Warhammer: In the Name of Ashes

Bad news always travels faster than the wind.

About a month later, Calvin had the opportunity to understand the true meaning of this letter through the internal reference data of the Star Language Court.

Mariachi, this ship is where Calvin's life began in some sense.

Not long after the new tithe collection journey began, they encountered a storm from the subspace at the edge of the Storm Star Domain.

And following the storm, there was an entire fleet of interstellar pirates.

In the fierce gang-hopping battle, more than 85% of the crew members of the Mariachi were lost.

The Sisters of Silence's team headed by Lady were interrupted by Chaos Space Marines who broke through the wall from the flank during their decapitation battle against the opposing wizard.

The lady and the nuns under her command all returned to the throne. Only Cassin survived because he was seriously injured and comatose and could not participate in the operation.

All Marines were killed.

All members of the ship's command staff, starting from the captain, were killed.

The weapons crew, including the gunnery sergeant, was all killed.

The Astropath and Navigator team were all killed, and she was the first to die.

The Astropaths foresaw the brutality of this battle before the critical moment arrived.

She sacrificed herself and forcibly sent the message for help to the nearest star sector defense fortress and the interstellar communication public channel in the subspace storm.

In the hope that any possible troops will come to the rescue.

The price is her soul. This thin lady, who had been silent for many years, tried her best to send out messages for help.

The soul that lost the last bit of spiritual protection was completely exposed to the greedy subspace, and was immediately torn apart by the demons that came up.

But her efforts were not wasted.

At the most critical moment of the battle, there was only sporadic resistance on the bridge of the entire ship. The engine power had been completely lost. The entire ship had been captured by the pirates' gravity claws and was about to be towed to the pirate base in the asteroid belt.

A company of Astartes, which had been patrolling the sector and receiving a call for help, finally arrived.

Under the strong support of this new force and the threat that the regional fleet may arrive at any time.

The pirates gave up their original goal of capturing the entire Mariachi and gradually retreated from the ship.

After this battle, less than 10,000 of the entire Mariachi crew, including the mechanical slaves on the lower deck, survived.

This kind of battle may be too brutal in our eyes, but it is inconspicuous in the empire's war-torn territory.

To some members of the High Lords Council, the empire's ruling body, he could even represent the departure of a familiar name.

In the eyes of the unrelated Ministry of Interior, this can only be a series of cold numbers.

But it is different for Calvin. In a sense, this spaceship, which he only lived in for a month, is his hometown in this life.

The deaths of those who represented his first acquaintances in this world had a huge impact on Calvin.

He was finally no longer like a paper boat drifting in the long river of destiny, only drifting with the current.

Calvin began to have a desire to get involved in this world. He hoped to understand the consciousness of those old people who sacrificed their lives when they fought to the last moment.

So outside of training, Calvin had a new activity place - the library.

Unlike most people, his purpose was not books containing psychic knowledge.

What he wanted to know was the history and culture of this empire. He wanted to understand the past and present of the country in which he lived.

Calvin no longer wanted to follow the crowd, he wanted to take the initiative to learn something he didn't know.

If possible, he wanted to continue to live with honor as a soldier, so he needed a reason.

Reason, this is the first lesson he was taught as a soldier in his previous life, and it is also the motivation for him to fight for it all his life:

"Why do we fight?"

The literature and history section of the library is sparsely visited. Probably because the young people here always pursue power too utilitarianally.

There are not many signs of borrowing the books here. Many books have been placed here and no one cares about them anymore.

There were only two people in the quiet bookshelf and lending area.

Besides Calvin, another borrower was sitting in the middle of the borrowing area.

What Calvin didn't know was that he was able to come here and browse these books without restraint, which were not accessible to his confidentiality level, all because of this stranger who was reading quietly in front of him.

In the dim candlelight, his body, which was taller than Calvin, stood as motionless as a sculpture.

Only the servo skull floating next to it occasionally makes a little sound when turning pages.

This is a tall, silver-haired old man wearing a simple gray robe. His angular appearance is hidden in the hood of his jumpsuit.

He always reads quietly by candlelight alone, but the feeling of reading is different from other people's thirst for knowledge.

When the old man sat among the piles of books written on the history of the empire and read quietly, a strange feeling made him become one with his surroundings.

It was as if he himself was part of that heavy history.

This is probably a person full of stories. Calvin thought when he was occasionally distracted.

The footprints of Calvin, who has been reading and storing books for a long time, are all over the bookshelves and reading areas.

Perhaps there were too many passing opportunities, so the old man occasionally raised his head and touched Calvin's eyes, and occasionally nodded politely.

But most of the time, the old man just sits there, quietly as if he has been here since ancient times.

And Calvin himself slowly let go of his inner impetuousness while reading, and began to surrender to the charm of this ancient empire that was growing full of disasters and suffering.

When an empire composed of a single race lasts for thousands of years despite many hardships, its history is not just a record of a civilization.

It is a history of development, a history of war, and a history of survival.

When the text carrier of Chronicles was unfolded in front of Calvin like a scroll, there was no doubt that he was conquered.

For the first time, he knew that there were so many alien species and disasters in this universe. There had been so many civilizations and wars within the scope of the Milky Way alone, and humans just wanted to survive. difficult.

In the history that lasts for thousands of years, there are too many heroes who burned themselves and dedicated themselves for the survival and continuation of this race and this empire.

There are also too many tragedies recorded in the same indifferent words in documents that no one cares about.

In the process of reading, I learned that the old and feudal management methods of the empire made Calvin despise it.

But the same or even worse environment made Calvin know that it was not that his predecessors were devoid of wisdom. This was just a last resort compromise with survival and continuation as the primary purpose.

Billions of people, life and death are up to him. From the perspective of an onlooker, the history of the empire is both magnificent and ruthless.

Among them, the biography of the emperor himself fascinated Calvin the most.

Calvin was a soldier, and he could understand the Emperor's contribution to the Empire; Calvin was just a soldier, and he couldn't understand how the Emperor could be so selfless.

To dedicate his life to the country and nation he loves is the limit that Calvin can achieve.

But completely abandon yourself, without any personal feelings. Even according to records, many of the decrees that came from the emperor himself could be seen through and followed in the eyes of Calvin, who had undergone nine years of compulsory education.

Any empire must have its military force as the center of power during its period of expansion. This is an iron rule.

When the country transitions into a maintenance period, the transfer of power centered on the civil service system is also the general trend.

But what if the ruler of this empire did not want to shed too much blood in the cruel transfer of power.

Then there must be someone who can stabilize those meritorious nobles: he must be strong enough, charming enough, have a broad enough vision, and even must have the consciousness that he is destined to sacrifice himself.

And the cruel thing is: this person cannot be the master himself.

Such a person is not only his closest comrade-in-arms, but also the eldest son who is most like himself and whom he loves most.

Delivering the altar called right with his own hands and watching his doomed death in painful struggle.

Whatever the outcome, it was far beyond Calvin's understanding.

He couldn't help but fall into thinking, is the Emperor inhumane? Or does the Emperor not understand human nature?

No, when he gets along with his beloved children, the affection he shows does not seem to be fake.

So if the Emperor has humanity, what explains such behavior? Doesn't he love his children?

No, of course he loves his children, but he loves this country and this race even more.

Calvin asked himself, putting himself in his shoes, could he do it?

He may sacrifice himself without hesitation, but what about his children? Where are your relatives?

Can you convince yourself to put them on the altar with your own hands? Just for this empire composed of countless humans? What about himself?

The answer is of course no, he can't do it.

These things, just seeing the brief written records, already made Calvin feel heavy.

So in the eyes of the emperor, how did he view these unavoidable problems?

Calvin frowned, lowered his head to think, and hurriedly put down the books in his hands, preparing to walk out of the library.

After all, a restaurant that is only open for a limited time would not understand Calvin’s sorrow for spring and autumn.

"You seem a little confused, my child." This was the first time that Calvin heard the old man's voice after being in the same room with him for so long.

Following this deep and powerful voice, Calvin stopped, raised his head, and looked towards the center of the reading area. In the golden candlelight, the silver-haired old man spoke to him calmly.

On a whim, I wanted to take this opportunity to explore the humanistic aspects of this IP other than war. I don’t know if everyone will be interested in reading it.