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

Chapter 218: Fateful Battle (VII)

Slaanesh looked down at the clouds of mist raised by his favorite over the battlefield. The sight of the Warp Power allowed him to easily brush off the influence of the etheric turbulence and the thunder caused by psychic energy, penetrate the forces that were of the same origin as himself without any obstacles, and see clearly what was happening on the distant Jerik.

Even today, He had to praise the Fire Thief's exquisite craftsmanship. If we only talk about the design of the Primarch, no matter which one, it is undoubtedly a near-perfect work of art in the eyes of Slaanesh. Of course, Fulgrim was the one who suited His temperament the most, so he became His favorite one, but subjective preference is one thing, and objective evaluation is another.

At this moment, He had to admit that the rotten corpse on the throne was also a perfect design for Ferrus Manus - otherwise, why could he hold on for so long when facing Fulgrim, whom He had blessed with his own hands?

Most of the weapons behind the Iron Hands Primarch were ineffective in the overly concentrated aether storm, and the remaining ones were unable to cause real damage due to the blessing of the gods. At present, the only weapon he could barely use was the flaming sword in his hand, at least it managed to leave a fleeting mark on the skin of the demon prince, which was shining like pearls and jade, but was tougher than any armor under the blessing of the power of the warp.

No matter who looked at him, he had no chance of winning, but he still hadn't given up. In Slaanesh's evaluation, Ferrus Manus undoubtedly seemed too rude and unromantic, but he still had to admit that the Fire Thief had done a good job with him.

That piece of bacon, who was equally unromantic, wanted a strong and excellent blade, a weapon that would always perform the tasks He needed it to perfectly, and everything else was secondary. Then, He did it, and Ferrus Manus was born. From this perspective, the Primarch of the Iron Hands is undoubtedly a perfect work.

But it was useless: even if he still didn't give up, no one could see that he couldn't win. Slaanesh thought so, and he knew that Fulgrim thought so too. The Lord of Pleasure leisurely savored the twisted pleasure surging in the heart of the prince he favored, and turned his head to mock the Lord of Change's previous madness -

——However, at that moment, the ripples of the Most High surrounding Him pushed a message closely related to Himself to Him:

He saw the unprotected Eldar Goddess, Isha, reappearing alone in the Warp.

-

What is awakened here is the breath of the stars—

Tzeentch's storms and spells were indeed effective. Even the Emperor sitting on the throne was unable to penetrate the heavy defenses on the battlefield at this moment, and naturally could not accurately project psychic energy to help.

But He was not aware of the existence of "Alaya", something similar but different from what the "Emperor" had been doing. Compared to some kind of self-aware "god" in the subspace, the inhibitory force that is a derivative of the "collective unconscious" and therefore "unconscious" is more like a natural phenomenon:

Wind will naturally form in places with pressure differences, and fog will appear in places with abundant water vapor, suitable temperatures, and condensation nuclei. Similarly, when a divine weapon fully develops its functions, it will also attract the attention of the restraining force.

——I will move forward side by side with mankind.

Under the dark clouds, between the thunderbolts that struck the ground continuously like a forest, huge chains sprang out rapidly like living things. Enkidu completely abandoned his clay doll appearance as a god, and showed the form that the gods who created him gave him at the beginning.

"The chains that can bind even the sky" have decided to once again set out on the path of being used by people with their own will.

A huge chain gleaming with golden light whizzed past Ferrus' head, blocking two psychic thunderbolts for him with its indestructible body. The power infused into it was not directly given by the Emperor, but came from the weak restraining force in this universe, but after being transformed into a divine weapon, it showed a very similar form and effect.

There was no conversation, no hint, but the two who were created as "weapons" by the creator naturally made clear the plan for the future at that moment. Therefore -

——People of the world, hope to chain the gods (Enuma Elish).

-

"You knew about this from the beginning?!" The exasperated Slaanesh questioned the Lord of Change beside him, "Or did Nurgle really not lie to us, and it was you who took away the Eldar's goddess of life while He was fighting the Cursed?"

He was still trying to get some information from Tzeentch, but he also knew that there was almost no possibility of getting the truth from this damn blue mollusk. Therefore, although the Lord of Pleasure was still talking to his older brother, he was also trying to withdraw from this battlefield and return to the vast ocean, chasing the pillar of divinity that attracted him from the depths of his soul.

If He in the Warp is aware of this, then Nurgle in the Warp will naturally be aware of this. The Lord of Pleasure does not think that the Lord of Plague, who has long regarded this goddess as his own forbidden fruit, will miss the opportunity to capture Him back to his garden. As an Eldar God, his instinct is urging Slaanesh to do it quickly.

"Do I know? Don't I know?" The crazy laughter of the Lord of Change pierced His mind annoyingly. "Did I do this? Maybe - but the root of the problem is not here, but: 'I', is it 'I'?"

"I don't have time to listen to your crazy talk! Can't you say something useful to the current situation?"

Under other more leisurely circumstances, Slaanesh might have been interested in guessing the meaning behind these words, but now, He obviously refused to waste his time and energy on puzzle-solving.

"What is 'useful' and what is 'useless'? You have to define this first!" Tzeentch, who obviously would not learn his lesson from a simple rebuke, continued to laugh wildly and said, "There are thousands of branches of fate. Your choice will determine which of them can continue to grow, which can linger, and which will wither immediately - which one will you choose?"

This obviously meant that the Supreme Eagle would not provide any help or obstruction to the Lord of Pleasure's next move. With the "long-lasting" friendship between gods that could not be measured by time even if they hated each other, Slaanesh knew that Tzeentch was now completely in a state of "watching for fun". Realizing this, the Lord of Pleasure quickly began to weigh the current situation:

First, it was his favorite toy. The play he presented was at its most crucial scene, and it would be a pity if he could not finish it, but for Slaanesh, he believed that the outcome of the play was already determined - even though there were many twists and turns in the process - wait, what was that?

He stared at the chains that suddenly appeared above the battlefield and studied them carefully. The chains seemed to grow out of the ground, but in an instant they seemed to reach the sky. They wrapped around the limbs of the demon prince as they rushed, forcing Fulgrim to stay fixed in place with a strange, conceptual power - that golden light -

"What is that?" Slaanesh asked Tzeentch beside him anxiously. It's not that he can't analyze the principle of that thing, but it will undoubtedly take a lot of time. Although time in the warp is just a toy that can be manipulated at will in the eyes of the Chaos Powers, if the possible enemy is another Chaos Power, it is still necessary to race against time.

Tzeentch glanced at the golden light on the battlefield, and several mouths in his ever-changing form began to mutter with interest. The Lord of Change did not answer the question, but the Lord of Pleasure could realize from his reaction that what was happening now had nothing to do with the Emperor - Tzeentch had spent a lot of effort to succeed in adding spells to the warp storm surrounding them to block all prying eyes, including the Emperor. Otherwise, he would definitely jump up and scream loudly.

He glanced back at the battlefield and quickly determined that although the power contained in those chains was superior in concept, they were obviously inferior in terms of the total energy compared to the blessing obtained by Fulgrim. Just as water can extinguish fire, but fire can also evaporate water, in the confrontation of mysticism, although compatibility has a great influence on victory or defeat, it is also unwise to talk about compatibility without considering the size.

It's just an ant trying to shake a tree, nothing to be afraid of. This is what Slaanesh thought at the moment. He was indeed very interested in this play, but under the premise that the ending was completely foreseeable, his desire to actually see the ending with his own eyes could never outweigh his desire to devour another Eldar god.

After a split second of weighing the pros and cons, he decisively gathered all his remaining strength together, and followed the gap in Tzeentch's spell to leave this space that was completely blocked by the Lord of Change - he wanted to achieve his goal in one go, and when it came to capturing Isa, he would never give Nurgle any chance to test him.

——However, he did not realize that the moment he left this space, in the spell created by Tzeentch, the "inside" and the "outside" were successfully connected for an instant.

Meow (six o'clock)

(End of this chapter)

Chapter 219: Fateful Battle (End)

In the storm of ether, Ferrus Manus was grabbing the chains with the mechanical arms behind him and climbing up with difficulty.

In theory, it shouldn't be that difficult for Ferrus to complete this action. But what was hindering him now was not only Fulgrim who kept trying to struggle in it, causing the chains to shake constantly, or the surroundings that seemed to never calm down, but also the chains themselves.

Perhaps this was not Enkidu's original intention, but when Ferrus touched him, or it, he immediately understood: the hazy golden light flickering on it was not the support from the Emperor that he was used to seeing in occasions such as the Webway War, but some other kind of energy output by the divine weapon after self-calculation, which would give him a slight burning sensation when it came into contact with it.

The nascent Suppression Force still seemed ignorant and mechanical at the moment, and its simple judgment method could not recognize that a Primarch who was established as a warp creature could also be classified as "human". However, since Enkidu's most important target was still Fulgrim, Ferrus Manus's "little action" was tacitly approved by the Suppression Force with the tacit consent of the God-made weapon itself, which dominated its current main function.

A slight burning sensation could not stop the Iron Hand Primarch from climbing up. Moreover, under the obstruction of the pair of "iron hands" covered with active metal, these minor pains were really not worth mentioning. Just like the strong wind around the chain and its own shaking, objectively speaking, they did hinder Ferrus's progress, but in fact, it was hard to say what effect this "obstruction" had.

In the myth, Perseus, with the help of the mirror shield given by the gods, cut off the head of the sleeping Gorgon with his sword.

Ferrus is now trying to cut off Fulgrim's head with the flaming sword in his hand with the help of the divine weapon "Chain of Heaven".

One does not need any profound knowledge of mysticism. Anyone with a little common sense to understand the reflections in the warp and know the related myths and legends can understand what Ferrus is trying to do and what results the corresponding attempts will lead to in the end.

Fulgrim himself, of course, knew it.

He did not intend to surrender and accept such a sudden turn of fate. Although he could not understand why the chain wrapped around him was so strong, he instinctively realized that it was not absolutely indestructible. As the favorite of the Lord of Pleasure, as long as he could use the psychic aura bestowed on him by the gods to corrupt and erode the thin golden aura on the chain, he could naturally escape - but that would take time.

Even with his larger size, his neck was only 20 to 30 meters from the ground. He needed time to escape, but Ferrus obviously would not give him that time.

Of course, a Primarch could not climb the chains as fast as he could on flat ground, but how much slower could he be?

"Don't think you will win if you keep going like this!" The Demon Prince spoke, trying to divert the opponent's attention and delay time.

His voice, which was at least light and graceful, inevitably became heavy and dull as he grew bigger. When this sound fell into his own ears, it was quite unbearable for the part of him that was still pursuing perfection even after his fall. However, the gradually approaching death was obviously more terrifying, so he had to endure his own "imperfect" voice and continued:

"Do you think you can kill me with the sword in your hand?" Fulgrim sneered. But even though he tried his best not to show his true emotions, Ferrus could still read his uneasiness from the details in his expression.

I don't know if this is because they were too familiar with it ten thousand years ago, or because the empty shell in front of them had lived too comfortably in the past ten thousand years, so that its originally effortless acting skills had deteriorated.

Ferrus was not troubled for long by this question which merely slipped through his mind without a trace, and as for the question he had been asked by his enemy before, it did not even succeed in disturbing his consciousness.

The Iron Hand Primarch continued to climb up in silence, and his lack of reaction made the Demon Prince feel unbearably anxious. This made the latter's expression more urgent, and he immediately wanted to continue to say something - and then, he realized that the Lord of Pleasure's eyes were no longer on him, relying on the ethereal, "intuitive", and almost inexplicable connection with his master that he had developed after receiving the gift.

This unconfirmed fact suddenly made him feel extremely terrified, as if a newborn child was thrown alone in a cruel world, helpless. His mind, twisted by Slaanesh, had forever lost the ability to perceive normal emotions, and the extreme feelings he had now, under the tampering of blessing, made him tremble and rejoice unconsciously.

The Daemon Prince's face once again showed an expression that was very different from Fulgrim's ten thousand years ago. Ferrus Manus took in all these changes, but still said nothing.

Seeing his best friend, who jokingly called him "Gorgon", fall to this state, Ferrus certainly couldn't remain calm. But he knew very well that now was not the time to be sentimental about these things.

Now, he had to prioritize ending it all himself.

He is the only one who can do this right now - and he is the only one who can put an end to this evil relationship that has lasted for thousands of years.

He was not sure how thorough this so-called "thoroughness" would be. To this day, Ferrus was still not completely sure whether this battlefield space, which was supposed to be on the surface of Jerick but was mixed with the High Heaven due to the tides in the Great Rift, belonged to "reality" or "warp" - or to put it bluntly, the result of "killing" Fulgrim here would be to exile him back to the Silver Palace of Slaanesh, or to let him have a clean and peaceful death.

But this "uncertainty" was not enough to stop him from continuing with his planned actions.

Everything would end here, or this "Fulgrim" before him could be reborn under Slaanesh and continue to wreak havoc in this corrupt and dissolute manner. No matter what, Ferrus Manus swore that he would end it all. Even if what he drew here today was just a rest, even if it took tens of thousands of years, he swore that he would catch up, and one day he would end the pain and suffering of his former friend with complete death.

This was his final response to Fulgrim's friendship, help, love, and betrayal after ten thousand years - to everything that had happened. The Purple Phoenix had called him "Gorgon", a monster that symbolized terror. A monster that symbolized terror could only give such a far from perfect solution when faced with such a complex problem.

In just a dozen seconds, Ferrus had already reached a suitable position. Fulgrim's distorted voice rumbled in his ears like thunder, but he didn't care at all what the other party was saying. He grabbed the chain with the two mechanical arms behind him, which were still considered strong, and barely stabilized his body in this position with no suitable foothold. He held the flaming sword with both hands and slashed at the target position he had chosen -

The sword wrapped in the eternal flame made a crisp metallic humming sound, and the demon prince's seemingly delicate and smooth neck seemed to be like the hardest adamantine gold that had been specially treated under the blessing of the power of the warp. Forged by Ferrus and given to Fulgrim, it was once carried by Fulgrim as his own sword for a long time. After experiencing the twists and turns of breaking and recasting, the flaming sword left only a white mark caused by the impact and a little bit of burnt black on his neck.

The Iron Hands Primarch was not very surprised by this, because he had seen similar results when the sword hit Fulgrim's arm, which was exposed outside the ostentatious decoration. The latter's sudden and confident laughter did not affect him, but then, while he was quickly thinking of a solution, he suddenly felt that he was being watched.

That gaze seemed to come from the distant horizon, yet it also seemed to be very close to him. He had long been familiar with the feeling of such a gaze falling on him over the past ten thousand years. Even someone like Ferrus, who was a little slow in emotional response, could easily read the clear sorrow and pain from that gaze.

He knew who that gaze came from, and he was also clearly aware that although the emotions contained in it did include "sorrow" and "pain", it did not include "opposition".

At that moment, Ferrus, who had an idea, swung the flaming sword in his hand again. In that moment, its blade inexplicably became wider and longer, and its shape also changed. The only thing that remained unchanged was that the blazing fire that never went out was still burning on its blade, and this time, when the fire touched the demon prince's neck, he screamed in pain.

Even Ferrus himself found it strange. At that moment, he didn't think about anything, but just let his wrist continue to move according to muscle memory. The long sword held in both hands this time smoothly cut through the part he wanted to cut like a hot knife cutting butter. Perhaps because of the flames on the sword, the blood gushing out from it was not as much as he had expected.

He did not expect that the final outcome of this matter would be so simple - at this moment, Ferrus Manus completely cut off Fulgrim's head with the "Sword of the Emperor".

He didn't even make any special effort.

Meow (peaceful)

(End of this chapter)

Chapter 220 A Night at the Museum (Part )

"These are the spatial coordinates that Fujimaru Ritsuka divined himself. I think it can't be wrong."

"But we can't tell anything except that this place is obviously heavily protected by an alien technology that we don't understand."

The Second Captain of the Emperor's Children, Akuldona, known as the "Eldest Son of Fulgrim", was hiding in a strange, mid-air anti-gravity vehicle, arguing quietly with Gary Bo Santo, the First Captain of the Iron Hands and the Commander of the "Morlocks" in the dim light.

"Besides, this is reality, and the curtain here is very solid," Santo continued.

Akurdona didn't know why the other party could know so many problems that he himself was not aware of at all at once. He could only attribute it to the blue-glowing mechanical eye of the Iron Hands' first captain being able to read the indications of some device that he didn't understand.

"I don't see what's wrong with this. After all, it's not our power to choose the battlefield."

"That's true, but don't you think about the follow-up support at all?"

There was even a hint of disappointment in Santo's voice:

"You'd better be aware of this: we are already creatures of the Warp! Although we have successfully confirmed that the coordinates from Fujimaru Ritsuka do point to 'a specific place' rather than pure void. But if this is in reality, even if the two of us use some Chaldean tricks to bypass the barrier of the curtain, once we leave the interior of this 'Prototype No. 1', we will soon be exiled back to the Warp due to the lack of energy to support our existence - not to mention calling your brothers to come together and deploy troops to meet the battle that is basically impossible to not exist in the future!"

Akuldona was silent for a moment, then continued, "Yes, of course. But look, isn't what we should do now still 'collect as much intelligence as possible without alerting the enemy'? There's no problem, right?"

"...I'll assume that you thought the same at the beginning." Santo sighed and reached out to operate the console in front of him.

The weird-looking "thing" they were riding on - the chassis looked like a Lander with anti-gravity components installed, but the chassis looked like a square cardboard box turned upside down on top... let's call it a "troop carrier" based on its function... The prototype of the vehicle was the first generation of imaginary submarines designed and manufactured by Da Vinci of Chaldea, the "Shadow Border".

Although Fujimaru Ritsuka did not have the bad habit of hoarding his own things and easily allowed all of them to study Chaldea's technology without causing damage, many of them involved completely different technological issues in another world. Even Ferrus himself found it difficult to replicate them all using technology that could be mass-produced in the empire without hindrance.

Not to mention the Cursed Iron Hands who are responsible for this special research.

For example, this prototype is ugly and lacks functionality. It looks like a vehicle shell that only a person with a brain is capable of designing. Of course, no one really wants to design it this way. But considering that the main function of this thing should be imaginary diving, and the theory of self-conversion between the imaginary and real domains requires a lot of computing power, the more irregular the outer surface, the more computing power is required. After the Empire banned the purely mechanical abomination intelligence, it is difficult to maintain the operation of related functions with wetware alone...

The Storm's Edge can do this easily because it has a supercomputer like Trismegistus, whose computing power and performance far exceed the average level of the Empire. The Cursed Iron Hand does not have such a good thing. At present, it is already the limit to let the Thinker array on this car be regarded as a Lander chassis with a cardboard box.

All in all, this is a tragic design error caused by having to desperately try to be backwards compatible. But anyway, this is just a prototype, and sooner or later they will find a way to solve the problem of not being able to install turrets or external machine guns.

If you want to put it into actual combat, you cannot do without insufficient firepower.

The Prototype No. 1, which was specially modified for stealth for this mission, slid silently through the darkness. The data captured and sent back by the auspicious instrument from all around was directly displayed on the console screen in a rather primitive way. Santo obviously had no difficulty reading the data, but Akurdona felt dizzy after reading it for a while, so he simply turned to the bulkhead, opened the light-shielding cover beside him, and tried to confirm the scene outside with his naked eyes.

This was a very dim, but not too dim environment. Akuldona's first impression was that it was very quiet and peaceful here - but then, a hideous face of an obvious Ork greenskin slipped past the observation window as the anti-gravity vehicle moved, causing him to reflexively grasp the hilt of his sword.

"Don't be too startled." Santo said without looking up while staring at the data on the console, "The auspex shows that there are no living things here, but there are stasis fields everywhere. I planned the route carefully and made sure that this 'thing' would not cause any alarm in the process. No matter what you see, remember, they will not move."

Acourdona responded by mercilessly kicking Santo's leg, which had long been replaced with a mechanical structure, and silently asking him to look out through the observation window as well.

Santo rolled his eyes at the other man with his one eye that could still express emotion, and only after confirming that the vehicle's route planning was correct did he open the observation window on his side.

He had clearly known from the data sent back by the auspicious instrument that there were quite a lot of large-scale stasis fields around them. Although he didn't know why, logically speaking, the reason why the stasis fields were turned on was to lock something in them. Therefore, when looking out the window, Santo was mentally prepared to see something "amazing" - but he didn't expect that what he saw would be... so amazing.

What is trapped in those stasis fields is not "something" but "somethings". Regardless of the fact that the scale of these stasis fields is shocking, whether it is intuitive or not, or how many obviously different individuals are "stagnant" in them, or in what state these individuals are trapped in the stasis fields -

"*Medusa swears*." Santo muttered unconsciously, "That greenskin is really big!"

In front of them - if only from the visual information - there is no doubt that it is a battlefield. Many Eldar warriors wearing different kinds of armor are charging towards the Orks who are almost the same in number. Behind them are the Eldar's light and agile vehicles and green stolen cars with billowing black smoke. No matter who looks in this direction, the first thing they notice is the huge Warboss surrounded by the Orcs.

—That thing was even bigger than the biggest Dr. Wow that Santo had ever seen on Ullanor.

Then, if you look closely, you will find that there is more: the green-skinned guys surrounding Dr. Wow are larger in average size than those Santo and Akuldona knew. And those Eldars - the two Cursed Space Marines present are obviously not experts in aliens, but the soldiers' natural sensitivity to the enemy's equipment also makes them realize that these Eldars are also significantly different from those they have fought before.

They didn't want to think about what would happen around them if these things were not locked in the stasis field, but were free to fight here. Greenskins are a very easy-to-understand alien, and their strength is often directly linked to their size. In this case, the Eldar who can fight these huge greenskins head-on are obviously not ordinary people. Perhaps the intensity of this battle will be far higher than the two Astartes of the Great Crusade knew about these two aliens. But the most important thing is——

——What is it that can cut off the entire battlefield where the aliens are fighting each other in full swing, and lock it in a stasis field alive like sealing a bug in amber?

Prototype No. 1 continued to move forward in silence along the route planned by Santo, and the man who planned all this retreated from the observation window to the driver's seat and sighed again:

"So I hate divination, which carries a lot of uncertainty... What on earth is the coordinates that Fujimaru Ritsuka calculated?!"

Meow (six o'clock)

You all guessed it anyway...

Eyes moving whistle.jpg

(End of this chapter)