The messages left in the Aeldari ruins deeply moved the pilgrims,
But it was only a brief interlude, not enough to distract them from their mission.
After a short rest, the group set out again, heading for Luna.
Datch had intended to ignore the golden question mark on his minimap, but it was like an itch he couldn't scratch, constantly nagging at his nerves.
As a completionist, he simply couldn't tolerate a question mark on the map.
"Might as well check it out—it's an eyesore otherwise."
Datch decided to go, hoping for some XP and maybe a rare item.
To avoid NPC attention, he bought a 3-day bamboo copter and a presence-reducing Pebble Hat from the in-game store.
[Item: Pebble Hat (1 day)] (TL: From Doraemon)
Effect: Wearing it lowers your presence—others will see you as just a roadside rock and ignore your actions.
[Review: "A must-have for social anxiety."]
Datch put on the Pebble Hat, attached the bamboo copter, and slipped away from the team while no one was watching.
Nobody noticed, and even if they did, they would subconsciously ignore him.
Only Guilliman spotted Datch leaving, but did nothing to stop him.
He trusted Datch enough to believe he would return at the crucial moment.
…
Elsewhere in the webway, low muttering echoed.
"The Imperium must know the truth."
"The Imperium must know the truth."
An injured Inquisitor staggered forward, clutching a wound.
Her name was Luce Spinoza, Interrogator to Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor Lord, Erasmus Crowl.
They had become entangled in a conspiracy involving the Emperor Himself.
Some time ago, during an investigation into a series of ritual murders linked to the "False Angel," Crowe discovered he had been played.
The so-called "False Angel" was just a retired old soldier,
who wanted to organize a militia to defend Terra's underhive, but was used as a scapegoat by others and labeled a cultist to draw attention.
The mastermind behind this was Adamara Rassilo, a radical Inquisitor from within the Ordo.
Rasylo used the "False Angel" as a decoy to quietly bring a Dark Eldar Haemonculus onto Terra,
intending to have him repair the failing Golden Throne.
With the Custodians' help, Spinoza and her allies dug deeper, discovering the scheme went beyond radical Inquisitors and implicated three High Lords:
Leops Franck, head of the Senatorum Imperialis,
Mars Fabricator-General Oud Oudia Raskian,
Rogue Trader representative Kania Dhanda.
All were involved and were the masterminds.
Yet, the deeper they investigated, the more complex things became.
What seemed like betrayal by the High Lords turned out to be desperate pragmatism—they only wanted the technology to repair the Golden Throne.
The Throne was becoming increasingly bloated and costly to maintain. Without urgent action, it would truly fail.
In their despair, they hatched a mad plan—to use Dark Eldar technology to fix the Throne.
Following this lead to Luna, Spinoza and her group found a Mechanicus-activated webway portal.
Once inside, they learned the Fabricator General and the others planned to trade the lives of 19 billion people from the system for spare parts to repair the Golden Throne.
Worse, the Custodians had been convinced to support the deal—after all, keeping the Golden Throne running was paramount.
But it was all a Dark Eldar scam.
Commorragh had also been invaded by daemons after the Great Rift opened.
To stop the endless tide of daemons and protect Commorragh,
the Dark Eldar tricked the Mechanicus into building a one-to-one replica of the Golden Throne in the webway.
But without a true king, the throne couldn't function.
So they set their sights on the Master of Mankind.
The real goal of the deal was to obtain a genetic sample from the Emperor—a drop of blood, a cell, or a chromosome.
With just a drop of blood or a few cells, they could create a knockoff Emperor to sit on the Dark Throne and make Commorragh great again.
At the last moment, Crowl saw through the scheme, stopped the deal, and ordered the Custodians to destroy all samples.
Naturally, this drew the Dark Eldar's wrath.
Spinoza, with the help of assassins and stormtroopers, escaped.
Now, alone and badly wounded,
her only thought was to report this to the Imperium, exposing the Dark Eldar's plot and warning all to beware of them.
"Aaaagh—!!"
A shriek of inhuman agony came from deep in the fog—the last of Spinoza's bodyguards.
Even the sound alone evoked the horror of their suffering.
Spinoza's heart raced, adrenaline surging past the pain as she ran faster, desperate to escape.
"Whizz!"
A tiny sound—a dart with a glowing green edge buried itself in her calf,
severing muscle and tendon. She grunted, collapsing into the thick mist.
Blood stained the ground as several ghostly figures leapt from the shadows, surrounding her with cold, dissecting eyes.
The leader stepped forward—a lean figure in a robe of leather and metal, long pale fingers gripping a surgical blade thin as a whisper.
"This could have been a win-win, but your stupidity ruined everything."
"You… will never succeed," Spinoza spat, reaching for her bolt pistol.
She was fast—but the Haemonculus was faster.
A flash of cold light and her hand was severed at the wrist, the gun falling to the ground.
"Give up your pointless struggle." The Haemonculus crouched, trailing his cold blade along Spinoza's bloodied face.
"You will experience pain beyond your species' imagination—terror and exquisite agony your kind has never known."
He savored the despair in her eyes, ready to create a masterpiece.
"For the Emperor, for the Dark Prince, for 36D!"
A giant figure in Terminator armor crashed down, chain sword roaring,
cleaving one Dark Eldar in two.
…