Chapter 323: Two Nurgle Garden Country Bumpkins

If all perfect things have their shadow, and all order contains chaos, then Illyrium is the shadow and chaos of Macragge.

This city, built of rough stone and belonging to the barbarian tribes of Macragge, is the most detached from Macragge's political system.

Once, Roboute Guilliman peacefully subdued the barbarian chieftains who worshipped primal faiths in this land.

But the barbarians were inherently a loose confederation of tribes, their internal beliefs wildly varied; the chieftain Guilliman subdued was merely the commander of a tribal alliance.

Beneath the surface, those tribes never truly submitted to Macragge's rule—even after ten thousand years, their descendants still secretly venerate those ancient gods.

Among them are countless Chaos worshippers, devoted to the four Chaos Gods.

Zhou Yun once asked Roboute Guilliman why he did not destroy Illyrium.

He had expected Guilliman to reply something like, "They are still my subjects; not all of them are Chaos worshippers."

But Guilliman answered: "When you find a toilet clogged, the best solution is never to blow it up and spray excrement everywhere."

"As long as Illyrium exists, it will continuously draw all of Macragge's Chaos worshippers there. They will turn on each other, exhaust themselves, maintain balance—and we only need to conduct periodic purges."

"As an ancient text from the Dragon Kingdoms once said: 'Scattered, they are stars across the sky; gathered, they are a pile of shit.'"

Zhou Yun thus sincerely admired Guilliman's political wisdom.

Encircle three sides, leave one open, offer a path of escape.

The followers of the four Chaos Gods are like this: individually, each is deadly dangerous; but together, their threat diminishes.

Because they always choose to bite first at the followers of other Chaos Gods.

"Puhhh!!"

A figure clad in dark green robes sprinted swiftly before the pipes of Illyrium, spitting out a mouthful of blood, his entire body covered in wounds.

Beneath the robe, a cage clattered noisily, crows cawing inside.

"The sixth time. This is the sixth time," Festus growled through gritted teeth.

Six days ago, their church received a divine oracle from the Great Father.

The Father's emissary was to descend, requiring two carrion crows as vessels for the divine messenger.

Thus, the faithful attempted six times; the first five attempts all ended in mishaps.

The Space Marines' purge squad stormed the ritual site; the newly captured crows died of heatstroke from the sun; a venomous snake bit and killed the crows; the priest conducting the ritual had his throat severed by hunting dogs mid-path; the crows in the cage inexplicably transformed into two blue hawks.

They had endured six inexplicable failures.

This time, the sixth, Festus and his companions bore the sacred duty to escort the crows to the ritual site.

They still encountered overwhelming obstacles.

First, the Ultramarines auxiliaries began searching; then, two beautiful women lured them on the road; next, a group of burly men went mad and demanded mortal combat; finally, a seer tried to steal the crows from his arms.

Countless other Chaos worshippers tried to stop them; after enduring hardship and the sacrifice of companions, he finally brought the crows to the ritual site's entrance.

Festus crashed into the ritual chamber, raising the cage high above his head, two jet-black crows cawing within.

"The vessels of the divine emissary have arrived!"

Festus shouted loudly:

"The sixth time—we have finally succeeded!"

The other worshippers in the chamber cast him eager, excited glances.

Festus grinned, blood gushing uncontrollably from his abdomen, his life force draining rapidly.

But it did not matter—he had felt it, felt the Great Father's garden calling.

The priest closest to Festus smiled a beautiful smile, gently caressing Festus's dying cheek, taking the cage from his hands.

"My Lord thanks your devotion; may your soul join mine in His garden."

". h, not the Garden of the Plague God—but the Garden of the Hungering Lady."

The priest's eyes glowed purple; he snatched the two crows from the cage and shoved them into his trousers.

Before the Great Father's followers could stop him, he violently fucked the two crows alive.

"Let us begin the seventh attempt."

After clearing away Festus's corpse and the priest's body, now corrupted by the Hungering Lady, the leader of Illyrium's Great Father Church gritted his teeth.

Two crows, their feathers crawling with writhing maggots and rotting flesh, took flight from Illyrium's rough stone towers, heading toward the Hera Fortress.

After seven days and seven attempts, the Great Father's followers of Illyrium finally completed the ritual, transforming the two crows.

These two crows became vessels for two souls from the Garden of Nurgle, allowing them to move within the material universe.

Monger flapped his wings awkwardly, struggling to endure the constriction of this physical form.

He had not returned to the material universe in a very, very long time.

His former body—dissolved into the biomass pool beneath Asford's lower nest.

Then, with the aid of Nurgle's spirits, his soul returned to the Great Father's garden.

He returned now to fulfill a mission given by the Great Father.

"Laine Russ—or rather, Zhou Yun. That man."

Monger, flying through the air, slightly shook his crow's head:

"Do you hate him, brother?"

Monger asked his brother, Marquett, who flew beside him.

"I am grateful to him."

Marquett opened his crow's beak and answered calmly:

"Only after returning to the Great Father's garden did I understand: the Great Father's love is not something all can bear."

"If we had succeeded and dragged all of Asford into His domain, most would have become zombies, fungal growths, and parasite nests."

"The Great Father loves humanity as He loves every living thing—this love is equal and profound; the people of Asford could not endure it."

"Zhou Yun did not save everyone, but he saved far more than should have lived."

"That sounds like a challenge to the Great Father's faith, brother," Monger said, fluttering his wings.

Marquett merely shook his head slightly: "The Great Father does not care. The Great Father loves us equally."

"As long as one accepts and endures this love, even our vile souls may return to His garden."

"Let us fulfill the Great Father's task and repay this great love."

Listening to Marquett's words, Monger cawed twice.

"Don't worry, brother," Monger said. "Our task is only to deliver a message to Zhou Yun—too simple."

"Besides, we're just two little crows now—who could possibly notice us?"

Hearing Monger's words, Marquett gave a faint nod of approval.

Yes, they were just two little crows—who could possibly notice them?

But Marquett did not notice that behind them, just one meter away, a pair of eyes glowing with psychic light watched them both.

Diggles in the Ptolemaic Library slightly withdrew his gaze; he sensed two corrupted entities approaching the Hera Fortress.

What amused Diggles most was that these two tiny Nurgle worshippers actually believed they wouldn't be found?

The moment they conceived the idea of heading toward the Hera Fortress, Diggles had foreseen their existence.

Do they not know Macragge has Diggles? Two country bumpkins from the Garden of Nurgle—no idea which remote demon world they crawled out of.

What? The Acheron System? Asford?

Diggles had originally planned to blast them out of the sky with a single psychic lightning bolt.

But hearing them mention Asford, Laine Russ, and Zhou Yun, he realized these crows were targeting Lord Zhou Yun.

That made Diggles pay closer attention.

He swiftly infused his thoughts into psychic energy and projected them into the mind of Mephiston, stationed at the Doraemon Corps base, instructing Mephiston to inform Zhou Yun and let him decide.

"Lord Diggles! You're slacking again! We're going to report you to Lord Guilliman!"

Two clowns, standing upside-down on a table while fabricating false history, chattered at Diggles.

These two were pulled from the Black Library and sent to Diggles by Lord Zhou Yun.

It must be said that the Eldar, especially the Eldar Clowns, are truly skilled at fabricating history; since their arrival, Diggis's workload has dropped significantly,

allowing him to spare time to use his psychic abilities to observe the entire Macragge as a form of relaxation,

but these two Eldar Clowns have personalities even worse than that of Cataphractii's Cato Sicarius,

Sicarius is merely proud, but these two clowns are insufferable, constantly producing bizarre and profoundly blasphemous writings,

"What slacking? Is monitoring the entire security of Macragge slacking? Have you finished your work?"

Diggles snapped back, then glanced at the nearly completed false historical file before the clowns.

"Already almost done? Let me see."

The clowns grinned and handed the newly written historical file to Diggles.

Diggles looked down and found the file was meant to fill the historical record of the Illyrium Rebellion during the Second Empire.

The first entry introduced how Roboute Guilliman, before his return to the Imperium, reclaimed Illyrium.

"The Young Roboute Guilliman Tamed the Illyrium Chieftains with His Tight Ass."

Diggles involuntarily read the title aloud, then his face turned black.

He hurled the book at the clowns' faces.

"If you write another blasphemous thing like this, I'll blast each of you into the sky with psychic energy."

"Then have Lord Zhou Yun throw you back into the Black Library!"

(End of Chapter)