Sevatar was the core of the Night Lords—First Captain, the lynchpin holding the Legion together. Wherever he went, his elite Terminator guard, the Atramentar, went with him. This interrogation was no different.
So when the Atramentar heard something off inside the cell, they moved instantly. Formation set. Weapons ready. All they needed was one more wrong sound—or Sevatar's order—and they would breach and butcher whatever was inside.
A wall of super-elite killers in Terminator plate stared down the cell door.
It was the kind of scene that made the Imperium's enemies go cold.
The dungeon air—dark, damp, and filthy—seemed to thicken, like a spring compressed to its absolute limit.
"!!!"
When the footsteps from inside weren't the familiar cadence they expected, they snapped fully into a combat posture, prepared to erase the target with overwhelming firepower at a heartbeat's notice.
Atramentar—sworn to the Primarch unto death.
Creeeak—
The heavy wooden door groaned as it opened.
The Terminators—holding their breath—saw an Astartes wearing the Crown of Night, and froze.
Veterans. Murderers. Survivors of a hundred hells.
And they made a fatal mistake.
They spent a full second processing what they were seeing—then finally realized the truth.
Sevatar had been taken hostage.
By a recruit.
A recruit with no gear.
A recruit who'd been unconscious for months, with no resupply, no nutrition, no combat refit.
It was like watching a child take down a seasoned special forces operator.
The sheer absurdity made them almost miss the fact that the recruit's shoulder carried something else—a small, humanlike girl.
For some reason, she projected a strange sense of closeness… and—
Authority.
In a span of seconds, the Atramentar committed multiple errors back-to-back. On a real battlefield, they'd have died for less.
"You're pointing guns at a Primarch's agent?" Bruce asked calmly, voice steady, as if he weren't facing enough firepower to kill him a hundred times over. "My battle-brothers."
As he spoke, he casually lowered Sevatar's unconscious body onto the floor.
Dragging Sevatar out with him had been Bruce's plan from the start. If they opened up, Sevatar's body could serve as cover.
More importantly, Sevatar was a perfect hostage—and a perfect "friend-or-foe" marker.
The Night Lords might be insane, but they weren't going to vaporize Sevatar on reflex. Not when the Primarch was missing and the entire Legion was being held together by Sevatar's will.
Dad going missing is bad.
Mom dying is how a family truly collapses.
"A Primarch's agent?" One Atramentar lowered his bolter slightly, studying Bruce with open confusion. "I've never heard of such a position."
"That's fine," Bruce said. "Starting tonight, it exists. I'm it."
He saw their fingers ease off the triggers. Good. That meant he could start selling the lie properly.
Come on—my Primarch is literally sitting on my shoulder. As long as I bluff hard enough and don't expose her identity, I can say whatever I want.
I could claim I'm the Emperor's secret bastard, and as long as the logic holds, nobody can prove I'm lying.
…Granted, my Primarch would probably find it disgusting and kill me on principle.
"Do you see the great token on my head?" Bruce pointed at the Crown of Night and lifted his chin. "The Primarch gave this to me. This is proof. This is symbol."
"From this moment onward, I will exercise the privileges the Primarch has granted me and make the Night Lords even greater!"
"I, Bruce Wayne, swear this oath: on the day the Primarch returns, I will hand back to him a strong and glorious Astartes Legion. The Night Lords will be feared across the galaxy. Every enemy of mankind will tremble at our name!"
"…."
The Night Lords stood there, stunned.
Not because Bruce's speech had somehow hypnotized them—but because the Crown of Night did.
Everything else could be forged.
Not that.
Every Night Lord knew that crown. If it were fake in the slightest, Bruce would already be dead. Instead, they stood motionless, trying to digest the impossible.
The Primarch hadn't returned for far too long, and the Legion was fraying into chaos. Sevatar had barely kept the "family" from tearing itself apart in open civil war.
Missing didn't mean dead, though. They could still feel their gene-father's presence, like a pressure at the edge of the soul.
So why would a recruit be the Primarch's agent?
A recruit?
It was absurd.
Like some nobody waking up one day and being told, "The organization has decided—you're the boss now."
"Any other questions?" Bruce pressed when no one spoke. "Say what you want. I'll answer."
"You… met Father?" someone asked.
"Of course. Just now. And I should make one thing clear: I'm the one Father chose. That's why the transport was attacked, and I'm the only one still alive."
"This was Father's trial," Bruce added, half-true, half-performance.
Was I attacked by the Primarch? Yes.
Did I survive? Obviously.
So I'm not lying, am I?
"And Lord Sevatar…?"
"He's fine," Bruce said smoothly. "When Father entrusted this mission to me, he didn't want Sevatar present—so he knocked him out."
Perfect. A closed loop.
Who else could drop Sevatar without a sound?
Only the Primarch.
And if Bruce can carry Sevatar out while wearing the Crown of Night, then this is clearly the Primarch's will.
Logically airtight. Practically unassailable.
The Atramentar fell silent again. They were dissecting every word—but the way more and more weapons lowered told the real story.
At that point, Bruce knew what he had to do: seal the lie with ritual.
He stepped forward, removed the Crown of Night, and raised it with both hands like a devotee offering a relic to a god.
"Hail the Night Lord!"
The moment Bruce's roar echoed, the Night Lords could no longer contain the hunger in their hearts. Their longing for the missing Primarch surged past discipline.
They answered as one.
"We have come for you!"
For a heartbeat, staring at the Crown of Night, it felt as if the Night Lords had truly become whole again.
"Night… Night Lord…"
A hoarse, heavy voice rose from the floor—perfectly timed, right after the war-cry ended.
"?" Bruce looked down.
Sevatar had woken at some point, and his gauntleted hand was locked around Bruce's ankle like a vise.
His eyes were fixed on the crown.
He asked Bruce, voice raw:
"Tell me… what did the Primarch say?"
"He said—nothing to say," Bruce replied, shaking his head.
"…"
Sevatar clenched his teeth to stay conscious.
He had a thousand questions, but he also understood one thing: the recruit couldn't be lying.
In the instant he'd gone down, he'd felt it—after years of absence, the Primarch had returned.
What he couldn't understand was why the Primarch would choose a recruit as an agent.
Why?
Was this another test? Another knife slipped between the ribs of certainty?
But if it was Curze's will… then he would obey.
The Primarch never did anything without meaning.
"She…" Sevatar's gaze shifted to the small, humanlike girl still perched on Bruce's shoulder. "Who is she?"
It was his first time seeing her, but she felt strangely familiar. Even her psychic "taste" and resonance—like something he'd encountered before.
Damn it.
How could he have no memory of her?
That shouldn't be possible.
"She?" Bruce's mouth went dry.
In that instant, he realized everyone was looking at her now. They were waiting for his answer.
This was bad.
If he answered wrong, the whole story could collapse right here.
The girl—Curze, or rather Remilia—kept an indifferent posture, but when she looked at Bruce, she wore a subtle smile, like she was waiting for a punchline.
"She is…"
Cold sweat ran down Bruce's spine.
He needed an answer that was perfect—flawless—fast enough that no one questioned the pause, and plausible enough that it wouldn't raise new questions.
If it had to be immediate, airtight, and convenient…
Then there was only one option.
"She's Father's daughter!"
"..."
"?"
"?!"
"Huh?"
In the "don't-let-the-room-go-silent" challenge, Bruce lasted exactly one second.
Incredible work, truly.
Seeing their reactions, Bruce instantly knew he'd screwed up and braced himself for the "everyone dies" outcome.
Because who the hell would believe that?
Except—
They did.
"Salutations, great scion of the Night Lord!"
The Atramentar didn't hesitate. They dropped to one knee before the girl and swore loyalty.
Because to them, she gave off that inexplicable sense of closeness—an instinctive urge to submit.
So when Bruce gave that ridiculous answer…
It somehow fit.
As for the possibility that the girl herself was the Primarch—
Don't be ridiculous.
What kind of Primarch is a woman?
Whoever dares insult our Primarch like that, we'll show up at your door and replace your skin.
"…."
The smile on Curze/Remilia's face froze.
She closed her eyes and drew in a slow breath.
Then she opened them and looked at Bruce with a glacial stare—as if she were already looking at a corpse.
If Curze weren't the kind of person who valued "rules" and "promises," she might have killed him on the spot.
It wasn't reasonable, but it technically worked. Her identity wasn't exposed.
So…
Endure.
"Primarch…" Sevatar stared directly at the girl and begged, voice tight. "Where did you go?"
"Tell me."
"Ten years. We've lost him… for ten years!"
What?!
Bruce went rigid.
Ten years? The Primarch has been missing for ten years? Are you kidding me?
But then it clicked.
Now Bruce finally understood why Sevatar was desperate for any scrap of Curze's trail—and why everyone had believed Bruce's performance so quickly.
So that's it…
I'm the one who got hit by the information gap.
This is a terrible opening.
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