Chapter 445 – What Will the Imperium of Man Become…?
Ever since the Imperium issued the edict of Prohibition of Passage—the order to lock down entire star domains—every administrative department voiced their "refusal" at the first opportunity. Yet it wasn't truly because they were concerned about shortages of supplies.
It was because the lockdown cut directly into their interests.
During the transport of Imperial resources, countless planetary governors engaged in resale and profiteering. Once the passages were sealed and travel was banned, many "complications" would arise—chief among them, a drastic fall in their personal profits.
Some governors had just sold off their own stockpiles of resources and were waiting for the next shipment to flip; others had warehouses full of near-expired food that needed to be dumped onto the market before it spoiled. If the lockdown was enforced, their hands would be tied, and they would be left holding the losses themselves.
Thus, even at such a critical juncture, there was no shortage of short-sighted fools willing to take risks—such as Hector, the governor of Fenris.
> "I'll repeat myself one last time—I will never agree to lock down the Fenris system's star domain! If you have the ability, then bring Horus here and let him discuss it with our Primarch!"
Hector shouted at Chisaji fox with brazen arrogance. The words left Chisaji fox simmering with anger. If the Universal Megacorp hadn't yet to fully take over the Imperium of Man, he would have gladly put a round through this pompous bureaucrat's skull.
> "Governor, from what I know, during your term you've done much for Fenris—harvesting marine resources, smelting metals, promoting Imperial education, transporting supplies…"
Suddenly, Chisaji fox changed his tone, abandoning the subject of the lockdown and instead praising Hector's accomplishments.
Hector arched a brow, uncertain what this was about. Truthfully, achieving such "merits" on Fenris was not difficult.
After all, Hector was born from a native Fenrisian tribe himself, with natural ties to the locals. Fenris was also rich in resources, particularly metals. Unless a governor was a complete idiot, results here would never look too bad.
But weren't they talking about sealing off the star domain? What did this have to do with unrelated praise?
Hector sneered. So what if The Megacorp pressed him? Fenris was the territory of the Space Wolves, and behind him stood both the Emperor and Primarch Leman Russ.
Even if the chief director of the New Warp Route Project came in person, he would have to obey his word!
Stop him from making money? Impossible!
> "I've heard that you deliberately hoarded certain supplies, waiting to resell them at high prices to colonies on the brink of collapse… lining your own pockets in the process.
> Fenris may be overflowing with wealth, but in other sectors Imperial citizens are so starved they trade children for food. Why is it that your so-called 'aid' seems to make others poorer with every year that passes?"
Chisaji fox's tone was calm, deliberate. On the way here, he had already dispatched MegaMegacorp intelligence agents to thoroughly investigate Hector's dealings. Over the years, Hector had frequently abused the name of "aid relief" to extort other colonies.
He would deliberately delay shipments, funnel food and supplies into the black market, forcing locals to buy at exorbitant prices. Only after wringing their purses dry would he finally release official aid shipments.
Thus, he fed on both ends: draining the wallets of desperate citizens and pocketing Imperial subsidies.
This two-faced operation had worked for Hector time and again, amassing a mountain of wealth and resources for himself and Fenris.
As for Primarch Russ—he simply feigned ignorance. What Primarch didn't have his own "private industries"? So long as there was no sorcery or contact with the Warp involved, the Imperium hardly bothered with such petty corruption.
Confronted with Chisaji fox's words, Hector froze for a moment, but quickly recovered, slamming his fist on the table.
> "What are you implying? Do you mean to accuse me of embezzlement?
> I've done countless good deeds for the people of Fenris! This world grows stronger and richer by the day. Its sons are the finest recruits for the Imperial armies!
> My contributions to the Imperium are plain for all to see!"
He wasn't lying—Hector had indeed turned Fenris, once a barren and bitter land, into a prosperous resource hub. Its people, hardened by nature, were prime candidates for Astartes recruitment.
But that was only half the truth. Fenris' prosperity had been built entirely upon sucking dry the lifeblood of neighboring colonies.
> "I never accused you of embezzlement. I merely find it strange… why do all the sectors supposedly 'aided' by Fenris grow ever poorer? Why do their people's lives worsen each year?"
Chisaji fox pressed harder, steering Hector exactly where he didn't want to go. Accompanying him were Terra's officials—ready to lodge formal charges should Hector attempt to evade the question.
Hector stiffened. Though Fenris was frozen and bitter, sweat now beaded on his brow.
> "I don't know what you're talking about."
He forced his voice steady, shamelessly retorting:
> "If other sectors suffer, how is that my fault? Blame those incompetent governors—it's their ineptitude that leaves people starving, not anything I've done.
> Instead of questioning those useless drunks, you come here to slander me, a loyal servant of the Imperium. Isn't that ridiculous?"
The longer he spoke, the more he convinced himself. Hector even looked Chisaji fox straight in the eye, wearing the composure of the self-righteous.
Chisaji fox couldn't help but laugh at the absurdity. He had rarely seen a bureaucrat so brazen.
In the Megacorp,such parasites would have long since been strapped into a bio-reactor, their flesh reduced to fodder and their fragmented consciousnesses milked by the Matrix until nothing remained.
With testimony from neighboring governors and the evidence they provided, Chisaji fox already had Hector dead to rights. Under his schemes, colonies had not collapsed outright, but the people lived on animal feed and scraps, gaunt as corpses.
With Hector leeching them dry, it was said of the surrounding colonies: too far from the Emperor, too close to Fenris.
Horus loathed corruption such as this with a passion—but the cruel irony was that it always sprouted within their own ranks. After all, Primarchs themselves were members of the elite, beneficiaries of the very system.
Fenris, as Russ's domain, enjoyed enormous autonomy. With a word, Russ could smooth away any difficulty. And Russ had no interest in politics; as long as Hector funneled resources into the Space Wolves' war machine, he was a "loyal minister of state."
Thus, Hector dared to act without fear.
But he knew full well this was a shameful weakness. If Chisaji fox truly pushed, if he sought justice for Imperial citizens, Hector's position would collapse.
> "Governor Hector, I'll leave it at that. You now have half an hour to consider. I expect that by then we will receive notice of your cooperation with the Megacorp in locking down the Fenris system."
Chisaji fox's meaning could not have been clearer.
Surely Hector didn't want these skeletons dragged before Horus? At this moment, Horus was building his authority by lopping the heads off corrupt officials.
He could not kill Russ, his brother—but Hector's head would serve just as well.
With those words, Chisaji fox turned and departed, his retinue following, leaving Hector glaring venomously after them.
For a fleeting moment, Hector wanted to have Chisaji fox assassinated. But he quickly realized: if he did, he would only hasten his own destruction.
Chisaji fox was the chief director of the New Warp Route Project. If he died, the Imperium and the Megacorp would both demand justice. The entire population of Fenris would be forced to pay the price.
Now that Chisaji fox held his darkest secrets in his hands, Hector had no choice but to comply.
> "Forget it. A wise man bows to circumstance. If I make a little less, so be it."
Hector sighed.
This matter was neither too small nor too large—but if Chisaji fox reported it to Horus, and added the crime of obstructing the Route Project, Hector's fate would likely be worse than death: to be reduced to a servitor.
A punishment crueler than the grave.
Before long, Hector activated the planetary communications system, ordering all departments to cooperate with the Megacorp and enforce the blockade of the Fenris system. All starship traffic was henceforth forbidden.
Similar scenes continued to play out across the vast territories of the Imperium.
Local Imperial bureaucrats and planetary governors would come up with all sorts of excuses to resist the attempts of Universal Megacorp to blockade star systems. But without exception, those Megacorps silenced them with incriminating evidence.
Only a rare handful of hardliners were dragged to Terra early and publicly executed. The rest of the governors all became "cooperative" and transformed into staunch supporters of the MegaMegacorps.
The progress of the New Warp Route project was far faster than Chisaji Fox had anticipated.
But within the Imperial Palace on Terra, Horus was being crushed beneath a torrent of bureaucratic troubles, leaving him utterly exasperated.
"Damn it! The more I deal with these affairs, the more they pile up…!"
In the Regent's chambers of the Imperium, Horus sat before a long table buried beneath books, reports, and stacks of documents. His once-luxurious silk robes were now disheveled and wrinkled after days of relentless toil.
In recent days, he had first dismissed a host of High Lords, replaced them with his own confidants, and begun sweeping reforms.
His first move was to punish corruption severely, arresting the venal officials who plagued the Imperium.
Yet his thunderous declarations achieved little more than a drizzle. Horus unleashed one fierce offensive after another, but the campaign barely caused a ripple.
Few corrupt officials were actually caught. Worse still, his wave of dismissals and replacements caused the machinery of Imperial administration to seize up and stall.
Without the assistance of the High Lords, Horus was left to shoulder the burden of governance alone—but the flood of paperwork was enough to wear even him down.
Within less than half a month, Horus was forced to recall the very High Lords he had dismissed, letting them once again handle civilian administration.
It was humiliating, like slapping his own face—but better that than watching the Imperium collapse. The Emperor had entrusted the realm to him; he could not be the one to ruin it.
"If it were only about appointing a Warmaster, fine—but why make me Regent of the Imperium too? What a fool I was to accept!" Horus groaned, his head pounding with regret.
Until now, he had thought that being Regent would be simple—just weigh in on key issues, give his opinion, and the officials beneath him would obey.
Anyone who didn't obey could be executed.
During the Great Crusade, Horus had seen countless Imperial bureaucrats operate like this—delegate everything, let their subordinates handle the work, then sit back and wait for results.
But when it was his turn, things were entirely different.
In truth, Horus wasn't wrong. But he had overestimated the Imperial bureaucracy. Without AI assistance, the Imperium's governance was woefully inefficient and archaic.
Many critical decisions required Horus's direct intervention.
Absolute centralization meant absolute responsibility.
The lesser lords and governors could afford to be useless because their territories were small—most matters could simply be reported upward, leaving Terra to devise a solution. All they had to do was follow orders.
If granted autonomy, it was even easier: seize control of the military, delegate civilian governance down the chain, and punish subordinates when failures occurred. If rebellion broke out, a rabble of peasants could hardly defeat the professional Imperial armies.
The classic example was Russ's Fenris: Russ cared only for war and feasting, while Hectorhandled governance. Even without political talent, the world still prospered and thrived.
But Horus's case was different.
Terra was the very heart of the Imperium. Every minor tremor here triggered a chain reaction throughout the galaxy.
If Horus so much as slacked off for a single day, the backlog of petitions and documents would double by the next.
"Sigh… Without Father and Malcador, who knows what would become of the Imperium!" Horus muttered bitterly.
By now, after these grueling days, he had come to understand the true lifeblood of the Imperium.
The reforms he had envisioned—cutting down corrupt officials and giving peace to the people—were utterly impossible.
For one, his investigations revealed that many of these corrupt bureaucrats served the Primarchs directly. Even some of his own Legion commanders had them as subordinates.
Remove those officials, and his brothers would immediately suffer shortages and administrative breakdowns.
Killing them would inevitably sour relations with his Primarch brothers—perhaps even turn them into enemies.
That ran completely counter to the promise Horus had made to the Emperor: to keep his brothers united and marching together.
Worse still, these corrupt officials and power-hungry nobles occupied vital positions. Remove them, and the already fragile bureaucracy would collapse entirely.
Having already experienced the nightmare of having no one capable to rely on, Horus no longer dared to dismiss the High Lords or senior officials so recklessly. Otherwise, he risked shattering the Imperium with his own hands.
Thus, the corrupt could neither be executed nor removed.
As worthless as they seemed, they were still valuable resources—among the rare few who were actually competent.
The Imperium's educational resources were pitifully scarce; producing even a handful of clever minds was difficult. If he culled all the corrupt, he'd be left with only the simple, honest fools.
And Horus knew well the danger of such fools.
The petty schemes of a villain were nothing compared to the havoc wrought by the sudden "bright idea" of an idiot.
Weighing all the pros and cons, Horus was forced to abandon reform. His revolutionary zeal felt like an iron fist striking cotton—dissipated, powerless, and utterly gone.
Now, he was little more than another cog in the bureaucratic machine, much like Malcador had been. Simply keeping the half-dead Imperium moving was already a miracle.
Reform? Impossible. Out of the question.
"Sigh… Are all these governors useless? Can't they handle even trivial matters on their own? Must they dump everything on Terra, wasting everyone's time?"
Leafing through the mountains of reports, Horus found many were repetitive, low-quality trash, which only fueled his fury. He felt a strong urge to drag a few governors out and thrash them on the spot.
But buried among the garbage were matters of true urgency—cases that required his personal judgment, often involving the Primarchs themselves.
For example, supplies originally designated for a barren colony were diverted by a Primarch, claiming they were needed to train his Legion. The justification was solid, and the act shielded by higher authority.
But without those supplies, the colonists would starve. What should be done?
Or a planet under xenos invasion—or warped by daemonic corruption—that required an Imperial task force. Decisions like these could not be made locally.
Governors had no choice but to report upward, even if it meant delays and disaster. No one dared act without Terra's explicit orders.
Because in the Imperium, initiative meant liability. If your gamble succeeded, perhaps you'd be spared. But if you failed, punishment was inevitable.
This bureaucratic system was already the result of Infinity experiments and refinements by the Emperor and Malcador.
There was no further room for optimization. Any attempt at reform would only unbalance the delicate structure. If the "code" stopped running, the entire system would have to be torn down and rebuilt from scratch.
The Imperium was simply too vast.
Each day, countless events unfolded, countless crises arose. Without AI, the ceiling of Imperial bureaucracy was already reached.
Sitting in the Regent's throne, Horus finally understood the Emperor and Malcador's burden. Governance was never simple. The mental strain was no less demanding than commanding the most complex military campaigns.
(Show your support and read more chapters on my Patreon: [email protected]/psychopet. Thank you for your support!)