Warhammer: Start with a dog

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"If we are to become like some of our cousins, losing our iron rationality and becoming lost in savagery, then I would rather die at the hands of the harsh and inhumane Iron Lord." - An unnamed Iron Warrior said after hearing that the Primarch might have a mental illness

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Crazy... No, sick, absolutely sick.

The Primarch was definitely seriously ill from the evil talents of those aliens.

The sudden and strange retreat, the ominously calm waiting, and the rage that was like a boiling underwater volcano that ordered the entire fleet to return home as quickly as possible - although this unfortunate news was not spread deliberately, it is well known that as long as the gossip is not disseminated without being beheaded, the speed and scope of the spread of the gossip will be wider and faster than the official news.

Most of these legionnaires and auxiliary officers, who had been recruited from Olympia over the past 150 years, were already aware of the unfortunate events that had occurred in their homeland.

And they all knew very well that such things would never be tolerated by even an ordinary imperial general in the empire.

What's more, Perturabo...

But the fact that shocked them the most was that during the entire process of returning, the Lord of Steel did not kill anyone nor did he lose his temper with anyone.

He simply returned to his usual secluded studio, where he spent most of the warp travel time alone - he also summoned a large amount of Reka coffee with beast milk, and after eating the ship's cook's cooking once, he refused to send any more meals, only asking them to send in large amounts of flour, eggs, bacon and other condiments.

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In this bizarre and tense atmosphere caused by the news of Olympia's betrayal, all the ships of the 125th Expeditionary Fleet jumped out one after another from the Mandeville Point in the Olympia system.

When the Iron Blood arrived in deep space above Olympia, it was not attacked by any planetary defense system, and no fleet in the galaxy made any offensive moves towards their visit. The other ships in the fleet had begun to line up at the anchor points in the high altitude and anchor in turn according to the instructions.

If an Olympian at the right latitude had looked up at the sky at that moment, he would have seen a string of stars reflected off the sides of the warships, streaking across the sky like a necklace of crystal beads.

When Dantioch arrived at the command deck, the Lord of Steel was standing on the protruding balcony, looking down at the busy people below.

Under the command of Fricks in the bridge, numerous Space Marines and technical officers are methodically performing a harmonious symphony composed of orders, receipts, reports, data streams, system notifications, ticking of indicator lights, humming of pistons and vibrations of gears and engines. The Chief Trident stands beside the captain's command throne, waving his invisible baton with concentration and ease, allowing hundreds of orders to flow perfectly through his hands and be sorted out.

"You're here?" The Primarch tilted his head slightly, and the light from outside cast a two-part silhouette on his face like a statue. "You see, Fricks is actually quite talented in these areas. I think it even exceeds his combat talent, isn't it?"

Dantioch nodded cautiously - just before the end of the jump, Fricks, Soraka and other most powerful senior officers of the Iron Warriors held a secret meeting at the risk of being executed if discovered, and he was invited for the first time - the main content was the Chief Pharmacist's report on the Primarch's condition with a sad face, and the Chief Trident and the Chief Pharmacist asked them to be more careful and considerate than ever before, and obey the Primarch's whims, perhaps this would allow him to slowly recover in a period of time, or at least agree to more treatment, that was roughly the content.

——Although from a selfish point of view, Dantioch really felt that it might be better not to treat him, but although this sentence was on the eyes and tongues of all the participants throughout the meeting, no one could go against their own heart or be bold enough to say it out loud.

To the Iron Warriors, the will of their Primarch was indefensible, even if his demands should be shown to be wrong, even if he would demand that they destroy with their own hands not the planet they were asked to attack, but the home world of them all.

Standing in the center of the bridge, Fricks realized this painfully and more clearly than ever as he deployed nuclear weapons and other heavy siege vehicles, destructive weapons, and fully armed warriors from each battalion to the ships designated to land on Olympia in accordance with the orders of the Lord of Steel.

And even now, as Dantioch looked at the large surround display screen on the bridge, showing his home world, Olympia, and the many scenes of his hometown that he missed: the snow-capped gray rock peaks, the dark green alpine forests, the emerald green meadows, and the beautiful vineyards and farmlands in the blue river valleys, he also realized this painfully and clearly - if he could have mustered the courage to advise against such atrocities out of reason and concern before, ever since the Lord of Iron saved the Sublime Steel in front of him and showed him the serious symptoms of his illness that seemed like a dream to him, Dantioch's courage had melted as quickly as ice and snow exposed to the sun.

Of course, the worries, pains, and concerns of Fricks, Dantioch, and the others were habitually hidden so well that they were not conveyed to Ramizane. Before arriving at the bridge, the latter had looked at the known events and the time points when he had listed them in the studio out of boredom while sailing in the subspace. His inner complaints were about to explode because of the many obvious problems, so at this moment he only wanted to land as soon as possible and sort out the mess in Olympia.

After all, to resist foreign aggression, one must first stabilize the internal situation. This is the ancient way.

"Our fleet did not come under any attack after entering the system and anchorage," Dantioch heard the Primarch mutter thoughtfully, "So although this place has rebelled, at least part of the air defense system and system defense have not fallen into the hands of others. Strange, if air supremacy and system fleets have not been seized, then why are they rebelling? Don't they realize that a volley of light spears alone can solve most problems? Strange. - Lord of Communications!" Ramizarn raised his voice, "Connect me to the communication of the garrison here!"

The communication was connected extremely smoothly and almost immediately, as if the leader of the Iron Warriors garrison on Olympia had been waiting by the communication device awaiting the communication request.

A face as pale as if wearing a plaster mask appeared in the center of the holographic projection screen. His face showed the combined characteristics of the natives of Olympia and the genes from Perturabo, but at this moment, any muscles and nerves that controlled his expression seemed to be forcibly suppressed, making him look as cold and numb as someone who had died a few hours before the communication began.

It was then that Ramizarn remembered that he didn't know his name yet, and before he began to manually search the archives as he had done in the previous few days, Dantioch immediately remembered the pharmacist's advice, and reluctantly took a step forward and whispered to the Primarch.

"…This is Captain Artorakes, my lord. He is in charge of five hundred of our warriors stationed in Olympia under your orders. He is responsible for recruiting soldiers, gathering resources, and sending supplies and new soldiers to the supply fleet as per our requirements."

"Oh." Ramizane nodded. Captain Atolakes on the opposite side looked even paler. Now he looked like he had been dead for at least twenty-four hours.

"Well, let's report the situation, Captain Atorakes. By the way, don't say any welcome words, just talk about the important things. The news you asked Captain Seshugo to bring us is short, but the matter is big enough."

This made the company commander immediately swallow the welcome speech he had prepared.

Good, now poor Artolacus looks like a week-old corpse. This sentence suddenly popped into Dantioch's mind.

"As you wish, my lord." The captain numbly maintained his fluency and propriety in his speech. "The reason is that Governor Damikos died three months ago. The issue of his successor has not been well resolved for several weeks, and many small-scale battles have broken out between cities and city-states over the distribution of power. Due to the delay in resolving the issue of the governor's succession, most of the government affairs here are in a backlog and cannot function. When Captain Seshugo came with the fleet to receive new recruits, no city was willing to hand over supplies on its own, and we did not have a major authority or person in charge to communicate with. I immediately asked most of the ships in the supply fleet to stay and block the system, and then sent Seshugo to pick you up. My lord, during this period I received many delegations from different factions who came to visit..."

"Wait, wait, I understand, [Ancient Terra swear], you mean, with regard to the [swear] big incident they caused on the surface, you [Ancient Terra swear] have been here for so long with 500 Iron Warriors Space Marines and a space fleet but [swear] did nothing?! Just waiting for them to come and visit you one by one?!"

The Primarch's tone was more like disbelief, as if someone had miscalculated one plus one, rather than anger. However, the high frequency of swear words made Atolakes shaky.

"Oh wait," Dantioch saw the changes in the expression on the Primarch's face like summer thunderclouds, which were uncertain and gathered and dispersed rapidly. "This is indeed a dilemma. You can make your own decision. If you are not happy, you can do nothing and fool around. You can't be happy either. No wonder it is like this. ... But if you ask me, it is still a bit stupid to do nothing in this situation. The state violence apparatus is not for you to use like this!"

Perhaps because his last sentence was a little loud, Captain Atorakes responded subconsciously.

"Your Excellency, it's not that we have done nothing about this. We have always controlled the orbits and galaxies. The current situation has not deteriorated further only after we threatened them, otherwise they would have taken more drastic actions. There are many factions among them and they have different opinions. Some want to secede from the empire, while others think it is not necessary, but they all believe that a change in ruling power is necessary. If it were not for our blockade and our neutral waiting attitude, I think a full-scale civil war would have broken out in Olympia before you return..."

"Listen, what a naive and immature idea." Ramizarn said sincerely, but the sincerity of his tone made even Fricks shudder subconsciously in his Terminator. "Either there is something wrong with the discipline and management part of your enhanced surgery, or there is something wrong with the cultural education of our legion, or both?" He raised his voice, "Who on earth [Ancient Terra swear word] told you regular soldiers to sit back and watch and cover up the situation when separatists were running rampant on our ancestral...home world?!"

"My Lord... This is our home world after all. I think perhaps you need us to proceed with caution and wait for you to come back and make the final decision..."

"Okay, that's enough. I guess what's going on. This is not called being cautious, Captain Atorakes. This is called being indecisive! You are not fit to stay there any longer. Hand over the command to your adjutant immediately and report to me on the Iron Blood."

Captain Artorakes's face now looked like it was made of limestone. "I will obey your orders, my lord."

Dantioch took the opportunity to glance at Frix, who was still commanding in the center of the bridge. The two Tridents' eyes met in the air and then quickly turned away.

They saw two things from each other's eyes. First, the Primarch's condition did not seem to be recovering, and considering that the next step was to deal with their home planet, the situation was not optimistic. Second, they did not think that Atorakes could replicate Urdek's luck in escaping death. After all, judging from Atorakes' current situation, he had to bear much more responsibility than Urdek - the latter objectively speaking, did not do anything wrong.

"Wu..." Dantioch saw the Lord of Steel pacing back and forth on the balcony, as if thinking about something. Then he raised his head and looked at the image of the surface of Olympia that appeared on the screen after Atolakes' face disappeared.

Cotton-like white clouds pass over the snow-capped mountains and the thousands of small blue-green lakes or oceans that sparkle like diamonds. Ancient geological and glacial activities have divided the rich rock layers of Olympia into a large number of mountains and valleys, but there is a serious lack of large plains and similar terrains. Such geographical features will naturally make it easier for cities that develop from settlements formed on relatively fertile and flat river valley open areas or plateaus to become independent.

This mountainous terrain is somewhat similar to eight mountains, one river, and one field. Looking at the snow line of the entire planet, the average temperature here is obviously very low, and in many areas nothing can be grown except for grass for feeding cattle and sheep.

Without tropical and subtropical temperatures and rainfall to help industrial and agricultural development...if the higher-level government lacks effective transportation, communication methods and grassroots administrative management, cities that have not yet fully industrialized may indeed act independently according to actual conditions, which may look better on the surface. In addition, the population growth rate will definitely not be too fast. It is no wonder that their cities are very sensitive to changes in population age and gender, and should rely heavily on adult males in the family as the main agricultural labor force...

No, this is not the time to think about this. Well, let me think about it... First of all, I still have to go down and understand the situation and see it with my own eyes.

He searched the LOGOS catalog of Olympian customs for some of the statements that the locals valued, and finally made a decision.

"Frix." The Chief of the Trident saluted his master from below.

"Have them pass on the message to the... representatives of the cities and their factions. I have decided to meet with them personally and hear their side of the story. Under... well, under the banner of Eirene, and make sure they understand this."

The first captain slammed his arm guard against his breastplate and went to handle the matter immediately. Although he and Dantioch were somewhat skeptical about the mildness of this description and the actual mildness, neither of them raised the issue aloud.

After all, the Primarch is still "sick".

It is better to follow the patient's wishes when he is sick.