The Emperor's suicide seemed somewhat unnecessary in Selene's eyes.
Originally, Selene had thought that after Magnus, who belonged to her, sat upon the Golden Throne, the Emperor would still suppress his emotions, but his first priorities would be declaring his will to the people of Terra, purging those senile old fools of the High Lords Council, and reconstructing the heart of the Imperium—the Throneworld itself.
Perhaps, deep down, the Emperor had already been scheming some kind of freeloading plan against Selene.
He must have been racking his immortal mind, thinking of how to rescue the future of the Imperium of Man—the entire human race among the stars—from the hands of an existence like Selene, a being that transcended dimensions.
Undoubtedly, despite how smooth their negotiations seemed, how easily they exchanged their so-called 'gifts', Selene had never truly trusted the Emperor.
After all, the Emperor's record of misconduct...
Was far too long.
A soul branded within the Warp had few secrets, and a being under the gaze of the Chaos Gods had none at all.
For millions of years, the Emperor had worn countless masks—so many that even he himself might not remember them all. Each mask suited a different era, tailored to the identity he needed at the time, providing the greatest convenience for his goals and missions.
The Emperor's soul—the immortal one—his greatest gift, was also what granted him unparalleled flexibility in all these matters.
In the eyes of others, he was sometimes male, sometimes female, sometimes neither. He could freely take the form of a child, an elder, a farmer, a king, a sorcerer, a magician, or even a madman. He was the great prophet, the Lord of Mankind, and also the Lord of Masks.
The Emperor embodied all these roles with extraordinary finesse. When humility was required, he was humble; when gentleness served as the best tool, he became gentle; he could be both cunning and kind, comforting yet tyrannical.
When fear was the only means, he would not hesitate to show his terrifying side; and sometimes, to rule, he would display mercy. He was whatever others needed him to be.
Selene was impressed.
Tracing backward through the sea of souls, along the tangled timelines of history, she could see the contrast between the Emperor's warmth and patience toward his sons during the early days of the Great Crusade and his cold indifference in the later years. Every instance reflected the Emperor's suspicious nature and his pessimistic, distrustful heart.
Judge a man by his deeds, not by his heart—for no one's heart is perfect.
Selene didn't care whether the Emperor was a socially anxious, middle-aged father. Her conclusions were drawn solely from his past actions.
Compared to this cesspool of a world, and those players of the 'Legendary Deceiver and Grand Conspirator Club'—people like the Emperor—Selene really was too honest, too straightforward, too naïve, and too pure-hearted.
Who were the members of this club, you ask?
Good question. Across the vast, boundless history of the cosmos, the ones qualified to join were, in Selene's estimation, the Emperor himself, the Chaos God Tzeentch, and the C'tan known as The Deceiver.
Each one of them a 'werewolf' among monsters—a cunning predator of the universe. Just from the name alone, one could tell how venomous The Deceiver was. This C'tan had deceived the entire Necron race into their mechanical ascension, only to devour the flesh and souls of the entire Necron species afterward—though, of course, he was later shattered by the Silent King's ultimate strike.
Among the surviving Aeldari gods, the Laughing God Cegorach barely qualified for membership.
The rest? At best, half-qualified—or maybe one-third.
In the now-annihilated Dark Eldar of Commorragh, rulers like Vect and Lady Malys, heads of various Kabal factions, were skilled players of schemes and deception.
Oh, and there was also the Chief Farseer of the Aeldari worldship Ulthwé—Eldrad Ulthran. His mind and manipulations were every bit as sharp, though Selene knew better than to think she could outwit him.
As for herself?
All that deceit and trickery was mere entertainment to her—never something she took seriously. To deceive others was one thing, but to deceive herself was impossible. Her path was the straightforward one—brute strength, overwhelming presence, and transcendence through sheer quality and quantity.
Selene had every reason to suspect that the Emperor was up to some secret scheme.
And sure enough, as the Emperor's humanity gradually revived under Selene's blessing, it was just as she had expected—this salted old fox had indeed started playing little tricks.
Endless tales of the Human Federation's past, endless emphasis on the loathsome and untrustworthy nature of xenos, and an oddly emotional insistence that humanity alone was deserving of love, protection, and guidance—these were all subtle seeds the Emperor had tried to plant within her.
"Indeed," Selene muttered, "I truly am too kind and far too honest."
Selene was in the middle of composing her reflections, "On Observing the Grand Deceivers and Great Conspirators of the Galaxy: A Chronicle / Genealogy / Biography," when—
Clang! Clang! Clang!
The enraged roar of the Blood God thundered across countless dying worlds. The Skull Lord himself swung his annihilating axe, capable of butchering the stars, straight down. From the bone-blade forged by a mountain of skulls erupted an inferno of crimson flame, the searing bloodlight striking Selene—just a fraction of a second too slow to dodge.
Boom!
In that fleeting instant, measured at planck time—a horrifying Warp storm erupted, tearing madly through the infinite gap between the Fortress of Ascension and the Sea of Thorns.
Crack! Crack!
The fortress of divine blood and flame, the ancient brass citadel that had stood since time immemorial, was torn apart in an instant. Every moving thing within was obliterated, reduced to the most fundamental particles of the Warp.
Including the battlefield of Khorne's bloodletting daemons and the Honkai Beasts of Finality—black masses piled and meshed together, grinding each other down like a colossal mill.
Warp-born beings were reaped like fields of grass—born in one sweep, wiped out in the next. None lasted even a single second. The pocket realms sustained by the Warp—the divine domains of lesser gods, the traces left behind by racial deities—all were erased.
The violent quake within the Warp pierced the barrier of reality itself. The material universe began to tremble. Planets tore apart spontaneously, turning in an instant into endless seas of blood. The power diffused from these seas snuffed out countless stars that should have burned for millennia more.
"Battle is the most magnificent contest all living beings can indulge in! Our glorious contest alone! And you dare lose focus—!"
"...So troublesome."
Selene muttered as she was sent flying by the blow. Even so, she did not forget—instinctively using her power to redirect the outlet of the Warp storm toward the habitats of other xeno species across the cosmos.
Especially those Tyranid Hive Fleets ravaging the galaxy—Behemoth, Kraken, Leviathan. Regardless of their current state, Selene made sure to give them her special attention.
Oh, and those greenskins preparing to launch another glorious WAAAGH! crusade—Selene guided the aftermath of her and Khorne's clash toward their massive junk armadas and the orc-infested planets and star systems.
And then, she left it at that.
Cough, cough...
Selene coughed lightly, crushing the shattered model of Might of An-Utu in her hand. A massive gash glittering with fragments of stars tore open across her Chaos God body. Her immense, super-energetic head swayed, nearly severed, as scarlet nebular energy poured from the wound in torrents.
As long as she didn't crash, it wasn't a big problem.
With an unchanged expression, she swung her Cleaver of Shamash, blasting the Blood God back as he tried to pursue. Then, she 'realigned' her head with a crack—instantly restored, smooth and pristine, no different from her prime.
For a Chaos God, injuries hardly mattered.
Finality, Lord of Eternity, Queen of Authority, Lady of Order, Goddess of Destruction—both the end and the supreme apex. As long as hierarchy existed, as long as disparity remained, as long as living beings aspired upward and destruction had not ceased, her power would continue to grow without end.
Selene was riding that arrogance hard now.
"Phew..."
Tch. The Blood God really wasn't easy to suppress.
Meanwhile, in the Ultramar sector, Lorgar had already begun collaborating with Guilliman on promoting The Holy Word—On Why We Must Piously and Faithfully Serve the Divine Selene (Revised Edition). But for those obstinate fools, a merciless cleansing was also underway.
The Imperium of Man had far too many internal issues. Even now, the Five Hundred Worlds and surrounding regions were engulfed in civil wars—some proclaiming Guilliman's fall, declaring that he had been corrupted by Chaos and reduced to the lapdog of a foul god.
In the grim darkness of the 41st millennium, the Imperium's countless tangled factions, petty local powers, and deeply rooted noble lineages—Navigator Houses, Astropathic Clans, and Ecclesiarchal priest families—all refused to relinquish their vested interests.
Far too troublesome indeed.
In addition to the war of the Great Rift, the Eye of Terror was now a grand stage of utter chaos... far too much chaos. Every moment, the number of dying lives reached astronomical figures. War, slaughter, atrocity—all of it endlessly fed into Khorne's reservoir of power.
Yet war could not simply be stopped.
Having vented much of her energy, seemingly savoring the pain, Selene's face—marked with fierce, crimson lines—dimmed slightly. But at the corner of her lips, an eerie smile appeared.
"I am, after all, not a pure warrior. I've no patience for the stubborn pride of clashing head-on as equals only to lose. In that case... I shall call upon powers beyond that of the Chaos God Finality."
With a single step across the void, after billions of collisions within mere nanoseconds, the shattered blade of her Cleaver of Shamash suddenly expanded, transforming into a massive black-and-white lance pulsating with power.
The whirlpool of decaying Honkai particles it unleashed made even the Warp tremble.
Two utterly different forces erupted without warning!
Khorne's blood axe shattered upon impact. The lance turned into a jet of black light, piercing through the purple-red curtain of the void. Under countless watching gazes, it shot forth, impaling the Blood God through the chest!
Trillions upon trillions of lights burst forth, blooming like the explosion of the universe itself!
Layer upon layer of shockwaves unfolded into vast circular rings of brilliance. The ultra-dimensional Brass Citadel and Sulphur Ladder collapsed completely, and even the Warp itself—the very cosmos in which they fought—seemed to scream and wail in agony.
Crack, crack, crack—
"To allow gentle trickles to merge, yet reject a torrent's violent flood... how fragile. The world must learn to adapt to the grandeur of my true form... Ah, I understand now. Next time, I'll remember."
Between her fingers, the massive black-and-white lance flared with radiant fire. With its surge of dazzling energy, the Warp quaked even harder. This time, however, it was not in pain—but in joy, in longing. The world itself, without conscious thought, responded with instinctive greed.
Yes—Selene was bribing it.
No world would refuse new elements or growth. Just as the newborn universe expanded eternally after its creation.
Staring at the bloody, ruinous void where the Blood God had fallen silent, Selene's gaze turned toward a corner filled with strange emotions.
"So, he really did kill himself. Even an Eternal One needs time to revive. Then stop watching and go—clean up that blue-feathered bird for me."
Her meaning was clear enough. Couldn't he see? Even while being hacked and cleaved apart, she still cared for the safety of the material universe, still loved humanity. She was already fighting three foes at once—asking him to handle one was hardly unreasonable.
He'd better not idle around. No more attempts at trapping her with words.
If he kept watching, she wouldn't bother containing the aftershocks next time!
Before her words even faded, a long sigh echoed—
Hummm—
In the Imaginary World, a pale golden sun slowly ascended, then streaked down like a thread of light, plunging straight into the crystalline labyrinth wrapped in a trillion vile magic arrays.
Rumble—!
"SKREEEEEE——!!"
The ever-scheming Lord of Change, who always managed to turn success into failure, shrieked in fury that split the heavens.
"Damn it! Damn it! Just a little more!"
He morphed continuously—first a white serpent crawling in circles, then a horned demon with unspeakable appendages sprouting from his head, then a blue, neckless djinn of light, then a swirling rainbow mist—until at last he settled into the form most familiar to all: a massive, twisted, blue avian being.
"A pack of brutes! Mindless fools! Without deviation from the norm, there can be no progress..."
True to his creed of never taking the lead himself and always manipulating others when possible, Tzeentch was not idle either. Instead, he peered into—
Selene's birthplace.
Where had her followers come from? What were they? What lay beyond the sealed boundaries—the outer infinite realm connected to the Immaterium?
"You will never understand the value of change—of the word 'new' itself!"
He watched with feverish obsession—the rapidly evolving, devouring Tyranids; the beautiful Seiren race known for their allure; the four-mouthed, intelligent, and powerful beings; the worm-like creatures that could merge into any form with their shared neural network; and the Protoss, masters of technology and psychic might...
Each of these questions drove the ever-changing avian god into ecstasy—he longed to pierce through and see for himself.
Knowing full well that this bird was prying into her secrets, Selene merely smirked. "The time for the material universe has come. That feathery mongrel and his lot... I'll leave them to you, Emperor."
"Understood..."
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