[It was a sword.]
[It was also a living, malevolent soul.]
[From the moment Fulgrim hung it at his waist, the Death knell for The Third Legion had begun to toll.]
[Except the sound was so melodious that no one realized it was the melody of Death.]
The scene shifted to Fulgrim's private quarters.
[This place was once filled with elegant artworks, sculptures, and grand blueprints.]
[But now, though the furnishings remained opulent, they exuded an unsettling grotesqueness. The limbs of the statues seemed slightly distorted, and the colors of the paintings were too vivid, as if they were bleeding.]
[Fulgrim stood alone before a massive mirror.]
[He was bare-chested, his perfect muscle lines resembling a marble statue from myth.]
[But he wasn't admiring himself; he was... arguing.]
[Or rather, listening.]
["They don't understand you, Fulgrim."]
[A voice echoed.]
[It didn't come from the room's speakers, but directly from the silver longsword resting on the table, yet it also sounded as if it were ringing deep within his mind.]
[The voice was syrupy and submissive, yet it carried hooks.]
["Look at Ferrus. That crude blacksmith. Does he really understand you? Does he truly appreciate your art?"]
["Ferrus is my brother."]
[Fulgrim retorted in a low voice, but his tone lacked conviction. "He... he's just not good at expressing himself."]
["No, he is jealous."]
[The voice chuckled, "He envies your perfection. He envies that your Legion is more dazzling than his.]
[He mocks you behind your back, calling you a 'vase,' a sissy who only knows how to wear pretty clothes."]
["Shut up!"]
On the screen, Fulgrim roared, but he didn't cast the sword away; instead... he gripped it even tighter.
Inside the real Throne Room, Ferrus Manus's hand slammed violently onto his armrest.
"Bullshit!"
The Primarch of the Iron Hands, usually the most steady and mountain-like of men, was now shaking with rage—the fury and grievance of being misunderstood by his closest kin.
"I never said that! Never! Fulgrim, you idiot! Has your brain been kicked by a donkey?"
"I would be jealous of you? I couldn't be more proud of you!"
Ferrus turned his head, staring intently at the real-life Fulgrim who sat with his head bowed, his eyes bloodshot.
"You'd rather believe a broken sword than our centuries of brotherhood?!"
The real Fulgrim did not look up.
His long hair veiled his face, and no one could see his expression, only the violent trembling of his shoulders.
The images on the screen continued; the poison was spreading.
As time passed, these psychological suggestions began to manifest as real actions.
[The Legion was changing.]
[The once-strict discipline began to loosen. Warriors started seeking more stimulating sensory experiences.]
[The screen cut to the laboratory of Chief Apothecary Fabius Bile.]
[It was no longer a place for healing the sick and saving the wounded, but a slaughterhouse filled with screams and deformed flesh.]
[Bile was dissecting the corpses of dead Laer Xenos, transplanting Xenos tissue capable of stimulating nerves and strengthening flesh into the warriors of the Emperor's Children.]
["This is evolution, Primarch."]
[On the screen, Bile fanatically showed Fulgrim his 'masterpiece'—an Astartes with bulging muscles and sensory acuity heightened several times over, but whose face had already begun to distort.]
["This is the shortcut to perfection. We can be stronger, faster, and... happier."]
[The Fulgrim of old would have cut down this gene-desecrating madman with a single stroke.]
[But now, under the influence of the daemon sword hanging at his waist, Fulgrim looked at the monster and actually revealed a faint, infatuated smile.]
["Well done, Fabius."]
[He said softly, "This is what I call... innovation."]
["Ugh..."]
In the real hall, many loyal Astartes let out sounds of dry heaving.
"That is sacrilege!" Saul Tarvitz closed his eyes in pain.
"We once took pride in being the 'Emperor's Children' because we were the standard of perfection. But that is not perfection... that is mutation! That is turning us into Beasts!"
The Dreadnought of the Ancient Rylanor let out a dull rumble, like a sigh: "So the rot began then. From the moment we accepted the'shortcut,' we were no longer who we once were."
[Next came a disaster known as 'Joint Operations.']
[Fulgrim and Ferrus Manus fought side-by-side once more.]
[But this was no longer a display of brotherly coordination; it was a competition thick with the scent of gunpowder.]
[In the footage, Ferrus led the Iron Hands in a steady advance, a result of precisely calculated tactics.]
[But Fulgrim, to prove he was'stronger' and 'more perfect,' actually ordered his troops to break from the battle line to conduct an entirely unnecessary, flashy, yet reckless flank assault.]
[Though they won, it caused massive casualties.]
[After the battle, Ferrus stormed into Fulgrim's command tent in a rage.]
["What are you doing?!"]
[Ferrus roared.]
["You nearly got my flank units killed! Which idiot taught you such undisciplined maneuvers?"]
[Fulgrim sat in his chair, toying with the silver sword, his face wearing an arrogant and contemptuous smile that was foreign to Ferrus.]
["I am displaying art, brother."]
[Fulgrim spoke slowly and deliberately.]
["And you, as I expected, only know how to stack bricks like a mason. You are too slow, too ugly."]
["What did you say?!" Ferrus was stunned.]
["Admit it, Ferrus."]
[Fulgrim stood up, the purple light in his eyes becoming eerie.]
["You are simply jealous of me. You envy that I can achieve what you cannot."]
["Unreasonable!"]
[Fuming, Ferrus turned to leave, slamming the tent flap hard behind him.]
["Come find me when you've sobered up! Until then, stay out of my sight!"]
[Watching Ferrus's departing back, Fulgrim made no move to stop him.]
[Instead, he drew the sword.]
[The blade reflected his perfect yet twisted face.]
["See," the voice whispered in his mind, "he has abandoned you. He looks down on you. Only I... only I have always stayed by your side, only I understand your true value."]
["Yes..." Fulgrim murmured to himself, like a brainwashed cultist, "Only you."]
Inside the real Throne Room, there was dead silence.
This was more chilling than any bloody battlefield.
Because they had witnessed with their own eyes how a noble soul, under the assault of sweet talk and psychological suggestion, was stripped of reason bit by bit, severed from the bonds of kin, and finally turned into an empty shell manipulated by a daemon.
"Is this... the way of Chaos?"
Chagatai's hand pressed against his sword hilt, his gaze solemn. "No need for massive armies, no need for psychic lightning."
"It only needs to find a single crack in your heart—even if it's the pursuit of perfection—and then burrow in like a maggot until it eats you hollow."
"Terrifying."
Vulkan shook his head, his eyes full of pity.
"Fulgrim, my brother... you didn't lose to an enemy; you lost to the self in the mirror."
And for the warriors of the Emperor's Children, this scene was a devastating blow.
They had always thought their Primarch's change was due to some profound philosophical contemplation or the pursuit of a higher state of being.
Now they knew.
Their father, the Phoenix they regarded as a god, had actually been fooled into ruin by a broken sword!
"For such a thing..."
Lucius looked at the sword on the screen, a complex expression on his face—a mix of desire for the sword's power and a sense of void after the shattering of his idol.
"We sold the entire Legion for a piece of junk that does nothing but chatter?"
This sense of absurdity was more despair-inducing than the tragedy itself.
However, the true abyss was still ahead.
When a person is deserted by all and their mental defenses are completely shattered, the true'Seducer' is about to make its entrance.