My Life as A Death Guard
Chapter 377: A Critical Hit from Your Dad
Countless gazes were fixed upon the two figures at the center of the stage. Sparks splashed irritably, as if someone were whispering into the monster's ear.
The steel cables around Vashtorr's body lowered imperceptibly. It took a step forward and began chanting a blasphemous incantation under Perturabo's watchful eyes.
The Primarch narrowed his eyes slightly. His hand shifted, hanging loosely at his waist.
Steam and flame surged. The rust receded as though it had never existed at all. Perturabo cast a thoughtful glance toward the direction where the corrosion had fled—before fire and lightning could reach them, the rust had already shrunk back in fear.
"Is this your show of sincerity as well?" the Primarch suddenly asked, staring at Vashtorr.
Vashtorr bowed lightly, elegantly and with exaggerated grace. The cables around its body slid back and vanished behind steel struts with the motion.
Vashtorr was abiding by the contract. It knew this clause was not included in the temporary agreement.
But… it was necessary. A required step, a sacrifice for a greater undertaking—for far longer-term gains.
+I am pleased that you can accept my temporary goodwill. Rust crawling over steel, adamantium rotting into sand—these are things I find intolerable.+
Perturabo had no interest in Vashtorr's words. His attention seemed still fixed on the vanished rust. Vashtorr watched him, nodded once, and turned slightly, gesturing to lead the fleet away.
"If you truly bear me any goodwill, then take the Iron Blood out of the warp."
Perturabo's words blurred behind layers of steam. Vashtorr paid no heed to the possible implications beneath the Primarch's tone.
The pact was sealed. One party had fulfilled its obligation; the other must now comply. It would complete its part first—then the problem would not lie with it.
Vashtorr raised its warhammer high. Its bone-wings spread wide. Flames coiled around it.
The turbulence of the Empyrean accelerated. The mist retreated as swiftly as rust, arcs of lightning rolling and shrieking thunder tearing open the vast tides. The Iron Blood seemed to let out a dying groan, steel sighing in protest.
When Perturabo blinked again, he found himself and the Iron Blood suspended between the stars. The warp's pressure still weighed upon him, but it was no longer a raging storm.
He turned his head and saw the Eye of Terror gazing back at him from amid the dim galaxy.
Here, the warp was still twisted together with reality, but the balance clearly favored the material realm.
Perturabo frowned slightly.
…This was not what he had imagined.
What exactly did it want?
The Lord of Iron paced silently across the deck, as though checking whether he and the Iron Blood had truly escaped the warp. It was a reasonable precaution. Vashtorr gripped its artisan's hammer and waited patiently.
It needed to demonstrate its sincerity—even if the reward would not come now.
Perturabo gazed thoughtfully at the Iron Warriors fleet trailing behind the Iron Blood. The rust had indeed been purged, but it had been replaced by other useless adornments: exposed cables, sparks bursting from nowhere.
He stared as if pondering something. The pause stretched on a bit too long.
Vashtorr moved to his side. The Lord of the Forge raised one hand, speaking as though in negotiation.
+They belong to you in the first place. Of course you may—+
Perturabo spun around in a flash of lightning and steel.
In that instant, Vashtorr saw the glint of a blade, the flare of fire igniting across the Primarch's Terminator armor.
Another oathbreaker.
"Get out of here!"
Amid a storm of bullets, Vashtorr ignored the Primarch's ambush. Its massive form lunged straight toward Perturabo, who was also charging forward, hammer raised. The skeletal frame spread wide, cables shrieking as they shot outward, weaving into a vast, web-like net.
Realizing too late that his foe did not fear his attack, Perturabo shifted his force, attempting to evade—but it was already too late—
Bang!
Perturabo was hurled straight into a forest of metal. Vashtorr's final words faded away alongside the teeth-grinding clatter of falling steel.
When Perturabo regained his balance and rose once more, he found that he was already standing in a vast, dim darkness.
Vashtorr's words faded from his ears—
+It was you who broke the pact first! In the name of the Lord of the Forge, I will exact a price!+
Perturabo remained silent. He had nothing left to lose anyway.
They were in league with one another, he thought—the rust, and that inexplicable monster that had come to him offering goodwill. They were all the same.
They were anxious. Or rather, that creature calling itself Vashtorr was anxious.
But since—
Perturabo's thoughts sank back into the mire. Since he already had nothing left—
Admitting it was difficult. Exceedingly difficult. Perturabo could scarcely bring himself to imagine it. For a moment, he had thought he might suffocate.
Yet even in such extremes, the cold, rational part of him still spoke.
They wanted him to do something. But Perturabo recalled the monster's words—no, impossible. Its naivety was almost laughable.
Fight it. Or see what they wanted, and then fight it. Perturabo chose the latter, though he still…
Just as he would never admit that Vashtorr's words about the Perfect City and Prospero had made him shudder, he would not admit that his choice had once again ended in failure.
Perturabo drew in a deep breath. He should be rational, cold, making the optimal decision based on facts. He would do so. He always had.
Faced with failure in reality, he sealed himself off once more.
As if to divert his attention, Perturabo forced his thoughts onto the situation at hand. Was this the punishment for breaking the pact? Or the "truth" it had spoken of?
He laughed loudly inside his own mind. The truth. Did they truly believe a Primarch so easily deceived?
Perturabo lowered his gaze. Cables lay neatly arranged at his feet. No—he frowned, identifying them more carefully. These were not Vashtorr's cables.
The instruments in the chamber hummed steadily. The sharp scent of disinfectant at his nose gave him the answer. He was in a laboratory—perhaps behind some large piece of machinery.
Perturabo frowned again. The truth? He had expected something more… theatrically obscure. Magnus had once shown him a corner of the warp; Perturabo was well acquainted with such things.
But the floor beneath his feet told him this was not so simple as an illusion.
Perturabo let out a low sigh. This should end here. He had no obligation to "gaze upon the truth." Since he had already broken the pact, he was under no compulsion to play childish warp-games with them.
The Primarch prepared to stride out of the shadows. He would tear apart the first living thing he saw in a storm of gunfire. He could already feel the muscles in his legs tightening—
Then he heard a voice.
A voice he knew better than any other. A voice he had thought of countless times.
The Emperor's voice.
"They must be loyal to me. That is paramount."
The words were calm.
Perturabo's pupils shuddered violently. No—this was an illusion, he thought. But his blood, and that—that voice he could never mistake—
It was the Emperor.
His heart slammed violently in his chest. Perturabo wanted to call out the Emperor's name, to rush out of the darkness, to tell Him—
Tell Him what?
Suddenly, Perturabo realized: he had lost the Iron Warriors. How would the Emperor look at him now? Would He rebuke him? Would He regard him as a failure—
A failed product.
Perturabo stopped breathing. His thoughts slid uncontrollably back to his conversation with Vashtorr. What had it said?
He seized and twisted their nature. Prospero. The Perfect City. A Primarch cast aside.
Against his own nature, Perturabo remained silent. He did not know what posture to take before this "illusory" Emperor. He had already… failed. Pain stabbed through his mind.
Yet in some hidden corner of himself, could he truly say he felt not the slightest curiosity about what the Emperor had just said—about those words?
Listen a little more, he thought. The power to decide is still mine.
"What I require is their absolute loyalty. They will fear me, yet be unable to suppress their craving for my reward. They will become the generals who expand the Imperium's borders. Therefore, loyalty is indispensable."
"They must be absolutely loyal. This will be engraved into the deepest code of their flesh and genes, encoded within the double helix, flowing through their blood."
Perturabo trembled as he looked down at his own hands. The Emperor… he thought. Loyalty.
Generals… He knew perfectly well whom the Emperor was referring to. He meant the Primarchs. The realization made Perturabo shake.
When he longed for the Emperor's praise; when he burned with anger at others being rewarded; when he presented his victories before Him again and again; when, in his heart, he hoped—
Perturabo was ashamed to admit it, but… but… this should have come from the heart. This was a son's admiration for his father, a general's devotion to his Emperor—not… not—
Not something deliberately engineered by the Emperor.
And then another thought struck him. The Emperor… his father… what pronoun was He using to refer to His sons?
It?
It?!
Perturabo froze in place. A faint voice within him still insisted that this was all an illusion, a lie spun by warp-things—but Perturabo could never mistake the Emperor.
Countless times he had waited for the Emperor's gaze to shift from among the many Primarchs to him. Countless times he had shed blood for the dream the Emperor spoke of. He had taken up blade and sword rather than pen and drafting board—for Him! For the Emperor!
And yet the Emperor had never spared him a second glance.
Once, Perturabo had been able to deceive himself with the notion that the Emperor trusted him—that was why He entrusted him with task after task.
But now… now…
He did not know.
Perturabo stood in silence. In that moment, his heart no longer beat, his lungs no longer drew breath. He seemed to exist only to await the Emperor's words—words that felt like a final judgment.
"Their very nature is dangerous, so I must restrain them through the genes of their flesh, so that they may better serve the Imperium. Genetics are of paramount importance. This step must not be neglected."
Nature.
Perturabo thought dully. He recalled Vashtorr's words: He captured and twisted your nature.
Then what are we, really? What am I?
Perturabo's mind trembled. He was the Emperor's fourth son. He was a general of the Imperium. He was an Iron Warrior…
His thoughts stalled for a moment.
He was… he was what the Emperor called "it." A thing bound by flesh, constrained by genes, engineered to demand loyalty and filial obedience.
Only then did Perturabo realize that the hum of machinery around him sounded disturbingly like the operation of a Geller Field.
He slid uncontrollably toward the abyss—but he had not yet fallen.
The Emperor's voice faded. The calm sound of boots striking the floor receded as well. The Emperor seemed to be inspecting other experimental chambers now, not striding out as Perturabo had first imagined.
Cautiously, Perturabo leaned out from behind the machinery.
With a single glance, he saw it: within a massive nutrient tube, a warp-entity imprisoned there—one that resonated faintly with him.
Darkness flooded Perturabo's vision. His body collapsed backward without his control, and he fell into a pool of blackness—
When Perturabo opened his eyes again, he found himself lying on the deck of the Iron Blood.
He rose unsteadily, dazed. He saw that the entire Iron Warriors fleet was intact—no rust, no exposed cables with some exhibitionist aesthetic, no senseless metal growths. Everything was whole, orderly, and gleaming, as though nothing had ever happened.
The first thing Perturabo did was check the ammunition reserves of his Terminator armor. The rounds he had fired at Vashtorr were indeed gone—tangible proof that all that chaos had truly happened.
And then, almost immediately, Perturabo realized that it had all happened.
He looked toward the Iron Warrior standing on the deck as if on routine watch. He opened his mouth to call the warrior over—but at the very instant the thought formed, the soldier had already turned and was walking toward him.
Perturabo stared in astonishment as his son approached. The moment his attention settled on the warrior, he already knew every relevant datum: height, weight, muscle density, proficiency with every weapon—
All except a name.
Perturabo ordered him to remove his helmet. The Primarch tested the thought, and the Iron Warrior obediently removed it. Perturabo did not recognize this son.
So he named him A00001.
Then Perturabo lowered his gaze. Through the deck plating, data flooded toward him like an ocean.
Perturabo gasped, unsure how to react. This was… unbelievable… unbelievable…
Yet Perturabo was certain of one thing: he was now the sole master of these soldiers. The data-cables embedded into his scalp hummed, reminding him of the vision—no, of reality—the machines, that fleeting glimpse he had seen.
This was… this was his original ability.
This was the ability that the thing called "Perturabo" had possessed from the very beginning.
The warp had washed away their souls—or perhaps weakened them just enough for Perturabo to take hold of them.
Perturabo let out a disbelieving, low laugh. Did the warp truly possess goodwill? Was Magnus right?
Impossible.
Upon realizing this new power, Perturabo spent a full day adapting to it, while simultaneously directing the Iron Warriors to inspect every corner of the fleet. The Iron Warriors' ships were still as pristine and orderly as if they had never entered the warp at all.
The fleet was anchored where Vashtorr had first brought them. After a brief deliberation, Perturabo chose to lead the fleet in search of a stable, physical world within this region of space—he had no intention of attempting another warp jump for now.
This new ability greatly dulled the sting of Perturabo's earlier sense of failure. These fools would never make mistakes again. They would never stammer reports of an oncoming plague, never squabble over meaningless trivialities, never resist for petty gain.
They listened only to him. Completely.
After repeated confirmation, Perturabo finally accepted the reality: the entire fleet now answered to him alone.
Yet the Lord of Iron's sense of unease did not fade. The entire fleet remained on high alert. After much hesitation, Perturabo ultimately chose not to call for aid from nearby Imperial fleets.
Instead, with the main force at maximum readiness, the Iron Warriors began attempting to colonize the surrounding star systems.
Silent, flawlessly efficient soldiers worked like true machines of war, while Perturabo himself did not appear among them.
In the laboratory, Perturabo raised his bare arm. He stared at the perfect limb… as if he could see through the skin, past the blood, down to those things small enough, subtle enough, to be hidden within.
Impossible, Perturabo thought. Whole-body genetic editing must be done in infancy. Even if I realize it now, it should all be futile.
Yet he still pierced his skin with a syringe and watched the bright red blood well up.
Perturabo placed his blood beneath the instruments. He took that futile step anyway—as though only by seeing it with his own eyes could he finally give up and accept reality.
He might have spent a very long time there. No one came to disturb him. Perhaps time itself flowed incorrectly near the Eye of Terror—or perhaps it was because he himself was the forgotten one… the abandoned one.
At last, he cracked the final genetic lock.
No… Perturabo thought. This will only confirm it. You are an adult; genetic editing can only take effect in childhood.
Still, he looked at the screen.
…
Perturabo swallowed in silence.
He saw it—the loyalty gene, half-knocked-out, as if on the verge of falling away.
He could remove it entirely. Right now.
That gene was crudely interfering with the expression of several neighboring genes. Perturabo's eye twitched.
Suddenly, he remembered something…
He had no memories of childhood.
Perturabo lifted his head. Through the deck, he saw the Eye of Terror gazing at him.
The warp has no concept of time… Perturabo thought slowly.
He had lost his memories of childhood—but he remembered the Eye of Terror.
. . .
After a long period of silence, the Iron Warriors' fleet once again opened the Mandeville point in the warp.
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