Where He Came From

"Was that all?" Sandman's reply made the powerful aura radiating from Korax falter.

"Your vision shouldn't be limited to a tiny place like Kiavahr and Lycaeus. Aren't you curious why I know so much about you?" Sandman slowly drew the Imperium's Aquila on the table with a stone.

The stone scraped across the hard tabletop with a grinding sound. In just a few strokes, a lifelike double-headed Imperial Aquila appeared on the table.

"This double-headed eagle insignia was the mark on your gestation pod when you landed on Lycaeus. You must be very familiar with it.

This power is called the Imperium, and its master is a powerful being known as the Emperor. He is also your father.

The mighty Imperium has now unified Terra, humanity's homeworld. Under the Emperor's leadership, it has begun a campaign centered on Terra to reclaim all lost human territories. Perhaps tomorrow, perhaps decades from now, your father's invincible fleet will descend upon Lycaeus, liberate this world, and take you, the Nineteenth Lord, home to assume command of the Space Marine Legion built using your genes as its template."

"As for why you somehow fell directly from Terra onto this mining world, that is beyond my knowledge. Perhaps... it was because of great maternal love." Sandman smiled meaningfully.

"Korax, the problems you see on Lycaeus are insignificant compared to the strife within humanity on worlds currently suffering alien invasion and colonization. Those aliens are out to exterminate entire species. So your eyes should never remain fixed on this tiny pool. The sea of stars is where your future journey lies." Sandman omitted much information and only gave a rough introduction to the Imperium and the Emperor.

There was neither time nor any way to explain many of the complicated matters.

"So, Boss, what do you expect from me? Or what do you want me to do?" Korax asked.

"Ah, requirements? In the future, make the worlds conquered by your forces accept your leadership. That's all." Sandman said only that.

He could hardly tell him that the Imperium would later descend into the Great Heresy because of the interference of four fiends in the Warp, shatter into pieces, and leave his old father gravely wounded and lying upon the Golden Throne, could he?

"Ah, aren't the worlds I conquer supposed to belong to me?" Korax asked in great confusion.

Sandman had unconsciously fallen into the confusion born from his past knowledge. In the original history, aside from Lycaeus being designated as Korax's Legion homeworld, Kiavahr had been handed directly to the Adeptus Mechanicus and transformed into a Forge World.

Put bluntly, the Emperor had been quite stingy in this regard. It was one thing that his ceremonial gift to Korax had only been a Master-crafted Power Whip, but he had also given Kiavahr to the Adeptus Mechanicus on the grounds that the Great Crusade required Kiavahr's production capacity.

Sandman's assessment of that was: What fucking bullshit...

Kiavahr was merely an industrial world. Could the Imperium of Man really have lacked that little bit of production capacity?

The later tale of the Raven King's homeworld rebellion was actually mistaken. The rebellion had taken place on Kiavahr. Its people could not endure the endless exploitation of a Forge World and rose up in revolt; there had been no rebellion on Lycaeus.

"Then speed things up and unify Lycaeus." Sandman did not dwell on the matter, instead urging him onward.

Come to think of it, it was rather strange. There had been a general pattern to how the Emperor recovered the Primarchs scattered throughout the galaxy, aside from Alpharius, who had landed directly at the Imperial Palace gates, and Horus, who had directly sent a message to the Adeptus Mechanicus.

Whenever the other Primarchs unified their planets, the Emperor would appear at their side in one form or another: as a wanderer, a challenger, or simply with his dazzling golden invincible fleet.

It was as though a Primarch could summon the Emperor once he had unified a planet or effectively become its ruler.

Of course, not every Primarch's path to unification had gone smoothly. Yet most of them had unified the planets they landed on in an extremely short time. The real issue was the enormous difference in timing: when had the Primarchs arrived on their homeworlds?

The Warp had no concept of time. The duration of travel from Terra to different planets was affected by countless factors, and under the combined influence of those factors, Korax became the last Primarch to return to the Imperium.

"I'll organize the camps we've already contacted to launch a collective strike and protest the Tower's increasingly reduced supply rations. In about a year, I plan to launch an uprising and completely overthrow the Tower's rule." Korax made his decision after hearing this.

"Go ahead and do it, Korax. Saviors Camp will support you with everything we have." Sandman's gaze seemed to pass through the noon sun and see the silent star that had illuminated Lycaeus for who knew how many years.

The star turned silently, as though fate itself were turning without a sound.

The miserable gears of destiny that had kept miners stagnant for thousands of years, forcing them to repeat the same misery over and over, began to turn at this moment. The rust-covered machine started operating, and its gears began crushing all the rot piled upon them.

The long-destined path began to move at this moment.

The protagonist was the visitor known as the Wanderer Beyond the Realm, while the supporting cast was the intelligent life that had repeated its own fate across countless ages.

By the time Sandman came back to his senses, Korax had already silently left the camp that had first taken him in.

"Boss, isn't this a little too soon?" Nekser was somewhat worried. Although Korax had already contacted most of the camps, whether they could be trusted was another matter.

Even if they could participate, could the miners withstand the Tower's retaliation? And had the Tower planted spies among them?

"Nekser, revolution demands bloodshed. In this great transformation, no one can remain untouched. The slaves on Lycaeus have fought for century after century, only to be suppressed every time. But this time, I believe the wise people in those camps will make the right choice.

As for the rest, just trust Korax. His sources of intelligence are far more extensive than ours." Sandman rose from the stone stool. Since Korax had already made his decision, it was time for him to take proper stock of Saviors Camp's assets.

Lycaeus, a secret Saviors camp.

Ephrenia was an utterly ordinary woman on Lycaeus.

Her life was the reflection of countless ordinary girls on Lycaeus.

Ever since she could remember, Ephrenia had known that her world consisted of a gray, murky sky and endless labor.

Every day, she worked as much as she could at the camp's mines while hungry, waiting for her parents and other family members to return.

Her father's rough palms, covered in cracks, would coarsely stroke her forehead. Her mother would laboriously slice open black Corpse Starch that gave off a pungent odor, soaking it in water to soothe her family's hungry taste buds.

Life went on peacefully like that, until her parents were buried deep in an unknown mine tunnel by an accident during mining.