Chapter Summaries

After the Warp research conference, Lin Fan discussed the T'au’s education and AI research with Krippman, then reviewed their successful joint campaigns with the Space Marines. He joined Shrek aboard a Thunderhawk and found Colvin and Kor'sarro preparing to send dazed T'au aboard an Orca transport.

• Lin Fan reassured Krippman that daemons were unlikely to target the T'au and asked how the T'au Re-education Department was progressing.
• Lin Fan and Krippman reviewed the technicians’ parchments, and Lin Fan found no Warp corruption among them.
• Lin Fan noted that Space Marine strike teams had fought effectively alongside T'au forces, making the Marines dissatisfied with the Astra Militarum’s methods.
• Shadowsun and Farsight planned to drive the Orks into the Red Sun Zone while the T'au focused on rebuilding their existing territory.
• Lin Fan left Delia, boarded a Raven Guard Thunderhawk with Shrek, and found Colvin and Kor'sarro waiting beside a transport carrying dazed T'au.

Lin Fan and Colvin used a Warp exposure scheme to break the resistance of diehard T'au opponents of the Human-T'au Alliance. The survivors were led away, expected to accept closer ties with the Imperium after witnessing the Warp's horrors.

• Colvin gave Lin Fan a relic can of ancient Coca-Cola, and Lin Fan drank it while discussing the T'au's resistance to the Warp.
• Lin Fan and Colvin went to a converted cargo hold where the Re-education Department sent the most defiant T'au aboard a destroyer for a staged trip through the Warp.
• The ship's Gellar Field was reduced around the T'au section, and the resulting Warp exposure drove many prisoners mad.
• Lin Fan killed the T'au who began eating their companions, while Colvin's Raven Guard burned the corpses.
• Lin Fan revived the remaining catatonic T'au and had servo-skulls lead them away, leaving them more fearful of the Warp and more likely to accept the alliance.

The High Lords convened on Terra in 972.M41, where the Lord High Administrator collapsed while opening the meeting and his replacement continued. The Astra Militarum commander began presenting the latest Star of Terra recipients, including the destruction of a Khorne-corrupted Imperator Titan.

• The chapter described Terra’s vast hive cities, Imperial institutions, and sharply divided populations.
• The chapter outlined the nine permanent High Lord seats and the leaders who could fill the three non-permanent seats.
• The High Lords gathered for their eighty-six million, seven hundred twenty-nine thousand, eight hundred fifteenth meeting.
• The Lord High Administrator collapsed from exhaustion, and his replacement took over the meeting.
• The Commander-in-Chief of the Astra Militarum presented the latest Star of Terra recipients and noted that the Khorne-corrupted Imperator Titan had been larger than an ordinary one.

The High Lords debated aid for the frontier and the T'au, then uncovered the Alien Execution Edict and sought the Emperor’s will. The chapter ended with someone asking about the Thousand Sons.

• The Grand Master of the Officio Assassinorum marked a decorated Astra Militarum soldier as a candidate for conversion into an Eversor Assassin after his death.
• The Fabricator-General examined a Beast Tamer-pattern weapon while the head of the Adeptus Astra Telepathica reported that a frontier xenos empire had submitted to the Imperium.
• The High Lords postponed another expedition against the xenos because the Great Enemy posed a greater threat near Cadia.
• The head of the Adeptus Arbites presented an unfamiliar Alien Execution Edict, and the Ecclesiarchy Pope urged caution while the Administratum searched the archives.
• After three days, the Administratum found that the Emperor and Malcador had established the edict during the Great Crusade, and the High Lords referred judgment on the T'au to the commander of the Adeptus Custodes.
• The commander of the Adeptus Custodes returned the Emperor’s will, and someone asked the High Lords about the Thousand Sons.

The High Lords approved the Emperor’s edict lowering the T’au’s purge priority and postponed their extermination investigation for five hundred years. Meanwhile, the Adeptus Custodes continued rooting out traitors and repairing the Imperium’s bureaucracy using Lin Fan’s trail.

• The High Lords resolved their deadlock and postponed the investigation into exterminating the T’au until 472.M42.
• The Senatorum Imperialis approved Beast Tamer weapons, ordered weekly information about the T’au, and arranged supplies for the vicinity of Damocles Gulf.
• The charter captains’ spokesperson prepared permits and commercial exemptions for ships carrying supplies along the dangerous route.
• The Adeptus Custodes rotated through shifts rewriting decrees and filling vacancies after uncovering traitors obstructing Lin Fan and the Kasare Legion.

Lin Fan told Shadowsun and Farsight that the Terra government had been informed about their situation and that Imperium fleets would not immediately attack them. The T'au continued adapting to Imperium customs as Lin Fan considered the work of governing and rebuilding worlds.

• The Adeptus Custodes gained time to rest after killing many daemons, but found governing and paperwork exhausting.
• Lin Fan woke, ate a plant grown from his drool, and reviewed documents while shrine-shaped drone bees flew nearby.
• Lin Fan surveyed the T'au city and passed XV59 Combined Battlesuits guarding the hall.
• Shadowsun and Farsight dismissed the administrators to speak with Lin Fan, who told them the Terra government had been informed and Imperium fleets would not attack them on sight.
• Shadowsun welcomed the news, reflecting on the Imperium's power and its defenses against daemons.
• Colvin handed Lin Fan a drink.

Lin Fan left the T'au Empire with the 37th Regiment aboard the Flame to find a lost world marked on Trazyn's star chart. After reaching the coordinates in empty space, he took a shuttle to investigate, and it struck an unseen object.

• Shadowsun asked Lin Fan if he needed help before leaving, and he urged her to strengthen defenses against the Tyranids.
• Lin Fan boarded the Flame with the 37th Regiment after the Imperial fleet withdrew from T'au territory, while Captain Vomit Mitt commanded the ship.
• Lin Fan showed the navigator Trazyn's coordinates and insisted the Flame travel to the uncharted lost world.
• After two Warp jumps, the Flame reached the coordinates but found only darkness, so Lin Fan took Delia, Rebecca, and soldiers ahead in a shuttle.
• Rebecca detected a faint trace and slowed the shuttle, which then struck an unseen object with a metallic denting sound.

Lin Fan tore open a barrier that had concealed a star system, and the sudden expansion of space knocked out most of the crew. Delia persuaded Captain Mitter to bring Flame into the newly revealed system, where they found a human colony world and vast mechanical wreckage.

• Rebecca suspected the black plane was a barrier, and Lin Fan punched through and ripped it open while Rebecca sent her core nanite swarm into him.
• The rift opened and space expanded, hurling Flame and the shuttle several light-years away and leaving everyone aboard except Delia unconscious.
• Captain Mitter detected a newly appeared star system and brought the shuttle back aboard Flame while Delia tended to the unconscious crew.
• Delia told Captain Mitter that Rebecca's last transmission identified the system as a former human colony, and he ordered Flame to enter it.
• Flame's scans revealed five planets, one with oceans and basic life, and enormous mechanical wreckage scattered throughout the system.

Owen Hill ruled the isolated planet Accident, where his family and three ancient organizations preserved fragments of the Imperium’s forgotten legacy. After describing the city and its surviving industries, he laid out a plan to defeat the Chaos Gods.

• Owen Hill inherited rule after his father passed down a story about the Emperor, the Imperium, and STC that neither of them understood.
• Owen described the Ascension Church of the Emperor, the Knight Corps, and the Artisans' Guild, each of which preserved ancient customs and equipment.
• Owen surveyed Accident’s walled city, its military, farming, residential, and industrial districts, and the machines that still produced food and weapons.
• Owen proposed legalizing weed to defeat Khorne, adding betrayal reversals to Tzeentch’s plans, promoting universal health consciousness against Nurgle, and thinking unsexy thoughts against Slaanesh.

Owen led an expedition to investigate a fiery object that fell from the sky, hoping it might help his declining city survive its war with monsters. His soldiers reached the impact site and began investigating, while the chapter revealed that Tzeentch had caused the fall.

• Ai Weide reported that Owen's city had twenty-four million residents, about two million fewer than ten years earlier.
• Owen saw a red object fall through the atmosphere and set out with the Imperial Guard and Hughes's knights to investigate it.
• Owen's forces opened the gates and fought off monsters drawn by the alarm, then began their journey toward the impact site.
• Hughes advised Owen to avoid the monster-filled swamp, so the force chose a route through Danma Mine.
• After two days of travel, Owen reached the crater and sent a squad to investigate; the falling object was revealed to be Tzeentch's doing.

Lin Fan and Rebecca emerged from a deep pit and met Owen, lord of the Last City, whose soldiers mistook them for monsters and attacked. After seeing Lin Fan shrug off their weapons, Owen apologized and considered asking him to investigate ancient ruins by the coast, while Rebecca asked for more metal to eat.

• Soldiers found Lin Fan and Rebecca digging in a pit and summoned Lord Owen after learning they claimed to be from the Imperium's Astra Militarum.
• Owen introduced himself as lord of the Last City, and Lin Fan identified himself as Colonel Soap of the 37th Regiment, Kasare Legion.
• Owen ordered his guards to fire, but Lin Fan protected Rebecca and emerged unharmed from the bolts.
• Lin Fan broke a soldier's blade and endured another volley before threatening the guards, prompting Owen to order them to lower their weapons and apologize.
• Owen learned that Lin Fan had killed two waves of scribble-like monsters and considered sending him to investigate the ancient coastal ruins.
• Rebecca told Lin Fan she wanted to eat more metal, and he called her a fat pig.

Lin Fan and Rebecca fought their way through the swamp, where Rebecca’s cannon blast destroyed the graffiti monsters and transformed the terrain. Valkyrie Transports then arrived, exchanged fire with the defenders on the metal wall, and began unloading Imperial soldiers.

• Lin Fan rejected Owen’s suggestion to retreat and drew the swamp’s graffiti monsters toward himself while Rebecca speculated that the planet was an abandoned immersive amusement park.
• Lin Fan charged through the swamp and attracted the monsters, while Rebecca ate Owen’s bolt shells and then fired her hand cannon into the swarm surrounding Lin Fan.
• Rebecca’s blast vaporized the monsters and left a vast crater of dried, vitrified ground, from which Lin Fan emerged unharmed.
• Valkyrie Transports appeared overhead, and soldiers on the metal wall opened fire on them, denting their armored hulls.
• A Valkyrie pilot fired warning shots at the wall, forcing the defenders to take cover, while other transports landed and unloaded Imperial soldiers.

Lin Fan and the Imperium swiftly took control of the planet’s city and began improving its army, farms, and factories. While flying to the coast with Rebecca, Lin Fan encountered a colossal mechanical sea creature that dragged their Valkyrie into the ocean.

• Lin Fan calmed the 37th Regiment soldiers and discussed the Imperium’s rule of the city with Owen as Commissar Cain and Delia arrived.
• Delia forced the factory craftsmen to maintain their aging machines, while Cain took control of the planet’s knightly army.
• Lin Fan left the city with Rebecca, and they observed the changes brought by the Imperium’s soldiers and workers.
• Rebecca detected an enormous hostile presence in the ocean and identified it as a mechanical octopus wrapped in artificial flesh.
• The creature seized the Valkyrie with its tentacles and dragged Lin Fan and Rebecca into the deep sea.

Lin Fan and Rebecca explored a ruined underwater amusement park populated by decaying machines and reenacting fish residents, then followed a foul smell to the Krusty Krab. The chapter left them inside the restaurant after Mr. Krabs rejected Lin Fan’s supply voucher as payment.

• Lin Fan recognized the mechanical Squidward as an amusement-park attraction, and Rebecca explained how Golden Age visitors used breathable liquefied oxygen for underwater leisure.
• Squidward threw the Valkyrie Transport away, mistook Lin Fan and Rebecca for visitors, and retreated into his bloodstained house.
• Lin Fan and Rebecca decided to find the amusement park’s center and disable its malfunctioning program, then walked through the decaying streets of Bikini Bottom.
• Rebecca followed the stench to the Krusty Krab, where Mr. Krabs demanded payment for Lin Fan’s Krabby Patty.
• Lin Fan gave Mr. Krabs an Astra Militarum supply voucher, and Mr. Krabs fell silent before turning away amid crackling sounds.

Lin Fan and Rebecca investigated the kitchen and discovered that the amusement park was actually a prison filled with transformed corpses and hostile creatures. Lin Fan devoured a starfish-like monster that tried to drag him into a two-dimensional world, leaving Rebecca without a specimen to study.

• Rebecca led Lin Fan to the sealed kitchen, where Lin Fan tore open the door and found a regenerating yellow sponge-like creature.
• Rebecca reported that the park was a prison disguised as an amusement park, with the corpses and out-of-control service robots transformed by an unknown force.
• Mr. Krabs's voice prompted the sponge creature to make a Krabby Patty from the corpses, and a starfish-shaped monster appeared.
• The starfish monster attacked Lin Fan with a corrosive stomach sac and released strange lines that began flattening the kitchen into a drawn world.
• Lin Fan resisted the monster's attempt to pull him into another world and devoured it, frustrating Rebecca's effort to study it.

Lin Fan and Rebecca met Oedmeir, a woman rescued from the Two-Dimensional Prison, but Oedmeir immediately attacked them after mistaking them for enemies. She contained Rebecca in a bottle and questioned Lin Fan about whether he was a Finalizer.

• Lin Fan vomited up a two-dimensional outline that transformed into Oedmeir.
• Oedmeir remembered being trapped in the Two-Dimensional Prison and attacked Rebecca, reducing her to silver-gray dust.
• Lin Fan caught Oedmeir's fist, but she detached her arm and began assembling an energy cannon from the floor.
• Oedmeir lowered her weapon after hearing Lin Fan speak normally and explained that Finalizers communicated through distinctive substitutes.
• Oedmeir sucked Rebecca's dust into a bottle and questioned Lin Fan, who denied knowing about Finalizers or elite lunatics.

Lin Fan told Oedmeir that humanity was now in 972.M41, and she began explaining how the Golden Age ended. She traced humanity’s expansion through Warp travel and the STC system, leaving the account at the start of humanity’s encounters with alien empires.

• Lin Fan told Oedmeir about the long history from the Iron Men Rebellion to the Imperium, and she was relieved that the Finalizers had failed to ascend.
• Oedmeir corrected Lin Fan, saying the so-called Iron Men Rebellion had been a War of Ideals between the Finalizers’ corporate alliance and the Conservative Alliance.
• Oedmeir said she had belonged to the Federation Truth Science Department and was its last survivor.
• Oedmeir explained that Warp engines enabled rapid human expansion but also helped bring about the Human Federation’s collapse.
• Oedmeir described how Men of Stone first colonized worlds, then how Warp travel and STC templates let humanity spread and establish thriving planets.
• Oedmeir recounted humanity’s bloody encounters with alien empires, Orks, and Aeldari.

Oedmeir explained how the Finalizers corrupted the Human Federation and pursued godhood by tormenting and devouring life. Lin Fan realized their ritual could create a Warp god, but Oedmeir did not know whether the Finalizers had succeeded after she was imprisoned.

• Oedmeir described how the Finalizers seized power, enslaved other species, and drove the galaxy into war.
• Oedmeir said the Finalizers believed the universe was flawed and sought to ascend as gods through a ritual recorded on a Blackstone tablet.
• Lin Fan recognized the ritual as resembling the C'tan's Red Harvest and concluded that the Finalizers might instead have created a Warp god.
• Lin Fan asked what happened to the Finalizers, and Oedmeir said she had been banished into a two-dimensional prison before she learned their fate.
• Lin Fan told Oedmeir that Kadur was dead.

Lin Fan learned how the Finalizers rose to power and how Dukhaka may have allied with an ancient entity, while Oedmeir explained her escape from the Men of Iron. After Lin Fan ate the prison’s contained entity, the prison began self-destructing, leaving them to race for its control center.

• Lin Fan pieced together how scientists became the Human Federation’s rulers and transformed into the Finalizers, using technology and robots to pursue ascension rather than ordinary power.
• Lin Fan questioned Oedmeir about the Men of Iron’s division, and she recalled Dukhaka leading the refugees to Mars and making a contract with something that turned their pursuers into allies.
• Oedmeir said Dukhaka had insisted they seize the Ascension Throne to keep humanity from perishing in the transaction, but she did not know whether the entity was the Void Dragon.
• The prison began shaking after Lin Fan admitted he had eaten its contained entity, and Oedmeir realized the prison was self-destructing.
• Oedmeir led Lin Fan toward the control center to deactivate the disintegration device.

Oedmeir and Lin Fan reached the ancient sphere beneath the Bikini Bottom Theme Park, where Oedmeir stopped its dissolution protocol and ended the planet’s collapse. Oedmeir then explained that the Ascension Throne could create a god, leading Lin Fan to connect it to the Golden Throne and the God-Emperor.

• Oedmeir carried Lin Fan underground with Rebecca, who transformed into a drilling vehicle to take them through the metal layers beneath the park.
• Oedmeir wrote on a piece of her skin and placed it on the sphere, which recognized her as Chief Administrator and began a dissolution protocol.
• Oedmeir halted the protocol, causing the sealed creations beneath Holy Terra to vanish and the planet’s tremors and collapse to stop.
• Oedmeir destroyed the ruined amusement park and asked Lin Fan about the missing artificial servant constructs; he told her they had arrived five thousand years earlier.
• Oedmeir explained that the Ascension Throne aboard the Golden Ark could gather the souls of the tortured and help the Finalizers ascend to godhood.
• Lin Fan realized the Ascension Throne resembled the Golden Throne and considered how it might have shaped the God-Emperor’s ascension and humanity’s psychic awakening.