40 Thousand Reasons

Chapter 139: Meridian

"You want me to travel with you to Hive World Meridian?" Ivixia asked looking strangely at me.

"Not just for the pleasant company, my dear. There is a cache of demonic artifacts there. And this time, it won't be just the Lamenter fleet. House Lancefire will provide some cruisers and the Knights." I explained with a big smile, just as Rose entered my room.

Even as a Blank, and my lover wearing the Null Bone Staff, her powers were obvious, as the air shimmered around Rose with a light blue glow.

Ivixia patted her hip to make sure the Null Wand was still in place.

"Pef, my love. A demonhunter now?" Rose asked with faint merriment.

"Lady Ivixia was instrumental in closing the Anomaly, my dear. She even fired the weapon." I said while offering a hug.

Rose smiled a little, while her deck of tarot cards flew out and glowed, before falling on the table in some mysterious reading. "Even so my naive Pef, your sweet Ivixia is only waiting for an opportunity to burn you alive. It's how their kind are trained or better said, brainwashed."

I sighed inward, knowing it was probably true. "There's a long list of those who want me dead, but it will never happen. In fact, it only saves me time by exposing the traitors and allowing me to exterminate them easier." I answered in a cheerful voice, then kissed Rose for a long minute.

When I returned inside my body, Ivixia was staring at me with a doubtful look, possibly reconsidering her life choices.

"I do not burn innocent people, no matter what you heard about my order, colleague Inquisitor. And Lord Pef is a Blank, so most corruption accusations would be absurd, at least those involving the Warp or Chaos. There is some doubt on his Chapter's approach on the Codex Astartes...plus all the proven heretek use of xenos artifacts." Inquisitor Dannica replied in a dignified voice.

"Proven you say? A Blackstone Fortress is made by xenos too, with the purpose of fighting against Chaos. Now, how should you be sentenced Inquisitor Dannica? Surely if you're not guilty, being submerged in molten brass will not hurt you." I explained with a wide grin.

"That would be interesting to watch indeed. I boiled Fulgrim's corpse in molten adamantium, but never an Inquisitor, not yet." Rose commented and weaved a claw made of Warpfire around her hand.

"... That won't be necessary. If Lord Pef did use a xeno artifact, he must have had a good reason." Lady Ivixia muttered as the adamantium floor beneath her feet started melting.

Rose cast another deck of tarot cards, while the floor became solid again. A trick of the trade worth remembering, as it did use the environment against someone immune to Warp.

You could also simply use weapons, which was how most Blanks got killed anyway.

"See Pef? Now we're all friends. Next crisis will happen in seven years, if the nice Inquisitor survives so far." Rose predicted with a warning voice, then continued on the Manifold. "This woman is completely deranged. Keep her away from Illevar."

I sobbed inward. All my efforts would be wasted on Ivixia, if things were this bad.

"Perhaps it's better if you are given a new quest, Lady Ivixia. Travel to the Rock and awaken Primarch El'Johnson. Those silly Dark Angels have forgotten about him and keep him hidden in a stasis crypt, right under their fortress." I murmured in a soft voice, while taking out a few items that will help. A dataslate containing the best STC templates I had, another Null Wand and a Blessed Autocimulacra disc, which contained enough alloygel to heal a power armor a few times.

Both women exhaled in unison, perhaps at the amazing news. "Why her?" Rose demanded in a furious tone.

"Because, only Ivixia can enter this crypt. She needs a Ferryman to help her cross, and those Ferrymen only listen to Ordo Malleus." I declared confidently, and then moved the demonhunter aboard the Inquisitorial Blackship in orbit.

Then I sat down and sighed deeply. If my conjecture was correct, the Ferrymen Grey Knights would be able to resolve those Watchers keeping the Lion in stasis. They were all Pariah after all.

"Dad! We're going to Titan! Too bad it takes two years to reach it." Janice sent me as the Blackship cruiser began undocking from the Forge Retribution's receiving spacestation.

"Be careful there, Janice. Trust no one." I advised my daughter with parental worry. Terra and the Solar System were always the most dangerous place to be, even for a Navigator. And Titan was the base of the Grey Knights.

Then I turned to stare at Rose, watching her get undressed with bemusement. "So all that was to get me for yourself, my beloved Rose?"

But she only laid herself in bed, and beckoned me over. "You have to stop doing this, love. If not Ivixia, then the next. But you will get excommunicated, and doom your family as well. So far, you got amazingly lucky, but don't chase after more Inquisitors. Even Velayne can't do much against the Inquisitor Lords."

While joining Rose in bed, I mentally scratched a notch on my bed pole anyway. Having seduced at least one woman Inquisitor from Ordo Malleus, it was time to look for an Ordo Hereticus lover.

Banking on my amazing life story, and my rather impressive resume of campaigns and high-profile kills, I would bet a throne at least one heretic hunter would fall for it.

Anyway, it seemed Rose was very eager for a new child, which made me just as eager too. I did choose a pleasant type of duty, and I'll never regret it.

The Blanktown has grown into a Blankcity in my absence, as my children and their children kept increasing our numbers, as did the imported Blanks like Jurgen and Sly Marbo and all the others.

As for the Catachans, we had 150 regiments now, and their children had also reached recruitment age, at least the first generations.

Technical training in the colonies was already the best I could offer, and that reflected back in increased output in new factories, mills and even agriculture.

My kingdom had finally achieved resource independence, although we will keep importing advanced machines and immigrants, in exchange for raw or processed materials.

If this wasn't a total war economy, things would have been much easier, but war will never end in this universe, not with Orks and Tyranids and Necrons eager to smash, eat or destroy everything, while Eldar and Chaos plotted the demise of the humanity at every opportunity.

However, while things were still bad for the Imperium, in the Ultima Segmentum it was possibly a better state of affairs than anywhere else. Many of the Forge Worlds doomed in that other timeline were still here, some battered, some thriving but alive even so.

Also, pretty much every Demon World I could reach had been burned, as were many Ork, Necron and other xenos planets.

Plus, all the new technologies and the blackstone and adamantium provided for the war effort, and a few easy victories over Eldar, Orks and Tyranid Hives, and much costlier victories over Necrons and Chaos forces.

I was just waiting for Primarch Guilliam to make up his mind and commence his march for Terra. The man had charisma and momentum behind him, something I could never hope to achieve. To put it simply, Roboute was the hero of the story and everyone else was his helpful aid.

Soon enough, this proved true again as my fleet reached Meridian, and we rapidly began preparing defenses against the Tyranid Hive Fleet.

With over 30 billion people, I could demand and obtain a thousand regiments being raised without any problem, although arming and training them would take time.

So I tasked my techpriests, and the local techpriests to convert the criminal underground into tech-servitors, and had them assemble Hellguns and Lascannons and land mines and autocannons by the millions, while my troops and Astartes provided enforcement.

It would have worked great, because my plans always work. It was not the first Hive World that I defended after all.

But then, the damned Blood Ravens objected, claiming this world was under their protection, and sent a priority communique to the Primarch, and the damn idiot gave them command over the defense.

It wasn't enough that this Space Marine Chapter had an ungodly large amount of psykers and Librarians. No, that I could deal with.

Not with a fucking corrupted Azariah Kyras, the cretin wishing for demonhood.

So now I had to find a damn Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor, or let this world get munched on by Tyranids.

Well, I could also act sneakily, but I was pretty sure this time and place was not right. There were too many eyes watching, and not many friendly ones.

At least I had a patsy to send forward and take the blame.

"Commissar Cain! We meet again, and you look rather healthy now. How has duty been treating you?" I asked over a glass of expensive wine.

"...I manage, Lord Lancefire. The armor and sword you gave me saved my life a dozen times, and the bodyguard twice that. Although some of them have died, fighting valiantly for the Emperor." the man muttered not too pleased.

I nodded gallantly, because death was too common in the Imperium. "I have another gift for you, esteemed Hero of the Imperium. This is a miniaturized Warp Null Rod, disguised as a combat knife. It also cuts, but that's not the point."

I explained and offered him a Catachan Style jungle knife, with the handle drilled to allow a Null Wand to nest inside.

The man hesitated, before accepting the gift with a sad face. "Protection against the Warp is too valuable to refuse...as much as I would like."

"I am a Blank, so I don't have a need for such a trinket. However, I do require a favor, Commissar. Place a call and ask for an Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor to be dispatched at once, hopefully on a warp-less drive ship." I whispered in fake secrecy.

Really no need, inside my quarters but it made a better impact.

"I suppose it is within my rights as a Lord Commissar, although I never used the rank. But why me, why not yourself, Lord Lancefire?" he asked with visible worry.

I just shrugged and emptied my cup. "The last time I met a Chapter Master who fell to Chaos, it ended in the Badab War, billions of people died and that Chapter was excommunicated and completely exterminated. My Chapter, the Lamenters lost 900 Battle-Brothers fighting the Astral Claws and their allies. We only have 200 Astartes right now."

Cain blinked at me, and drank his wine in a single gulp. "I shall make the call, Lord Lancefire. And let's pray the Emperor listens too, and sends us someone able to fix this, before the Tyranids arrive."

I sighed inward, and poured myself more wine, while mentally placing a vox call to the Governor of Meridian, while Cain walked away at a rapid pace.

"Governor Derosa, do you have time for a meeting?'" I asked while smiling at the holoscreen.

"Lord Lancefire...In one hour, if you're available then. There will be a working dinner, with my closest staff only." the Lady Governor answered a bit flustered.

My face did have that effect on mortals, and I planned to use that. For the benefit of the Imperium and the salvation of the human race, of course.

"I'll invite Inquisitor Kalistradi then. Best if she scans your staff for genestealer infiltrators." I explained with a gentle voice.

The genome scanning gadget from Lord Trazyn was really useful after all, even if it cost as much to make as a dreadnought suit or Baneblade heavy tank. A single tank would not save a planet from a genesealer cult, but the Invictus-patern auspex could.

Sadly, only Forge Masters or Archmagi with great experience cold craft them, and not very quickly. Not when it required using thin slivers of Enslaver bones and other exotic materials, like psyker nerves and neurons and an Emanatus Forcefield to scan for special aether and empathic markers.

Trazyn was working on a new device, able to detect Chaos corruption just like the Necrons could for themselves.

Only, doing that with Mechanicus level of technology was not as easy, nor were Enslaver bones an item found on markets.