Emperor's Bane

Chapter 845: There is always a flame that refuses to go out

We made mistakes.

The Emperor has sent down His punishment.

The ruthless fate and cruel butchers have forced everyone into a desperate situation.

But after that.

It is ourselves who have truly destroyed the Legion and the world.

-

Motep was perhaps the first of Magnus's sons still alive to realize these simple truths.

After all, true Thousand Sons would never admit that they had made a mistake. They would only bow their heads before their Primarch, but often the Primarch's accusations would not make them return to the right path: the Sixth School that was quietly wiped out before Nikaea was the best proof of this.

(The sixth school, the Star Falcon School, tried to summon and bind the Warp Demons during the Great Crusade in the original book, and actually achieved phased results. Even Magnus thought they were too extreme and banned them, but there are still active members.)
It is said that some core members of the Star Falcon School are still wandering around and have even escaped the pursuit of the Imperial Legion.

Because the Primarch had exiled them decades ago and wiped them one by one from the Legion's service rolls, no one knew where they were or what they were doing.

Perhaps: they too are waiting for the chance to return to Prospero?

With the allies they once claimed they could find in the depths of the Warp?
Motep didn't care about these street rumors. The situation of the Thousand Sons Legion had already become as bad as it could not be. Even if those exiled battle brothers really caused some big problems in the outside world, what was there to be afraid of?
You can't scare a dying man: especially a dying man with no worries.

Thinking of this, a wonderful sense of optimism surged in Motep's heart.

His limbs regained strength and he stumbled up from the floor, brushing off the dust on his body and letting it pile on the ground. When he walked over, it was as if he was stepping on a carpet of very bad quality.

Motep was not surprised by all this.

As early as when he first visited, this place was already in this horrible state, and his condition was no better than this house: at that time, he had lost almost everything he had, his subordinates and confidants were dead or fled, and his past glory was torn apart by the betrayal of his brothers, making him a walking corpse in the city of Tizca.

If he hadn't received help from those people later, he would have died directly in that dark alley: just like the other senior officers of the Cang Yue.

He remembered clearly: that was the tenth year since the Emperor issued the punishment order.

It was also the beginning of all nightmares.

Motep walked to the fifth floor of this luxurious single-family building. The external balcony here was the best vantage point he could find: holding on to the bullet-riddled railings, he could look out over the pitch-black city of Tizca under the moonlight, and the never-ending smoke and flames on the streets.

The sound of gunfire came from farther away, while curses and groans echoed at his feet.

In the dim moonlight and the huge shadow cast by the Imperial fleet, all evil seemed to be encouraged. Brothers pointed their swords at each other in front of the monument where they once swore an oath side by side, and corrupt armies massacred the people they were supposed to protect on the once prosperous streets.

The majestic snow-white pyramids once shone brightly under the scorching sun of Prospero. They were a symbol of the prosperity of Magnus and the Thousand Sons Legion, and should have been a symbol of the city that combined purity and whiteness.

But today, these iconic structures of Tizca have been tarnished, fully half destroyed in the civil strife of the past decade, while the remaining half have undergone the most vicious transformation, with all the snow-white marble removed and the smooth surface now covered with turrets and gun barrels.

The most powerful warlords in Tizca would use the remaining pyramids as their headquarters, watching their men fighting in the shadows of the streets, vying for the borders marked by rooms and crossroads: hundreds or thousands of lives were lost in each battle, but rarely a Thousand Sons warrior died in it.

The pyramids that once belonged to the five major factions are now occupied by their descendants. The owners of the fortresses often have unfamiliar names, because most of them are middle-level officers with little fame in the original legions. The disappearance of the primarch and superiors gave them the opportunity to dominate this abandoned land.

These former minor characters have now given themselves titles such as Captain, Leader, Templar Lecturer or simply Primarch's Assistant. The honorary titles are as complicated as the stars in the sky: even in the most difficult times, the Thousand Sons will not give up their inherent arrogance and ingenuity, even though these are what destroyed them.

But these crowns in ashes often do not have a stable owner, because the power struggle within the pyramids is equally bloody: in the chaos of recent years, except for an unknown young man named Kayan who was able to occupy a pyramid for a long time by relying on his cunning and wisdom, the rest of the magnificent buildings have changed countless owners.

And further away, core buildings that were crucial to the Legion period, such as the House of Tenabri, Attunos, the Hall of Erudition, the Valpan Fortress and the Sacred Mountain, were also stationed with chapters or warbands centered around dozens or hundreds of Thousand Sons warriors, and their condition was no better than those in the pyramids.

The only two areas that remained pure in this chaos were the Primarch Magnus's Pyramid of Light and the Legion's Great Library: the former was a deterrent for ambitious people, and to this day no one would want to destroy its splendor, as it served more as an open negotiation venue, open to every self-proclaimed leader.

As for the latter, it was just the opposite: the nature of the Thousand Sons Legion made them regard knowledge as a strategic material far more important than weapons and food from the moment the split began. The competition for the library was the most brutal. This peaceful place that originally carried wisdom and hope was completely reduced to ashes and engulfed in flames on the ninth day after the split.

No one knows how many books and taboos originally sealed by the Primarch were abducted by someone during this period, but in recent years, countless Thousand Sons soldiers have tried to awaken their psychic powers or unlock the damn shackles around their necks. These efforts all revolve around the terrible forbidden books. Perhaps only God knows where they got them from.

God may know.

But Motep didn't care about the answer.

He cared about almost nothing: he didn't even care about the Civil War.

He was just like the dwindling Imperial Inspectorate fleets above his head, silent and ruthless about everything on this land. Without orders from higher up, they were even unwilling to set foot in the city of Tizca.

And how could he care: after all, he had seen how the Civil War began.

He still remembered that it was the tenth year since the Emperor's punishment order was officially issued, and the ninth year since the two Primarchs left: as the main forces of the Astartes and the Imperial Guards gradually left Prospaedo's low-Earth orbit to carry out more important tasks in their eyes, the supervision of the city of Tizca was essentially weakened.

They were still not allowed to leave the city, but the Imperial Army's surveillance of the city walls had been reduced by several levels: at the beginning, ships would come down regularly and randomly pick up a group of Thousand Sons warriors to participate in what they called an expedition to atone for the Legion.

But a few years later, no one knew what happened during these expeditions, and the Empire never took similar actions again. They seemed to have changed their plans and did not intend to let the Thousand Sons warriors leave Prospero again, as if they were some dangerous potential bombs, and the best fate was to starve to death here.

Motep could vaguely guess that the reason why Terra still tolerated their existence instead of directly dropping a few extermination orders on this damn desert was simply because there were still eyes in the galaxy watching this land.

Perhaps it was Horus, the wolf-god, or some other Primarch, who occasionally worried about the plight of the Thousand Sons, watching with concern what would happen to their brother legion at the hands of Terra: these concerns were precisely why the Thousand Sons survived.

But beyond that, any guarantees about quality of life were false. Terra was consciously weakening them, using cruel reality and crazy situations to reduce the combat potential of the XVth Legion to the lowest level: to facilitate their final solution in the future.

The Thousand Sons are still alive, but that's all they can do.

Apart from this, everything has been swallowed up by the countdown to destruction: the destruction of the psychic energy collection array means that the people of Prospero can no longer enjoy the leisurely life of having everything provided for them. Although the survival of the underground hydroponic system prevents famine, the huge sense of gap still causes unprecedented chaos.

Fortunately, the chaos in the city of Tizca broke out early enough, and the Thousand Sons Legion at that time was still able to unite as one: the remaining officers led the soldiers, used a combination of kindness and force to quell the chaos among the people, and barely established a stable system.

Magnus's people gave up their leisurely life and had to return to the harsh real world. Silks and satins were replaced by linen and straw sandals, and their boastful and cheerful smiles were replaced by chapped lips and calluses from gripping farm tools.

As for the exploration of psychic energy, it was abandoned the fastest. The former city of Tizca was a holy place where even a three-year-old child could actively explore the warp under guidance. However, the new generation can only follow their parents, learning to work in the fields or polish parts. The beauty of the warp is getting farther and farther away from them and no longer exists.

Soon people died, first those Warp Scholars whose heavy reliance on psychic powers affected their physical health, then those hedonists who had lived a life of luxury, and all those fragile people who were unable to fight for survival in the difficult new era.

Mothers stopped raising children, births plummeted, and the elderly died younger and younger: a few years after the Emperor had inflicted his punishment, Tizca, with a touch of dark humor, had brought population and need back into balance.

At that moment, everyone breathed a sigh of relief, as if the suffering was about to end, and all that was left was to endure patiently until the return of the Primarch: at least that was what Motep thought, and so did most of the people of Tizca.

But he was wrong: and so were most of the people on Prospero.

They had miscalculated one thing: the meanness hidden in the heart of the Thousand Sons.

As the survival crisis that they had to face together gradually disappeared, the remaining officers and veterans of the Thousand Sons Legion began to think about a more realistic question: who among them should take over those vacant positions, those powers that had lost their masters, and those who were qualified to enter the Great Library and the Primarch's residence to acquire more knowledge?
Obviously, not many people can be selfless on these issues.

What the world may not know is that in addition to their thirst for psychic power and knowledge, the Thousand Sons Legion has another distinctive label: they are perhaps one of the legions most keen on internal struggles among all the Astartes.

You can even remove [one of].

Of course, internal strife is common in every legion, but the internal strife of the Thousand Sons Legion is particularly special: it is more brutal, more sophisticated, more worthwhile to invest in, and there are more seeded players ready to enter at any time.

While the Dawnbreakers fought for their Mother's favor and regard, the Emperor's Children fought to boast more honors, and the Word Bearers yearned to prove their purity of faith, the situation of the Thousand Sons was more complicated.

At the most extreme moment, the power struggle inherent in the Fifteenth Legion forced even the Primarch Magnus to reconsider: the Thousand Sons Legion's system is complex and decentralized, and power is like a pile of loose sand with no centralization at all, and it is completely centered around Magnus himself.

During the Great Crusade, the Thousand Sons' power struggle was known to never end, with no side being able to gain even a temporary advantage. On the Legion's flagship, the seats assigned to each company commander by the Primarch were movable, because they needed to compete for the position closest to the Primarch Magnus at all times through their psychic strength and power.

(A little-known fact: the Thousand Sons Legion in the original novel fell apart almost immediately after the Burning of Prospero and their escape to the Sorcerer Planet. A considerable number of them did not even participate in the Siege of Terra. The World Eaters and the Emperor's Children, who were also known for their disorganization, at least persisted through the Heresy until Khârn's indiscriminate massacre on the planet Skarathrex completely tore the two legions apart.)
This situation even spread to the auxiliary forces of the Thousand Sons. In the Spire Guard alone, there were at least thirteen independent arms groups and headquarters, which were not subordinate to each other at all: the situation of the Legion itself was an example.

In this situation, after losing the Primarch who could have suppressed everything, as well as almost all senior officers, the future of the Fifteenth Legion seemed foreseeable.

In order to compete for power, knowledge, and control of the remaining areas of Tizca, the increasingly brutal power struggle became more and more intense after the survival crisis was resolved. When rumors, slander, factionalism, and even assassinations and poisoning could not satisfy the officers and leaders whose desire for power was growing, fighting seemed to be the only viable answer.

No one knows which two groups of brother troops were the first to trample on their oath and pour explosives on each other, but what is certain is that it happened one night: in the absence of means of communication, the sudden gunshots triggered chaos that swept the entire city.

Before dawn, the Thousand Sons Legion, which had barely survived, collapsed and split into dozens of combat groups that obeyed officers and powerful figures. They constantly tore apart and devoured smaller forces: such as Motep and his subordinates who were unwilling to surrender.

The fleet commander's men became the first victims of the brutal struggle. After he stumbled away from the center of the city, he witnessed with his own eyes how the subsequent brutal fighting pushed the city of Tizca into the abyss.

The chaotic command system and the mutual struggle among the Astartes dragged the minaret guards, who were able to barely maintain the situation, into mutual killing. Soldiers took to the streets and shot at citizens and comrades. All it took was a looting to turn the originally disciplined troops into a group of chaotic bandits. Once such a disaster started, there was no possibility of recovery.

Underground hydroponic systems and ports that could provide food became the focus of competition, and these competitions themselves seriously damaged the food supply that was already barely maintained in the city of Tizca: when the Thousand Sons could no longer provide enough food for the spire guards loyal to them, the most loyal soldiers would sneak into the old city and find their own way to survive in the chaotic city.

In just a few years, the former Fifteenth Legion had completely collapsed, and no one wanted to reorganize it, because that would mean surrendering to their opponents: the cruel reality and the collapse of ideals burned along with the ruined city of Tizca, until more people died of war than of famine.

Meanwhile, Motep had been huddled in his dusty old house, down a long-burned street from a former Spire Guard that had run amok: they had stormed into the Old City, the Silver District, and the Acropolis like others, mortal officers who ruled like kings among the poor folk, their small kingdoms often comprising only a block or two.

In superstructures such as the city center, the palace area and the blue district, there are hundreds of Thousand Sons groups of all sizes. Most of them also remotely control the various mortal forces in the lower city. The endless fighting between them and the increasing blood feuds have made the desire to reunite the legion no longer mentioned by anyone.

Gone with it was the oath of allegiance to the Emperor and the Imperium.

In the air, it seemed that only the name of the Primarch Magnus could still barely float in the wind.

The surviving Thousand Sons and Spire Guards chewed on the names of the Lord of Mankind and other legions in tones of hatred. They thought of themselves as people who had been abandoned and ignored, and called themselves Bruno and Galileo who were persecuted by mediocre people. They frantically sought ways to regain their psychic powers, and engraved the desire for revenge in their hearts.

Here, loyalty to the Empire fades faster than hope for the future.

No one will be loyal anymore: the Empire has proven that they are not worthy of loyalty.

Only the most foolish person would continue to keep the oath he made after going through all these hardships: that damn oath!

No one will do that anymore.

……

------

No.

Maybe.

Will there be?

……

It really will happen.

Motep withdrew his gaze, slowly left the balcony that made him sad, and disappeared into the darkness of the house again, out of the sight of those increasingly crazy Thousand Sons warriors: in a corner where no one knew, the fleet commander quietly hid his existence.

Just like everyone else.

He was silent, surviving, and waiting quietly in the shadows. Survival and hope were no longer the driving force that supported him. The only reason that allowed him to keep breathing was the words written on a crumpled piece of paper hidden in his shoulder armor.

He didn't know who the note was from: nor did he care to answer the question.

He only remembered that night, when his troops were ambushed and killed by their fellow Thousand Sons fighting brothers, and when he stumbled into a dead end and could only listen in despair to the footsteps of his pursuers, a group of invisible people rescued him.

They lurked in the shadows, speaking to each other in a language he could not understand.

He seemed to have heard someone say something like this: Ahriman, perhaps? He could not remember.

But when he woke up, he found that he had been placed in this house, with the most basic living supplies and this note around him.

There were only a few sentences on it. After several years of thinking and studying, Motep had already memorized them. He had carefully considered the deeper meaning behind them and listed hundreds and thousands of possible solutions: but in the end, he chose to simply comply with the above requirements.

survive.

wait.

silence.

Stay hopeful…and faithful.

……

The note asked him to do this: and wrote their return at the end.

He will come back.

He would return, and lead the newborn Thousand Sons Legion into a new future.

Their proudest warrior, the most valued son of the Primarch, the one most people would only remember his name and denounce as a scum and a traitor: the one Motep had fought alongside and was willing to believe that he was still alive and would still come back.

"Ahriman."

In the shadows, the fleet commander who had lost everything whispered the name, his gray pupils gleaming.

"Are you still alive?"

"How come you are still alive..."

He didn't say anything, his footsteps and figure disappeared at the end of the room, hiding the rest of his thoughts in his heart.

In the heart that only he knows.

------

He didn't know how many of them there were, he didn't know how many people in the shadows had received the same instructions and requests as himself, he didn't know how many comrades he had: but he knew that they had never left.

Those people, they had been lurking in the shadows and chaos of Tizca, they and Motep had been waiting for that moment.

Waiting for an answer.

The one who waits: the one named Ahriman.

If that man was still alive, if he really chose to come back, if he really believed that he was still a part of the Legion, he was willing to take on his responsibilities as a battle-brother, he was willing to shoulder this dead world.

Then... he would wait.

He would wait until he came back, he would wait for him to come before him, he would wait until he told the truth about it all, and his reasons: in return, he would listen to his desires.

Could Motep guess what that craving was?
Just as he could have guessed: if Ahriman really stood before him, if Ahriman really brought the Emperor's orders, if Ahriman really asked him to recall the oath he had sworn on Terra hundreds of years ago, the oath when the Thousand Sons Legion was first formed.

If he really does that.

……

Well, he would do the same.

He will remember, and he will say: he will not forget the loyalty he once swore, even in the kingdom of ashes, even if he has to endure the most painful fifty years, even if his loyalty throws him into darkness, into despair where he cannot see his hand in front of him.

but……

There is always a flame that refuses to go out.

There is always a flame that will continue to burn.

There is always a flame, no matter what he will give or what he will get.

And this flame...

Its name is the oath.

It's called responsibility.

Its name is...loyalty.

(End of this chapter)