59: In Chapter 59, Tzeentch returned the stolen key, adding a note of "thank you."

Less than a standard hour after Sebastian's Terminators assault squad withdrew from the tomb, the main screen on the bridge of the Wrath of the Emperor was forcibly taken over by a completely unencrypted string of quantum-state text.

It was not the Hive Mind, not the Brood Queen, nor Nephilak—the signature was Tzeentch.

The text was pink and purple, every letter writhing slightly on the screen as if mocking everyone who stared at it: "Returning the key to you. Don't thank me. I have already finished copying the seal frequency on it. You have obtained the inheritance rights, and I have obtained the resonance key—the Void Throat will open sooner or later; when that happens, we shall see who stands on the other side of the door."

Marcus Aurelian stood before the command console, the sling for his right arm still not yet removed.

He stared at the line of writhing pink and purple text on the screen, then ordered a full-spectrum scan of the tomb's direction across the entire fleet channel.

The scan results were synchronized and forwarded by Canoptek-7—floating in the orbit around the tomb was a palm-sized shard of Necron Dynasty living metal, which was indeed the first Void Throat key that Tzeentch had dug out of the altar groove.

The shard was intact, the quantum-state seal layer was not unlocked, and there were no visible signs of Chaos corruption on its surface.

Tzeentch had returned the key, just as It had said—It only needed to copy the seal frequency on it; It did not need to keep the original.

Bern stood half a step behind Marcus, holding a psychic talisman in his hand, using holy power to remotely probe the key shard.

There was no Chaos contamination on the surface of the shard, the seal layer had not been cracked, and its structure was consistent with how it was before being stolen.

He immediately suggested continuous, uninterrupted holy power monitoring of the key.

Marcus nodded and ordered the key shard to be placed into a relic-grade isolation chamber, to be guarded full-time by Bern's Grey Knights squad.

The Brood Queen's quantum-state translator lit up on the bridge.

The Hive Mind sent a short message, the words so calm they carried almost no emotional fluctuation: "Tzeentch does not know one thing. The sealing device of the Void Throat was not designed by the Necron Dynasty—it was built by the Old Ones.

The Necron Dynasty dismantled the original seal of the Old Ones and added three keys as a double insurance. The seal frequency on that key has no effect on the main body of the Old Ones' seal. It thinks it has obtained the password to open the door, but in reality, it has only cracked the thinnest layer of paint on the door latch."

Marcus forwarded this message to all members of the War Council, with a single attached note: "Tzeentch has copied a key that cannot open the door. Let It think It has won. Let us not wake It."

His right arm throbbed under the sling, his voice hoarse but steady, then he turned to Captain Oldenburg and ordered the Third Assault Fleet to execute the plan as scheduled.

Oldenburg saluted, turned, and walked into the command cabin.

Beneath the Metallis Forge Temple, the Titan-Eater was slowly rising from the launch pad.

Its limb-piercing bone blades had all been fitted with adamantium-chitin composite plating during the multi-day refit, and the seven sets of Void-class Blackstone Resonance Chambers in its chest and abdomen had been completely recalibrated after the Tzeentch infiltration incident, connecting the living random key generated by the Brood Queen larvae's neural impulses to the main control link.

The Hive Mind reviewed all combat readiness data of the Titan-Eater within the Hive Mind and then transmitted the activation order to the Brood Queen.

Since returning from the tomb, the Brood Queen had been squatting on the creep platform of the Forge Temple, that cold green light crown still slowly adjusting her Hive Mind node bandwidth.

The Blackstone Cerebrate's inheritance authentication had transferred all residual blackstone engine management permissions of the Solemmnace Dynasty tomb to the Brood Queen's key database, and the remote interfaces for the Void Throat's seal frequencies were packaged and uploaded one by one.

Canoptek-7, according to Nephilak's authorization, decrypted the entire tomb star map, marking the last known location of the second key.

Chaos had already dispatched a Chaos fleet led personally by a Tzeentch chosen sorcerer to that location.

The Hive Mind docked all information streams within the Hive Mind and then issued an order.

When the Brood Queen received the order, a circle of extremely fine cold green corona lit up along the ridges of her carapace, and the translated text was projected onto all holographic terminals of the War Council—"Order.

First, the Titan-Eater and the leviathan mothership battle group shall complete all sortie preparations and immediately proceed to the coordinates of the second key to seize the sealing component before Tzeentch.

Second, Marcus, your fleet shall be responsible for the blockade of the outer perimeter of the star system where the second key is located, preventing Chaos reinforcements from breaking through.

Third, Captain Oldenburg shall serve as the fleet operation Commander."

Oldenburg stood at attention and acknowledged.

The leviathan mothership's living railgun arrays began charging at full power, and the Brood Lord formation waiting in low orbit simultaneously deployed into a wedge-shaped assault formation.