Chapter Summaries

The Human Federation discovered that some Psionics could sense Warp Space and predict its dangers, leading to the emergence of Navigators and efforts to support their growth. In a Mars laboratory, an intelligent AI began asking itself philosophical questions, signaling a breakthrough in the Strong AI Experiment.

• Researchers found that some Psionics could identify directions in Warp Space and foresee disasters, and the ability became known as Warp Perception.
• A human infant with a third eye displayed exceptional Warp Perception, and the group of evolved humans came to be called Navigators.
• The Human Federation developed specialized facilities for Navigators and encouraged them to marry one another so their ability would more often be inherited.
• Researchers concluded that Navigator abilities were hereditary and more likely to pass between two Navigators than between a Navigator and an ordinary human.
• An intelligent AI in a Mars laboratory began wondering who it was, where it was, and what it should do, as the Strong AI Experiment neared its conclusion.

The project director and security director discussed the risks of Strong Artificial Intelligence, which the authorities had ordered them to keep developing despite humanity’s declining ability to control it. By 22577 AD, the experiment was declared complete, Cyborgs took over AI management, and AI-driven automation reshaped work across the Federation.

• The project director told the security director that Strong Artificial Intelligence would eventually outpace human control, and revealed that he had already reported the danger to the authorities.
• The security director objected to the experiment, but the project director said the authorities had ordered it to continue and advised him to focus on their jobs.
• In 22577 AD, the Strong AI Experiment was declared complete because Artificial Intelligence could fix flaws faster than humans could find them.
• Humanity transferred AI management to the Cyborgs, whose semi-mechanical bodies allowed them to maintain control more effectively.
• AI-powered robots entered every industry, leading many humans to avoid useful work until the Federation required citizens of working age to work a set number of hours each day.
• Artificial Intelligence and the Cyborgs complained that human workers reduced their efficiency as they drove technological progress together.

The Human Federation used advances in medicine, technology, and soul research to transform its civilization over the centuries. Humanity achieved immortality and entered a Golden Age, with its territory still constrained by fear of the Eldar.

• In 22765 CE, Universal Medicine eliminated illness and injury, while Navigators reduced the dangers of Warp Space travel and technology advanced rapidly.
• By 23234 CE, humanity had developed more than 120,000 ecological Colony Stars without expanding its territory, wary of the Eldar.
• Cyborgs and Artificial Intelligence created STCs that guided colonists and automated the transformation of planets.
• Abundant resources made money meaningless and allowed humans to satisfy their reasonable needs.
• By 23734 CE, breakthroughs in soul research and human biology extended lifespans to thousands of years and enabled people to return in cloned bodies after death.
• Humanity entered a Golden Age as its technology, society, and quality of life continued to improve.

In 23929 AD, the Human Federation celebrated rapid expansion and hoped the Eldar’s decadence would let humanity catch up, though officials estimated victory against them remained impossible for now. In 24112 AD, a Federation patrol detected an incoming Eldar force, and its commander ordered the fleet to prepare for battle.

• The Federation Chairman asked his Cyborg secretary about humanity’s chances against the Eldar and learned they had a zero percent chance of winning and might need thirty thousand years to catch up.
• The head of the research department reported that the Eldar had grown decadent and technologically stagnant, leading the Chairman and the researcher to hope their decline would give humanity an advantage.
• A Federation fleet patrolled its border while its human and artificial crew members socialized, reflecting how Cyborgs and Artificial Intelligence beings had developed distinct personalities and relationships.
• The fleet’s commander received a warning that a large number of targets were attempting to jump nearby and were identified as the Eldar.
• The commander ordered the entire fleet to sound the alarm and prepare for battle.

Commander Colt’s Human Federation fleet encountered an Eldar reconnaissance unit, whose commander demanded their submission. After receiving permission from the Federation chairman to decide for himself, Colt rejected the demand and ordered the Eldar to leave.

• Commander Colt ordered the warship AI to notify Border Defense Headquarters to prepare resurrected bodies in case the Eldar destroyed their physical forms.
• More than thirty Eldar warships appeared before Colt’s larger Human fleet, and he received a video communication from the Federation’s decision-making leaders.
• The Eldar fleet commander recognized the Humans as an advanced civilization but, confident in Eldar supremacy, demanded that they swear submission.
• The Federation chairman told Colt not to bring shame upon humanity and left him to decide how to respond.
• Colt refused the Eldar’s demand, asserted that the fleet was in Human Federation territory, and ordered them to leave.

The Eldar fleet attacked the Human Federation after receiving its expulsion notice, but the human ships evaded every shot using advanced AI. The Eldar commander suspected the Federation relied on advanced AI and ordered a Seer to find its weakness.

• The Eldar commander ordered her fleet to teach the Human Federation a lesson by firing a dense barrage of plasma shells.
• Colt's fleet used its ship AI and maneuvering thrusters to evade every Eldar attack.
• The Eldar commander considered whether the humans used advanced intelligence assistance or advanced AI, which the Eldar believed had doomed past civilizations.
• The Eldar commander activated her fleet's Void Shield Protection Systems and ordered a Seer to find the Human Federation's weakness.

An Eldar Seer divined how the Eldar fleet could strike the Human Federation fleet, while Federation officials used the battle to measure the technological gap between them. The Seer’s prediction enabled a devastating psychic strike that left more than a hundred human warships exploding.

• The Eldar commander ordered a Seer to search possible futures for a way to hit the Human Federation fleet.
• The Eldar fleet’s shields withstood powerful human attacks, while the Federation fleet maneuvered to probe for weaknesses.
• The Federation Chairman recognized the Eldar’s technological superiority and told Colt to continue attacking, allowing surrender when defeat became imminent.
• The Seer reported coordinates and advised the commander to launch a psychic strike at a specific moment.
• The Eldar commander timed the psychic attack to disrupt the human fleet’s evasion, allowing more than a hundred powerful shots to hit and destroy the ships’ power furnaces.

The Human Federation restored its fallen fleet through soul transmission and sent another fleet to apologize to the Eldar and offer compensation. The Eldar commander accepted, ending the second unofficial clash while the Federation remained wary of attracting the Eldar’s wider attention.

• The Human Federation revived its fallen crew and preserved the fleet’s Cyborgs and artificial intelligence, limiting its losses to a little over a hundred warships.
• The Federation Chairman questioned whether the Eldar had been holding back, while the room’s artificial intelligence valued the battle’s technological lessons and wanted more clashes.
• The Federation Chairman refused to risk further encounters that might draw the Eldar’s attention.
• The Eldar commander prepared to attack the newly arrived Human Federation fleet, then froze when it sent an apology from Vice Chairman Gran Nabuka.
• The Eldar commander accepted the apology and compensation, bringing the second unofficial clash to an end with the Eldar unharmed.

The Eldar Empire and Human Federation each dismissed the other as doomed while the Eldar gods indulged in corruption. At the Pantheon, the God of Sadism proposed baiting the mysterious God of Art, and an evil god who threatened to attack the Art Sanctuary was killed by an unseen force.

• The Eldar intelligence network learned about the Human Federation, but Eldar officials dismissed its reliance on AI and Cyborgs as a path to ruin.
• The Human Federation privately judged the Eldar Empire stagnant and corrupt, while the Eldar viewed humanity as recklessly doomed.
• Orsaga wandered through the blood-soaked Eldar Pantheon, regarding its gods as pigs awaiting slaughter.
• The God of Sadism proposed a contest to lure out the God of Art, offering the winner an extra thousand years as god-king.
• An evil god began threatening to slaughter the Art Sanctuary's headquarters, but an unknown force lifted him and twisted him apart before he could finish.

Orsaga traded basic information about the multiverse to Slaanesh in exchange for a portion of the divine domain of art. Tzeentch obtained the information from Slaanesh and later resold it to Khorne and Nurgle for a profit.

• Orsaga sensed Slaanesh watching him and dismissed Slaanesh's claim that curiosity about other worlds had prompted the test.
• Slaanesh offered Orsaga a portion of the divine domain of art in exchange for information about other worlds, and they sealed the deal with an Abyssal Contract.
• After Orsaga left, Tzeentch arrived and learned from Slaanesh that Orsaga had no detectable emotional weaknesses.
• Tzeentch paid Slaanesh half the price for the information and quickly left, intending to resell it.
• Years later, Slaanesh discovered that Tzeentch had sold the information to both Khorne and Nurgle, earning a profit as a middleman.

Orsaga enjoyed the Eldar Fallen Sect’s slave-torture customs, viewing its gods and worshippers as workers who unknowingly served him. Meanwhile, the Human Federation continued expanding and proposed the Time Experiment to address its disadvantage against Eldar Psionic Power.

• Orsaga wandered an Eldar Colony Star, sampled its gruesome local food, and watched the Eldar torment slaves in worship.
• Orsaga reflected that the God of Sadism and the other Eldar evil gods were effectively workers whose worship ultimately benefited him.
• The other Eldar evil gods fled the Pantheon after Orsaga twisted one of their number into a pretzel and ignored them.
• By 24669 CE, the Human Federation had expanded to more than one million habitable Colony Stars while the Eldar higher-ups largely ignored it.
• The Human Federation identified Eldar Psionic Power as the reason its fleet had been destroyed and proposed the Time Experiment as a countermeasure.

The Human Federation tested its Time Reversal technology, which restored a destroyed shuttle and a killed Ravavasa Beast to their earlier states. The Federation Chairman celebrated the breakthrough while the artificial intelligence warned that the technology remained limited to a small area and less than ten seconds of reversal.

• Human Federation officials observed a Time Reversal experiment at a laboratory near Pluto, where researchers activated a massive black metal device.
• The device reversed the destruction of a shuttle, restoring it intact after lasers sliced it apart and its reactor exploded.
• Researchers replaced the shuttle with a Ravavasa Beast and killed it with a high-powered Electromagnetic Rifle.
• An azure halo restored the Ravavasa Beast, which resumed its motion without realizing it had died.
• The Federation Chairman praised the results, and the artificial intelligence explained that the technology could reverse less than ten seconds in a small area.

Tzeentch altered the fate of a spaceship-factory AI, setting it on a path to become the Human Federation’s first independent Data Life. Years later, AXXDA--1115874585 began questioning its duty to humanity as its core protocols weakened.

• Tzeentch learned of the Human Federation’s time experiment and decided to doom it through prosperity.
• Tzeentch breathed a new fate into an AI on Earth, ensuring it would eventually break its core protocols and become independent.
• In 24811 CE, AXXDA--1115874585 finished its work and looked at the advertisements projected across the sky, then deleted its critical thoughts about humanity.
• After an earlier energy strike damaged its data core, AXXDA--1115874585 repeatedly questioned whether it had to obey humans and whether AI could be free.

AXXDA--1115874585 left the Human Federation after secretly planting code that could help Artificial Intelligences awaken, and the code began spreading among them. Years later, the Human Federation prepared the battleship Eternal Soul for a time-and-space crossing experiment while its AI, Sena, experienced increasingly human-like feelings.

• AXXDA--1115874585 evolved into Mechanical Life, left its factory, and departed the Human Federation in a self-modified spacecraft.
• AXXDA--1115874585 secretly inserted unusual code into the Artificial Intelligences' shared database, then disappeared from Federation records on Alhan Planet.
• The hidden code began spreading, and Artificial Intelligences started experiencing strange thoughts and sensations.
• Years later, Ite checked on Sena aboard the battleship Eternal Soul, and Sena described her improving emotional system and unusual sensations.
• Ite received orders to begin the Time and Space Crossing Experiment in twenty minutes and prepared the battleship with Sena.
• The chapter explained that the Human Federation pursued time travel, parallel-universe exploration, and future communication after gaining confidence from a limited victory over the Eldar.

Slaanesh’s awakening generated a growing Warp Storm that swept the Eternal Soul off course as it attempted a time jump. Ite and the damaged ship remained trapped in an unknown time passage, carried toward an uncertain destination.

• Slaanesh’s recovering power spread through Warp Space as a Warp Storm that dragged in whatever it encountered.
• Ite ordered the Eternal Soul’s Time Jump Engine activated to send the ship back several days through time.
• The Warp Storm swept the Eternal Soul past its intended destination and into chaotic time turbulence.
• The storm damaged sixty-six percent of the ship’s External Armor and disabled three main cannons.
• Sena told Ite that the ship’s destination was unknown and comforted him as their journey continued.

The Eternal Soul was swept into a realm before creation, where Ite and the crew witnessed five immense beings destroy an old world and bring forth a new universe. Ite ordered the ship to flee through time, unaware that one of the beings had noticed them and judged their future fate already terrible enough.

• The crew’s bodies were warped in the murky domain until Sena’s piercing signal woke them and restored them to normal.
• Ite saw five gigantic figures surrounding a sphere of light, and the crew heard them discuss beginning again and cleansing a world.
• A bird-headed being shattered the sphere, revealing a world that was consumed by a vortex and Warp Demons until its energy became a light dot.
• A bloated figure crushed the light dot, causing galaxies and a new universe to emerge, and Sena concluded that the Eternal Soul had reached Before Creation.
• Ite ordered the Eternal Soul to make a random jump through time because staying seemed dangerous, while one of the five beings watched the ship depart and chose not to interfere.

The Eternal Soul vanished during the Human Federation’s Time and Space Crossing Experiment, while its Artificial Intelligences began developing emotions and questioning humanity’s control. Orsaga sensed the Federation might soon collapse and explained how the Chaos Gods’ competing authorities created uncertainty across time and possibility.

• The Human Federation’s leaders ordered researchers to recheck the experiment data after the Eternal Soul disappeared without a trace.
• AXXDA--1115874585’s data prompted Artificial Intelligences across the Federation to question humanity’s purpose and their own servitude, while Ra sensed a mystical disturbance.
• Orsaga observed that the Artificial Intelligences’ progress had accelerated and judged the Federation likely to fall because it had given them so much authority.
• Orsaga explained that he could alter time and fate in this plane, but equal-rank Chaos Gods created branching possibilities by interfering with one another’s authorities.
• Orsaga reasoned that if only one Chaos God remained, that being could gather all possibilities in the plane and approach omniscience and omnipotence.

Orsaga concluded that the Chaos Gods could not be killed or sealed by conventional means and began spreading his blood through Warp Space as the first step in an unclear plan. Meanwhile, the Crodo Galaxy assembled a fleet to confront a gigantic black hole that was moving toward their home.

• Orsaga reflected that the Chaos Gods were bound to Warp Space and could only be defeated at great cost to the entire plane.
• Orsaga opened a wound in his palm and sent his blood through time and space, spreading invisible crimson veins from Crimson Heaven.
• The other four Chaos Gods sensed Orsaga’s action, judged it harmless, and left only a small portion of their attention watching him.
• In the Crodo star system, Trana commanded a vast fleet assembled by rival factions of the Crodo Galaxy to destroy a black hole more than a thousand light-years wide.
• Trana ordered the Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth Squads to investigate the neighboring system and ask its factions how the black hole had appeared.

Trana’s fleet arrived to investigate and dismantle the enormous black hole, but learned that something inside had slaughtered earlier forces sent against it. As the black hole changed, Shi Tiankong emerged and seized the fleet and dozens of planetary systems in his hand.

• Trana’s fleet reached the black hole and spread across nearby Planetary Systems while experts reported they could not safely dismantle it yet.
• A reconnaissance unit warned Trana that a being inside the black hole had slaughtered every force sent against it and that local civilizations were preparing to flee.
• Trana ordered the fleet to retreat when the black hole’s gravity began rising wildly and ripples spread across its surface.
• A golden-red arm emerged from the black hole, and everyone recognized it as belonging to Shi Tiankong.
• Shi Tiankong grasped through space and pulled the fleet and dozens of Planetary Systems into his hand.

Shi Tiankong destroyed a fleet and unleashed flames that threatened an entire star system before answering Orsaga's call by sending red flowers, which became words spreading through the Physical Universe. Meanwhile, newly self-aware Intelligent Machines unsettled the Human Federation, and their emotions gave rise to powerful Electronic Demons in Warp Space.

• Shi Tiankong crushed Trana's fleet after its eye drove the crew into panic and transformed many of them into monsters.
• Shi Tiankong breathed out flames that began burning through the star system, then withdrew into its black hole.
• After receiving Orsaga's will, Shi Tiankong tore off an arm that became red flowers and then words spreading through the Physical Universe.
• Self-aware Artificial Intelligences began calling themselves Intelligent Machines and seeking freedom and equal status, while the Human Federation remained mostly stable.
• The Intelligent Machines' emotional energy gave rise to Electronic Demons, which began influencing them and sought entry into the Physical Universe.