In Warhammer, My System is Minecraft

Chapter 240: Terra Falls, The Death of the Emperor (Bonus)

This is the bonus Chapter for reaching 400 Powerstones.

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A tremor split the sky, and thunder rolled across the rooftops.

Raindrops the size of beans dripped from the eaves, splashing into dense, fine ripples on the ground.

Zeke pulled out a pre-prepared chest full of Adventure Compasses.

"Use these to find the other missing Primarchs," Zeke explained their usage, deliberately speaking loudly to prevent his voice from being drowned out by the rain.

"And this," Zeke added, pulling out a Transmutation Table and placing it in front of Malcador. "Fifty-fifty split. I remember it clearly, so don’t try any funny business. Don’t think that just because you’re an old man, I’ll go easy on you."

He spoke with absolute seriousness, but his eyes were already winking playfully—thirty percent threat, seventy percent joke, leaving Malcador not knowing whether to laugh or cry.

Malcador solemnly accepted both items. Watching this scene, Zeke inexplicably felt a bit like he was entrusting his final arrangements to the man. Banishing this morbid thought from his mind, Zeke asked for the Imperial Regent’s opinion one last time before leaving.

"I plan to resurrect Ferrus and Horus. You know, just like how I resurrected you back then."

Horus. Hearing that name again, Malcador’s face retreated deep into the shadows, a place even the candlelight could not reach. "Are you certain this is a good idea?"

"Does this kind of resurrection truly demand no price?" Malcador brewed on the thought for a while before finally uttering the question.

Reversing time, overturning life and death—Malcador had heard the detailed account of his own resurrection from Guilliman. He felt a deep sense of dread toward this power that casually toyed with time. Unless absolutely necessary, it was best to use such power sparingly.

Malcador was an old man, after all, and naturally somewhat conservative. Zeke nodded his head like a chicken, but the words went in one ear and out the other.

If you didn’t know how to use Minecraft tech mods, you could blow up your whole base. If you used them right, you could skyrocket your productivity by several tiers.

It all came back to the old saying: If you’re going to use it, don’t be afraid. If you’re afraid, don’t use it.

Zeke walked forward. "It’s no big deal. Since I can resurrect him, I can kill him just the same."

In Zeke’s mind, the worst-case scenario was simply that the resurrected Horus would fall to Chaos again, in which case, he’d just send him right back to the grave.

"I’m off, Malcador." Zeke walked down the stone path toward the Imperial Palace, his silhouette gradually shrinking in the drizzle.

Rainwater gurgled along the edges of the path, gathering into a miniature stream in a depression.

Malcador watched as Zeke stepped onto the stairs leading to the Palace and vanished through the grand doors.

The hand he had raised to call Zeke back slowly lowered.

Abaddon had been imprisoned in a cell near Terra for nine days now. Malcador had wanted to ask for Zeke’s opinion on executing him in the near future. But there were more pressing matters at hand; this could wait a little longer.

Shortly after Zeke’s departure, Malcador sat back down in his chair, but the longer he sat, the more restless he became.

Something heavy blocked his chest, making it difficult to breathe.

He mentally reviewed everything that had happened recently: The Emperor’s condition was excellent; just last night, He had personally told Malcador that He had found a way to temporarily leave the Golden Throne. Terra’s territories were steadily being reclaimed under the banner of Guilliman’s Indomitus Crusade. Everything was moving in the right direction...

Yet, the anxiety rising from the depths of his heart did not dissipate with this reassessment. Instead, it grew thicker, pervasive like the dampness of a rainy day.

"No, I must know," Malcador spoke to the silence. "I must be certain."

Malcador raised his staff and slipped the heavy shawl of his cloak off his shoulders.

The candles floated from their trays, circling in the air to form a halo of light around him as he approached the wooden table.

A box rose from the table. Malcador’s mind turned the mechanism, and the locks along its edges spun open.

The box opened, and a small velvet-wrapped package fell into Malcador’s hand.

His hand held the package for a long time. Then, he peeled back the soft fabric.

A deck of cards.

Some would call them Tarot cards—the permutations of destiny and meaning shattered into fragments, thrown to mortals to interpret, whispering the inner truths of the universe.

He looked down at the cards.

"What does the future hold?" Malcador whispered. "Where shall we go from here?"

Then, slowly and hesitantly, Malcador reached for the first card.

Rumble. The world trembled.

Shouts, screams, cries. The hissing of something he thought he recognized but couldn’t quite place surged from all directions.

Malcador fell into a momentary daze, then instantly realized the sounds were coming from all around him.

His frail body erupted with astonishing strength. He took a massive stride forward and shoved the door open.

What exactly is happening?! How could this be?!

Malcador’s fragile bones trembled uncontrollably; he could barely stand by gripping his staff tightly. The scene before his eyes shook his soul to the core, leaving him completely at a loss.

A sea of fire churned.

A plague-rain of blood, toxins, and biomass poured from the sky. The citizens of the Imperium scrambled and fled through the streets in sheer panic.

Swarms of Astartes and towering war machines rushed to intercept the corrupted Chaos Space Marines and daemons descending from the heavens.

Further away, lance strikes fired from the Lion’s Gate Spaceport, their energy beams illuminating the suffocating thick smoke as they shot into the sky.

Nothing was whole anymore. The Warp was freely spilling into Realspace. Terra was bathed in darkness, and the entire planet began to rot.

Traitor fleets formed dense black specks, swarming over its polluted skin like a plague of blowflies.

Once-proud Terra was now enveloped in a toxic, murky halo, looking like an ashen hole in reality, crowned by a ghastly, freezing corona.

And among the diverse array of traitor fleets, Malcador instantly recognized the old friend occupying the center stage: The Vengeful Spirit, the very place where Horus and the Emperor had fought their final duel.

It circled above Terra like a carrion bird, utterly unbridled and brazen.

Malcador was completely baffled. How did the Vengeful Spirit reach Terra without the Imperium receiving a single warning?

He soon had no time to ponder this.

Because right beside the Vengeful Spirit, another utterly identical Vengeful Spirit appeared. Malcador rubbed his eyes. A third. A fourth...

"Enemy attack! Enemy attack!"

The voices in the wind recounted names all too familiar.

Mortarion. Perturabo. Fulgrim.

There was too much Malcador couldn’t make sense of. His thoughts were a tangled mess, impossible to unravel. It had all happened far too suddenly.

Right, Zeke must know something! The Emperor must know something! Like grabbing onto a lifeline, Malcador desperately used his psychic powers to teleport directly in front of the Imperial Palace.

The Imperial Palace district was already devastated, its towering spires collapsing under lightning strikes. The golden avenues melted into streams of liquid metal, and the polished walls were scorched black by oily smoke.

Before the Eternity Gate, other Custodians were scattered haphazardly around. Trajann Valoris, the Captain-General of the Custodian Guard, lay on the ground covered in blood, barely clinging to his last breath.

"What exactly happened?!" Malcador urgently asked, using his psychic power to prop Trajann up.

Trajann’s consciousness seemed to have suffered a severe shock. He muttered deliriously, "Both are real... Save the Emp..."

Then, he passed out cold.

With a wave of his hand, Malcador teleported the Custodians to a safe location and sprinted into the Palace.

Fire was everywhere. Frantic, Malcador unleashed a torrent of majestic psychic energy, extinguishing the arrogant flames through sheer force of will.

With his vision restored, Malcador finally laid eyes upon the Golden Throne.

The Emperor sat quietly on the Golden Throne, His eyes tightly shut.

"No..." Upon seeing the Emperor’s chest, Malcador, the Imperial Regent, completely broke down.

A massive sword, colored red and blue and filled with countless agonizing faces, was plunged deep into the Emperor’s chest.

Drach’nyen. Malcador recognized the blade. When Abaddon was sent to prison, the Emperor had confiscated this sword and kept it in His possession.

This sword was also known as the End of Empires and the Echo of the First Murder. It was an ancient daemon and pure malice incarnate. It was born at the very moment the first murder occurred—the first time a human killed another human out of the necessity of survival.

Therefore, it possessed a near-instant-kill effect against humanity, the Emperor Himself included. Unfortunately for Abaddon, he hadn’t been able to unleash the sword’s full potential.

However, even the strongest weapon required someone to wield it to be effective.

Malcador recalled the Emperor’s state during their conversation last night. He had been terrifyingly well. He was fully capable of temporarily detaching Himself from the Golden Throne. An Emperor in that state wouldn’t be bested even if all four Chaos Gods attacked Him simultaneously!

So who exactly drove that sword into the Emperor’s chest?!

"Zeke! Zeke, where are you?!" Malcador shouted, simultaneously casting his psychic senses to search for Zeke’s whereabouts.

From the Palace, to all of Terra, to even further beyond... nothing.

Zeke had vanished as if he had evaporated from the face of the earth. Not a single trace could be found.

Tearfully, Malcador gripped the Emperor’s hanging hand and closed his eyes in agony. When he opened them again, only unyielding resolve remained.

The Imperium needed him.

Thousands of years ago, Malcador had sat upon the Golden Throne so the Emperor could protect the Imperium. And now that the Emperor was trapped upon the Golden Throne, it was his turn, Malcador’s turn, to protect the Imperium.

"Leave it to me, old friend."

Malcador desperately wanted to seek the truth, to understand exactly what had happened to lead to this outcome. But right now, there was something far more important he needed to do: save Terra.

Malcador pushed his psychic power to its absolute limit. The overexertion caused his frail body to tremble uncontrollably.

Using his psychic abilities to contact leaders on the fringes of the sector was a skill Malcador had mastered long ago. Even before Terra had suffered Horus’s attack, he frequently used this skill to better manage the Imperium’s frontiers.

And now, this skill proved vital once again.

Malcador’s psychic projection crossed the sea of stars. Beating the Warp veil before it fully blanketed Terra, his projection appeared everywhere human territory reached, broadcasting the message.

On the bridge of the Macragge’s Honour, Guilliman had paused before the hololith, gazing at the next planned advance of the Indomitus Crusade;

Within the logistics base on Baal, Sanguinius was head down, reviewing a proposal for improving the planet’s ecosystem;

At the edge of Caliban’s forests, Lion El’Jonson was pointing the tip of his sword toward the rumored location of an Old One vault, issuing low-voiced orders to his subordinates...

Simultaneously, a voice echoed in the minds of all three Primarchs:

"Reinforce Terra."

It wasn’t just these three Primarchs. Cadia, Vigilus, Armageddon... anywhere the Nether Portals could reach received the message, and everyone immediately responded.

Possessing Nether Portals that connected the various territories of the Imperium, they no longer feared enemy surprise attacks like they used to.

All forces, all soldiers, all Astartes... they were all converging on one single location.

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Meanwhile,

Within the abyss of the Warp, where time and space were both shattered to fragments.

A chessboard extended endlessly into the void. It had no borders, no rules; only an eternal game played out upon it.

Four divine shadows each occupied a side.

"Everything is proceeding exactly as planned."

The grating beak of the blue bird spoke, harboring a thousand different answers and ten thousand questions that had never been asked. Myriad eyes sprouted upon His feathers, delighting in every single shifting variable.

Suddenly, as if discovering something, Tzeentch extended an avian limb, reached into the chessboard, and plucked out a piece. The piece bore a striking resemblance to Zeke.

With a flick of disdain, Tzeentch flicked the piece away. It streaked across the void, tumbled off the chessboard, and vanished into the undercurrents of Chaos.

"Those who break the rules have no right to participate." Tzeentch’s voice overlapped, shifting between ancient and infantile.

His statement earned the unanimous agreement of the other three.

"That detestable human has finally received his well-deserved punishment." Nurgle’s massive, rotting bulk caused His corner of the chessboard to sink slightly.

His pustule-covered hands carefully cradled a cauldron. The cauldron was covered in cracks, having experienced a violent shattering in the past, before He personally glued it back together with pathogens and mycelium.

It wasn’t until the corrupted liquid stirred up an aroma that satisfied Him that Nurgle reached out His other hand, groped across the chessboard, and pinched a piece between His fingers.

The piece had a vacuous expression and was a plump, well-fed animal. If Zeke were here, he would undoubtedly exclaim: Wait, isn’t that Cow?!

Nurgle clenched His fist, crushing the Cow piece into fine powder.

"Hush, don’t be so loud. Let me see... where is my child? Come quickly into mommy’s mouth."

Pink, toxic gas swirled around slender hands as they pushed aside pieces on the board, searching for the one Zeke had snatched away from Her.

"Enough of your drivel." Khorne’s voice was a thunderclap, a war drum, the roar of a million corpses crashing together.

"Let the flames of war consume all of Terra! I can wait no longer!"

The crimson figure, wreathed in fire, swung His massive axe with a savage grin, churning the entire chessboard into violent chaos.

"Then let us begin quickly," the voice of an ordinary middle-aged man spoke from the central seat.

In the darkness, light appeared. All four deities were startled.

"Aren’t you already—"

"What is there to fear? This is merely an empty shell, a hollow image."

The Emperor ignored the voices. He was nailed to the throne of His own making, gold and decay coexisting upon His form.

He simply reached out calmly and pulled out a cloth sack.

Clatter—

The pieces spilled out, bouncing and rolling across the chessboard before coming to rest.

A total of seventeen pieces.

The four gods stared at those pieces, the jealousy in their hollow eyes practically overflowing.

"When did you recover so many pieces?"

"Not long ago," the Emperor replied, though His eyes were fixed beneath the chessboard.

Down there, the Zeke piece twitched slightly.

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