Imperator: Resurrection of an Empire

The passage dipped downward, spiraling like a prayer.

With each step, torches burst to life in sequence—blue flames hissing awake, lining the descent in sacred rhythm.

Julius followed the light, boots pressing into smooth stone shaped by hands long dead.

The chamber at the base of the vault was wide and circular, its ceiling domed with gold-leaf mosaics that shimmered with faint, unnatural warmth.

The walls were carved in bas-relief, each panel telling a story from a forgotten age.

Legions marching behind armored priests.

Altars raised beneath eclipse-washed skies.

Symbols of healing and fire and resurrection.

And in the center of the room, beneath the dome's apex:

A sarcophagus.

Flat.

Unadorned save for its material—pale marble capped with blackened glass.

Here rests the Custodian of Light, last of the Solar Ordinem.

Julius read it twice.

The Solar Ordinem.

Not canon.

Not in the final lore.

He remembered the beta notes—theorized orders, lost knightly sects tied to sun-worship and pre-imperial rites.

Scrapped.

Forgotten.

And yet… here.

A body beneath Joan's sacred ground, buried not for decades, but millenia.

He stepped forward as the air changed—warmth blooming through vents in the stone, faint but unnatural.

The system pulsed again.

☼ Forgotten Relic Detected[Laurel Of Jupiter Victor]Status: Compatible | Interface Pending

Julius froze.

The Laurel Of Jupiter Victor.

His breath caught, mind flooding with fragments of knowledge from his time when all of this was just a game.

The artifact was legendary even in half-truths—some players had managed to find the artifact but each time it was reported the way they had done so was different which led players to believe that each game instance and world seed spawned a different location and quest

"Here?"

he murmured.

"Under a grand project temple?"

Still failing to believe his luck at having found such a legendary item, Julius gingerly reached out his hands to lay claim to the crown before him.

And as soon as he took the golden laurel wreath into his hands.

There was a stir in the room, like an engine coming to life after the long dormant treasure was finally collected.

But rather than setting off a trap the room itself just came to life.

Not in a literal sense of course but the blue flame torches seemed to brighten illuminating the vault space more so than before.

Showing that this vault held treasures beyond the crown.

Taking slow cautious steps wary of any possible traps his ancient ancestors may have set for possible intruders who were not in the know.

Thankfully no traps were found, and after completing a survey of the vault a total of six new items were added to his inventory, while the rest were simply decorative or useless articles of the fallen empire.

Chief among them was the Laurel crown, which was suitable enough to act as his own personal imperial crown, with the added bonus of the effect the Laurel would grant him, at least until such a time that a greater crown relic could be located.

Next to this was a pair of items for the boon of his armies, and people of the empire itself.

The torches along the shrine's edge flared once more as Julius approached the far end of the chamber.

There was a kind of low-lying altar — cracked in places, yet held together by a gleaming bronze inlay, forming the unmistakable pattern of a Roman sunburst.

Atop it lay five objects julius had select amonst the piles of treasures and stored away objects.

Each separated by a gilded line in the altar's surface.

Julius's eyes swept over the treasures once more.

The first, resting in a folded cloth of violet silk, was a tri-segmented pauldron set etched with winged lions across each plate.

1. Mantle of the Golden Legion

Description: A ceremonial shoulderplate from the Praetoria Prima, forged in the height of the Solar Ordinem.

Effect: Grants +20% resistance to fatigue for troops under the commander's control. At dawn, nearby units recover morale twice as quickly for an hour.

Looking the item over Julius nodded.

This would suit Sabellus.

The man's long marches and complex encampments would benefit from the stamina reinforcement.

Beside it, half-wrapped in oil-treated leather, was a spearhead of obsidian steel, engraved with a single word: Veritas.

2. Spiculum of the Flame-Ward

Description: A sanctified throwing spear, imbued with divine sigils used in the purification rites of pre-imperial legions.

Effect: Upon striking the ground, it creates a small anti-mana ward, cancelling out or preventing the use of external mana arts, while not interferring with internal mana arts or strengthening.

Julius pondered for but a moment before deciding this would go to Caetrax.

The root had long since reported the Francian priest to be using Mana arts as a form of divine providence, but should those divine revelations fail them, the peoples faith in their scewed church and removing one of the pillars still giving them hope of resisting in this war.

The third relic was heavier — a legionary gladius, sheathed in bronze and bound with sun-etched rings along the grip.

3. Gladius Solaris

Description: Wielded by a champion of the Solar Ordinem. Polished to mirror brightness, the blade shimmered faintly even in shadow.

Effect: The blade carries with it the power of the sun, its blade imbued with the ability to call forth light or heat through the cycling of mana.

Julius lifted it, feeling the warmth radiating from the steel as he poured some of his mana into the blade, a radiant warmth, but there was the feeling that if he were to push further the blade would be like it was on fire, scalding all who came close to the blade itself allowing for indirect injury even should one manage to dodge a strike from the blade.

Elheat.

He was already a hammer.

This would make him a hammer that shone.

Next came a more unusual object — a circular brass device, no larger than a book, composed of turning plates. It hummed with soft internal gears, as if it had never truly stopped moving.

4. The Censor of Bellarae

Description: A device used by the priest-scribes of the pre-unification cults. Once tied to census rituals, now bound to ambient soul-resonance.

Effect: Generates a tactical overlay for the user in battle. Range is limited to only 1km arround the bearer.

For Gallius.

No man in Julius's command used field scouts more efficiently.

With this in his hands, the enemy's flanks would never be safe again, and he would be assured as there would be a second within his ranks including himself with the ability to see the battlefield from a bird eye view.

And then… the final relic.

Unlike the others, it was not placed on cloth or pedestal.

It was embedded into the altar itself — a codex, its metal binding shaped like the spine of a lion, its cover bound in worn sun-dyed leather, held by three clasps of blackened gold.

When Julius reached for it, the clasps unlatched at his touch.

Not pulled.

Not pried.

They simply knew.

As he opened it, the System Interface bloomed like a silent explosion.

🜁 You have acquired a Lost Sovereign Relic:Codex Solaris | Voice of the CrownType: Imperial RelicSocket Slot:* [Throne / Crown]Status: CompatibleFunction: Sociopolitical Influence Engine

Effect:

When socketed into a compatible structure (Palace, Cathedral, System Core), the Codex allows for up to five Subliminal State Directives to be enacted over a designated citizen population depending on the rank of the socket it is placed within.

Current Socket Status: NoneDirectives Available: 5

Julius stared at the screen.

His grip on the codex tightened.

A relic that could influence millions — not with fire or law, but with quiet, persistent shaping of perception.

Not propaganda.

Not mind control.

But the subtle language of myth, memory, and suggestion.

This is what it means to rule, he thought.

And was the one relic recently he was seeking for more than anything.

With his years of conquering his territory had expanded massively, but with it his army had been stretched a bit thin, adding to it the dissedent uprisings contained within.

Thankfully his system could alert him to the worst of it, but even still having to commit full legions just to maintaining his hold over regions rather than leaving it to local forces whove sworn loyalty to the empire.

He flipped through the Codex's pages.

Empty.

But not blank.

Each sheet shimmered faintly under the torchlight — like it was waiting to be written.

Julius could feel it: this was not a tool for generals.

This was a tool for emperors.

Having used this codex many times before in the game Julius was intricately aware of the powers it held, and while there was the minor boon capable to him now if he chose to socket the codex in the alter of the shrine, but to do so was a waste.

At best he'd be able to use one maybe two of the codex's passages, meanwhile if he found a proper socket point he could unleash all five possible passages.