Dust and fog were rising, and spider webs were everywhere. Karas raised his feet, and a light layer of dust covered his helmet boots.
The long-stagnant engine started running again, the humming sound was like an ancient giant whale, and layers of white mist hit the huge ship.
At the foot of the giant ship, the dead trees that had grown over the years were broken like small branches. On the deck, warriors in armor that were either bloated and rotten or thin and as thin as bones walked hurriedly, starting the ship instead of the crew members who had died long ago.
“Woo—”
The Endurance, stranded in the garden mud, began to move slowly.
Karas breathed a sigh of relief. In the observatory, the star-calculating platform designed and built by the Pale Lord himself began to move. The course and time were correct.
A long sob sounded in his ears, and Karas didn't want to tell whether it was Nurgle's or Elsa's.
Except for the Pale Lord, they are all too cowardly.
When Karas thought of this, he felt relieved. The delicate balance that lasted for thousands of years was finally broken by two alien gods. Nurgle could no longer imprison his so-called beloved son.
"put!!!"
Karas roared, and the Death Guard's last black missiles in stock were released as a parting gift to the dilapidated garden. Smoke and dust rose not far from the giant ship, and the edge of the garden became darker.
Washed away by the white fog, the Endurance slowly sailed away from here.
it's over…
Karas took another deep breath. In total, 490,000 troops, as well as hundreds of millions of auxiliary troops and wise men followed the army, were used up. In the end, only a few ships of warriors... 70,000... most of them were obviously mutated.
Even fewer mortals survived, and only strong believers related to the god of death barely survived, less than a hundred people.
Silent white mist surged up from the cracks in the corridor, gently gathering around him. Karas felt the pain all over his body, as if he had been run over, ease a little. Mortarion distributed his strength to his believers -
However, Karas is not sure whether this is just a painkiller or has a healing effect.
It doesn't matter.
Karas looked up, toward the ceiling. The Pale Lord had locked himself away, and he needed to prepare to return to the physical world—perhaps he would try to make himself less scary, or maybe not.
… … … …
…
Tiredness, pain, despair.
die.
monster.
With his bone-like fingertips stained with alien blood, Mortarion squatted on the ground and patiently drew the numbers required for the ritual on the ground. The words written in blood were like chains, or like the limbs of a living spider, locking the prey in the center of the array.
His wings hung to the ground like a tattered cloak, with patterns like screaming skulls shrieking between them.
7665678… Mortarion wrote, his eyelashes fluttering,
[Quiet.]
He said, looking up at the sacrifice nailed to the floor, Mortarion needed some of the power of [Life], or at least weaken Aisha a little so that the prisoners would not escape easily.
Tears flowed, and Mortarion increased his speed. The Eldar's Goddess of Life loved to cry, and her tears had the function of strengthening herself. Digging out her eyes could not stop her crying, although Mortarion tried.
[alright…]
The Pale Lord stood up, walked to the center of the altar, and grasped the black stone spear that was stuck in the ground - the polarity was positive.
+May I… +
A faint whisper sounded, like the soft tone of Barbarus, but distorted like the hum of a garden, and the spell that could control the power of Nurgle was a variation of Barbarus's language - all of this was no coincidence.
The spell lit up, the whole hall flickered, the sacrifice whimpered, but was soon submerged by the white mist.
The rustling sound of growth was heard.
Tender yellow new shoots emerged from the cracks in the bone-like armor, vines drooped, pink new flesh grew, and quickly climbed up the insect-like shell to form muscles and skin—
—A puff of white mist blew out from between Mortarion’s mask.
The scorched yellow climbed up the leaf buds, the vines curled up and withered, the grayish-white rotten tissue fluid oozed out of the newly grown muscles, and the body of the Pale Lord shook.
Mortarion still held the spear tightly, the light flickered, and his hand slowly loosened its grip on the spear. The ritual ended and the mist quickly dissipated like the tide.
Failed.
Mortarion coughed and looked at Aisha. The Eldar god had fainted.
Unbearable... Death is inherently opposed to rebirth.
He needs to find someone else, Mortarion breathed. This result did not surprise him. The Primarch himself could not imagine himself in charge of [Life]. He was not obsessed with life.
Mortarion's mind searched for his brother... Perhaps Vulkan could try.
Giving up the attempt, Mortarion turned and sat back on the bench, slumped and weary.
Mortarion raised his hand and looked at his bony hand, which looked like insect limbs.
He took seven deep breaths... Back, back... Pluto was in the Solar System.
He hoped that when Hades saw him for the first time, he would not mistake him for an alien.
… When did he become so much like Guilliman? Such optimism.
Maybe he shouldn't go back to the physical world.
The physical universe is not too welcoming to a subspace existence, although he has a way to get through it, it just requires some cost.
Mortarion's hazy green eyes blinked, and he silently calculated in his mind. He thought of the beheaded Dark Eldar. The Emperor took action, but the Pale Lord hid well - his past stubbornness protected him well.
Terra... The Emperor, the Emperor, Hades... Mortarion found it difficult to imagine the coexistence of these three, but the numbers told him that they formed a delicate balance.
The gas mask spewed out white mist again.
Go back, go back... No matter what, the Pale Lord needs to return. Since no one among his brothers is willing to return first, he will return on his own initiative.
Humanity needs help, and he needs to see his old friend.
Mortarion was silent for a moment, and he looked at his hands again.
…
Instead of despairing, perhaps he should prepare in advance for an escape route in case Hades goes berserk when he sees him.
The Pale Lord laughed desperately.
His old friend had finally become a xenos atop Mount Barbarus. Mortarion felt despair, but he still existed, continued to exist... and refused to leave.
After all, his long-cherished wish has not been fulfilled, and after all, he prides himself on being tenacious.
7… Mortarion looked at Aisha who was struggling slightly beside him, and he knew something was wrong.
He needs to abide by the laws of the warp.
The subspace has its own unique order, the first one should be 6, then 7...
No... the first one is not necessarily 6...
Mortarion fell silent, but he still remembered his wish.
At least two... He thought, to fulfill their wish back then.
Hope the other person still remembers the promises made in the past.
… Hopefully he will return as a human.
… … … … … …
[School of Athens]1.1 update.
First, Hades cruelly restricted the forum traffic of each sage. They could not dump garbage on the forum without limit, which put too much pressure on the main server.
But he still maintained the hierarchy, and the higher the level, the more traffic.
Another change is that Hades' level has been increased to 14. He still underestimated the sages, and his combat power expanded a little too quickly.
Five months after the establishment of the Academy of Athens, Hades received not only an avalanche of low- and medium-level technologies, but also a lot of technologies lost in the Golden Age.
Some of the technologies were not even understood by the Sage himself, so he uploaded them directly to the Academy of Athens, wanting to see how the technology in his hands could be rated.
In short, use the School of Athens as a free valuation system, or if you want to see if there is a complete version of this technology.
In this way, a lot of low- and medium-level technologies were received, but very few high-level ones. However, many incomplete papers were received for the highest level that exceeded the high level - because the sages were not clear about the value of the technology in their hands.
Hades was greatly shocked by this.
This actually added a lot of work to him. In addition to government affairs review, Hades began to work with the sages to complete these extremely valuable technologies, such as the general cannon, the super giant virus that can devour an entire star region, and the trajectory change of stars and planets...
Speaking of the Necrons, the application of the [Athens Academy] also brought unexpected surprises. Hades discovered a very small amount of Necromancer technology among the large amount of uploaded technology. Following the clues, Hades found a sage who was keen on innovation.
This unremarkable sage, who possessed some Necron technology, came from the infamous forge world Acheron VIII and was fortunate enough to be on the same ship as Cawl.
α3 Alina, with the help of Kaul, Hades successfully found her. After simple communication (coercion and inducement) and the charm of reputation, Hades obtained a loyal sage.
This sage is extremely skilled at grave digging and has his own set of tomb-robbing techniques. He likes to dig up the tombs of the Necrons beneath jungle planets.
So far, she has successfully excavated the tomb worlds of no less than four small dynasties.
Although according to the sage, only one of the worlds involved deep excavation - only because she was convinced that due to natural reasons, the automatic soul of this small dynasty had some problems, so that the Necrons could not be revived normally, and the planet became a dead star.
This also became the reason why α3 Alina was exposed to Hades' gaze.
Deep in this small dynasty, under the coffin where the Necron Lord was placed, α3 Alina forced her 654tapeh into the socket under the coffin and forcibly downloaded a piece of data from the Necrons using four different communication protocols.
This garbled code was not successfully deciphered by the sage, and was forgotten by the sage over a long period of time. Finally, the sage determined it to be a piece of waste code.
With the mentality of just gaining some experience so that she could go to the forum and argue with the sages who believe that technology is supreme, α3 Alina uploaded this "junk code" to the [Athens Academy].
And was successfully discovered by Hades.
With just one glance, Hades judged the value of this code—this was a lord-level control protocol.
"So, Great Om Messiah... what does this mean?"
α3 Alina stood in front of Hades and asked hesitantly.
Hades was silent. He realized that there were always talented people among humans, but these talented people might not realize what they had done.
“This means,”
Hades said slowly,
"After finding the key corresponding to the corresponding dynasty and breaking through the firewall of the automaton spirit - this agreement will allow us to gain lord-level control and take over the lower-level armies of the Necrons."
The female sage also fell into a long silence. After a long while, she spoke again carefully and meaningfully.
"My Lord, I think the first two points are difficult to achieve?"
Hades was silent again.
If he wasn't here, then breaking the Necrons' keys would be difficult for the humans, but he was here - he had the knowledge of the void dragons, and breaking the keys and breaching the firewalls... given enough time, it wouldn't be particularly difficult.
My Lord, this is blasphemy.
This opened a new door for Hades, but even a pragmatist like Hades found it a little unacceptable.
... command an army of undead
In fact, in the world of Necrons, there is a world called the [Isolated World]. This is a world that is automatically managed by automatic machine souls. Due to various reasons, the minds of the space lords here have been destroyed, unable to wake up from hibernation, and unable to realize the advanced functions in the program.
The consciousness of the Necrons has been completely deleted here.
But the time for revival has come, so the automatic spirits that cannot find their managers will mechanically awaken the Necrons, and imitate the actions of their former overlords, leading the Necrons to expand.
This proves one thing, that is, the Necrons' army does not depend on who commands it.
They "obey" the orders of the automatic soul, or in other words, the drive of the program.
Low-level Necrons do not possess advanced functional minds, do not have their own personality or soul, and only know how to accept orders from the Machine Soul.
So... if someone intervenes in the automatic soul manually at this time, inputs the management agreement, and lets the automatic soul confirm the new manager.
Hades looked at the timid sage in front of him and felt that he had opened the door to a new world.
Hades is brainstorming.
No, Hades thought, the empire’s strength was unstable now and this could not be exposed rashly.
Each dynasty has its own unique key. Cracking the key for an entire dynasty requires at least one automaton spirit on the Tomb World, while breaking through the firewall requires real-time operations.
Hades thought that if he wanted to increase his leverage in the war against the Necrons, he should now increase the number of Dynasty Keys in his possession.
He thought of the gravediggers of the Death Guard.
There is a group of Death Guard technical sergeants who specialize in digging graves of the dead, but perhaps because of the guidance of Hades ten thousand years ago, the Death Guards are not as wild as the Sages, who directly connect their machines to the machine soul system of the Necrons.
This also means missing the opportunity to discover the management agreement.
It's time to form a new tomb raiding team, Hades thought. It would be best if they had a small number of people, quietly, without guns, to dig up the tombs of the dead and find the key...
Although doing so might be unfair to the King of Figures, Hades would rather owe the King of Figures something.
"α3 Alina, I have a mission for you."
Hades said seriously, "Next you need to connect with the Death Guard's technical sergeant."
… … … … …
"Are you happy lately?"
Makado said, calmly placing a piece on the chessboard. Hades, who was sitting opposite him, rubbed his chin in a pretentious manner.
Then a hearty smile appeared on the corner of his mouth, which was harder to suppress than a grenade launcher.
Fortunately, he was wearing a mask at the moment, hiding his image-destroying smile.
"I think of happy things."
Hades also moved his black piece, and Malcador stared at the chessboard numbly - another bad piece, this kid's heart was not here at all.
Hades has contacted Mortarion...
Malcador thought, he felt the approaching power of annihilation, but he was ultimately unable to stop it... Did the Pale Lord notice his true identity? Perhaps not, but that did not affect...
As the final piece of the puzzle, the Tuchucha engine is about to be found.
Damn the Eldar... He couldn't be impatient now.
Makado thought, picking up the white piece,
"I know you are anxious,"
Malcador said, and Hades' smile grew wider.
"Did you guess it, Lao Ma? I thought you didn't care..."
…of the oil man.
Hades was stunned. He felt the approaching spiritual energy. He subconsciously raised his head and stared at the tightly closed door.
Malcador sighed, threw down the chess piece in his hand, and stood up. "I have been keeping an eye on the garden for you. Now that he is back, I will not disturb you any more."
Hades looked up blankly.
"ah?"
Wasn't it news that he had found the Necrons' control protocols?!
Wait?! Who's back?! ! !
Without waiting for Hades to react, the short and treacherous minister immediately left through the side door. The door slammed shut and Hades stood up suddenly.
He hurried to the gate and saw the surging fog in the black area. The spiritual energy content seemed to be a bit too high. Hades subconsciously felt that something was wrong.
Although he asked Vox and Old Mo every day like a time-telling bird when they would come back to share the hardships, the news he got was always soon.
Hades had no hope of that.
But - but - what is that?!
Hades' pupils trembled, he didn't expect it to be so sloppy and easy, just like Vox at that time, well, he should have been mentally prepared.
According to common sense, Hades should open the door directly, give his good brother a warm welcome ceremony, and randomly perform a cheerful gorilla dance.
But Hades just stood at the door, his hand on the door handle not daring to exert any force.
The spiritual energy also stopped on the other side of the door.
Death, despair, and extinction, Hades felt these three forces.
White mist diffused in from the crack in the door.
Hades took a deep breath, adjusted his facial expression, and suddenly opened the door.
"Hey! Die-"
Inhuman shadows and mist descended, and Hades' words became stuck in his throat.
[Long time no see,] Mortarion said tiredly. The God of Death looked at the frozen Hades, with mountains of wrinkles piled up at the corners of his eyes. Mortarion took a long breath and patted Hades' shoulder armor.
Mortarion passed Hades and sat naturally on the only Primarch-sized chair in the room. He sat there, staring at Hades.
[I'm so tired.]
Mortarion said, not surprised to see Hades turn stiffly.
"Motar-Motarion?!"
(End of this chapter)