294: Chapter 294 The Fourth Item! Say that name, and even the alien gods will tremble before you!

The eternal green fire in Trazyn's eye sockets flickered violently and irregularly for the first time. His clockwork-precise cognitive core was calculating at an unimaginable speed, evaluating the true value of the "Genesis Epic" Zhang Yuan spoke of.

Origin.

The origin of a race. The origin of a universe.

This was of far greater ultimate collector's value than a weapon, a warship, or even a frozen hero.

This silence was broken by a dull, heavy thud.

"Silence!"

Tai Adronetus took a heavy step forward. The corridor of light beneath his feet let out a groan, the light particles composing it vibrating violently, nearly collapsing. The voice beneath his golden helmet was no longer one of majesty, but had transformed into the unquestionable final verdict of the Inquisition when purging a heretic!

"Governor Zhang Yuan! Your words and actions have crossed the boundary of blasphemy!" The aegis shield in his hand was at full power, golden electric arcs darting frantically like angry spirit-snakes. "The foundations of the Empire cannot be shaken! How dare you trade secrets concerning the sacred origins of humanity with an ancient xenos?!"

What he rebuked was not Zhang Yuan's concealment of secrets, but his choice of trading partner. Consorting with xenos was one of the most unforgivable original sins in the Imperial Lexicon.

Zhang Yuan slowly turned around to face this Custodian, who pressed down like a mountain of gold. The layer of cold stillness on his face did not melt in the slightest due to the other's fury.

"The foundations of the Empire?"

Zhang Yuan asked back, his voice not loud, yet like countless steel needles, it precisely pierced every crack in Tai Adronetus's conviction.

"Are you referring to the foundation beneath the Golden Throne, where a thousand Psykers are burned alive every day as fuel, just to light a lighthouse that is barely gasping for breath?"

Titus's hand gripping the Bolter suddenly tightened. The cold touch from the gun's body could not cool his boiling thoughts at this moment. He knew those things—every high-level warrior did—but no one had ever dared to speak them so bluntly.

Zhang Yuan's voice did not pause, continuing to tear away the magnificent cloak named "Loyalty."

"Or are you referring to the foundation where that 'Perfect Son' Fulgrim personally strangled his best friend, where that 'Night Lord' Konrad Curze blew his own home planet to the sky, and where that 'Iron Warrior' Perturabo used the flesh and blood of his own sons to forge Daemon Engines?"

"Or perhaps, it is the Ecclesiarchy of Terra beneath our feet? That foundation based on the 'Lectitio Divinitatus' written by the traitor Primarch Lorgar, which forcibly molded a staunch atheist into a cult-like idol for people to worship?"

Every word was like a heavy hammer, smashing ruthlessly against Tai Adronetus's ten-thousand-year-old pride.

He fell silent.

He knew all of this. He knew the dark, hidden, and rotting truths beneath the Empire's glory better than any human present. But he could not speak, nor even think of them. Because the duty of the Custodes was to guard this great order built upon lies and sacrifice.

After a long time, he squeezed a sentence out from between his teeth.

"All sacrifices... and lies, are for the Empire."

"Ah—" Zhang Yuan elongated his tone, echoing in a nearly chanting, sarcastic manner, "For the Empire."

He took a step forward, his lifeless eyes staring directly into the Custodian's helmet.

"Then, would a secret that could let you re-recognize the Emperor, changing him from a cold, enshrined idol back into a 'man' of flesh and blood, who makes mistakes, feels pain, and has great ideals, also benefit the Empire?"

Zhang Yuan's voice suddenly turned cold.

"Would a secret that could let you 'Shields of the Emperor' understand what exactly you were guarding back then, and why you failed, also benefit the Empire?"

"Furthermore..."

He leaned closer to that golden helmet, saying each word distinctly.

"...you didn't manage to guard him anyway."

Vrrr!

The power pack behind Tai Adronetus let out an overloaded wail. This sentence was like a red-hot, poison-drenched psychic dagger, stabbing into the deepest wound of his soul.

It was the eternal nightmare of every Custodian who had slumbered for ten thousand years.

It was the shame they could never wash away as they stood before the Golden Throne!

No one had ever dared to question his guardianship of the Emperor to his face.

Callista Raine's figure silently glided between the two. The psycannon nullifying spear in her hand was lowered slightly, its invisible annihilation field carrying a hint of... mediation for the first time.

The sound of breathing beneath the Custodian's golden helmet was as heavy as a bellows.

Three seconds.

In just three seconds, that fury, which almost crushed the entire antechamber, was forcibly suppressed by him.

"I will be watching you."

Tai Adronetus squeezed these words out from between his teeth, each word sounding as if it were carved from ten-thousand-year-old ice. He took a step back, returning to his original position, and the electric arcs on the aegis shield slowly receded.

He had conceded.

Zhang Yuan stopped looking at him and turned his gaze back to the xenos lord who had been watching the show from start to finish.

"Now then, Trazyn The Infinite."

"Have you decided which of your collections you'll use to trade for this secret, for which even the Emperor's Custodian is willing to compromise?"

Trazyn elegantly extended a metal finger and wagged it gently.

"Mr. Governor, the proposition you've put forward has exceeded the scope of 'value assessment.' The value of a Genesis Epic is infinite. I cannot put a price on it." The green light in its eyes flickered with cunning. "So, for the sake of fairness, why don't you choose the items yourself. Take from my exhibition hall whatever you deem equivalent to the value of your secret."

It kicked the ball back.

Zhang Yuan's face remained expressionless.

"Very well."

Without the slightest hesitation, he spoke directly, his voice as calm as if he were ordering food at a market.

"First, that clone."

Trazyn's head nodded slightly in acknowledgment. This was an expected request.

"Second, that C'tan shard you have imprisoned."

Trazyn's movement paused for a moment, but it still nodded. Trading a troublesome shard for the ultimate mystery of the universe was worth it.

"Third, the remains of that Old One."

This time, Trazyn was silent for a moment. The remains of an Old One had research and historical value nearly equal to its finest treasures. But compared to a living, speaking 'Genesis Epic'...

"Accepted," it finally agreed.

The breathing of the Custodian, the Space Marine, and the Sister of Silence almost stopped.

A Primarch clone, a C'tan, and an Old One.

If any of these three things were to get out, it would be enough to trigger an apocalypse-level war sweeping across several sectors of the Milky Way. And now, Zhang Yuan had pocketed them all so casually.

However, Zhang Yuan was not finished.

He looked at Trazyn and slowly stated his fourth request.

A name.

"The final item..."

"I want Lady Talasha Eudon."

The moment the words fell.

In the entire Solumnas Exhibition Hall, those countless frozen moments and the historical dust flowing in the void seemed to come to a complete standstill at this instant.

Trazyn, who had maintained its elegance and composure, suddenly stiffened in its body of living metal.

The green fire that had burned for millions of years in its eye sockets contracted violently, nearly going out.

A data stream called 'shock' overwhelmed its normally calm logic core for the first time.

Its metallic voice, for the first time, carried an unmaskable bewilderment and... a hint of terror that even it hadn't noticed.

"You..."

"...how could you know that name?!"

Titus and Tai Adronetus glanced at each other. The former thought the name was quite ordinary, not sounding like any known Imperial hero, nor like any notorious xenos or daemon, while the latter was shocked by the name.

But Trazyn's reaction was ten thousand times more violent than when it heard Zhang Yuan's request for the C'tan shard!

It was as if Zhang Yuan hadn't just made a request.

But had accurately pointed out, among its countless glorious collections, the only one...

...the taboo that should never be mentioned.