Upon the Golden Throne, the Emperor of Mankind sat unmoving, like a statue, as if he had been seated there since the end of time, and would remain so until the end of the universe.
But only the Custodes knew that the Emperor of Mankind was not entirely without change; in recent decades, some flesh and blood had slowly grown back on the Emperor's body.
And all of this was because...
Custodes Shield-Captain Valerian, while on patrol, looked up at the steps beside the Golden Throne.
On those steps, a bedroll was laid out, and a man, his head resting on a pillow with various mechanical structures, slept soundly beside the Golden Throne.
His presence made the originally solemn and sacred Throne Room seem a little comical, as if he and the other elements of the Throne Room were on different layers.
Beside the man, a young boy with glasses and a buzz cut sat cross-legged. The boy had a revolver tucked into his waist and a Denkōmaru that was out of power.
He was the incarnation of Saint Doraemon, Nobita, who once shot off Khorne's thigh with a single bullet. But after Saint Doraemon fell asleep, Nobita did not follow him into slumber; instead, he remained awake, occasionally leaving the Throne Room to do who knows what.
Valerian knew some rumors from the outside, some saying that it was the Emperor borrowing the incarnation of Saint Doraemon to walk among humanity.
But... Valerian had seen Nobita look at the Emperor on the Golden Throne with a wary gaze several times.
Just then, Valerian's superhuman senses sharply detected a figure.
It was a woman dressed in a Cadia military uniform. The uniform was somewhat faded from washing but not worn out; instead, it was very neat. Her face was quite beautiful, but her cheek bore a deep scar.
The woman, with her hair tied in a ponytail, climbed the steps in front of the Golden Throne, carrying a bucket.
That was Lady Reyna, the commander of the Cadia 184th Regiment.
In a sense, they were Saint Doraemon's Custodes.
Lady Reyna's Cadia 184th Regiment and the part of the Battle Sister led by Lady Joan would rotate every ten years to watch over the sleeping man, that is, to guard Saint Doraemon's sleeping body.
Reyna nodded to Shield-Captain Valerian, then reached out and temporarily deactivated the Mad Clock affecting Alexander, using a damp towel to wipe the dust from Alexander's face.
The item called the Mad Clock could distort time; many years would pass around Saint Doraemon's body while only a few seconds passed in the outside world, so his body naturally often accumulated dust and needed frequent cleaning.
Reyna first used a towel to wipe Alexander's face clean, then took out a box of face cream with the Ultramarines emblem from her pocket and applied it to Alexander's face.
Valerian had curiously asked Lady Reyna about it.
Reyna told him that it was a special face cream gifted by the Ultramarines, which they had used to maintain Primarch Roboute Guilliman while he was in a Static Field; it would form an ion field to automatically block nearby dust.
Valerian also requested some Ultramarines face cream and occasionally applied it to the Emperor.
And indeed, after using it, the Emperor did appear a bit more radiant.
After Lady Reyna finished cleaning Saint Doraemon's face, she changed all the bedding, then carried the swapped bedding out of the Throne Room.
Logically, such work shouldn't have required Lady Reyna to do it personally.
However, with two divine beings sleeping in the Throne Room, the Custodes would never trust anyone else to enter.
Yet, Lady Joan, who also worshipped Saint Doraemon, didn't quite trust the Custodes either. After much negotiation, it was decided that only Lady Joan and Lady Reyna could ascend the steps in front of the Golden Throne to look after Saint Doraemon's body.
The great doors of the Throne Room slowly closed, and Lady Reyna briefly left the Throne Room. Valerian's gaze lingered slightly on the closing doors of the Throne Room.
Many Custodes had now left the Throne Room, heading out among the stars, acting under Guilliman's command, but the vast majority of Custodes still preferred to directly guard the Emperor within the Throne Room.
But Valerian was different from many Custodes; he actually yearned to go out among the stars, to use the body the Emperor had bestowed upon him to protect humanity. He even vaguely felt that this was what the Emperor wished for them to do.
It was just a pity that Marshal Trajan Valoris had kept him in the Throne Room... Valerian sighed inwardly.
Swoosh.
Valerian's keen senses detected a sound, and his vigilance instantly rose. He gripped his power spear tightly and looked in the direction of the sound.
"Haaahhhhhhhhhh—"
A long yawn echoed through the Throne Room, as if someone who had slept for thousands of years had awakened.
"Reyna is putting face cream on my face again. She's really treating me like Guilliman."
Alexander complained with familiarity, rubbing his face and wiping off all the sticky face cream.
Then he stretched, loosening his somewhat numb body, and emerged from the bedding, moving his body around.
He felt his body had become as stiff as if filled with lead after countless years of sleep. It took him a while of moving before he felt the blood in his body begin to flow again.
And at the first moment his body recovered, Alexander turned his head to look at the three years neet pillow still on the bed.
Looking at this item, Alexander's expression instantly became a bit complex, a bit numb, and he couldn't quite maintain his composure.
Twenty-two thousand two hundred twenty-two dream sequences were still swirling in his mind, even causing Alexander an unbearable sense of numbness.
This was the operating principle of the three years neet pillow: repeatedly simulating in dreams until the user's desired answer was obtained. This was also why the more complex the problem, the longer it took for the three years neet pillow to produce an answer.
Although with the 22nd century technology, Alexander wouldn't develop psychological problems from over twenty thousand dream sequences... but cycling through the Warhammer universe twenty thousand times still left Alexander feeling exhausted, numb, and in pain.
He had indeed gotten the answer from the dream, but his gaze towards the three years neet pillow was still filled with disdain.
"I hereby name you the first prison of the Nine Doors of Wondrous Tools!" Alexander cursed, kicking the three years neet pillow away.
Valerian, standing at the foot of the steps, instinctively wanted to catch the three years neet pillow when he saw this.
But the three years neet pillow bounced off the steps, hit a nearby stone pillar, and then, due to the reaction force, landed on an adjacent statue, was deflected by the statue's sharp edges, and flew back towards Alexander.
Alexander lightly extended his hand, and the three years neet pillow landed perfectly in his grasp, which he casually tucked into his four-dimensional pocket.
In over twenty thousand dreams, Alexander had kicked this accursed item away so many times that he could accurately predict its landing spot after being kicked.
"It seems you have already found the answer," Emperor Nobita, sitting cross-legged nearby, gently raised his eyes and asked.
Upon hearing this, Alexander's expression became slightly more complex.
Before falling asleep, Alexander, the Emperor, Sanguinius, and Guilliman had originally formulated many other plans. The intention was to have a backup plan if the three years neet pillow didn't yield a suitable answer.
But in those twenty thousand-plus dreams, Alexander had long understood that these plans, though seemingly different choices, all ultimately led to only one option.
"..Is the answer that you must ascend to godhood?" Emperor Nobita looked at Alexander's complex and numb expression, immediately judging what kind of answer Alexander had likely received.
When he sat on the Golden Throne, he had a similar expression.
Neither angry nor sad about his fate, just purely numb.
"If it were just ascending to godhood once, I wouldn't be this numb," Alexander shook his head.
A strained smile appeared at the corner of his mouth; this answer truly left him utterly numb.
This answer was too terrible. If Alexander made a mistake along the way, or if the Emperor couldn't hold on, it would only lead to eternal damnation. Did he truly have the ability to fulfill this answer?
If it weren't for the fact that the results of his attempts to escape to Paradise World or a pocket universe in his dreams weren't very good, Alexander would have really wanted to run away.
Alexander remained silent, feeling the prayers directed at him during his decades of sleep surging through the Warp.
He heard countless voices echoing in his ears, countless voices longing for his awakening, longing for him to bring back that answer.
Such a vast wave of faith, if it were his former self, he would probably be instantly overwhelmed, feeling extremely uncomfortable.
But the memories of those twenty thousand-plus long dreams still swirled in his mind; even the faith accumulated over decades pouring into Alexander's mind was, in turn, drowned out by those memories.
He calmly listened to the sounds of prayer, letting out a soft sigh.
When the sky falls, the tallest one bears the burden.
The last tallest one was the Emperor; he had already borne it, but he was close to breaking.
And Alexander looked around, realizing that he had somehow become that tallest one.
He had to bear it, not because he could, but because he was the only one left.
Alexander turned his head, glancing at the Emperor on the Golden Throne.
The Emperor's face was covered in a thick layer of face cream, making him look radiant yet a little comical.
Alexander stared at him for a while, then finally couldn't help but chuckle and shake his head.
Just then, the sound of a bucket hitting the floor echoed, and a joyful exclamation followed.
Alexander, not surprised, turned his head to look at the face that had matured a bit more than before, and a slight smile involuntarily appeared at the corner of his mouth.
"Long time no see, Reyna."
Alexander said to Reyna, who stood below the Golden Throne, her eyes brimming with tears:
"I'm awake. I'm back."
"I have come to save this Fortieth Millennium of humanity, a millennium of only darkness and war."