Dorn was exhausted.
He realized that all his past experience had completely failed him. He felt like an ancient man left behind by the age.
After reaching the surface, Dorn was delighted to find the entrance to an old subterranean sepulchre route.
But he quickly discovered, to his misery, that the ancient stone-slab gate had become nothing but a display piece for tourists.
He had stood there like an idiot, fiddling with it for ages.
Only then did Dorn finally learn that the Savior had not only rebuilt Terra's surface on a grand scale, turning it into a garden world.
He had also, citing "security," dug up the countless ages of accumulated underground tunnel networks and ruins that had spread across the continent like a hive, all to research them.
And he had filled the remaining shafts and galleries with high-strength concrete.
Who does that?
It was practically the same as turning Terra inside out. The scale of the project was terrifying, yet that man had simply done it.
As for the population affected by the demolition, they had been relocated to other civilized worlds and compensated with upgrades in citizenship rank.
More than that, he had even uprooted the entire Senatorum Imperialis in one sweep. What remained were mostly planetary defense forces and maintenance personnel.
In other words, the heart of the Imperium had become a full-on pilgrimage and sightseeing holy land, filled with beautiful natural vistas from across the galaxy and sacred ruins.
This was devastating for Dorn's infiltration plan. The underground network had been dug out, the hive cities were gone, and if he wanted to reach the Imperial Palace, he could only force his way across the surface.
Under strict traffic control and dense defensive arrays, the difficulty was nothing short of hell-mode.
Fortunately, as the Praetorian of Terra and the Imperium's foremost master of fortification, Dorn was not completely out of options. It was just… a lot more painful.
After tremendous effort, Dorn finally reached the vicinity of the Himalazian Mountains. The Imperial Palace lay within them. He was not far from seeing his father.
Beep-beep-beep.
A detector warned him that a long-term sustaining barrier field lay ahead, along with one electrified wall after another.
"Damn it. Another barrier field zone."
Dorn stopped, his stern face full of resignation.
The Savior had divided Terra into multiple zones. While building scenic wonders, he had also installed dense layers of barrier fields, arrays, and more across huge swaths of territory.
He had turned this sacred world into an iron barrel inside an iron barrel. Anyone attacking it would go numb just looking at it.
Dorn was numb too. Forget leading an army. Even as a primarch, sneaking through these zones was difficult.
He felt worn down, and a deep frustration gnawed at him as he recalled what he had experienced recently.
He was the Vigilant. The Imperium's number one defensive master.
For countless centuries, he had studied fortification, bastion design, and defensive doctrine with painstaking care, accumulating experience beyond imagination.
Dorn had believed, without a shred of doubt, that in the realm of defense, no one in the galaxy surpassed him. He alone was the best choice to guard Terra and the Imperial Palace.
No one else.
And yet now he felt he had lost. Lost to the Savior. The man had beaten Dorn's millennia of hard-won craft with the crudest method imaginable and the most shameless investment of resources.
Dorn looked up through gaps in the jungle canopy at the blue sky. With a primarch's sight, he could make out pinpricks of light glittering in orbit.
Countless.
Those were near-orbit weapons platforms, capable of bombarding the voidspace and the surface zones alike.
Meaning that beyond the ground defenses blanketing Terra, there was also effectively inexhaustible fire support, and that was not even counting the defense fleet.
This was the Savior's philosophy of defense:
Dump resources into it. Dump them hard. If it still cannot be held, then the only explanation is that you did not dump enough.
With defenses at this level, you could chain a fart-spirited gremlin to the command throne and still not lose, right?
Can resources really let you do whatever you want?
Dorn could not even imagine how an enemy was supposed to break in. He sighed deeply.
"I do not deserve the titles Vigilant, Praetorian of Terra, first master of defense. That man is the true master of defense, unmatched."
His cultivated skill had been completely eclipsed by the other man's extravagant resource-crushing posture, rendered dim and irrelevant.
Against such a gap, no amount of seriousness could change the outcome.
It was absolute, ruthless domination.
It very nearly drove the Vigilant into depression. He even felt envy, jealousy, and hatred toward the Savior's resources. Maybe the real defense was simply smashing people with resources.
He had even stopped mentioning his title as the "Lord of the Phalanx," because the Phalanx itself had been dismantled by that bastard Savior.
Dorn steadied his emotions.
He scanned the defenses ahead and could not help showing a faint smile.
Those barrier fields and electrified walls were not a serious threat. They were symbolic deterrents, not war-grade fortifications.
As expected, the Savior could not possibly deploy high-strength fields and attack arrays everywhere, especially not in a scenic jungle like this with little defensive value.
Crossing it would not be difficult, and it would not trigger any alarms.
"Once I traverse this primeval jungle, I'll reach the Palace perimeter. Then I can send a special signal to contact the Custodes…"
Dorn thought silently.
Everything he had learned on the way had changed his thinking.
That Savior might actually be loyal. Otherwise he would not have gone to such lengths to protect Terra.
Perhaps Father had chosen an excellent ruler, someone who had slowly pulled the Imperium out of darkness.
At least for now, Dorn saw no signs of betrayal. The Savior was merely… flamboyant. He might have ambition, but perhaps not to an unforgivable extent.
The reshaping of the Emperor's public image into a golden sun, and the religious adjustments, were likely done with Father's approval.
Dorn only wanted to reach the Golden Throne as soon as possible, to see the Emperor, his father, and learn more about the Imperium.
After that, he would meet the Savior and formally announce his return.
Having sorted through these thoughts, Dorn felt lighter.
He used technical methods to slip through the barrier field and climb over the electrified wall, even offering an internal critique as he did:
This wall was not very good. At best it could stop idiots. It could not even stop an experienced veteran.
Fortifications could not rely on resources alone. They also required skill.
Dorn shook his head with a chuckle and stepped into the dark forest of towering ancient trees.
After his back vanished into the depths, a warning sign in the former blind spot became clearly visible:
Wildlife Reserve. EXTREME DANGER. ILLEGAL CROSSING PROHIBITED.
In truth, this was a free-range forest for high-risk apex predators. Inside were beasts like ant-bulls, sgro beasts, giant bears, and all manner of dangerous wildlife.
It was an environmental measure consistent with the Savior's ecological protection ideals.
Naturally, the creatures inside were absurdly vicious. Even a Primaris Space Marine could go in and end up crawling out. Special facilities were required for safe sightseeing.
As for the barrier fields and electrified walls, they were mainly meant to stop lost pilgrims and keep the internal predators from causing needless harm.
If someone foolishly forced their way in, safety could not be guaranteed.
ROAR!!!
Before long, furious howls echoed from deep within the forest. Someone had invaded their territory.
Then came the crashing pursuit. The ground shook. Claws scraped rock. Trees were slapped and snapped.
Dorn sprinted for his life under a tide of hunting beasts, cursing through gritted teeth in a lowered voice.
He could not understand why Terra would contain predators from the far fringes of the galaxy. Not only that, but so many of them. He understood even less why the Savior would do this.
Worse, he could not use firearms or disintegration-field weapons, and he certainly could not slaughter freely. He feared being detected by the monitoring arrays.
So he could only take it and run.
Dorn clenched his teeth and accelerated again, dodging the scorching lava spat by a fire-breathing lizard. Even the armor over his backside was seared red.
The Savior really was inhuman.
At the same time, outside the Himalazian Palace perimeter.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Multi-legged construction titans were heaving and grinding as they poured concrete, dug foundations, mixed aggregate, and hauled alloy components. Dust billowed. The site was blazing with activity.
"Steel begets strength. Strength begets will. Will begets faith. Faith begets glory. Glory begets steel!"
The Iron Warriors' mutation was now almost imperceptible. Wearing yellow helms, chanting slogans, they drove piles and worked like they had endless strength.
"Brothers, put your siege spirit into the work. When we're done, we'll go admire the faces of those yellow-armored stubborn stones now that their gene-father is dead!"
The Warsmith, the Breaker Forrix, wore a white-painted helm. He drove the workers onward and supervised the defensive project's progress.
He wiped grime from his faceplate and looked up toward the Palace dome high on the mountain, a faint smile tugging at his lips.
Forrix had been born on Holy Terra. He was one of the last Terran-born old hands in the Legion, and one of the Trident's members.
As the Legion's former First Captain, he had led assaults that broke countless walls and bastions, a warrior of brutal courage.
During the Siege of Terra, he had led a thousand-strong force that successfully punched through the defenses of the Lion's Gate Spaceport, completing the breakthrough mission.
He had been the only one to survive that assault.
Forrix had not wanted to fight such a war or pay meaningless costs, but the gene-father's order had been given, and he had no choice but to obey.
It was that ferocity that earned him the title "Breaker," nearly unstoppable in assault.
Yet with the Lord of Iron, his gene-father Perturabo, returning to the Imperium, Forrix received a new mission.
He was to lead the Iron Warriors in forming an engineering corps, compete with the Imperial Fists, and expand the Legion's construction arm.
To serve the new Imperium better.
In simpler terms, the Iron Warriors were not only to be the Imperium's greatest siege Legion. They were also to become its finest bastion-building enterprise.
The Lord of Iron had not forgotten old hatred. Even under the Savior's restrictions, unable to indulge in slaughter, he still intended to defeat the Imperial Fists in the very field they prided themselves on most.
To humiliate them, thoroughly.
Thus Forrix, the Breaker, pivoted on the spot into a fortress-architect and Warsmith.
He was satisfied with that identity.
After ten thousand years of error and wandering, the Iron Warriors had returned to the Imperium, and even gained the chance to serve Holy Terra and the Emperor.
More recently, they had seized the contract for a new Palace defense project right out from under the Imperial Fists and achieved major breakthroughs.
Their chests were high again.
The only regret the Lord of Iron held was that Dorn, primarch of the Imperial Fists, was not here to witness it.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Iron Warriors with mechanical augmetics brought their hammers down. Each strike burst with dark-violet, scorching sparks.
They drove rune-etched blackstone pylons into the foundation by brute force, even causing faint tremors in the surrounding space.
This was an anchoring technique between realspace and the warp, or perhaps a teleportation beacon. It involved the use of warp energy.
Aside from the Savior, the Lord of Iron, and a few high-ranking Adeptus Mechanicus figures, no one knew what it truly did.
It was also one of the reasons the Iron Warriors had defeated the Imperial Fists in the public bidding and taken this defensive project.
They were better at adapting to and controlling warp energies.
Suddenly, whispers and hisses rose from within the worksite. A few daemons crawled out along the leaked energy.
Fortunately, there were not many, scattered and small in number.
Such minor warp leakage provided no opening for a true Chaos offensive. It merely threatened to slow construction.
"Cursed daemons. Where's the cleanup team? Get over here and deal with them!"
Forrix's face darkened. He raised a modified master-crafted heavy bolter and burned through several magazines while calling for the cleanup team to handle the daemons, construction waste in flesh form.
Gunfire and explosions erupted across the zone. Some pilots even stomped the stray daemons under the feet of their construction titans.
The Iron Warriors cleaned the daemons out quickly and returned to work.
"Good. We didn't lose too much time." Forrix checked the build data and finally exhaled.
Then he saw a group of red safety helmets approaching and went rigid with tension.
He was more nervous than he had been about the daemonic leak.
"The red hats are here."
"Everyone follows procedure. If any bastard gets caught violating safety code, I'll skin him."
Forrix barked the warning on the channel, then jogged forward to greet the red hats.
Everyone knew that on a worksite, red hats outranked white hats. They usually meant the client. In other words, officials from the new Imperium's Department of Works.
You could not afford to be careless.
After being fined savagely the last time and forced to write a formal self-criticism to the relevant offices, the Breaker had learned to build properly and survive properly.
"S-Savior… Your Majesty?"
When Forrix arrived, he discovered the one leading the red hats was the Savior himself, the Emperor of the Imperium.
He was stunned. After bowing, he was about to call the other Iron Warriors over.
Proper ceremony could not be neglected in the Emperor's presence.
Eden waved a hand, stopping him.
"No need. I'm just having a look. Don't let it affect the work…"
He was only here to check on the progress of this important project.
Of course, Eden did not actually understand any of it. The red hats at his side, senior Mechanicus magi from the Department of Works, were responsible for inspection and verification.
He was just passing through, taking a look, then leaving, with the remaining red hats staying behind to continue oversight.
Eden had other matters.
This time he had brought the Phaeron of the Kalozasa Dynasty, Necrodermis Governor Zhabok, along with dynastic nobles and high-ranking warriors, to the Palace on pilgrimage.
He wanted them to feel the atmosphere of Imperial loyalty.
Naturally, this meant walking around the holy ground outside the Palace, touring within the Palace precincts, and finally viewing the great doors of the sacred Golden Throne Hall from far away.
During this, Eden would quietly implant an emotional virus into Zhabok and the others, then use the power of the Holy Sun to stage a "miracle," creating a new god who could "restore Necron souls."
Of course, the new god did not exist.
It would be the Hope Sun acting as a stand-in, allowing Eden to seize control over the Kalozasa Dynasty and establish a new religious framework.
"This is the first step in reshaping Necron thought."
"It is the opening of the ideological war."
Eden thought silently.
Would bringing Necron xenos into the Palace zone so openly cause trouble?
Not at all.
First, he had temporarily cleared all other pilgrims out of the relevant Palace zones, so there would be no panic.
As for the Iron Warriors and the Custodes seeing those disarmed Necron xenos, it would not matter. They were "ours." They would not defy his will.
As long as he was not leading a fully armed Necron host to attack the Golden Throne, the Custodes would not object, and they would not dare question him.
Even if he truly did lead a Necron host to attack the Golden Throne, more than half of the Custodes with Thunder Guard origins would support him.
From a certain point of view, the Custodes were practically becoming the Savior's private army.
Suddenly, Eden's communicator chimed. It was important.
He frowned and looked down.
It was a message from the Machine-Goddess. She had found anomalous data within the monitoring database of the psychic network.
…
At the forest's edge.
Dorn staggered out of that damned zone, with some unknown small beast still latched onto the armor over his backside.
The creature's teeth were sharp, leaving deep dents in his plate.
Dorn tore the nuisance off and threw it back into the forest.
"Father…"
He raised his head and saw the Palace's golden dome. His eyes grew wet.
He had finally reached his father's Palace.
But after staring for a moment, he froze.
Why were there green-glowing machines over there?
Then he saw a banner he knew too well, a hated sigil he recognized instantly.
A skull-shaped iron helm.
???
The moment Dorn understood what he was looking at, his heart turned to ice.
The Imperium was in peril.
(End of Chapter)
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