40k: Midnight Blade

Chapter 634 17. Interlude: Gods and the Dead (1)

There was a time when Trazin wished very much that he still had the precious treasure of 'feeling', but he never revealed it to anyone.

It's not necessary, is it? His fellow Necron brethren would laugh at him, and the polite ones among them would pat him on the shoulder after laughing and tell him—

"We've always felt it."

Trazin read this sentence with a low smile and shook his head sarcastically.

"Yes, yes, there have always been feelings, but they are just feelings imitated in neural pathways using various complex signals. In essence, what is the difference between this and deception, Orikan?"

Lying aside, still twitching, the astrologer muttered one word: "No."

Trazin looked at him with some surprise. He did not expect that the astrologer would reach an agreement with him on something so easily.

In the past, this would never have happened so easily, and the debate between them could even last for centuries. Moreover, the best result is just to break up on bad terms, and no one can convince anyone. When they meet again, the argument will happen again.

Thinking of this, Trazin couldn't help but sigh: "This is really sad."

"what do you mean?"

"All of this." The Infinite shrugged. "When I think that our empire, and even the rise and fall of the entire race, was actually created by a fool like me and you, I feel that we are really hopeless."

Upon hearing his words, the Astrologer immediately threw out a few bitter sneers from the sound machine that was still in a state of repair.

"Don't compare me to yourself, great Trazin."

The great Trazin looked at him expectantly, wondering what fresh ridicule his crippled old friend could use the stuck voice machine to say-but he was disappointed, Orican's argument was still the same old, no any changes.

"Although I am not very popular like you, at least I did not shamelessly steal the bodies of my compatriots, use them as substitutes, and then take away everything in their dynasty."

Why would I expect an old dog to learn new things? Listening to his words, Trazin thought regretfully. Then, he chuckled and didn't even refute.

This time it was Orikan's turn to be surprised. His face, which was far less anthropomorphic than Trazin, miraculously revealed a visible suspicion, and his one eye began to flicker.

Finally, the astrologer asked suspiciously. He couldn't help it anymore. Trazin's abnormality aroused his curiosity: "What tricks are you playing?"

Trazin smiled happily, suppressed the urge to laugh at him, and instead used a very gentle tone and spoke slowly.

"Hey, have some faith in me, okay, old friend?"

Orikan looked at him coldly, then raised his arm. His hand is still healing itself, and the living metal is trying hard to repair the fracture. Trazin didn't have a hand before, which makes their work a little difficult.

Ignoring the pitiful display of the victim to the murderer, Trazin chuckled and shook his head.

"How could I defend you so hard that you can't hold your head up at this moment? It won't do any good for our meeting in three hours to undermine your self-confidence."

"Also, by the way, you'd better keep one thing in mind: that god is very partial."

"eccentric?"

"Yes, he is firmly on the side of humanity."

Orikan immediately frowned. Obviously, this answer exceeded a certain limit, making it difficult for him to endure it.

Trazin, who had witnessed his expression at this moment, was too lazy to care about his emotions at the moment. What he wanted to do most now was to take a photo as a souvenir - again, the astrologer's face was far less anthropomorphic than Trazin's. .

Most of the time, Trazin felt that his friend looked like a cold one-eyed iron shell, shrouded in green light, floating cross-legged posture and continuous weird gestures, which was absurd and ridiculous.

In front of him, the cold one-eyed iron shell roared and spoke.

"Don't tell me, he is just as fascinated by humans as you!"

Trazin laughed again, not just out of ridicule, but because he understood what Orikan's words meant.

He shook his head meaningfully: "It seems that you really erased your own memory, old friend. It's really rare that you astrologers can actually allow memory surgery."

"What?" Orikan looked at him suspiciously. "What the hell are you doing again?"

"Nothing happened, and I don't want your hard work to go to waste. Let's get back to the point - you'd better correct your adjectives, Orikan. He is not fascinated by humans, he just thinks..."

Trazin paused in a most obvious way: "Well, he thinks he is human, do you understand?"

Orikan looked at him without saying a word.

"I'm not kidding," Trazin added in a timely manner, as if afraid that Orikan was still alive.

"I'd rather you were kidding me!" the Astrologer growled again. "A being of that level actually thinks that he is a ridiculous, insect-like race like humans?!"

"I don't accept this ridiculous statement! It's understandable that an idiot like you would be fascinated by them. After all, you are just as stupid as them, but He can never be like this!"

"It's him."

"What?"

"I'm correcting your wording. You should use him, not him."

Trazin corrected him word by word. I don't know when, but there was no smile on his face anymore, only the dead coldness that metal should have.

Orikan was extremely confused about this. His reason told him that Trazin would never cheat or joke at this time, but

Trazin's voice interrupted his thoughts.

"Is it difficult for you to accept reality, Orican?" the Infinite asked sincerely.

"you--"

After a sigh, Trazin said: "Stop your arrogance, my old friend."

"You know, the insect in your mouth is now protected by two real gods. Besides, even if you don't care about these, how far behind is their empire compared to ours?"

"Yes, I know what you are going to say - you just want to say that they are short-lived and superstitious, vulgar and ignorant, and even deeply proud of it. You have stated your point of view too many times, I heard My ears are rusty."

"But, you know, Orikan? I have noticed something since a long time ago. Whether it is you or our compatriots, you all have a weird self-esteem."

"You regard humans as mere mortals or worse, but they have succeeded us as the new masters of the galaxy, and they may even have a chance to reach greater heights."

"Sooner or later, their vast and rigid empire will be reintegrated into an efficient collective wholeheartedly. They will surpass every one of our achievements and walk out of the galaxy on our shoulders."

"So if they are mean maggots, then what are we?"

Trazin raised his chin proudly and looked at his friend, with only a cruel mockery that was almost hatred on his iron face.

he whispered quietly.

"Don't forget our essence. We were once great, but now we are just a group of decaying undead, trapped in the glory of the past, unable to move forward, deceiving ourselves into thinking that we are still alive - in your words, our destiny has been truncated."

"We who came out of the furnace of self-organism are not a race, we are not the product of natural evolution, even a stone has more soul than us. We exchanged it for eternal life, so we can no longer make any progress or gain anything. bright."

"If this is not enough, then please remember that the glory of our empire is just a tulle that can be torn to pieces, and your weird self-esteem is too high."

"Ha, to me, this is more like a self-deception that is unwilling to accept reality. How ridiculous."

The astrologer tremblingly clenched his left fist, which was still repairing itself, and hammered the iron table beneath him hard. Amidst the huge sound, he roared unbearably.

But it was just a roar.

There are no sentences, no rebuttals, just a helpless catharsis. He was breathing heavily as if he were alive, his steel body was rising and falling, and the artificial sound source came from the speaker. In Trazin's eyes, it was really ridiculous and sad.

He wanted to laugh, but couldn't. Somehow, what he actually did was the exact opposite of what he wanted to do - Trazin approached Orikan and held out her right hand to him.

"And now, we finally have a chance." Faced with One Eye's gaze, the Endless One spoke calmly. "It may even be our only chance."

After a few seconds, his right hand was held.

"But how can you guarantee that this time won't be like last time?" his old friend asked in a low voice.

Trazin didn't answer the question, just laughed as if Orikan was an idiot.

In the astrologer's annoyance, time passed quickly. They reorganized their manners, put on new and unnecessary decorations and cloaks, and stood one after another in the bottom hinterland of the nameless ship.

The special characteristics of living metal have allowed Orican to fully recover from the serious injury of losing his limbs. He holds a Starburst Staff in his hand and leans it non-threateningly against himself.

Unlike him, Trazin did not carry any weapons, and even though Orican had strongly protested - "You should at least show some etiquette, it would be too ugly to be empty-handed!" - he didn't care at all.

Being in front of gods doesn't mean you have to grovel, at least that's what Trazin thinks. Moreover, the god he wants to meet may not necessarily like to see others kneeling on the ground and worshiping him devoutly.

If possible, he would probably prefer to see his existence forgotten.

so good. The Endless One sighed secretly. If all gods were like this, how much work would we save?

"Have you never thought about placing a light source here?" O'Rikan suddenly asked, the complaint in his voice obvious.

"Yes, but I turned them off temporarily." Trazin replied leisurely. "Don't ask why, you will know later. There are only the last fifteen seconds."

The astrologer snorted coldly, let go of his hand, and the anti-gravity unit placed at the bottom of the staff began to work, making it levitate and float behind him.

He himself bent over hard, trying to look humble under the torment of the unhealed injury and the error in his neural pathways.

Trazin sighed respectfully, almost wanting to kick him to the ground.

never mind. he thinks. Anyway, Orikan didn't become so stupid in one day or two.

In his unspoken taunt, the darkness in front of them began to surge. The visual sensor unit followed closely and began to upload errors, one after another, without stopping.

The ground was frosted, and the temperature was so cold that even the basic functions of the Shroud-class cruiser began to shut down. Trazyn waited in silence - he didn't see any black flames, so he was not nervous, but if he said he didn't care, he would be deceiving himself.

He kept telling himself: You are ready, you already know what you have to do, the future that the Necrontyr has cut off for countless years is now on your shoulders, you must stay calm.

Then the god appeared.

There was no sound, no movement, he didn't even appear from the darkness. He just stood calmly in front of Trazyn and Orikan, as if he had been here since morning and had never left.

Trazyn's thinking process suddenly had a brief error, and an idea that did not belong to logical thinking slowly emerged.

He felt that the gods might even have been standing here waiting before the word time was invented and the raw materials of the ship were born.

Waiting for whom? Waiting for me?

According to old habits, Trazyn took a breath and said: "You are here."

The god nodded and said nothing. Trazyn felt difficult for this rarely, but he continued: "I, Trazyn of the Necrontyr, and he, Orikan of the Necrontyr, hereby extend my sincere greetings to you."

I really have a mental illness. Trazyn thought after saying this. If I were still alive, I would definitely be a madman rolling around with drooling - why did I make such a meaningless greeting?

He regretted it, but the god didn't care, just made a direct gesture to continue. Trazyn understood what he meant, and he also wanted to continue, but... How can he continue?

Under the pressure of this question, Trazyn made a move that he himself did not expect - he turned his head to look at Orikan behind him, then slowly stepped back and signaled the astrologer to take over.

Orikan's single eye flashed several times at a high frequency, and then he spoke with difficulty: "We."

"Agreement." The god reminded sympathetically.

"Yes, agreement!" Trazyn suddenly said loudly. "Oh, agreement!"

He slapped his forehead.