Chapter 437: Why, Corswain, Do You Merely Watch? Could It Be That You Too...?
The newcomer was clad in black plate from head to toe, etched with red-gold and silver.
Upon his pauldrons were wings the color of steel, and his crimson cloak was trimmed with black fur.
His expression was grim, his emerald eyes glowing with inner light. The thermal difference from the bombardment stirred the wind, sweeping his shoulder-length, soft golden hair behind him. In his hand, he gripped a black sword, its pommel shaped like four wings—half folded, half spread—protecting an azure gem.
Lion El'Jonson.
The Lion of Caliban.
Primarch of the Dark Angels.
It was as if he were staring into a distorted mirror, reflecting a version of himself from another time and space.
A knight, equally tall, equally cold, and equally served by the Dark Angels, stood blocking his path of pursuit. Something that should not exist in reality had appeared here.
Whoosh!
The Lion swung his longsword. That colossal force, enough to bury the knight before him along with the bedrock beneath his feet, struck nothing but air. As the dust settled, the knight reappeared at his side.
The knight stepped through the ash, his longsword held obliquely, letting gravity pull the divine blood from its edge.
The Lion felt pain.
An attack without warning had grazed his left arm, then was parried away. That indestructible blade had easily pierced the Primarch's armor, severing muscle and tendon.
Not an hallucination. Not sorcery.
Illusions could not affect the senses of a Primarch, especially the Lion.
The Khrave, renowned for their individual psychic might, could not shake this unparalleled warrior even when they besieged him in droves. Their mental incursions, catastrophic to ordinary men, failed to make the Lion waver in the slightest. Instead, after failing on the psychic plane, they exposed their homeworld, allowing their extinction to become another honor for the Dark Angels.
Arthur turned his body slightly. Though he swung his sword from outside striking range, in an instant, he vanished from the Lion's focused gaze and reappeared behind him. The sudden descent of the blade whipped up a gale at the Lion's side.
Clang!
The sword was fast—so fast that pain was imperceptible. The sword was sharp—the Lion could already feel the razor edge against his face.
His hair, bound by an elegant circlet, came loose. The Lion's pupils contracted sharply as he tasted the scent in the wind again. It was no fake.
Truly, a Primarch.
"Who are you?"
After a brief clash, frozen in place for a tenth of a second, the Lion growled low.
He swung his sword to force back Arthur, who was pressing forward. He did not understand why such a person would appear on Caliban.
Confusion, even a flicker of panic.
The Lion began to recall. A thousand thoughts roared through his mind, but no matter how deep he dug into his memories, he could not recall who this being was.
Caliban, the Dark Angels, his father, and his brothers.
Horus, the pathetic traitor; Perturabo, the disgusting liar; Curze, the hateful monster; the noble and tragic Sanguinius; the arrogant and brash Russ; and the annoying Roboute Guilliman...
The names of nineteen brothers flashed through his mind. He even unearthed the two long-forgotten existences from the depths of his memory, but he found that the person before him matched none of them.
Bang!
In the same instant, the Lion's counterattack arrived, hardly slower than teleportation.
Arthur blocked it with his sword.
"I am Arthur Pendragon. I come from ten thousand years in the future, attempting to salvage a tragedy."
The Lord of Knights stated his name and briefly explained his purpose.
He watched the Lion open his mouth, watched the Lion who had subconsciously placed him on equal footing.
"See? You do know how to use your mouth, don't you?"
The Knight couldn't help but remark.
"What is this cryptic nonsense?"
The Lion was furious, hacking continuously with his sword. His tense nerves strangely relaxed a fraction from the breaking point after the other chose to respond.
Clang—
Countless strikes were exchanged in a single second. The sound of clashing blades formed a continuous line amidst the ruins, leaving behind sharp sonic booms. The wind howled around them. The Lion felt an inexplicable suppression. The state of heightened focus he could usually enter seemed restricted within a 'reasonable' range.
This made him uncomfortable.
His keen instincts alerted him almost immediately to the anomaly.
The opponent possessed an inexplicable dampening effect on 'Primarchs' themselves, as if shielding the most critical part of what made a Primarch. If the Lion could rely on courage and will to fight a titan-sized beast in the past, he absolutely could not do so now.
Such a trait.
Bang!
Both drew their ranged weapons simultaneously, the shots colliding. Their longswords held firm in the middle guard. The two knights danced within the storm. Their full power unleashed, they flickered in and out of visibility at the center of the whirlwind.
Stable power output. Agile yet fierce. Parrying the blade, dodging the gunshot, flashing again, inflicting wounds, cycling endlessly.
So effortless. The opponent was clearly well-adapted to this combat without fluctuation.
If Magnus were here, he would have fallen in a single exchange.
As the Emperor's Executioner, the Lion almost subconsciously arrived at a very grim conclusion. He exhaled turbid air through his nose, trying to spot even a trace of Chaos corruption on the other.
Likewise, the name instinctively suffocated him.
Arthur Pendragon. This name was not unfamiliar to the Lion, who had mastered the Dark Angels' lore.
The ancient Host of Crowns, who fought alongside the Emperor long before the Lion or even the other Legions appeared. It took nearly two hundred years to lead the humans of that planet off their homeworld again.
Their names were taken from the gods, kings, and heroes of history before humanity stepped into the stars. The Lion remembered every name clearly, and knew their origins.
Among the Primarchs, only one was granted such an honor.
Only Horus...
Only Horus.
Even as a ganger on Cthonia, he struggled until he killed his adoptive father and earned his kill-name before receiving his true name. And the Lion, who knew countless secrets, knew this was all the Emperor's doing.
Jealousy.
The Lion tasted this emotion.
Along with the suffocation came jealousy.
"It seems you like to let your mind wander."
Arthur's attacks were denser than the fiercest storms of Caliban, leaving the Lion little room to manage his stamina.
"I've heard their complaints. You've always been like this. Unwilling to say anything, unwilling to listen. Unfathomable, intimidating."
Advance and retreat. Beneath their feet, nothing remained but devastation—cleaved steel, shredded rockcrete, and massive footprints.
"I want you to tell me, what prompted you to make such an irrational decision? Can you not smell the scent of panic on those Neophytes?"
The Lion knew this stranger seemed to have a problem with him. The other was angry because of his decision.
Of course. Almost no Primarch liked him.
The Angel was gone. Only Perturabo was left posturing, and the Lion wished he could strangle that bastard right now.
"Is this not betrayal?"
The Lion forced himself to reply in the same tone. A strange competitiveness gripped him, as if responding to a provocation:
"They are my right hand, the Dark Angels Legion. I must know where my hand is at all times. I cannot look away and find my right hand has picked up a blade without my knowledge."
Boom!
Under the furious gale, the Lion felt his flesh tremble, though strangely without pain. He clashed hard with Arthur, sliding back dozens of meters.
"Then what of your actions before Isstvan V? What were your thoughts when you chose to split your forces? The founding of Imperium Secundus? Did the Emperor know of any of this?"
Arthur asked in a low voice.
His tone remained flat, not arrogant like Fulgrim, nor sharp like Dorn, yet it stabbed into the Lion's heart like a steel knife.
"..."
The Lion suddenly found he could not respond calmly.
Arthur sighed lightly, but looked on the bright side: at least this enraged beast was willing to talk to him.
"What exactly are you afraid of? That your cleverness backfired, and the ordinatus siege engines ended up in Horus's hands? That while Dorn defended Terra, you were on the other side of the galaxy, playing Lord Protector of Imperium Secundus? That because you were busy destroying the traitor homeworlds, you couldn't make it to the Emperor's final battle?"
The Lion almost subconsciously checked his vox.
Disastrously, his comms were still linked to the Invincible Reason and his Paladins.
"Are you afraid your actions will be counted as betrayal? Afraid the Emperor, equally unfathomable and moody, will punish you, just as you treat the humans of this planet? You don't want anyone to know about this, so you chose such an extreme method?"
The Lion lunged again, his strikes dazzling, but he found the man before him was like another storm meeting his own, tit for tat.
"No! We returned to Caliban from Terra, only to find the entire defensive system locking onto us! It was this planet that fired on us without warning! Some were even tainted by powers you should know!"
The Lion roared.
His judgment was correct.
"Yet many knew nothing of the powers you mention. They had no contact with the commanders, be it Luther, Astelan, or anyone else. And I have just arrived; I did not order fire upon your fleet. Regardless of who your commanders conspired with, there are countless innocents who still love the Emperor and humanity. They raised weapons against you only because your actions made them think they were betrayed."
For the first time, the Dark Angels discovered that His Highness's words truly held power.
He could force any existence, no matter how strong, to confront him, and then make them listen obediently.
"You should have had a better way to solve this problem, instead of forcing the entire planet to become your enemy."
"They failed to notice their commander's fall."
"Didn't you also fail to notice Perturabo's problem?"
Arthur's words were truly sharp. The Lion bitterly realized he had never been good at reading people.
At Diamat, he handed the siege engines to Perturabo. Lost in the chants of 'Warmaster', he mistakenly thought Perturabo would use them to crush Horus's shameful betrayal. Instead, those guns were turned on the Raven Guard and Salamanders at Isstvan V, and later blasted open the Saturnine Gate on Terra.
If he had fully trusted Guilliman when the Tuchulcha Engine brought him across the galaxy to Macragge, how much pain and bloodshed could have been avoided? Yet they both guarded their own secrets, leading to catastrophic consequences.
No, there was worse.
The Lion lowered his gaze.
If he had discovered Lorgar's corruption, if he had noticed Angron's rage was endless, if he had seen Perturabo's twisted internal friction... As the Emperor's Executioner, he scattered his Legion into several expeditionary fleets across the galaxy, yet couldn't even grasp the state of his own brothers.
Now, Lion El'Jonson couldn't even predict the thoughts and actions of his own Legion.
The Lion gritted his teeth in silence, his sword strikes becoming even fiercer.
"When you yourself cannot detect the corruption of your brothers, how can you demand your sons detect the fall of their commanders?"
The other always seemed to catch the words in the bottom of his heart.
"Then what are you here for? As the Emperor's new Executioner to execute me? To mock my dereliction of duty, to declare my betrayal?"
The Lion's voice was low and dangerous.
He had witnessed the strange Dark Angels. They had stronger physiques, better equipment. Their automata didn't even follow the Emperor's ban on AI.
And such warriors were not loyal to him, the Primarch of the Dark Angels.
"No, I don't believe you betrayed anyone."
Arthur replied. "So why do you emphasize it? You just performed poorly during the Heresy, but that doesn't warrant death. These Knights of Caliban face the same dilemma in another rebellion. Do they deserve to die?"
Logical and well-founded.
The Lion's face puffed up with anger.
Judging others by himself, indeed.
Boom!
The impact kicked up a gale, sending debris flying. The sweeping blade seemed to carry the weight of mountains, raising a tsunami of dust on the concrete.
"We returned here to change unnecessary tragedies, to make the true criminals pay."
Arthur looked at the Lion, who still refused peace, and spoke seriously.
"Before that, I will strip you of your authority."
And give you a good beating.
"No, you cannot."
The Lion remained furious. Even losing ground in the verbal clash, he instinctively wanted to seize the initiative.
He would defeat these beings from nowhere, make the rebels pay, and then think about the rest.
"No, we can."
Arthur replied, full of expectation for those behind him.
Storm Dance!
Gareth held his breath. He only saw the leveled city district erupt with countless sparks in the smoke, flickering like firecrackers.
His knightly instincts urged him to join in, but there was no way to intervene. These two had reached a point where one must fall. A third party's rash interference would only result in being torn to shreds.
"Hey, recovered enough?"
Behind the cordon, having finished deploying the automata under Azrael's command, Kay patted Gareth on the shoulder.
He looked excitedly at the leveled ruins, his blood boiling at the sight of the Primarch battle.
"This is the second time I've witnessed such a scene," he said solemnly.
Merian raised an eyebrow, unsure what this guy was bragging about, and looked down to operate his dataslate.
As a Terran veteran who had clashed with many techno-warlords, he naturally operated the Cybernetica bots without issue.
As victims imprisoned by Astelan, they were quite clear on Luther's conspiracy. Now, this Cybernetica cohort—mainly Castellans, supported by other patterns, and even mixed with Terran mechanical sentinel models—was heading to various combat zones to broadcast. Relying on their tough frames and non-lethal weapons, they separated the overlapping battle lines, further easing the conflict.
This approach was quite effective. Not only did it protect the members from the future, but when the blood-crazed sides saw the Cybernetica cohort—capable of easily annihilating both—standing in the middle without attacking immediately, their brains regained some thinking ability amidst the blaring broadcasts.
"Done."
Gareth clenched his fist. His body, nearly shattered by the Lion's pulled punch, had recovered with the help of the external Belisarius dispenser. His broken armor was repaired by nanites.
His Highness had successfully stalled the Lion. They had to use their advantage to do more.
Caliban had many troubles.
First was Chaos corruption.
With the disappearance of the Great Beasts, much of the corruption directly affected Caliban's inhabitants. As the Imperium's exploitation of Caliban's population of less than 100 million deepened, these potential Chaos cultists were a huge threat.
Second were the true traitors.
Luther, the Lion's knight-brother, mentor and friend, the culprit behind it all. He stole the chaos tomes of the Order of the Wolf and accepted the power of Chaos.
Astelan, a madman fanatically loyal to the Emperor. Though claiming loyalty, his methods involved killing loyal allies and purging his own knightly orders. He conspired with Luther and was now the First Master of the rebel Knights.
Zahariel, who worshipped the Ouroboros tainted by Chaos, wanting to release it from Caliban. Now the Lord of the Mystai under Luther—Mystai being the Calibanite term for psykers—this new title undoubtedly symbolized Zahariel's leadership of Caliban's Librarian corps.
The group formed by these three and their senior officers was the core of the rebellion. It was they who controlled some orbital defense facilities to open fire, provoking the Lion into extreme measures and causing countless confused brothers to suffer disaster.
Finally, the brothers in the sky.
Led by the current Supreme Grand Master of the Dreadwing, Farith Redloss—the Lion's loyalist faction. These members dared to confront other Orders on the Invincible Reason years ago, and even attempted to Exterminatus Macragge to prevent accidents involving the Lion.
Furthermore, Redloss himself was the first Chapter Master of the Dark Angels after the Caliban event. He was the one who caught Luther.
No need to worry about them. Corswain and Galahad had already gone up.
"Let's move."
Kay extended his hand.
Gareth grabbed his arm, lifting his blade with his left hand again. They took one last look at the two still in standoff, then left firmly. The trauma inflicted by the Lion had vanished within hundreds of breaths.
They needed to handle these people before the winner was decided between His Highness and the Lion.
The core of everything was salvation.
Cherish this opportunity. Rely on the power in their hands to try a better way, to save more people.
"The warp storm not only disrupted the space we are in, but also confused time."
On the Invincible Reason, Inner Circle Knight Galahad tapped the table, speaking to everyone present. "I returned to realspace 656 years later. For over six hundred years, I fled and hid from my little brothers, until I met His Highness."
Among them were tall Primaris Marines, but more were Firstborn. Their power packs removed, arms secured by mag-locks, they were stuck to steel chairs.
These knights, who had fallen to backstabbing by colleagues, glared at the surrounding betrayers with hatred.
"This is the Dreadwing," Zabriel, a Knight of the 2nd Destroyer Squad, 3rd Company of the 15th Chapter, Proctor of the Order of the Three Keys, and Dreadwing warrior, added contemptuously.
"When we identify an enemy, we are always so single-minded. But to create another ten-thousand-year feud just to erase original sin? Honestly, Lord Redloss, you taught your juniors well."
"You're being cryptic again."
Redloss instinctively wanted to slam the table, but finding his hands mag-locked, he kicked the table indignantly.
The one-way transparency of intelligence made the Dreadwing Supreme Grand Master look incredibly awkward in front of his colleagues. Many were controlled without reaction, forced to listen to stories fabricated—maybe not fabricated, but definitely absurd—by betrayers, helpless to act.
No one expected these colleagues, who were once trustworthy enough to watch their backs, to suddenly attack them with power far beyond the norm. With equal experience, the outcome wasn't hard to guess.
"You serve a new master, yet come to mock my methods. Why didn't my loyal juniors hunt down traitors like you?"
Redloss replied fiercely.
As a Calibanite, he and his family were attacked by beasts when he was eight. The Lion saved him, taught him to be a knight, joined the Dark Angels, and finally became the Supreme Grand Master of the Dreadwing.
He obeyed because of the camaraderie shown by the Lion, and contributed all his strength to the Lion.
"If we really wanted to kill you, you wouldn't be sitting here."
Galahad said flatly: "Try to switch places, Redloss. If you stood here, how would you treat us?"
"..."
Redloss fell silent, hammering the table lowly again.
Behind him, the Neophytes from ten thousand years later were curiously observing this group.
"I feel they are no different from the Inner Circle ten thousand years later," young Ravenwing Grand Master Sammael whispered to his comrade.
Master of Sanctity Sapphon quickly covered his mouth.
"..."
Galahad fell into silence.
Indeed, ten thousand years ago, the differences between their Orders were huge, but at least the Lion was there to suppress them, keeping conflicts from surfacing.
Wait for Caliban to explode and the Lion to disappear, and every member would show their craziest side.
And Galahad dared to bet, if His Highness suddenly disappeared one day, these knights who seemed to have lost the dark traits of the Dark Angels would only behave more crazily.
Click.
The elevator doors of the conference room slid open.
A knight leading multiple Dark Angels walked into the conference hall of the Invincible Reason.
They were all unmodified Firstborn Space Marines.
These shadows moved forward, converging at the edge of the table. They tacitly made way for the throne area, coming to stand opposite Galahad.
"I warn you."
A low, recognizable voice rang out.
"If any possible accident happens to the Lord of Knights—"
Redloss turned his head, showing a slight smile of victory.
He knew Corswain had arrived.
Seneschal of the Ninth Order, the Lion's most reliable deputy, the Champion of the Dark Angels.
After the Horus Heresy ended, Corswain, who directly participated in the Siege of Terra, reached the peak of his prestige within the Dark Angels.
"Trust me, I will kill every last one of you."
Yes, that's it. Tough. Repay these traitors planning to serve a new master in the toughest way.
Hands on the table, Redloss turned his head to look at his 'comrade-in-arms'.
"..."
A look of confusion appeared on the Dreadwing Grand Master's face.
Because the other was staring at him.
"?"
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