Corvus's question hung in the cold, sterile air of the empty Necron tomb, heavy with the weight of a shattered worldview. "What in the Emperor's holy name," he had asked, his voice a strained whisper, "are you?"
The remaining battle-brothers stood like statues of blue ceramite, their disciplined silence a mask for the storm of confusion and awe raging within them. They had faced the soulless, self-repairing legions of the Necrons before, on desperate battlefields where victory was measured in meters of ground and pyres of their own dead. They had just witnessed this polite, soft-spoken being dismantle them as easily as a child might knock over a set of blocks.
Rimuru met the Librarian's intense stare, his golden eyes holding not arrogance or malice, but a deep, placid empathy. He understood the question went far beyond mere curiosity. It was a plea for a single, definable concept to cling to in a universe that had suddenly become terrifyingly larger and more inexplicable than their rigid doctrines had ever allowed.
"I have already told you, Librarian Corvus," Rimuru said, his voice gentle. He took a small step back, deliberately making himself seem less imposing. "My name is Rimuru Tempest."
He paused, considering how to answer the unspoken part of the question. The what.
"I am the ruler of a nation," he continued, choosing his words with care. "A king, if you wish to use that title. My home is a federation of many different peoples who came together to build a peaceful life. The power I use is the power of a leader, wielded to protect them." He offered a small, almost apologetic smile. "I suppose you could say I am a monster who became a king."
The answer was both simple and impossibly complex. A king. A monster. A ruler of xenos. The terms were contradictory in the lexicon of the Imperium. A ruler commanded armies and fleets, not unraveled reality with a gesture. A monster was a thing to be purged, not a polite being who offered aid.
Sergeant Cassian stared, his jaw tight beneath his helmet. The conflict within him was a palpable force. His entire life, from the Schola Progenium to the Scout Cadres to the hallowed ranks of the Ultramarines, had been built on a foundation of absolute truths: Mankind was ascendant. The Emperor was God. The xenos was filth. The heretic was damned. This being, this 'king', fit nowhere. It had saved them, showed them courtesy, and wielded a power that made a mockery of their Chapter's might. His faith felt like a shield riddled with cracks.
Corvus, however, seized on a different part of the encounter. His mind, trained to analyze every scrap of intelligence, replayed the Necron Warden's final, synthesized words.
"'The Silent King will be notified of this irregularity'," the Librarian quoted, his voice low and grim. He looked at his brothers. "Do you understand what that means? That automaton was not a mere tomb guardian. It was part of the greater Necron dynasties, reporting to their supreme master." He turned his gaze back to Rimuru. "The Silent King is the ruler of the entire Necron race, an entity whose awakening has sent ripples of terror throughout the Segmentum. For his Tomb Warden to retreat, to deem a direct conflict illogical and report your presence to their highest authority… you have, in a single moment, placed yourself on the galactic stage as a power rivaling one of the Imperium's greatest existential threats."
Rimuru blinked, processing this. "Oh. Is he that important? I suppose that's… inconvenient."
His nonchalant response was so utterly at odds with the Librarian's grave pronouncement that it was almost comical. It spoke of a confidence so absolute that the politics of a galaxy-spanning empire of ancient murder-robots was little more than a potential scheduling conflict.
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You think? Rimuru replied internally, a hint of exasperation in his thoughts. One small, accidental trip through dimensions and I'm already on the watchlist of a galactic robot emperor. My luck is truly something else.
He clapped his hands together softly, bringing the focus back to the present. "Well, that's a problem for another day. We have a bargain to uphold, don't we? This Silent King isn't on this ship, but your Genestealer Patriarch is." He smiled kindly at Corvus. "Let's finish your mission. Then we can worry about galactic politics."
Corvus was taken aback by the being's focus. After a display that would have sent a Lord Inquisitor into a frenzy of panicked exterminatus orders, Rimuru was calmly steering them back to the original objective. It was a gesture that, more than anything, seemed to honor their agreement. It was… honorable.
"Yes," Corvus agreed, nodding slowly. "The mission remains." He turned to his men, his voice once again the steady boom of command. "You heard him. Form up. Our path is clear. We move to purge the Patriarch."
As they left the cold, empty tomb and re-entered the decaying, rust-streaked corridors of the Hulk, the dynamic of the group had fundamentally changed. The Ultramarines no longer saw Rimuru as a suspicious xenos to be tolerated. They now saw him as a cataclysmic power to be observed. Their steps were no longer just wary, but deferential. They walked in the shadow of a being who had treated a force of nature as an inconvenience, and they did not know whether to be grateful for his protection or terrified of his true potential.
They traveled in this new, tense silence for another hour, guided by Rimuru's unerring sense of direction. Finally, he held up a hand, bringing them to a halt before a vast, chasm-like opening that led into a cavernous bio-mechanical dome. The air was thick and humid, smelling of musk and alien ichor.
"We're here," Rimuru said, his expression hardening slightly as he focused on the chamber ahead. "The psychic presence of that Patriarch you mentioned is immense. It's like a beacon of pure, ravenous hunger." He looked at Corvus, his golden eyes serious. "And it knows we're coming."