The High Court of the Korthane Hegemony was not a throne room. It was a courtroom.
Massive, perfectly squared pillars of obsidian rose three hundred feet into the vaulted ceiling. There were no tapestries, no gilded statues, no chaotic displays of wealth. Everything was designed to project absolute, irrefutable order.
The Arbiter, the Rank 9 God of Law, sat behind a colossal bench of black basalt, reviewing the latest intelligence packet from the western frontier.
The packet detailed the Sovereign Imperium's response to the Cult Splinter insurgency.
Target: Sovereign Eastern Grid.Korthane supply node: Destroyed.Current Imperium counter-measure: Total demographic extermination.Estimated Sovereign casualties authorized by Zephyr: Four million.
The Arbiter placed the parchment on the basalt bench, his expression perfectly still. His divine optics—shining with the cold, silver light of absolute logic—processed the sheer scale of the bloodletting.
