Warhammer Cultivation: Cultivating the Tao Te Ching in the 40K Universe

It was more like a reality that had always existed here, but had been obscured by an invisible "veil," and now, finally, it revealed its true face to this already broken world.

With his arrival, an absolutely silent arena instantly spread outwards from him in all directions, like a silent tide, covering the entire battlefield!

The twisted, writhing steel corridor, before this Taoist aura of "harmony" and "balance," seemed to receive some supreme decree, slowly restoring its original geometric structure, filled with cold logic.

The unpredictable, sometimes overwhelming, sometimes weightless, chaotic gravity field, under the influence of this "dojo," returned to Necromonda's standard, heavy 1.2 times Terra gravity.

Even the foul smell in the air, filled with rust, blood, and chaotic stench, was completely purified by this invisible force field, restoring a refreshing freshness like that of a mountain forest after rain!

Hector Kane.

He simply stood there quietly, his dark, abyss-like eyes sweeping over the remaining Dao Guards who were now completely stunned by his appearance. A barely perceptible flicker of heartache, like a father seeing his child wronged outside, flashed in his eyes…

Then, his gaze turned to the Tzeentch wizard who was gripped by a profound sense of religious panic due to his inability to comprehend the scene before him.

He didn't act immediately. He simply slowly raised his eyes.

Those dark, abyss-like, calm pupils underwent a terrifying transformation! In the left eye, all light vanished, transforming into an eternal night that could devour everything, representing "yin" and "end." In the right eye, however, a warm, brilliant, platinum sun, like the first star at the dawn of creation, ignited, representing "yang" and "life force!"

In an instant, the entire world as seen by the wizard Tzeentch was "rewritten." The surface of reality was stripped away, revealing a far more real underworld constructed from countless cold, shimmering blue lines of "laws"!

Supernatural Powers – Understanding the Dao and All Things!

This is a completely new law-level divine ability that he has developed after advancing to the Golden Core stage. It was originally a technique called "Qi Observation" that could only passively "observe" but was now being used to actively "interfere" with reality.

He no longer merely "sees" the qi (vital energy). He can directly "deconstruct" the underlying principles that govern all things!

In the horrified "vision" of the treacherous sorcerer, he saw the mortal merely glance at him calmly. That single glance was like an irresistible "decree" from the very source of the universe, instantly declaring the "illegitimacy" of all his power!

The seven-colored robe he wore, woven from pure subspace energy and filled with paradoxes and lies, and the chaotic runes on it that constantly changed shape and possessed powerful protective abilities—in essence, those fragments of laws "borrowed" from the subspace and full of "change" and "possibilities"—were forcibly "expelled" from the real universe by that gaze!

The runes, like thieves whose lies have been exposed, screamed silently as they were stripped from the robes and vanished, reverting to strings of the most basic, meaningless energy and information!

"No...my power..."

The wizard let out a horrified scream! He tried to chant the incantation again, trying to draw once more the power to distort reality from that great, unspeakable master!

But he found that he had failed.

Chapter 151 Lies as the Foundation (Bonus Chapter 2)

His blasphemous incantation, capable of driving any mortal mad, was instantly "deconstructed" under Hector's calm gaze—every "syllable" it formed, and every "law" it linked to!

His mouth was open, and what came out of his throat was no longer the taboo words that could trigger a warp storm, but a series of meaningless, laughable "Ah...ba...woo..." sounds, like a baby learning to speak!

His connection with the evil god was completely severed from a "logical" level!

This is not a matter of suppressing one's aura.

This is a higher-dimensional, more profound form of law-based dimensional reduction attack, imbued with the essence of "Tao"!

It perfectly countered all of Tzeentch's power, which was based on "change" and "deception"!

Because, in the face of absolute "order", any "change" is merely a calculable "variable".

Those fanatical believers who were preparing to launch another attack, fearless of death, encountered an even more terrifying "divine punishment."

The chaotic runes on their bodies, drawn with blood and filth, that brought them false courage and power, were instantly "disproven" when that calm gaze swept over them, along with the false "faith" they were linked to!

The runes, like faded, cheap tattoos, have lost all their luster.

The "blessings" attached to the weapons in their hands, which were blessed by chaotic energy and shimmered with an ominous light, were forcibly stripped away! The weapons lost their luster and reverted to their original, rough and fragile nature, made of rusty steel and inferior plastic.

And the fanatical faith in their minds, instilled by the wizard and the "altar of lies" and filled with "happiness" and "hope," shattered like a burst bubble under that gaze!

Their connection with the evil god was completely severed at the level of "faith"!

"what--!!!"

A scream filled with confusion and fear came from the mouth of a traitor who was closest to Hector and had once been a Necromonda enforcer!

He looked at the power hammer in his hand, now devoid of all its chaotic brilliance, and then at his "comrades" around him, equally gripped by immense panic. The grand visions of "rebirth" and "change" in his mind were, in that instant, utterly shattered by the cold, cruel reality!

What he saw was no longer a great god and a bright future.

All he saw were filthy hands, stained with blood and betrayal, and an incomprehensible, godlike being who had somehow appeared before them.

"No...this isn't real...God...God has abandoned us..."

The collapse of faith is far more deadly than physical death.

The officer's spirit collapsed under the stark contrast between reality and lies. He let out a scream that sounded inhuman and filled with despair, dropped his weapon, and like a madman, turned and fled in panic into the depths of the twisted and dark labyrinth.

His collapse was like a spark thrown into a powder keg, instantly igniting the entire battlefield!

Panic, like a real plague, spread wildly among the fanatical believers who had lost the protection of "God"! They dropped their weapons, pushed and shoved each other, cried and screamed, like headless flies, trying to escape this terrifying realm of "silence" that had shattered their faith!

What should have been a bloody and brutal battle was ironically and completely dismantled in the mere dozen seconds following Hector's arrival, without a single drop of blood.

The entire battlefield returned to silence once again.

Only the Tzeentch wizard, who had completely lost all his power, and the cultists who were already terrified and collapsed to the ground, watched in despair, like prisoners awaiting their final judgment, at the figure that was slowly walking towards them, like the embodiment of death.

The entire battlefield returned to silence once again.

But this tranquility was not the absolute "order" of harmony that accompanied Hector's arrival. Rather, it was a deeper, more unsettling, deathly stillness before the storm.

Those fanatical believers, stripped of their "god's" protection, collapsed like puppets whose strings had been removed, onto the purified, cold alloy deck. They weren't dead, but their souls had long since been reduced to shattered ruins by the violent impact of the collapse of their faith. They simply stared blankly, numbly, at the two "gods" before them, beings they couldn't comprehend, about to engage in their final showdown.

Tzeentch, the wizard who not long ago seemed like a mastermind, now knelt pathetically before the ruins of the "Altar of Lies," now devoid of all its brilliance. His once magnificent, multicolored robes were now dull and lifeless, like a pathetic costume stripped of all its color. His enormous wings, composed of pure psionic flames, flickered in and out of focus, as if they might be extinguished at any moment, their connection to their master forcibly severed.

For the first time, his face, which was covered with countless small, constantly blinking eyes full of wisdom and malice, revealed pure, undisguised horror and... rage!

"You...what did you do?"

His voice was no longer that seductive tone, a composite of billions of different lies. It was a more primal, more real, hoarse roar, like that of a wounded beast: "How dare you... how dare you sever my link with the great 'change'? You... blasphemer! You... worm of order!"

Hector did not answer.

He simply walked silently, step by step, toward the already shattered altar. Each step he took was like the most precise musical note, treading on this desolate battlefield, playing a silent symphony called "The End." His strange eyes, one like eternal night and the other like a star, calmly gazed at the chaotic creation before him, which had completely lost all pretense.

“Your ‘change’ needs a ‘foundation’.” Hector’s voice, though not loud, echoed clearly in the empty factory, like the most composed scholar explaining the simplest truth to his student. “And I have simply removed your false foundation built on ‘lies’.”

"lie?!"

The wizard seemed to have heard the most ridiculous joke in the universe, and he let out a neurotic, shrill laugh, “Foolish mortal! What do you know?! Lies and truth are just two sides of the same coin! So are order and chaos! Without lies, where is the truth? Without chaos, where is the order?”

“What I believe in is the most fundamental truth of the universe! It is ‘possibility’! It is ‘infinity’! And you…” His countless small, malicious eyes were fixed on Hector, filled with the deepest hatred for “stillness”, “…you represent ‘stagnation’! You represent ‘end’! You represent ‘death’! You are the greatest ‘heretic’ in this universe!”

Chapter 152 Illusion Formatting (Bonus Chapter 3)

What he said was not just a simple roar.

Each syllable contains a paradoxical and distorted, most vicious logical virus! It attempts to drag Hector's Daoist heart, filled with absolute "order," back into that quagmire of relativism and nihilism, belonging to the Tzeentch school!

However, Hector did not pause in his steps.

“You’re right, wizard.” His answer surprised the other man. “Order and chaos are indeed two sides of the same coin.”

“But,” he said slowly, raising his right index finger, “you seem to have forgotten something.”

"Between these two, there exists... an 'observer'."

The moment he finished speaking, the wizard Tzeentch's expression changed drastically!

He could clearly feel an indescribable, even larger and more unstoppable will pressing down on him from all directions!

He's desperate!

He knew that any conventional psionic attack was meaningless in the face of this monster that could directly "deconstruct" the laws of nature!

His only chance of winning was to use himself, along with the "Resonance Obelisk" that was already bound to his soul, as the final "fuel" to pry open the grandest and most uncontrollable... ultimate illusion that was enough to drag the entire Lower Nest into the abyss of the warp!

He wanted to drag Hector into a logical hell he had woven himself, one from which he could never escape, filled with ultimate paradoxes!

"Come! Mortal!" the wizard roared in a final, desperate, and mad cry. "Let me show you what kind of 'perfect' future your ridiculous 'order' will ultimately bring to this universe!"

His body, along with the resonant obelisk behind him, constructed from countless discarded mechanical parts, the flesh and blood of living people, and some unknown alien crystal, instantly transformed into a soaring torrent of psionic energy filled with seven-colored light, which crashed fiercely into Hector's seemingly unprepared soul!

"boom--!!!!!"

The real world, like a calm lake surface tossed with a stone, shattered with a deafening roar! It transformed into countless points of light, vanishing without a trace!

Immediately afterwards, a completely new, vast, and boundless "reality," filled with a sense of fate and tragedy, took its place!

Hector found himself standing alone in an ocean of absolute, pure, and flawless light.

Here, there is no sky, no earth, no matter, no energy. There is only the purest, eternal stillness, filled with "order" and "harmony".

He could "hear" a familiar melody, full of the essence of the "Tao," echoing from the deepest part of that ocean of light. It was the "Taoist Canon: Qi Refining Scroll," which he had compiled himself. At this moment, it resonated eternally in this newborn world, like the background music of the universe.

Then, scene after scene unfolded slowly before him, as if it were a pre-ordained script.

He saw Robert Guilliman, in the distant city of Macragge, home of the Ultramarines, solemnly awarding a massive, pure gold copy of the Daoist Canon: The Golden Elixir Scroll to his most elite warriors. The warriors' faces no longer held the fortitude of warriors, but only an absolute calmness, like that of the most precise machine gunners.

He saw that, above the frozen world of Fenris, Leman Ruth was forcing his wild, wolf-like offspring to sit cross-legged, reciting over and over the mantra, "If the heart is pure, the sky will not fall." The wolf howls that were once full of wildness and glory had been replaced by a suffocating silence filled with "reason."

He even saw himself, dressed in a platinum robe symbolizing supreme power, in the magnificent imperial palace of Terra, replacing Makado as the sole "Master" beside the emperor. And on the golden throne, the human monarch's golden eyes, burning with endless weariness, had lost all their light, leaving only an eternal stillness, like absolute zero.

Under the guidance of his "Tao," the entire galaxy has achieved unprecedented "harmony" and "unity."

There was no more war, no more betrayal, no more chaos.

There was only one...dead silence, eternal, without any "variables"...perfection.

"Look, Hector Kane!"

The wizard's voice, like an omnipresent and mocking "voice of God," resounded throughout this perfect world.

"This is the ultimate form of 'order' you seek! A world... devoid of any pain, yet also... devoid of any 'surprise'! A... perfect... prison where everyone has become a 'copy' of you!"

“Tell me, great ‘Dao Lord’!” The voice, carrying an ultimate paradox capable of driving any seeker of the Dao mad, pierced Hector’s heart: “You, in your attempt to eradicate ‘Chaos,’ have ultimately transformed yourself into another… more terrifying, absolute ‘Chaos’!”

"What is the essential difference between your 'way' and the 'way' of my Lord?!"

This is Tzeentch's most vicious and unsolvable ultimate trick!

It is not your enemy.

It makes you your own worst enemy!

It uses the "order" you yourself pursue to construct a perfect "hell" that you can't refute!

However, Hector's face remained expressionless in the face of this ultimate illusion, which was enough to shatter the moral compass of any Primarch.

He simply gazed quietly at the perfect yet utterly empty world before him, constructed from his own "Tao."

Then, he slowly shook his head.

"You still don't understand."

His voice, though not loud, was clear and resonated throughout this "perfect" world that he should have ruled.

"You think you've imitated my 'form'. But you'll never understand my 'spirit'."

He slowly raised his right index finger.

There was no energy fluctuation or resonance of any law on that finger.

It merely points to the single, and most fatal, "logical loophole" within this seemingly flawless, perfect illusionary world.

That was... "himself".

An "observer"... possessing independent will, not belonging to this "perfect" picture...

"The 'Tao' has never been used to 'construct' the world, wizard." Hector's voice carried an absolute calm after profound enlightenment. "It is used to... 'understand' the world."

“You used my ‘order’ to construct a ‘static’ universe. But you forgot that the true ‘order’ is, in essence, ‘continuous life’.”

As soon as he finished speaking, his strange eyes, one like eternal night and the other like a star, slowly opened once more!

The new supernatural power—"Dao Jie·Wanxiang"—is activated once again!

This time, he is not deconstructing the enemy.

But it was... himself!

He instantly deconstructed and restored that seemingly flawless illusory world, just as a program whose underlying code vulnerability had been discovered, from the most fundamental level of "laws"!

He "saw" it!

He saw that this seemingly perfect ocean of "light" was, in essence, nothing more than a huge "information field" projected by the core of the "Resonance Obelisk" and that unknown strange crystal!

He saw that those so-called "futures" were nothing more than a "mental model" full of logical traps, formed by a wizard who stole his deepest "concerns" about Guilliman, Ruth, and the Emperor, and then "distorted" and "amplified" them in the most vicious way!