Warhammer: Empire Reboot

Usvi Ark.

Lawson, along with Er Gou and San Gou, followed Karaden inside the Ark.

The prophets and chieftains of the Ark lined up to greet them in the connecting hall of the main spine corridor.

The twelve high-ranking prophets, six phoenix lords, and the Bone Song Grandmaster—all the elites of Usvi—stood in two rows and performed the unified Eldar salute to Lawson.

Lawson did not linger on the formalities.

"Which direction is the Bone Soul Realm in?"

Led by Karaden, the group passed through three spirit bone sealing gates and entered the outer area of ​​the Bone Soul Realm.

The air here is completely different from that in other parts of the Ark.

Lawson's endogenous psionic field can directly sense those things in the molecular structure of the spirit bone that do not belong here.

He walked to the edge of the contaminated area.

There is a clear dividing line between the milky white, healthy spiritual bones and the dark purple, polluted spiritual bones.

The dividing line was covered with the warlock's array of purification runes, with faint psionic light flickering on the surface of the runes.

That was the result of seventy-three sorcerers working non-stop for more than ten days.

Lawson deployed his psionic powers and scanned the general situation.

That's within his capabilities.

He didn't say anything more, and the Imperial Golden Fire surged from his palm.

The golden flames transformed into countless tiny points of light, like a golden drizzle falling in reverse, rising, spreading, and landing on the dome and walls of the Bone Soul Realm.

The light spots penetrate the molecular structure of the spiritual bone and advance deeper along the resonance channel.

The purifying energy of the metal fire collides with the chaotic pollution in the spiritual bone at the molecular level.

The golden flames, carrying pollutants, were squeezed out of the resonance channel, condensing into a layer of dark purple frost on the surface of the spirit bone, before quickly evaporating and dissipating.

The whole process was extremely spectacular.

On the hundreds-of-meters-high dome of the Bone Soul Realm, the dark purple contaminated area receded at a visible speed under the washing of golden light rain.

The spiritual bone changed from dark purple back to milky white, and pure spiritual energy echoes flowed again in the resonance channel.

The crystalline structure of the Ancestral Soul Stone regained its normal luster after the contamination was removed.

Those corrupted and eroded souls settled down again, no longer twisting in agony.

The Eldar high-ranking members standing behind Lawson were quite shocked by what they saw.

Seventy-three sorcerers spent eleven days trying to keep the dividing line still.

In less than four minutes, Lawson had cleared more than two-thirds of the 23% contaminated area.

The Bone Song Master's legs were going weak.

He was the highest-ranking technical official in charge of the maintenance of the skeletal structure, and he understood the technical complexity of the matter better than anyone else.

The last patch of dark purple contamination on the dome of the Bone Soul Realm dissipated in the golden rain of light.

Milky white psionic light once again filled the entire Bone Soul Realm.

The echoes of the ancestors' souls awoke from their silence, which had been suppressed for more than ten days, and flowed again through the spiritual bone network like thawing streams.

The purification of the Bone Soul Realm is complete.

Karadon's prophetic eye was flashing violently.

It took her several seconds to control her emotions.

The prophets behind him had already knelt down.

Their submission was not to Lawson, but rather a reverence for the souls of their ancestors.

Lawson didn't care about any of that.

He said to the Great Prophet with some regret, "The bone structure of the Bone Soul Realm can be purified, but the reproductive circuit cannot."

Karaden's excitement subsided.

"What you mean, sir..."

Lawson said, "The Eldar's reproductive circuit is a symbiotic structure of living psionic tissue and subspace resonance channels. The contamination is not attached to the surface, but has already fused with the living tissue at the cellular level. If it is forcibly removed with golden fire, the host's reproductive tissue will be burned along with it."

Celine turned pale after hearing this.

She was the person on the Ark who understood Eldar physiology best, and she understood every word Lawson said.

It was precisely because of this understanding that she knew what it meant.

"As for those fetuses that have already been contaminated..."

Lawson continued, "The situation is more complicated. The soul development mechanism of Eldar fetuses is unique to Eldar, and I don't have enough data to perform the reconstruction."

Simply put, rust can be removed, but toxins that have seeped into the bone cannot be cured by simply wiping them off.

The Bone Soul Realm has been purified, but the damage to the reproductive system is permanent.

The declining birth rate at Usvi Ark is an irreversible fact.

Karaden stood still.

The light of the Prophet's Eye dimmed.

The surrounding prophets and clan leaders, who had just experienced the ecstasy of purifying the Bone Soul Realm, fell into an even deeper silence.

But they couldn't blame Lawson.

The restoration of the Bone Soul Realm is an immense blessing; the souls of our ancestors have been preserved.

But what about the future of the Ark?

What's the point of preserving the souls of our ancestors if the birth rate collapses?

Thousands of years later, there were no living people left on the ark.

Evelyn comforted her, "The Marker has indeed done his best. The problem with the reproductive circuit... unless the Goddess of Life returns, otherwise..."

"The Spirit Race's Goddess of Life?"

Evelyn and Karaden both looked at Lawson.

“Isa, our Eldar goddess of life, healing and procreation, is still alive.”

Seeing that Lawson seemed not to understand, Karaden explained to him, "When Heaven fell, Slaanesh devoured almost all of our gods. But Isha was not consumed by Slaanesh; Nurgle snatched her from them."

"Nurgle has a morbid obsession with life. He spreads plague and decay, but he is essentially fascinated by the cycle of life... Decay is another form of life. Isha is the Eldar goddess of life, and her power is to heal all things. Nurgle has kept her locked in his Plague Garden as an eternal experiment."

“Every day, Nurgle would create new plagues and viruses and feed them to Isha. Isha’s divine power would automatically heal all diseases, so she could not die. Nurgle tormented her in this way, creating new plagues, experimenting, observing how her body resisted and healed, recording the data, and then creating even stronger plagues. Isha was Nurgle’s perfect experimental subject. She would never die and would suffer forever.”

"It's not that we, the Elven race, haven't considered rescuing the goddess."

“About three thousand years ago, the great prophet Urason of the Biltan Ark united the elite forces of the four Arks... the Phoenix Lords, the Ghost Warriors, the entire forces of the Banshee Temple... to form an expeditionary force that penetrated deep into the warp through the Webway and directly attacked Nurgle Gardens.”

"The result was failure; the entire army was wiped out."

"Nurgle Gardens is not a physical space, but the spiritual realm of demon gods. There, the laws of physics are defined by Nurgle, and time begins to distort after the expeditionary force enters the garden... Some warriors age a thousand years in a second, while others are trapped in endlessly looping corridors, unable to find an exit even after centuries. The number of Great Impurities and Plague Drones is infinite, because they can be generated infinitely within Nurgle's realm."

"After that, no Ark dared to mention rescuing Isa again. With the current strength of the Eldar, it was impossible to snatch it from the core domain of a Chaos God."

Lawson listened to the whole story but didn't pick up on the topic.

It's not that he's not interested.

On the contrary...

If a goddess of life capable of healing all things truly exists and can be saved, her strategic value would be immeasurable.

Karaden turned to the prophets and patriarchs behind him.

"Everyone, the Lord of the Seal has purified the Bone Soul Realm, and the souls of our ancestors have been preserved. However, the damage to the reproductive circuit is irreversible, and we must face reality."

"Those 117 million pregnant women..."

"Prepare to terminate the pregnancy."

Alsane's voice came from among the prophets.

“The fetus that has been confirmed to be contaminated cannot be kept, but at least we can save the mother’s life.”

Iseran's eyes reddened.

Just then, Lawson suddenly said, "Wait a minute, I can't cure the contaminated fetus, but pausing the fetus's development might be something we can try."

"Bring thirty pregnant women here first, and come with me to a place."

The Seventh Blackrock Fortress.

The sixth ring road surrounds the core area.

Upon landing, Karaden and the Eldar high-ranking members accompanying him experienced intense physical discomfort almost simultaneously.

The Eldar are the race with the highest psychic talent in the entire universe.

For them, warp energy is like air, omnipresent, something they breathe every moment. For an Eldar prophet to lose his psionic senses is like a human suddenly losing his sight and hearing.

The interior of Blackrock Fortress is a psionic vacuum.

The natural suppression effect of the pure black stone structure, stretching over two thousand kilometers, on subspace energy has reduced the level of psionic energy inside the fortress to near zero.

Karadon's Eye of the Prophet dimmed the moment he stepped into the fortress.

The psychic perception of other prophets is also rapidly diminishing.

Lawson led his team through the fortress's corridors toward the area pre-marked by the swarm intelligence.

Thirty pregnant women from the Elven race followed behind the group.

They were chosen by Celine from the Ark...

Ten samples were confirmed to be contaminated, ten were suspected of being contaminated, and ten showed no abnormalities, serving as three sets of control samples.

The corridor remained stable under the control of swarm intelligence, without any structural changes.

The black stone walls on both sides of the corridor emitted a dim purple glow.

Lawson stopped in front of a medium-sized oval cabin.