The Adeptus Custodes' meeting was rudely interrupted by two Primarchs accompanied by a Man of Iron.
At Dorn's signal, Iax began speaking through the Machine Body, recounting a history long buried in dust. Hidden within it was a secret concerning the Alpha Legion.
Fabius Bile's experimental records explicitly stated that he had identified twenty distinct genetic combinations in the Gene-seed of Alpha Primus, created by Belisarius Cawl, rather than twenty-one.
Although Iax had never retrieved information on the Sangprimus Portum from Cawl.
The data analysis nevertheless indicated that there had indeed been only twenty Primarchs at the outset.
There should originally have been only one Alpharius.
The expressions of the assembled Adeptus Custodes shifted as they listened to the Man of Iron's account.
The Emperor knew very well that the Primarchs he had created possessed certain aspects beyond his control.
Those were related to the additional gains he had incorporated when creating them.
But Iax had not found anything in the journal explaining exactly what those gains were.
According to all the data currently available.
The Emperor had known of Alpharius's nature very early on.
His defining traits were division and regeneration.
Just like the hydra of Terra's ancient myths.
Cut off one head, and two more would grow.
Alpharius had already died once in the laboratory where the Primarchs were first created.
Afterward, he had split into two souls capable of sensing one another.
This had resulted in the Twentieth Legion's Primarch becoming twin brothers.
And among all the Legiones Astartes.
The Alpha Legion alone had always had the fewest members of any Legion.
There was a reason for all of this.
The Emperor knew that he could not personally maintain a large reserve of bodies for the twentieth Primarch's use forever.
The modifications undergone by every member of