Warhammer: Empire Reboot

If we could persuade the Thirsty Lady to send a stronger force to harass Lawson, it would at least distract that human warlord on multiple fronts.

“I’ll go,” Vashtor said.

Slaanesh's palace has no fixed form.

It exists in a region at the deepest part of the subspace, where the space itself is a semi-entity formed from desire, pleasure, pain, and ultimate experience.

Everyone who enters this area will see a different sight, because the appearance of the palace depends on the viewer's deepest desires.

What Vashtor saw was a forging palace made of perfect gears and flawless alloys.

It knew it was fake.

It doesn't care.

Deep within the palace, there was a room, if it could be called a room.

That space had no walls, no ceiling, and no floor.

A flowing purple halo surrounded me from all sides, as if I were inside a giant drop of liquid gemstone.

In the very center of the space, a being sat there.

It has no fixed image.

Or rather, it possesses all forms simultaneously.

With each frame refreshed, Wastor's optical sensors would see a different silhouette: sometimes a woman with a breathtakingly perfect figure, sometimes a man so handsome he was aggressive, sometimes a creature that transcended the concept of species, and sometimes a pure sensory shockwave that caused all nerve endings to discharge simultaneously.

Slaanesh, the youngest of the four Chaos Gods.

"The Creator".

Slaanesh's voice rang out simultaneously from all directions, as if a thousand lips were speaking to every sensor in Vashtor.

"You came to me because your toy is broken?"

Vashtor's mechanical wings tightened.

It doesn't like this place.

Slaanesh's palace will try to infiltrate the desires of every entrant, but Vashtor is the closest thing to a purely mechanical being among the demon demigods, whose desires are only efficiency, creation, and godhood.

These things are too dry for Slaanesh to chew.

“Your two great demons—Ash Velos and Salathion Thousand Strings—have been enslaved by a human.”

Vashtor went straight to the point: "He put collars on them and locked their physical forms with Imperial Fire and some kind of non-warp psionic energy. They are now his pets, his slaves."

Slaanesh's image froze for a moment, transforming into an indescribable face with the corners of his mouth curving into an arc.

"I know."

Vashtor waited a second, expecting to hear a declaration of anger, threat, or revenge.

"And then?" it asked.

"And then what?" Slaanesh's voice carried a genuine bewilderment that caused Vashtor's computational core to pause briefly, as it was completely unable to decipher the reaction.

"Your great demon is being kept as a pet by humans, aren't you going to do something about it?"

Slaanesh laughed.

The laughter echoed through the palace, making the purple aura even more intense.

"doing what?"

Its form transformed into a woman reclining languidly in the void, one hand supporting her chin, the other hand's fingertips drawing circles in a purple halo—a gesture identical to that of Salasion drawing circles on the spirit bone ground of the Starfire Royal Court.

"Ash and Qianxian are my children. They went out and encountered some interesting things. Why should I stop them?"

Vashtor's gears turned once.

"They were chained."

"Chains are also an experience."

Slaanesh's tone softened, so much so that Vashtor's defense protocol automatically triggered a level three alarm. "Severed, bound, forced to eat from the bowl given by her enemy, Ash has been a Keeper of Secrets for tens of thousands of years, always controlling, manipulating, and spying on others' secrets. Now she is being controlled by others."

Slaanesh's lips curled into a deeper smile: "Don't you find this amusing?"

"I think this is absurd."

"That's because you only have gears, not a tongue."

Slaanesh's appearance changed, becoming an almost transparent outline with only a pair of purple eyes floating in the void.

"Qianxian is the same. She has always been the one playing other people's souls. Now she has been pinned to the ground and beaten by a human, and then she took the initiative to kneel down and call him master."

Those eyes blinked.

"She was experiencing something she had never experienced before: true surrender. Being completely overwhelmed by an existence far more powerful than herself, losing all room for resistance, and then finding that she could actually enjoy this situation was entirely new to her."

Slaanesh's voice carried a genuine appreciation.

Why should I interrupt her studies?

Vashtor stood in a purple halo, the flames flickering at the tips of his mechanical wings.

Its computing core is processing Seneca's words at high speed, trying to find logic, exploit space, and anything that can be used as a bargaining chip.

Can't find it.

Slaanesh's logic is self-consistent. In his value system, pain is pleasure, imprisonment is experience, and failure is growth. You cannot convince him by saying "your great demon is suffering," because in his view, suffering is precisely a valuable form of education.

Vashtor changed his perspective.

"Lossen poses a threat to your side. He possesses a technology capable of permanently annihilating demon souls. If he continues to grow stronger..."

“If he continues to grow stronger,” Slaanesh continued, “Creator, when you said that, did you consider one question?”

Its appearance changed again, transforming into Vashtor's own likeness.

A perfectly replicated mechanical demigod projection, with identical gears, iron wings, and forge flames.

"You want to be fifth."

Slaanesh spoke those words in the voice of Vashtor.

"You want to ascend from a demon demigod to a true god of chaos. You think that as long as you collect the keys and open that door, you can step into godhood."

The projection dissipates.

Slaanesh regained his purple eyes that had been floating in the void.

"You won't succeed."

The fire in Vashtor's forge suddenly blazed brightly.

What are you saying?

"I am stating the facts."

Slaanesh's voice was calm to the point of being cruel.

"The structure of the four gods was already set in stone the day this warp was formed. Khorne, Nurgle, Tzeentch, and Slaanesh—four positions, four extremes. The structure of the warp can only support four gods. No matter how many arks you build, how many fragments you collect, or how many doors you open, there will never be a fifth chair behind those doors."

The flames of the Vastor furnace flickered several times.

The laughter of gears meshing was extremely jarring in Slaanesh's palace, like someone stirring iron nails in a crystal glass.

"Only four chairs?"

Vashtor's optical sensors were directly aimed at the pair of purple eyes floating in the void. "The one sitting on the golden throne, do you four intend to pretend you can't see him forever?"

Slaanesh's image wavered slightly.

It was an extremely subtle fluctuation, but Vashtor caught it.

"He sat in that chair for ten thousand years."

Vashtor took a step forward, the flames of the forge baking the surrounding purple aura with scorch marks.

“For ten thousand years, none of you four dared to drag him off his chair. His star torch burned through most of the warp, and his golden fire could reduce your demons to ashes. Every second he lived was spent using his will to break down the barrier between reality and the warp. What if one day he stood up?”

Slaanesh did not answer.

"The moment he stood up,"

Vashtor said, "He is the fifth one, and he may even be more troublesome than the four of you combined. Forty thousand years of humanity's faith has been channeled into one soul, and forty thousand years of psionic energy has been accumulated on the Golden Throne. Tell me, if that thing really becomes a god, will the structure of the warp support four or five deities?"

The purple halo remained silent for three seconds.

Three seconds is a very long time in Slaanesh's palace.

Everything here operates on the rhythm of pleasure; three seconds of silence equals a complete embarrassment.

"He won't stand up."

Slaanesh finally spoke, his tone lacking the previous condescending languor.

"He was nailed to that chair; he chose it himself."

"He made the right choice."

Vashtor repeated the sentence: "But what if someone did what he didn't finish? What if someone found another way, without sitting on the golden throne, without being crushed by ten thousand years of faith, without maintaining godhood with a half-dead body, and directly opened another door with a key?"

Its mechanical wings were fully deployed.

“What you four are always afraid of is the emperor standing up. What I need to do is sit in that fifth chair before he stands up, the one behind the door he blocked with the golden throne.”

Slaanesh's purple eyes stared at Vashtor and blinked.

The expression in that blink was complex, with a hint of surprise, a hint of interest, but more so a weariness unique to an ancient being, the weariness that comes from seeing through the entire game.

Slaanesh's voice returned to its initial languidness: "Everyone who wants to become a god thinks so. Tzeentch's disciples thought so, Nurgle's gardener thought so, Khorne's butcher thought so. What's behind the door, you haven't seen yet, you're just guessing."

“I’m calculating,” Vashtor corrected. “I guess it’s something you emotional creatures do. I can calculate it.”

Slaanesh laughed: "Then let's continue calculating."

Those eyes curved into two purple crescent moons.

"In the end, you'll find that even the emperor is calculating. He's been sitting in that chair for ten thousand years. Do you think he's just daydreaming?"

Vashtor did not answer that question.

It's not because I have nothing to say, but because this statement really hits a problem with an unsolvable variable in its model.