A-3 test plot, located at the edge of the Eastern Granary.
It stood right beside the towering windbreak wall.
It had once been a barren stretch of saline-alkali soil.
The earth was a sickly grayish white.
Twenty-four hours earlier, Rovi had ordered the specially treated "premium fertilizer" dumped into the Irrigation Canal:
A dark green slurry made from the ground-up remains of Genestealer hosts, acid, and a bacterial culture.
Now, Rovi had come to see the results.
He stood on the ridge between the fields, his boots sinking into the soft, damp soil.
The sight before him was enough to make any agricultural expert from Holy Terra faint on the spot.
They might even call for Exterminatus from the Ordo.
The wheat had sprouted.
It hadn't simply pushed through the soil.
It had erupted.
In just one day and night, dense vegetation had already covered the once-bare furrows.
Yet this was no sign of vitality and hope.
The wheat stalks were absurdly thick, their surfaces crisscrossed with tiny purplish-red veins.
The leaves were broad and fleshy, their edges lined with tiny serrations.
Under the pale glow of the temperature-controlled lamps, they reflected a leathery sheen.
Rovi crouched and reached out to nudge one of the seedlings.
It felt cold and slick, with an unsettling toughness.
"Rustle—"
When he touched the leaf, the surrounding seedlings seemed to sense something and rustled in perfect unison.
It didn't sound like wind sweeping through a field of wheat.
It sounded more like countless tiny insects chewing.
"Growth efficiency has increased twentyfold!"
Rovi withdrew his hand, a little sticky sap clinging to his fingertips.
He didn't seem bothered. He even held them beneath his nose and sniffed.
There was no fresh, vegetal scent.
Only a faint smell of rust.
"Also, it's highly resistant to adverse