In realspace, it turned out, psychic power was unreasonable — but technology was more unreasonable still.
By an overwhelming margin.
Without Gork's blessing, the so-called WAAAGH field simply could not sustain the combat intensity the Orks had been operating at. The moment the psychic suppression grid activated, the Legion champions and Custodians — accompanied by Silent Sisters — moved out across every front, striking to decapitate Ork Warlords and their overlords.
The other Primarchs turned their attention to the Ork Warlords who had been approaching Primarch-level — and commenced righteous group beatings.
The Abominable Intelligence cohorts simply ignored the Ork Gargants. The Ork advance — never much of a formation to begin with — was shattered instantly.
The one-sided slaughter produced something rarely seen in the Orks: fear. Without Gork's protection, they had regressed far from the ancient Krork their makers had originally intended. Whatever had been driving their escalation was gone.
"Guilliman! Angron!"
Horus held a phase thunder hammer in one hand and his Talon in the other, working against an Ork Emperor whose physical frame was three times his size.
Horus was clearly at a disadvantage here. This most powerful Ork Emperor, even under the psychic suppression field, retained formidable capability.
But in this moment, the Imperium's greatest advantage — the one no species in the current galaxy could match — made itself felt.
Weight of numbers.
Every enemy that had ever sought to destroy this decaying Imperium found itself mired in endless war, and then found itself being carved apart by heroic units that just kept arriving. Without exception.
There was no such thing as an unfair group attack on the Imperial side. That was called righteous judgement.
Angron dragged his two phase glaives forward and launched himself at the Ork Emperor with blinding speed — a leaping overhead strike.
Strength that could trade blows with Vulkan, combined with the devastating properties of phase weapons — the Ork Emperor's left shoulder, locked against Horus, was simply sheared off.
The Ork Emperor roared in pain. But Horus had already seized the moment — one kick sent it stumbling backward, and the thunder hammer crashed into the armoured skull.
Half its face was caved in. And Guilliman was already coming through from behind Horus — the phase greatsword took the right arm off at the root, the arm already replaced with a massive mechanical prosthetic.
Angron swept the left leg from under it. The Ork Emperor bellowed and fell, unable to stand.
Horus moved in. The hammer drove into its chest — sinking into the fungal body — and then with a savage surge of force, Horus stepped up to its skull. The Talon divided what remained of its half-destroyed head into six pieces.
The WAAAGH field that had blanketed the entire Solar System collapsed by more than half in an instant. The Ork Boyz and their Bosses visibly began to deflate before everyone's eyes.
An already deteriorating situation for the Orks became catastrophic.
"Sejanus — signal all fleets immediately. Seal off the entire Solar System. Not a single Ork vessel leaves."
Horus transmitted at once. This time the Orks could not be allowed to escape. An Ork force that had run this kind of operation once would not hesitate to try something worse the next time.
"Yes, Father."
"Well fought, both of you. We're pulling out now — this planet cannot be left standing. Otherwise Orks will return here eventually."
Horus clearly understood the nature of Orks. Truly exterminating them from a planet meant destroying the planet. Otherwise, you would somehow find yourself having scoured the entire surface with melta and virus bombs, and the following year Ork Boyz would be sprouting up again like mushrooms after rain.
In the Warp, Perturabo — who had anticipated one of Tzeentch's moves in advance — was having a somewhat difficult time fighting on two fronts simultaneously.
Then Gork did something unexpected. With the air of an entity that had sensed something, Mork produced a large gun from somewhere and fired a shot into Khorne's back — and both aspects disengaged from the fight.
The Emperor, having driven Slaanesh back with a single sword stroke, retreated into the daemon factory. He and Perturabo made their exit at speed — neither wanted to be in range if that blunt instrument of a Blood God started swinging at anything that moved.
The objective had been achieved. No point lingering here.
Once the Webway was complete — more advanced technology developed — they would settle accounts with all of these entities properly.
The Ork assault had already crumbled. They were in full flight — but the Imperium did not let them go.
Dorn began consolidating the defence lines. Ferrus and the Lion organised the final sweeps. The Deathwatch deployed in every direction — their combat capability was extraordinary, and their distinctly unusual characteristics were beginning to make the other Legions genuinely wonder where these cousins had come from.
Brutal and extreme in their methods. Vicious and ruthless in person but remarkably prone to talking. And personality issues across the board — any of them dropped into a regular Legion would be isolated and shunned by their brothers within a week. The kind you don't bring on boarding actions.
But in the Deathwatch, none of that mattered. They had no need to care about any of it.
They gave full expression to everything in their characters. They put their personality defects on display without reservation. And they directed every bit of it at the Orks.
These black-armoured figures — whose honeyed-tongue combined with a viciousness that exceeded even Russ and Jaghatai, who launched psychological attacks at allies and Orks alike mid-battle — had the Primarchs genuinely curious about where Perturabo had found this particular collection of exceptional specimens.
"So, Warmaster — are they Iron Warriors?"
Russ and Guilliman stood beside Perturabo, watching the footage of these remarkably capable but extraordinarily mouthy black-armoured figures. Russ couldn't help asking.
Perturabo wasn't sure how to answer. His scalp was tingling slightly. He was not sure how to explain to his brothers that this was actually a group of half-bloods made using their templates.
"More or less."
He admitted it, somewhat against his own better judgement.
"Mmm."
Guilliman heard that and immediately knew the answer was definitely not. Russ moved in with a grin.
"More or less?"
"Once this Ork business is finished, get back to your campaigns. The Webway is almost ready — once the new navigation method has been rolled out to humanity, your assignments are done."
"After that, do whatever you want. As long as you don't do anything that betrays humanity, even if you blow up a planet for fireworks, no one's going to say a word."
Perturabo changed the subject with complete bluntness.
"Warmaster, I—"
But Perturabo had already vanished. Russ and Guilliman exchanged a look and saw the same thing in each other's eyes.
Those boys. Not simple at all.
Hundreds of bipolar cyclonic torpedoes fell from low orbit into Ullanor's core. The planet — sitting on mineral deposits of extraordinary richness — turned to ash before their eyes.
Both Guilliman and Ferrus felt a pang of regret. The strategic and logistical value of this planet had been immense. If only it hadn't been an Ork homeworld.
The four Ork empires that had ravaged the Solar System collapsed completely — exterminated to the last by an Imperium whose strength had grown dramatically over these years.
This had been one of the greatest crises the Imperium had faced since the beginning of the Great Crusade. The last comparable moment had been when the Imperium nearly tore itself apart from internal rebellion.
Now — with Vulkan still deep in Webway research, the Second still imprisoned, and the Eleventh and Omega not yet returned — the assembled Primarchs were nevertheless the most complete gathering they had ever managed. Not even the virtual War Councils had achieved this headcount.
Inside the Phalanx, Dorn had built small private rooms for each of his brothers. The Primarchs sat in their own designated seats, enjoying a rare moment of unscheduled freedom — talking openly about what they intended to do after the Great Crusade ended.
"I'll go back to Baal. Build things. Make art. Create an ocean. Plant vineyards, brew wine worth drinking. Build hospitals and schools for the people — beautiful plazas, and raise scorpions for export across the Imperium."
"Sometimes I'll fly up and look down at the world I've made. Watch the children working with my sons in the fields, strolling across the plazas, telling stories on the grass—"
Sanguinius spread his wings slightly, leaning back against the fur padding behind him, imagining a beautiful retirement.
"In that case we're coming to drink your wine and get a proper sunbath on Baal."
Horus teased.
"Baal welcomes you all, brothers."
Sanguinius smiled with effortless warmth.
"Actually — forget the grand plans for now. The galaxy is enormous. We haven't properly seen most of the worlds we've taken back. Come fly with me first — let's actually look at them."
"There's the Webway too — let's go explore it together. Then go back and build whatever you want in your homelands. Anyone interested?"
Jaghatai drank his mare's milk and grinned as he spoke.
"Perhaps when I grow bored — I might join you. We could compose poetry together."
Magnus responded to his closest friend.
"I want to keep searching the stars for the technology and knowledge the Dark Age of Technology left behind. Build a school inside the Webway for teaching psychic theory — and in my spare time, help scholars who want to understand and control their abilities."
"That still sounds boring to me. Better idea — bring your sons, I'll bring my wolf-cubs, and we roam the galaxy together. Hunt some xenos now and then. Eat and drink at the expense of whatever world we land on. Nine meals a day!"
Russ showed all his teeth.
"At that consumption rate, I don't think many worlds could support you both. You'd leave famine behind you wherever you went."
Horus replied.
"I remember you once bet against the Emperor. Outside of the Warmaster, I've never seen anyone beat Father twice in a row at anything."
Russ rubbed the back of his neck — slightly embarrassed. He'd only been annoyed at the time because the Emperor's charisma had drawn everyone to pay respect to him instead, which was humiliating. Who knew the Emperor would actually get heated over it?
"I've already selected my retirement agricultural world. I'll live there with my sons and grow old alongside the clan. And I've already built rooms for all of you there — if any of you decide you've had enough of moving around, come experience the pastoral life. I'll be happy to have you."
Guilliman was more prepared than any of his brothers — the agricultural world and the entire star system surrounding it had already been fully arranged. He was simply waiting for the day he could move there.
"I don't see it going that way."
Perturabo said.
"Given your character — when you're farming, you'll notice the crop yields aren't satisfying enough. So you'll start researching seed strains, fertiliser, and soil composition."
"Once you've developed solutions, you'll find you can't source the raw materials locally. So you'll go and find where those materials originate."
"At that point you'll notice how the entire star system — and then the star sector — handles taxation and management of these crops. And you'll start working to change things."
"Then you'll realise the problem isn't just agriculture. Administration, military, politics — all of it has issues. And you'll start addressing those too."
"Once you're in the middle of that, you'll discover it's not just this sector. The entire segmentum has the same problems. You apply that extraordinary mind of yours. You find an endless chain of things that make no rational sense to you."
"And your original dream — the old farmer who just wanted the simple pastoral life — has somehow looped all the way back to the statesman. Back to the ambitious Lord of Ultramar."
Laughter broke out among several brothers. That was more like it. The Lord of Five Hundred Worlds, dreaming of farming — not even a three-year-old would believe that.
"I really do just want a plot of land to grow things and retire."
Guilliman laughed helplessly.
"I'm different."
Perturabo raised his head with a trace of genuine pride, drinking Baalite wine.
"I'm going to take my engineering projects galaxy-wide!"
"I'll build the perfect fortress that can never fall! Self-repairing city-planets! A star-bridge spanning five segmentums!"
"And then I'll build a marvel that crosses the entire galaxy — something so everyone who lifts their eyes to the stars will see it — brighter than any star, burning with eternal light! A City of Iron that never goes dark!"
The brothers could only say — as expected from the Imperium's greatest builder. Even Dorn and Ferrus gave him a thumbs-up.
"What about you, Dorn? When the Great Crusade ends, what do you want to do?"
"Return to Inwit. Improve the environment there. Build a fortress. Repair the Phalanx to its proper state. Then wait on Father's summons — see if the Imperium needs me."
Boring.
That was everyone's unspoken consensus — but no one was surprised. This was the man's nature.
"I'll continue spreading the Imperial Truth. Churches of Truth on every world. Every human being in the Imperium should be able to know the greatness of our Father."
Lorgar's eyes burned with fanaticism.
The Imperial Truth evangelist. As ever.
"I think I'll probably take my sons and move through the galaxy quietly. When I see injustice and oppression — I'll intervene. Continue dwelling in the shadows."
"I'm less noble than that. I enjoy killing the worst of them. Separating skin from tissue and organs. Enjoying the sound of their screaming."
Corvus and Konrad exchanged looks of mutual distaste — then silence. Their brothers had no idea how to respond to either of them.
The absolute bleakness. The damp, dark oppressiveness of it. Looking at either of them, you wouldn't think you were looking at a Primarch — more like something genuinely monstrous.
"I think following Father into retirement is enough for me. Being with him — wherever it is — always feels right. Cthonia still needs to be dealt with though. That might take some time."
Horus — whose hairline had been steadily retreating under the stress of the Great Crusade and who had now simply shaved it all off — smiled but with an undertow of weariness. In his mind, nothing felt more settled than being at the Emperor's side — like those early days when he had first returned, learning under his father's guidance.
That period was the one he missed most. And now — soon — those days would come again.
"I want to be a wandering bard. Pick a direction, go somewhere, and let whoever I meet tell me where to go next. Until I'm tired — then I'll find you all, rest a while, and set out again."
Angron described his dream with a faraway expression.
"If that happens, let me race you somewhere along the way!"
Jaghatai had always had enormous enthusiasm for this kind of thing.
"I intend to collect artwork from across the galaxy. Hold exhibitions. Live with elegance and style until the end of my days — and occasionally visit Gorgoroth to see what new curiosities Ferrus has invented."
Fulgrim looked at Ferrus — that introverted, deeply technical man.
"I'll probably just work on research with my sons and clan members. Honestly — I'm tired of making nothing but weapons. Maybe I'll work with the Iron Snakes on the STCs they've been excavating. Visit Perturabo and Vulkan sometimes."
"And me?"
Fulgrim looked at Ferrus with slight displeasure.
"I'll make you every new creation I can imagine."
Fulgrim's smile was radiant — radiant enough that several brothers instinctively created a little distance between themselves and the two of them, just as they had done with Horus a moment earlier.
Some futures for humanity were simply not worth examining too closely.
"You look miserable all the time — this is rare, all of us together. Don't you have anything to say?"
Mortarion was a closed book. But Angron could sense the powerful emotion that this brother kept hidden — layered over by a difficult childhood and long-suppressed pain.
Mortarion had removed his rebreather and toxin canisters. This kind of occasion wasn't right for them. He had let down his guard, just slightly.
"I want to go back to Barbarus. Farm with my sons. Lie in the open plains and feel the sun."
Barbarus was well-governed now. The planet of poisonous fog and pollution was a distant memory.
No one doubted him. He genuinely liked farming. Always had.
"And you — once you don't have to live like this anymore, what do you want to do?"
Perturabo looked at Alpharius beside him. He had the least contact with his brothers of any of them — and it showed, even among Primarchs. Even Konrad didn't create quite this particular sense of wrongness. Alpharius carried an inherent quality of separation — though he actually cared about his brothers. Angron could feel that clearly.
"I'll probably find a hive world somewhere to disappear into. Work as a clerk. Or a judge. Anything, really — as long as it's quiet."
"Why not one of Guilliman's worlds? Those are good places."
"That works. I don't have hard requirements. The Imperium is roughly the same everywhere now."
"Then I'll hold the most relaxed position for you. Do you like the sea? What about tax collector for a fishing commune? No real work required — you can go out on the water several times a week, fish for deep-sea creatures, sit in the sun."
"Or if you get bored, transfer to library administration. Or archival records. Whenever you want a change, the Imperium has enough careers that you could try a new one every day for a thousand years and not repeat."
Guilliman smiled as he spoke.
"Then I'll gratefully accept."
Lion had been watching his brothers in silence throughout. Their easy conversation was different from his own situation — a knight destined to remain in the dark. He would have no day of rest. He would keep watch in the Imperium's shadows, and one day when the Emperor called, he would step out again.
The Dark Angels would never be dissolved. And they were never going to rest.
"Lion — are you going back to Caliban, or what?"
The assembled Primarchs looked at this man — the Emperor's truest firstborn in any meaningful sense, the one whose reputation within the Imperium was most steeped in mystery and dread.
"I don't know. Caliban, probably. Train every day. And when something goes wrong — I'll follow Father's orders and go out again."
"Haven't you considered trying a different kind of life? By that point Father himself may not want to think about any of this. You could let some of that responsibility go. You don't have to carry it all."
"When that day comes. Maybe I'll do that then."
Lion raised his cup and downed the wine in a single motion.
Maybe growing grapes and making wine — like Sanguinius — wouldn't be the worst thing?
That thought passed through Lion's mind for one brief moment.
The Great Crusade continued.
The Iron Warriors and Imperial Fists set about repairing the Solar System's defensive installations. Vulkan and the Emperor remained deep in Webway research.
Life returned to its former monotony.
War was never the heroic thing people imagined. It was administration problems and the unceasing logistics cost of expansion — astronomical figures consumed every single day. Administrative efficiency was being pushed so hard that tens of thousands of officials were dying at their desks daily.
This was not an era for the ambitious to find glory. But it was, at least, a hopeful era.
Perturabo felt this way — until Alpharius's message arrived confirming that Omega had been found. The small excitement from solving a key problem in the Blackstone Gate evaporated immediately.
"You're telling me — when you found Omega, you also just happened to find the Eleventh?"
"Yes."
"What's their status?"
"Omega is fine in every regard. I found him in a hive world — he was operating as a Lord Governor. He's with me now."
"And the Eleventh?"
Alpharius went uncharacteristically quiet for a moment — then spoke with something like reluctance.
"I think you and Father should come see in person."
"What happened?"
"Is that the Eleventh? What did you do to it?"
Perturabo turned to look at the Emperor's psychic projection — whose expression had gone darker than a burned pan.
"When you created the Eleventh — did you ever consider it might end up like this?"
Below them: Planet 13-22. A perfectly standard paradise world by every metric. But what rested on its surface was neither standard nor serene — a creature hundreds of metres in scale, its appearance grotesque and primordially terrifying, currently asleep, its snoring audible for dozens of kilometres.
Nobody knew how this creature had appeared. The Emperor and the others had absolutely no idea what the Eleventh had consumed on this world to become this.
"What do we do now? Remove it? Or capture it and keep it until after the Great Crusade, then fix it alongside the Second?"
The Emperor said nothing. It was Malcador who finally answered.
"Can you put it under and transfer it to the Shadow Cells?"
Nothing else to be done right now. First priority: work out how to fix the Eleventh.
Perturabo said nothing further. He vanished from the Iron Blood — and appeared on the paradise world's surface, facing the grotesque creature directly.
"Brother—"
He genuinely could not imagine how the Eleventh had eaten its way to this. The world looked nothing like an environment that could produce something like this.
The monstrous creature seemed to sense something. It opened its eyes — bleary with sleep.
Then it spotted the small bipedal figure standing before it.
A skinny little monkey. Except — odd. This one seemed different from the last ones. Not the usual pale, scrawny, rather dry-tasting variety.
But something about this particular small monkey gave it a feeling it couldn't quite place — a strange familiarity, as if it was supposed to be close to this one naturally. And at the same time, a deeply unsettling feeling.
As if the instant it moved to bite, it would immediately cease to exist.
"Can you understand what I'm saying?"
The creature lurched upright. The voice that appeared in its mind felt wrong.
"Brother?"
This small monkey could do that?
A flicker of human confusion crossed the creature's eyes — it seemed genuinely unable to understand how Perturabo had achieved this.
No response to language, then. Perturabo shook his head.
This old man. He really is constitutionally incapable of not causing disasters.
"Don't blame me for this, brother."
As the creature was still blinking in confusion, the crushing force of Perturabo's psychic presence began to radiate outward — an immense pressure descending on the grotesque form.
"RAAAARGH!"
The creature roared in pain. But Perturabo didn't ease up — he forced its physical mass to compress to approximately two metres, then delivered a firm knock to the skull. It went under.
He loaded it into a stasis field and returned to the Iron Blood.
"This is your doing."
If it hadn't been a psychic projection, Perturabo would already have put a fist into the Emperor.
"Let's go back to Terra first."
The Emperor's voice carried a faint trace of helplessness and something that might, if you were generous, be called guilt.
"Is there any solution? What did you actually do when you created the Eleventh? Let's go through it and see if there's anything that can help."
"This is how you run experiments? All your time and effort spent on self-admiration?"
Perturabo had come to the Emperor's laboratory. He and Malcador dug through decades of experimental records.
What left Perturabo genuinely speechless was that the Emperor's manuscripts were dominated, almost completely, by self-congratulatory entries. Actual experimental data was sparse — and buried inside endless narcissistic annotations.
To find the original draft work from the relevant period, Perturabo had to wade through years of the Emperor's self-adulation logs. Already irritated, he stormed over to the Golden Throne and punched the Emperor twice.
In the end, neither of them found anything useful. They left the laboratory muttering curses.
"Nothing can be done until the Great Crusade ends and you finish laying the Webway. We address this after."
"The poor Second and the poor Eleventh — ruined by you, you old disaster."
The Emperor lowered his head with a trace of awkwardness. In truth he felt no particular guilt — but years sitting on the Golden Throne, well-fed and comfortable, had given him marginally more consideration for his sons than he'd had before.
Malcador had nothing left to say about his old friend. He had seen clearly what the Emperor was when Aule and the others had left long ago.
Fine. Once the Great Crusade was over and the Webway was complete, he would wrap up his own loose ends and quietly disappear. Seeing the Emperor occasionally after that was enough. This man needed to be kept at a distance — otherwise you would genuinely never know what new disaster he was capable of producing that would leave you haemorrhaging from the brain.
Could this be called humanity's return to its pinnacle — for the first time since the Dark Age of Technology?
001, M31.
The Emperor stood on the Eternity Wall, looking out over a Terra alive with energy and bursting growth. A swell of pride rose in him unbidden.
Three hundred years of the Unification Wars. Two hundred years of the Great Crusade. The twists and reversals, the difficulties beyond description — but in the end, humanity had climbed once more to its golden age.
The Great Crusade had reached the very edge of the Astronomican's light. Every Astartes Legion was powerful as dragons. Imperial fleets filled every corner of the galaxy.
Humanity had re-colonised the Milky Way. The Mechanicus and the Abominable Intelligence cohorts reshaped world after world as they had in the Dark Age — without restraint.
There were almost no nights anymore. The spaceports never dimmed. The orbital rings never stopped turning. The ceaseless traffic of fleets filled every inhabited planet with light — no dark side, no shadow zone to speak of.
Planets that still had natural nights had become rare, sought-after retirement destinations — proof that such worlds had preserved genuine natural environments and superior living conditions, and that their populations weren't buried alive in administrative work.
For a planetary official, managing to close their eyes for ten minutes in a day was a luxury.
The Emperor and the Warmaster had imposed standards too demanding for words — so demanding that even a citizen who wished to end their own life had to file a form, wait two months for administrative review, and receive formal approval before doing so.
Because the Emperor and the Warmaster had both said:
"What? You have authority and you still want to enjoy yourself?"
"Signing edicts IS your highest enjoyment! Signing until the day you die is the reward for your loyalty!"
And so they had been driven — with no alternative — to sit at their desks with rotating stimulant drips and life-sustaining devices, no sunlight, the constant company of Abominable Intelligence units, processing endless work.
Occasionally they wondered whether the Emperor's prohibition on excessive AI autonomy had been a mistake — because the volume of administrative work had long since exceeded what the human body could endure.
But the Emperor did not notice. Because he was standing on the Eternity Wall, his psychic awareness extending from the Astronomican across every human world in the galaxy.
He had stood here at the beginning of the Great Crusade. Now he stood here again to receive its fruits.
The Webway was complete.
With Vulkan and Tarasin's contributions, the quality of this section of Webway remained imperfect — but no longer the dirt track compared to a highway it once was.
At minimum, it was a national road compared to a highway.
And Vulkan had nearly finished decoding the Webway's fundamental composition. With a little more time, if the Webway developed gaps in the future, humanity would be able to repair them itself — or dismantle and rebuild entirely.
The method for accessing the Webway had also been published by Perturabo. If necessary, humanity could use the ancient Eldar Webway indefinitely. From this point forward, humanity would no longer face the threat of being stranded or swallowed by the Warp.
Guilliman and Sanguinius had already held celebrations on their homeworlds — and formalised festival days to mark the occasion.
The entire human Imperium was following suit. Terra itself was about to inaugurate a new holiday. The Emperor named it personally:
The Eternal Dawn.
The Emperor had already begun thinking about retirement. Malcador was busier than ever and couldn't leave yet — and the Emperor still needed to hold the stage a little longer, get through this transition period, and then he could quietly disappear into peace.
The Primarchs had already begun acting on their dreams and intentions.
Jaghatai had submitted his resignation last year — the Fifth Legion was no longer needed on campaign, and his instinct for freedom meant he was already itching to take a skimmer and race across the galaxy at speed. But processes had to be followed, so the resignation had been held.
Others — Sanguinius, Guilliman — had also sent messages in advance, notifying the Emperor they were preparing to step back from their military duties.
He could find a quiet place to study how to fix the Second and the Eleventh. Continue being a shut-in. Dig into the Dark Age technology that still waited.
The future was bright. Everything was within reach.
The Emperor looked up — at the sun, in its prime, shining steadily over Terra.
All these years.
And somehow, he had never noticed until now how beautiful this sunlight was.