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

Chapter 365: Unable to Reach Consensus

"No, I won't agree to it." Akurdona said in a thunderous voice, "Obviously, we didn't agree on the 'most important part', so I won't hold the corresponding ceremony on this side of reality!"

Obviously, he has run out of words to argue with, but he is determined not to change. But under such circumstances, this firm attitude will only make him look like he is being unreasonable and childish.

He was now in the underground prison section of the Hera Fortress, an area that was originally used to detain psychic prisoners and was specially reinforced in the corresponding field. The surrounding equipment made of black stone did make him feel uncomfortable, but it did not have a visible impact on his actions.

As a son of the Emperor, even if he is a loyalist, Akuldona's existence is obviously not suitable to be made public. At least that's what Varro Diglis, the director of the Ultramarines think tank who currently manages all matters of the Hera Fortress, thinks - but this does not mean that Akuldona must endure the treatment of a prisoner. The Ultramarines' hospitality is indeed very different from what the Emperor's children are used to, and this difference does not affect the emotional color expressed by various treatments. So, Akuldona is certainly not imprisoned here, he is here now just to make a psychic connection.

Since it was a "psychic" contact, it was obviously unlikely that Akuldona stayed in this room by himself. Also here were two of Digris's attendants, one was the Astartes Think Tank Recorder, and the other was a mortal scribe: the Think Tank was responsible for activating the newly installed devices in this room, while the scribe who was writing furiously behind the various devices installed on his body was not responsible for recording what Akuldona said to the other side, this kind of chores was done by the servo skull floating in the sky. The scribe's real task was to record the various data generated during the operation of the entire "device".

This so-called "device" was a so-called "spirit communicator" applied for and built by Gabriel Santo after the group arrived at the gene seed bank on the Macragge satellite and was detained by Digris without explanation (of course, considering the heavyweight members in the team, the actual operation was much more gentle). Of course, the specific principles were naturally copied from the water mirror magic circle in the summoning room of the Storm Edge, but after leaving the unique ship environment of Chaldea and all parts were imperialized, the size of the entire device was forced to be enlarged a lot:
The device used by Fujimaru Ritsuka was only the size of a desk, and even most of the volume under the desk was not of practical significance, it was just raised for the convenience of operation. But the communicator that Santo had built by the Mechanicus men in the basement of Hera Fortress, the ring-shaped part of the spirit particle extraction and accelerator alone occupied more than 60 square meters of space.

On the Storm's Edge, the corresponding functions were integrated into the hull. But even if someone allowed Santo to build a large-scale project and imitated the Storm's Edge, and hid this part of the ring-shaped device in the wall, the part responsible for constructing the rune magic circle, performing the descent and decoding the spirit son signal for communication transmission, would still be more than three meters high.

Santo was frustrated, which meant that the technology tree of Storm's Edge from the year 2000 had indeed surpassed the Empire in terms of miniaturization and integration. It was not that the various parts of the parts could not be made that small in the Empire, but because the Empire had never had such extreme design requirements in this regard, it had never pursued reducing the size during the production process. This was also one aspect of the rigidity of the design caused by the Om Messianic faith: rather than letting the sacred machinery adapt to humans, the Mechanicus was more inclined to transform humans into machines: What? This gun weighs 60 kilograms and the Skitarii can't lift it? No problem, just add an auxiliary mechanical arm to their waists. What? This continuous load will compress the lumbar spine and increase the depreciation rate of the Skitarii? The sages who still had some humanitarian ideas might consider whether to replace the Skitarii's lumbar spine with ceramic steel, but the more common practice was that the sages, after some precise and accurate calculations, slightly increased the order quantity of the mechanical wombs that produced the Skitarii's bodies.

According to this idea, the more common practice in the Empire should obviously be to add some steps to the side of the three-meter-high main operating table so that the operator can climb up. But after seeing the various designs on the Storm Boundary, Santo began to feel that he could not tolerate this: he chose to violate the ancestral law without hesitation in this part, and put the rune magic circle and the water mirror on a liftable suspended gravity orientation device - the operating interface that was originally supposed to "lie flat" on the desktop was erected and placed on the side of the device through redundant wiring.

Then, the result of this "innovation" made Santo even more frustrated: the extra suspended gravity orientation device was not a high-tech device in anyone's eyes, at most it was a semi-finished anti-gravity engine. But it was this thing that made the energy consumption of the entire mechanism 43.70% higher than the original design, and 67.52% higher than the original version made by Fujimaru Ritsuka in the summoning room of Storm Edge.

——This indirectly shows that the overall energy consumption of the entire device during operation is actually very small. Putting a low-end civilian controlled fusion reactor inside is enough to keep it running non-stop for three or four thousand years. That is why most people cannot understand Santo's collapse. They would think: with such a small amount of energy and space, real-time communication can be connected from Macragge to the bottom of Terra's Astronomical Torch (although this version can only talk to the "dead" in the subspace), how much more is needed? This is undoubtedly an epoch-making (convinced) invention (doubtful). Compared with reducing energy consumption and volume, others will of course give priority to suggesting that Santo iterate a version that can be used by living people.

In response, Santo just said in anger, "The Primarch has also seen the final form of this mechanism, he will definitely understand me", and then turned away, beeping in binary code to the Mechanicus personnel stationed on Macragge. So, now in this sufficiently secret underground room, facing this rather large device and the person being communicated with on the other side of the water mirror magic, the only one left was Akuldona.

"I also realize this. We may not be able to reach an agreement on this matter in a short period of time." The man opposite the water mirror - also a Cursed Loyalist Emperor's Child in gorgeous armor - tried to calm his tone under the raging anger, and his beautiful low voice trembled slightly. "In any case, this is clear blasphemy."

"I've never denied it, but the reality is - Tarvitz, the reality is that it has already happened, and Fabius Bile has already created him. This is not a problem that can be easily solved by a power sword or a flamethrower -"

"——Considering that your current location is very safe, I suggest, sir, that you come back and we meet face to face——"

The Emperor's son in the water mirror had not finished his words. A strong, electronic noise suddenly broke into the communication. The overly strong emotions, or obsessions, in it made the think tank responsible for maintaining the psychic structure of the device pale:
"—kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him kill him—"

"Shut up!" Akuldona roared on the other end of the communication. "You should know that I call you 'Ceremony Elder' because I pity you for still squatting in Dauntless! Otherwise, you are just a bastard boy with a mysophobia and extreme fussiness! If you keep going like this, I will tear you apart into a sarcophagus when I get back!"

The number of Dreadnoughts in the Bound Legion is extremely small - this is also easy to understand. Their bodies have all perished, leaving only their souls. No matter how broken their abandoned bodies are, they will naturally return to their own limbs after returning to the Golden Throne, and thus leave the Dreadnought. But the Warp is very idealistic after all, and the image of the person after death seems to have a strong relationship with their own self-cognition: for example, most of the Iron Hands Astartes who believe in "flesh and blood are weak" have retained their mechanical modifications; for example, Rilano, who had obviously been waiting alone in the Dreadnought for thousands of years before his death and was almost crazy after being locked up, still felt that he was in the Dreadnought after his death.

Because of this story, Akuldona, like other loyal Emperor's children, would show great tolerance for the occasional madness of the "Ceremony Elder" in most cases. But not now. Rationally, he might understand the other party's need to express his opinions in such a way regardless of the occasion - sorry, he really can't find a more appropriate adjective - "barking", but in fact, Akuldona is not rational now:
"Don't just casually extend your hatred for Fulgrim to him!" The eldest son of the Phoenix roared at Shui Jing with almost the same degree of anger, "Those things in the past have nothing to do with him-"

——There was a crackling sound of electricity, and the picture on the water mirror, which had become chaotic due to the invasion of another psychic individual, shook noticeably and went out. The Primaris Librarian of the Ultramarines next to him raised his hand steadily and admitted his mistake: "My mistake. After the environmental load became chaotic, I failed to grasp the specific output of the psychic link. Do you want to relink it immediately?" After a sudden jam due to personnel and equipment problems, the anger that suddenly surged in Akuldona's body quickly withered due to the sudden lack of the target object, turning into an obvious frustration. He was silent for two seconds, and then replied: "No, thank you, cousin... I think that's it for today. Santo has enough data from these trial runs. Maybe we should mention it to him to make the channel redundancy of psychic channels greater."

"Thank you for your suggestion. I will write it down on the form and submit it. But now, I have to take advantage of the idle time to check whether the machine is damaged due to the interruption of communication." The think tank said calmly, as if nothing had happened before, and said goodbye to Akuldona in a normal manner, silently watching the purple and gold overlapping figure leave the room that became cramped due to the existence of the communication device. Then, he turned his head and met the inquiring eyes of the scribe beside him.

“I should probably write that down, but I think you did it on purpose,” said the scribe, whose voice, coming from a synthesizer near her throat, sounded like a woman, but whose gender was actually difficult to discern from her appearance. “So, do you really want to include this suggestion on the list of things to be revised?”

"No need, I did it on purpose." Think Tank admitted, "I've seen this happen many times - looking at their expressions, I know they won't be able to discuss anything today, so why not temporarily stop and let both sides calm down."
-
Akuldona walked out of the cramped and dreary room, took off his helmet, and sighed in the not-so-clear air in the underground corridor. He wanted to stay there for a while, but when his long hair tied into a warrior braid slipped from his neck due to gravity, the eldest son of the Phoenix straightened his back and looked towards the corner of the corridor with a clear goal.

The clone Fulgrim appeared silently, silent, without saying a word, but his eyes were clearly focused on Akuldona. He had taken off the ridiculous and tattered ceremonial armor that was useless except for its beauty, and put on a toga provided by the Ultramarines in the size of the Primarch. Ultramarine was a bright color favored by both the Macragge and the Ultramarines, but it looked too plain and simple against the noble and exquisite appearance of the person in question, just like the uncorrupted Fulgrim himself, and it looked a little gray. However, when anyone recognizes this, they will also recognize another fact at the same time: it is the clothes that are the problem, not the person. The clone, like Fulgrim himself, still looks radiant in such a simple outfit that lacks ornaments and complex details and can only be called "conventional".

But he remained silent - it was Akurdona who spoke first:

"Everything is fine." He tried to gloss over the situation: "It was just a normal report and intelligence communication. Nothing special happened."

"But I heard you yelling," the clone pointed out calmly, "You wouldn't be that angry if 'nothing special happened'."

Akurdona seemed to want to frown, but the clone added: "Don't blame the building's sound insulation. Everything is normal. It's just that - these can't block my senses."

The silence lasted for a short while, and then Akuldona suddenly changed the subject: "Indeed, due to various reasons, most people in the empire cannot make an objective and fair evaluation of you, but there will always be calm and rational people who will speak for you, sir, such as-"

"--I told you not to call me 'My Lord.'" The clone's calm voice seemed to reveal a hint of sadness. "I am not the 'Fulgrim' you know. I thought we had made that clear last time."

"but--"

"Akuldona, do you realize that your judgment of me is obviously not 'objective and fair'?" The clone asked back, "I am very grateful that I met you who is willing to love me among countless people who hate me, but isn't your love, like the hatred of others, derived from empathy for my face?"

Akurdona was completely choked. He couldn't deny it, and could only stand there in the corridor like a dumb sculpture. If he had a sharper mind, he might have come up with some brilliant sophistry to refute this point of view. But unfortunately - his respect and admiration for the clone in front of him were indeed mostly transferred from the genetic father in his memory. He really couldn't convince himself to ignore these, whether it was the facts themselves or his attitude.

"You don't have to spend your time on these things related to me." There was a hint of bitterness in the clone's tone. "If this is my fate, I should certainly face it alone. Wait until a week later, when the Lord of the Ultramarines returns to the fortress, everything will be settled. If you really want to do something for me, Akuldona, then go to the superstructure and see what Dorn is doing for me."

Akurdona opened his mouth like a dying fish thrown onto the shore, but no sound came out.

——The reason why the eldest son of Phoenix lingered in the structure of the underground prison of Hera Fortress for a long time, and even why he first strongly requested Santo to build the spirit particle communication device in the room of the underground prison that was temporarily vacated and renovated, was essentially based on this:

Clone Fulgrim is currently being held under house arrest in this area, under the control of the Ultramarines.

(End of this chapter)