40k: Midnight Blade.

Chapter 632 15. Interlude: Journey into the Solar System (I)

The lion hurriedly took Haid into a cabin that had just been cleaned. The decoration here was simple and not luxurious, but it had everything one needed.

The Edge of Reason has been serving the Lion since its birth, and its internal structure is also a specialized design based on the Primarch's own opinions. These cabins are one of the results. He required that a place must be reserved for mortals on the Edge of Reason.

This incident attracted many expected accusations from the Lions, and those at the political center of the empire expressed the same opinion: Does the Lord of the Dark Angels want to return to the Legion era?

The Sigil Bearer remained silent about this. But the Lion said that the Legion never left.

Haid walked into the cabin in silence, his hands folded into fists in his sleeves that had been worn to white. He had been like this since he learned the truth.

The truth was as cruel as a bone-cutting knife, peeling off his flesh and pride, leaving him pale and unsteady on his feet.

Despite this, the Lion has not slowed down to wait for him - in fact, he has not even verbally expressed any form of sympathy for Hayid since the trial ended.

The security door slowly closed, metal rubbing against each other, and a faint buzzing sound came from the wall. Haid stared around, his lips tightly pursed, and the lion strode towards a mortal-sized desk.

On it lay an unopened military uniform, and the military boots were placed on the ground according to the little superstition among soldiers, shiny and spotless.

Whether it is the Guards or the Navy, they believe that if you don't put your new boots on the ground, it will bring bad luck. No one knows whether this superstition is really true, but the soldiers are obviously too lazy to find out the source.
You have to do it, they believe.

The new boots lying on the ground have a convincing power like pendants, rosaries and nameplates. No matter what, as long as they have it, they can gain courage for a short time when the moment comes.

The lion reached out and picked up the uniform, then bent down and picked up the boots, pressing them on the uniform, and the hardened plastic used to protect it made a soft crisp sound. He turned around, and Haid saw some kind of invitation in his deep green eyes.

A genuine wry smile crossed the old corporal's face.

"Sir."

"What is it, Haid?"

Haid was silent for a moment, then he said the second half of the sentence: "Is this some kind of compensation?"

The lion stared at him seriously, and after a long while, he slowly shook his head, giving a cold and firm denial.

"Compensation is an insult to you. It is an insult to me, too."

"What is this, then, sir?"

"Isn't this obvious enough?" the lion asked back.

Hayed did not reply.

A kind of courage that is too unbelievable for mortals is slowly sprouting in this old body of flesh and blood. Not many people in the galaxy dare to ignore the problems of a Primarch, but Haid did it.

In fact, not only that, he didn't just ignore the Lions' question, he even expressed clear rejection.

Regardless of the reason, whether it was momentary anger or some strange desire to die, he did it after all.

The lion understood and nodded slightly in appreciation, placing the uniform back on the table. Then, a moist scent unique to the forest began to fill the air.

Hayd's body froze.

"My time is running out." The lion said in a rare gentle tone. "So, be prepared."

In the next moment, his right hand rested on Hayd's shoulder. For the old corporal, this feeling was indescribable. Every part of his body stopped working at this moment, but his consciousness was still clear.

Haid saw very clearly - or rather felt - something that the lion wanted to show him.
A forest.

This is what Haid saw, but he didn't even know how to describe it.

He saw low-hanging treetops and lush grass, as well as a forest path that somehow appeared right in the center of his sight. It was not muddy, and there were no footprints on the soil.

This piece of quiet green brought a kind of "perception" beyond reason, as if he was really in it. Unconsciously, Haid became sweaty, and he did not hear any insects or birds singing in this forest.

All he had was indescribable silence. Listening to his own breathing, Haid felt goose bumps on his hands. He felt a little scared, but his body made a choice before his consciousness.

He took a step and set foot on the path. No one pushed him, no one forced him, and the lion didn't even say a word.

But it was only one step forward.
Somehow, Haid felt this very clearly. He took only one step, and it was absolutely true, but this one step brought him to a completely unfamiliar place.

This place is grand and vast, and every place you see is made of pure cold gray steel. The light source is dim, but the place ten steps away is completely obscured by darkness.

Moreover, it was eerily quiet here, no less than the forest. Haid felt dizzy and had to lower his head to calm down. Thick cables were laid on the rough steel, like blood vessels embedded in the cold gray skin, extending into the depths of darkness.

Haid quickly closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He made another attempt, looking up at the ceiling, but was hit again - the ceiling was simply out of reach, at least several dozen meters high. The dim light source slowly descended from a place where he could not tell the direction, which made him shudder.

What on earth is this place? What is hiding in the darkness?
Haid swallowed his saliva and tried to take a deep breath, but he only breathed in choking cold. It was only then that he realized that it was extremely cold here.

Then he heard a voice.

"Lion El'Jonson. I remember you promised me last time that you wouldn't do this again."

The person who spoke called out the lion's name without any respect, and there was an obvious accusation in his words.

Behind Hayid, the lion responded calmly: "I'm in a hurry, brother."

Haid froze in confusion. He had a strong mind, but it had its limits. The forest, the steel in front of him, and the lion's words of brotherhood all turned into a heavy cloud pressing down on his heart, blinding him and making him dizzy.
Fortunately, this did not last long. When another giant calmly walked out of the darkness, these things completely turned into nothingness.

Haid opened his eyes wide, looking at the person in front of him in shock. A word slowly rose from the depths of his completely blank mind, and then was extended and expanded to become a single word.

Steel.

"Urgency cannot obscure the nature of your actions, Leon." Steel spoke calmly. "You can take that path and go wherever you want, but how much do I have to consider?"

"Three seconds before you arrived, I had received advance warning. The psychic monitors inside the fortress detected sixty-nine sets of abnormally active data at the same time. These data almost made them faint, and twenty-two people had to be injected with emergency suppressants that would shorten their lives in order to suppress the impact of these data."

"After I received the message, that is, the moment your boots set foot here, the automatic alarm inside the fortress was triggered, and I now have to turn it off in manual mode."

"If I don't, all nearby Imperial forces, whether guards or chapters, will rush here as quickly as possible after receiving the news, not to mention my guards."

"They are already fully armed. And they are not me, they can't recognize who you are, and even if they recognize you, they dare not confirm whether you are real or fake, so they will shoot."

"So, if I'm not here next time, and you break your promise again until then, what will happen, Leon?"

Hayd heard the lion sighing amid these shocking words.

"I apologize," Lion El'Jonson said after a moment. "I apologize with all my heart, Perturabo. I am very sorry."

Perturabo nodded expressionlessly. "I accept. So, brother, what brings you here?"

"I want to see Malcador."

Perturabo frowned slightly. "In that case, why don't you go directly to his 'Administrative Council'? He spends 95% of the year in that dark place struggling with various documents."

“I want to go through the official process.”

Perturabo was silent for a moment, then said, "Nice joke."

“I’m not kidding,” the lion said.

He raised his hand and gently placed it on Hayid's shoulder. After a pause, he added very seriously: "Also, when we meet, I will bring with me Corporal Hayid, who served in the 23rd Company of the 77th Doomsday Guard Regiment."

Perturabo narrowed his eyes, as if he had realized something, and then he looked down at Haid. The old corporal couldn't help but tremble at this moment, and he couldn't help but feel fear, even though he already knew the identity of the person in front of him.
He tried to kneel, but his body was too stiff to obey. Fortunately, however, Perturabo's gaze soon ended.

The lion nodded to him and made another request: "The sooner the better."

"I'll make the arrangements," said the Lord of Steel. "Also, if there is a next time, you'd better come to me again."

"Why?"

"Because Rogal Dorn's fortress is not designed the same way as mine, there will only be two results when his anti-psychic devices collide with your abilities."

The Lord of Steel turned and walked into the darkness, his voice still echoing smoothly.

"First, you shred his anti-psychic device, causing damage to the fortress. Second, your ability is reduced, causing unpredictable chaos. Where will you go then?"

His footsteps faded away, and Haid and the lion remained where they were, staring into the darkness one after the other. After a few seconds, the old corporal heard a chuckle.

"What he meant by that was that he had a special way for me, Haid."

"Sir."

"Cheer up." The lion patted his shoulder.

One and a half Terra hours later, they boarded an iron-gray shuttle. Haid was assigned a window seat, which was probably designed specifically for mortals, with a slightly smaller size and a specially adjusted safety belt. In addition to him, the shuttle also had ten fully-armed Astartes and the Lion himself.

He sat at the front of the plane, and the design of the chair was simply an eye-sore. Unlike the other seats, its edge was extremely sharp, like a knife edge.

The lion's frown betrayed his true feelings, and then, amid the vibrations of the shuttle, he asked, "Is this how my brother has always treated himself?"

"grown ups--"

An Iron Warrior took a deep breath. He was not wearing a helmet and there was a hint of frustration on his face.

"—we couldn't convince him."

The lion suddenly uttered something in dialect. No one knew what he said, but judging from the increasingly deep wrinkles between his brows, the words were probably not very gentle. The passenger cabin fell into silence.

Haid carefully turned his neck and looked out the window.

Every day, countless people in the Milky Way want to make a pilgrimage to the solar system. Some wealthy worlds have already opened up special routes, but the price is very expensive, even for the nobles.

The poor people naturally couldn't catch this ride, but they had other ways. They would set out in their youth and follow the footsteps of their predecessors on a difficult and arduous pilgrimage, basically begging for a living along the way.

Captains would be happy to take these pilgrims aboard if they did not have too much cargo, and then drop them off on a planet on the pilgrimage route, leaving them to wait for passing ships.
Helping pilgrims is generally believed in the empire to bring good luck, and if it weren't for the need to make a living, who wouldn't want to take a look at the solar system?

When the journey finally ends, the pilgrims who have not died usually reach the last moment of their lives. They are ragged, with sunken cheeks, and their wrists and necks are hung with the certificates of faith they have been given.

Those who cannot be like them choose to bring their piety to the eyes of the God-Emperor in this way, hoping that He can see it.

Hayed didn't know whether He could see it or not, but he felt that if he was a pilgrim who finally reached the edge of the solar system after going through untold hardships, he would be so excited that he would be unable to breathe.

It was so beautiful. The old corporal gritted his teeth and tried to stop himself from trembling.

He had seen many things in his life that many other people would never see. Not to mention the burning hell on Sovet, he had also seen the crash of a battleship with his own eyes.

It fell from the sky like a collapsing town, breaking apart and burning, people screaming and falling freely through the crumbling wreckage, and a woman shattered before his eyes.

He had also seen an entire army frozen to death in a blizzard, with the sun shining on them, making them sparkle. But now, he was so shocked by the miracle before his eyes that he could hardly utter a word.

Ultimately, what he saw was not the cruelty of war to people, nor the horror brought by the might of nature. At this moment, what Hayd saw was a miracle created by human beings themselves.

Over the past ten thousand years, people have worked tirelessly, generation after generation, endlessly devoted to this endless undertaking. In the end, they succeeded.

Every planet in the solar system has been transformed into a planet-sized fortress, connected to each other by unimaginably thick chains and suspended in the void.

Countless other fortresses that are slightly smaller than these occupied the empty spaces, filling up the cruel curtain of the void. Countless warships, aircraft, and shuttles came and went, advancing on every planned route.
This is where Terra is located, the ultimate and last line of defense.

And here he came.

Hayid suddenly realized the sadness of the matter - what was he doing here?

He had no intention of making a pilgrimage, nor was he some wandering trader who could come to the solar system to discuss business or other matters. He was just a dirty sailor who had just resolved a matter and learned the truth.
I think he will die soon.

But he finally came here.

With such complicated thoughts in mind, Haid sat in the shuttle and waited with mixed feelings. Their voyage lasted about two Terra hours and finally ended at a star port.

It was extremely busy here, with the ships coming and going so that the surrounding space was packed. When Hayd walked out of the cabin, every staff member he saw was roaring loudly.

He looked at what was before him in bewilderment, shocked by the busyness beyond his imagination. Just in front of him on the left, a group of officials in red robes were debating with others, and there was obvious impatience on the faces of both sides.

A fat official roared breathlessly: "You can't just take over our duties like this! The establishment of the Penal Corps should be carried out in accordance with the laws of the Empire. Laws, you understand! This is not something that your Ministry of Military Affairs has the final say!"

His words elicited agreement from his colleagues, while one of the men in uniform sneered in disdain.

"All I know is that those who fight on the front lines, whether they are scum criminals or elite soldiers, they are fighting on the front lines, your Excellency."

"Unlike fat pigs like you, they can't eat any delicacies for three meals a day. Where was the imperial law at that time? Why were the prescribed supplies never delivered to us as required?"

"Don't blame us for your own corruption!" the fat official roared. "Every supply I handle is handled according to the highest standards!"

"Okay, that's enough." An old officer said lightly. "There's no point in arguing any further. Let's go and line up. Let's see what the Sigillite's Arbitrator thinks about this."

They left angrily, and what replaced them and attracted Hayd's attention was a team of tall Astartes wearing dark green power armor. They were even taller than the team of Iron Warriors standing behind Hayd.

Their dark skin and dark red pupils made them look extremely intimidating, and coupled with their calm expressions, Haid could hardly suppress a shudder.
As a result, just a dozen seconds later, his trembling was torn to pieces. He saw the Astartes couple surrounded by a group of civilians who came from nowhere. They were cheering and shouting a name that Hayd had a vague impression of.

"Salamander?" he murmured the name.

A cold snort came from behind him: "Why not just send them some wreaths? I think they will not refuse."

Haid did not dare to look back to see who was talking, but he was familiar with this kind of scene, so he had the urge to laugh. If the lion had not stepped past him at the right time and led the way, Haid might have really laughed.

By then, things might get a little ugly.

But they did not join the crowd as others did, instead they left the vast, bustling place through a side door and a long corridor.

Another hall appeared in front of Haid. Compared with the port, there were far fewer people here, and it was very quiet. Most people either had no expression on their faces or frowned very seriously.

Not only that, they were also very sharp, at least much sharper than the people in that noisy hall.

The moment the lion appeared, they looked over, then saluted and greeted silently, and no one was as excited as Hayid was at the beginning.
"Finally there is no choir." Haid heard the lion say this in a low voice.

He was talking to an Iron Warrior, the same one he had talked to on the shuttle. Their pace was not fast, leading the way in front, while the others surrounded Hayid in the middle.

This strange treatment made the old corporal feel uncomfortable all over. He felt it was extremely absurd, so he had to listen attentively to the conversation in front of him to divert his attention.

"Do you hate the choir, too?"

"I don't think many people would like it - except for the psychic choir, of course. How's the solar system doing?"

"Same old, sir. Starting from last year's Emperor's Ascension Day, we have dealt with sixteen potential demon invasions. Overall, the situation in the solar system is good."

The lion hummed noncommittally, then said, "Are you still holding the competition?"

"Of course, sir," the Iron Warrior seemed to sigh. "To be honest, I am not opposed to exchanging combat techniques with Rogal Dorn's sons, but the thought of broadcasting this matter throughout the solar system is a little hard for me to accept."

The lion looked at him with a little surprise: "Full-range broadcast? Why haven't I heard of this?"

"The new regulations have only been implemented for four years." The Iron Warrior said in a muffled voice. "But I must admit that the benefits brought by this matter are immediate."

"for example?"

"The economic and livelihood data have increased. Some things based on our chapter culture are selling very well in the solar system. The number of applications to join the chapter has also increased by 14%. The Primarch said that people are gradually realizing that we are actually no different from them."

The lion snorted and laughed. "Broadcasting the entire area is a good idea, but it doesn't sound like a decision Perturabo would make. So, tell me, how long did it take Rogal Dorn to convince him?"

"Half a century."

The lion laughed.

A few minutes later, they walked into another door, but there was no other passage behind it. Two bald men in black were standing in front of the closed relief door, waiting, with a complex tattoo engraved on their foreheads.

The Iron Warriors stopped and gently pushed Hayid with one hand, signaling him to leave the team. The old corporal left the iron and gray package at a loss, and walked in front of a bald man at the signal of the lion.

The man looked at him, raised his hands, and suddenly made a few gestures. Haid looked at him in confusion, not understanding what he meant. At this time, the Iron Warriors had already turned and left.

The lion spoke up, explaining his confusion. "He is one of Malcador's silent guards, sworn to silence. He was asking you if you were here to see the Sigillite."

Hayid was silent for a moment and said, "No, it's not."

The mute guard continued to make more gestures, and the lion spoke again: "He asked you, what are you doing here?"

"I don't know either." Haid answered in a low voice. He looked up at the lion, and the Lord of the Dark Angels gave him a calm gaze in return, as if to encourage him.
The door suddenly opened, and a tall, silver-haired young man walked out, holding a Skyhawk staff that was emitting golden flames. He was followed by a dozen servoskulls, and heavy documents were floating and humming under their anti-gravity blades.

Haid was stunned, and the young man was already looking at him.

The old corporal was struck by lightning.

Emperor, those eyes
Haid almost thought he had seen it wrong, but the young man did not give him a chance to inquire. He just waved his hand, signaling the lion and Haid to come in, and then returned inside.

"Let's go." said the lion.

Haid was brought in with a blank mind.

(End of this chapter)