Chapter 121: The Underlying Logic of Warhammer.JPG (Patreon)

The original Wondrous Shadow had carried a bit of a 'middle-aged auntie' vibe, honestly — a limitation of Western aesthetic conventions.

Setting aside all the messy tangents, Western games tend toward a wild, rugged art style. Applied to male characters, that style naturally produces a kind of primal beauty and ferocity — but slapped onto female characters, it comes out looking a bit like a middle-aged auntie.

Take Living Saint Celestine, for instance — supposedly drop-dead gorgeous by the setting's own description, yet her actual in-game model isn't much to look at.

In this regard, domestic Chinese gacha games utterly outclass them — though under that style, some male characters do come out looking a touch effeminate, or at least lacking that same wild edge.

But when it comes to the ladies, it's an absolute crushing victory. Every masterpiece Heydrich sculpted with his own hands — Wondrous Shadow included — came wrapped in a layer of pure aesthetic beautification, even though he hadn't actually unlocked any Path of Beauty or anything like that.

Wondrous Shadow was no exception — tall, statuesque, fair-skinned.

Just as Heydrich told her to wrap herself in his own coat for the moment, he saw Pearl arrive, Kamir, Irena, and the guard detail in tow.

The group froze for a moment — not stunned by her beauty, exactly, but simply because none of them had expected that the colossal thunder-dragon they'd seen from afar would, in its true form, turn out to be this.

"Hm?" Right about then, Heydrich felt something soft press against him. Wondrous Shadow, newly born, might look every inch a mature, statuesque beauty — but she was clearly still in that fragile, newborn state of first venturing into the world.

So instinct simply drove her straight toward her creator — and she threw her arms around Heydrich.

Heydrich didn't resist. After all, who hasn't wanted to cuddle up with their own creator now and then? Right, little V?

Pearl let out a sigh at the sight. Heydrich's creations always seemed to feel some special attachment to him — she was used to it by now.

"Hmph!!!"

"Mimi!!!"

At the sight of Wondrous Shadow practically hanging off Heydrich, Irena and Mimi — perched atop her head — both puffed out their cheeks in unison.

"Things are about to get even more chaotic," Heydrich sighed. "Still, at least all my creations turn out to be pretty girls."

With the Emperor's cautionary example fresh in mind, Heydrich figured he must be some kind of genius.

Meanwhile, elsewhere — at the barrier system of Baal, the Underworld Sector known as the Shield of Baal, space rippled and distorted, and a handful of Harlequins stepped out from the webway.

"So, this is the target system for our mission — the Underworld Sector."

The lead Harlequin looked around at the surroundings: a fine specimen of an Imperium-flavored hive world.

Except now, with the Tyranid swarm closing in, the entire planet had descended into chaos.

Under the Great Devourer's influence, the Genestealers had launched a sprawling uprising of their own. Not that it didn't sound righteous enough on paper — full of the Imperium's usual inhumanity and the Planetary Governor's oppression.

Of course, if Heydrich had been there, he'd have said something like: leave it to that finest hand-picked 'white-feather' stock, Victoria's own select breed — tough as nails, built to endure.

"That lord thinks awfully little of us, doesn't he — insisting again and again that we're forbidden from using force."

One of the Harlequins couldn't hold back the complaint — he was, after all, a member of the God of Death's Laughing-Face troupe, one of the Harlequins' companies famed for slaughter.

Heydrich's orders chafed at him more than a little; they left his specialty almost entirely unused.

As for what orders Heydrich had actually given them: avoid all conflict as much as possible, and if they ran into anything they couldn't handle, just call for backup.

"That lord might just... dote on us a bit too much?"

The lead Harlequin shook his head, helpless. That was simply the impression Heydrich gave them. The Laughing God, after all, would still occasionally hand them dangerous, even near-suicidal missions — but working under Heydrich meant they never had to worry about their safety at all.

Heydrich's first and only priority for them was to keep their own worthless hides intact, not to throw their lives away fighting anyone.

It wasn't that Heydrich actually liked the Eldar, mind you. Considering the Eldar had managed to court disaster so spectacularly that they birthed Slaanesh — a feat of self-destruction even he had to admit he couldn't top — Heydrich's whole philosophy toward that lot amounted to: out of sight, out of mind.

The real reason was much the same as with the Custodes. Of all the Custodes' talents, their overwhelming martial strength was actually the least important part; their most fitting role was serving as Sector Governors over key sectors.

The same held for these Harlequins — their combat strength, rivaling that of the Custodes, was likewise the least important thing about them.

First and foremost, they were Pathwalkers of the Path of Elation. In a cosmos as crappy as this one, precious few beings could truly understand and walk that Path — every single one of them was beyond precious. Second, they served as Heydrich's most important eyes and messengers, and there simply weren't enough of them, their numbers all but irreplaceable.

That was exactly why Heydrich placed such weight on their safety — there weren't nearly enough of them to begin with, and every death meant one fewer, permanently.

It was also why Heydrich had only assigned one or two to accompany Guilliman and Calgar respectively — he simply didn't have the manpower to spare.

"According to the Laughing God's calculations, the overall flow of time in this sector and several nearby sectors has grown unstable because of the Great Rift opening up. Our webway route should be fine. But if we link up through the tavern — a method completely independent of the Warp — it could very well synchronize both sides instantaneously. So once we've confirmed the enemy's war footing, hm—"

Just then, the lead Harlequin's eye twitched. Through their Eldar-specific means of reconnaissance, they'd just watched the Imperial Navy bloom apart like fireworks along the outer edge of the Underworld Sector.

"Contact that lord immediately — if we let those bugs come charging through, it'll be too late!!!"

The Harlequin let out a sharp, urgent cry — but they did have one piece of good news. To push through the Underworld Sector's outer ice-crystal belt, the swarm had slowed itself down to conventional speed — supersonic, nowhere close to light-speed — meaning it would still take at least a week, possibly longer, to reach the sector's primary world.

Clearly the commander of the Underworld Sector — the Lord Castellan leading several million Cadian troops — still had a firm grasp of the situation.

The Harlequins scrambled into a flurry of activity, rushing to build the link to the tavern; they had to inform that great being at once. Facing other Eldar, these Flower Sprouts might have hesitated — but facing the Tyranid swarm, they had only one thought: get the hell after them. If there'd been any Craftworld Eldar nearby, the lead Harlequin would have summoned a few of their Titans without a second thought.

Meanwhile, elsewhere — aboard Heydrich's ecosystem-Ark.

"We've now entered cruising mode, currently touring the Five Hundred Worlds of Ultramar at sub-light speed. We're opening trade with various worlds along the way, and picking up a new batch of students while we're at it."

Pearl stood before Heydrich, delivering her latest report. Wondrous Shadow, meanwhile, had for now been enrolled in Heydrich's military academy. Powerful as she already was, Heydrich had created her specifically so she could one day stand on her own and hold a command.

Creating her had drained nearly every last drop of imaginary-number energy Heydrich held in his Path of Permanence — at his current strength of the Path, recovery would take a long while. So for the time being, Heydrich couldn't possibly create a second dragon of Permanence. As the sole dragon-being, and the one true creation Heydrich had made to stand as a genuine match for a Primarch, she needed to grow strong, and fast.

As for Mimi — sure, her future potential might be sky-high, but for now she was still nothing more than a standard-issue cute little mascot.

The Ark had already begun its tour of the Five Hundred Worlds of Ultramar. As for the students, that tied back to the agreement Heydrich had signed with Guilliman.

With the Five Hundred Worlds of Ultramar in fragments, Guilliman needed a flood of new manpower — not just Space Marine, but mortal officials of every stripe as well.

His own Five Hundred Worlds had hit capacity and couldn't expand any further on short notice. So in the end, he'd come to Heydrich, hoping to use his system to train up new recruits.

Heydrich hadn't objected. It wasn't as if he was short on money.

After all, Heydrich had analyzed one crucial reason the Imperium had fractured so badly: talent simply didn't circulate between its factions. The Mechanicus in particular was practically a cancer on the system — from selecting fresh oil-guzzler recruits to manufacturing high-end weapons and equipment, the forge worlds monopolized the entire pipeline.

Under those conditions, the Mechanicus was practically half-independent from the rest of the Imperium of Man — so Heydrich had imposed strict limits of his own.

His own forge world wasn't allowed to train its own oil-guzzlers at all; every recruit was trained aboard his Ark and then assigned outward. He'd even begun planning to open up a new cave-heaven realm to head off the population boom he expected down the line.

Given the current strength of the Path energy at his disposal, opening up one more space wouldn't cost him much anyway.

On the personnel front, he'd essentially locked the forge world down tight — and much the same went for its economy.

As long as Heydrich's own forge world stayed firmly under control, everything else could be worked out.

"Hyacine has essentially completed her staged experiments on the Tyranids, and I've used the results to improve the Memetic Virus."

Heydrich looked pleased at that. He'd prepared any number of measures to fight the Tyranids. His very last trump card was a living planet — an absolute worst-case option, only to be used if nothing else could hold the line.

In truth, Heydrich figured he'd probably never need it — because the Battle of Baal would, in the end, be wrapped up by Guilliman himself.

But before Guilliman arrived, the swarm would essentially have burned itself out — by that point, both the Sons of Sanguinius and the Tyranids alike would be gritting their teeth just to hold on.

If the Blood Angels could hold the line as things stood now, then factoring in his own strength, they were certain to hold — the only question left was the cost.

After all, in the original course of events the Blood Angels had been all but annihilated — of more than thirty thousand Sons of Sanguinius, it was doubtful even one percent survived in the end. If Guilliman hadn't reinforced them with Primaris Marines, they'd have collapsed outright.

As for his own ultimate killing blow, that still came down to the Memetic Virus — it could deal the swarm a devastating blow, letting him wrench a huge chunk of the swarm straight out of the Great Devourer's control. But it would only work best the first time; after that, the thing would surely be on guard.

So it could only serve as the decisive weapon for the final showdown. Beyond that, there was his budget-tier War Forge, revised through several iterations now. With that thing in play, the swarm wouldn't be replenishing itself anytime soon.

The trouble was, it amounted to a suicide weapon — not something he could use casually.

As for the rest of his arsenal, the power was simply too great; Heydrich had no intention of using it for now.

"Oh, right — pass these out."

Heydrich pulled a smartphone out from somewhere on his person just then, and Pearl's eye twitched at the sight.

Of everything in Star Rail that struck Heydrich as genuine black technology, there were really only two things. One was the Star Rail itself — but that belonged to the Trailblaze Path. The other was the smartphone every single person seemed to carry, the kind of thing even Rin Tohsaka had in one of the crossover events.

The thing genuinely allowed for zero-delay calls across star systems, useless only in the rare regions where the power of the Path had gone berserk.

Of course, Heydrich's version differed a little from the original — he'd dumped the phone's terminal signal server straight into his own tavern.

Then, relying on the tavern doors' unique ability to link different worlds together, he used that to relay the calls. As long as both ends lay within the tavern's connected network, he could manage calls with about as little delay as possible.

It was one of the most important projects Heydrich had been working on all along — and at its core, the phone was a creation born of imaginary numbers.

So forget about Chaos touching it — even ordinary psychic power making contact with the thing could make it explode outright, and that included if the Emperor himself tried to use one.

"Make sure every one of the Harlequins gets one without fail. Hand out the rest to people in important positions — I'll leave the exact allocation to you, Pearl. The second batch will still take some time to finish production."

Handing the phone over to Pearl, Heydrich finally let out a breath of relief.

The most urgent work on his plate was, for now, finished. As for everything else — well, it was practically endless, but as the saying went, a man with enough debts stops worrying about carrying more of them. He'd gone numb to it all anyway.

"Understood. Mm... what?"

Pearl nodded at Heydrich's words. But her expression shifted again almost immediately, and she turned to look at him, dead serious.

"According to intelligence from the Harlequins, the Tyranid swarm has broken through the Underworld Sector's ice-crystal barrier. The Imperial Navy is completely wiped out. It's now only a matter of time before this Tyranid tendril fleet reaches the Underworld Sector."

"...Sigh."

Heydrich sighed helplessly at the news, then rose to his feet and looked straight at Titus, who stood waiting nearby. "Get ready to move out. Bring your entire Tyranid War Veteran Company."

"Yes, sir!!!"