In the far and dark forty-first millennium, there is only war. Behind the veil, countless evils peer at the living in reality. Xenos eye this stagnant Empire, longing to tear a piece of flesh from its body. Internally, the Empire is utterly corrupt, with various factions locked in endless infighting.
But for this very reason, peace is precious.
Terra. The Eternal City.
Shale, dressed in work clothes, widened his eyes in disbelief. His pupils reflected everything he hadn't dared to imagine even in his dreams.
What was this?
He was originally just an ordinary hive city worker. In the depths of that never-sleeping megacity, Shale's daily work consisted of curling up beside a dim assembly line, using his calloused hands to assemble mechanical parts whose purpose he didn't even know. Day after day, year after year.
Until recently, due to a daemonic outbreak in the Eternal City, he had lost everything. He was then taken by a well-trained evacuation team to a pre-established resettlement zone. To be honest, this was already incredible. Shale's ancestors had lived in the hive for generations, and their oral traditions told him: the Empire would never tolerate any hive city being contaminated. Conventionally, they should have been subjected to the Emperor's wrath without hesitation, turning everything to ash.
He didn't even know why he was still alive.
And now, Shale, having finally received orders to return home, saw an unbelievable sight.
"Is this... is this really my home?"
It wasn't just Shale; all his fellow workers around him were lost in the same shock. They stood blankly at the entrance, as if nailed to the spot, mouths slightly agape and eyes vacant. Everything before them looked nothing like the hive city in their memories. The floors were clean and bright, reflecting the pure white light from above. This light wasn't like the dim, flickering lamps common in the hive, but poured down softly and evenly, illuminating every corner clearly. The air lacked the familiar stench of exhaust, replaced by a clean scent.
Shale instinctively took a deep breath, feeling a sense of comfort in his lungs he had never experienced before.
Praise the Emperor. Praise the Emperor! If he could work in this environment every day, what had the past decades of his life been?
At that moment, a figure stepped out. Shale straightened up almost instinctively, his movements hurried and frantic. All the workers around him stood up in unison; some even stumbled from standing too quickly.
It was an Adeptus Custodes.
That massive frame seemed to have stepped out of myth, every step carrying a majesty that seemed to solidify the air. His face was hidden by a golden helmet, revealing only a pair of deep eyepieces. As a citizen of Terra, Shale had occasionally been lucky enough to catch a glimpse of these beings from a distance during grand proclamation days. But back then, they always stood on high platforms, as distant as gods. Now, a god stood right before them.
"Sit down," the Custodian spoke.
Shale's knees were weak. He swallowed hard and, along with his fellow workers, sat back down on the side chairs tremblingly, his spine ramrod straight, even his breathing becoming cautious.
The Custodian looked around, his golden eyes sweeping over every face.
"This is the change brought by Lord Adam." His voice echoed in the silent room. "From now on, your lives will change completely. I promise you—the Emperor's grace will shroud all of you."
Shale held his breath.
"You will receive a good education, learning to read, write, and calculate—knowledge you have never touched. You will receive proper medical services and corresponding medical subsidies. Every day, you will receive sufficient food supplies." The Custodian paused. "As for work—next, you will implement an eight-hour workday. Before officially starting, you will undergo training through immersive equipment we provide to learn how to operate the new machinery."
Silence. Shale felt his mind go blank. Could the Low Gothic of the Empire even be arranged in such a combination? He had never thought these things related to a commoner like himself. And now, a Custodian stood before him, telling him personally—all of this would belong to them.
No one questioned it. Facing the promise of such a being, Shale could find no reason for doubt. His body reacted before his brain—hands thrusting toward the sky, fingers spread as if to embrace the holy radiance pouring down.
"Praise the Emperor!" His voice carried a near-frenzied piety.
The workers beside him also raised their hands, jumping and cheering, tears welling in their eyes and sliding down their cheeks.
"Praise the Emperor! Praise the Emperor!" "Praise Lord Adam!"
They didn't know who this somewhat unfamiliar name "Adam" belonged to. However, that didn't stop these poor people returning home from cheering his name.
Meanwhile, on the other side.
In a hidden room, Adam stood before a massive monitoring screen, looking at the Imperial citizens in the footage with their hands raised and tears streaming down their faces, and nodded slightly. Good, this was fine. With a material foundation, promoting his own existence and letting others view him as the entity they believed in would likely be much easier. He still had a gap in faith to fill, and he had to rely on the galaxy's side to find a solution.
"To be honest, I don't actually think this is a good idea."
Adam tilted his head slightly toward the person who spoke. From the shadows, a man in blue power armor stepped out. Guilliman looked at everything on the monitor and shook his head. "This is just utilizing your ability to successfully complete material abundance; it hasn't changed anything important. Allowing sudden material abundance without any spiritual construction may allow corrupt and twisted forces to find an opportunity."
"...To be honest, if these words about the virtue of suffering came from Leman Russ, I'd find it more fitting." Adam was clearly somewhat surprised.
"Because this is the most fundamental fact of this dark universe," Guilliman sighed. "Though I don't want to admit it... forget it, I will handle it later. Why does it feel like we haven't seen each other in a long time even though only a day has passed? The change in your aura is quite significant."
"It's nothing, you don't need to worry about it." Adam thought for a long time and, finding the explanation too troublesome, shook his head. "Later, I will give you formal documents; it's not that I'm hiding anything from you."
Guilliman nodded with difficulty, then saw Adam toss over a helmet-shaped device.
"What is this?" Guilliman was curious.
"This is the immersive equipment I mentioned," Adam explained. "I know you're right; those Warp evils indeed make material satisfaction dangerous. So, I've created this immersive helmet. I call it 'Braindance.'"
Adam paused and continued, "Because I previously went to a... a place you can understand as something similar to the Warp. There, I successfully obtained a large amount of personal memory data. With such convenience and data support, those entering the dream can experience a complete second life. They can not only complete the most common education but also be guided to become outstanding talents. Do you want to test it? With a Primarch's ability, this helmet will likely take effect quickly, without needing sleep."
Guilliman put the helmet on with half-skepticism, closing his eyes briefly to rest. After a while, he took off the helmet, looking somewhat lost.
"How was it?" Adam asked with a smile.
Guilliman thought for a moment and spoke: "The content inside seems to be a historical instance of Ancient Terra?"
To be honest, Guilliman was very surprised. Such extremely precious instances had long been lost throughout the forty thousand years of the Age of Strife and various wars. In most cases, even the most famous scholars of the Empire only knew vague things about how humanity burst out of the solar system and conquered the galaxy, such as the "Stone Men," "Gold Men," and "Iron Men"—things more like metaphors than formal historical works, let alone the even more distant era of Ancient Terra.
But in this short time, Guilliman, relying on the supernatural brain of a Primarch, had quickly played through an instance and gained insight into its principles. No matter how you looked at it, this was an immersive game based on the Ancient Terra era. The Empire had such things, but the cost was extremely high; arranging one for every commoner was out of the question. If mass-produced to strengthen education, it truly might produce qualified talents in batches.
As for how Guilliman knew? Regardless, when Guilliman raised an army through fast operations to take down a city-state and heard that the cave where the city-state's founder was born was named "Lupercal," anyone would lose their composure. Knowing such secrets, Guilliman even wondered if a golden-glowing psychic slap would fall from the sky to kill him and silence him.
Forget it, shouldn't think that way.
Guilliman forced his straying thoughts back and asked seriously: "So, you traveled into the history of Ancient Terra earlier?" His eyes widened slightly. Could this man's ability already allow him to travel through time? Was it that exaggerated? Wouldn't that mean...
Before Guilliman could gather his thoughts, Adam waved his hand. "I know what you're thinking, but don't. It wasn't time travel in the true sense. After all, with the Warp as a reference, what happens in the Warp stays happened; once proven, it is eternally proven. Time travel is actually very troublesome."
Before he could finish, he felt the ground vibrate slightly. Both looked up simultaneously. What happened?
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Explosions, endless explosions. Fire erupted from various sub-screens of the monitor, orange flames carrying rolling thick smoke, and various fragments flying. The people who were harmoniously entering various rooms seemed to have stepped on a trigger point, dying rapidly in the massive explosions.
Those who originally had happy faces fell immediately under the fire—their smiles hadn't faded before blood splashed on the clean walls, limbs scattered on the ground, and those throats that were just cheering were now left with only silent cries. The wails of the people were incessant, merging into a heart-wrenching noise in the speakers.
"What happened? This is an enemy attack!" Guilliman immediately swept his gaze over the other monitors, sharp as a hawk. He immediately discovered that at the same time, almost all jurisdictions of the Eternal City serving as Adam's pilot cities were under bomb attacks. Was it cultists? Or xenos? No, it didn't look like it. Guilliman's gaze fixed on an explosion fragment—the fragment bore a broken mark, a rosette he would never misidentify. His eyes twitched violently.
"This is truly annoying," Adam muttered while slowly reaching out his hand, his fingers falling on the control console. He operated the instrument with composed movements, then slid a gesture. A time progress bar appeared before him, suspended in mid-air, flickering with a faint blue-white light.
Adam pulled the progress bar forward. With this rapid pull, time constantly rewound. Those explosions and fires disappeared like a video being rewound—flames retracted to their origin, fragments flew back to their places, blood rose from the ground back into wounds, wounds healed, and the dead were resurrected. Everything retracted, as if being combed neat again by an invisible hand.
Of course, this was just "dragging the progress bar." What use was that?
Before Guilliman could speak, his eyes widened. Adam let go. People at this time seemed to already know something—those Custodes seemed to have heard a command, stepping out with steady and powerful strides, beginning to evacuate the crowds that had returned to their original state. Subsequently, the bombs hidden in the shadows were quickly dismantled one by one using the peak wisdom of humanity. The Custodes' movements were precise and efficient; in a short time, all bombs were completely dismantled.
Not a single casualty.
"Phew, alright." Adam wiped the non-existent sweat from his forehead and turned around with some self-satisfaction. "As expected of me, such a creative solution."
Then he looked back and saw Guilliman scrutinizing him. Emotions so complex they were indescribable surged in those eyes.
Guilliman: "And you said you couldn't rewind time?"
Adam said speechlessly: "Of course I can't. Don't overthink it."