Warhammer 40K: System Error, I Summoned the Arch-Traitor!

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During their exchange, Lion learned from the Emperor of Mankind just how vital the artifact born from the fusion of the Tuchulcha Engine and the two relics would be for human civilization. The Dissonance Engine that emerged from that union represented something staggering in scope.

It was the very goal the Emperor had spent his entire life pursuing.

A Webway Tunnel Boring Machine.

That was already the best description the Emperor could pull from his own lips.

He was even in the mood to tell his son about his days as a subway construction worker in ancient Terra's England, and to gripe about English inefficiency, truly jaw-dropping, he said — pointing out that the ancient Romans had built their grand roads faster.

Had Rogal Dorn been present, or Perturabo, had the Iron Lord remained loyal, either of them would have been halfway through drafting construction plans before the Emperor finished speaking.

Unfortunately, the Lion was no civil-engineering STEM type. He only knew this object mattered.

To humanity. To his father.

Lion swore he would stake his life to defend it and deliver it safely to Terra.

He also hadn't forgotten to seek confirmation from his father regarding Horus's absolution.

The Emperor answered him, and revealed the truth behind the Horus Heresy.

It was more or less what Lion had already worked out in his own mind.

Whatever last shred of wariness he'd held toward his brother Horus dissolved. Lion let out a long, slow breath.

The Emperor seemed to catch the small thought stirring behind his son's eyes, and he smiled.

"I can feel your joy, Lion. I learned from Sanguinius that Horus yielded the Warmaster's title to you."

"Ahem. Father, the position of Warmaster is, truthfully... I don't covet it."

The old knight's face went red. He coughed twice to cover his embarrassment.

"Oh? Then if I were to bestow it on Horus once more, you wouldn't mind?"

Lion stiffened. He opened his mouth to say something, and his mouth did the opposite.

"I would not."

"Truly?"

"Truly."

"Ha. Ha. Ha."

The Emperor laughed, divine radiance shimmering off him.

"You are still so untruthful, my son."

"But the title of Warmaster belongs to a bygone age. It does not suit the present. I have seen your efforts — how you protect the suffering people of the Dark Imperium. And so I appoint you Lord Protector."

"Do you accept this title, Lion El'Jonson?"

The Lion set his sword point-first into the ground and dropped to one knee.

"Loyalty is its own reward, Father. I accept."

The Emperor, possessing Sanguinius, extended one finger and pressed it gently to Lion's forehead.

Power flowed from that fingertip into the Lion's body, a warm torrent moving through bone and nerve and cell. The aged face the Lion wore began to visibly recede. Wrinkles smoothed away. The slackness at the corners of his eyes drew tight. Vitality swept through him like a tide, a restoration that surpassed anything biotechnology could give. A blessing from the Master of Mankind Himself.

Lion raised his head and saw himself in a mirror the Emperor shaped from psychic light: a calm, handsome elder knight, his full head of gray hair now a mark of gravitas rather than age, his whole bearing radiating the quiet strength of reason and civilization.

"Lion. Will you still, as you once did, offer me your loyalty and your victories? Will you fight to the last for humanity's survival?"

"I will, Father." There was no hesitation in the Lion's voice. "For you, and for humanity, I will offer my loyalty and my victories."

The Emperor had his answer. He said nothing more.

The corner of his mouth lifted, and the psychic radiance faded slowly from Sanguinius.

The Angel blinked, and his own light returned to his eyes.

Time resumed around them.

The honor guard hadn't noticed a thing. In their perception, barely a heartbeat had passed.

Lion rose and walked toward the Dissonance Engine, its terrible presence pressing against the air like a physical weight. He extended his hand. The power the Emperor had just given him surged from his palm, wrapping around the ancient creation like an invisible net, containing it.

They returned to the Rock.

The Lion kept his promise to the Tuchulcha Engine.

When the Dissonance Engine and the Tuchulcha Engine merged, all three relics blazed with a light so fierce it hurt to look at, resonating in chorus, like a match struck against the darkness of humanity's longest night.

Standing in that radiance, Lion El'Jonson and Sanguinius stood side by side, and for a moment it felt as though they could see it: a future no longer shackled by the Warp. The true turning point of humanity's fate.

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Imperium Sanctus.

[Any Astartes with power and a distinct character, loyalist or Chaos-fallen, is utterly unremarkable in the era of the Primarchs' return.]

[I will admit they possess exceptional command ability and personal charisma. But that is all, because the gene-sires surpass them in every regard.]

[The day Lupercal pacified the Great Maelstrom, I was there.]

Kaelen set down the data-slate and stood at the bridge viewport, looking out into the void.

The fleet was pulling its formation tight. Engine trails dragged streaks of light across the darkness, a great net drawing closed.

Three rebuilt Legions under three Primarchs pressed on with their crusade. Wherever they passed, Imperial worlds overrun by xenos and Chaos fell back into loyalist hands, one after another. Hundreds of millions of humans were pulled out of slavery and terror. The enemies that had savaged this stretch of space were being ground down at a pace no crusade in Imperial history had ever matched.

And now the war against the Great Maelstrom was nearly over.

The Red Corsairs.

A force too large to dismiss among the Imperium's enemies, one that had grown until it vaguely resembled the ghost of an old Space Marine Legion.

The Bloody Butcher. The Tyrant of Badab. Former Chapter Master of the Astral Claws. Now the Blackheart, Huron. He had been one of the Imperium's most persistent nightmares for as long as anyone could remember. Even the Chaos Warmaster Abaddon had acknowledged this upstart's capabilities, swallowing his pride more than once to court an alliance with the Red Corsairs.

In the old days, dealing with an enemy like Huron meant mobilizing massive Imperial forces, paying a terrible price, and still not being certain of winning.

Not anymore.

Huron wasn't facing the Imperium's main battle strength. He wasn't facing some joint crusade scraped together from a handful of Chapters.

He was facing three Astartes Legions, each commanded in person by a gene-sire, backed by a crusade fleet that blotted out the stars.

The outcome was never in question.

The crusade fleet moved like a whip in a steady hand, cracking through the Red Corsairs' defensive lines one after another, leaving nothing behind.

Huron himself was gravely wounded when he tried to turn the tide with a desperate surprise assault. The Phoenix Archon Fulgrim took his arm personally, and Huron only scraped out alive through an emergency Warp translation.

But that life cost him something.

The price was the heads of nearly every senior commander he had.

The Night Haunter Curze and his son Sevatar worked through the Red Corsairs' entire core command layer, one name at a time, until there was no one left.

The Red Corsairs. Back to nothing, overnight.

➤ Next: What Do You Mean Chaos Warbands Came to Help

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