Old Earth

A distant figure stood surrounded by the light of that golden sun. He carried a flaming sword and wore a laurel crown.

Eldrad smiled, as a master would to his hound. ‘You are amusing to me, Barthusa Narek.’
‘I will be markedly less so when we are face-to-face. I have killed witches before – your kind, others. It matters not. You will use the fulgurite, or I will.’
The light overtook them, but not just light, fire too – a storm of it, heralded by the rising sun.
‘Ever surprising are you, Barthusa Narek,’ Eldrad said calmly. ‘Yes, though not all will require it.’
‘It proves the Emperor’s divinity.’ Narek had to bellow against the roaring firestorm. His skin prickled. What little hair he possessed began to burn.
‘And as such it has divine power,’ Eldrad replied without concern, seemingly heedless of the purifying flames, ‘His power,’ he said, and acknowledged the conflagration coming towards them for the first time. ‘And you know that with it even gods, or those claiming to be gods, can die.’
‘How do you know I’ll help you?’ Narek shouted, trying to turn, but the light blinded, and Eldrad knew he would barely be able to hear his own voice; that searing heat would be coursing down his throat, burning his lungs…
Untouched by fire, Eldrad smiled one last time.
‘Fate.’
And the fire crashed against them both, drowning the ruins of the perfect city in immolation.