Chapter Forty-Six: Brother, I Want to Leave the Ship!

Traveling through the warp is perilous; countless currents and dangers within the realm threaten any vessel daring to traverse its depths. Navigators, gifted with the Eye of the Warp, can foresee and detect these turbulent tides, guiding ships safely through otherwise treacherous passages.

"Brother, this is a bit tricky to handle," Xing Jian murmured, seated at the navigator’s station, the psychic energy on his brow flickering ceaselessly. The original navigator had been forcibly sent to rest by Wang Ming, despite his insistence that he could continue. Yet his exhausted mental state betrayed his limits, and Wang Ming feared that pushing him further would risk corruption by the chaotic forces of the warp.

Xing Jian, wielding his formidable psionic power, forcefully probed the warp. Though he lacked the navigator's bloodline and the true Eye of the Warp, he managed to conjure a makeshift substitute using his abilities. It was unstable and far less effective, but it sufficed for now—better than nothing. Only Xing Jian, chosen of Tzeentch, could attempt such a feat; any ordinary psychic would have been consumed by warp corruption long ago.

There was, in fact, another device aboard the Imperial Truth that could substitute for a navigator—the "Warp Navigator," a relic from humanity’s Golden Age. Harnessing the ship’s advanced artificial intelligence and the warp sensor array mounted at the bow, it could predict warp turbulence and pinpoint its own location and nearby star systems. Before the creation of human navigators, this was the most reliable tool for safe passage through the warp.

However, the emergence of the Great Rift had rendered it obsolete; the storms unleashed by the Rift had stripped the device of its ability to find its bearings. Furthermore, with Wang Ming having disabled the ship’s artificial intelligence, it could no longer compute the chaotic warp flows.

"Bear with it; once we reach the Solar System, all will be well," Wang Ming offered comfort, sitting beside Xing Jian.

"Brother, at this rate, it’ll take at least three more months to reach the Solar System. Can I get off the ship?" Xing Jian now realized Wang Ming was exploiting his immunity to warp corruption as a chosen of Tzeentch, turning him into a highly efficient warp navigator.

"Just hang on. We're all from the same place—lend a hand," Wang Ming replied.

Xing Jian’s face drooped as he nodded slowly.

For the next two and a half months, Xing Jian remained at the navigator’s station, guiding the Imperial Truth through perilous currents. He even charted a shortcut, allowing the ship to arrive "ahead of schedule" at the Solar System.

The Imperial Truth emerged from the warp near Uranus, through the "Gate of Ecstasy," a warp portal from the Golden Age that enabled ships to bypass the Solar System’s Mandeville Point and enter its heart directly.

The ship’s windows slid open, letting sunlight pour into the Imperial Truth. Wang Ming and his fellow travelers gazed through the portholes at that familiar yet distant star.

It was the sun—the lone star of the Solar System, cradle of Terra, or Earth, and the birthplace of human civilization. It had witnessed every epoch of humanity’s journey into the cosmos, from the stone age to the calendar years, through the Human Federation and into the Human Empire.

It had seen this great species rise and fall, flourish and fade, across the vast expanse of the universe.