the maniac Spiderfang dwellers of the Crawling Pits now swept up in the Great Waaagh!’s wake.

It was anarchic. It was primal. It was the way things should be. Urgak was almost tempted to join in himself. But he was a Megaboss, and more than that, he was one of the Fist of Gork’s chosen lads. He had places to be.

Bracing his choppa over a shoulder, the Megaboss lumbered into the darkness of the ruined Stormvault. Things scuttled in the shadows, occasionally hissing at him or staring with far too many eyes. A snarl from the hulking orruk put them in their place.

Urgak wasn’t sure how long he had been walking before he reached the inner sanctum of Thunderstone Reach, a great semicircular chamber bisected by a curving wall. One thing about humies was that they couldn’t help but show off. Certainly the Megaboss had no doubt that the faded golden doors set into the wall, carved with images of the Hammer God besting Ghur’s biggest critters and left shaken but intact by the vault’s collapse, concealed impressive loot. A mob of gargants had been set to heave at the doors with great, crudely forged chains. Ancient hinges groaned and creaked, but the arcane wards that still clung to the doors rendered them inviolable to simple force.

‘So?’ uttered a rumbling voice. It belonged to the dark shape stood at the centre of the gargant mob, physically dwarfed yet somehow overmatching them in presence. Within Urgak’s barrel chest, his heart drummed harder. ‘You finished krumping ’em yet?’

Every denizen of Ghur, from the lowliest grot to the mightiest Megaboss, knew of Gordrakk. They had heard legends of his booming voice, his terrible battle-fury, his Gork-granted favour. Few realised that he could be so still. Not a muscle twitched as Gordrakk watched the thwarted progress of his minions. His scarred visage never wavered from the sealed doors. At his side, the twin axes Smasha and Kunnin’ rested motionless, their crude but deadly edges catching the limited light – refracting it, shattering it, as they did all things.

‘There’s a few of ’em still muckin’ around outside, boss,’ said Urgak as he approached. ‘Sneakin’ and ambushin’ and wotnot. Brakka said some of ’em had a bunch of ogors with ’em. But the boyz’ll run ’em down soon enough.’

A bass growl echoed from the shadowed extremities of the chamber. Urgak tried not to look Bigteef directly in the eye, though he felt the Maw-krusha watching him intently. The beast was subservient to the Fist of Gork, but it always regarded the other Megabosses with a hungering gaze.

Gordrakk accepted the report with a wordless grunt. Attempting to lie would have been fruitless – the Fist of Gork could sniff out anything that was not the raw and simple truth. He stared to the sealed doors with such quiet intensity that Urgak half expected them to suddenly crumple inwards of their own accord. Stopping a pace or two behind the Megaboss of Megabosses, Urgak scratched at the side of his own scarred face before clearing his throat.

‘You think there’s somethin’ big in there, boss?’ Another grunt in reply. ‘Like, somethin’ real big? ‘Cause the boys have been askin’ when we is gonna be gettin’ movin’ again. I’ve been saying to wait though, ’cause I thought there’s probably somethin’ worth ’aving in ’ere.’

‘When I first came to these lands, I zoggin’ hated ’em,’ Gordrakk rumbled. Urgak flinched in surprise. He hadn’t expected the Fist of Gork to answer – much less to change the subject. ‘Chaos boys that puked everywhere or split in half or laughed when you smashed ’em. Dead gits who snap like twigs. Tree-gits and stunties and pointy ears, all off hidin’. Some of the Chaos boys, they could fight, but it weren’t many. But then, the Hammer God sent his lads.’

Gordrakk’s eyes lit up with a vicious light at the memory. ‘Big armour. Big weapons. Good in a scrap. Zog me, Urgak, dey even came back fer more when you smashed ’em!’ Gordrakk’s green hand crashed against the Megaboss’s shoulder, staggering Urgak. ‘Finally, I thought – ’ere’s a proppa fight. An’ fer a time, that was enough.’

‘An’ den, they let me down,’ Gordrakk seemed almost to sigh. A lesser being might have mistaken the sound for wistfulness. Urgak knew it was frustration. It was always frustration. Smasha and Kunnin’ twitched as the Fist of Gork’s tapped his fingers on their grips.

‘They started buildin’ cities. They started throwin’ about magic. They hid gubbinz in places like this,’ he gestured around the inner sanctum. ‘That’s when I realised, Urgak. The storm lads – they’re just like all da uvvers. Just like every other git not worthy of fightin’ me.’

Bigteef’s growl echoed its master’s growing displeasure. Urgak swallowed; he wasn’t sure if this was an invitation to respond, or if Gordrakk would respond as violently to questioning as he did most other things. But the orruk’s curiosity was piqued.

‘Dere’s gotta be someone out there worthy of gettin’ krumped by you, boss.’

‘The Hammer God.’

The vehemence, the bubbling fury, in Gordrakk’s voice saw Urgak flinch again. A predator’s rumble escaped the Fist of Gork, spittle running past sharpened tusks.

‘The Hammer God’s the only one still worth fightin’. He’s a proppa warrior. Proppa enough to earn the respect of Gorkamorka. But time’s changed,’ Gordrakk’s eyes narrowed as he gripped his axes tighter. ‘Now da Hammer God hides up in the stars. He’s forgotten who he was. But I know. I can kick over every one of his precious little cities. I can duff up the biggest and ’ardest of his champions. I can grind these realms to dust beneath me boot. But I ain’t never gonna be satisfied until I can get at the git that fought Gorkamorka to a standstill.’ The hulking orruk shook his head. ‘I ain’t gonna be satisfied until I’ve had a crack at the Hammer God.’

One moment, he was still. The next, Gordrakk was in motion, iron-shod boots clanging against the cracked stone floor. As he neared the doorway, the Fist of Gork raised Kunnin’. The axe sundered magic, shattered sorcery, annihilated the perfidious arcane. It was with savage enthusiasm, then, that Gordrakk swung the blade.

The doors blasted off their hinges. Urgak, alongside several of the gargants, twitched as metal scraped loudly across the floor. The magical wards flickered before the surge of Waaagh! energy obliterated them. An echoing silence descended over the vault once more, before a growl from Bigteef saw Urgak follow after the Fist of Gork.

Zephyrs of broken magic flickered around the orruks, offering paltry illumination. Standing a pace behind Gordrakk, Urgak lifted his gaze into the darkness. His barrel jaw dropped. Suspended upon thick chains and surrounded by dead-eyed statues hung a truly titanic beast skull. Behemothic horns curled from its temples, while its great eye-sockets were rimmed by burn marks. The skull’s crown was covered in notches and blows beyond number. None had left more than a superficial imprint.

‘Hammergord,’ said Gordrakk. ‘One of the ’ardest beasties dere ever was.’ There was an odd inflection in the Fist of Gork’s voice. For the first time that Urgak could recall, Gordrakk was smiling. It was the grin of a being for whom the future was certain, who would batter fate itself into submission if he had to.

‘Hammergord, fer the Hammer God. If he won’t come and fight me, then I won’t give him the choice. I’ll smash up his poncy empire. I’ll break down the gate to his star-realm myself if I gotta. I’ll crush everything in my way until there’s just me, an’ him. The Great Green God and the Hammer God. And then we’ll see who’s best.’

‘Get the boyz to build a ram, Urgak my lad,’ Gordrakk chortled. His eyes never left Hammergord’s skull. ‘I got plans fer this thing. An’ I know just what to test it out on first.’

PRODUCED BY GAMES WORKSHOP IN NOTTINGHAM

The Hammer God © Copyright Games Workshop Limited 2019. The Hammer God, Forbidden Power, GW, Games Workshop, Warhammer, Stormcast Eternals, and all associated logos, illustrations, images, names, creatures, races, vehicles, locations, weapons, characters, and the distinctive likenesses thereof, are either ® or TM, and/or © Games Workshop Limited, variably registered around the world. All Rights Reserved.

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