Chapter 250: See, They Even Have to Thank Us
"Are you departing?"
In Romulus's temporary office at the Third Imperium Starport on Dawnstar, Executor Russell, who had just returned from the Phalanx Sector, asked with some surprise.
"Yes. It's a good thing you've returned. You can come with us," Romulus replied, nodding from his solid wood chair, his gaze lifting from a personal report on Azrael. He closed the report, thinking to himself that these Dark Angels were a real handful, never a moment of peace.
"The opening of the trade routes will require your expertise," he said to Russell.
Everything is always a 'good thing.' I seriously suspect you plan these things. Russell couldn't help but complain internally. After so many years together, he had gradually come to understand just how extraordinary these so-called 'Primarchs' were. It had to be said, compared to his initial, horrified view of the Imperium, he now had a grudging understanding of why its political system was so abstract. Because kings and generals really were a different breed, and gods and monsters truly existed.
After a series of internal discussions, and factoring in the influence of the four Chaos Gods, even they couldn't imagine a political system that could survive for ten thousand years under such harsh conditions. And yet, the Imperium had miraculously held on. It was magical, difficult to comprehend. So now, whenever Russell wanted to criticize something, he would first consider if there was some deeper meaning to the tradition.
He was now grateful that these four were beings of high moral character. To call them supermen was an exaggeration, but they were certainly much better than the Homelander.
Watching the busy Romulus, Russell frowned slightly. He wasn't sure that if he had such power, he could still restrain himself.
"Yes. I will replace a few personnel, and then we will depart together," he said. He then signaled his secretarial team to submit the commercial reports, as well as the exploration reports on the resources, political systems, and actual development of the various planets along their route. Several ship-sized cargo containers of data.
When in Rome... aside from the Pioneer system, they also had to use consecrated parchment to store important data. The clerks of the Federation were now a world away from the word 'relaxed'. Especially the archivists. They wore a mask of pain every day, and had even had to recruit grassroots civil servants from the Imperial Administratum on various planets during their trade missions. Now, many members of the Human Federation who hadn't yet changed their mindset regretted choosing the archives.
And whenever the members of the Commerce Department watched these grassroots civil servants go from a state of bewilderment after being conscripted, to a look of surprise after being briefed on their duties, and then a look of 'thank the heavens, praise the Emperor'... they couldn't understand how these Imperial officials had survived.
These Imperial grassroots civil servants were simply gods. No computers, no A.I., their computational aids were simple mechanical devices. And yet, these people could somehow organize the data of an entire planet. The only drawback was the time it took. But could that be considered a human flaw?
"I've already organized it. you can add more as you see fit. Here is the list," Romulus said, pushing forward a file. "Also, remember to get your trade warrant renewed. The Commerce Department is currently over-saturated and needs to expand its personnel."
A Warrant of Trade. An important component of the Imperium, the legal basis for a Rogue Trader to roam freely among the stars. Now, as a proof of the Commerce Department's external activities and its integration into the Imperium, it could bring great convenience to this group from the Human Federation, who were still full of dreams about the outside world.
Don't be fooled by the name 'Rogue Trader.' If you were to use another word, you would know just how much power they held in the Imperium. Jiedushi. A military governor who could command the military and political affairs of a region, and was also responsible for the Imperium's external expansion and exploration.
Most of the ancient families, especially those whose Warrants of Trade were personally signed by the Emperor, were nobles who had fought with the Emperor on Terra, or warlords who had been defeated by him. And these Warrants were an accumulation from the Dawn Crusade. Many of them were Imperial Blood Warrants. At the time, they had just copied a batch, let Arthur use them up, and were just waiting to see when they could be used. And in the end, they were used for this.
This group from the Human Federation was inevitably out of place in the Imperium. Not long after the Pioneer system problem had been solved, Russell and the others had submitted an application to Romulus, hoping to take them to see the outside world. Because the four Dawnbreakers, as representatives of an official government, had left an extremely deep impression on them, giving this group from the Human Federation the impression that 'there are still good people in this world.'
At the time, the four had been covered in a cold sweat. To be honest, you can't say that. Whether there are good people in this Imperium or not... everyone knows the score. And with the Human Federation's naive outlook, the chances of them running into bad people were much higher.
To be honest, Romulus couldn't just let them explore on their own. In the end, they had held a meeting and decided to just give them the Warrants of Trade. Of course, a warrant wasn't something you could just have. A warrant signed by a Primarch or a High Lord was fine; the power wasn't that great. But as an Imperial Blood Rogue Trader, while you enjoyed a unique and noble status, to be formally recognized by the Rogue Trader league, you also needed to have the matching genes.
After all, although no one had ever been caught forging a warrant with so-called Emperor's blood, the various strange incidents created by Tzeentchian daemons were not few. Reviving saints was a routine operation. They even dared to impersonate the Emperor, to make those devout subjects of the Emperor worship them. Romulus didn't know the specifics, but according to Cawl, they could trace the origin through certain changes in the genes. The fewer the changes, the older, and the closer to Terra. As long as it could be traced back to Terra within a certain range, it was enough to prove the warrant was valid.
But what was magical was that, according to Terran standards of genetic analysis, these members of the Human Federation, who had not adjusted their own genes for tens of thousands of years, all had ancient bloodlines that could be directly traced back to ancient Terra. It could be said that the descendants of the Dragon Nations, the Frankish knightly nobles, the Pacific Rim warlords... none of them were as pure in their bloodline as these people. Who could you even complain to?
And so the matter was settled. The Human Federation was now in charge of the Dawnlight Sector's official trade and external exploration. The Dawnbreakers were in charge of wholesaling Warrants of Trade to facilitate their actions. And the High Lords of Terra had no objections. The Rogue Trader league was indifferent, and was even grateful that the Primarchs, because of their own noble status, had not arbitrarily signed Rogue Trader warrants to disrupt their trade activities within the Imperium, but had instead chosen to use the warrants that the Emperor had left for his divine sons.
In the eyes of the High Lords, this represented the Primarchs' sense of proportion, and their evaluation of the Dawnlight Sector grew even higher. They continued to say that the Dawnlight Sector was doing a good job, and then continued to deal with the series of time bombs within Terra. Compared to these Rogue Trader dynasties, which operated all over the Imperium and whose interests were not so closely tied to Terra, the other departments were having a harder and harder time.
See, they even have to thank us.
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