How can a retired savior be considered retired if his price drops to 40,000?

Chapter 418: Meaningless (VII)
Fujimaru Ritsuka and others' escape in the temple did not have the advantage of timing, location, or even people.

After regaining direct orders from Nitocris, the undead who seemed to be acting entirely on the remnants of the dead also became more orderly, and were able to flexibly divide into small teams to chase and intercept these uninvited guests in the not-so-spacious corridors inside the building. Moreover, the passages and traps in the temple were also changing irregularly.

The Master of Chaldea did not think that this was the original function. It cannot be said that there were no similar mechanisms in the Grand Temple of Glory, but Ozymandias would never put such "things that destroy the beauty" everywhere. However, it was not the first time that she had experienced such an escape route - the corridor that seemed to be unobstructed suddenly became a dead end, and the enemy suddenly emerged from the secret door in the hall that was thought to be temporarily safe. She had experienced such emergencies more than once in the Crystal Demon Palace. Considering that there was also a combination of Egyptian mythical beasts that could drive away and repel the undead to a certain extent this time, there was no need to use the weapons in his hands and the limited ether every time he broke through. Ritsuka Fujimaru even felt that this tug-of-war, which was not particularly intense, could be called easy and enjoyable.

Although she was probably the only one who really thought so in the whole team, most of them were not really troubled by the current reality. After all, apart from Fujimaru Ritsuka and her subspace animal friends, the initial members of this decapitation team were a cloned Primarch and two legendary Astartes from the Great Crusade. It was unlikely that such a luxurious team would feel any pressure from those enemies who literally "shattered at the touch" during the 20 to 30 minutes of transition, guerrilla warfare, exploration and hiding. In fact, they basically did not think too much about the battlefield in front of them, but instead focused most of their minds on finding the next way out.

"I'm a little skeptical. Can we really get out of this temple?" Akurdona said irritably after being blocked by the constantly changing corridors for the fourth time. "We should have recaptured Santo before we came here. If we had an engineering drill now, the situation would be much clearer."

"It's useless." The person who answered was, somewhat surprisingly, Lot. This Chaos Astartes who was picked up by the Iron Warriors from some Imperial world, randomly tested for suitability, randomly transformed, and randomly thrown into the army to roam freely until now has successfully survived to this day, but in fact, his frontal battlefield combat capabilities as a "Space Marine" are relatively poor even among the Astartes Chapters in the Empire that are often criticized by his Iron Warrior predecessors as "flowers in a greenhouse". Moreover, now, the people around him can be generally classified as "ceiling" in the imprecise evaluation system. In comparison, the only gray Lot seems particularly unpresentable.

But after all, he is also an Astartes. Regardless of whether his bloodline is inherited from Perturabo or Dorn, the resilience contained in these gene seeds will not make him be overwhelmed by the situation without hope in these twenty or thirty minutes. It's just that after experiencing the previous turbulent ups and downs, his mood is really not very good, and his perspective on the problem is also extremely pessimistic. Therefore, when he wants to speak, he can only express some pessimistic views: "All buildings in this alien space are protected by the power of the warp. We tried, and the usual siege equipment can't even leave traces in the parts where construction is not allowed. What's more, even if the wall is broken, the corridor will still move. Apart from further angering the controller of the temple, I don't see what the use of this is."

To be fair, this view is not pleasant to hear, but it is quite objective. Unfortunately, when such an unpleasant but objective view comes from the mouth of a rebel, some people are not able to be fair.

Nasir snorted coldly and said in a muffled voice inside the Terminator helmet: "This team doesn't need someone to say discouraging words. I think we should let you die cleanly now. This won't be considered a violation of the agreement between you and the lady."

"Nasir, stop it." Fujimaru Ritsuka said helplessly. She obviously wanted to add something else, but before she could say the next word, another voice came from Lotte's direction.

"What?" Nasir was still in a bad mood, "Your tattered power armor finally--"

"Oi! Shut up!" Fujimaru Ritsuka hurriedly stopped him from continuing.

It was hard to tell whether Nasir chose to obey the girl's orders first, or whether he first realized what those small noises coming from Lot were and kept quiet. Pegasus, who was closer to the Iron Warrior, did not speak, but physically "reminded" the other party, causing him to amplify the buzzing sound in the power armor through the neural link unwillingly, so that everyone nearby could hear it.

In this way, everyone can easily identify the source of this sound - it is the sound of the signal receiver built into the Lot Power Armor. Someone spoke on the broadcast channel of the Iron Warriors battlefield communication:

"Warriors of Steel, what are you fighting for?" the voice said.

This was obviously not Tolamino's voice. Lot made a judgment in his mind. But when he was hesitating whether to report the fact that "the person who spoke was not our commander", someone else had already done so from a different perspective:

"This is the voice of Ozymandias." In order not to cover up the sound of the broadcast on Lot's power armor, Fujimaru Ritsuka muttered in a low voice.

According to Lotte's own thoughts, he really shouldn't listen to the radio in the current situation where he was surrounded by enemies. But unfortunately, he couldn't even control his own life, so he naturally had no right to decide on these matters. So, Ozymandias' voice still echoed in the noise of the battlefield.

No one knew how he had found this radio frequency. The nature of the channel meant that it was a one-way communication, and no one could answer his questions. However, Ozymandias did not seem to expect any answers, and just kept asking his questions:

"Since the end of the so-called 'Great Crusade' that unified humanity by the Emperor (Moses), what exactly have you been fighting for in the past ten thousand years?" Lot realized that the voice was not asking, but questioning, otherwise he would not have had to ask the same question over and over again, "As an army, you chose to follow your so-called 'Original Body' because of the natural connection in the bases. But what were the countless battles you have experienced in the past ten thousand years for?"

Lot didn't want to pay attention to the nonsense from the creatures in the warp, but after the same question was repeated three times in his ears, he subconsciously divided a part of his brain power and began to think about the answer while dealing with the enemy and choosing an escape route. Perhaps some of the Iron Warriors stationed inside the Grand Temple who could hear the broadcast at the same time, and those who were not very determined, would also start similar thinking like Lot. But for the others in this team, they did not have the prerequisites for such thinking - obviously, they were not Iron Warriors.

“Doesn’t he know too much?” He chopped down a few mummies with the glowing sword in his hand. Akurdona, who was wailing as they turned back into ether and waited to be “reborn” under Nitocris’ spell, also muttered softly, and said the second half of the sentence very clearly to Fujimaru Ritsuka, “When Tarvitz explained the basic structure of the Space Marine Legion to you, it took a lot of effort.” “Do you think I enjoyed listening to the class?” Fujimaru Ritsuka couldn’t help but whispered under the sound of Ozymandias’ speech, “At that time, I didn’t even know Gothic very well!”

This conversation, which was close to teasing and fighting, did not continue, because they all wanted to continue listening to what was being said on the radio. Ozymandias' voice was as full of energy as always, and it seemed to be no different from what Fujimaru Ritsuka had originally remembered:
"It's normal that you can't give an answer, because you have no purpose!" Such a straightforward and sharp conclusion came from the channel, making Lot almost jump up on the spot, "You are just blindly following your gene father, blindly following the orders from your superiors, and blindly drifting in the universe! If the legion commander doesn't give an order, you have no goal, just hating for the sake of hatred, living for the sake of living, and starting wars for the sake of war itself! The logic of all your actions is nothing more than creating a false meaning for your empty life, and deceiving yourself to fill your empty life with the illusion of this meaning! Apart from trying every means to please your superiors and primarchs, do you really have any other motivations that can be called "ambitions" in your actions?"

After hearing this, Pegasus seemed a little confused: "Has the Iron Warrior become like this now?"

"What he said seemed to be right and wrong, but he knew too much, didn't he?" Fujimaru Ritsuka was a little surprised, "How much did Jianqi tell him?"

Nasir looked at Lot's face, which had turned red like liver, but he dared not say anything, and smiled: "I think what he said is probably right."

"So what?" The Iron Warrior said, trying to be objective. "Except for angering my colleagues in the temple, what he said is of no use at all—"

"——But I allowed it!" Such a voice came from the radio again.

This made Lot stunned: Who are you, and what qualifications do you have to "allow" such a thing? When did the Iron Warriors need an outsider, or a creature from the Warp, to tell them how to live? The anger caused by the hidden meaning of this declaration almost made Lot laugh. He believed that most of the other Iron Warriors who could also receive this broadcast would also be furious - unfortunately, this was a one-sided broadcast, so no one could interrupt Ozymandias's next speech.

"A goal worth risking one's life for is a luxury, and not everyone can discover it on their own." He said, "As a mediocre person without light, it is natural to live under the light of the real sun. This is not something to be condemned! Ordinary people naturally have the need to follow the strong, and the base contract between the Astartes and the Primarchs strengthens this point. You are just unlucky, because your Primarch, as the 'sun', cannot emit enough light to lead the entire legion. Therefore, taking advantage of the fate of your stationing in my Grand Temple of Glory today, I, as the Pharaoh, offer you another choice:

"Will you follow the instinct written into your genes and continue to follow the sun that cannot shine that you were forced to choose, and finally live and die in the darkness, letting your souls be wasted in meaningless repetition, war and killing, and no one will care about the name you leave behind; or will you resist this choice imposed by the base contract and follow the true incarnation of the sun - follow me, the 'King of Kings' Ozymandias, and earn for yourself the right to march forward, conquer and build under the true light, towards a true goal? You have three hours to think about and decide on this. After three hours, I will accept those warriors who are willing to follow me in the temple and wipe out those invaders who are unwilling to surrender. Of course, no matter what the outcome of this matter is, it will not hinder my ultimate goal. I will be on the jade throne in the main hall, waiting for good news."

The broadcast was terminated, and Lotte, who had reached his limit emotionally, could no longer hold back:
"How dare he say that?" He could not hide his exasperation when he spoke. "What makes him think he is greater than a Primarch? How dare he say that directly in the Iron Warriors' comm?"

He still had a lot of insults to say, but in the end he could only curse at the other party's arrogant attitude. To him, the words on the radio were indeed hard to hear, but Lot himself knew that he really couldn't find any reason to refute: the Iron Warriors warbands scattered in the Eye of Terror were indeed mostly just aimless stragglers. Before the Primarch suddenly got interested in summoning the legion this time, including Lot's own warband - except for the Imperial warband that went to beat up the Imperial Fists because of inexplicable hatred, they were just barely making a living in the Chaos camp with a survival method similar to that of mercenaries.

Lotte said this out of his impotent rage that needed to be vented. He didn't expect that his casual words would actually get a response:

"Just because he is Ozymandias." Fujimaru Ritsuka's tone was somewhat helpless, "It's hard to explain. On the one hand, the 'honorable pharaoh' is indeed like this. On the other hand, in his early years, he-"

The Chaldean Master did not finish his words, because the broadcast on Lot's body sounded again:
"--Oh, I forgot one thing. I haven't told you yet. The Pharaoh will show you a way." Ozymandias' voice added, "Overthrow the corrupt and bloated regime of the Empire, bring all things in the galaxy back under the control of the Pharaoh, and let all the people live and work in peace. These are natural things. Needless to say. The most important thing is--I will return to Earth, the birthplace of mankind, the so-called 'Holy Terra', and liberate my best friend (the Emperor) from the cage of the Golden Throne!"

A click sounded, announcing that the radio was turned off, but Lotte was temporarily unable to express his opinion in the quiet interval. He was completely stunned by the unrealistic "ambitions" contained in these words. The shock was so strong that it made him feel absurd and ridiculous, and he completely lost his ability to speak. He looked around in shock, subconsciously thinking that this emotion should have transcended the distinction between camps and would make everyone feel similar - but unfortunately, he didn't know that the people in front of him were not normal people.

"Uh..." In the awkward atmosphere, Fujimaru Ritsuka reluctantly found a topic to talk about, "Although... but... hey. When we meet him face to face later, I really have to tell him: no matter what the reason is, we are indeed on the same page in terms of the goal of 'pulling the Emperor off the Golden Throne'."

No one else refuted her. So, amid Akurdona's grumbling, Lot also cast his shocked eyes towards the leader who looked the least like a leader in the team:
"You're crazy!" he couldn't help shouting, "You're all crazy!"

No one expected that after hearing this accusation, Fujimaru Ritsuka actually nodded in agreement: "Indeed. You are not the first person to say that to me."

(End of this chapter)