Lion didn't hate stories, but he hated listening to stories about King Arthur.
Because all of Caelan's stories about King Arthur were full of metaphors. His adoptive father was constantly using stories to indirectly prod him.
But that wasn't him.
It was just a future that hadn't happened and never would.
Using the past to criticize the present was common throughout history, but using the future to criticize the present was probably unique to his father.
He didn't want to listen, but he couldn't just block it out either.
After all, he was his father. He had no choice but to comply.
"The story begins with Lucius finding Price in the Capcom Forest."
"Price was born with extraordinary strength, different from others from a young age."
"The people around the Capcom Forest were constantly attacked by Great Beasts. The most powerful Great Beast was called Godzilla."
"To fight the Great Beasts, the people of Capcom formed the Toho Knights. Lucius was one of its knights."
"Later, Price grew up and also joined the Toho Knights. He resolved to hunt Great Beasts outside the city. He swore to wipe them out completely!"
"Did he succeed?" Lion firmly interrupted Caelan. He couldn't be led by the nose.
"Success-ish."
Lion frowned. What did 'success-ish' mean?
"He successfully wiped out the original Great Beasts of the Capcom Forest, but he didn't completely eradicate them."
"Because the Chaos contamination source that created the Great Beasts was still poisoning Capcom. Price couldn't remove it."
"The Great Beasts were originally Caliban's beasts, mutated by Chaos."
"Chaos made them mindless, but beasts never had much reason to begin with. Some variants even became more intelligent."
"They were ecstatic. The strongest Great Beasts took control of the contaminated source, greedily drawing power from it."
"Even if the Great Beasts died, as long as the contamination source existed, new Great Beasts would be born."
Lion's voice was low. "Why didn't King Arthur eliminate the contamination source?"
"Because he couldn't. The contamination source was Capcom. Capcom was the contamination source."
Pudong is Shanghai. Shanghai is Pudong.
Caliban's Chaos corruption came from the Ouroboros. Caliban was the Ouroboros's prison. The Watchers in the Dark were its jailers.
The prisoner couldn't escape.
But its power would seep through the cracks in the cage, corrupting Caliban's life.
Over tens of millions of years, the Ouroboros had become one with Caliban. It was Caliban's world-spirit.
Even if Caliban was blasted to pieces, the Ouroboros would still crawl in the ruins.
It couldn't escape, but it couldn't die either.
But the Ouroboros didn't want to stay on Caliban. It wanted to escape too.
It couldn't escape on its own. It had to trick others into freeing it.
As long as one lived on Caliban, they couldn't escape its influence.
The reason things had been peaceful before was that the Watchers in the Dark had been secretly protecting mortals.
The corrupted Caliban Great Beasts had also lingered in the contaminated core, hunting any mortal who ventured near.
But as the Great Beasts died and the Caliban forests were logged and replaced by factories, corruption became inevitable, unless Caliban was abandoned.
Lion undoubtedly knew the secret. Lord Cypher had been its guardian for generations.
But Lion couldn't bring himself to abandon his homeworld. The Order's knights and Caliban's residents wouldn't agree either.
If you can't get rid of it, what can you do?
Just make do. What else could you do?
But Lion had failed to correctly understand the seriousness of Chaos.
Perhaps he thought that as long as the secret was kept, the spread of corruption could be avoided.
"After Price ascended the throne, he led the new Knights of the Round Table on campaigns, expanding territory."
"But in the midst of glorious conquest, he and Lucius grew apart."
"The former closeness was shrouded in suspicion, eventually becoming an irreparable rift."
"Lucius could never understand why his former son and brother would treat him so cruelly."
"He wanted to understand, but he couldn't let go, and his resentment festered."
"Driven by pain and confusion, Lucius began to dabble in forbidden secrets."
"He naively believed this could help him regain lost dignity and fairness."
"Gradually, the high-ranking Round Table Knights left behind in Capcom all fell into the trap. New Great Beasts were born."
"Though many low-ranking Round Table Knights and new knights knew nothing of this, since they were on Caliban, they were implicated in Lucius's rebellion."
"In Lucius's ambition for these new Great Beasts, civil war swept across Caliban like wildfire. The honour of the Round Table Knights was destroyed."
"What happened next, you already know."
Lion was silent for a long time. "When the prisoner escapes, where are the jailers?"
Caelan replied, "The jailers also want to blow up the prison."
The Ouroboros's goal in corrupting Great Beasts wasn't to destroy mortals, but precisely to fight the Watchers in the Dark.
It's like a prisoner, twisted by hatred for the jailers, breeding cockroaches with sugar to bite them.
Though the cockroaches couldn't hurt the jailers, one bite was enough to disgust them.
Even if they couldn't kill the Watchers, crawling on their cakes could disgust them.
The Watchers were also annoyed, which might have been one reason they wanted to blow up the prison.
The Watchers hadn't stood idly by. They had also supported Cypher against Zahariel.
But with Cypher's death, their subsequent plans likely died with him.
They wouldn't directly oppose the Dark Angels, nor truly participate in their civil war.
Because Luther was the leader of these men, and Luther had led the Dark Angels in disrupting the ritual of the corrupted Terran engineers, banishing the summoned original annihilators.
Though Luther had betrayed Lion, he still fought Chaos.
Thus, the Watchers in the Dark didn't need to do anything.
But they also didn't protect Caliban.
Even if the prison exploded, the Ouroboros couldn't escape.
And the Watchers seemed to have some restriction preventing them from leaving Caliban, so after leaving the prison, they still stayed on the Rock.
But at least they were rid of the prisoner, no longer having to fear cockroaches climbing onto the dinner table.
Without Caliban, the Ouroboros could no longer corrupt anyone. Three birds with one stone.
They had secretly supported mortal knight orders, probably as proxies, making humanity fight the Great Beasts at a cost.
It was a win-win.
The jailers' work became easier, and the Calibanites even worshipped them as gods.
Apart from the Great Beasts, no one was harmed.
Lion asked, "Since King Arthur exterminated the Great Beasts, why do you claim he nurtured enemies to retain power?"
"Then let me ask you: who was the 'enemy' in the story?"
Lion was silent for a long time.
The Great Beasts were gone, so the 'enemy' couldn't be the Great Beasts.
The Ouroboros couldn't be eliminated. King Arthur was powerless against it, nor was it the 'enemy'.
So who could it be?
"Lucius."
"Those you-"
"King Arthur!"
"Those knights exiled by King Arthur to the Capcom Forest were the 'enemies'. Why didn't King Arthur kill them?"
"They had fought alongside him. Executing them would damage his authority."
"Then why exile them?"
"They had indeed erred. Exile was harsh, but it wasn't excessive."
All actions were within the framework of rules. That was Lion's view of King Arthur.
He wasn't defending King Arthur, but King Arthur had always followed rules with absolute rationality.
Lion said, "Moreover, the punishment of many knights wasn't exile, but a balancing act."
Half were Terrans, half Calibanites.
They came from different worlds, and there was indeed distance between them.
He thought Cypher would remain neutral. Luther and Zahariel were the Caliban faction. Astelan and Israfael were the Terran faction.
Their positions were also comparable.
Luther was Lion's Seneschal. Astelan was Grand Master of the First Chapter.
Zahariel was a psyker of great potential but too close to Luther. Israfael was the Chief Librarian.
Even if Luther and Zahariel had treacherous intentions, Astelan and Israfael could restrain them.
Having them all return to the Caliban forest together could indeed balance each other.
That explanation was reasonable.
Too bad Astelan sided with Luther.
"But you-"
"King Arthur!"
"But King Arthur didn't seem to tell Arthas the truth."
"Perhaps he thought the knights would understand his good intentions. They were warriors who had been with him day and night. Why couldn't they understand?"
"Are you going to tell me next that true understanding doesn't need words?"
Lion's expression was proud. Wasn't that true?
Take their father-son relationship, for example. Many things didn't need to be said. They understood each other through a glance.
Caelan sighed softly. "King Arthur didn't understand the human heart!"
"Are you criticizing me for neglecting to spend time with you?"
Caelan denied it flatly. "Not at all. You can go hunting all you like. You don't even need to tell me. Even if you disappear for a week without a word, I don't mind at all, and I won't worry one bit."
Lion sighed. "Father, why are you so conflicted?"
"Conflicted? I learned it from you."
Lion's body stiffened. Was that how his father saw him?
Where was he conflicted?
"I was wrong."
Lion couldn't stand that look from his father.
"What were you wrong about?"
"I'll report to you next time. I won't act on my own again."
"And?"
Lion frowned. What else?
"Not everyone can understand you. And they don't have to accommodate you. If you always assume they should understand you, and misunderstandings arise, similar tragedies will repeat."
"But if you clearly explain the reasons to them, they will naturally understand your good intentions."
"Even if you have reasons you can't explain, at least pat them on the shoulder and say 'I believe in you'."
"Even if they don't understand, they'll fill in the gaps themselves."
"You shouldn't see them as cold, mindless killing machines. They've never seen you just as a Primarch."
"You are their father. They are your sons. They respect you, admire you. They will understand your good intentions."
"But if you're too stingy to even say 'I believe in you', why should they continue to serve a heartless lord?"
"Whoever they are, if you want them to persevere in something, you must give them a reason."
"Honour is what I desire. Loyalty is also what I desire."
"They are powerful Astartes, but they are also simple."
"They die in battle across the galaxy because the Emperor gave them a belief worth dying for: the unification of humanity, the Imperial Truth."
"You once told me the Imperial Truth is a lie."
"But you're even too stingy to give a lie."
"It was King Arthur!" Lion was really getting annoyed.
"If you can't give them the truth, give them a lie."
"They may not care about the truth, only about a reason to persevere. Any reason you give is the direction they will march."
"But remember, whatever your reason, nothing is unshakeable. Maintain it."
"Even a mighty Astartes Legion relies on logistics."
"Behind every gallant Astartes are tens of millions of workers toiling on assembly lines, tens of thousands of Administratum officials working overtime day and night."
"Mortals are as humble as dust, but it is these humble mortals who produce the Astartes' weapons and ships."
"Every triumph of the Astartes has their silent dedication."
"The Imperium's pyramid is majestic and magnificent, resplendent as gold."
"But holding up this pyramid are billions of ordinary foundation stones."
"Those who reach the pyramid's peak are also born from these ordinary stones."
Lion remained silent. He wasn't a foolish son. He could understand his father's good intentions.
Even if he couldn't understand, he wouldn't argue.
Any argument now would only hurt his father.
Lion began to reflect. Had he really neglected something?
For these three years, he had frequently travelled between the forest and the city, hunting Great Beasts.
He maintained good relationships with the other knights, and the people loved him.
He thought he had understood the human heart and assumed they would understand him too.
So he gradually neglected those relationships.
Lion said, "The human heart is complicated."
"Complicated hearts often start with conflict. But hearts can also be simple. You are simple."
"Are you calling me stupid?"
Caelan sighed. "You think we know each other very well, that we can understand each other without words. Yet even so, you also misunderstand me."
Lion's heart sank. A wave of guilt washed over him.
How could he think of his father that way?
"I was wrong."
"Actually, you weren't wrong. I was calling you stupid."
Lion didn't care anymore.
Let him call him stupid. He was pretty stupid.
"Then you should teach me more."
"Haven't I taught you enough?"
"Never enough."
"Then I'll always teach you."
The corners of Lion's mouth twitched. He was silent for a moment.
"I love you, Father."
"Yes, I love you too."
.....
If you enjoy the story, my p@treon is 30 chapters ahead.
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