Warhammer: Start with a dog.

Chapter 663 Magnus on the Cliff
Ten thousand years later

Iron... On the Destiny Steel

"So what are they doing?"

Magna Dorn's eyes flickered a few times. "They are trying to dig out more from Gasper Hauser's memories that he himself doesn't remember. If a scholar who specializes in recording and researching believes that he has obvious memory loss and begins to have hallucinations, then it is obvious that someone has tampered with his brain. Now that his most important task has been completed, the original control mechanism has completed its mission and begun to fail. Now is a good time to dig."

"Is it so urgent? Do we have to find a place to land and perform this ritual? If we need to stabilize it, we can find a suitable room on the Queen of Glory in the real universe, or return to Prospero in time."

"It's urgent, because memories in the mind are not static. Casper's mind is like a mural that has just had its outer protective coating peeled off. If it is not immediately excavated and maintained, these images will soon begin to disappear and become even more elusive. At this time, they are still on the surface and are easier to excavate."

"I see... Uh, I didn't know you were so familiar with the principles of this technique. I thought you hated it."

"Maybe the reason I hate it is because I know exactly how they work."

"That makes sense, Magna. It seems that Perturabo has done his best to teach you, although I think he is a little too strict with you."

The young phoenix made these comments while drinking some scented tea brought by the chief steward of the royal court. The pigeon seemed to finally feel tired and was squatting on top of his head, curled up in a white ball with its eyes closed to rest.

The Wolf King still had a glass of wine in his hand, but Pallas felt that he didn't drink much, which further confirmed his suspicion: the Wolf King was testing something, or he felt that the Wolf King was more concerned about how much intelligence, logic and other abilities were left in the pigeon that called itself "I".

Leman Russ's thundercloud-like ancient-yet-new armor had been removed and sent to the armory for repair. Although Pallas later personally reset the reactor emergency switch that he had locked, the suspicious Wolf King, after asking which department the armory master here belonged to, made a maintenance request and asked the sage of the Source Order to move the damn emergency switch to a new position that only he knew.

"The same trick cannot be used a second time against the Son of Fenris." He explained to the people present, not thinking that there was anything wrong with his open defense against his brothers. "But I still have to thank you, Pallas. Before you stopped it, I didn't even know that our power armor had such a setting that would bring us danger."

"Well, although, according to the formal design requirements," Fulgrim Pallas chose his words carefully, "I think any equipment with a reactor and a pressure vessel or any equipment that requires professional operation should have safety measures to ensure that there is no danger."

"That's true." Leman Russ raised his eyebrows. His chin was smooth, and under his dark golden eyebrows were a pair of cold blue eyes. Although the elite feeling on him was more serious, the terrifying smell was not reduced at all. "But who knows whether the one who uses it will be one of us or the enemy?"

----------

"Psionic power is not a double-edged sword that can be safely hung in a scabbard on our belts. I said it, Magnus. It is a weapon lying there. You can't be sure it is in the scabbard, and you don't know who has used it and who will use it, so this is why it should be strictly monitored." Ramizane answered patiently again, "You can't just infer that 'this thing is harmless and usable' because 'I feel I can control it' and then spread it to 'we can let everyone who can use it use it for convenience'."

"Why?" While waiting for the Templars and Rune Priests to prepare for the next Tracing Ceremony, the three Primarchs - the false Perturabo, the impostor Leman Russ and the real but (unconsciously) losing his mind Magnus - were wandering around the canyon together.

It was not easy to find a planet where such a large task force could dock and rest without attracting attention. Although most of the Empire's ports were completely open to the Astartes Legion's fleet, Ramezane did not want to attract too much attention to them along the way - after all, now was really not a good time to attract attention.

So finally they came here.

Sadia is a very ordinary planet. There are no large-scale human settlements, only scattered scientific research stations and other organisms and plants that have not yet developed civilization. However, there are more mosses, lichens and other plants that live in cold alpine climates. Forests formed by ancient tall gymnosperms spread from the foot of the mountain all the way to the mountain forest line. The gray-white rock surface is covered with a thin layer of soil formed by tens of millions of years of weathering.

Various kinds of mosses are the main color embellishment here. They grow tall and soft, some can reach ten centimeters thick. The colors range from beautiful light pink to thick royal blue or purple and turquoise. There are also mosses green like some areas on Terra, but more are blue-based mosses. Ramizarn guessed that this may be related to the stellar spectrum exposure of the planet.

They walked along an uninhabited natural path, a channel cut out by water after flowing through ancient rocks for billions of years. The cold, dry air and the mountain breeze blew across the faces of the three of them... the two men and the dog. White mist formed by their exhaled breath formed around the faces of the Lord of Steel and the Lord of Winter.

"Because you are too arrogant, Magnus, even though you know the most knowledge, you don't know what it's like when knowledge comes to life. When you think, you rely on the power of your instincts, because that's enough to achieve almost 100% of your goals. So your own mind," the Lord of Steel pointed to his own head, "has never been truly smelted and used in the real university of the 'human world'. So your reasoning will appear simple and naive and laughable. Or let me put it bluntly, you are like a child walking in a dark forest, holding a torch in search of truth, but you are not sure what monsters the torch will attract, but you are very sure that the burning torch will not burn your hands, and you are sure that it can help you defeat any monsters that are attracted - you see, isn't that the case?"

"It is a scholar's virtue to remain humble," Magnus said dissatisfiedly. "I am well aware of this, and I would say that you should be too, Perturabo. Because I must have conducted in-depth research before using my power in this way, not unprepared as you said." At this time, they began to walk up a slope, which seemed to be formed naturally by the weathering and collapse of the cliff at the top. Now moss grew on the white bone-like gravel, leaving two deep rows of huge footprints where they walked.

"I am sure that the 'torches' in our hands can trap the weaker ones among them, deal with the slightly stronger ones among them, and disperse the stronger ones. Moreover, even the strongest ones are not as aggressive as you worry about... Even the largest and most profound ones are the same... And I am also sure that some of the creatures that are attracted here will be of great help to us."

"is it?"

"Of course! You should go with me to explore the sea of ​​souls someday, and then you will know..."

"So..." They were now on the top of the cliff, the other side of which was almost vertical, overlooking the forest and valley plains at the foot of the mountain. The thin clouds were like white mist hovering halfway up the mountain. Ramizarn turned and stared at Magnus's one eye.

"So you actually know that there are many other things in the Soul Sea, and you have seen some things at the bottom of it, but you never told your descendants to be careful of them, because you were afraid that if they knew about it, they would oppose your advancement of psychic power like others, and would not be as obedient as they are now, right?"

For a moment, Magnus’s psychic energy seemed to flash like a solar prominence, but before he could say anything, the Lord of Steel changed the subject, “Do you remember that you saw some prophetic images after you fainted on Nikaea?” “I remember.” The Fifteenth Primarch’s eyes suddenly became alert, “But who told you? Ahriman? Or my Sekhmet Guards? When you asked me why I was in such a hurry to return to Prospero, I explained the prophecy I saw, but I certainly didn’t mention that I fainted at the time. You shouldn’t…”

"Don't doubt any of them. I didn't ask them, and none of them revealed your movements. It was my heir, Soltarn, who saw it."

"What characteristics did your son inherit from you?" Magnus asked in surprise. "If I wasn't sure that our father only had us as his descendants, I would have suspected that he was another younger brother created by our father for us."

"It's not necessarily just these offspring..." Ramizane muttered, "If we're just talking about genes..."

"what?"

"Ahem. It is absolutely true that Soltarn inherited my genetic code. As the one among us who is most proficient in various psychic powers, you should have noticed that although Soltarn looks like a mixture of your Fire Phoenix and Falcon school classifications, upon closer examination he cannot be classified into any of the schools of your descendants."

"Indeed." Magnus' attention was successfully attracted by this fascinating question. "So what kind of power is his ability? Can his ability be replicated or acquired through learning, meditation, or any other form?"

"His ability..." Ramizane thought and chose his words, "His ability is more like a combination of some of my 'basic characteristics' and some special, almost impossible luck. As far as I know, it has nothing to do with learning ability or anything else acquired."

"He's a natural born special psyker? It's just that your gene seed stimulated his psionic powers?"

"No." Ramizane began to smile, "In fact, Soltarn has no psychic power, not at all. If you must say that he has something special in terms of psychic power... He has a very rare physique, which I call 'Balancer'."

"What do you mean?"

"You know, humans all have some psychic powers, some are very powerful, such as the leader of the Navigators, the leader of the Astronomican, and the Imperial Chancellor Malcador. Or, on the other hand, some people are not good at this, the so-called soulless. The silent nuns guarded by our old Deng to shield the wild wolf and others this time are the best among the soulless. As for Ms. Kroll, even I sometimes overlook her because of my distraction."

"I know that."

"Between the psychics and soulless beings who can actually form combat capabilities are the vast majority of people - neither strong enough to make this their profession, nor completely lacking these qualities. This is the vast majority of mortals."

"Yes, but this...wait, do you mean?"

"Yes, the only special thing about Soltan is that although he has no psychic power, he is not soulless. His soul has achieved a balance between the two. He is like a point with nowhere to go for the psychic energy system curve of this universe. He is a special case among humans. If he did not gain such ability and lived his life as a mortal, then no one would even notice anything unusual about him until his death."

Even a Primarch as knowledgeable as Magnus could not help but marvel at the wonders of nature.

"In my opinion, it is this one in a billion lucky chance that caused some unknown changes when he received Perturabo's gene seed implantation, and finally gave him some special abilities. But you see, in this case, this probability is completely beyond our control, or in other words, he was able to grow in his mother's womb, grow up safely, pass the conscription screening, and finally successfully survive the operation and then discover that he had acquired abilities - the probability of these things added up -"

The Red King did not respond immediately. His one eye looked slightly absent-minded, indicating that this Primarch, who was famous for his wisdom, was going through a mental calculation that was extremely grand even for him.

Finally he let out a long breath, his broad shoulders drooping dejectedly. "You are right, Perturabo," he said dejectedly. "Humans born now are more or less tainted by psychic energy. The probability of him being able to completely neutralize it is too low. So low that even if we do not add any new recruits in the next ten thousand years and use all the gene seeds for such an experiment, the probability of success is less than the probability of a monkey typing out a Shakespeare play on a typewriter."

His brother raised an eyebrow. "Shakespeare? You still have that?"

"The Terran Institute of Textual Research has restored at least three of his plays." Magnus answered casually, "But you still haven't answered my question. What qualities did Soltarn inherit from you?" The Scarlet King looked down at his brother. "I know that your erudition is unknown, but I didn't know that you have this level of ability for your heirs to inherit - is it the ability you used to stop our father's thunder of light?"

"Oh..." His elder brother smiled evilly, "It's like this, Magnus, it's a side of my ability. Soltarn only inherited a small part, but it was enough. Or, have you ever thought about how Old Deng confidently raised the torch in his hand, attracted what kind of behemoth, and finally stuffed it into the flesh cage created by his genes to create 'me'?"

A small stone was kicked off the cliff by Magnus as he took a half step back, making a distant rolling sound.

The cold mountain wind howled across the top of the cliff.

Magnus found that his palms and soles were sweating.

It was quiet here and there was no one around.

Only the smile on Perturabo's face seemed to become even weirder.

(End of this chapter)