"Inquisitor Alex, may I know the purpose of your visit?" Cawl's deep, mechanical voice echoed through the Forge Ark's reception hall.
The Archmagos of the Adeptus Mechanicus was leaning on his forge axe, observing Alex. Due to the extensive mechanical modifications to his body, he was too massive to sit down.
Several servitor skulls hovered around him, with countless pieces of information and data being exchanged between them and Cawl.
Evidently, the Archmagos was still busy even while receiving a guest.
"For this expedition, Archmagos," Alex went straight to the point, knowing that Tech-Priests disliked meaningless waste of time. "How much do you know about the Necrons, this Xenos civilization?"
He looked up at Cawl's seemingly original eye, his gaze sharp and imposing.
"They were once a technologically advanced and glorious race, but as of now, they seem to be left with only ruins and sleeping tombs." Cawl's reply was standard, his voice, transmitted through a loudspeaker, betraying no emotion.
This answer generally aligned with the Imperium's mainstream view of the Necrons, and it also did not exceed necessary limits.
After all, Alex was an Inquisitor. Although Cawl, as a high-ranking member of the Adeptus Mechanicus, did not fear the Inquisition's authority, it was always better to avoid unnecessary complications.
Cawl now diverted one of his many thought processes to specifically address Alex's questions, carefully considering his intentions.
However, Alex was clearly not there to exchange common knowledge with Cawl; he directly asked, "Then, Archmagos, do you know about the star gods?"
Cawl's red robe trembled slightly, and a flicker of confusion passed through his bionic eye.
He was silent for a moment, seemingly searching his vast database, and finally shook his head: "Star gods? Some kind of heretical belief? In my database, records of this term are almost non-existent."
"They could be said to be the former faith of the Necrons, but they are not merely a faith." Alex revealed the existence and nature of the star gods to Cawl: "According to my investigation and verification, star gods are super-lifeforms that once truly existed. They once fed on stars and possessed incredibly powerful, even god-like, abilities."
Cawl's bionic eye flickered slightly, his gaze fixed on Alex, indicating that he was listening intently.
Alex continued, "They could warp space-time, reshape matter, turn a planet into dust in an instant, and even create life from nothingness."
"Arbitrarily twisting physical laws, elevating a race's technology to an incomprehensible degree," Alex's voice grew solemn. "These seemingly unbelievable things were all the mighty powers once possessed by the star gods."
At this point, Alex solemnly said to Cawl, "And the Necrontyr, the predecessors of the Necrons, were able to develop from a weak, near-extinct race into a vast empire spanning the entire galaxy precisely because they acquired the power of the star gods."
However, at this juncture, Alex changed his tone and revealed a result that even Cawl had not anticipated: "But it was also due to their faith in the star gods that ultimately led to the demise of the entire Necrontyr civilization. The current Necrons are merely the result of the Necrontyr's attempts at achieving immortality."
A brief silence fell over the laboratory, broken only by the hum of machinery in the air.
Cawl's bionic eye glowed with a cold blue light, and the servitors and cooling systems on his body emitted a faint hum, indicating the high-speed operation that only occurred when he was deeply engaged. Clearly, what Alex said had garnered the Archmagos's intense attention and profound interest.
Cawl had already realized that a secret, long sealed in the river of history, was now slowly unveiling its mysterious veil.
His logic processors whirred, attempting to cross-reference the information provided by Alex with the Adeptus Mechanicus's ancient databases, but records concerning "star gods" were almost entirely blank.
"If these star gods truly exist…" Cawl's voice was low and hoarse, with the electronic texture characteristic of machinery: "Then where are they now?"
His tone revealed a rare thirst for knowledge, and although he maintained the composure befitting a Archmagos, Alex could detect a subtle shift in his attitude.
Alex's words had indeed piqued his interest. Although Cawl could not yet understand why Alex would bring up such an ancient and hidden existence at this moment, as a Archmagos of the Adeptus Mechanicus who pursued knowledge, he instinctively craved more information.
Even if it might involve heretical doctrines, or some forbidden knowledge deliberately erased by the Imperium.
"They were torn apart by the Necrons, in a physical sense." Alex did not hold back, directly addressing the main reason for his visit to Cawl today: "Approximately sixty million years ago, the Necrons, led by the star gods, launched a grand war against beings called the Old Ones, a war that tore apart the entire galaxy.
Towards the end of the war, the star gods defeated the Old Ones at great cost, which also left them weakened.
It was at this time that the Necrons silently turned on the star gods who controlled them. Some star gods were killed, and some fled this galaxy, but most of the star gods were fragmented into countless pieces by the Necrons and imprisoned using a device called a hyperdimensional cube.
During their imprisonment, the star god shards would continuously damage their prisons, but these prisons, specifically designed by the Necrons to contain star god shards, could continuously extract the infinite energy contained within the star god shards to power their tomb worlds.
Of course, this energy would also be used to repair the hyperdimensional cubes themselves, which were constantly being damaged by the star god shards, thus ensuring that the star gods would never be released."
At this point, Alex paused briefly, then said to Cawl, "However, when the Necrons are at a disadvantage on the battlefield, or when defeat is irreversible, they will also release these prisoners onto the battlefield, relying on the incredibly powerful strength of the star god shards to destroy the Necrons' enemies."
"So, does the Necron Dynasty we are facing possess a star god shard?" Cawl asked the question Alex most wanted to hear.
"I'm not certain, but the possibility of them possessing a star god shard is not zero," Alex replied, while also making a request: "Therefore, I hope that you, Archmagos, can prepare a sufficiently sturdy containment device. In case we encounter this thing on the battlefield, we won't be caught unprepared."
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