Silence—an uncomfortable, oppressive silence.
"Russ—"
Jaghatai Khan looked toward Curze, whose breathing had grown heavy with irritation, and toward Selene, whose smile had vanished, replaced by a strange, unreadable expression. He reached out to restrain Russ, but Selene's calm voice made him stop.
"Let him continue. It's fine. The more contradictions are spoken aloud, the smaller they become."
Selene's gaze drifted toward the Emperor, whose form shimmered with light as he silently absorbed the essence of Fenghuang Down, his divine presence diluting the frenzied faith of the Imperial Cult around him.
The Wolf King's strength was beyond question. He had faced most of his Primarch brothers—and even the Emperor himself—in combat. His wisdom, though... controversial, had proven itself time and again on the battlefield.
Wild, stubborn, superstitious, impulsive, and willful—he often responded to others' counsel with, "You're right, but I'm not listening." A man who seemed to abandon reason—and yet such men often possessed insights no one else could grasp.
Selene was intrigued.
Being mistaken for someone else no longer bothered her—she had grown used to it. In fact, she rather enjoyed it.
Well... except when it came to being mistaken as a stepmother.
Selene had no intention of adopting a legion of towering, musclebound sons.
Do the Primarchs even have a mother?
In a sense—they do.
Her identity as a Chaos God allowed Selene to glimpse the deep truths buried within the Sea of Souls, and among them were secrets of the Emperor himself.
The Primarchs were the Emperor's magnum opus—beings born of gene-craft at a level inconceivable even in the Golden Age of Humanity. Their essence within the Warp originated from the Emperor's theft—or tacit bargain—with the Chaos Gods themselves.
The old relic had tried to outwit Chaos and steal from it freely. Everyone knew that.
But as vessels carrying the essence of the Warp within physical form, the Primarchs were not clones of the Emperor. They were, in truth, his biological sons.
And as everyone knows, to create a new human life requires not only a paternal genetic donor.
A child's genome must carry both paternal and maternal contributions for proper embryonic development.
The maternal donor—the provider of the ovum—was the Primarchs' mother in the biological sense.
Erda.
This ancient psyker from Holy Terra was the biological mother of the Primarchs.
Like the Emperor, Erda was an Eternal—believed to be second only to Malcador in power among their kind.
During the creation of the Primarchs, both the Emperor's and Erda's DNA were used. Though born within artificial wombs, the Primarchs were undeniably their biological children.
The bond between Erda and the Emperor ran far deeper than mere romantic love. To call it "love" at all was to cheapen it.
From the dawn of ancient Terra, Erda had walked beside the Emperor. He ruled humanity's first great city, guiding mankind's ascent, and Erda had long admired him—eventually becoming one of the Eternals who aided his mission.
But when the Great Crusade began, the Emperor's pride—and the immense risks he took in forcing humanity's evolution—drove many of the Eternals away. Only a few remained loyal: Malcador, and Erda among them.
When the others departed, the Emperor confided in those who remained, revealing his plan. Thus began the Primarch Project.
Together, they forged the foundations of a new breed of humanity—the loyal sons who would lead the stars.
Erda's expertise as a geneticist was indispensable. Her rare genome became the maternal half of the Primarch template, while the Emperor's own essence provided the paternal. The experiments succeeded. Their combined code birthed the Primarchs—vessels capable of housing the divine spark the Emperor had stolen from the Warp.
Biologically, Erda was their mother. The Emperor, their father.
But it was Erda's maternal love that birthed the tragedy to come.
Erda had foreseen the grim destiny the Emperor intended for their creations, and despair took root in her heart. She saw the Primarchs' nature—the essence of the Warp within them—and knew that her children would become nothing more than weapons in his hand, just as the Thunder Warriors had been.
So, she made her choice.
When the Primarchs were still infants, Erda tore open a rift in the Warp, scattering them across the galaxy in a desperate attempt to save them from the Emperor's grasp. Afterward, she vanished, hiding herself for many years.
One could say that it was this mother's misguided love that doomed them all—that condemned [Angron] and [Curze] to the horrors of their tragic childhoods. Their fates, their differing lives and temperaments, had thus escaped the Emperor's control.
As a Chaos God, Selene had seen that betrayal unfold in full clarity—her divine awareness closed to time itself, viewing the event through both active and dormant epochs. And it was a bitter truth: Erda, in her blind love, had not acted freely. Unknowingly, she had been manipulated by the Chaos Gods, her hand guided to complete their design.
The Emperor's fury had been great, but he never took revenge upon Erda—even though he always knew where she hid.
Selene pondered whether she should reveal this ancient truth to the Primarchs.
"What do you take us for? What do you take the Imperium for?! What do you take humanity for?!"
Breaking free from Jaghatai Khan's grasp, Leman Russ glared at each of them in turn—Selene, the Emperor, Curze—his breath ragged, his stance unsteady. The Wolf King of Fenris, Lord of Winter and Ruin, looked for all the world like a drunken beast as he stumbled forward, eyes wild, his rage barely leashed.
"I know you love us. I know you love mankind—that your love for humanity eclipses all else. But why... why did you have to keep everything hidden until now?!"
"My fallen brothers are gone. Malcador is gone. And beneath the Golden Throne gather petty vermin—sniveling worms whispering of matters decided before they were even born, boasting as if those deeds were their own!"
"They drown in the wine left by fallen gods, growing fat and idle. The claws of the Imperium are still sharp as wolves' fangs, but they are shackled—unable to strike freely!"
"I don't know what grand design you and this so-called 'goddess' have planned—and I don't care! But since you have awakened, surely you've seen it—the pitiful state of the Imperium today!"
Russ turned his gaze skyward—toward the projection of [Finality] that loomed over them—and the fury he'd been restraining finally broke free. Never one to master his emotions, the Wolf King roared.
With a violent motion, he hurled both his mastercrafted weapons—the Sword of Night and his massive Frost Axe—into the ashen ruins before him.
BOOM—
The blade, forged from the tooth of a Fenrisian Kraken, struck the ground like a hammer. The hardened ash cracked into a spiderweb of fissures, cold light gleaming off its edge. In that reflection were the faces of Selene, Jaghatai Khan, Curze, and the faintly wavering form of the Emperor.
"Your life's work—now a realm wracked by strife, fragile as an egg, a colossus on the verge of collapse! The Imperium is a dying giant, a decaying fortress—one light push and it will crumble, never to rise again!"
Russ's voice rose to a maddened pitch as he raged on, his fury shaking the air itself.
"Just like your damned plan back then! Why can't you ever just tell us the truth?! You never explain anything—you hide it from all of us! During the Burning of Prospero—do you know what that one-eyed ogre [Magnus] said to me before he died?"
He froze for a heartbeat, eyes distant, haunted. Then he laughed—a hollow, bitter sound—and mimicked the words in a voice not his own: "'The wicked borrow your blade to slit the throat of the innocent.'"
"My father! Our All-Father! This time, you damned golden corpse, You'd better explain everything! If we really are failures..."
Russ's teeth bared in a snarl as he suddenly jabbed a finger toward the sky—toward Selene, who had been laughing quietly since his outburst. Her laughter was melodic, her expression both beautiful and deadly—like a field of crimson blossoms blooming over a grave.
"My dear Curze," she purred, her tone almost playful, "show me what it is you see... Oh, by the Throne—"
The ritual of offering had been completed. The formation was ready, its beams of transmission glimmering. Magnus, about to speak, was abruptly pulled aside by Curze.
At that instant—
"If those born from her hand—my unseen brothers—are the true successes, then what are we? Look at this one—this [Konrad Curze] who seems... whole, not the half-dead wretch he once was. Oh, and she even has a Russ of her own..."
"So tell me—what does that make us? Why summon us here? To return to this empire of ignorance and suffering, to surrender our legions once again? Or perhaps..." Russ's lips curled, baring his fangs. "Perhaps, like the lost ones you erased before, there will be another 'me' to do your dirty work and end us."
Selene and the Emperor had not concealed their conversation. Every word reached Russ and Jaghatai's ears.
The Emperor's strange demeanor, his sudden summons, his attitude toward the newly risen Chaos God [Finality]—so different from his hatred of other ruinous powers—all of it had gnawed at Russ's mind.
And now, after witnessing firsthand in Commorragh the seamless cooperation between the Midnight Lords and the Thousand Sons, seeing [Finality]'s subordinate Konrad Curze and Magnus performing the sacrificial ritual in the heavens above—after hearing from [Finality] Herself that another him existed in some distant galaxy—Russ could no longer dismiss the truth.
He didn't want to believe it. But his instincts told him—it was real.
If [Finality] had been some deceitful fiend like [Tzeentch] or [Slaanesh], Russ would have ignored every word. But he could feel it—her aura, proud and domineering, carried the same brutal resonance as [Khorne].
And Russ knew [Khorne] and his followers well. He had slaughtered enough of them to understand their nature.
Deception and cunning were tools of war, yes—but when faced directly, neither [Khorne] nor his kind would lie. They might mislead, but never deceive outright. Their pride would not allow it.
[Finality] was no different.
And then there was the Emperor—standing beside her.
In that instant, Russ believed.
To think that the Emperor and [Finality] had conspired together—to create the Primarchs, split their essence in two, cast them into the galaxy as abandoned experiments, and conceal the truth for millennia—Russ's fury reached a breaking point.
Oh.
Look at our 'Father and Mother.'
Of course.
No wonder you preached that damned Imperial Truth.
The Emperor's Primarchs embodied the material aspect of reality.
[Finality]'s Primarchs embodied the ascendant, higher-dimensional aspect.
Half-gods, they called them—yet in truth, all were pieces on a board, pawns in some grand cosmic design.
Russ knew his thoughts were rash, even foolish—but they explained so much. The Emperor's cold decisions during the Great Crusade, his cryptic orders, his merciless silences—it all fit.
Watching [Finality] hand over the Feather of Fenghuang Down, distilled from the humanity of billions, Russ felt a strange bitterness. A part of him—one that still loved—was glad.
As the Emperor's loyal executioner, Russ had always been among the few who shared a bond with Him—a son who raged and mourned when his Father was bound to the Golden Throne, who prayed for his return to flesh and blood.
But now, knowing this—seeing the truth laid bare—his sorrow burned into fury.
"...Haa..."
The Emperor's noble face remained expressionless. Yet within the long exhalation that followed, one could faintly hear the depth of his ancient sorrow.
Crimson and violet feathers drifted through the air. The emotions—grief, regret, and a thousand other contradictions—coiled around his psychic projection like serpents, forming a vortex so dense it nearly took shape.
"...Forgive me... Russ... My son... Things are not as you believe. The truth is harsh beyond imagining—but they are they, and you are you..."
The shifting lights of Fenghuang Down flickered across the Emperor's face. They did not illuminate his features, but for the first time, his psychic image focused. His eyes shimmered—not with light, but with the faint pulse of living emotion.
"This is a confession long overdue... Perhaps any apology is meaningless now. But, my son... I ask you—believe in me once more."
For the first time, the Emperor's voice carried a clear, unmistakable sorrow—his words rippling through the veil between reality and the Warp, crossing the stars from distant Holy Terra, reaching Russ and Jaghatai's ears as if whispered by the universe itself.
The voice was no longer the perfect, resonant tone that once filled the hearts of men with awe. It rasped dry and brittle, like a sandstorm passing through rusted gears—each word scraping against the throat like a blood-choked file.
At that moment, Russ's eyes widened.
His vision pierced a slowly opening doorway—through it, he beheld the grand gates of the Throne Room deep within Holy Terra. Beyond those towering doors, even a Primarch's existence seemed insignificant before the colossal seat of gold.
The Emperor—his Father—sat upon the Golden Throne.
The once-mighty, flawless body of flesh was gone. What remained was a towering skeleton—a corpse bound to the machine of agony known as the Golden Throne.
He had died, in the physical sense, sometime between the [Horus Heresy] and the dawn of M41. Yet something of him lingered still—refusing to depart.
The remaining flesh was shriveled and sunken, the skin clinging to bone like brittle parchment. From the center of his chest down to his waist ran a gaping wound—a torment unending.
That wound—the final gift of [Horus]—still throbbed with the power of the Chaos Gods, its corruption ever circling. It was that wound that had damned him to the Throne for all eternity.
Russ saw clearly as the corpse lifted its head. The hollow sockets of its skull fixed upon him, jaw creaking open and shut as a broken, sand-dry voice emerged from within.
"Time... is short... The threat of Chaos grows with every passing second... This is humanity's final chance. The Golden Throne is failing. I have no time left."
"The birth of [Finality] has shattered the balance of the Warp. To end the chaos that has consumed the galaxy—to restore struggle, progress, and prosperity to mankind—to bring our species once more into an age of greatness—this is the key."
"...I will act, no matter the cost... I cannot tell you everything yet—it is for your protection... When we meet again on Terra, Russ, Jaghatai... I will reveal all."
"For now, I can only tell you this: [Finality] is different. She is the Chaos of Humanity—the Chaos of all sentient life."
The golden psychic projection leaned forward. The Emperor's hand—woven from pure psychic energy—reached out, carefully resting upon the heads of his furious, broken, and sorrowful sons.
"Do not despair. Do not hate. Do not surrender. Fulfill the burden upon your shoulders."
Calming his sons, the Emperor's voice softened.
"...Selene... I entrust my children to you. I shall uphold my promise. I will await you on Terra, Magnus. I shall return—reborn in humanity—to cleanse the material universe, and aid you in the war to consume the true source of darkness."
Selene's lips curved into a faint smile. "Then, a pleasant cooperation."
"If possible... Macragge..."
"No problem," she replied smoothly. "I have already sent Lorgar Aurelian to rescue your thirteenth son."
Straightforward, unhesitating—the words carried an air of satisfaction.
"..."
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