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

Chapter 304: The Name is "Frame" (Part )
Techniques were of little use at this point. The clone realized this almost immediately.

He was a near-perfect copy of Fulgrim, possessing the same precise skills and graceful and deadly swordsmanship as the Purple Phoenix, but he still made such a judgment after two moments of close combat with the opponent. Skills are indeed useful. The right skills can help a person easily defeat another mindless brute who is far stronger than himself. Perhaps when facing a furious Rogal Dorn, the skills mastered by the clone should at least not cause him to be defeated so quickly - this is by no means "useless", but he still made such a judgment.

The clone stepped back to get out of the opponent's attack range, and took advantage of this short gap of less than half a second to think quickly:

The conclusion was that he could not achieve victory gracefully from Dorn in his current state without causing any harm.

Admittedly, he was in a relatively advantageous position in the current situation of both parties: the clone did not have anything except the broken sword in his hand and the determination to win, but in comparison, Dorn lacked more. With just one encounter, he clearly realized that the Dorn in front of him was not only withered and old, with one hand missing, but also far inferior to the "Rogal Dorn" who did not belong to his memory in terms of reaction and strength. Although the power armor on the other party looked real, and was different from the ceremonial armor on his body, it was already in tatters, leaving no doubt that its function had almost completely stopped.

Even so, Dorn still had something that the clone didn't have: a rage that came from nowhere. It was this rage that prevented them from resolving the issue peacefully.

"Traitor!" he accused as he pursued him. "Fallen! A disgrace to the Emperor's children!"

Apart from that, he had no more words. He threw a jab straight at the clone's face, but the latter dodged it swiftly. The terrifying punch was like a high-pressure air knife cutting the clone's face, but he didn't care about it at all. He seized the opportunity in an instant and clamped Dorn's punching hand, trying to break the opponent's center of gravity while wrestling carefully, so that he could fall to the ground.

"I'm not--" At the same time, the clone wanted to refute, but he didn't succeed in finishing the sentence. The moment he successfully clamped Dorn's arm with his left hand, he realized that he had made a mistake. He might have had experience fighting similar opponents in those memories that belonged to him or not, but to be honest, this was indeed the first time in his life that he had fought against an opponent of the same level like this.

Dorne now only had one hand, and the "simple weapon" on his other hand, which was tied with a piece of rag from nowhere, was easily cut off by the broken sword and lost control. His reaction speed also decreased slightly, but he was still a Primarch. At the moment when his only intact hand was controlled, Dorne did not need to think about what he should do next - all Primarchs were created for the purpose of war machines, and when dealing with this level of temptation, they only needed to rely on instinct.

At that moment, Dorn took a step forward in the direction of the clone's lead. He did lose a hand somehow, but the distance was close enough to make his opponent feel threatened. The clone had enough combat intelligence to predict the opponent's next move, so he intended to retreat, but his retreat only gave his opponent more opportunities.

Dorn's attack was like a violent storm, with no rules but hard to find flaws. In the next twenty seconds of attack and defense, although the clone was not successfully hit, he did not gain any advantage. Instead, he retreated step by step, and gradually accumulated a small disadvantage for himself without knowing it. Logically speaking, he should have had the advantage - maybe he was just a copy made according to Fulgrim, maybe he could not compare with the Emperor's real creation in some aspects, but he was still the younger, more complete person, and even had a weapon that was better than nothing.

He just didn't want to use his full strength, as that would make him look bad. Besides, this matter didn't need to be resolved by force, and a proper conversation should have allowed both sides to call it a day. He was Fulgrim, and he should be able to do this easily and gracefully - he had to do this easily and gracefully, because that was what "Fulgrim" should do.

The Primarch of the Imperial Fists had very simple thoughts. He was unscrupulously venting his anger in the wilderness. Dorn ignored the "Fulgrim" who tried to defend himself several times. His shabby power armor roared heavily as he moved, making incoherent wails. If the clone was to make a comment, with the knowledge that a master forger should have, he did not think that thing could provide any assistance to the other party. Dorn might have been forced to drag the huge weight of his ineffective dusty golden armor to fight against him, and the reason why he refused to give up these burdens was undoubtedly the eagle emblem carved on his chest, which was still shining under the earth-gray cloak.

This moved the clone for a moment, but the oncoming fist did not allow him to divide his attention on these things. He had to admit that even the power armor that could only be a burden in action was still useful to Dorn: his broken sword successfully cut the inside of the opponent's arm three times in these twenty seconds, and unfortunately found that the protective power of the adamantium was still there, and in the last failed attempt to attack the elbow, the broken sword was broken again to the point of being useless.

The clone dropped the scrap metal in his hand and had to try to fight a Primarch with his bare hands. He knew what to do. He had a lot of knowledge and experience in hand-to-hand combat, ranging from the relatively gentle to the insidious. The memories that lingered in his mind told him that Fulgrim had fought similar battles with his brother more than once during the years of the Great Crusade, most often with Ferrus Manus, but also with others. Due to other distractions, he was unable to immediately successfully find out from his memory whether Fulgrim had "practiced" in this way with Dorn in the past, nor could he recall any previous examples that could be used as reference. The combat instinct engraved in his genes told him to fight back immediately and not "give in" like this, but he still had doubts - could he really not end this unnecessary fight gracefully and decently?
"Listen to me, Dorn - you have to -" Another swinging punch interrupted the clone's attempt to communicate. This made him a little angry: why didn't he have the impression that the Primarch of the Imperial Fists was a boxing expert in his memory? He finally couldn't help but hold the opponent's arm and forcefully pinned the only remaining good elbow outward to control the opponent's actions: "Listen to me! I'm not who you think I am!"

He was sure that the other party heard him, but Dorn just turned a deaf ear to him. The only reaction of the Primarch of the Imperial Fists to this declaration was no reaction - he approached the other party, trying to relieve the force, and at the same time tried to "punch" the opponent's face with the remaining limbs of the broken hand. For a moment, the clone was not sure whether he had forgotten that his hand was broken or he really intended to do so, but in any case, he still followed his instinct to make an evasive move. In that fast and slow moment, he clearly saw the ugly scars on Rogal Dorn's missing limbs. This made him realize instinctively that this wound had not received the proper medical care after it was inflicted. The reason why this old giant can still live until now is all due to the Primarch's natural strong recovery ability. And obviously, at this moment, he still holds the same view on his own wound: no need to care.

The clone was sure that he had turned his body to a dangerous angle, and Rogal Dorn could not have failed to realize that this angle was dangerous - but he still had no intention of retreating. The limb that was originally rushing towards the opponent's face turned into a winged accessory on the opponent's shoulder armor after this dangerous sideways movement. Although the thin layer of metal on the surface could not be compared with the original body that had been tempered by thousands of hammers, it was only possible under the correct method of force application and operation. The clone was very sure that if Dorn just hit the half of his arm without armor protection like this, he would definitely be injured. The clone had predicted that his opponent would change his tactics, giving him a slight chance to dodge. But in reality, Dorn's severed limb fearlessly collided with the decoration on his shoulder armor. The metal piece with the wing-embossed carving cut through his skin that had healed the hyperplastic tissue, got stuck in the bone with a clang, and was violently torn off the clone's armor with a teeth-grinding sound - still rushing towards his head and face.

This shocked the clone. He had to let go of the opponent's arm to dodge because of this unexpected move, but then he found that it was his turn to be controlled by the opponent. Dorn's good hand was tightly clamped on the clone's arm like a hydraulic clamp. The latter could even feel the decorative armor deforming and cracking on his skin inch by inch. But this was not the point - he barely managed to lower himself while being caught, and at the cost of losing a more advantageous posture, he avoided the "elbow attack" with a broken blade, and then gave up the attack, and reluctantly grabbed Dorn's broken arm with his temporarily free other hand:

"You have to listen to me! Dorn! We don't need to fight to the death like this!" The clone was holding back his anger and yelled at his angry opponent, "You have the wrong person - I am not the 'Fulgrim' you think! I am sure that I am loyal to the Empire and hate Chaos. I will never go along with the Warp -"

"You're lying!" Dorn's ferocious roar seemed to be able to collapse mountains and destroy peaks. The thunderous roar resounded in the clone's ears, making him almost deaf for a moment. "You have betrayed me long ago, Fulgrim! Don't think you can deceive me with the illusions you create with evil magic!"

The clone interpreted the second half of his sentence through lip reading. But in fact, this was also difficult, because Dorn's expression at the moment looked particularly ferocious, as if he wanted to eat him alive. The clone felt a considerable pressure on the arm that Dorn had grabbed. He had no doubt that in a few seconds, the hand would be torn off his body along with the arm armor that was completely useless. The instinctive desire to survive and the anger caused by the opponent's intransigence made the clone give up his original principles a little. While bullying, he misplaced his steps and pinned the opponent's legs and feet at an angle that was inconvenient to apply force.

——Then he leaned down slightly, and the shoulder armor, whose decoration had just been broken off and whose broken edge was still fresh and sharp, hit the opponent's chest armor. After a sharp and piercing sound, the clone successfully used an inefficient variation of wrestling techniques in a rather awkward posture and in a desperate situation to successfully throw Rog Dorn to the ground.

The heavy body of the original body fell sideways on the wilderness with a loud noise. The smoke and dust floating on the ground choked the clone's eyes, ears, mouth and nose, but he did not make any defensive reflex movements. Dorn's power armor made a sharper and more ominous cry after changing its posture. It tried its best to help its master stand up again, but the power it could provide could not even completely offset its own weight. The clone was still the first to regain its posture. The latter tried to quickly clip Dorn's good hand back, which was almost impossible under the influence of the opponent's still huge shoulder armor, but the clone knew what to do.

He reached out, trying to get the decorative metal piece stuck in Dorn's broken arm bone. His knowledge told him that with a decent tool, he could free Dorn's hand from the rubbish that bound him. But before he could do that, Dorn's good hand had already escaped from his grip, and with a roar, he was hit by a real elbow in the chest.

The violent vibration of the rib plate was transmitted to his internal organs, and the clone fell backwards uncontrollably due to the impact. There was pain, and the clone could tell that he had suffered some internal injuries. A bloody smell rushed up his throat and into his mouth, and almost instantly solidified into a sticky blood scab in his mouth. He was caught off guard and failed to recover, but he still rolled on the ground in a dusty state before getting up again - fortunately, because of the weight of the power armor, Dorn got up much slower than him, so he didn't have time to pursue the victory.

The confrontation between the two returned to the starting point.

"If you are not Fulgrim, then what are you?" Dorn, who was reluctant to speak during the battle, questioned the clone during this break. "I am Rogal Dorn, the Guardian of Terra. I serve my father, the Emperor. I will eliminate all betrayal and pollution in the universe. Who are you? Who do you serve? Why are you standing here?!"

The clone opened its mouth, but ended up just spitting out a mouthful of blood scabs from its ruptured internal organs.

He suddenly realized that if he denied the name "Fulgrim", he would not be able to answer this question.

(End of this chapter)