Chapter 280– Dune! The Legend of the Messiah! The God Emperor!
Dune!
When the newly unlocked instance turned out to be Dune, Li Ang froze for a moment, just as he had when he first saw the Halo instance—this was definitely unexpected.
Based on his predictions, the next instance should've been something like the Star Wars universe, or perhaps a romp through The Three-Body Problem with a creationist twist.
Maybe even Transformers, so he could pick himself a shiny yellow Bumblebee to cruise around in.
But if it was the Dune universe—well, that meant he was in for some real mental gymnastics and hard work.
The good news was, the Dune instance wasn't all that difficult. At least on paper, its forces were far weaker than the Covenant from Halo.
If he wanted to bulldoze through the Dune universe with sheer brute force, it would pretty much be a walk in the park.
The bad news? If he wanted to integrate this universe using Universal Corporation's current systems and model, things could get tricky.
Because the societal structure in Dune was fundamentally different. Most universes featured Earth governments or united planetary governments. But Dune? Dune ran on a combination of feudalism and theocracy.
To the nobles and common folk in that world, only a prophesied "Messiah," a "God Emperor," could ever be accepted as the legitimate ruler of humanity—someone who would lead them toward a brighter future.
Clearly, within the Dune worldview, people placed more faith in divine destiny than themselves. They believed in a true chosen one who could "carry" them to salvation.
Which meant, if Li Ang wanted to unify the Dune universe, he had no choice but to become that one and only "God Emperor + Messiah + Chosen One."
Even if he had no intention of becoming emperor, he'd be forced into the role. Otherwise, the people wouldn't buy into the Universal Corporation model at all.
"Tch… This really screws me over."
Li Ang shook his head with a sigh. He'd originally wanted to interact with the people of Dune simply as an Executor. But looking at the situation now, he'd have to crown himself as their Emperor whether he liked it or not.
After all, if Halo's narrative hook was taking over the mantle of the Reclaimers, then Dune's was undoubtedly becoming the prophesied "Messiah."
With that thought, Li Ang closed the system panel and walked alone to the floor-to-ceiling window of the headquarters' upper floor, gazing down over the full expanse of Night City. He began to recall the story of Dune.
At first glance, Dune seemed like a long and distant epic. But if you really boiled it down, the core of its story wasn't all that complex.
In fact, it was a bit… barren, even.
Think: Julius Caesar + a bunch of social-climbing noblewomen bouncing around, throw in some mystical Messiah prophecies, and mix it all together with a "tyrannical emperor versus rebellious upstarts" kind of stew.
The Dune universe starts like any classic sci-fi tale: humanity reaches the interstellar age, overpopulation kicks in, and colonization becomes necessary.
But during this golden age of expansion, something nasty happens—an AI uprising.
This AI rebellion traumatized the people of Dune. Following the "eliminate the root of the problem" philosophy, they made an extreme decision:
They abandoned AI altogether—and built a completely different "computing" system.
That's right. The Dune humans took a very… skewed path down the tech tree.
Thanks to the discovery of "spice" on the planet Arrakis, they managed to create "human computers" using this substance—individuals trained to replace AI and computers altogether.
Yup, in the Dune universe, humans became the computers—wild as that sounds, it actually worked.
These human computers were known as "Mentats." This group possessed extraordinary cognitive powers, capable of immense calculations and logical reasoning. They were basically human-shaped AIs.
Oh, and sometimes they moonlighted as assassins—because hey, the more skills the better.
But creating these Mentats required spice. And spice, as it happened, was only found on Arrakis. Nowhere else. One planet, one source.
And the benefits of spice? Practically infinite: enhanced perception, unlocked supernatural abilities, extended lifespan—you name it. It was basically the original raw ingredient for cultivating immortality.
Naturally, something this valuable became the plaything of the elite. Spice was monopolized, divided up, and jealously guarded by noble families.
And with no AI or computers, the average citizen's access to information remained primitive—hearsay, oral tradition. Their worldview remained medieval.
They still believed in myths like the "Messiah."
Enter Paul Atreides—the protagonist of Dune, born to House Atreides.
Dad's a regional duke. Mom's a high-ranking member of the Bene Gesserit, a powerful order of politically savvy "socialites." So naturally, Paul is handsome and highly capable.
Speaking of the Bene Gesserit—their ultimate goal was singular: to create the perfect human.
Literally. Create a person.
These "courtesans" traveled around marrying into powerful families, mixing bloodlines, all in the hopes of producing the ultimate "Messiah."
This Messiah wasn't just some legend—he'd be the King of Prophets, capable of seeing the future, boasting sky-high IQ, and exuding overwhelming destiny-level plot armor. His name? Kwisatz Haderach.
Now, no one quite knew why the Bene Gesserit thought they could just… engineer a prophesied king, but that didn't stop them from working tirelessly—door-to-door delivery style—with top-tier "customer service."
Thanks to Lady Jessica's "participation," Paul was born.
And you had to give it to the Bene Gesserit—these ladies weren't just stunning, they were also intelligent, cunning, and well-trained in both mind and body.
With a lineage like his, Paul came stacked with bloodline buffs, social standing buffs, and—of course—a pretty face.
You can't have an ugly Messiah, after all. His good looks helped spread the whispers: This one looks like a true king…
Whether orchestrated or not, the rumors began to snowball.
Then came Emperor Shaddam. Looking at Paul's family—nobles with growing power, swirling rumors of destiny—he got nervous.
The Atreides were a threat. So Shaddam convinced the Harkonnen family, long-standing enemies of House Atreides, to take them out.
The Harkonnens, already itching to crush the Atreides, jumped at the chance. But they botched the job—Paul and Lady Jessica managed to escape deep into the desert.
And we all know what happens when you don't finish the job—spring winds bring new life.
Paul used his Messiah identity to rally the desert Fremen, building a formidable force and eventually toppling the evil Emperor Shaddam.
At this point in the story, Dune seems like a fairly typical Messiah tale with some overused "chosen bloodline" tropes.
But as Li Ang's memory dug deeper, he recalled how much wilder things got later on—Dune's plot didn't just stop at rebellion and revenge.
After toppling Shaddam, Paul crowned himself Emperor of the galaxy.
But the other noble families weren't having it.
Where did this little punk come from? It's bad enough he killed the Emperor, now he wants the throne too? Just because he's handsome? What's the military for, then?
Clearly, in every version of humanity across the multiverse, the noble elite don't buy into "Messiah" stories.
Might makes right!
Paul's "Messiah" bloodline as justification for the throne? Most noble houses thought it was a joke.
Like hell we believe those Bene Gesserit floozies could birth a prophesied king! That narrative might work on peasants—but trying to fool us with that crap? Not happening.
"Oh sure, because Lady Jessica's womb is diamond-encrusted, she gives birth to you and suddenly you get to be Emperor? The rest of us are just chopped liver?"
"You shameless brat. You're dead."
And so began an epic interstellar holy war—an earth-shattering, sky-splitting conflict that killed off hundreds of billions and wiped out more than a hundred planets.
By now, Paul had awakened full precognitive powers, and he was quite confident in his role as Emperor. His visions of the future told him he was destined for the throne.
And if anyone doubted that?
Then war it was.
To legitimize his rule and establish absolute control, Paul created a new theocratic empire—melding religion and government—and crowned himself as High Priest.
"This script… they sure didn't try hard to hide the Caesar parallels. Is this entire plot just a Caesar template remix!?"
---
At this point, Li Ang couldn't help but complain to himself—so many years had passed, and those Westerners were still hung up on the old Roman Empire.
In short, Paul used his iron-fisted tactics to unify the stars and become the sole God-Emperor.
But after consolidating his control over the interstellar domains, Paul had a prophetic vision of his own assassination. Any normal person would take precautions to avoid getting killed, and Paul did exactly that. But he quickly realized that the assassination attempts never stopped—they came one after another, every single day. The constant paranoia was driving him to the brink.
In the same situation, Emperor Qin Shi Huang would've said, "No big deal, just tighten up security."
But Paul believed it was his destiny—and destiny, like the prophecy that made him Emperor in the first place, was unchangeable.
Clearly, this was a textbook example of self-fulfilling prophecy.
One of the most outrageous things Paul ever did was using prophecy to foresee that his wife would die in childbirth.
A normal person faced with that kind of foresight would've either prepared for a difficult delivery in advance or simply decided not to have the child at all.
But Paul insisted on watching it happen—he let her die in labor, and when faced with the choice between saving the mother or the child, he chose the child.
This cause-and-effect belief, born of his prophetic visions, made later generations almost religiously obsessed with prophecy.
A power that could've been used to avoid danger and pursue fortune was reduced to a glorified gimmick.
Eventually, Paul got tired of it all. He handed power over to his younger sister Alia and his son Leto Atreides, and retreated into the desert for early retirement.
However, Alia was a power-hungry strongwoman who got addicted to being Empress. She wasn't ready to let go—and even plotted to kill her own nephew.
In response to this blatant backstabbing, Leto fled into the desert and fused with the sandworms, transforming into a new generation of God-Emperor with unmatched power and intellect.
And then, the "prophesied savior" of legend somehow turned out to be Paul II—Leto Atreides.
By now, Li Ang's brow was tightly furrowed. These kinds of after-the-fact prophecies were clearly the work of the Bene Gesserit priestesses manipulating public opinion.
It was all about inflating the "B" value to gold-plate themselves, so they could infiltrate the elite class and wield influence. Marry a Bene Gesserit woman, and boom—you just might father a "savior"!
Just like that, fully buffed Leto followed in his father's footsteps and became the invincible God-Emperor, walking the Golden Path and ruling the galaxy for 3,000 years.
Of course, Dune's story didn't end there.
Under the manipulative control of the Bene Gesserit, the legend of the savior continued. These women cooked up a new strategy: "Everyone gets a turn at being Emperor—my womb's next!"
They painted Leto as a tyrant and claimed a new savior was on the way!
And just like his crazy father, Leto, having foreseen his own assassination through prophecy, chose an utterly abstract way to face it—
He actively became a tyrant, provoking the rebels into killing him and ending his reign, all to usher in a new beginning.
By now, Li Ang was seriously starting to suspect that spice might just be a hallucinogen. No sane person would deal with assassination threats like that.
Maybe so-called prophecy was nothing more than psychological manipulation by the Bene Gesserit.
After all, if you look at the whole Dune saga, the biggest winners were those seductive witches of the Bene Gesserit!
And in fact, that's exactly what happened.
After Leto was assassinated, chaos broke out once more. One faction after another took the stage, all awaiting the next "savior."
But this time, the Bene Gesserit didn't even bother with the act—they skipped the whole "give birth to a messiah" thing and just nominated someone directly.
They pushed forward the Reverend Mother Murbella and the new savior Sheeana. Their names didn't matter—the important part was that both were Bene Gesserit!
These two women carefully balanced the power blocs and assured the masses, "Alright everyone, settle down. From now on, no more God-Emperors. We'll run things with two co-rulers. Isn't that beautiful?"
And so, Dune's storyline finally drew to a close. These extremely abstract plot twists stacked on every "Holy Mother" trope the West had to offer.
"A bunch of women using their ancient seduction skills dismantled the God-Emperor's galactic empire and pulled off dual rulership? That's next-level ops!"
Having reviewed the entire plot of Dune, Li Ang's brow was now deeply furrowed. This kind of zero-cost enterprise pulled off to such extremes was practically a textbook case in elite strategy.
Using the "savior child" scam, they sweet-talked the upper class into marrying Bene Gesserit women, all just to gamble on birthing a messiah.
That's some high-level game right there.
After calming his thoughts and setting aside those absurd plot points, Li Ang admitted that Dune did present some truly impressive technological concepts.
For instance, the Holtzman faster-than-light engine built on subatomic interaction theory, the Mentat human computers, and a range of bizarre biological creations.
Spice, for example, as a rare and valuable substance, could easily be a best-seller in any galactic trade network!
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