Chapter 10 Change and Thinking

Bad news always spreads faster than the wind.

About a month later, Calvin had the opportunity to learn the true meaning of this letter through the internal reference materials of the Star Tongue Court.

The Wandering Band, the ship where Calvin's life began in some sense.

Not long after the new tithe collection journey began, they encountered a storm from the subspace at the edge of the Storm Segment.

And following the storm, there was also a whole fleet of space pirates.

In the fierce boarding battle, the entire crew of the Wandering Band suffered more than 85% casualties.

The Silent Sisters, led by the lady, were interrupted by the Chaos Space Marines who broke through the wall from the flank during the decapitation operation launched against the enemy wizard.

The lady and her sisters all returned to the throne, and only Kasin survived because he was seriously injured and unconscious and could not participate in this operation.

All the marines were killed.

All the commanding personnel on the ship, from the captain onwards, were killed.

All the weapons group, including the gunners, were killed.

The astropath and the navigator team were all killed, and she was the first one to die.

The astropath had foreseen the cruelty of this battle before the critical moment arrived.

She sacrificed herself and forced the message of help to be sent to the nearest star field sector defense fortress and the interstellar communication public channel in the subspace storm.

In the hope that any possible troops would go to rescue.

The price was her soul. This thin lady who had been silent for many years, after trying her best to send out a message for help.

The soul that lost the last bit of psychic protection was completely exposed to the greedy subspace and was immediately torn apart by the demons who rose up.

But her efforts were not in vain.

At the most critical moment of the battle, there was only sporadic resistance on the bridge of the entire ship, the engine power had been completely lost, and the entire ship had been captured by the pirates' gravity claws and was about to be towed to the pirate base in the asteroid belt.

An Astartes company that was patrolling the star area and received the message of help finally arrived.

Under the strong support of this new force and the threat that the sector fleet could arrive at any time.

The pirates gave up their original goal of capturing the entire Wandering Band and gradually withdrew from the ship.

After this battle, less than 10,000 of the entire Wandering Band crew, including the mechanical slaves on the lower deck, survived.

Such a battle may be too tragic in our eyes, but it is not noticeable in the war-torn territory of the Empire.

To some members of the High Lords Council, the ruling body of the Empire, he can only represent the departure of a familiar name.

In the eyes of the irrelevant Ministry of the Interior, this is just a string of cold numbers.

But it is different for Calvin. In a sense, this spaceship, which has only lived for a month, is his hometown in this life.

And the death of those who represented the first people he knew in this world had a huge impact on Calvin.

He is finally no longer like a paper boat drifting in the long river of fate, just floating with the water.

Calvin began to have the desire to participate in this world. He hopes to understand what kind of awareness those old people who sacrificed their lives had when they fought to the last moment.

So in addition to training, Calvin has a new place for activities-the library.

Unlike most people, his purpose was not to read books about psychic knowledge.

What he wanted to know was the history and culture of this empire. He wanted to know the past and present of the country where he lived.

Calvin didn't want to go with the flow anymore, he wanted to take the initiative to learn about things he didn't know.

If possible, he wanted to continue to live with honor as a soldier, so he needed a reason.

The reason was the first lesson he was taught as a soldier in his previous life, and it was also the driving force for his lifelong struggle:

"Why do we fight?"

The history and literature area of ​​the library was sparsely populated. It was probably because the young people here always pursued power too utilitarianly.

There were not many signs of borrowing books here, and many books had been put here and no one cared about them.

There were only two people in the quiet bookshelf and borrowing area.

In addition to Calvin, another borrower was sitting in the middle of the borrowing area.

What Calvin didn't know was that he could come here and read these books that were not accessible to him at his confidentiality level, all thanks to the stranger who was reading quietly in front of him.

In the dim candlelight, his body, taller than Calvin, stood still like a sculpture.

Only the floating servo skull next to him occasionally made a sound when turning pages.

This was a tall, silver-haired old man in a simple gray robe, with a rugged face hidden in the hood of his dress.

He always read quietly by himself under the candlelight, but the feeling of reading was different from others' thirst for knowledge.

When the old man sat in the pile of books about the history of the empire and read quietly, a strange feeling made him blend into the surroundings.

It was as if he himself was part of that heavy history.

This was probably a person full of stories. Calvin thought when he was occasionally distracted.

Calvin, who had been reading and accessing books for a long time, had footprints all over the bookshelves and reading areas.

Perhaps too many opportunities to pass by each other made the old man occasionally raise his head and meet Calvin's eyes, and occasionally nod politely.

But most of the time, the old man just sat there, quietly as if he had been here since ancient times.

Calvin himself also slowly put aside his inner impetuousness while reading, and began to be succumbed to the charm of this ancient empire that was full of disasters and sufferings during its growth.

When an empire composed of a single race continues for thousands of years in numerous hardships, its history is not just a record of civilization.

It is a history of development, a history of war, and a history of survival.

When the chronicle, a text carrier, unfolded in front of Calvin like a scroll, there was no doubt that he was conquered.

For the first time, he knew that there were so many aliens and disasters in this universe, and there were so many civilizations and wars in the Milky Way alone, and it was so difficult for humans to just hope to survive.

In the history of thousands of years, there were too many heroes who burned themselves and dedicated themselves for the survival and continuation of this race and this empire.

There were also too many tragedies recorded in the same indifferent text in documents that no one cared about.

In the process of reading, I learned that the empire’s old and feudal management methods made Calvin despise it.

But it was the same or even worse environment that made Calvin realize that it was not that his predecessors were not wise, but that this was just a compromise that was forced to be made with the first goal of survival.

Billions of people, life and death are up to him. From the perspective of an observer, the history of the empire is so magnificent and so ruthless.

Among them, Calvin is most obsessed with the biography of the emperor himself.

Calvin is a soldier, he can understand the contribution of the emperor to the empire; Calvin is just a soldier, he can't understand how the emperor can be so selfless.

Dedicating his life for the country and nation he loves is the limit of what Calvin can do.

But completely abandoning himself, without any personal feelings. Even many records show that those decrees from the emperor himself can be seen through and have rules in the eyes of Calvin who has undergone 9 years of compulsory education.

Any empire must use military institutions as the center of power during the expansion period. This is an iron rule.

And when the country transitions to the maintenance period, the transfer of power centered on the civil service system is also the general trend.

But if the ruler of this empire does not want to shed too much blood in the cruel transfer of power.

Then there must be someone who can stabilize those meritorious nobles: he must be strong enough, charming enough, have a broad vision, and even have the awareness of self-sacrifice.

And the cruel thing is: this person cannot be the ruler himself.

Send such a person, who is the closest comrade-in-arms, and the eldest son who is most like himself and whom he loves the most.

Personally send him to the altar called power and watch him die in painful struggle.

No matter what the result is, it is far beyond Calvin's understanding.

He couldn't help but fall into thinking, does the emperor have no humanity? Or does the emperor not understand humanity?

No, when he gets along with his beloved children, the love he shows does not seem to be fake.

Then if the emperor has humanity, how to explain such behavior? Doesn't he love his children?

No, of course he loves his children, but he loves this country and this race more.

Calvin asked himself, thinking from another perspective, can he do it?

He might sacrifice himself without hesitation, but what about his children? What about his relatives?

Can he convince himself to put them on the altar with his own hands? Just for this empire composed of countless humans? What about himself?

The answer is of course no, he can't do it.

These things, just seeing the brief written records, have made Calvin feel heavy.

So in the eyes of the emperor, how does he view these unavoidable problems?

Calvin frowned, lowered his head to think, and hurriedly put down the book in his hand, ready to leave the library.

After all, the restaurant that is open for a limited time will not understand Calvin's sadness.

"You seem a little confused, my child." This is the first time Calvin has heard his voice in the long time he has been in the same room with the old man.

Following this low and powerful voice, Calvin stopped, raised his head, and looked at the center of the reading area. In the golden candlelight, the silver-haired old man spoke to him leisurely.

On a whim, I would like to take this opportunity to discuss the humanistic aspects of this IP other than war. I don’t know if you will be interested in reading it.