Chapter Summaries

Fros and the Custodian rescued more than two hundred survivors from the plague-ravaged underground city, but found no one else alive. As the survivors were evacuated, the priestess was quarantined after a plague scan, and Fros learned that another world in the system had already fallen.

• Fros guided the civilians through the underground city while searching rooms for survivors, and the Custodian held back a horde of Plague Zombies so they could escape.
• After four days and nights of searching, Fros and the Custodian confirmed that more than two hundred rescued people were the only survivors they had found.
• Fros and the Custodian returned to the civilians, who prepared to leave the underground city for Talon under Astartes protection.
• Tessa returned Fros’s dagger, and the survivors boarded transports, where a drone detected the plague in the Ecclesiarchy Priestess and sent her into quarantine.
• Fros lamented that political and military threats had delayed the fleet’s arrival, then learned from the captain that the system’s second world had already been destroyed.

The Leviathan began testing its planet-cleansing mission by extracting the hive world’s resources and mass-producing Iron Men. It deployed the machines to clear underground Plague Zombies while igniting the entire surface, and the purge continued.

• The Leviathan arrived above the planet and extracted minerals and natural gas to manufacture weapons and Iron Men.
• The Leviathan’s production lines printed tens of thousands of varied Iron Men every three minutes and teleported them to the surface.
• Some Iron Men fused with buildings or rocks during teleportation, but they cut themselves free and fought the Plague Zombies.
• The Master Control Intelligence directed the Iron Men past surface hordes toward underground entrances while calculating a planet-wide bombardment.
• The Leviathan dropped billions of gas weapons, setting the planet’s surface ablaze as the Iron Men continued advancing underground.

Qin Mo investigated why the Plague of Unbelief had spread through the systems around Tyran but spared Tyran System itself, while Mimic helped survey the sector. As the Tyran Fleet continued its cleansing, twelve grotesque warships emerged from the Warp at the sector’s edge.

• Qin Mo ordered Mimic to report regularly so he could monitor its condition and shock it if it became lost in its memories.
• Qin Mo and Mimic found no plague in Tyran System and reviewed the system’s history, discovering no fleet had brought the outbreak there.
• Qin Mo theorized that his C'tan power might be shielding Tyran System from Warp influence while the plague spread beyond it.
• Qin Mo decided to register the people of every world in the Tyran Sector and extend Tyran System’s methods of governance across the region.
• Mimic showed Qin Mo the sector’s systems as the Tyran Fleet neared completion of its cleansing, and twelve plague-covered warships emerged from the Warp in the seventeenth system.

After the plague returned with the arrival of a Chaos fleet, its captain and crew continued onward despite expecting to die. Adam brought the Lord of Tyran and reinforcements into the system, where the Tyran Fleet opened fire and devastated the enemy’s Frigates.

• The Tyran Fleet detected twelve approaching enemy warships and jumped away to a strategic point rather than immediately engaging them.
• The Chaos fleet’s arrival caused the plague to spread again, and its captain wondered why the plague was weaker in the system.
• A powerful energy signal appeared, and the Chaos fleet prepared to fight when a Tyran battle fleet arrived.
• Adam ordered the Tyran ships to keep their distance and focus fire on the enemy.
• The Tyran Fleet’s volley destroyed eight enemy Frigates and brought the shields of the remaining ships close to overload.

Adam’s fleet destroyed the hostile ships, contained the released plague, and prepared to cleanse the star system. After the battle, Qin Mo and Mimic discussed the enemy’s sacrifice fleet and the Tyran Fleet’s strength, until Mimic lost track of himself and his illusion expanded to show the entire galaxy.

• Adam ordered the fleet to disable the remaining enemy ships’ engines and point-defense weapons, then sent Defensive Torpedoes to teleport their wrecks away.
• Green specks intercepted nearly all the torpedoes, but the fleet destroyed and removed the two crippled Cruisers and Frigates one by one.
• Adam ordered melta torpedoes and lances to clear the poison gas before the fleet eradicated the plague in the star system.
• Qin Mo watched the battle through Mimic’s illusion, and Mimic concluded that the twelve enemy warships had been sacrifices sent to test the Tyran Fleet.
• Qin Mo asked Mimic to assess the fleet, and Mimic compared it unfavorably to a civilian convoy from the War in Heaven before praising what Qin Mo had built from nothing.
• Mimic suddenly forgot what he was doing, and his illusion expanded from the Tyran System to the entire galaxy.

Mimic encountered a fragment of the Nightbringer in an illusion and learned it had discovered his location, then returned to reality and planned a route to Cadian for Qin Mo. After Mimic revealed the danger, he and Qin Mo began considering how to face the Nightbringer fragment with an army of War Machines.

• Mimic relived a memory of the Void Dragon ordering the Forger to help erase the Warp counterparts of the planets sustaining the Old Ones' barrier.
• The Nightbringer found Mimic in the darkness and mocked his imprisonment, then Mimic escaped the illusion and woke beside Qin Mo.
• Mimic planned a route to Cadian while Qin Mo explained that he wanted to warn the Cadians about the future rebellion of the Voskany Iron Cavalry.
• Mimic told Qin Mo that the Nightbringer had found him, and Qin Mo asked whether they could defeat it together if Mimic were freed.
• Mimic said they could not defeat the Nightbringer alone, so Qin Mo proposed fighting it with a large force of War Machines.

Qin Mo learned that a Nightbringer fragment would reach Mimic’s star system within seven days and prepared to use the impending clash with a Nurgle fleet to his advantage. Aboard one of the plague fleet’s ships, Horst discovered that a Death God-like entity was nearing and followed a Tarot-guided route to escape.

• Qin Mo asked Mimic for its location and learned that it was trapped in a Necron Hypercube Maze, then planned to teleport it away if it could delay the Nightbringer and send an energy signal.
• Mimic prophesied that the Nightbringer fragment would arrive within seven days and fight a fleet of flesh-covered warships assembling in its system, and Qin Mo welcomed the opportunity.
• Two days later, more than seventy mutated Space Hulks and other warships gathered near the system’s Mandeville Point, while Horst secretly investigated aboard a plague cruiser.
• Horst heard that crew members shared nightmares of a black-robed figure with a scythe, and that some were mutilating or killing themselves after seeing visions of it.
• Horst drew five Emperor Tarot cards and saw that an embodiment of death was approaching, then followed his instinct toward a pipe entrance.

A Nightbringer fragment arrived on the black planet and wiped out Nurgle's fleet before searching underground for the Necron tombs. Qin Mo watched through Mimic's illusion and reassured it that his defenses could withstand the fragment, though the space fortress was unfinished.

• The Nightbringer fragment descended onto the black planet, sensed Mimic inside a dimensional rift, and spotted Nurgle's fleet nearby.
• The Nightbringer moved to the fleet, killed its remaining crew with a glance, and dragged its warships into a black vortex.
• The Nightbringer returned to the planet and searched underground for the Necron tombs while Mimic showed Qin Mo what was happening.
• Qin Mo judged the fragment to be of moderate strength and reassured Mimic that his preparations could hold it off.
• Mimic showed Qin Mo the unfinished space fortress orbiting a metal planet, and Qin Mo said its firepower could be supplemented by Leviathan and the Hyper-dimensional Sky Dome.

Mimic escaped the Hypercube Maze and joined Qin Mo as Nightbringer pursued them to the planet. Qin Mo used the Hyper-dimensional Sky Dome to restore the shattered battlefield and launched a war of attrition against Nightbringer, leaving the fight ongoing.

• Nightbringer freed Mimic from the Hypercube Maze, but Mimic escaped through a blue rift into the Forge Dimension.
• Nightbringer recognized the rift and flew to the planet’s surface, where structures at both poles began enveloping the atmosphere in blue energy.
• Qin Mo tried to sense Nightbringer with the Hyper-dimensional Sky Dome, then ordered the Celestial Engine to bombard it.
• The Celestial Engine’s Particle Lances shattered the planet and broke apart Nightbringer’s body, but Mimic confirmed the Star God fragment survived.
• Qin Mo restored the planet with the Hyper-dimensional Sky Dome and teleported Iron Men to attack Nightbringer while the Celestial Engine recharged near the star.
• Qin Mo told Mimic to conserve his strength because he had a more important duty.

Qin Mo and the Iron Men weakened the Nightbringer fragment by destroying its planet, then Qin Mo captured it in a Hypercube Maze. With the battle over, the Leviathan and Celestial Engine began their return journey as Qin Mo explained his plans for even larger war machines.

• The Iron Men used a gravity generator to pin the Nightbringer, while Qin Mo and Mimic discussed how sustained planetary-scale attacks could wear down the fragment.
• The Celestial Engine returned and fired a Particle Lance that destroyed the planet, after which Qin Mo chose to capture the Nightbringer rather than eat it.
• Qin Mo teleported beside the struggling Nightbringer and threw a red-and-white Hypercube Maze, which captured the fragment.
• Qin Mo told Mimic that his backup plans were no longer needed, and they teleported back aboard the Leviathan.
• As the Leviathan and Celestial Engine departed, Qin Mo explained that he had built the weapon for a possible war against the Imperium and described his vision for a fleet of complete Celestial Engines.

Qin Mo negotiated with Belisarius Cawl to have the Lamenters undergo Primaris upgrades in exchange for Living Metal and advanced printing technology. After Cawl agreed, Qin Mo assigned the Mimic to stay with him and help identify who could survive the procedure as he planned to integrate the sector's systems.

• Qin Mo showed Cawl a piece of Living Metal taken from the Nightbringer shard and asked about the Weeping Legion and the Lamenters.
• Qin Mo offered Cawl the Living Metal in exchange for upgrading the Lamenters, but Cawl warned that revealing Primaris technology could make them targets of the Imperium.
• Qin Mo offered to reinforce Cawl's King of Explorers with Living Metal and provide a printer capable of manufacturing printing equipment, and Cawl agreed to attempt the upgrades.
• Cawl warned that the upgrades might fail and that the Lamenters might refuse, while Qin Mo said he could identify those unlikely to survive.
• After Cawl left, the Mimic took his appearance and asked Qin Mo for instructions, and Qin Mo told it to stay close and help foresee the future.
• Qin Mo considered using the Mimic to assess the Lamenters' chances of surviving Primaris upgrades while planning to unite the sector's systems and await Klein's return from Cadia.

Klein found Creed aboard the Path of Faith and delivered Qin Mo’s warning about the Voskany Iron Cavalry’s future rebellion. Creed decided to prepare for possible calamities, and Klein encountered Vanessa, who asked to see the Lord of Tyran.

• Klein located Creed on the Path of Faith and gave him Qin Mo’s letter.
• Creed read the prophecy that the Voskany Iron Cavalry would rebel and kill Cadia’s Governor and several generals.
• Creed burned the chip and worried that he lacked the authority to prevent the foretold rebellion.
• Klein told Creed that the Governor would support him, and Creed resolved to prepare for future calamities.
• After leaving the ship, Klein was approached by Vanessa, an officer of the Cadian Shock Troops’ 8th Regiment, who asked him to take her to the Lord of Tyran.

Vanessa used her Psychic Power to make Klein take her aboard his ship, then guided him to gather more than a hundred Lamenters Astartes on the return journey to Talon. After Klein brought the group to Qin Mo, Qin Mo sent the Astartes to Fros and confronted Vanessa about why she had come.

• Vanessa accompanied Klein aboard the merchant ship Grace and used her Psychic Power to make him answer her questions and show her the Dimension Engine.
• During the five-month journey back to Talon, Vanessa changed the ship’s route to find and gather Fros’s scattered Lamenters Astartes.
• Klein, Vanessa, and more than a hundred Astartes arrived at Qin Mo’s fortress and asked about Fros.
• Qin Mo ordered Klein to take the Astartes to Fros at Camp Nineteen, then confronted Vanessa and demanded to know why she had come.

Vanessa offered to serve as a bridge between Qin Mo and the Imperium, and he assigned her to help establish the Tyran Sector while keeping his plans secret. Meanwhile, Grey prepared a public execution on Industrial World Number Seven to warn governors who defied Qin Mo.

• Vanessa told Qin Mo that a mysterious voice guided her during yearly revelations, but she could not send messages back to it.
• Qin Mo learned that the High Lords of Terra mostly viewed the Talon System as useful but untouchable for now, and explained why he would not reveal Dimension Engine technology or his plans.
• Qin Mo told Vanessa to help form the Tyran Sector and ensure it remained under his control.
• Qin Mo revealed that the Custodians had spent months removing obstacles to his rule.
• On Industrial World Number Seven, Grey planned to execute the Governor publicly to warn other governors against rejecting Qin Mo's aid, ignoring his mobilization order, or reselling Talon System weapons.

Grey publicly sentenced and executed the Governor for disobeying the mobilization order and reselling military aid. He found a letter from Governor Ode on the Governor’s body, revealing that the arms deal had drawn Ode into the affair.

• The Governor received a letter from Governor Ode offering goods in exchange for the Tyran System’s weapons and Power Armor, and planned to send him the equipment.
• Grey arrived at the capital square, replaced the holograms with his image, and announced the Governor’s death sentence in the name of the Lord of Tyran.
• The Governor questioned why he was being punished for reselling equipment that had been sent without real authority over his system.
• Grey crushed a breach through the Planetary Defense Force line, fought through the guards, and beat the Governor to death in public.
• Grey found a letter from Governor Ode inside the Governor’s clothes and read Ode’s name aloud.

Governor Oude secretly plotted against Tyran Sector integration with help from Inquisitor Eren, while Qin Mo prepared Stone Men to govern the sector’s fifty-five worlds. After Grey revealed Oude’s covert military purchases and Minotaur Legion protection, Qin Mo decided to eliminate him.

• Oude watched recordings of Qin Mo publicly killing governors, and Inquisitor Eren explained that he had been sent by Lord Kalamazov to hinder integration without starting an armed conflict.
• Oude told Eren he would pretend to cooperate while secretly contacting other governors opposed to integration, and Eren promised protection from ten Minotaur Legion brothers.
• Three days later, Qin Mo began mass-producing Stone Men to serve as assistants or replacement governors across all fifty-five worlds in the sector.
• Grey reported that Oude had secretly bought military supplies and showed Qin Mo letters and photographs of Oude arranging defensive positions for ten Minotaur Legion Astartes.
• Qin Mo decided he had no patience for bargaining with Oude, and Grey left to act within two hours.

Grey infiltrated Ode's estate to kill the Governor, but ten Astartes detected him and launched a coordinated attack. He disabled one and resisted repeated EMP blasts, then fought the remaining Astartes as the battle continued.

• Grey scanned Ode's estate, found Ode asleep on the third underground level, and infiltrated the building while evading its patrols and defenses.
• Two Astartes noticed Grey's movement, alerted a patrol, and rushed inside to pursue him.
• Grey headed toward the underground entrance, but the ten Astartes surrounded him and fired Bolter rounds from concealed positions.
• Grey pulled one Astartes from the ceiling and crushed his helmet, while the other nine adjusted their tactics and attacked with grenades, including EMP bombs.
• Grey's armor and augmentations resisted the EMP blasts, but the Astartes continued their assault; Grey shot at four charging Astartes and struck one attacker behind him while tearing off another's arms.

Grey captured the surviving Astartes and brought Inquisitor Eren aboard the cruiser, where he reported the operation to Qin Mo and Chapter Master Fros. At the prison, the captured Minotaurs recognized Fros and taunted him about the Weeping Legion’s defeat in the Badab War.

• Grey persuaded the three remaining Astartes to emerge, fitted them with teleportation Protection Devices, and sent them to the prison.
• Grey entered the underground level, killed Governor Ode, and teleported himself and Inquisitor Eren to the cruiser.
• Grey told Qin Mo and Fros that he had captured ten Astartes and brought Eren back alive.
• Qin Mo explained that the captured Astartes belonged to the Minotaur Legion, and the group went to the prison.
• The Minotaurs recognized Fros and insulted him, recalling their victory over the Weeping Legion during the Badab War.

Qin Mo learned that the Minotaurs had accompanied Inquisitor Eren to obstruct the Tyran System’s integration, and decided to keep the captured Astartes imprisoned. He agreed to let Vanessa attempt to secure official recognition for the Sector Governor within a month, sending her off with a ship and an escort.

• Qin Mo redirected the Minotaurs’ hostility toward himself, then ordered Grey to extract their memories after deciding not to release them.
• Fros advised Qin Mo to release the Minotaurs because of their ties to the High Lords, while Grey argued they should remain imprisoned.
• Qin Mo reassured Fros that the Lamenters did not need to bow to the Minotaurs over the Badab War.
• Grey’s report revealed that the High Lords had sent Inquisitor Eren to watch the Tyran System, while Karamazov wanted him killed to provoke a war; the Minotaurs had served as hired muscle.
• Qin Mo decided to keep the Minotaurs imprisoned and considered giving them implanted personalities when they became useful.
• Vanessa promised to obtain official recognition for the Sector Governor within a month, and Qin Mo agreed to provide her with a warship and a Soulless One Custodian escort.

Vanessa traveled with Yao En aboard the Glory Road to a Hive World in the Misty Sector, where she used her Psychic Power and met a black-robed messenger in an ancient temple. After delivering a request about the Lord of Tyran seeking the Sector Governor position, she learned Admiral Kwalon’s fleet had been ambushed near Agripina and agreed to seek Tyran Fleet support for the Forge World.

• Vanessa boarded the Glory Road with Yao En and recorded an analysis of its dimensional travel, which appeared to span thousands of years while taking only seconds from the crew’s perspective.
• After forty jumps, Vanessa used her Psychic Power to redirect the cruiser to a remote Hive World in the Misty Sector and made its Governor serve her.
• Vanessa and Yao En spent several days exploring the Hive City before she led him to ruins resembling a temple.
• Vanessa gave a black-robed person a parchment explaining that the Lord of Tyran’s request to become Sector Governor was a test.
• The black-robed person told Vanessa that Admiral Kwalon had been ambushed near Agripina and asked her to arrange Tyran Fleet protection for the Forge World there.
• Vanessa accepted the new task and left with Yao En aboard the Glory Road, preparing to return to Talon.