Warhammer 40: Shattered Steel Soul

Chapter 455: The Holy Book of Nikea

One of the Primarchs is late, Robouti Guilliman concluded, counting the number of curtains that shone through the alcove-like compartments of the hall.

There are thirteen curtains with crimson eagle emblem gems hanging on them, and a faint golden light shining through from the inside - the distorted light and shields used to conceal the figures operate under pure technology in order to conceal the identities of the visitors in each box; if necessary, it is also enough to conceal their positions and allow everyone to speak freely.

In addition to the Warmaster Perturabo on the high rostrum, Horus Lupercal who was recuperating on Terra, and the two Primarchs Magnus and Mortarion who were standing in the center of the venue and talking freely, the locations of the seventeen Primarchs had been determined.

There is still one person who has not arrived.

The latecomers arrived silently.

At the sound of the intermission horn, when Magnus went down to the side of the stage and discussed some psychics' own topics with Chagatai and Riemann, a beam of light blocked by a black cloth quietly lit up in the compartment next to where Robert was.

Then, the curtain that concealed their identities was pulled open, allowing the legion representatives inside to look directly at the red carpet and sky eagle in the center of the Nikea venue.

And when Robouti Guilliman found a burning suit of armor with falling ash residue sitting quietly not far from him, his upper lip raised slightly in surprise.

After seeing the remaining golden words reflected by the occasional light on the face in the shadow, his surprise deepened quietly.

Lorgar Aurelion seemed to be aware of something and looked at his curtain, a silent gaze lingering on his still smooth facial skin.

"Brother Roboute Guilliman," Lorgar was the first to greet, in some intuitive way.

"Aurellion," Guilliman had to reply, and he politely drew aside the curtain. He could not help but read the changes in Lorgar as if he were reading a tome.

For many years, the Word Bearers and the Ultramarines have been at odds with each other. Roboute Guilliman has banned the practice of any religion in Ultramar, and the Word Bearers chose to stand idly by after a few nosy greetings.

However, to Guilliman's surprise, Lorgar himself spoke highly of him, and praised "the Lord of Ultramar's firm belief in the truth of the Empire" many times. This made Guilliman disagree, but he couldn't say it.

His voice was as broken as his appearance, which made his greeting a hoarse search.

A Word Bearers priest stood beside him, parallel to the Primarch. He was a stranger, with thin and bloodless cheeks. He looked less like a Word Bearers missionary and more like a victim of torture.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Robert," Lorgar said in a low voice, "Can you tell me how the meeting went today?"

"I can give you a copy of the minutes. It's nice to meet you, Aurelion." Guilliman nodded slightly to the warrior beside him and stood up from his chair. The two clerks stepped forward with the scrolls to match Guilliman's promise.

Luo Jia stared at him, his purple pupils sunken in his eye sockets, and his golden skin looked like a dry parchment roll, which was an illusion caused by him not having eaten or drunk anything for many days.

"Thank you, Robert," he said softly, pausing, "Is Perturabo's custodial meeting today?"

“Yesterday, too,” Guilliman said honestly.

Lorgar stared at him, as if trying to pry some deeper insight or opinion from him, until Perturabo called to him.

"I hear you coming, Lorgar Aurelion, come to my side," after the directional diffusion of the loudspeaker, the voice of Warmaster Perturabo reached him accurately.

Lorgar looked down, meeting Perturabo's eyes distantly, his silence unsettling Guilliman.

"You missed the oath," Guilliman reminded.

Lorgar disappeared into the shadows of the alcove, and soon appeared in the center of the theater below, walking across the polished marble floor and leaning under the statue of the eagle.

Perturabo walked toward him, accompanied by two acolytes brought from Terra. The speakers adjusted their frequencies, and hidden sound panels in the walls moved in sequence, ensuring that Lorgar Aurelion's oath was witnessed by all.

Perturabo stood on the steps, looking down at Lorgar. He held a familiar scepter in his palm, the Skyhawk Staff of the Imperial Chancellor. In his right hand he held an unfolded parchment.

“Dear brother: Today we gather here to discuss and solve the urgent governance issues facing the human empire, and to pursue unity and truth under the guidance of the Emperor. Are you willing to listen to him and his spokespersons with humility and awe? Are you willing to make decisions in accordance with his will with honesty and rationality?”

"I pledge my all, all I have learned, all I have sought, all I have believed. I acknowledge the Emperor as my only Lord, and I hope this meeting will be blessed and bear fruitful results."

Lorgar's oath came out of his mouth easily. For him, taking an oath was as easy as drinking water. However, few people knew that Lorgar could actually remember every word of his oath, and look through the unappreciated words to find the words worth analyzing in each oath.

"I bear witness to your oath in the name of the Emperor," Perturabo said, motioning for the acolyte to seal the parchment scroll inscribed with the oath he had recited and place it on the candlestick in front of the statue of the Emperor behind the rostrum, where it would be ignited by the electric spark.

Just as the acolyte was about to take the oath scroll away, Lorgar stepped forward and grasped the paper.

The wounds that had not healed for days were bleeding. He left his own red blood mark on the scroll and looked directly at Perturabo, his eyes telling of unspoken persistence.

Perturabo returned the look.

Around the platform, several Primarchs were drawn to the situation of Lorgar and Perturabo.

A crashing sound broke the silence in the theater, and Leman Russ raised his hands to apologize for bumping into the round table beside the stage. Today he also wore a wolf skin on his shoulders, but in a different way than Horus, the wolf's head was hung on his head as a scary and wild gray round hat, which added a hint of Fenris chill to his cheerful and awkward smile.

Lorgar released the acolyte and bowed once more to Perturabo.

A few minutes later, Guilliman watched as Aurelion reappeared in the compartment next to him. For some reason, Robouti Guilliman sighed inwardly.

The second half of the meeting was held under the chairmanship of Perturabo. During the two days of presentations, the requirements for the empire's psychic system had been basically determined. Magnus's psychic codex was officially named "Nikaean Codex" and would be gradually implemented throughout the area where the Astronomican could illuminate after corrections and revisions.

Now it was time for suggestions and questions. The Acolytes and Memoirists would faithfully note Guilliman's suggestions based on his theoretical knowledge and management experience.

Even with the shadow curtain blocking the view, he was sure that Magnus would recognize him as the one participating in the discussion. Magnus was certainly arrogant and strict, especially in academic matters, but it was definitely not the style of this imperial scholar to directly ask the questioner not to waste precious meeting time, and that he would come to discuss these issues alone after the meeting.

After him, another legion offered some useful advice.

"This is the psychic prohibition law that we have been experimenting with. If you are interested, we are willing to donate all our management experience to the Nikaea Conference. In addition, I support Magnus - if Mortarion is not always obsessed with keeping his guards 749 steps away from him, we will also support him."

Mortarion cast a gloomy glance toward the dark curtain, his pride in standing at the center of the Nikaea Conference allowing him to ignore the ridicule of others.

For this meeting, for the promise he had received from the Emperor one hundred and fifty years ago when he was still surviving on Barbarus, he had prepared for countless years, using countless compasses, cards, bone dice and abacus, even scripts, recordings and mirrors, to rehearse his words and actions and to ponder his decisions.

He walked seven steps around Magnus and said, "You cunning adviser, if you can only talk nonsense based on your own predetermined position, you should not join the discussion of complex issues at this moment." The shadow behind the curtain surged for a moment, and before it merged into silence, there seemed to be a laugh like a breeze in the rain.

On the stage, Mortarion was pacing slowly, looking at every curtain of shadow around him, his boots making crisp sounds on the ground to accompany his speech.

With resolute confidence, he recounts the disasters brought to countless worlds by uncontrolled psionic power, tells the story of the agricultural world seduced by ancient psionicists, the collapsed temples and the rebellious demons, the destruction and destruction brought about by the inability to give up witchcraft, and the struggle, the struggle within and without, and most tragically, the endless struggle within humanity itself.

Guilliman listened to Mortarion's statement until the Death Guard Primarch finally bowed in the direction of Perturabo and the Imperial Aquila represented by the Warmaster, welcoming the proposal of the next questioner.

"They are all firm in their views, Brother Guilliman." The hoarse voice drifted to Guilliman's ears, like the clinking and shuddering of vitrified gravel on a burned sand dune.

“That’s right,” said Guilliman, taking in the atmosphere of the battle of minds in the theater below.

Everyone is contributing to the construction of the human empire, and all the achievements will be further practically promoted in their respective territories or home planets. Except for the Emperor's whereabouts and Horus's unawakened state, the meeting of Nikea was held perfectly.

"And you?" Lorgar whispered, his voice reaching Guilliman through the sound transmission hole in the wall. "How do you keep your mind firm, Guilliman?"

"Me?" Guilliman was puzzled by the question. "You ask me?"

"Why not? We all have our own beliefs, Robert. Some of us believe in the Imperial Truth, which is also reflected in my Word Bearers. 'The heavens tell of His glory, and the firmament proclaims His handiwork.' The Imperial Truth, or science as some call it, is the tool He gave us to explore and reveal the mysteries and laws of His creation."

"I think what I believe is different from what you describe," Guilliman couldn't help but argue with Lorgar. He didn't like others to pounce on mistakes in front of him. "I believe in the Imperial Truth itself, not the truth of the Word reinterpreted by your ideas. In our observation of reality, according to the principle of simplification, is there room and necessity for the existence of gods here?"

"Then answer me the meaning of psychic powers, Robert," Lorgar whispered, and in Guilliman's momentary silence, he fell silent, as if thinking about something. When Guilliman had thought of his response, he felt that the atmosphere here was not suitable for him to express his point of view.

Guilliman grew increasingly uneasy at Lorgar's silence. Just across the wall, the most dangerous Primarch among them was experiencing turbulent waves in his mind.

A premonition told him that Lorgar was trembling. In the world seen by the One who Bears the Truth and analyzed by another framework, he felt everything he could perceive turned upside down.

Because next, Lorgar asked softly: "But where is the Emperor?"

Lorgar Aurelion stood up and walked to the edge of the railing, gazing at the Primarch on the dais below. It was like gazing at three blazing stars, burning on the pure white stone and the crimson carpet, like walking on the edge of a furnace.

Lorgar's hands gripped the railing tightly, tightly grasping the iron painted to look like stone. He heard a slight creaking sound that spread quietly like a continuous whimper.

He had wanted to promise you, to promise that at the Nicaea Conference your doubts would be answered, your tensions would be relieved.

He said he was extremely frank and would tell you everything, but you could feel the unrelieved doubts swelling in your heart and contracting violently in your two hearts and three lungs.

He answered your question honestly, but he told you: Tyrant Star will not take us to heaven.

He refused to answer: Is the Emperor a tyrant?

He sees your pain, but cannot understand it.

He doesn't see the world that you see - or maybe he does, but when facing the Nightmare Sun and the Tyrant Star, he sees a completely different result from you.

He saw - the Morning Star saw the Enemy.

You gasp, looking at Perturabo, the man you love. You know that everything here belongs to him, that after Horus fell, after the Emperor was gone, the whole Imperium belongs to him, and you can be his too, if he wills to have you.

The curtain before your eyes is the window he has set up for you, locked in your own hands. You can easily unlock it, and you do so, exposing yourself to him in silence, praying that he doesn't think you are playing a self-pitying role and begging for his forgiveness.

It was not Perturabo you feared, it was the Emperor's refusal to see you, even if you certainly didn't want Perturabo to refuse to hear you.

But you stand here alone, your image stands alone in the vast theater, casting a dark and lonely shadow and a silent and hollow echo. The fragrant wind passes through the corridor in your chest.

Perturabo was focused on the meeting itself, the words drifting past you as if knowing your heart wouldn't and couldn't listen, your mind was being used to record all the crucial decisions made at the Nikaea Council, while your emotions were focused on the higher level of the situation, shrinking back as Perturabo ignored you.

Your eyelids begin to ache from the long gaze, and black ripples spread in your eyes like the charred sand of Colchis.

At this moment you observe the eldest son in your heart.

You think of a word that trembles in your heart, like a fatal serpent biting through your finger. You think of the tenth plague that ancient Terra brought down, the plague of the firstborn. All the firstborn were killed by the angel of death overnight.

You didn't know what this meant, only that you were beginning to regret your premature judgment and name-calling of Perturabo.

You gaze at Perturabo through the falling curtains, the vast empty space and the distance that makes your eyes widen, and you feel unsteady on your feet. You thought you were conscious, but the fear has found you, through the cracks in your armor of self-blame and dedication, and against the flow of blood.

Then you see Perturabo suddenly look at you, and the wire above his head whips gently like a whip, or there is a subtle sound of a silenced gun.

The invisible bullet pierced you through his eyes, and your heart trembled sickly for a cold moment, and then you knew it was not a good thing, and you took a quick breath, waiting for Perturabo to send you the verdict. Your limbs panicked and wanted to escape, but you fixed yourself on the railing, with your eyes open, but it seemed that you could not see anything clearly.

"The matter of psychic energy has come to an end," Perturabo said. "I would like to thank everyone for their participation. You have made an indelible contribution to the construction of the Empire. The historians will record our legend. No, history itself will write about us. Every time another person is born in the galaxy who benefits from the decision made today, our dedication will be given new meaning."

You look at Perturabo, without making any expression. It's time, you think, it's my turn, it looks like the Emperor won't be there. And he looks at you, the eldest son in your mind invites you.

“Next, we will discuss another important topic.

"I believe many of you are confused about this, especially since we have just put the issue of psychic power on the table, acknowledged its existence, divided the boundary between psychic power and witchcraft, and clarified the details one by one. The "Nicaea Code" has been initially written, and all that is left is for it to be officially implemented.

“This does not seem to be completely consistent with a belief we have always held—the universe is rational, all knowledge is understandable, and there are no mysteries of psychic power, witchcraft of the soul, or supernatural gods.

"We can certainly believe that all psychic powers can be analyzed and all mysteries are just part of science. However, based on our current level of technology, in the eyes of rational people, this is a protective cloak woven with authoritative ideas, a deceptive language logic used to protect humans from the endless dark world with ignorance and stupidity."

"So, next, we will discuss the Imperial Truth again."

Perturabo declared calmly, rising from the podium, grasping the Aquila Scepter in his hand, and stepping off the podium into the center of the theater, the end of the scepter tapping hollowly on the marble floor as he walked.

Then, the Iron Lord raised the Skyhawk Scepter high, and his cold eyes swept across every closed shadow curtain until his gaze rested on the pale face of Lorgar Aurelion.

(End of this chapter)