Chapter 914 - 913

The Lord of Hope was having a baby!

The announcement from Eden, the Lord of Hope, sent shock waves through the Tombstone Council Chamber.

It went far beyond anything the Phaerons had imagined. They stared in stunned disbelief, unable to process the news for a long time.

As everyone knew, the Necrons had permanently lost the ability to reproduce after the C’tan devoured their flesh and souls and imprisoned them within bodies of living metal.

Over the past tens of millions of years, their Crypteks had conducted more experiments than anyone could count.

Unfortunately, whether they attempted reversal, cloning, or replication, they had never succeeded in creating new life.

Even the Technomandrites controlled by the Silent King had achieved only the slightest progress in reverse biotransference, producing changes in living metal so minuscule they were almost impossible to detect.

Worse still, those advances concerned only the restoration of flesh.

Restoring a soul remained a distant, seemingly impossible dream.

Yet now, the Lord of Hope and Phaeron Fahela had created a new life together?!

This revelation was no less explosive than dropping a star into the chamber.

“Impossible! Absolutely impossible!”

Hapthatra the Radiant, the Silent King’s mouthpiece, was the first to react. He furiously denounced the Lord of Hope.

“A shameless deception! You pitiful slave to a god are deceiving the Necrons, just as the C’tan once did when they tempted us into the abyss!”

Mesophet the Shadowed Hand immediately joined in, offering a further rebuttal.

“According to every available theory and piece of data, neither you nor Phaeron Fahela could possibly produce offspring.

“This is nothing more than a conspiracy to delay us and disrupt the Triarchal Council. You and the god behind you fear the reunification of the Necron Empire!”

Although the two Phaerons serving as Szarekh’s mouthpieces were deeply shocked, they struggled to keep the situation under control.

They could not allow the Lord of Hope to destroy everything the Silent King had worked so hard to achieve.

Szarekh himself continued watching the spectacle with contempt, though his fists had clenched involuntarily.

He was already mobilizing his power to suppress the Lord of Hope and stop him from continuing.

“My apologies, but I didn’t come here to debate the matter with you.”

Eden ignored the accusations of the two Phaerons, avoiding the trap of being forced to prove himself.

He faced the gathering with elegant poise and a delighted smile.

“Regardless of anything else, the birth of a child, a noble Necron child, is surely worthy of a grand celebration.”

“My honored Phaerons.

“This is a miracle. The New God granted Charles and me everything we needed to have a child.

“It is what I have always prayed for and longed to receive.”

Fahela held the Lord of Hope’s arm. She was still immersed in overwhelming happiness, and her voice trembled slightly.

“I only wish to share the Ramses Dynasty’s joy with our people.

“I hope all of you will attend the grand banquet celebrating the arrival of our new child and offer him your blessings. One day, he will become the master of our dynasty.”

In short, Fahela and the Lord of Hope had supposedly come only to extend an invitation to the Necrons’ highest-ranking rulers.

Nor had Eden limited that invitation to those gathered here.

The Lord of Hope had broadcast it throughout the Pariah Nexus and across the galaxy, blasting the announcement over every channel he could access. He seemed terrified that someone might fail to hear that he had gotten Phaeron Fahela pregnant.

“Is this what we Necrons looked like in the past?”

As the Phaerons studied the Lord of Hope and his consort, that thought surfaced within their data-logic.

Unlike other high-ranking Necrons, who went everywhere in skeletal metal bodies, the Lord of Hope and his consort wore archaic ceremonial clothing.

Even their outer layers of living metal had been shaped to imitate Necrontyr flesh and skin. Their every movement was elegant.

Standing before the gathering, they resembled living Necrontyr nobles who had never undergone biotransference.

“Perhaps the announcement isn’t false. Maybe only beings like them could create new life.”

“What would the child even look like?”

The Phaerons remained skeptical, but their thoughts were beginning to change.

No new Necron life had been born in sixty million years.

Their entire species had become lifeless and stagnant.

The resulting mental torment was difficult to imagine. Their existence was long, dull, eternally repetitive, and utterly devoid of hope.

Yet this announcement caused something to stir once more within their long-silent minds.

“Lord of Hope, how did you accomplish this?”

“Does the New God truly possess such power?”

The Phaerons grew increasingly agitated and bombarded him with questions.

They were desperate to discover the truth.

“My friends, the New God was born from the collective thoughts of the Necrons. That proves we haven’t lost every last fragment of our souls.

“The New God can…”

Eden looked across the gathering and seized this opportunity to spread the teachings of the New God.

However, he had barely begun when an irresistible force interfered. His signal could no longer transmit any information.

“What the hell? The Silent King actually pulled the network cable. What a sore loser!”

Eden was left speechless.

Wasn’t everyone supposed to have the right to speak freely during a Triarchal Council?

The pulse signal he had sent was forcibly intercepted, and the transmission channel itself was severed. The Tombstone Council Chamber had been completely isolated from outside communications.

In other words, he could no longer transmit pulse data to either the chamber or the Phaerons inside it.

Fortunately, the message he wanted to deliver had already reached most of them.

Now all he had to do was wait.

Inside the Tombstone Council Chamber, the blue holographic projections of the Lord of Hope and Phaeron Fahela flickered violently before disappearing.

The connection had clearly been severed.

An uproar swept through the Phaerons.

The Silent King had refused to tolerate any further speeches from that traitor and defiant rebel. He had forcibly blocked the Lord of Hope’s pulse signal.

Szarekh knew that if Eden were allowed to continue, the situation would become even more troublesome.

“My noble kinsmen, there is no credibility whatsoever to the Lord of Hope’s claims.

“Our Crypteks have conducted research for tens of millions of years. Until reverse biotransference succeeds, it is impossible for us to regain the ability to reproduce.

“He has become a slave to a god and speaks nothing but lies. Once again, he seeks to deceive us.”

Hapthatra the Radiant hurried forward to salvage the situation, gradually steering the conversation elsewhere.

“Our most urgent concern is humanity’s offensive. They have developed lethal weapons that threaten the Necron Empire…”

The Phaeron serving as Szarekh’s mouthpiece stopped mentioning the Lord of Hope. Instead, he introduced the threat posed by humanity, claiming that the humans possessed deadly new weapons in an attempt to redirect the Phaerons’ attention.

It did not matter whether humanity actually had such weapons.

He would insist they did.

They were simply too dangerous!

At the Silent King’s prompting, Hapthatra and Mesophet repeatedly emphasized humanity’s threat, reinforcing the narrative while urging the Phaerons to surrender their command protocols and accept centralized control.

The Silent King maintained his imposing posture, appearing as steady and immovable as a mountain.

Inwardly, however, the Sovereign was frantic. He was desperately trying to counteract the Lord of Hope’s influence.

He even stopped intercepting a volley of human cyclonic torpedoes and allowed them to strike a nearby region. The resulting shock waves reached the Tombstone Council Chamber, deliberately inspiring fear among the Phaerons.

“The Lord of Hope must be destroyed. We cannot wait another moment!”

The Silent King ground his teeth.

He was desperate to acquire the Phaerons’ command protocols, even if he received only half of them.

Once he had command authority, he would immediately send his tomb fleets to surround and destroy the Lord of Hope.

Both Eden and Phaeron Fahela would be torn apart so completely that even their reanimation protocols could not activate.

The Sovereign would not allow anyone to interfere with his rule.

Of course, he wanted the Necrons to reverse biotransference and create new life.

But it had to happen under his rule and with his support.

If such an achievement threatened his authority, he would destroy it without hesitation and search for another method.

In short, the Silent King was frantically trying to assemble his coalition so he could carry out a complete reckoning against the Lord of Hope and eliminate the threat.

Although he considered it unlikely, if the Lord of Hope’s claims were true, Szarekh would seize both the newborn and the cultivation technology after killing Eden.

Then he would place everything under his absolute control.

While Hapthatra and Mesophet continued speaking endlessly under the Silent King’s direction, guiding the Phaerons into surrendering their dynasties’ command protocols, several projections quietly disappeared.

Those Phaerons had left the ancient Tombstone Council Chamber.

It was obvious where they were going.

“Traitors!”

From his elevated platform, the Silent King saw everything clearly.

He clenched his fists and added the departing Phaerons to a blacklist, marking them as targets for a future reckoning.

Most had belonged to the Lord of Hope’s faction but had begun wavering in their loyalties. Upon hearing that a new child had been born, they immediately returned to Eden’s side.

Their growing faith in the New God now outweighed any desire to follow the Silent King and reunify the Necron Empire.

Gradually, more Phaerons noticed the departure of the other dynastic rulers.

They quietly followed suit and left the group chat.

One Phaeron after another severed their communications and departed, leaving the once-crowded chamber increasingly empty.

“My apologies, great Szarekh. My tomb world is under human bombardment. I must return and stop them.”

“M-my tomb world is being bombarded as well!”

Several Phaerons who wanted to escape noticed the Silent King staring at them and nervously offered excuses.

They bowed in a hurry and immediately fled.

The more unstable Phaerons offered even stranger explanations. Some claimed they needed to return to stasis, while others insisted they had to resume fighting the Old Ones.

A few openly declared that they were leaving to see the newborn child, showing the Silent King no respect whatsoever.

More and more Phaerons departed the Tombstone Council Chamber.

In the end, only a small number remained, most of whom either wanted to retain their living-metal bodies or were utterly loyal to Szarekh.

Of course, several remained simply because they had arrived at the chamber in person and did not dare run away.

Because of the Lord of Hope’s intervention, the atmosphere surrounding the Triarchal Council became cold and desolate.

In the distance, flashes from detonating human cyclonic torpedoes pierced the chamber’s dome and illuminated the Silent King on his platform, making the bridge of his nose look strangely red.

His entire body trembled.

He was so furious he was practically about to explode.

The Sovereign had gone to enormous trouble to create this group and summon the Phaerons, only for them to leave the group chat one after another.

The entire Triarchal Council had become a joke.

Even worse, most of those Phaerons were probably heading straight to the Lord of Hope to learn more about the newborn.

After endless ages of erosion, many high-ranking Necrons no longer found any joy in conquest, slaughter, or the seizure of territory.

They were not particularly interested in following the Silent King and rebuilding the Necron Empire. Most had attended only because they believed he might complete reverse biotransference and finally change their condition.

Another group consisted of thrill-seeking Phaerons who had come only because a large crowd promised entertainment.

In short, after existing for so long without physical sensation, many high-ranking Necrons had become joyless thrill-seekers.

They did not object to using their ancient fleets to exterminate a few species, but they did not consider it essential.

What did they gain from conquering more territory?

They no longer possessed the capacity to enjoy acquiring anything.

Naturally, a few Necrons, such as the Stormlord, pursued conquest and slaughter with even greater intensity.

But they remained a minority.

The news brought by the Lord of Hope had sent a tremor through the Phaerons’ dead and stagnant data-logic.

They had discovered a new source of interest.

They longed to see the child, the first new life born to their species in tens of millions of years.

Even if the announcement ultimately proved false, they still wanted to investigate it personally and discover the truth.

No matter how they looked at it, the Lord of Hope seemed far more likely to resolve the Necrons’ eternal suffering.

After all, the Silent King’s promises of reverse biotransference still existed mostly as PowerPoint presentations.

The Lord of Hope, meanwhile, had already delivered on several of his promises and become a father.

“Fools. A pack of deceived fools!”

The Silent King was numb with fury.

He struggled to suppress his rage and continued trying to win over the Phaerons who remained.

If he failed to keep even these few, the mighty Sovereign would become a commander without an army.

…

The Ramses Dynasty.

New Life City.

This Necrontyr city had been excavated by the Lord of Hope, foundation and all, and placed upon the deck of his tomb flagship.

It was now bustling with activity.

An enormous celebration was underway, filling the city with noise and laughter.

This was a living city, overflowing with vitality and energy. It was unlike any other tomb world in existence.

Now it had been fully opened to friendly Necrons arriving from across the galaxy.

Above the dome, green light flickered within Eden’s eyes as he gazed down at the lively city and released a quiet breath of relief.

“Good thing I arrived in time. Otherwise, the Silent King would have succeeded.”

Just as he had expected, the promise of a newborn was more devastating to the Necrons than any weapon.

As the war continued, more and more Necron dynasties awakened. There was no longer any way to stop them all.

From what Eden understood, the Necrons’ loss of sensation, combined with the total absence of new generations, had stripped the entire species of its motivation to move forward.

They had become stagnant and lifeless.

If nothing was done, the most likely outcome was that extreme boredom and insanity would eventually drive them to destroy themselves along with every other species in the galaxy.

That was what made the Necrons so terrifying.

Ancient weapons capable of destroying stars were controlled by a group of thrill-seekers who could lose their minds at any moment.

Among them were hundreds of Phaerons with power comparable to Legion Masters and dozens of high-ranking Phaerons who were no weaker than Primarchs.

When they went mad, they were perfectly willing to blow themselves up along with everyone else.

Who could say whether these lunatics might eventually decide that existence had lost all meaning, carry the Celestial Orrery around the galaxy, and start crushing stars for fun?!

The danger would only grow if they awakened in large numbers and united.

If the problem remained unresolved, it would become a catastrophe for humanity, potentially even worse than the threat posed by Chaos and the Warp.

As far as Eden was concerned, how could he possibly sleep at night if he did not bring such power under his control?

Fortunately, he had finally discovered a solution.

He would use a newborn child to give the Necrons hope.

The New God brought children!

That was one of the things the Necrons desired most.

What Necron could refuse an adorable, healthy, chubby new life?

Of course, accomplishing this had been extraordinarily difficult.

The Necrons had tried countless methods without success.

That outcome was inevitable.

How could a soulless species that rejected the gods possibly create a soul through technology alone?

Naturally, Eden had not truly gotten Fahela pregnant.

How could two bodies of living metal produce a child?

The pregnancy was merely a cover story.

In reality, the newborn was developing inside an artificial gestation pod.

Eden had first used the Cryptek Association’s immature reverse-biotransference technology to partially reactivate the organic material within his cloned body and Fahela’s living-metal cells, allowing him to extract genetic material from both.

He then combined the authority of the Goddess of Life, the Hope Sun, the Power of I Reckon, and the New God’s energy to nurture an entirely new life.

Without Eden, the King of Warp Knockoffs, no being or god anywhere in either the galaxy or the Warp could have accomplished such a feat.

All things considered, the child was at least half-biologically his.

It was somewhat similar to the relationship between the Emperor and the Primarchs.

The child was a Primarch-like new life-form that came extraordinarily close to being a true Necrontyr and possessed an almost complete soul.

That was enough.

Even individual humans differed from one another genetically more than this child differed from a Necrontyr.

To the Phaerons, he would be a genuine Necrontyr newborn and the hope of their species.

As the only child born to the Necrons in tens of millions of years, Eden’s son would possess unparalleled political significance from the moment of his birth.

No one could claim a stronger right to become the next Silent King.

Eden, as the Lord of Hope, would therefore become the Silent King’s father and indirectly control the Necrons.

After all, he could not maintain his rule indefinitely through cloned bodies.

As the total war continued, Eden had increasingly recognized that completely exterminating the Necron Empire was unrealistic.

Their forces included countless powerful armies capable of interstellar travel.

If the war turned against them and they scattered throughout the galaxy to wage guerrilla warfare, Eden would face endless trouble.

Even if that many pigs were released across the galaxy and humanity was ordered to hunt them down, it would be nearly impossible to kill every last one.

The best option was to bring the Necrons temporarily under his rule and then weaken them from within.

Even if he later sent them to fight the Great Devourer, they would remain a formidable military force.

That ravenous swarm beyond the galaxy possessed the potential to devour the entire Milky Way.

“Quite a lot of Phaerons have come. What a vigorous scene, bursting with life and competition…”

Eden looked up at the sky.

When he saw the deep-tomb barges arriving above New Life City one after another, a faint smile appeared on his face.

They carried Phaerons who had come to witness the newborn.

The only thing Eden needed to do was convince them to remain, subjugate them, and take control of a formidable Necron military force comparable to humanity’s own.

Once he accomplished that, victory in this total war would be assured.

The Savior and Lord of Hope would sweep away every remaining obstacle and achieve an overwhelming triumph.

In short, the advantage was his, and victory was within sight!

“Ah, this may be the most wonderful day in all of Trazyn’s existence…”

At that same moment, a figure appeared on the streets of New Life City.

He was almost trembling with excitement.

The Necron collector had concealed himself through some unknown means. Moving furtively but with barely contained impatience, he hurried toward the Lord of Hope’s palace.

(End of Chapter)

“Zaelum”]