Warhammer 40k: Shattered Steel Soul

Chapter 192 Extra: Apocalypse and the Rack

——Volume 3 Chapter 63 Regicide Chess (Part 1) Fragments Expand——

Malcador raised his hand, and his apartment was illuminated by bright lights.

Morse's eyes swept across Van Gogh's copy of Sunflowers, swept over the pale and mysterious smile of the woman in black, and smiled at the self-portrait of a man with one ear tightly wrapped in gauze.

On another wall hung a few tattered flags, thunder faded and thunderbolts bent. He reached out and picked up a corner of the broken lightning flag and smelled the blood stained on the edge of the flag.

"The surface of my body is free of grease and bacteria," the craftsman put down the lightning flag and turned his head. "There's no pollution - and you're hanging these things in the air, it's not really a problem to worry about."

Malcador's white hair spread in his hood. He sat on a wooden chair, slowly opened a bottle of red wine that had just been taken out of the stasis stand, held the concave groove at the bottom of the bottle and tilted the bottle, and the wine fell into the glass.

"Want a drink?" Macado asked.

Morse took the wine glass and sat down opposite Macado. The wooden chair made no sound, as if sitting on it was just a light black mist.

"I don't recognize that flag," Morse said, "just like I don't exactly recognize these cards you're playing with. A variant of Tarot?"

"Before the Old Night, people used these cards for divination." The prime minister said, "They were just gadgets to relieve boredom."

The old man turned over the cards one by one. moon. Martyr. monster. bishop. The Dark King pinned down half of the Emperor's side.

"Their meanings are not absolute," Makado said. "The moon, for example, symbolizes rising destiny in hive cities in Western Europe, while in Antarctica it is associated with unexpected sacrifices."

"Where are the martyrs?" Morse asked.

Malcador took back the card with the picture of the withered bones tied to the stake in his palm, and the card disappeared into the air.

"Necessary sacrifice." The prime minister replied, looking past the craftsman's ears and falling on the thunder flag behind him.

Morse tapped his fingers on the side of the armrest of the wooden chair and looked around at the apartment of the imperial prime minister. This place doesn't look like an inhabited place, but more like a small museum. The incense blended with the floral decorations on the walls, and expensive natural wood paved the dark brown floor. In the center was the small square table they were using now, so small that it could only accommodate two people sitting face to face.

"Is there that painting here?" Morse asked, "the one where a young woman is in the middle of the painting, wearing a skullcap and a yellow dress, holding a red, white and blue flag, leading a group of workers, citizens and children to fight. ?”

"Never heard of it." The prime minister took a sip of red wine.

"In the second millennium of the empire's clock, in a country called France, the Bourbon dynasty was restored for the second time. On July 26, 1830, the citizens of the French capital revolted and occupied the palace within three days. Charles X fled."

Morse closed his eyes and rested his head half on the top of the neck-height backrest of the wooden chair: "During this battle, Clara Lessing first raised the tricolor symbolizing the Republic on the barricade. She was the frame of the painting. the subject.”

"History is a cycle of domination and resistance," said Makado.

"And we are on the road to domination?" Morse opened his eyes, put one hand on the middle of the armrest, and raised his head.

Malcador refilled his glass: "There are no more than three bottles of this wine in the entire galaxy. You should drink some."

Morse gently put the wine glass back on the table: "You can pour it back."

Malcador smiled.

"Nios was nearby when Clara Lessing died," Morse continued. "In fact, he is in that painting."

"As an unknown comrade?"

"No, he's in the Notre Dame Cathedral in the background," Morse said. "He was a priest at the time."

"He was involved in the citizen uprising." Makado guessed with certainty.

Morse covered his smile with his hand when he recalled, "A three-day uprising that won. They all said they must be crazy before participating in the battle. Those people carried rifles and knives and walked from the street to the street." Rushing out of the alley, like a storm descending from the coast upwards... But they won, although the bloody smell of the dead made the street that was as dirty as a nest even more unsightly, and this god-sent The victory is also disappearing in the cycle of history. What do you think Neos wants, Malcador?”

"What do you think?" the prime minister returned the question to Morse.

Morse shrugged and changed the subject again. "There was a joke in Guterre when France still existed. The country needed women, dwarfs and foreigners to save it. There was another woman more famous than Clara Lessing."

Malcador listened quietly, his eyes dark, his fingers hanging above the set of cards.

"Jeanne d'Arc," Morse said, "was later named a saint. In 1429, Jeanne d'Arc, a shepherd girl from Donremie, ended the offensive of the British army that was attacking France and led The troops lifted the siege of Orleans, then claimed to have heard the words of revelation and led the army in a series of incredible victories that turned the tide of the entire war."

He paused briefly.

"In 1431, Joan of Arc was tried and accused of heresy. The court asked her whether she had received God's grace. She said that if she had not received grace, she hoped God would give it to her; if she had received grace, she hoped God would still favor her. She also mentioned that she owned a ring engraved with three crosses and an inscription of Jesus and Mary.”

"In May of the same year, she was burned at the stake. Her confessor rushed back to the church to get her a golden cross. From the moment she was ignited to the moment she turned into dry bones, she firmly called out the name of Jesus, but received no response. Then they removed the charcoal, examined the body, and burned it again to prevent anyone from collecting the ashes. The ashes fell into the Seine.

"The executioner later said that he was afraid that he had personally executed a follower of revelation."

Malcado did not ask what happened in the two years between these changes, which was not a question for an imperial chancellor. "What role did Neos play in this story?"

"I thought it was obvious." Morse's fingers rubbed the top of the wine glass, making a series of sliding friction sounds. "He is the voice of revelation, the God who favors the saint, and the shadow behind the curtain that drives the current situation. He made Joan of Arc believe in him. "This is..." Malcador did not finish. He took another sip of red wine, his fingers pressed on the side of the glass, the temperature was transmitted through the glass to the wine, affecting the taste of this extremely precious wine. "I am being sarcastic," Morse suddenly sighed softly, picked up the wine glass and took a sip. "I am being sarcastic again." He turned his palm and threw a Martyr card. The thin paper card slid on the table and fell accurately back into the original deck, falling into the gap under the Emperor card, revealing only a corner of the flame on the card. "He himself experienced it once during the witch hunting in the Middle Ages." Morse said, "He had a hundred ways to escape, but he didn't. 'Those who deny the existence of demons and witchcraft are heretics', he burned himself once in order to publicly refute this statement of the church at the time." "This is really..." Malcador shook his head. "Practice what you have learned." Morse said, "Now there is also this sentence in the Imperial Truth, but only one word has been changed. "

He drank the wine in the glass, confirming once again that he did not like the astringent taste of red wine, then stood up and held out his hand to Malcador.

The Prime Minister shook his hand and let go after a few seconds.

"I will not ask what the thunder flag is." Morse's voice was light and cold, "All mortals will die one day."

"Revelation can also die for revelation." Malcador murmured, put away the bottle, pulled his hood back on his head, and paused suddenly: "You accompanied him all the way, where do you live in these stories?"

Morse stretched his hand to the side, with his palm wrapped in black cloth facing up.

A ring fell into his palm, which looked like gold and copper, small and simple. It was engraved with three crosses and an inscription of Jesus and Mary.

"For you, you can add it to your collection." Morse threw the ring to Malcador and curled his lips. "I am usually the executioner. "

Okay, then this long volume is completely over!

The next volume is naturally about a certain Robert Guilliman... Is it just him? I don't know.

By the way, some small stereotypes still need to be mentioned. The scythe is not necessarily equal to Mortarion, the basilisk is not necessarily equal to Fulgrim, the one who sent the brothers the cannon is not necessarily the lion king, and the impenetrable wall is not necessarily Dorne...