It was the first time I realised approaching me could be a daunting task for some people. Sister Dialogus Welminah Maeyer looked apprehensive and nervous as she approached me to verify if my name was written correctly for her record.
Welminah herself looked more similar to the older metal model which represented a sister dialogus than the newer plastic version. Sans the ridiculous scrolls hanging around her body plus missing a staff, her general hairstyle and the eyepiece she wore matched the metal model.
After I verified my name i.e. Syrine was spelt correctly, this still felt weird every time as I can talk and read Low Gothic like I have known them for life, Welminah’s next question boggled my mind on an obvious but little-discussed matter.
‘I am sorry my lady… but your name is simply just that? Do you have a surname for me to complete my record?’ the scholar timidly asked. My thought acceleration activated upon hearing her question. Yeah, why doesn’t Syrine have a surname?
Almost everyone important enough seems to have longer names right? Like I had learned the name of the current planetary governor was Khatalina von Klaeus from the Fortress’ database and she was quite good looking.
But wait… suddenly to my shock, it occurred to me amongst the primarchs, a lot of them like Magnus, Angron, Sanguinius, Fulgrim and Alpharius seemed to have always had a single name, even Perturabo who was disclosed in the lore to have known his own name since birth had ever only gone around with a single name. I vividly recalled an audio drama featuring the primarch going “I am Perturabo!” when his birth pod landed near a mountain and he was surviving as an angry baby for a while.
So I looked at Welminah and replied sincerely, ‘yes, I have but a single name. Do we still have some time before the canoness arrives? Can anyone tell me about the prophecy Alicya mentioned?’
My easy-going attitude seemed to have eased the sisters a bit, so we sat down before Welminah started telling me the stories and legends from the founding of the minor militant Order of the Shining Beacon.
It was a story that happened about a thousand years ago; an unnamed sister returned triumphant from an impossible mission with a mysterious sword. She later received visions from dubious sources telling her to travel here and establish the Shining Beacon Order. Officially that was where the story ended, unofficially said sister had received more visions foretelling a prophecy about the coming of a true daughter of the Emperor who would be their salvation in their darkest hour, it was known as the Holy Daughter prophecy.
My trouble senses were tingling just from hearing the vague details passed down as legends. The story contained a shining figure with no more description who could cut through the throng of enemies like paper mockups with a sword. Then the poor sister started receiving vague visions asking her to leave her home and the people she knew behind, bravely travel a large swath of the hostile galaxy to establish a new branch of Sororitas Order in a backwater part of the Imperium, only to wait for a certain someone to “save the day” when cosmic shit hits the galactic fan.
Be their salvation in the darkest hour? I doubt anyone but the Emperor himself is capable of such a feat, in the lore I knew even after Roboute Guilliman returned it wasn’t exactly sunshine and roses awaiting the renowned primarch, and he was the real deal.
This story had all the hallmarks of some powerful entities laying down the groundwork for their schemes and letting the lesser people toil till they dropped written all over it.
I was contemplating the story when the corner of my mind registered multiple incoming aircraft through my link with the fortress’ machine spirit. It was the same Aquila lander Alicya was riding in earlier and it now had four fighter escorts.
‘Alicya, will your canoness be arriving in the same lander you rode?’
‘Probably, why?’
‘I think she is here.’
* * *
We ended up receiving the canoness with two other sisters in another meeting room with spotless reflective walls. This room was much grander than the room I had used earlier, probably in a show of respect to the Order’s highest-ranking member visiting.
Present with me was Alicya and Welminah, then Veritta joined in representing the inquisition instead of Niandra due to their request to keep certain sensitive matters within the Adepta.
We all stood up as the three new visitors stepped through the door with the canoness leading in the front, the floor clicking with the steps of their power armour boots. You could feel the air of piousness they carried as they entered the room.
The canoness looked to be in her forties and had surprisingly delicate features considering her position, she looked impressive in her personalised ornate power armour which was half-covered with an elaborately embroidered cloak featuring a hood. A huge symbol of the ministorum was shining proudly below her collar.
The two sisters who arrived with her were obviously elite warriors of the Order, one of them was carrying a long object covered by a silk cloth with purity seals plastered all over it. While they looked decent enough they exuded so much martial prowess in their demeanour I suspected even drunken hooligans would not dare to approach them, one of them even had a small Fleur De Lys tattooed under her left eye.
Alicya, Welminah and Veritta all bowed deeply while simultaneously performing the Aquila hand sign towards the canoness. At a loss of what to do for my proper etiquette but suspecting I should not follow the sisters, I merely performed the Aquila hand sign.
The canoness pulled back her hood, returned the gesture and stood perfectly still looking at me, after a while, just before it started giving me the creeps she finally spoke. ‘Greetings, I am Canoness Diadinah. You must be Lady Syrine, I heard you had entered the inner sanctum?’
‘Inner sanctum? You meant the place where I met Sister Alicya?’ I inquired while glancing at the palatine and the latter was fast on returning an affirmative expression.
Canoness Diadinah nodded and continued, ‘your arrival was foretold by our founder, it was unfortunate this happened at the worst possible time and resulted in your amnesia. I apologise if my actions appeared hasty but our situation is getting dire and time is scarce.’
She then gestured to the sister who was carrying a long object and the sister stepped forward, carefully unwrapped the package to reveal a huge sheathed sword that looked too big to be wielded with one hand for an average human.
The sister respectfully presented the hilt end of the sword towards Diadinah. The canoness muttered a quick prayer before pulling out the sword in one go with both hands. A blinding flash filled the room as the mirror-finished blade exited its sheath.
‘Behold, the nameless sword.’ Diadinah said. I heard Alicya gulp at the sight of their Order’s holiest relic and all eyes in the room were looking at the shimmering blade.
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The canoness admired the sword reverently while explaining to me, ‘though impressive, this relic is only a really sharp piece of almost indestructible metal forged with incredible skill. The reality was, any decent power sword will outperform it so it was rarely used on the battlefield.’
‘However,’ she looked at me and continued, ‘there were records of it behaving like a power sword and more in the heat of battle during dire circumstances, which should have been impossible due to the sword having no power circuit nor power source.’
Diadinah paused for a while before turning to her colleague, ‘Sister Welminah, have you briefed Lady Syrine about our founding legends yet?’
‘Yes, my canoness.’ The dialogus sister quickly replied.
‘Good,’ Diadinah said and approached me with the huge sword. ‘There is one more legend that was only passed down from each successive canoness… until now.’ She stopped in front of me and presented the hilt of the sword towards my side.
‘It was said the true and Holy Daughter of the Emperor will appear in our darkest hour to lead us, and the nameless sword shall be her witness.’
Wait, what? While I *might* be this prophesied figure they spoke of, I was definitely no warrior, let alone wielding a sword. ‘What am I supposed to do?’
‘Just hold the sword,’ Diadinah nudged.
Looking at the large blade, I hesitated and wanted to decline, ‘I am no warrior, canoness.’
‘Please my lady, a final verification if you will, this is the secret directive my order passed down since our founding.’
Everyone was looking at me expectantly. I gulped, touched the hilt of the sword and picked it up. It was surprisingly lighter than it looked. I ran [Analytica] on it and it simply read Nameless sword.
Its size was on the larger end, probably due to it being built as a single-handed weapon for a space marine size end-user in mind. In my hands, it sort of resembled the size of a slightly larger bastard sword.
I raised the sword with both hands, had its blade stood upright pointing at the ceiling and was enlightened to the fact that this was a perfectly balanced blade, a truly remarkable piece of work. Intrigued by the level of craftsmanship invested into a piece of metal that was meant for killing, I turned it slowly while watching the light reflect on its mirror finish.
It was then out of the blue that a weird sensation hit me. I had a distinct feeling someone or something was reaching out to me and my thought acceleration activated in case this was an attack. Just as the world slowed down, a flat and artificial sounding message wormed itself into my consciousness.
++You passed the preliminary scan. For the next level of activation, insert your blood into the sword fuller.++
Wait, who was communicating with me? I looked around and eventually, my eyes settled on the sword. This sword is imbued with artificial intelligence? The need for blood or any other bodily fluid to activate a gene lock was not a new thing in this universe, I recalled a scene in the lore where an infamous primarch licked on a dataslate to bypass a high-security measure.
I looked at the sword again and decided to do as it advised, but I was too big a pansy to cut my finger with its edge. ‘Sister Veritta.’ I held out my hand to her, ‘if you please, kindly prick my finger so I might get a few drops of blood.’ She was surprised but quickly went to work with haste, a few seconds later and it was done; it was wise to leave it to the professionals. All the sisters watched with bated breath as I gingerly dropped my blood into the sword’s fuller.
++.....++
Nothing happened, did I make a fool of myself?
Then a loud chime sounded from the sword, startling everyone in the room and more messages started reaching my mind.
++Genecode accepted.++
++Next level activation started.++
As the sword “came alive”, alarmingly I felt it started drawing heat and energy from me. Just as I was about to panic and drop it, the sword passed the energy back to me and an energy loop of sorts formed. Faster and faster the energy circulated until I felt like the weapon had become an extension of my limbs.
An energy field suddenly flickered to life around the blade of the sword, showering the meeting room with pure blue light while the sisters gasped. This is…? ‘The azureus glow,’ Welminah whispered with her shaking voice, ‘last recorded sighting was over two centuries ago.’
‘Hmmm…’ While this looked pretty, I was unsure of its stability and decided to test it. Like a noob, I did some mock swings with the weapon and stopped when remembering I really was no warrior with zero training in swordsmanship. My sword swing probably looked so amateurish I wonder if it made the battle sisters cringe. The good news was the energy field persisted and was not going anywhere.
‘So, it is just a fancy power sword?’ I queried while marvelling at the glowing sword.
‘My Lady, it is running without a power source.’ Diadinah replied with unconcealed excitement. Maybe that sounded like a miracle on the surface, but I reckoned it should be just some fancy mechanic like the luxury Rolex watches running solely on kinetic energy but scaled up with space-age technology mixed with a bit of Throne knows what sorcery. Personally, I was not that impressed due to the simple fact that using this weapon still implied one had to walk up to people and chop them up within arms reach.
I looked again at the shimmering blue light on the mirror blade and had to admit, impractical as it was going melee into a battlefield brimming with guns, the sword with its energy field activated was enchantingly beautiful. Then an idea hit me: what if I introduced my psychic energy to the circulation.
Though I loathed the idea of activating [Psykana Activa] as I still had so much to learn about the perils of the warp, my curiosity got the better of me. Just a little while should be fine, I thought and went psychic active.
[Psykana Activa] activated-
The world went trippy as expected but this time I was ready for it, psychic energy reacted to my active state and swirled around and inside me then onto the sword, adding another layer of energy into the circulation.
Then it happened, starting with a hint of fluctuation in the energy field, a second later a brilliant fire burst forth into existence and the whole blade was covered in a dazzling blue flame. Astonished by this sudden development, I almost dropped the sword again but immediately noticed no heat coming from the conflagration.
This is... psychic flame? I moved my fingers near the raging spectral inferno and confirmed no rise in temperature. How peculiar.
Mesmerised by the pretty light show, my whole attention was transfixed on it for a while until I remembered there were still other people in the room. Now that I think about it, they were awfully quiet. Flustered by my ability to get lost in my little world, which would undoubtedly look like a lack of proper manners, I turned my attention back to them and was surprised to see all the sisters, including the canoness, knelt before me.
Speaking in a voice shaking with religious fervour, Diadinah proclaimed with the tone of finality, ‘Revered Lady Syrine, I, Diadinah Grace, Canoness of the Order of The Shining Beacon, hereby officially recognise you as the prophesied Holy Daughter of the Emperor, please take over the command of the Order and lead us as you will!’
Wait wait, activating a flaming sword doesn’t prove any- I wanted to say but caught a sight that made me froze, there on the many spotless mirror-like surfaces inside the meeting room were the reflections of a fair maiden standing tall, holding a huge sword crackling with raging azureus flame and around her head was the unmistakable holy radiance of a golden halo.