"Hm?
Why's the sky so dark? Chaos corruption is hitting pretty hard."
Eden glanced up at the sky, then looked back toward the Lord of Ramparts.
He waited for the stubborn mule's response.
"Savior.
As Father's final wall, so long as I still stand, I will never surrender."
Dorn shook his head. "If you are not a heretic or a rebel, then you should open a path.
Let me proceed to the Golden Throne in the Imperial Palace and meet the Emperor.
Instead of gathering so many troops to besiege one of the Emperor's loyal sons, causing pointless casualties!"
Even Horus, a son trusted by their father, had betrayed him. Much less the Savior, who had no blood relation at all.
That man might be telling the truth, or he might be lying.
But no matter what, Dorn did not dare gamble. He did not dare abandon the one possible hope of salvaging the situation.
Nor could he bear the consequences of choosing wrong.
What was more, he was already extremely close to the Imperial Palace. There might still be a chance.
Boom.
A heavy alloy gate rose up, surrounded by force fields and dense defensive gun platforms.
Using his authority, Dorn activated one of the hidden defensive structures he had left behind ten thousand years ago, opening a relic gate that led toward the Palace.
That Lord of Ramparts, that master of defense, had found a route for breakout from within the encirclement.
"I knew you wouldn't agree."
Eden looked at the newly opened portal, not especially surprised. If a master of defense like Dorn did not hide a few tricks away, that would have been stranger.
His gaze sharpened.
"So I'll personally make you agree. You won't have any room to resist."
Eden was preparing to move.
In a situation like this, letting the Imperial forces swarm the Lord of Ramparts would not only cost too many lives, it would also look ugly.
Their greatest use was really just standing around, blocking the exits so he could not escape, and preventing any possible Chaos incursion.
King against king was still the simplest solution.
Within the atmosphere, countless burning streaks fell from the sky. One of them slammed into the ground in front of Dorn, blocking his charging path.
The mechanical structure within the fiery mass rapidly unfolded and expanded, its force field temporarily driving him back.
That too was a teleport beacon.
Buzz!
The teleport beacon erupted with dazzling golden light, like a divine miracle descending.
One could vaguely see holy runes and angels in flight.
At the same time, on a high stairway platform in the distance near the Palace, the Savior stepped into a mechanical teleportation device, transferred at just the right moment, and appeared before Dorn amid the blazing special effects of golden light.
It was like the Emperor himself descending, so elegant, so imposing.
"Defeat me, and only then will you have a chance to break through."
Eden appeared in the posture of a superior being and spoke those words.
He looked just like the final boss of a game level. The villain aura was absolutely maxed out.
Originally, Eden had not wanted to intervene personally. But Dorn was too difficult to reason with and clearly had no intention of compromising.
So Eden had no choice but to teach this stubborn mule some "reason" with a battle between primarchs.
First knock him flat, then talk.
With Lion and the Khan absent, and with Perturabo unable to learn of this matter, only Eden himself could defeat a primarch who had awakened to his essence.
As the dazzling light pollution faded, Dorn finally got a clear look at the Savior, the Emperor of the Imperium.
The other man's appearance was even more magnificent and handsome than Fulgrim's had once been.
Dorn froze for a second, unable to believe the Savior had appeared so easily.
"Savior, you have made a mistake."
A smile appeared on Dorn's hard, resolute face, and battle-lust surged from him.
"You actually left the protection of your army and dared to come before me like this. Who gave you the confidence to do that?!"
The situation had gone beyond Dorn's expectations. He had assumed he would have to fight through near-certain death to enter the Palace.
Only then would he have a chance to strike back.
Yet the Savior, the leader of the rebels, had abandoned his advantage and personally come to intercept him.
How absurdly arrogant.
If so, then things became much simpler.
As long as he defeated the Savior or took him hostage, he could naturally dismantle the rebel faction far more effectively.
Boarding actions, decapitation strikes, slaying the enemy commander: these had always been the fastest way to end a war in the galaxy.
Even if this were all a misunderstanding, it would not cost too many lives.
Now, dealing with or capturing the Savior had become a higher priority than simply entering the Palace.
"You wretched rebel, you dare challenge the strongest fortress of the Imperium? My fists will wake you up so thoroughly that you'll cry like a grot that just got its toe stomped!"
Dorn sneered.
He began his usual pre-fight barrage of trash talk, hoping to provoke the Savior so the man would not retreat.
"When you kneel helpless before me in a moment, you'll understand just how laughable your rebellion truly is..."
But as Dorn kept talking, it gradually started to feel off.
Because the Savior opposite him did not react in the slightest.
He did not even respond.
That composed gaze, that calm bearing, made Dorn look a little like some random mook shouting a challenge before battle.
He even started doubting his own ability to taunt and project menace.
There was nothing to be done. One of the great strengths of the Savior, the king of knockoffing both the galaxy and the warp, was that his skin was incredibly thick.
Even the Emperor's own trash-talk mode could not break his defense, much less the Lord of Ramparts. Dorn's level of verbal abuse was not even as good as Fulgrim's.
So naturally, it had no effect at all.
Dorn took a deep breath and stopped taunting.
In an instant, he exerted force and clenched his relic gauntlets, preparing to publicly hammer the Savior down with real strength.
He would make all the surrounding Imperial armed forces see the ugly face and cowardly nature of that ambitious schemer.
Then he would reverse the entire situation.
"Die, rebel!"
Before everyone's eyes, Dorn ignited the force field of his relic gauntlets and lunged at the Savior like a primordial beast.
The gale stirred by his fist seemed to solidify, as if a thousand tons of force were being hurled forward.
Even heavy vehicles and Titan war engines would struggle to endure such a terrifying blow.
As Dorn threw that heavy punch, his eyes remained locked on the Savior, ready to switch moves at any moment and seal off any avenue of evasion.
Yet he discovered that the Savior had no intention of dodging, nor any apparent strategy for countering him.
It looked as though he intended to take that full-force punch head-on.
His fist was about to smash into the Savior and flatten that gorgeous, hypocritical face.
"Did he get scared stupid?" Dorn thought.
After all, the Savior was not a true primarch.
Perhaps he was only a power-hungry schemer putting on a false front, using religion and public opinion to manufacture an invincible image for himself.
Even so, Dorn remained alert, lest the Savior seize some opening to counterattack.
All of this happened within milliseconds.
In the eyes of ordinary people, the interval would have been too brief to notice.
But within a primarch's perception, that tiny slice of time was drawn out long enough for countless calculations and feints.
Even so, the Savior still stood there with his hands clasped behind his back, not even assuming a combat posture.
He simply watched the thousand-ton fist rushing toward his face, as though he were about to be blasted away in the next instant.
Buzz.
Then, in the next moment, Dorn realized the Savior had lit up.
He lit up?!
What???
Caught completely off guard, Dorn was hit in the eyes by dense, layered, overlapping force-field light pollution.
Out of the corner of his vision, he could vaguely make out the Savior's smile.
Then his fist struck what felt like an incomparably solid wall, and an immense force rebounded back into his own body.
Bang!
Dorn's heavy punch slammed into the Savior's multilayered folded force fields.
In the very next instant, he was blasted backward by the backlash of his own power and bounced across the ground several times.
Several deep craters were smashed out where he landed.
His full-power punch had not even broken the Savior's defenses.
The scene was extremely awkward.
The Savior's multiple layers of force fields had reached a staggering level, enough to stop the vast majority of attacks.
One could only call it lavish.
That was the power of throwing money at the problem.
Dorn climbed back to his feet and took a deep breath.
Bastard. He was actually this cautious, loading himself up with so many relic-grade force fields?
This battle was not going to be easy. He would have to treat it carefully.
"Don't think this means you're safe. No matter how many force fields you have, they will break eventually."
Dorn ground out the words through clenched teeth.
The moment the Savior's multilayered fields had deployed, he had already begun searching for flaws in their defense.
Even relic-grade force fields could not withstand a primarch's sustained assault forever.
That last strike of his had already destroyed several layers of deflection fields.
Haah!
The ground caved in beneath him as Dorn gathered force and turned into an afterimage, charging once more.
Yet in the next moment, his instincts screamed a warning as a burning black shadow crashed down from above.
It blocked his path.
Another streak of fire fell. A drop pod smashed down between the two of them, and the force field it released once again blocked the Lord of Ramparts' assault.
It was an airdrop platform controlled by the Machine Goddess, capable of precisely delivering drop pods into the target zone.
"Who said this was all the force fields I had?"
Eden finally spoke.
He moved his body and stepped into the drop pod. Its outer force-armored shell stood like a shield, blocking the howling stubborn mule.
Elegant. Far too elegant.
???
"Rebel!
You won't be able to hide for long!"
Dorn froze for a moment, then launched into another frenzied barrage, tearing into the drop pod's armor in an attempt to seize the traitorous Savior inside.
Yet the moment he ripped the pod open, all he saw was pitch-black heavy armor, and then his vision went black.
That was the Savior's big gun: an electro-plasma mechanical warhammer that smashed directly into Dorn's face, leaving him dizzy and reeling.
"Sometimes knowing how to fight is not enough. Resources and backing matter too..."
Eden spoke slowly.
At that moment, he was covered in the latest model of blackstone exoskeletal armor. Inside the armor were mounted a great many relic-grade force fields and weapons, radiating pure menace.
Using the drop pod fitting platform, he had fully refreshed his defenses and then landed another brutal critical hit on the stubborn mule.
After Eden crowd-controlled and hammered Dorn a few times, the other man finally recovered enough to roar in anger and strike back.
The two figures unleashed a violent storm throughout the entire area. Even the aftershocks of their battle were enough to kill.
Mountainsides, buildings, and defensive gun platforms all began to bear huge scars, collapsing one after another.
The Iron Warriors were on the verge of tears. The Savior and the Lord of Ramparts had chosen to fight right inside their engineering zone, and the shadow of bankruptcy now hung over everything.
Very quickly, Dorn once more destroyed the Savior's armor, and even the remaining force fields were on the verge of collapse.
That made some of the watching soldiers start to worry.
Because next, the Lord of Ramparts would finally be able to strike the Savior's true body.
"Hah. Mere equipment can never triumph over a resilient body and an unyielding will!"
Blood hanging from his nostrils and wounds covering him from head to toe, Dorn's momentum did not diminish. He knew the time had come to reverse the battle.
His attacks grew even more ferocious. He tore off the mechanical limb of an engineering Titan and used it as a club, smashing the Savior's armor apart.
Eden could naturally sense the danger too, and his brows furrowed.
That stubborn mule had fully entered berserk mode. If his armor and force fields were destroyed, he would probably take a few punches to the face.
Even so, he was not particularly worried.
He had plenty of equipment.
A few seconds later, another drop pod descended. Eden calmly stepped inside to swap into fresh external armaments and force-field units.
Outside, the furious roars and pounding blows of the stubborn mule continued. Fortunately, the man could not break through the defensive armor for the time being.
As everyone knew, changing gear and transforming came with invincibility frames.
Of course, that was mainly because the drop pod itself also had extremely high-strength armor and force fields.
Under the control of the Machine Goddess, Eden's rearmoring speed was astonishingly fast. In no time at all, he reappeared in full-health condition.
Then came another round of brutal hammering. Dorn howled as he was beaten, and even the power gauntlets on his hands were smashed apart.
"This is a method utterly devoid of honor!"
Dorn was so furious he felt numb, his entire body trembling. Never in his life had he fought such an utterly humiliating battle.
To put it simply, the Lord of Ramparts had struggled desperately for half the fight, yet had not even managed to scratch the enemy.
All he had done was get beaten.
Or rather, he had never managed to break through the other man's defense at all. He had not even seen the health bar. What greater disgrace could there be?
"Sorry. When you have resources, you really can do whatever you want. That too is part of strength."
As if he had read Dorn's mind, Eden said exactly that.
A direct critical hit to the spirit.
He wanted to beat this stubborn mule into submission in one go, to show him what real ferocity looked like.
That way, during future cooperation, Dorn would stop locking horns with him over every little thing or criticizing his development strategy.
Fortunately, Dorn did not know psyker sorcery or other bizarre methods. Otherwise, it would not have been so easy to use pure equipment advantage to pound him into the ground.
There would have been no way to clear the fight without taking damage, nor produce a shock factor this strong.
As a bonus, Eden could also test the newest blackstone equipment and collect data.
From beginning to end, Eden had barely spent any of his own strength.
He was fighting almost entirely through his gear.
In his view, human effort would always run dry, but machines would not. Machines also had a steady reserve of backup power and could channel greater force through engines.
If they could not, then the only reason was that not enough resources had been poured in and the technology was not yet good enough.
Eden hammered the stubborn mule again and again. The battle was so intense that the entire mountain peak cracked apart and was ground into ruin.
By the time he had changed into his thirteenth external armor set, the other man finally could not hold on any longer.
"D... damn it..."
Dorn's face was pale. Every muscle in his body twitched with exhaustion.
It felt to him as if he had been attacking an impregnable wall-fortress, and the helplessness was overwhelming.
That Savior, that Emperor of the Imperium, was so hateful, so shameless. Dorn had gone all out, yet still could not win.
The Imperial Fists watching nearby were overwhelmed with sympathy. Tears welled in the eyes of those hard men. Compared to their adoptive father, their gene-father still came up short.
Even more despairing was the fact that Dorn had not managed to hit the Savior's true body even once.
He could not even break through the armor's defenses.
It was as if the man possessed endless armor and endless force fields.
Perhaps that was the true art of defense.
"Father, I have failed."
Dorn gazed toward the Palace's distant dome, and his body could no longer support itself.
He was completely drained. His legs gave out and he dropped to his knees with a smack, just as he had mocked the Savior earlier.
Helpless.
The Lord of Ramparts wriggled as he tried to stand again, but he had long since exhausted every last bit of his strength in that savage battle.
Before he could even rise, he lost consciousness completely.
"Call the Hospitaller Sisters."
Eden walked over to inspect Dorn, bound him with blackstone shackles, and then fed a bit of life energy into his body.
Just in case the injuries were too severe.
After that, he summoned medical sisters to treat him.
And while they were at it, he had them administer some ultra-high-strength anesthetic so Dorn would remain in a state where resistance was nearly impossible.
There was no telling when the Emperor might awaken, so it was better to keep the stubborn mule restrained for now.
The stubborn mule was one of the staunchest loyalists. His intentions were good. He had simply botched the matter.
Beating him thoroughly was enough. Going any further would only hurt the bond between the primarchs and the Imperium.
Besides, the stubborn mule excelled at building fortress walls and defensive lines, and he could still provide tremendous support to the Imperium.
Not long after, Dorn slowly recovered under the care of the medical sisters and gradually opened his eyes.
He tried to struggle free of the blackstone shackles on his body, only to realize that his muscles had lost all strength.
There was nothing he could do.
The Savior Biologis Institute had long been researching high-strength anesthetics capable of affecting primarchs, primarily intended as sleeping medication for the Savior himself.
But because the Savior's physical qualities were simply too overwhelming, those same sedatives could also be used to restrain other primarchs, so long as the dosage was increased.
Dorn realized he had been completely defeated. He no longer possessed the power to turn the tables.
The choice now lay with the Savior.
Most likely, no one in the Imperium could restrain or check him anymore.
All Dorn could do was pray that the Savior truly was loyal, and did not harbor ambitions of false sainthood, heresy, or rebellion.
The Lord of Ramparts slowly lifted his head, and saw the Savior's warm smile.
For some reason, that smile no longer seemed quite so hateful.
"Stubborn... ahem. You no longer have the capital to oppose this. Accept it."
Eden raised a hand and patted Dorn on the shoulder, using an authority that eased negative emotions.
Then he patiently told him, "But you do not need to worry or be afraid. The Golden Throne and the Emperor are perfectly safe. There is no problem at all.
Before long, I will take you to meet him in person."
Eden let out a long sigh and began going through the usual steps.
"The Emperor always spoke to me about you. He said you were his most loyal son, the solid wall of the Imperium.
He has long hoped that you would return to defend the Imperium."
He had already used similar lines on several other primarchs before.
The tactic worked every time.
At best, one could call it a well-intentioned lie.
Then Eden switched into full PUA mode, carrying a hint of disappointed frustration.
"Ah, ten thousand years have passed. So many dangers arose in that time, yet you never once came back to look in on the Golden Throne.
And now that you do return, you make a huge scene right outside the Emperor's Palace, smashing things up, harming Imperial unity, and damaging so many defensive lines..."
His words were half true and half false. He occupied the moral high ground, sounded deeply sincere, and wrapped it all in the Emperor's fatherly love.
The Lord of Ramparts could not help lowering his head in guilt.
"Look.
That's the area you just destroyed. Chaos corruption is leaking out all over the place. It's extremely dangerous.
If the Chaos Gods were to..."
Eden continued the PUA, pointing toward the Iron Warriors' construction zone.
But in the very next moment, his brow tightened sharply as psychic warnings screamed through his senses.
Oh no. Did a warp rift really appear?!
A tremendous roar followed immediately. The construction zone looked like a pot exploding open, with corrupt energies running wild...
(End of Chapter)
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