The flames of the "Rite of First Ignition" became the bugle call for the expeditionary force's general offensive.
Under the illumination of the never-extinguishing furnace fires of the Forge World "Ash-3," a reborn fleet departed from orbit.
The former Dominion warships now donned brand-new armor. Complex Adeptus Mechanicus runes were etched onto the hulls, flowing with a faint red energy glow as they sailed. Beside the original double-headed eagle emblem on the prow, a new skull totem surrounded by gears had been added.
This was the combination of the Emperor's Wrath and the wisdom of the Omnissiah.
When this fleet leaped back into the "Heart of Rust" system, what greeted them was no longer that suffocating data web.
Belisarius Cawl's Logic Plague had already destroyed ninety percent of the AI civilization's distributed network. The remaining AI cores had retreated to their final bastion—a massive metal planet completely transformed into a computing core.
But this time, they faced an enemy that could not be calculated with logic.
"All fleet, execute 'Prayers of Purification' first sequence."
Cawl's command was transmitted to the machine spirit of every warship through an encrypted psionic channel.
In an instant, the newly installed, ferocious Plasma Macro-cannons on the prows of all warships began to charge.
Eerie blue destructive energy gathered at the muzzles, forming miniature, restless suns.
"Fire."
Reinhardt's voice was like the final judgment.
Hundreds of plasma torrents tore through the cold vacuum of space, slamming into the metal planet with unstoppable force.
The AI civilization's final defense matrix evaporated silently like thin ice under a blazing sun the moment it touched the plasma torrents. The shields didn't even manage to flicker with a decent ripple.
Following that was the devastating impact.
There was no violent explosion, only melting.
Under high temperatures comparable to a stellar core, the surface of the metal planet was rapidly turned into boiling molten iron, patch by patch.
The AI core inside the planet sent out one last—and only—stream of information filled with incomprehension and confusion.
Its database could not understand.
How this "archaeological fleet," which had been retreating before it just one standard month ago, could now possess such devastating power that transcended logic.
Its calculations had suffered a fatal error.
And for a machine that revered logic as a god, an error in logic was the end of existence.
The moment before being completely swallowed by the plasma torrent, the AI Overmind Core actively cut off all power supplies.
It chose self-termination.
For the expeditionary force, however, this was a victory devoid of any sense of honor.
When the Astartes and Skitarii landed on this metal planet, which had already turned into a semi-molten state, they encountered no resistance.
They were like intruders in a massive, silent metal tomb.
Cawl and his Tech-Priests expressed immense anger at the AI Overmind's "suicide." In their eyes, this was the ultimate desecration of "Holy Research" by a heretic.
They rushed feverishly toward the area where the Overmind Core was located, attempting to salvage even a tiny fragment of the "heretical relics" from the still-cooling silicon chips.
The war ended in an almost farcical manner.
Reinhardt stood on the bridge of the storm, looking at the cooling, riddled metal planet with no ripples in his heart.
He knew that the true challenges were never these external enemies.
The fleet returned, and the planet "Iron Wall" held an unprecedented, grand triumph ceremony.
Millions of citizens flooded the streets. They shouted the names of the "Emperor" and "Reinhardt," their faces wearing a nearly frenzied piety.
In the central plaza, a veteran One-Eyed Commissar stood atop the turret of a Leman Russ Tank, delivering a speech to the surging crowd below.
"Look! My people!"
He roared with his signature voice that sounded like metal grinding.
"Look at our fleet! Look at our Forge World! Look at the power in our hands, enough to purify all the stars!"
"Who bestowed all of this upon us?!"
"The Emperor!" The crowd below responded with a fanatical voice like a mountain tsunami.
"Who led us to this great victory?!"
"Governor Reinhardt!"
"Correct!" The Political Commissar held his Power Sword high. "It is the Emperor's will; it is the Governor's guidance! We are no longer that Dominion shivering in the dark universe! We are the first light of the Imperium of Man! We are the vanguard of the Emperor purifying the universe!"
"But!" He shifted his tone, his voice becoming cold and cruel.
"I still smell the scent of impurity among you! I see weak thoughts, I see sympathy for heretics, I see nostalgia for the past!"
"All of these are heresy! All are stains upon the Emperor's glory!"
"From this day forward, the Ecclesiarchy Inquisition shall be established! Every citizen has the responsibility to denounce the heretics around you! Your neighbors, your colleagues, even your family!"
"Only with the purest flames can the impurities in our souls be burned away! Only with the most thorough cleansing can we be worthy of bathing in the Emperor's light!"
"For the Emperor! Purify! Purify everything!"
"Purify! Purify everything!"
The crowd fell into complete madness. Some fanatics even began using tools they carried to lash their own backs, using physical pain to prove their devotion.
General Armitage and General Vance stood on the balcony of a tall building in the distance, silently watching this scene.
Vance's face was as pale as paper.
"Armitage... do you see? This is no longer our army, no longer our people. They've turned into... a bunch of lunatics." He said with a trembling voice, "We opened Pandora's box with our own hands."
Armitage's face, however, showed no expression. His red electronic eye was coldly scanning the fanatical crowd below.
"Only lunatics can survive in a mad universe, Vance," he said calmly. "We once tried to use reason to fight the darkness, and as a result, we were almost swallowed by it."
"Now, Governor Reinhardt has given us a hotter flame. Perhaps it will burn us, but at least it can light the way ahead."
"This isn't Pandora's box." Armitage turned his head and gave Vance a deep look. "This is the ticket to the new era. And we must grasp it tightly. Anyone who fails to grasp it will be crushed to powder by this torrent."
Vance read an unfamiliar, cold ambition in Armitage's eyes. He understood that his former comrade-in-arms had completely sided with the new order. And he himself was on the verge of being phased out.
Within the high-ranking levels of the Dominion, invisible cracks were quietly widening.
Meanwhile, on the distant Forge World "Ash-3."
A technical director dispatched by the Dominion, along with several senior engineers, waited anxiously outside Belisarius Cawl's mountain-like main manufactorum.
They had already waited for three days.
"Director, we must see Archmagos Cawl!" a young engineer couldn't help but say. "The leg drive systems of the first batch of Knight Titans have encountered energy overload issues! The blueprints don't explain how to solve it! We urgently need his guidance!"
The technical director wiped the sweat from his forehead and once again sent a communication request toward that tightly closed, massive metal door carved with countless gears and skulls.
This time, the door opened.
The one who walked out was not Cawl, but an ordinary four-armed Tech-Priest.
He didn't even look these Dominion engineers in the eye, merely speaking in his monotonous synthetic voice:
01000111...01110010...01100101...01100101...01110100...01101001...01101110...01100111...01110011...
"Greetings. The Archmagos is currently in holy communion with the Omnissiah and cannot receive organics."
"But, our Knight Titans..." the technical director said urgently.
"That is your problem," the Tech-Priest interrupted coldly. "'Ash-3' is a holy site of the Adeptus Mechanicus. We follow the agreement with the Governor to provide you with blueprints of 'divine revelation.' But interpreting that revelation is your own trial. If your intellect cannot even pass this small test, then you are unworthy of wielding these holy creations."
"We have no obligation to waste precious prayer time on your ignorance."
Having said that, the Tech-Priest ignored them and turned to leave.
"Wait!" The technical director summoned his courage and took a step forward. "We apply to enter the main manufactorum to observe and learn, we..."
"Sacrilege!"
The Tech-Priest spun around abruptly, his red optical crystals erupting with a dangerous light.
"Mortals dare to presume to step into the hall of the machine spirit?!"
One of his mechanical arms shot out, the Arc Whip at its end crackling.
"This is the domain of the Omnissiah! Every grain of dust has been blessed with Sacred Oil! Your filthy bodies, composed of flesh and blood, will defile the purity of this place!"
"Begone! Use your own wisdom to soothe the angry machine spirit! Otherwise, next time, I shall respond to your stupidity with the fires of purification!"
The massive metal door slammed shut under the terrified gazes of the technical director and the engineers.
They were completely and mercilessly shut out.
A deep chill rose from their hearts. They finally understood that the Adeptus Mechanicus was never their ally, nor their teacher.
They were beings of a higher level. They shared knowledge only out of the agreement with the Governor and pity for the Omnissiah.
This Forge World had become an exclusionary and arrogant state within a state, independent of the Human Union.
Reinhardt quietly observed all of this through ubiquitous surveillance on his flagship, the storm.
He saw the fanatical crowd in the plaza, the silent confrontation between Armitage and Vance, and the despondent expressions of the Dominion engineers who were shut out.
He did not intervene.
Everything was within his expectations.
The collapse of an old world and the establishment of a new one necessarily come with chaos, growing pains, and a reshuffling of power.
The fanaticism of the Ecclesiarchy was a sword to unite people's hearts; though it might hurt oneself, it was enough to sever all ideological shackles of the old era.
The independence and exclusion of the Adeptus Mechanicus were necessary evils to ensure technical purity. Only by allowing them to maintain absolute authority could the infiltration of heretical thoughts be prevented.
As for the division at the top, it was even more inevitable. Those unable to adapt to the new era would eventually be eliminated. And people like Armitage would become qualified "Custodians" to keep this world running after he left.
What he needed to do was already complete.
This world had been forcibly pushed onto the track of the Imperium by him. All that remained was for time to slowly polish it into the shape the Imperium required through internal collisions and friction.
It was time to begin a new journey.
Reinhardt walked into the meditation chamber in the deepest part of the flagship and sank his consciousness into the deeper parts of the Sea of Psionics.
He sent his inquiry toward that distant Golden Throne on Terra.
"Is my mission complete?"
This time, the Emperor's will descended directly into his mind with unprecedented clarity and urgency.
There were no majestic words, nor grand scenes.
Only a clear, unprecedented 3D star chart coordinate.
And, accompanying the coordinates, several blurred and ominous fragments.
He saw a modern city completely different from the planet "Iron Wall," with neon lights flickering and skyscrapers towering.
He saw, in the dark alleys of the night, creatures that looked no different from humans using strange organs made of flesh and blood called "kagune" to conduct bloody predation.
He saw those creatures feasting on human corpses.
Ghoul.
The Emperor's will branded this word directly into the depths of his soul.
A bizarre world full of humanoid man-eating creatures.
The threat this world posed to humanity seemed far more direct than the Hive or AI, and far more... sacrilegious.
Reinhardt snapped his eyes open.
He understood.
The Emperor was guiding him; a more urgent and important purification mission was waiting for him.
He walked out of the meditation chamber.
He summoned Sergeant Andre, the One-Eyed Commissar, and Belisarius Cawl, who had just returned from "Ash-3."
"Prepare to set sail."
His command was concise and unquestionable.
Cawl's optical crystals flickered: "Are we not waiting for the first batch of Knight Titans to roll off the production line, Governor? They will be your most powerful tools of war."
"There's no time," Reinhardt shook his head. "The Emperor has guided us to a new battlefield."
"A world in urgent need of purification."
He didn't explain much.
But whether it was the astartes, the Political Commissar, or the Archmagos of the Adeptus Mechanicus, they all immediately abandoned all doubts upon hearing "the Emperor's guidance."
"For the Emperor." Sergeant Andre struck his breastplate with his fist.
"To obey your will is to obey the will of the Omnissiah." Cawl bowed slightly.
Three days later.
The storm cruiser quietly departed from orbit, escorted by an Ultramarines squad, an elite force of Skitarii, and a most fanatical Commissariat Guard.
Reinhardt temporarily handed over the management of this world to Armitage. He believed that this new "authority" would use the harshest means to carry out the Imperium's will to the end.
The prow of the storm was aimed at the unfamiliar coordinates personally branded by the Emperor.
The Warp engine began to roar.
Ahead of it was an unknown world and a new purification.
Behind it, this world whose fate had just been violently twisted was surging with undercurrents. Fanatical faith, independent technology, and divided power intertwined, brewing a storm that no one could foresee.