"Yeah, yeah."
The Primarch of the White Scars, Jaghatai Khan, glanced at the Savior's deliberately lifeless look and couldn't help rolling his eyes.
He'd worried for nothing just now.
But his expression soon turned grave.
The Savior wasn't wrong. The Emperor's condition was precarious, and vast swathes of the Imperium still lay swallowed by the dark. Beyond the ceaseless undercurrent of Chaos, the Tyranid hive fleets and the Necrons were pressing harder than ever.
It was a crushing burden.
Perhaps no one but the Savior could shoulder it.
As for that former Lord Commander and Ultramarines Primarch, Roboute Guilliman… the Khan doubted he could clean up this mess and save the Imperium. You could tell just by the Codex Astartes—too conservative—and in battle he was always a beat behind. Weak, too. If not for the Khan, Dorn, Vulkan and the others racing home with their Legions, by the time the Lion and Guilliman got back, Holy Terra would already have fallen.
And don't even get him started on that "Imperium Secundus."
The Khan chalked it up to Guilliman wanting the Throne but lacking the guts.
All talk, no nerve.
Once they learned their father—the Emperor—yet lived, they dissolved the Second Imperium in a hurry and scurried back to help.
Fortunately, Father had now named the true Lord of the Imperium. Even Guilliman would have to accept it.
"Brother, Guilliman and I will back you to the hilt—whatever it costs!"
The Khan lifted his big paw and clapped the Savior's pauldron till it rang.
In the past, any Primarch ruling the Imperium would draw the others' resentment.
But when it came to the Savior, none of them had a reason to refuse—nor any leverage to do so. The Savior was rich, deadly, and already held the levers of imperial power. What else could they do but support him?
"Old Khan, that warms my heart. We really are the best of brothers."
Eden said it with feeling.
He'd told Guilliman the same thing. Best brother with everyone—why not?
"Got any more White Falcon anti-grav rides on your side?"
The Khan remembered something and looked a little sheepish.
The White Scars whelps had heard the webway garrisons all had grav-vehicles. They were drooling, desperate to get those gorgeous anti-grav mounts. For a White Scar, that was the dream.
"Of course. It's a vehicle; consider it done. From now on, every White Scar gets a White Falcon grav-vehicle—full maintenance plan included."
Eden waved like a big spender and promised mountains of gear and supplies. "Oh, and I've got a batch of Redemption God-Engines in a webway depot—crews included. Enough to form a full Titan Legion. Send people to drive them home and have some fun."
"Eh?!"
The Khan grinned so wide his face nearly split.
Even in the Great Crusade, Titans were rare beasts to an Astartes force, but their firepower on the field was colossal. The trouble was, the Adeptus Mechanicus owned them. You had to treat them like delicate allies to get them onto a battlefield at all.
Even Horus, the Warmaster himself, only got Titan support by cutting deals with traitor Tech-priests.
With a whole Titan Legion under his own hand, the Khan could use them however he wished. It would be a massive force-multiplier for the White Scars.
Vehicles and Titans both—the Savior's largesse moved the Khan deeply.
He thumped his chest. "Brother Eden, from this day on, point, and the White Scars ride where you tell us to ride!"
"White Scars Chapter?"
Eden shook his head and smiled.
"The White Scars Legion, Khan. Old Gui's Codex Astartes doesn't rule anymore. We'll be restoring Legion formations, step by step, to meet the new shape of the wars."
Since the Great Rift tore the galaxy asunder, the scale of imperial wars had ballooned. Scattershot Chapters simply couldn't keep up. In a truly massive war, dozens or hundreds of Chapters and successors swarmed a front—each with their own taboos, styles, and command chains—making unified strategy a nightmare.
Reconstituting the Legions and putting Primarchs back in unified command would better ignite the Astartes' war-fury.
Two Primarchs had already returned: the Ultramarines and the White Scars would be first to revert to Legions. In truth, "Old Gui" was already moving that way.
When the Lion returned, if he'd accept it, the Dark Angels would be re-raised as a Legion too.
Eden suspected that convincing Lion El'Jonson—the First—to obey him, the new Lord of the Imperium, wouldn't be easy. The Emperor might have to weigh in.
And if the Lion obeyed unwillingly, that would be a problem waiting to happen.
He'd need to establish his authority—and perhaps start with the Dark Angels: bring them to heel first. He remembered the Angels' Rock monastery-fortress hid many secrets and treasures, several of which would be very useful for building out the webway.
Eden tucked the plan away.
After dealing with immediate business, he'd swing through the shadowed regions and make arrangements with the Dark Angels.
When Eden returned to the temporary Sanctum of the Savior, dispatches from Holy Terra were waiting.
On the Throneworld, the unrest sparked by his coronation had been stamped out. A new statue of the Hope Primarch, the Savior, stood tall, and the ad-hoc enthronement was complete.
Power had passed smoothly into his hands.
From now on, both the light-side Imperium and those dark-side regions reachable through the webway would heed him.
Once the Sacred Spire Project reached critical mass, he'd retake more of the dark, rebuild, and erase the Great Rift's scars.
"That kid's ruthless enough…"
Eden skimmed Grand Inquisitor Deville's report and other eyes-only briefs, taking in the whole sweep of Holy Terra's purge.
The Grand Inquisitor he'd appointed had moved with lightning speed, clearing out anyone who might obstruct the new regime—decisive enough to smash future threats with one blow. With that, the Savior's edicts would run unimpeded, and the upcoming governmental reshuffle would go far smoother.
None of it had been pre-cleared with Eden.
But Eden understood.
If Deville had asked first, Eden might have flinched—worrying about reputation—and told him to go slow, not to spill quite so much blood.
From the Imperium's perspective, though, Deville's choice was swift and correct, minimizing turmoil during the political overhaul and giving lurking heretics no time to organize resistance.
Politics isn't war; killing everyone doesn't fix everything—and the bill can be ruinous.
A clean cut had its merits.
Even so, Deville couldn't stay. He'd have to be punished to calm the waters.
Eden sent the order to Holy Terra:
Deville was stripped of his High Lord's seat and his office as head of oversight, reassigned away from Holy Terra, and barred from Throneworld affairs.
Short of execution, it was the harshest penalty an imperial grandee could face. Only participation in treason with massive loss of life would normally see a High Lord de-throned.
As for Deville himself, he would return to the Urth Conclave as Grand Inquisitor, quietly handling special inspections for the Savior, Lord of the Imperium.
At the same time, Holy Terra's oversight organs would be pared back, easing the high-pressure atmosphere and letting administrators unclench—lest all that stress just feed Chaos.
Besides, there were no meaningful opponents left on the Throneworld. The Imperium was his, utterly.
Monitoring could relax and shift to a gentler, subtler posture.
At that moment, the Patriarch of the Koton Seneschal House—Bayev, Grand Seneschal of the Savior's Demesne, known as the Savior's Hand—departed the Urth royal ward for the Throneworld to assume power.
The loyal seneschal of House Grant—planetary governors of the border—would step from the rim into the heart, to become Imperial Chancellor.
When the Hope Primarch, Lord of the Imperium, was away from Holy Terra, Bayev would serve as Imperial Regent.
Imperial governance would run through him—second only to one.
From this day on, Bayev would be what his idol, Malcador the Sigillite, had been—and more powerful yet.
Eden had always understood why the Emperor left rulership to Malcador. It felt great. What warrior-king wanted to rot on a throne, drowning in audiences and paperwork?
Nightmare stuff.
Eden wasn't a warrior-king; he was a "hands-off" king. He only needed to keep a tight grip on the core team.
He was grateful to have his own "Malcador."
Once Bayev took office, he'd remake the political order. Many of the Savior's own administrators would migrate to Holy Terra and take up imperial office.
The Imperium would change.
After round upon round of purges, there was a crushing talent shortage—on the Throneworld and beyond. That meant the Savior's officials would get rocketed upward, invited to take their seats at the engine of empire.
It wasn't "three grades at once." It was straight to the stratosphere.
Graduates of the Loyal Scions Academy were even luckier. While the Empire's own "Loyalty Academies" still churned out interns and raw recruits, Scions alumni—trained in the new system—would go straight into management.
The best honor graduates, thanks to the gaping demand, would step off the dais with a diploma and jog directly to their departments to take the chair.
Even planetary governor.
There wasn't time to be picky; the seats had to be filled. With sound institutions, real authority, and tax incentives, even the worst of them would outperform the old guard—as the locals would soon see.
And they weren't untested—Scions students had rotated through every bureau during their studies.
They'd do fine.
They were graduating into a golden hour. No one was going jobless.
Before Eden ended the call with Bayev, the two aligned on the last details—then Eden stopped worrying about the reshuffle.
Bayev would handle it.
Eden closed the channel and exhaled. "Power's settled cleanly enough. But we've got other headaches…"
He left the office and stepped into a temporary situation room.
"Old Khan, how's the situation across the webway city of Commorragh?"
He asked the White Scars Primarch the moment he sat.
White Scars patrols were crisscrossing the webway, scouting the daemon remnants.
That was the real headache: how to deal with the Prince of Pleasure's daemons still in Commorragh.
If there were enough left, they'd need whole armies to scour them. That would bleed time, materiel, and lives.
"This counts as good news, I suppose," the Khan said, combing the reports for the key points. "Aside from the Prince of Pleasure's daemon hosts, the other major daemon armies have withdrawn.
"The problem is, Slaanesh's hosts have broken apart and sunk into the webway and city structures—everywhere…"
"Which may be the worse problem," Tarko, the Savior's deputy and War Department officer, frowned. "The Drukhari and their forces have pulled out, and Slaanesh's daemons crept deeper into Commorragh's layers. They'll be harder to uproot than a single massed army.
"We're talking an area the size of a Sector—ridiculous strata of buildings, under-ways, and webway arteries. Purging daemons there will be brutally hard.
"By our estimates, to finish the job we'd need multiple armies at Apocalypse scale, and we'd be measuring the campaign in centuries. Anything less, and we won't cleanse the city for reconstruction."
Eden's expression tightened as Tarko laid it out.
He clenched his fist. "So Slaanesh wants to bleed us with guerrilla war and a war of attrition—on home turf!"
That was the strategy—use the webway's labyrinth to hide daemons, making it impossible for the Savior, Lord of the Imperium, to secure Commorragh.
Snakes in the dark, striking from the angles of the webway.
He'd never get the webway construction rolling at that rate.
A whole host of Slaaneshi daemons nesting in the webway courtyards could spark catastrophe at any moment. If the Prince of Pleasure found a way to bring the city down—or slip through the ruins to strike the Redemption Satellite Zone—everything they'd gained would go up in smoke.
Worse, mortal regiments couldn't fight cleanly in that terrain. But he couldn't just throw Astartes at the maze, either.
Even if he ignored outside fronts and hurled every Space Marine in the Imperium into Commorragh, they wouldn't finish the cull quickly.
Only massive forces, pushed forward as Grand-Legions, block by block, artery by artery, could drive out the last Slaaneshi fiends.
Multiple Apocalypse-scale armies and a century of war—Eden and the Imperium could pay that price.
But the Emperor couldn't wait that long.
Eden needed to bring the webway online fast, strip resources, and raise the Sacred Spire.
"Maybe the greenskins could…?"
The thought flashed—and died. Orks were too dim to hunt ghosts in a maze; they'd just spore everywhere.
He didn't want Commorragh sprouting green mushrooms. Cleanup would be a nightmare. And even if you got them in there, could you get them back out? More likely, you'd end up with little ork tribes all over the webway. Another mess to tame.
He needed an army that was enormous, disciplined, capable of intricate maneuvers—and one he could command remotely—to execute the purge.
Eden fired off a query and slumped back in his chair, silent.
The whole room went quiet with him.
No one had imagined that after winning the webway war of Commorragh, they'd be staring at a problem this stubborn.
A deadlock—with no obvious answer.
…
The galaxy. High above a feral world.
A living thing drifted in the void—vast, mountain-tall, its chitinous carapace stretching out of sight. Forty-plus kilometers long, nearly five wide. A thrashing bouquet of hooked limbs like scythes, any one set strong enough to crush a starship as if it were glass.
Its head was a gullet of the abyss, ringed with questing tendrils. Along its flanks, countless leathery fins undulated. From its belly, capillary towers plunged downward, drinking the raw world below.
A Redemption Hive Ship.
(End of Chapter)
[Get +20 Extra Chapters On — P@tr3on "Zaelum"]
[Every 500 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter Drop]
[Thanks for Reading!]