How can a retired savior be considered retired if his price drops to 40,000?

Chapter 296: On how tyrannical the richest man in mankind is

After escaping from the Cathedral of the Holy Blood, Fujimaru Ritsuka, who thought that all the preaching of the original body that could reach her had come to an end, could finally let out a sigh of relief. The only person she had to deal with next was Sigismund, and based on her experience, as long as she could find the right direction and didn't make any mistakes, the heirs of Dorne were always very easy to coax. Fujimaru Ritsuka is very confident in handling (getting through) this problem appropriately.

Provided that she didn't spot Mephiston in her peripheral vision mid-sigh.

Admittedly, she did not have any unnecessary fear of the Chief Thinker of the Blood Angels himself, but the possibility brought about by the fact that the other party's figure appeared at the edge of her sight still made her spit it out before she could. He choked back half a breath.

Fujimaru Ritsuka's first reaction was that the think tank chief had something to say about her "great achievements" not long ago, but then she realized that this was her fault. Next, she began to nervously check in her memory what activities Chaldea had carried out after landing in Baal. When Mephiston himself stepped in front of her from the edge of her peripheral vision a few seconds later, she had finished reviewing it, convinced that she had not messed up anything, and regained the confidence from this conclusion. The courage and confidence to face the other person with your head held high.

These courage and self-confidence were well maintained until the end of the pleasantries between the two parties, and the chief think tank directly invited the imperial saint to "have a light meal." There is nothing wrong with the invitation itself. Everyone knows that "having a casual meal" is just an excuse for being drunk. In fact, it is just that Mephiston wants to talk to Fujimaru Ritsuka alone about certain things. In the past, the latter would of course have accepted it without any fear, but unfortunately, it was not long after Fujimaru Ritsuka got into trouble, and he was still being closely monitored.

So, with just the right amount of trepidation, she cast a questioning look at Sigismund behind her.
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In fact, even as a founding group, the Blood Angels almost became a complete Primaris war group after their home planet of Baal was ravaged by the Leviathan Hive. It is said that after that devastating battle, there were only about 300 Blood Angel survivors left, and most of the sub-groups that were summoned were in disarray, and even the entire organization was completely destroyed in the sea of ​​​​worms. If the Indomitus Expedition fleet led by Guilliman had not rushed to the rescue in time and used the Primaris technology of the Sons of Unplanned and the Great Sage Caul to transfuse blood into the battle group, the bloodline of the Archangels might have been cut off in that tragic and earth-shattering war.

With the help of the Imperial Regent, the Blood Angels chapter survived, but excessive attrition caused them to replenish themselves with Primaris warriors, but the Firstborn Astartes accounted for a lower proportion - —Even made the Blood Angels become the founding group with the highest proportion of Primaris Space Marines, no one else. Today, as the Primaris technology is becoming more and more mature, the only remaining first-born son in the chapter has either fallen on the battlefield, or has crossed the Rubicon River that belongs to him alone. The Primaris Astartes are in the Holy Blood. The proportion among angels will only get higher and higher.

The result is: Sigismund, as the undoubted firstborn son, looks petite and cute in comparison when walking among the Blood Angels. Fujimaru Ritsuka himself is even more impressive among these three-meter-old think tank giants. It is made into a small particle.

When he was first invited, Fujimaru Ritsuka did not expect that he would be directly invited into the Think Tank Sanctuary. True, she was an Imperial Saint, or so the Custodes said she had that title, but a facility guarding a Chapter's most important secrets would not theoretically be open to others simply because of a distinguished title. This fact may be interpreted in many different ways, and Fujimaru Ritsuka carefully chose a neutral guess: Mephiston believes that some psychic defenses should be deployed in the following conversation. , and a certain room in the think tank sanctuary obviously has more suitable conditions.

She and Sigismund had already passed some Astartes guards guarding certain gates, but Mephiston, who was leading the way, had no intention of stopping and still took them deeper into the sanctuary. The guards in blue think tank armor were motionless, as if they were not living people, but sculptures placed there merely as intimidating decorations. But Fujimaru Ritsuka has no doubt about the threat these "sculptures" actually possess. The evidence is that the deeper they go in the sanctuary, the more violent the black knight following her not far behind becomes.

But that could also be because Sigismund sensed something that Fujimaru Ritsuka couldn't. Even after the Servant of Chaldea's Destiny Summoning System materialized into the world, Sigismund, who only existed in the state of a soul among the Cursed Legion, once again acquired a physical entity, but his essence was still closer to that of the subspace. On one side, you can gain a little bit of transcendent perception. Even if he has no relevant knowledge, he may be able to instinctively realize what the symbols and mantras engraved on the walls represent and what threats they may pose - however, regardless of the specific reasons, Fujimaru Ritsuka feels that the most important thing for him is to Fortunately, some measures were taken before the latter really exploded.

"Mr. Mephiston, I'm sorry, but would you mind telling us our final destination?" she asked, but Mephiston didn't make too much of a fuss about the issue: "We are heading to my sanctuary. "But before that, I think there is something else in the sanctuary that should be shown to you."

"So, you took us a long way around in an arc." Sigismund said.

There was no doubt the stark accusation in this sentence, but Mephiston admitted it without realizing it: "Yes, I admit it, but sometimes such detours are necessary because of the internal structure of the sanctuary." Some paths exist outside the norm.”

This is a euphemism. A more accurate statement is "not complying with physical constraints", and everyone present knows this. Perhaps no matter which world the occultists build, when they build residences, positions, workshops, or any buildings with similar functions, it is a common phenomenon to do something with the internal space. Fujimaru Ritsuka, who took the initiative to understand the "Think Tank Sanctuary" as the "Magic Workshop", naturally understood it tacitly, and even Sigismund, who knew nothing about psychic powers, had already understood this on the Storm Frontier.

The Black Knight closed his mouth angrily and muttered something like "I feel uncomfortable all over here." Fujimaru Ritsuka turned to glance at him slightly worriedly, but then Mephiston's voice rang out:
"We are here." The chief think tank said in front of a towering and luxurious door covered with exquisite reliefs. Then, while raising one hand and using his spiritual energy, he turned to Fujimaru Ritsuka and gave additional instructions, "No offense, Your Excellency, but your body as a mortal is more fragile. Please pay attention to the changes in the light." Sigismund, who became irritable because he was surrounded by some unspeakable pressure, wanted to ask at this moment, "How can the light in the building change? Are you adding redundancy in the room?" Is the ground equipped with high-power lumen lamps?" - But before this sentence came to an end in his mind, the door had been opened by the chief think tank's psychic energy:

With just a gap, the few people standing at the door were swallowed up by the ocean of light.

There must be something more outrageous than the high-power lumen lamp he guessed. Sigismund thought. He squinted his eyes, the lenses of the finely crafted power armor quickly adjusted the filtering frequency, and the Astartes' visual control organs also functioned perfectly and quickly. Sigismund, who had further strengthened his endurance after becoming a Heroic Spirit, just squinted his eyes slightly and caught a glimpse of the scene behind the door in the next second:

It was a vast hall, the interior space unnaturally vast, the vaults literally soaring into the sky with no end in sight. From the perspective of architectural theory and physics, such a huge hall cannot be accommodated in the Blood Angels' Think Tank Sanctuary - in terms of space capacity, it may be larger than the entire Think Tank Sanctuary looks from the outside. It was vast, but after getting to know the Stormbound, this level of "unreasonableness" could no longer really shock Sigismund.

What really astonished him was something indescribably majestic in the center of the room, the source of this all-devouring sea of ​​light. It was a huge ball of light, about twelve meters in diameter. It burned quietly on the chest of an even larger statue, causing excessive light to spread throughout the hall. The entire structure is suspended in mid-air. The tops of everyone's heads give people the impression of a blazing pillar of fire, but the light she sheds seems to have no temperature: the air blowing from the hall is not hot, even The temperature is slightly lower than outside.

The statue is a two-winged angel. Its appearance is obviously based on Sanguinius himself, but the stone used is jet black Baal marble. It placed one hand on the hilt of the sword, and raised the other hand upwards, its chest burned red by the light ball embedded in it. Bundles of energy directed by wires, cables and valves from the light ball like its heart flow continuously day and night, causing the blood vessel-like cables to glow with a faint crimson light. Three huge red obelisks rotate peacefully above the upward hand. This unreasonable movement trajectory may be driven by some kind of psychic field. Countless servo-skulls, cherubs, and even mortal scribes who had given themselves wings were flying around the three gems like a flock of birds, chirping and reciting something.

"This hall is the celestial sphere, the center of the Think Tank Sanctuary." Mephiston said briefly, and then explained to his guests the most eye-catching part of the hall, "That is Idalia, the dying heart. of stars.”

"I've heard of this." In order to cope with the sudden strong light, Fujimaru Ritsuka instinctively raised his hand to block his eyes, then quickly pulled out a pair of sunglasses for himself from the void and put them on his face, "Emperor The emperor mentioned this to me. He said that he gave you a star to serve as a power source for the entire fortress. He suggested that I obtain the energy needed for the ceremony from it. But to be honest, I am not sure about this. ”

Mephiston looked a little confused for a moment: "I didn't expect... that you had thought about what I was going to propose next."

"Do you mean 'obtaining the energy required for the ritual from this device'?" Fujimaru Ritsuka asked, and after getting a definite answer, he continued to explain, "Theoretically it shouldn't be impossible, but the relevant education I received is relatively limited. It can be said that it is more...traditional. The school of occultism I understand is better at borrowing and guiding original natural phenomena. The later addition of human intervention like Idalia's "Imprisonment", to me It’s a redundant thing that’s computationally troublesome to deal with.”

Mephiston said nothing. Although it couldn't be seen from the outside, in fact, he was a little stuck for a while. He took two seconds to collect his thoughts, and with a little embarrassment, he managed to squeeze out the next sentence that was more or less a repetition of his previous sentence: "I didn't expect you to know about this great device in advance."

Fujimaru Ritsuka is not a psyker, but even if she does not have psychic vision that can read emotions, Mephiston's current feelings are not difficult for her to guess: "Capture a star from the galaxy and take her Dragging her away from the orbit, compressing her to such a size, and stably restraining her, makes her power a tiny facility built by even smaller humans on a planet that is supposed to be much smaller than her. There is no doubt that this is the case. It is a great project and an excellent proof of human beings' ability to tame the power of nature. I believe that anyone will be shocked and amazed when they see such a facility for the first time - but be afraid of comparison in everything. This is far from the most outrageous thing the Emperor has ever done."

Even Mephiston was uncontrollably aroused by this sentence: "You mean, have you seen other great deeds created by the Emperor with his superhuman wisdom?"

"That is a well-known bio-alchemy project." Fujimaru Ritsuka replied, "'Primary Body Project'. It may be unbelievable to say, but this huge device in front of you and me is actually the original body. A small part of the prerequisite technology required for the plan: how to change some physical properties while retaining other physical properties in the real universe; how to organize and retain its projection and concept in subspace; how to stabilize How to collect and preserve a huge energy source; how to control the reaction rate and output power of this energy source; how to transform this energy between the material universe and subspace... To be honest, I read it again every time After an overview of these things, I felt that if someone told me that the emperor was indeed a god, I wouldn’t be able to believe it. If you ask me to copy these things, I won’t understand.”

(End of this chapter)