Warhammer: Empire Reboot

"Very likely."

Klaus looked up at the top of the beacon.

There hung a piece of metal that had been removed from the machinery.

The markings on it belong to the Golden Throne maintenance system.

"It entered the throne area."

Nafradaran gripped the Watcher's Spear tightly.

"The alien could not have passed through the inner palace blockade on its own."

"So, someone brought it in."

This statement changed the nature of their collaboration.

Previously, Nafradaran had only considered this incident as an alien infiltration.

From that moment on, he realized that someone inside the palace had bypassed the Imperial Guard and sent a Dark Elf to a position close to the Golden Throne.

They eventually cornered the Bloodlust in an abandoned shrine.

It let out a mocking laugh before it died.

"Your throne... is already rotting."

It looked at Crow as if stating a fact.

"And we are the only ones who can help you."

Klaus did not include his dying words in the public report.

It wasn't that he wanted to cover up the truth, but before the report was finished, Lord Lassilo of the Tribunal personally took over the case.

Her men sealed off the sanctuary, took away the Bloody Man's body and the beacon's remains, and demanded that Crowe hand over all the investigation records.

Crow did not obey immediately.

"This alien was brought into the palace by someone, and here are the words it said before it died."

Lassilio took a step closer.

"Inquisitor, you are using the dying taunts of a Dark Eldar to infer the state of the Golden Throne."

"I am making judgments based on deleted files, murdered witnesses, and a beacon leading to the Comoros."

The two stared at each other for a moment.

Lassillo cannot kill Crowley.

Nafradaran was right next to him.

A member of the Imperial Guard witnessed the entire incident. If Crowley were to die suddenly thereafter, the inner court would certainly investigate.

Crowley was also unable to publicly accuse Lassilo.

The evidence he had could only prove that someone at the top was covering up the truth, but it couldn't prove that Lacillo was personally involved in the deal.

Finally, Lassilio chose another approach.

"This case involves the security of the royal palace, and the subsequent investigation will be taken over by the Lord's Court. You will retain your status as a judge, but you may no longer have access to the relevant files."

Lacillo ordered his men to remove the scene.

The judge in charge of the first escort mission and his remaining personnel were subsequently interrogated in secret.

Some of them died in the escort battle.

The survivors were executed on Lacillo's orders due to their dereliction of duty, the risk of leaking secrets, and the possibility of being contaminated by aliens.

She eliminated all direct witnesses who could possibly point to the first contact.

But he could neither cleanse Klaus nor make Nafradaran forget what he had seen.

As a result, the entire incident was suppressed under a highly encrypted report.

The official conclusion is that a Dark Eldar infiltrated the lower levels of the palace through an unstable rift in the web, carried out a massacre, and was subsequently eliminated by the Inquisition and the Guardians.

The report makes no mention of why the Bloodwalker carried parts of the Golden Throne, why he was able to accurately discuss the throne's malfunction, or who deleted the relevant records.

The Bloodlink died in Terra, but its first batch of data has already reached Comoros.

When Asdubal Victor received the information, he did not immediately disclose it to other conspiracies.

He knew how valuable this intelligence was.

If the emperor dies, the real universe will fall into chaos.

But for Comoros, this is both an opportunity and a threat.

The great rift has torn open the net, and demons are pouring into the dark city through the breach.

If the human empire collapses completely, Chaos will lose its most important check, and Comoros will not be able to remain unscathed.

Therefore, the Golden Throne cannot be destroyed immediately.

At least not until the Dark Eldar find an alternative.

On the other hand, Lawson had just severely damaged Comoros, killed a large number of Dark Eldar, destroyed the Conspiracy and the Arena, and also taken Isa away.

Victor was unable to confront him directly.

Therefore, the human empire must pay the price for the losses in Comoros.

Empires need technology.

The Dark Eldar need population, the structure of the Golden Throne, and the biological tissues left behind by the Emperor.

The two sides soon had their second contact.

This time, it's not about smuggling a Bloodwalker into Terra.

Lassián, Frank, Danda, and Lassián decided to send a formal mission to Comoros for negotiations.

"What do they want?" Lassilo asked.

The mechanical casting general unfolded another document.

"They initially asked for 50 billion people."

"Including three casting worlds, seventeen tithe worlds, and two stable shipping routes."

"After some haggling, the price was brought down to the lowest possible level."

The projection of the Kirill 9 galaxy appeared between the four people.

Nine Imperial Worlds, including one Foundry World and eight Industrial Worlds that can reliably pay tithes on food, minerals, and people.

The total population is 19 billion, and all of that has been given to the Dark Eldar.

The Dark Eldar demanded that the Imperium withdraw all major garrisons, orbital fleets, and Astartes forces, shut down its early warning system, and hand over the complete navigation coordinates.

The Empire only needs to remove the protection of nine worlds, and then the Comoros will collect the reward themselves.

They could arbitrarily seize civilians and take them back to the Comoros arenas, laboratories, and slave markets.

Those who could not be taken away would die from subsequent raids, famine, and the collapse of order.

With only 190 billion people, the empire could afford the loss, and Danda immediately began planning the details.

“Troop troop movements can be disguised as emergency deployments to deal with chaos. Fleet withdrawals can be explained as route reorganization.”

"The Red Claws stationed there need a top-level order from Terra to transfer them to another theater of operations."

Nine world-class administrators are unaware that they and the people under their rule have become bargaining chips.

They will only receive orders to hold their ground.

Then wait for reinforcements that will never arrive.

Lassillo asked one last question: "What if the deal falls through again?"

"We have lost Cyril IX, and the throne continues to decline. The Empire will never know why this is happening."

From the very beginning, this deal was not allowed to have any witnesses.

This time, the Dark Eldar showed sufficient sincerity.

They demonstrate an understanding of the distorted components of the Golden Throne, point out several erroneous modifications made by the Mechanicus over thousands of years, and even offer a new scheme for a stable structure.

But the Dark Eldar never intended to acquire only 19 billion slaves.

Deep within the Comoros, an even larger project has already begun—the construction of the Black Throne.

It was built in imitation of the core structure of the Golden Throne to seal the ever-expanding subspace rift inside Comoros.

This throne also requires a sufficiently powerful psionicist as its core.

When the Bloodlings first entered Terra, their real concern was not the malfunctioning throne, but rather the search for any biological remains the Emperor might have left behind.

Skin, bone fragments, anything will do.

In the second transaction, the throne components they requested from the Empire were also carefully selected.

Those components were in close proximity to the emperor for a long time, and may contain traces of his genetic material.

The Blood Actors of Comoros do not need to replicate the Emperor's soul.

They only need to cultivate a sufficiently powerful body, fix it on the black throne, and use it as a living component that can burn continuously.

A population of 19 billion is the reward.

The technology of the Golden Throne is a harvest.

But the Emperor's genes are the real target of this deal.

Judge Crow never stopped investigating.

He started with the deleted list of the deceased and found the shipping records left from the first transaction.

From the memory chip of a murdered mechanical priest, a set of coordinates leading to the Comoros were discovered.

He entered the Webway with the Royal Guard Nafradaran, following the trail left by the secret expedition, and infiltrated the Dark City.

Deep within an abandoned Bloodlust laboratory, he saw a black throne suspended before a massive rift.

And in the nurturing room next to the throne, there was a huge humanoid figure that was developing and radiating psionic energy.