The Sacred Purification Certificate

The battle was over.

But another, more hidden and deadly "war" had only just begun on this land.

A bureaucratic war.

In the face of this vast, despair-inducing Imperial machine, even survivors who had just crawled out of a mountain of corpses first had to learn to bow their heads before stacks upon stacks of yellowed parchment.

As a Rank 4 Scribe, Special Agricultural Advisor, and the de facto authority temporarily exercising the powers of Supervisor of Granary Seven,

Rovi had no time to catch his breath.

He had to force his brain, which had only just been calculating trajectories and Warp heat, back into the inefficient mode of processing paperwork.

Four whole hours.

He was trapped behind an oil- and bloodstained desk, like an emotionless stamping machine.

The head of the Sanitation Department was a scrawny old man wearing a Gas Mask, his words whistling through it.

He clutched a thirty-page Cadaver Decontamination Approval Application and droned on about the importance of the "standard incineration procedure."

Rovi had to grit his teeth and sign the form, adding a note:

"No incineration required. Use directly as raw material for Fermentation Vat Three."

The decision made the old man's eyes widen in horror, as if he were looking at a monster that had blasphemed against the gods.

Yet under Rovi's icy gaze, he still tremblingly stamped it with the red seal of approval.

At that moment, a memory of that afternoon flashed through Rovi's mind.

Back then, Supervisor Kase, as fat as a mountain of flesh, had also forced him to sign and stamp a fraudulent ledger riddled with holes.

Back then, he had been a lamb waiting to be slaughtered.

Now, their positions had been reversed.

The only difference was that back then, if he hadn't stamped the papers, Kase really would have found a chance to kill him and turn him into a pile of rotten meat.

Next came the Logistics Department's report.

Rovi drew a fierce red circle around the item for "additional fuel consumption."

He had to explain not only why the Heavy Logging Guns had consumed five times the standard amount of coolant,

but also invent a plausible reason for the Power Furnaces that had been scrapped due to overloading.

Something like "a short circuit caused by excessive environmental humidity."

Every word had to be carefully considered.

Every explanation had to stand up to scrutiny from the Ministry of the Interior's tax assessors in the future.

The person Rovi was most wary of was still the Ecclesiarchy's priest, Simon.

The plump man wore a deep-red robe embroidered with gold trim.

His Priestly Robe, which should have been sacred and solemn, was covered in spots of mud,

but he didn't care in the slightest.

He swung a Brass Censer in his hand. Its pungent medicinal fumes barely masked the sour stench clinging to him from years spent among the Slums.

"Praise the Emperor. This is a sacred victory, Advisor Rovi."

Father Simon walked into the office through the mud covering the floor.

His tiny eyes, squeezed into slits by rolls of fat, didn't look at Rovi. Instead, they scrutinized the supply list that had just been drawn up on the desk.

"I heard there were some... unusual 'miracles' on the battlefield?"

With a fat hand covered in cheap gemstone rings, he gestured toward the window and smiled knowingly.

"Some of the faithful told me that wall seemed alive. And those purple flames spouting from the gun barrels... They didn't look much like standard Imperial technology."

Rovi's heart jolted.

These priests weren't just messengers of the faith; they were also unofficial informants for the Ordo Hereticus.

If Simon so much as wagged his tongue and branded Rovi with "heretical technology" or "communing with Chaos,"

then even after saving the entire granary, he'd be tied to a pyre tomorrow.

His life

was now in the hands of this greedy fat man.

"That was the latest research from the Adeptus Mechanicus Priest Alpha, Father."

Rovi lifted his head, his gaze open and devout.

"It was the Omnissiah's reward to the faithful. To fight those filthy plague monsters, we need a fiercer wrath, don't we?"

"Of course, of course. Wrath is always a good thing." Father Simon chuckled, his little eyes darting between Rovi and the supply list. "But wrath needs fuel, just as faith needs offerings."

"The charity porridge at our church is nearly gone, and the poor faithful are still going hungry. If they get desperate enough, they may start having improper visions."

"Like mistaking those sacred Machine Spirits for the work of demons."

This was extortion.

And a tacit bargain.

Rovi understood.

Pay enough "hush money," and the Metal Wall was a "miracle." Pay too little, and it was "heresy."

"Two crates." Rovi held up two fingers, his voice calm. "Two crates of Special Synth-Starch Blocks. In addition, I'll donate fifty gallons of fuel to the church in the granary's name, for a 'Purification Ritual.'"

Father Simon's eyes lit up at once,

and his knowing smile turned into a satisfied, benevolent one.

"Ah, the Emperor will see your piety, Advisor."

He swiftly pulled a piece of parchment, already prepared, from his ample sleeve.

The bright red Ecclesiarchy Seal was already stamped on it—the Sacred Purification Certificate.

"Those Metal Walls are sacred, and those flames are pure. I have felt the Emperor's will."

The priest slapped the certificate onto the desk.

He grabbed two Material Requisition Forms and turned to leave, his steps light.

Rovi let out a long breath.

At least for now, he was safe.

Father Simon hadn't pressed the matter, which meant Rovi had temporarily passed the "Political Screening."

In this world,

greed was often more reassuring than fanaticism.

Because greed could be satisfied.

Fanaticism couldn't.

In this vast and bloated Imperial machine, efficiency was an ancient word, forgotten ten thousand years ago.

Only procedure—tedious, rigid, and sometimes absurd procedure—was an eternal truth.

Every document needed a signature.

Every decision needed a stamp.

Every damned process was like a rusted gate.

Unless you greased it with "bribes" or "threats," it wouldn't budge even if the sky fell.

By the time Rovi had finally signed the last name on the Wartime Temporary Special Allowance Distribution Form for Granary Seven

and escaped the department heads buzzing around him like flies, it was already deep into the night.

His wrist felt more sore than it had after holding a gun.

Fatigue made him want to lie down and rest.

Yet just as he was about to loosen his collar, a tightness that made his heart skip suddenly gripped his chest.

Then came a burning sensation.

The Amulet Fragment he had carefully hidden in his breast pocket, sandwiched between Double-Layered Lead Plates, was actually growing warm!

Rovi's gaze instantly hardened.

This fragment, torn from the corpse of a Follower of Nurgle,

was a twisted creation of Chaos.

It was a medium the Followers of Nurgle used to recognize one another and sense "blessings."

Rovi had been treating it like a Geiger Counter, using it as an early warning system.

Whenever abnormal Rotting Power stirred nearby, it reacted like a needle encountering a magnet, generating a little heat.

But according to the monitoring of the Kais Wetware Server, the plague army had already retreated from the surrounding area, and even the Spore Concentration in the air was falling.

If there was no threat outside...

then the only possibility was that it was inside.

In the place where the Warp Crystal was stored, where a Blasphemous Experiment had been conducted.

The simple deduction banished all traces of sleepiness in an instant.

Rovi didn't hesitate.

He quickly straightened his slightly wrinkled uniform and fastened the collar clasp.

He strode toward the Elevator leading to the Underground Bunker of the Seventh Repair Workshop.

The basement air was even more stagnant than the air outside.

It was thick with the damp heat of leaking High-Pressure Steam and the burnt stench of overheated metal.

The old, broken Grating Floor beneath his feet creaked again and again.

The six Heavy Logging Guns, modified through blasphemy and instrumental in the battle, had now turned completely into scrap.

Their barrels had melted completely, drooping limply over the firing ports like pools of hardened wax.

The High-Energy Plasma Stream had completely worn away the rifling inside, and the red-hot metal was slowly cooling with sharp little crackles.

The Warp Crystal, which had served as the core heat source inside the Water Tank, had also shattered.

All that remained was a heap of gray-white powder floating on the murky coolant.

Clearly, the Priest Alpha's repair work had failed.

It had not only destroyed the Heavy Logging Guns completely, but also shattered the Warp core, causing an outpouring of plague energy.

At that moment, the Adeptus Mechanicus Priest Alpha stood in the middle of the wreckage.

Several of his Mechanical Tentacles were gently wrapped around the melted gun barrels.

His movements were tender, as if caressing a lover's skin.

The red glow of his bionic eye was fixed and unchanging.

It wasn't scanning data as usual; instead, it held a dazed, entranced look.

"Such perfect repair and evolution..."

A delirious murmur, crackling with electrical interference, came from the priest's voice synthesizer.

"The sacred union of organic and inorganic... This is the Omnissiah's revelation..."

"Heat, life, steel—they were always meant to be one..."

A horrifying "sense of bliss" was spreading through the Tech-Priest's logic circuits.

Rovi's pupils contracted slightly.

He glanced at the ashes in the Water Tank, his mind racing as he reached an unsettling conclusion:

After he had modified the Warp Crystal into an energy source, it had also become a trap.

It wasn't just providing heat.

It was also subtly implanting some kind of "grand harmony of life" cognitive code in its user through the data interface.

And the Priest Alpha, as the one in direct contact with it, had clearly been infected by the "Digital Plague."

Rovi had to hurry back to the office.

When he returned, he was carrying the Silver Suitcase from the Governor's airdrop.

The Clarity Agent inside had long since been used up by the Defense Force officers.

But one empty bottle still had the last few drops of pale blue liquid at the bottom.

He walked up behind the priest.

He didn't hesitate for a moment.

He suddenly reached out, grabbed the Main Data Cable at the back of the priest's neck, the one connected to his Nerve Center,

and yanked hard.

"Zzt!"

Sparks flew.

At the same time, Rovi splashed the last few drops of cold medicine directly onto the half of the priest's human face that remained.

"Wake up, Alpha!"

Rovi warned him sternly.

"This is a virus, not repair or evolution!"

"Look at those guns. They're all ruined. What a load of crap about miracles—it's all Chaos excrement!"