The Eternal Wall.

The ancient landing pad was crowded with people, from the ground-level platforms to the high ramparts of the citadel, silhouettes packed together tightly.

The sacred statues gleamed under the light of censers, where perfumed flames burned in ritualistic bowls.

The fragrant scent of sanctified oil masked the pollution thick in the air.

People inhaled a strange blend of rust, sacred oil, and powdery cosmetics, while listening to a choir of young children singing hymns dedicated to the Imperial Regent and the Primarch of Hope.

Everyone craned their necks forward, eyes brimming with anticipation—they were about to witness a living legend.

But most could only observe from afar.

Even those who were Terran bureaucrats, masters over the fates of entire planetary systems, were relegated to the fringes.

Only the most exalted elite of the Imperium—high nobles or military commanders—were allowed to stand on the platform and meet the Primarch face to face.

Upon the platform, the mighty of the High Lords of Terra, the officials of the Adeptus Administratum, and the Ecclesiarchal priests had already taken their places, ranked according to title and prestige.

It was chaotic, yet not without order.

But many among them were far from pleased, some even visibly sullen.

After half a century, the Imperial Regent had returned from the frontlines to the center of power.

That signaled that their vested interests were about to be disrupted.

Worse still, the arrival of the Primarch of Hope presented a far greater threat.

He was inherently incompatible with the decaying order of the Imperium—his presence promised the total upheaval of the millennia-old balance of power.

These political animals had keen instincts—they sensed a storm of reform on the horizon.

Their families might soon fall from grace.

Some were already scheming in the shadows, plotting underhanded moves. Hidden chambers were being reopened, forbidden weapons dusted off, contacts made with hereteks and xenos assassins.

All aimed at the Primarch of Hope.

Once, these highborn would have feared the wrath of a Primarch and chosen subservience for safety.

But now, the contradictions had grown too sharp. They were desperate.

A Primarch, after all, was still mortal—he bled, he could be wounded, even slain.

Hadn't the Imperium once boasted twenty Primarchs? And now nearly all of them were dead?

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—

As the shuttle landed, every face stretched into a broad smile—some genuine, others forced.

"Savior!" someone cried out.

One of the High Lords eagerly stepped forward, making sure everyone saw his display of loyalty.

Nova Father—the patriarch of a Navigator house and Lord Admiral of the Imperial Navy—looked up and scoffed when he saw the overeager flatterer.

It was the commander-in-chief of the Astra Militarum—that pauper.

"Tch... shameless."

The third eye on Nova Father's forehead trembled faintly, transmitting a psychic message.

"Can you blame him?" the Lord Admiral sneered. "The Savior has given the Astra Militarum everything."

"That dog barely resembles a High Lord anymore."

If the commander-in-chief had heard that, he'd have exploded: "Oh sure, you're so noble, huh?!"

But the truth was, the Astra Militarum was the most wretched of all Imperial departments—bootstrapped peasants of the Imperium.

They didn't even have a permanent High Lord seat.

The current seat was only won through political struggle. It held no real weight.

And they still had to beg the High Lords of the Administratum for budget approval.

In this grimdark age, where the Imperium's borders were alight with war, Astra Militarum soldiers died by the hundreds of billions on every front, and their supply lines were growing thinner by the day.

They were on the brink of collapse.

Everyone knew it—only the Savior had the wealth to change that. Why not cling to his golden robes?

And cling he did.

If not for the presence of the Adeptus Custodes, the commander-in-chief might have leapt forward and clung to the Savior's thigh on the spot.

…

Eden stepped off the shuttle, descending the ancient obsidian platform alongside the Lord Regent.

The crowd erupted into joyous cheers.

The elite and clergy bowed deeply to the Primarch.

Eden sighed. "Nothing's changed, huh?"

"Indeed," Roboute Guilliman replied calmly, face radiant as he acknowledged the crowd.

As a seasoned statesman, Guilliman was masterful at these public appearances—presenting warmth while veiling his iron resolve.

In contrast, the Savior Primarch moved with a casual air.

Or rather—he simply didn't care.

Eden observed the scene carefully.

The grim, towering walls. The dense black mass of humanity.

All of them bore bizarre cybernetic augmentations. Their bodies stank of decay and sanctified rot.

The thick incense choked the air. Choirs of children, repurposed into cherubs, fluttered about. Scribal servitors entombed in iron coffins scratched away with feathered quills.

It was a manifestation of the Imperium's rot and darkness.

Even Guilliman showed a flicker of disgust.

After witnessing the flourishing realm of the Savior, the Lord Regent found the state of Terra more repugnant than ever.

It was one of the reasons he'd returned from the Indomitus Crusade during this moment of relative peace.

"Half a century later... I set foot on Holy Terra again…"

Eden reminisced about his past.

Back then, he was barely eighteen—well, in demeanor.

In truth, he had been over fifty at the time, and now his real age surpassed a century.

Still, by the standards of the galaxy's great powers, he was in his prime.

Fifty years ago, he had come to Holy Terra to activate a Rogue Trader license and seek the Ecclesiarchy's blessing.

It was on this very platform.

He had stood quietly behind the Lord Regent, a nameless figure among the masses.

Now—he returned to this place as a victor, the Savior Primarch of Hope.

He was no longer the minor Segmentum Governor begging for favors.

He was one of the most powerful beings in the Imperium—a ruler whose authority could not be challenged.

The High Lords now had to curry favor with him.

Eden greeted the Astra Militarum commander, the Ecclesiarch, and the Archmagos of Mars with a broad, warm smile.

That commander really had a sharp nose for opportunity.

He'd be showered with supply boosts moving forward.

These were Eden's allies on Terra—including the Grand Marshal of the Custodian Guard.

This trip was meant to spark reform—to reshape the throneworld—and for that, he needed as many allies as possible.

If he could push change peacefully through majority rule, all the better.

Less blood spilled was always preferred.

"But among these smiling faces—who are my enemies, and who are my friends?"

Eden scanned the crowd, alert.

He knew some here viewed him as a threat, loathing him to the point of murder.

They might feign obedience for now, but desperation could push them to act.

After all, he intended to reshape Holy Terra, revitalize the heart of humanity.

A necessary step.

Eden didn't want his march forward to be hindered by people pulling him back.

Terra was a bloated, decaying world—it could implode at any moment.

Better to act early.

Yet this planet held tens of thousands of ancient noble houses and interwoven power blocs, connecting countless worlds across the galaxy.

No doubt much of the High Lords' time was spent untangling this mess.

These entanglements were impossible to resolve gently—only swift, decisive action could work.

The longer things dragged, the harder it would become.

These families would band together under pressure and create greater resistance.

Some of them even held forbidden technologies, capable of immense destruction.

They had the potential to rebel—and even draw in heretics or xenos.

Eden exchanged a look with Guilliman.

They were both resolved to bring change—to make Terra match the Savior's realm.

Humanity should not remain shackled in darkness—it must walk toward the light.

Among the crowd, the nobility gazed at the two Primarchs, anxiety gnawing at their hearts.

They were beginning to wonder: what should they do next?

But Eden didn't waste time dwelling on it.

Plans were already in motion. His agents would ensure the reforms were implemented smoothly.

Teams of administrators and tech-adepts were en route.

They would overhaul Terra's archaic bureaucracy and agonizing inefficiency.

They would prevent more tragic catastrophes of the "Imperial kind."

Still—Eden had come to Terra not just for reform.

He had also come to shear the sheep.

As the birthplace of humanity, Holy Terra had lived through the glorious Golden Age of Technology and retained many artifacts from that era.

But with Chaos influence ever-looming, the Imperium had grown increasingly paranoid and regressive.

Countless relics and technologies were locked away in shadows, slowly rotting.

Imperial leadership could no longer wield them—but he could.

Eden could harness humanity's lost wonders.

Some of these relics could change the galaxy.

Take the Iron Men, for instance.

Powerful self-upgrading AI robots—they had once been humanity's key to galactic colonization during the Dark Age of Technology.

Compared to those things, the mighty Imperial Titans were but mundane engineering tools.

It was said that the Emperor once recovered some mutilated and neutered Iron Men relics and reforged them into a type of autonomous combat unit known as the Extinction Automata.

If Eden could gain control of such a force—or better yet, find and command a fully intact Iron Man—his territory's power would increase by an order of magnitude.

Even without deploying them en masse, merely researching the Iron Men's technologies and data would yield colossal benefits.

Using relics from the Golden Age of Humanity, his domain could begin producing planet-killing war machines.

There was also the Yme-Loc Megalith, a relic from the golden age of the Necrons.

According to the few fragmented and hidden records that could be found, this titanic obelisk had activated once during the Great Rift. As the warp storm tore open reality, the Megalith began to glow—

—and generated a perfect anti-psyker field.

The surrounding region remained completely unaffected by the warp storm, utterly stable.

It was absurd.

If humanity could replicate such an anti-warp field, it would become a devastating weapon against Chaos.

And shockingly, that was only its defensive function.

The Megalith, according to a psyker's prophetic vision recorded by the Imperium, was actually a technological manufacturing device.

One capable of physically duplicating any Necron ship that came into contact with it—down to every functioning component.

When Eden read that document, he went numb.

A perfect 3D printer… that produced fully functional ships.

It was madness.

He could hardly fathom the scale of the War in Heaven—when the Necrontyr's ancestors, the Necrons, clashed with the Old Ones.

It was so vast and catastrophic that it led the Old Ones to create the Aeldari and the Orks to turn the tide.

Even the divine Star Gods were annihilated.

Perhaps weapons like the Yme-Loc Megalith were just standard issue during those times.

Like an Imperial battleship dropped into the feudal age—what else would the locals call it but a divine artifact?

Eden didn't even want to imagine.

How many of these ancient apocalyptic weapons had the awakening Necrons or the dwindling Aeldari still kept hidden?

If they reclaimed their former technologies and unleashed them, what kind of devastation would they bring?

"Humanity's screwed…"

The more he thought about it, the more horrified he became.

And the more determined he was to push reforms on Holy Terra, to drag mankind forward.

To cling to outdated beliefs, to reject forbidden or advanced technologies, was suicidal.

With the old races returning or reawakening, humanity needed to evolve—fast—or it would be trampled into dust.

In fact, danger had already arrived.

The Savior's Webway domain had recently suffered an attack from forbidden technologies—its standard force fields and arrayed defenses proved useless. Casualties were heavy.

The issue was that his territory had prioritized the development of Holy Sun Technology.

It was extremely effective against daemons of Chaos—but not so much against alien tech and physical threats.

Eden had his suspicions.

He suspected this attack originated from the Dark Eldar—a depraved offshoot of the Aeldari who retained much of the old empire's knowledge and forbidden wargear.

Cruel, sadistic, and bloodthirsty.

Some of their upper-echelon might have set their sights on his Webway domain and started making moves.

Using the ancient Webway technology, the Dark Eldar could strike anywhere in the galaxy.

Destruction was far easier than creation.

If they were truly determined to use forbidden weaponry for terror attacks, they could wreak havoc on the Savior's realm.

And they were almost impossible to catch.

It would be a nightmare.

Eden furrowed his brows, trying to devise a method to counter the Dark Eldar.

How could he catch beings who could flit across the galaxy and the Webway? Should he strike their home base?

What weapons could even work against such degenerate xenos?

Currently, the Savior's tech—while heretical by Imperial standards—was still fairly conventional by galactic norms.

Then a thought came to him.

There was a forbidden Imperial relic called the Lustre of Silence—a soul-affecting artifact of terrifying potency.

It was said to reveal a person's true self.

It would be the perfect weapon against the soulless and fractured Dark Eldar.

The only lead he had was that the Carcharodons Chapter had once escorted this forbidden relic.

He would need to track them down for answers.

There should also be records buried deep within the Sanctum Library.

Eden sank into his thoughts, so much so that he didn't even notice Guilliman calling out to him.

His defensive instincts did not trigger without immediate danger.

"You alright?" Guilliman asked again, a note of concern in his voice.

Eden snapped back to the present—and noticed the worried, cautious expressions of those around him.

He realized something at once.

He shouldn't be showing such a grim face in public.

That could shake the morale of Imperial citizens and officials alike—causing unnecessary unrest.

"Nothing," Eden smiled, brushing it off. "Just remembered something unpleasant."

He shoved his grim thoughts aside and once again returned to greeting the Imperial masses with warmth.

He often overthought things—a flaw of his. He had a habit of imagining the worst possible scenarios.

But that kind of caution was a survival trait for someone like him.

It was one reason he had rarely failed.

Sometimes, he even envied Guilliman—when faced with danger, he could simply charge forward with valor and strength—and win.

Eden wasn't that lucky. So he had to rely on foresight and preparation.

Soon, the ceremonial procedure resumed.

Eden and Guilliman boarded a hulking, lavish ceremonial transport vessel.

The parade had begun.

The vessel would traverse major travel routes across Terra, giving citizens a rare glimpse of the Primarchs' majesty.

Just as it had fifty years ago.

The view shifted from grand cathedrals and noble districts… to the slums.

Starving paupers and disfigured mutants hobbled out of hovels, staring in awe.

They were like maggots crawling in the shadows of Holy Terra.

Half a century ago, their forebears had also watched Guilliman's return.

They had chased after the transport ship, praying for salvation.

Yet, before and after that momentous event… nothing had really changed.

Their suffering had only grown worse.

The Indomitus Crusade had drained resources from across the Imperium, pushing these already miserable people further into despair.

A necessary sacrifice.

But the wretched of Terra could never understand that.

Why must Terra sacrifice so much to save humans light-years away…

…but not save the ones starving in its own gutters?

Even now, they chased after the Savior's vessel—hoping that this Primarch would bless them, save them.

Eden looked down at them, returning their hopeful gazes with smiles.

Their suffering will end soon…

If all went according to plan, after the victory celebrations, Holy Terra would undergo sweeping changes.

If these people could live long enough to see it.

Luckily, that day wasn't too far off. Most of them would make it.

Suddenly, Eden sensed a concealed gaze.

It was watching him—intently.

He turned his head and saw her.

Saint Celestine, the Silver-Haired Angel, and her twin bodyguards.

She looked the same as ever—holy, radiant.

Silver hair. White angelic wings. A slender form encased in gilded warplate. She drew many gazes from the crowd.

No normal man could ignore her presence.

Some nobles even birthed forbidden fantasies.

But none dared act on them—not even to allow a disrespectful glance.

Saint Celestine remained cold and serene.

But Eden knew—just now, it was she and her twin guards who had been stealing glances at him.

Over the years, Celestine had changed.

She smiled more now. The pain in her soul had eased.

The Savior's lingering soul energy had healed her, bathed her in light.

She dreamt of the Savior more and more—especially after that vision.

"Saint Celestine," Eden approached with noble grace. "Is there something you wished to discuss?"

But as he drew closer—

The angel and her twins panicked slightly.

"No," Celestine said flatly and quickly strode away to another part of the deck.

Eden halted, baffled.

"…Did I offend her somehow?"

Then he noticed other stares—burning, desirous.

From noblewomen, princesses, officials' daughters…

Their eyes shimmered with a raw hunger.

Some were already fluttering their eyelashes at him. Some practically drooled.

He could feel it.

They were undressing him with their eyes.

They knew every inch of his body, as if they had studied it closely.

???

Eden instinctively pulled his robes tighter and thought:

"Damn it… they're all thirsting for me."

The bizarre atmosphere made him uneasy.

Was this the work of Slaanesh? Had the Lord of Pleasure begun corrupting Terra's upper class?

If so, it was a grave matter.

Once the parade vessel reached its destination, Eden didn't even attend the celebratory banquet.

He immediately dispatched elite agents from the Court of Pius to investigate.

He also contacted the Custodes for assistance.

But the results…

…were not what he expected.

(End of Chapter)

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