Chapter 626

With a bang, Zarathus's metal head was cleaved off by two blades resembling raven wings, falling to the ground with a clatter and rolling all the way to Sol's feet on the smooth floor.

An Astartes clad in pitch-black power armor, wearing a helmet resembling a raven, appeared silently within Zarathus's headless body.

Zarathus's heavy metal body slammed heavily onto the ground.

Shrike of the Raven Guard—long before entering the World Engine, this legendary Raven Guard had hidden himself among the crowd using the Blind Spot Star, waiting only for the critical moment to strike, severing Zarathus's life in one blow, giving Zarathus no chance to act at all.

But this was not the end. Zarathus was a Necron; he possessed a Resurrection Protocol within the World Engine and would soon be able to reshape his body through it.

"Have you found Zarathus's Resurrection Protocol?" Szarekh asked, looking at Trazyn.

Trazyn's eyes, flickering with green light, were blinking constantly, seemingly calculating and searching for something.

His will was surging continuously within the core of the World Engine, searching through the data torrent for Zarathus's Resurrection Protocol.

But slowly, Trazyn's expression became increasingly wrong.

The moment after Zarathus died, Trazyn's will had forcibly connected to the World Engine, replacing Zarathus. This was one of Trazyn's specialties; his will was pervasive. Not to mention the World Engine, even the bodies of other Necrons were often inexplicably taken over by Trazyn.

It was precisely because of this skill that Trazyn could come and go freely in the tomb worlds of various dynasties, protecting those ownerless, pitiful artifacts.

But this time, no matter how Trazyn's will probed within the World Engine, he could not find Zarathus's Resurrection Protocol. Even now, Zarathus's will had not reappeared in the World Engine to compete with Trazyn for control, as if Zarathus were truly dead...

"Could it be that his Resurrection Protocol is outside? Did he abandon the World Engine and run away?"

Trazyn's face gradually darkened; he realized an unpleasant possibility.

"Found it."

Trazyn found a fragment of Zarathus's Resurrection Protocol in the discarded data holes.

Zarathus's Resurrection Protocol had been destroyed long ago, even before the battle within the Pariah Nexus began.

Zarathus's will within it had almost completely vanished, leaving only a broken obsession still lingering.

"... I... Ascend."

"... Deceiver..."

Deceiver.

Crack—

A crisp cracking sound suddenly rang out. Zarathus's head at Sol's feet suddenly twisted on its own, lifted up, and looked at everyone present.

An expression of sudden realization appeared on Zarathus's face, and then a playful smile hung on the corners of his mouth.

"Yi!"

"I never thought I was the C'tan Deceiver!!"

A sharp, wild laugh rang out. Blinding golden light burst from Zarathus's head. Under the illumination of this light, the mountains of corpses and seas of blood in the surroundings changed in an instant.

Those corpses that had been tortured to death by Zarathus stood up one after another, twisted, joyful smiles on their lips, piling up together, using their broken limbs to begin malfunctioning, as if welcoming a great actor to the stage to perform.

"Damn it!" Trazyn growled, discovering that he had fallen into a blind spot in his thinking.

Saint Doraemon had warned them that there might be a Deceiver present. The two Saints beside the Silent King, the Silent King himself, Imotekh, Zarathus, and even many Phaerekhs could be the Deceiver. The Deceiver might randomly choose one of them to possess or replace, but most of these had been ruled out one by one. Finally, the news sent back by Orikan confirmed that the Deceiver was Hapsarast the Radiant.

But after stepping into the World Engine, Trazyn's thinking seemed to have been blocked, automatically ignoring one possibility: that there might be more than one fragment of the Deceiver active in the Pariah Nexus...

Light as hot as a star burst forth, and a golden, athletic figure slowly emerged in the pocket dimension. That body, which looked like a gilded marble statue, gently spread its arms and bowed slightly to everyone present, as if welcoming them.

"Thank you all for visiting. If you hadn't come, poor old Deceiver wouldn't have known how much longer he'd have to work overtime!"

"To reward you for seeing through the old Deceiver's tricks, I'll give you nine seconds to run."

"One."