The wildfire of revolution swept across the city like an unstoppable tide, its blazing light illuminating every dark corner.
The once-golden palaces twisted and crumbled in the flames, while the towering walls that symbolized oppression were drowned beneath the waves of fury.
When the first light of dawn pierced the smoke and shone upon the bloodstained banners of the rebels, the whole city was burning, yet these were not the flames of destruction, but of rebirth.
Every flickering spark whispered the same truth: the shackles of the old age had been broken, and from the ashes, a new order would rise.
When Angron's uprising surged through the palace gates like a storming tide, its master was long gone. Only the servants who had been enslaved just as cruelly remained, along with women and children huddled in corners.
"Please… spare my child!"
A noblewoman in tattered finery shielded her son with trembling arms, the hem of her silk gown brushing the gilded tiles. Her frail body pressed against a carved pillar, as if her flesh alone could stand between death and her child.
"I won't harm you," the soldier said, slowly lowering his bloodstained blade. But his scarred and brutalized face made the woman and her boy shrink back nonetheless. A dry chuckle rumbled from his throat.
"You fear me because of this face? This is your husband's masterpiece, but don't worry. I won't hold you responsible. We're not like him. We're still human."
"The blade shall strike only at chains, never at the innocent."
That line was branded into every rebel's heart. Angron repeated it to them over and over between battles, an iron law that anchored their humanity.
When the rebels' blades fell upon the High Knights and severed the last chains, hatred was burned away.
To let the slaughter continue would be to become the very monsters they had sworn to destroy. True freedom needed no blood sacrifice.
"Go," the warrior said, stepping aside, his sword tip dipping into the blood-soaked carpet. He turned his head so that the shadow might hide his twisted scars.
"Go… where?" the noblewoman asked, clutching her child tight, her voice trembling with despair.
"To the square. All noble families are gathered there."
Seeing her hesitate, he sighed, weariness softening the fury in his scarred face.
"We swore to our leader never to kill the innocent. You'll be treated the same as everyone else in this city. The palace and your property will be confiscated, but you'll receive new housing. You'll live by your own labor."
"Confiscated?!"
The noblewoman's shriek echoed beneath the gilded dome, a screech that clawed at the air.
"Every stone here bears the oath of House Tarc's ancestors! Every tapestry holds generations of devotion, and you think a single word can make it public property?!"
"And that's exactly why nobles sicken me," the soldier growled, anger flickering in his voice.
"There will be no more knights. No more House Tarc. We don't spare you for your bloodline, we spare you because, unlike your husband, we still have humanity left."
He tapped his fingers against his sword hilt.
"I don't wish to fight, but if you refuse…"
The noblewoman flinched, swallowing her next protest. She pulled her child close, took two unsteady steps back, and turned away, her gown dragging through the dust like a drenched peacock's feathers.
"He actually managed not to kill her," Caelan said quietly, watching the soldier's back.
"What would my brothers have done?" Angron asked.
"All Primarchs would have taken up arms for the weak against injustice," Caelan replied solemnly.
"But if it were Curze, he would've executed them without hesitation, unless he saw a sliver of redemption in their fate."
Angron knew his brother's curse, his prophetic sight.
When Curze gazed upon someone, their future unfurled before him like a painted scroll. Every strand of fate was visible to him.
He would judge the knight's families as guilty as the High Knights themselves, deciding their punishment or mercy by what he foresaw.
But Angron was not Curze. Even if he had the same gift, he would never follow that path.
He would not deny Curze's choices either. Every road remained uncertain until it reached its end.
"Father," Angron murmured, looking out over the smoke-shrouded city-state, "how am I supposed to rule these souls who have just broken their chains?"
"What is it you fear?"
Caelan asked, reading the deep confusion in his son's eyes.
"I don't know how to rule free people."
From the day he was reborn on Nuceria, Angron had prepared for this rebellion.
His resolve had been absolute; nothing could shake it.
But when the dawn of freedom finally arrived, he hesitated before the threshold, struck by doubt for the first time.
Primarchs were born knowing, and Caelan had taught him much besides.
Angron understood the strengths and weaknesses of every political system in human history. He could choose any and rule Nuceria well.
But what truly paralyzed him was the unknowable future.
"In ancient Terra's 14th century," Caelan said suddenly, "there was a donkey, Buridan's Ass."
Angron bowed his head, listening with reverence.
"This starving donkey stood between two identical piles of hay, unable to decide which to eat first… and starved to death."
"I'm that donkey?"
Angron asked, startled.
"Some donkeys are stubborn, like your father," Caelan said with a faint grin. "And some are Buridan's donkeys, like you."
Human nature.
Such a simple word, yet as deep as the abyss.
Every human choice, every act, could be traced back to that root.
When choices are clear-cut, most can tell right from wrong. But when both seem equally valid, the hesitant fear choosing at all.
Choose A, and the shadow of B follows. Choose B, and the echo of A lingers.
So they choose neither, or rather, they choose "or."
This paralysis of indecision traps people in the mire of choices until they sink.
It is not stupidity. It is humanity.
Angron's dilemma came from his overflowing humanity, and as all fathers do, Caelan knew his son's heart perfectly.
"Human governance," he said, "comes in two broad forms: democracy, built upon the collective will, and authoritarianism, defined by centralized power."
Angron's compassion made him instinctively favor democracy.
But democracy's essence, the rule of the majority, could easily turn into the tyranny of the many, for the majority was not always right.
Most of his brothers, by contrast, chose authoritarian rule.
Curze's rule was brutally efficient; his justice was the only order. The people bore no burden of choice; they were perfect cogs in his machine, serving a flawless vision.
Angron's heart yearned for democracy, but his reason told him authoritarianism worked.
Democracy suffered from indecision and mob rule. Authoritarianism rotted from within, devoured by corruption and stagnation.
Both systems, driven to their extremes, devoured themselves.
There were solutions, fragile ones.
To save democracy, one must ensure the majority's justice.
To save authoritarianism, one must trust entirely in the ruler's virtue.
And in the grim darkness of the far future, authoritarianism often proved more stable, because humanity had the Primarchs.
Each was a near-perfect ruler, engineered by the Emperor Himself, immune to corruption, unmatched in intellect and will.
The Emperor, the greatest autocrat in human history, had etched authoritarian instinct into their very genes.
Thus, most Primarchs acted without hesitation; it was in their blood.
"What should I do?"
Angron asked at last, looking at his father like a lost child.
"I've already taught you that," Caelan said, pointing to his heart.
"Follow what's here."
Angron's bitter smile deepened. It was because he followed his heart that he hesitated.
"Do you really think democracy and authority are irreconcilable?"
Caelan asked.
Angron listened in silence.
"You hesitate because you're a Primarch," Caelan said softly.
"You'd choose authoritarianism not from lust for power, but because you alone can resist its corruption."
"But let's look from another's eyes, from an ordinary human's. What would we choose?"
"Human nature is greedy and contradictory. We crave democracy's freedom and vitality, yet admire authoritarianism's decisiveness and efficiency."
"We fear the tyranny of the majority, yet dread the unchecked corruption of absolute power."
"So we compromise, we build hybrids, systems that correct themselves. We preserve the checks and citizen voice of democracy while adopting the efficiency of authority."
"The key," Caelan concluded, "is an institutional mechanism for correction, law to restrain power, and culture to cultivate reason. When done right, each system balances the other's flaws."
"Compromise…"
Angron murmured, tasting the word like fine wine.
"My advice," Caelan said, leaning forward slightly, "is not to rush. Don't chain yourself to any single idea. You are a Primarch; you have the luxury to experiment. Across this galaxy lie countless worlds. Try, learn, fail, and build. Through that, you'll find the path humanity deserves."
"I understand."
Angron nodded slowly, his brow unknitting.
Compromise.
A simple word, yet it carried the deepest wisdom of mortals.
It wasn't cowardly surrender or empty diplomacy, but the art of finding balance amidst chaos.
Most Primarchs had no use for compromise; their power let them enforce their will absolutely.
But for Angron, compromise was perfection, the harmony between heart and reason.
When the flames of revolution consumed Desia, all the noble palaces were confiscated, except one: the Octavia estate.
To keep rebels from storming it, Oenomaus himself stood guard before its gates, not to protect its wealth, but to keep his soldiers from dying in vain.
"Octavia…"
he muttered, staring at the bronze serpents coiling atop the spires, unease flickering in his eyes.
A few days ago, witnesses saw high knights in ornate armor lead thousands of elite guards into the palace, and none ever came out.
No gunfire, no clash of steel, not even a scream. The palace stood silent as a tomb.
Oenomaus had been born a slave in Desh'ea's slums, branded for his "beast genes."
"Oenomaus," said Clest, landing before him on her spear.
"I searched the arena's slave records. Do you want to know the results?"
"Tell me."
"As you suspected, no slave has belonged to House Octavia for decades. The only ones listed now are those who survived duels with Angron recently."
He wasn't surprised, but his unease deepened.
Every noble house owned gladiators, bought, bred, or won.
He had been owned by House Tarc; Lain by House Crassus; even Clest had a master. But none belonged to Octavia.
"Maybe they're just good people?"
Clest offered weakly.
"Good people?"
Oenomaus sighed at her naivete.
He had met Claudia of House Octavia once, and the impression burned into him.
Even behind her golden mask, her arrogance radiated like a divine flame. She didn't look down on mortals; she simply didn't care.
Not out of cruelty, but indifference, the same way a dragon ignores the ants beneath its feet.
House Octavia didn't own slaves not from mercy, but from pride.
If one were to accuse them of enslavement, their only victims might be their maids.
"No one's come to claim them?"
"No," Mira answered softly.
The rebels had announced that any family could reclaim their daughters who had served the High Knights, sparing them from judgment, yet no one came for the Octavia maids.
There were hundreds of them, which meant hundreds of missing daughters.
Either their families had been silenced… or they had never existed.
Oenomaus suspected the latter.
These maids were too perfect to be slaves, too humble to be nobles, too graceful to be commoners.
Their beauty eclipsed even noblewomen. Their every gesture was elegant, deliberate, mechanical, and even.
They moved without sound, breathed with precision, every eyelash curved like a sculpted masterpiece. Each one resembled Claudia, flawless, cold, and inhuman.
They weren't servants. They were crafted, living art.
No city, no world like Nuceria could have birthed them.
So where did they come from?
Oenomaus shivered just standing at the gates. He didn't even notice when Caelan and Angron arrived.
"Have any of them left?"
Caelan asked.
"No," Oenomaus replied firmly.
"None of them have left this palace."
.....
If you enjoy the story, my p@treon is 30 chapters ahead.
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