4th Month, 844.M41, Segmentum Ultima, Attila System.
The Shadow's Sovereignty emerged out of the Warp and proceeded directly towards the Ymga Monolith, massive as a moon.
"Open the protective shutters."
Following Nareth's command, motors whirred, and the shutters on either side of the windows rose.
Under silent machine-code commands, the machine-spirit dimmed the glass.
Nareth's gaze pierced through the window, across the void, towards the ancient monolith.
With no Warp storm present in neighboring systems, the Ymga Monolith was not activated by any influence. It stood silent in the void, like any other celestial body.
Nareth's superhuman vision could also make out the web-like patterns of glyphs covering its surface.
He could recognize a small portion of them, identical to the glyphs on Medusa that had bound the Burning One's fragment.
The majority of the glyphs, however, he had never seen before.
Two stellar hours later, Nareth, along with Arsena, Gabriel, Thomas, and Miguel Cuesta, boarded a Stormbird and flew towards the base of the Monolith.
On a stone step platform, he met Sanchez, who had rushed over upon hearing the news.
Nareth led the group forward. The Monolith's portico was about a hundred meters high, its surface smooth and even, as if carved from a single piece of onyx stone.
Intricate circles and lines were traced upon it, forming together an eerie composition.
Arsena, a "Student of Ratiocination" looked at the composition and said:
"It seems to be a glyph."
"Correct," Nareth confirmed his judgment.
The center of the glyph was interlinked circles, one above the other. The outer part resembled crescent arcs converging inwards, all connected, with a horizontal line extending outwards from the center of each.
"It is time to inform you of an ancient race's existence."
Nareth then psychically transmitted knowledge about the Necrons and the Sautekh Dynasty to the others.
The glyph on the great door was precisely the symbol of the Sautekh Dynasty.
Arsena and the others rapidly absorbed the information flooding their minds.
An ancient race wielding incomprehensibly advanced technology, the Necrons.
The powerful Sautekh Dynasty.
Gabriel, having received three mental fortification enhancements, was the first to fully process the incoming stream of information. He remarked with awe:
"The Necrontyr and the Tech-Priests share some similarities, but also differences."
"The Necrontyr leadership was deceived by the C'tan, the Deceiver. To prolong their lives, they forced their entire race to undergo biotransference into machines."
"The Tech-Priests view the machine as the sacred form of the Omnissiah, believing the flesh is weak and that mechanization is drawing closer to the Omnissiah."
Arsena, a dual-discipline psyker who had received two significant mental fortifications, absorbed the information fully comprehending its meaning. He gazed at the Sautekh Dynasty glyph.
"The Sautekh Dynasty was already one of the most powerful dynasties during the time of the Necrontyr."
"As a powerful Necron Dynasty, it possesses over eighty Tomb Worlds."
"The Ymga Monolith is located on the fringe of Sautekh Dynasty territory. It is one of their dynastic artifacts."
Thomas, a mental discipline psyker who had received three minor mental fortifications, was the third to finish processing the information stream. He said:
"The Necrons must possess anti-psyker technology. I can feel that my consciousness cannot penetrate the door."
Nareth had a similar feeling. Although the anti-psyker field wasn't active, the Ymga Monolith incorporated some Blackstone technology, and his psychic abilities were somewhat suppressed.
The difference was, as a Primarch, his psychic power wasn't completely suppressed; his consciousness could barely penetrate the layered barriers of the door.
Miguel, a technomancer who had received one mental fortification, finished absorbing the information in his mind slightly faster than Sanchez. He looked at the massive stone structure before him in amazement.
"The primary function of the Ymga Monolith is perfect physical replication. It can actually fully replicate Necron warships."
"What Father emphasized is that it's true duplication. The thousands of duplicated ships all exist physically in the real universe and can fight independently."
"This… this is a technological miracle. I don't understand how the Sautekh tomb-artisans achieved it."
"They utilized the power of the C'tan," Nareth stated definitively. Even the Necrons could not achieve perfect physical replication through technology alone.
Duplicating thousands of warships required technological and energetic power on an astronomical scale.
"The Necrons' labyrinths can imprison a C'tan, using tendrils wrapped around its shards to siphon energy and produce force-fields."
"Sautekh is among the foremost in this. Their relics, can bind even a Transcendent C'tan."
The Sautekh Dynasty ranked among the foremost of the many Necron Dynasties, both in military might and technology.
In the future, the awakened Nemesor Imotekh, would unify the Sautekh Dynasty becoming it's Phaeron, he even dare to challenge the Silent King Szarekh.
"Each Trascendent C'tan shard is an amalgamation of dozens or even hundreds of fragments. Their power far surpasses that of lesser shards."
"Fortunately, the shard here is bound by the Sautekh. It cannot escape."
Nareth recalled that the Ymga Monolith wasn't activated until ten thousand years later, after the opening of the Great Rift.
He also knew that Hannibal had managed to withdraw unscathed and with significant gains; otherwise, he wouldn't risk exploring here.
Sanchez gripped the sword forged from the Fenrisian Kraken, his reward from the Wolf King for winning the contest against the Space Wolves, and examined the structure before him with a hunter's gaze.
"I am more interested in the Necron warriors, especially those scorpion-shaped constructs."
Nareth shook his head slightly and said with a smile.
"This is not a Tomb World. There won't be large numbers of Necrons. You might only hunt some guardians."
"The greater dangers will be the pervasive traps and the defensive systems guarding the place."
"You now have some understanding of our objective here. It is time to begin the exploration."
Having said this, Nareth led the five and the members of the Honour Guard forward.
Reaching the great door, the group began to examine the sealed entrance.
After a moment, Sanchez spoke first, he had assessed the door as a Hunter would.
"The traces at the entrance have been washed away by tens of millions of years. Not a hint remains."
"I also can't locate a structural weak point. I can't break it open with controlled force."
"We cannot use violent force to breach it," Gabriel continued. "Although I cannot yet comprehend the technology used to build the door."
"According to our Lord, it contains immense energy. A violent breach could trigger catastrophic consequences."
Arsena used his psychic senses to probe the glyphs on the door, attempting to reason and find a pattern in them.
"My knowledge of Necron glyphs is still shallow. I cannot deduce a pattern to open the door."
"I have probed the door and grasped some of its technology, but there is a force within that repels my psychic power." After silently calculating for a few seconds, Miguel continued.
"To open the door, it is estimated to require at least ten years."
"My "Eyes of Mystery Prying" can perceive some things, but the spiritual energy consumption is extremely rapid. The time required..." Thomas pondered for a moment before continuing.
"...would also be roughly ten years."
"It will not take that long," Nareth stated.
In the eyes of the "Baron of Corruption," the door was deconstructed into geometric shapes: rectangles, circles...
He could also see threads after thread of rules, red, black...
Then he noticed that all shapes, all colored threads, converged at a single point.
A single convergence beneath the Sautekh emblem, at the center of a circular ring, a glyph like a mandala.
Nareth knew that the capital of the Sautekh Dynasty was on Mandragora. That glyph must be the control glyph for the entire door.
He spread his golden wings and instantly flew up to the glyph. Raising his right hand, he pressed it against the surface.
The ground beneath their feet trembled as the hundred-meter-high door slowly began to open.
.....
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