Warhammer Survival Guide

Chapter 103 Shadows

After dealing with the spoils, Rowe arrived at the underground temporary maintenance area by the field.

The "Gluttony Wall" Chimera 1 is currently lurking in the depths of the shadows.

After a night of intense operation, the compound eyes on the front of the train appeared cloudy and restless.

The purple crystalline luster that originally flowed across the surface of the vehicle became dull and unclear, turning into an ominous scarlet.

It no longer resembles a machine.

It's more like a wild beast that has just gone through a fierce battle and is exhausted.

"Zzz."

The sound of the engine idling is no longer a steady roar.

A worker responsible for cleaning the mud off the tracks got a little too close.

The armor plates on the side of the vehicle suddenly burst open like scales.

Several hydraulic lines sprang out like predatory tentacles.

He slapped the air hard an inch from the laborer's nose.

The worker screamed and collapsed to the ground, his crotch instantly soaked.

"Back off! Everyone back off!"

Father Alpha, who was standing nearby, then issued a loud warning.

He waved his mechanical tentacles, dispersing the surrounding crowd, and said anxiously, "Advisor, its logic circuits are being overwhelmed by a primal hunger."

"The depletion of the repulsive field has drained its reserves, causing its energy level to drop by 30%."

"The machine spirit is currently in an extremely unstable predatory mode," it no longer distinguishes between friend and foe, and it craves sacrifices.

Living sacrifices of flesh and blood.

The priest pondered for a moment, then said with utmost seriousness, "The harvesting of Grey Mule No. 1 is over, and the historical mission of this machine has been completed."

"As a tech priest, I must offer my professional advice: physically destroy it before it gets completely out of control."

"This is about being responsible to Om Messiah, and also about being responsible for our own lives."

Hearing Alpha's words, Rowe was slightly surprised.

Since he successfully persuaded Father Alpha to raise and study the Wall of Gluttony, he has explicitly stated that it should be destroyed.

Lowe first took out a fragment of the Nurgle Amulet that he always carried with him from his pocket and felt it through the lead box.

The amulet did not generate heat.

This means that the restlessness is not due to the corruption of Nurgle, but simply biological hunger, which is why it said, "It's just hungry and needs more food."

More than ten minutes later, several laborers wearing hazmat suits approached, pushing a handcart with trepidation.

They stopped five meters away from the tank and ran away as if their lives depended on it.

The truck was loaded with a bunch of dark purple plant root nodules, twisted like tumors.

This was dug out from the root of "Wheat King", the most severely mutated variety of Grey Mule No. 1.

It contains the highest concentrations of Tylen biomass and heavy metal toxins.

In addition, several twisted and deformed gilded metal plates were piled on top of these root nodules:

The wreckage of young Valentine's luxurious command vehicle.

It contains some fragments of machine soul.

Standing outside the safety line, Luo Wei whispered to the steel beast, "Eat."

It seemed to have understood Rowe's instructions.

Or perhaps they were attracted by the smell of food.

The front armor of the Chimera 1 tank has cracked.

A barbed metal mouthpiece emerged from the gaps in the armor and greedily coiled towards the handcart.

"Click, creak."

The sounds of metal twisting and plant fibers cracking mingled together.

The root nodules, as hard as iron, were turned into powder by these mouthparts.

Several gilded metal plates were also mercilessly swallowed up and turned into its food.

As the feeding continued, the chariot's restless growls gradually subsided, returning to its normal rumble.

The originally murky scarlet color faded.

A deep purple sheen has re-covered the surface of the crystal.

A faint, dim light flowed along the welded seams of the vehicle body, gradually seeping into the interior.

Father Alpha's mechanical tentacles froze in mid-air, his voice trembling as he said, "Oh Messiah above! Look at this reading, its armor density is increasing. Not just the surface, it's generating—a biological endoskeletal structure!"

"It digested the silicified genes from the Tyran plants and absorbed the metal fragments from the wreckage, and is currently iterating itself!"

"The current armor strength is at least 15% higher than that of a standard chimera — but we have to destroy it."

Once Chimera One had calmed down, Rowe spoke up: "Alpha, let's talk in private."

Rowe walked into the shadows of the ruins.

There was a section of broken load-bearing wall there, which conveniently blocked the view of the surrounding laborers.

The priest remained silent for a moment, then followed.

As soon as he stopped, he said impatiently, "Advisor, this doesn't make sense. Even in those dark forging worlds sealed off by the Data Abolition Order, ordinary heretical modifications couldn't achieve this effect."

"Without the guidance of warp rituals, without the sacrifice of psionic souls, how could such blasphemous self-evolution be achieved through mere matter consumption?"

The priest's mechanical tentacles waved restlessly in mid-air.

"This reminds me of something I stumbled upon in the bottom layer of the Thirteenth Forbidden Library when I was studying on Mars—those records bound in human skin."

Lo Wei leaned against the broken wall, relaxed, and lit a cigarette.

He did not immediately interrupt the priest's outpouring, but listened quietly.

Lowe was not entirely ignorant about Father Alpha's past.

That was the confidential information he had obtained with dignity and risk during his last trip to the Spire of the Nest City, under the suffocating gaze of Chief Guard Lilith.

Lo Wei still remembers how the head guard, with his short, silver hair as sharp as steel needles, stared at him with the same look he had when examining a dead man.

She pushed a top-secret document, sealed with sealing wax, in front of Luo Wei: "Guarantee of Joint Liability for Heretical Technology".

"The file on Father Alpha is completely black, Advisor."

"In the Imperial Executive's taxonomy, black represents absolute taboo. It usually involves chaos, aliens, abominations, and scandals that certain high-ranking officials do not want others to know."

"If you want to know the contents, be prepared to be physically erased along with him. After all, knowing about this universe is itself a kind of original sin."

Without the slightest hesitation, Luo Wei signed his name immediately.

Because of what he did:

Whether it was privately breeding "Grey Mule No. 1" or raising this chimera named "Gluttony Wall".

Once the witch hunters of the Inquisition smell the scent, the entire Seventh Agricultural War Zone will be reduced to scorched earth.

Since they already have huge "debts", what's wrong with taking out another high-interest loan?

As long as you can ensure that your core technical partners are completely trustworthy, even if they are crazy.

Then, Lilith, the head of the guards, solemnly revealed a few words to him:

This humble technical priest, holed up on an agricultural planet repairing tractors, was once the chief apprentice of a radical sage at the Martian Forging Temple.

He was stripped of all his glory and implants, exiled here to eke out a living, simply for touching upon forbidden knowledge about alien technology fusion and the abhorrent nature of intelligent logic locks.

My thoughts returned to reality.

Luo Wei exhaled a smoke ring and asked calmly, "You mean the shadow of the 'Lord of the Soul Forge,' right?"

This code name is like a forbidden spell.

Father Alpha's body suddenly stiffened, and several servo robotic arms rose uneasily.

The cutting laser at the end, though not yet charged, was subtly pointing towards Luo Wei's vitals. He asked warily, "You know 'that being'?"

"That warp demigod who makes steel bleed and gears scream? That mechanical nightmare whose name even the Martian Forging General dares not utter?"

The priest's logic seemed to have collapsed, and he quickly said, "You're just a fourth-level clerk in the Abundance II Executive Yuan. Even with the title of 'advisor,' your level of authority is still that of a mortal!"

"How could you possibly know these things? Dark archives that only high-ranking Martian sages have the right to access after signing the Soul Firewall Protocol?"

"This is non-compliant; this is a serious violation of the sacred Data Classification Act!"

Faced with the priest's almost stressful questioning.

Lowe did not back down, nor did he show the slightest sign of panic or point the laser probe at himself.

He simply replied calmly, "I am someone who is used to auditing bad debts, Father."

"In the field of auditing, there is no such thing as non-compliance, only hidden liabilities that have not yet been disclosed."

Loewe did not give a direct answer.

Instead, they invoked the universal logic of their profession, offering a dubious explanation.

He bet on this former apprentice of the radical sage, who, despite his fear of the destruction that the name "Vashtor" represented, possessed a radical, mad thirst for knowledge and was obsessed with an unknown, entirely new logical model.

Fear can make people retreat.

But curiosity can drive a priest to see the truth inside the box, even at the cost of his life.

Of course, if this reason cannot be logically verified by the priest—

Luo Wei silently added alternative plans in his mind:

The blame is shifted to Governor Alicia, implying that this is a fragment of an ancient tradition passed down by a family of traveling merchants.

If the priest remains inflexible, then the final interpretation right will have to be invoked:

Shamelessly claiming that in last night's dream, he received revelation from a divine being on the golden throne.

After all, the idea of ​​"the emperor appearing in a dream" sounds absurd, but within the logic of the state religion, it is absolutely politically correct.

However, seeing the priest gradually getting stuck in a calculation loop, it seemed there was no need to use the excuse of alternative solutions.

"When I see strange patterns in the data for 'metal fatigue' and 'machine soul corruption' in the accounts, I start looking for the reasons," Rowe continued.

"I don't understand profound theology, but I understand induction. I know how to deduce the unseen variable from chaotic data."

Then, pointing to the Chimera 1 lying prone in the distance, he said in a deep voice, "Alpha, you've always wanted to destroy it because you're afraid. You believe it's sliding into the abyss of the 'Shadow of the Forge.'"

"Even if it exhibits properties that combat the Nurgle plague, in your rigorous logic circuitry, this is just another form of decadence, a self-destructive tactic of robbing Peter to pay Paul, right?"

Father Alpha remained silent for a long time, finally lowering his tentacles in dejection, and answered weakly and wearily, "Yes—the corruption of 'that being' often begins with the flesh-and-blood transformation of metal."

"I have seen machines contaminated by it. They would ooze a mixture of machine oil and pus, and the machine spirit would scream in pain, eventually turning into a monster that devours everything."

"This Chimera, its performance is too similar, it's practically a textbook example of a harbinger of decline."

Luo Wei took another drag of his cigarette and asked, "So, this is why you secretly apply the highest purity holy oil to it every night while I'm resting, even if it's beyond your capacity, to perform a purification ritual?"

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