Although Hathor agreed to train the Ashen Knights Chapter at Alex's request, she did not dedicate her primary efforts to it. Each day, she only set aside a fixed two hours to guide new recruits in combat skills, devoting the rest of her time to more pressing matters.
Both Hathor and Alex understood clearly: the true foundation of an army's strength lay in efficient administration and robust logistical support, which were the cold lifeblood sustaining the Imperium's vast war machine.
The shouts of training on the Chapter's training grounds were far less frequent than the crisp clatter of abacus beads in the data chambers.
Over the years, Alex's Governor's office had been upgraded, becoming far more luxurious and imposing than before.
The walls, adorned with dark ebony carvings, gleamed with a faint light. Dark hardwood wainscoting, Imperial Aquilas, crimson carpets, and a painted dome depicting the Imperium's history made the place resemble a solemn palace.
Sunlight filtered through the stained-glass windows, casting scenes of the Great Crusade Era's battlefields onto the carpet.
Yet, at this moment, the palace was almost submerged by a sea of documents.
Mountains of parchment scrolls, flickering data-slates, and heavy tomes occupied the desk, side tables, and even low cabinets, forming precarious 'document towers' with the edges of the topmost reports already curled.
Data cables tangled and hung like vines, while holographic projections flickered above the paper piles, displaying constantly updated fleet deployment data—this unending torrent of information was the cold reality of governing a Sub-Sector.
At the heart of this 'paper mountain,' Hathor worked at an astonishing speed; the area in front of her was the only 'battlefield' that had been efficiently cleared.
Her amber-gold eyes, like precise scanning arrays, needed only a few lines to scan an open parchment budget report before her fingers, holding a pen, signed flowing and authoritative florid annotations.
Her left hand almost simultaneously picked up a data-slate, her fingertips rapidly gliding across the suspended interface, retrieving data, comparing, correcting, and annotating—the entire process took no longer than a mortal's single deep breath.
The freshly processed data-slate was precisely dropped into the 'processed' box, as her right hand already received an urgent report on a Forge World strike handed to her by a Servitor.
Her movements were without the slightest pause, flowing like a precise machine, her extraordinary brain, originating from a Gene-Seed Primarch, operating at full capacity, processing a vast amount of information and complex decisions that would take a mortal days or even weeks to sort through.
In this highly efficient and focused atmosphere, Hathor's gaze swept over a lengthy report concerning agricultural world crop failures and tithe adjustments, and the movement of her fingertips paused almost imperceptibly.
"I once underestimated mortals, and I once questioned the Imperium's heavy tithe... but now, I finally understand," she uttered a low sigh, her voice remarkably clear in the silent room.
She did not look up, her gaze still moving across key data: "Without billions of mortals sweating on Forge Worlds, digging deep in mines, toiling on farms, and silently turning within the vast and slow gears of the administrative machinery...
Without this seemingly endless taxation, which extracts the very marrow from every world, the Imperium would never have been able to launch the Great Crusade, let alone establish this colossal entity spanning the star seas."
She finally raised her eyes, her amber-gold pupils reflecting the mountains of tax reports.
Alex sat behind his large obsidian desk opposite her, the Imperial double-headed eagle etched on the desktop gleaming coldly.
He was reviewing a suspended holographic star map, marking complex fleet patrol routes and resource nodes.
Hearing her sigh, he looked up, the soft light illuminating his thoughtful expression and reflecting the equally piled, though slightly smaller, mountain of documents on his side—one of which was a half-open file marked with a red 'TOP SECRET' stamp.
"Because warriors cannot lay down their weapons to farm," Alex's voice was low and clear, his gaze passing over the piles of documents to rest on Hathor.
He put down the data-slate, and the holographic projection extinguished.
"And to let Astartes manage civil affairs..." He paused, his fingertips unconsciously brushing over the cold obsidian desktop, "They do possess that ability. An extraordinary brain, almost limitless energy, the ability to process vast amounts of information instantly... these are the cornerstones of an excellent administrator."
"But regrettably," he continued, his tone carrying the weight of history, "during the Great Crusade Era, only Guilliman truly transformed this potential into institutionalized power and implemented it across an entire Legion."
His eyes revealed a complex acknowledgment of that Primarch's unique talent.
Surrounded by these 'paper mountains' symbolizing the foundation of Imperial rule, discussing Guilliman's achievements in internal affairs carried exceptional weight: "The Thirteenth Legion pushed the Astartes' superhuman qualities to their extreme.
They used their extraordinary minds not just to deduce tactical sandboxes, but to handle the most complex and trivial civilian disputes, plan urban blueprints, and precisely allocate rations for tens of billions of people.
It was because of this that the Five Hundred Worlds of Macragge could possess such terrifying war potential—it was not just a powerful recruitment base, but a nearly perfect, self-sustaining and self-renewing core of a war engine."
"Yes," Hathor's gaze held a trace of recollection and a sharp re-evaluation, her pen tip briefly suspended, "At that time, 'Horus' perhaps only saw the powerful surface of Guilliman's internal affairs, but failed to delve into its roots."
Now, as Hathor, she was striving to dissect the mistakes 'Horus' had made.
Especially after Alex revealed to her political wisdom and profound analyses of class and interest relations that far surpassed the former Primarch's understanding, she realized with increasing clarity: "Whether it was Father or us Primarchs, in some aspects, we seemed... too naive. Perhaps among all of us, only Guilliman was truly mature, and closest to Father's initial expectations for us."
Her amber-gold eyes swept over a new report, her voice clearly audible amidst the piles of documents.
Looking back at the Great Crusade from the ruins of ten thousand years later, she had a completely different realization.
In response, Alex gazed at the silently rotating holographic star map: "For the Emperor of the Great Crusade Era, the purpose of the Gene-Seed Primarchs' existence was to conquer more worlds in the shortest possible time, to secure as many refuges for humanity as possible before the dark future fully descended.
Since the collapse of civilization in the Old Night, humanity's only chance for resurgence was when the Dark Prince's cry briefly tore open the Warp Storm that enveloped the galaxy."
His fingertip lightly tapped the desktop, as if striking a historical node.
"At that moment, Warp routes became viable again, and the Chaos Gods were temporarily preoccupied, allowing the Emperor to race against time to establish the Imperium and shelter the surviving remnants of humanity. It was precisely for this reason that he appeared so urgent—" His gaze deepened, looking beyond the painted dome, "Urgent to hope that you Primarchs could conquer more territory."
His words fell into the silence, broken only by the ticking of the grandfather clock.
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