"It felt like a dream."
"Maybe I hadn't woken up yet."
Lox returned to his laboratory on Ganymede, where he had remained throughout this time.
Looking at the familiar equipment in the laboratory, he suddenly stretched out his hand as if by instinct. An invisible force immediately set those complex machines into motion.
Whether they were precision gears or cogitator computers composed of hundreds of billions of matrices, they all gave him an indescribable sense of intimacy.
It was as though these things were his children. So long as he wished it, a mere thought would let him command and control them.
Run, machines, he thought.
The next second, every machine—whether idle or already operational—began running frantically. Their Machine Spirits responded to Lox's will with unparalleled fervor.
Their efficiency even exceeded one hundred percent of their design limits, reaching the point of overclocked operation.
The source of this power was the authority of the Omnissiah that the Emperor had placed within his soul. Strictly speaking, he had not yet fully fused with that tiny thing, which resembled a miniature gear.
Lox could only wield the power contained within that authority as though using a remote control, but he felt that, given enough time to explore it, he might truly merge with it as one.
Like a child who had received a new toy, he excitedly played with the technological creations on Ganymede. The triangular unmanned mechanical constructs in particular combined into all manner of formations under his control.
Lox had once envied the miraculous psychic powers of the Psyker librarians. Later, Neos told him that when the plan had first been formulated ten thousand years ago, he had personally sealed Lox's weak psychic ability to prevent the grand plan from being disrupted and failing midway through.
Of course, in the