Chapter 982: The Siege of Terra (Part 1)
Marshal of the Imperial Guards, Yan Xinzhen, has been mainly concerned about two things in the past few days.
The first thing to do is to clear the palace.
It is certainly unrealistic to clear out everyone in the palace. After all, the entire palace is located in the former Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.
It's called an imperial palace because it served as a residence, with high-ranking officials from all over the empire having their official residences there. It also served as an administrative office, with many of the empire's central government offices located within the palace. It also served as a ceremonial center, with various squares and halls hosting various grand ceremonial ceremonies.
However, these are just some of the functions that come with the palace.
Perhaps over the long years, these attributes have become very strong.
The dignitaries were honored to have a residence in the Terra Palace; the orders sent out every day by countless government agencies and departments determined the rise and fall of the entire cosmic empire; various ceremonies not only relied on the majesty of the palace, but also brought more glory to the palace bit by bit.
However, no matter what, it cannot conceal the fact that the design goal of the Terra Palace from its establishment was to be a huge military fortress and the last guarantee for mankind.
The Imperial Guards subsequently spent tens of thousands of years carefully maintaining its war capabilities.
Because of this, it is impossible to eliminate everyone except the Wanfu Corps and the Imperial Palace Guards under its jurisdiction.
Even though Yan Xinzhen completely distrusted all the bureaucrats of the previous old government, some institutions and personnel that maintained the normal operation of the palace still had to be retained.
As for the others, those dignitaries living there and those government offices that had little to do with maintaining the survival of the imperial palace, they were all cleared out.
The imperial guards had no control over where you worked or what you did after you left.
Do whatever you want, but don’t stay in the palace.
If you don't have enough time and energy to discern who is loyal and who is rebellious, who is pure and who is corrupted, then just treat them all as hidden dangers and get out of here.
Those who may pose a threat to the palace from within should be eliminated as much as possible.
The remaining maintenance departments, a large number of engineers, technical workers, etc., even if they are retained, will be subject to strict control.
The Imperial Guards will definitely treat every hidden danger with the worst-case scenario in mind and have made sufficient contingency plans. As long as a problem occurs, no matter how big or small, there must be a way to deal with it.
These are the things that Yan Xinzhen attaches the most importance to, and he does them personally.
This was the duty of the Imperial Guards. After the Emperor's ascension, they lost their supreme duty as the Emperor's personal guards. For the past ten thousand years, they had to find a reason for their existence.
Defending the imperial palace is where this value lies.
This must not be lost.
In addition to this most important thing, the second thing Yan Xinzhen has been thinking about during this period of time is how to help the Son of God - Robert?
He believed in Robert's identity, and he also hoped that Robert could settle in Holy Terra and the Terra Palace.
It is true that the only owner of the palace is the emperor; but it is also okay for the emperor's son to come and live there for a while.
Yan Xinzhen has lived for more than two thousand years, during which time he has become accustomed to the ugliness of the Terra government.
To be honest, he was neither sad nor happy about it.
He doesn't care what happens to the Terran government; that's not the responsibility of the Custodians.
The Imperial Guards' responsibility is only to protect the imperial palace.
Defend the empire...and defend this place by the way.
But the core is to protect the palace.
The main force of the Custodians always stayed within the Imperial Palace—or at least within Terra itself. However, they also had covert teams operating outward. Most of the time, this was due to their own unique intelligence network receiving intelligence of potential threats to Holy Terra, and dispatching the Custodians to address them. On rare occasions, they might be called in by the Ministry of Justice or the Ministry of Taxation to resolve a matter. But generally, it all depended on their mood.
But no matter what those Terra officials did in the past, no matter how the empire looked like it was about to end, it was not the current time.
There are always some people in the empire who are praised as heroes even by perfect humans like the Imperial Guards, who save the day time and time again.
It's very gratifying.
However, after the Cataclysm, the situation was somewhat different.
Yan Xinzhen discovered that Terra was out of control.
These insects fought for power and profit with each other, messing up the political ecology of the central empire. Yan Xinzhen had seen many similar situations in his cold observation over the past two thousand years.
It's no wonder they messed up the empire.
However, when you add the scarlet scar that has not been seen in ten thousand years and has torn the entire empire apart, it is a different story.
Over the past few decades, Yan Xinzhen gradually realized that if things continued like this, it seemed... the empire might really be destroyed by this group of people!
Then how can he defend his palace?
But at this point, how can he save the empire?
They were just the Imperial Guards, they were the Ten Thousand Man Regiment - just ten thousand men.
Even if each one is a perfect human, capable of crushing those Space Marines they despise, they are different from Space Marines in that they do not focus entirely on combat and warfare. They also study various subjects according to their personal strengths and interests. Whether in social sciences or technical disciplines, they can be considered outstanding scholars, artists, and administrative experts.
But... coming back to the point, there are only 10,000 of them.
They had no legal basis for governing the empire.
If he wanted to take the initiative and do something earth-shattering, there would be many shackles within the Imperial Guard. Although he was a marshal, there were also guys with even greater experience than him, and there were also conservatives within the Imperial Guard.
Hesitant, entangled, not knowing what to do... In this mood, he heard the news of Robert's arrival.
The Son of God is one of the few people that the Imperial Guards can identify with and even be willing to obey to a certain extent.
After verifying that it was highly likely to be true, Yan Xinzhen sent troops to provide support when he learned about the lunar war.
Then, in the following period of time, he was also actively trying to find a way to see if there was a particularly good way to bring the Son of God and his troops to the ground.
The Imperial Guard troops sent out to control the railgun defense facilities are one of these efforts.
But he still felt it was not enough. He was still considering whether there were any more ways to help the expeditionary force.
Plans were proposed one after another, and he was still hesitating about what action to take.
However, the biggest crisis Yan Xinzhen encountered in his more than 2,000 years of career in the Imperial Guards and 1,100 years as the Imperial Guards Marshal occurred.
A huge number of enemies appeared in multiple directions of the palace.
They are going to lay siege to the Terra Palace!
Now is not the time for Yan Xin to consider how to help Robert, but he needs to think about how to get Robert's help as soon as possible.
Although the Terra Palace can be regarded as the most complete defensive fortress complex in the entire human empire, the number of the imperial guards is still too small, and the enemies they have to face are too many.
(End of this chapter)
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