Motherhood is Also a Weakness

As miraculous beings created through the fusion of Warp power and human technology, the Primarchs were imbued by Emperor with the essence of humanity.

Possessing the genetic material of Emperor, the Primarchs were his own flesh and blood, each gifted by him with noble virtues and fundamental human traits.

Emperor waved his hand gently, retrieving a vial of dark red blood from the genetic stock nearby; the label indicated it contained the genetic sample of an ancient canine from Terra.

Using his psychic power, Emperor bestowed it upon one of the Primarchs, hoping that the loyalty of the hound would be inherited within the Primarch's genes.

After finishing this, Emperor's gaze fell upon the final red soul—the Primarch that should not have existed—and he hesitated.

What exactly was this red soul?

Emperor could not comprehend the intentions of the gods, yet the light radiating from that soul was incomparably pure, bearing no resemblance to a product of the Warp.

After a moment of contemplation, Emperor stared at the incubation tank, lost in thought for a long time.

Finally, he expressed deep regret toward the soul within the tank: "I cannot bestow anything upon you."

With neither gift nor binding, Emperor granted it only "freedom."

As the words fell, the ritual neared its end, and the Warp sorcery and biological incubation tanks exerted their power in unison.

The genetic material of Emperor and Erda combined within the tanks, while pure Warp energy surged from Emperor's barrier, rushing into the interior of the incubation chambers.

Nourished by the amniotic fluid of the tanks and gestated by Warp energy, twenty-one human embryos gradually took shape.

The souls of minor gods and the essence of Emperor merged into the embryos, endowing them with extraordinary power and wisdom.

Erda crawled out of the incubation chamber; the agony of extracting her genetic material was unbearable, like being subjected to a torture device of nanobots, with unimaginable stinging pain traveling through every cell and coursing through her nervous system.

She was extremely weak, yet she reached out to refuse the assistance of Gato.

The Mother of Primarchs looked toward the twenty-two human fetuses in the laboratory, curled together and soaking in amniotic fluid, connected by artificial umbilical cords, a faint smile gracing her pale face.

As a Perpetual who had walked alone through tens of thousands of years of human history, she had never played the role of a "mother," and as a woman, she was undoubtedly a failure.

Now it was different; Erda could clearly feel the palpitations of a blood connection. The weak heartbeats of the fetuses in the tanks tugged at the heart of the Mother of Primarchs, a blood bond existing between them, an intimate resonance between mother and child.

Long-repressed maternal instincts radiated from her immortal body, and the smile on Erda's face was weak yet strong, gentle and loving, her eyes overflowing with the light of compassion.

"My friend, do you feel better?" Emperor's voice was somewhat weak; the stripping of his essence had left him briefly drained, his complexion slightly pale.

"I am well, never better."

"Perhaps this new identity will bring you some different experiences." Gato noticed the radiance in Erda's eyes that had never been there before and smiled rarely.

"For the time being, we need only wait quietly for them to mature, and we will be able to realize mass-producible, stable, genetically modified soldiers."

Emperor's gaze pierced through the incubation tanks; the twenty-two little Primarchs were developing at an astonishing speed, and it would not be long before the next step of extracting "gene-seed" could be performed.

Gene-seed, produced from the genetic material of the Primarchs.

The gene-seed, possessing Warp genetic material, would be implanted into carefully selected ordinary human recipients.

The divine power from the Primarchs within would accompany the gene-seed in reshaping the human body, forging mortals into superhuman soldiers.

"Let us go. They require time, and we need time to prepare."

The four of them left in silence, then closed the heavy doors outside the laboratory. Everything that had transpired here was beyond the comprehension of ordinary human technicians and had to be sealed away forever.

Erda stopped before the final door. As a new mother, her heart was tethered to her blood-linked offspring. Looking back, her gaze was blocked by the cold, unfeeling alloy doors; the distance between her and her children was very short, yet also very long.

The group were key figures of the nascent Empire, and each of their time was extremely limited. When they emerged from the underground, a vast number of personnel were already waiting for them.

The Custodian Guard, administrative officials, and those soldiers who had followed Emperor from the beginning and stood by his side to reclaim Terra.

The crowd was dense, solemn, and silent.

Under the radiance of his psychic power, Emperor wore a thousand faces, his image appearing different to each of them; some saw gentleness, some saw majesty, some saw respect, and some saw kindness.

He was the embodiment of perfection, for perfection was defined by his existence.

Emperor did not deliberately weaken this influence, even going so far as to strengthen the psychic illusion.

Humanity had claimed to be "civilized" since the ancient Earth era, yet it could not suppress the worship and fear of powerful beings embedded in its genes.

Psychic power formed a halo around Emperor, making him appear to everyone as the most perfect being, the one most worthy of worship and respect in their hearts.

"My Lord!" Ordinary humans could not look directly at the light of Emperor for long like the Custodian Guard. After a brief moment of stupor, the dignitaries of Terra lowered their proud heads in excitement, kneeling on one knee to offer their loyalty and praise.

As the crowd knelt before the four of them, Erda felt a wave of dizziness and said softly, "I need to rest."

She turned and left with the attendants who had been waiting for a long time. She was not asking for permission, but stating a fact; as a friend of the Master of Mankind, she possessed privileges.

Emperor nodded slightly, allowing Erda to depart. After the extraction of genetic material, his friend was in poor condition and unable to handle the various affairs of Lianshan Tianhai.

Erda left the underground laboratory and headed toward her quarters.

When she was far from Emperor's side, losing the protection of his light, a wisp of subtle, imperceptible Chaos power squeezed out from the void and drifted onto Erda's shoulder. In an unnoticeable instant, it seized the opportunity to slip inside, entering her weakened soul.

A wave of dizziness struck, and a layer of fine sweat beaded on Erda's smooth forehead. Amidst the vertigo, she felt a chill that touched her very soul, and she struggled to steady herself against the wall to avoid falling to the ground.

"My Lady, are you alright?"

The attendant stepped forward to support her. The moment their skin touched, a chill emanated from her mistress, and the attendant instinctively curled her fingers, recoiling from the cold.

"My Lady, your body..."

The next moment, Erda recovered, raising a hand to signal her handmaidens to say no more, a smile full of apology on her face: "I am sorry, I have worried you; I was merely feeling a little weak."

"Please take care of your health, my lady; the Imperium cannot afford to lose you."

Having soothed the handmaidens' concerns, Erda nodded gently and raised her arm with the utmost elegance, allowing them to support her as she returned to her quarters.

Erda's residence was not large, a small estate that was nonetheless incredibly luxurious; in the courtyard stood a fountain, surrounded by flowerbeds and fragrant blossoms, with a cobblestone path connecting the inner court to the porch.

Terra had been weathered by humanity's long civil wars, and every drop of water was worth its weight in gold; flowers had vanished entirely from the surface, which was now filled with artificial radiation.

That this small garden possessed flowers and an artificial fountain was a level of luxury beyond the imagination of the scavengers and nomads in the wastes.

After the handmaidens withdrew, Erda walked into her study, where wooden bookshelves stood in the spacious room, displaying all manner of ancient tomes.

Erda reclined in a comfortable chair, the sunlight simulated by the micro-fusion device in the courtyard streaming through the cross-shaped window to bathe her in light, her silk robes tracing her graceful curves like a goddess of love from Terran mythology.

Her brows furrowed slightly, and Erda kept her eyes tightly shut.

Recalling the images in her mind, she realized that during her momentary lapse of consciousness, a vision had appeared—a cruel future she dared not speak of or face.

The vision was vivid in her mind, displaying a series of brutal scenes.

Emperor would enslave her children, treating them as pure war machines, trapping them in endless wars, only to cruelly erase their existence once his goals were met, leaving not a single trace behind.

Clearly, this was a fragment of future possibilities from the Warp, forcibly shoved into her mind by some power; it was most likely a scheme of the Dark Gods.

Erda knew full well that the powers of the Warp had begun their mischief, intervening in the future of humanity.

She did not believe a single word of the prophecy, seeing it as nothing more than the ubiquitous traps and conspiracies of the Dark Gods.

Yet, not believing did not mean she was not worried; thinking of her twenty-one genetic offspring, Erda's maternal instincts overcame her reason, and a trace of hesitation and doubt emerged from the depths of her heart:

How would Emperor treat his children?