The galaxy, Segmentum Obscurus, Cheslatan, the human colonial outpost on the main continent.
Bright, dappled golden-yellow light fell through the windowpanes onto the floor, and a gentle breeze drifted in through the door.
Bare-chested and wearing trousers, Fu Qinghai sat on the edge of the bed and turned to look outside. A dazzling star hung in the sky, a little larger than the sun.
He had been in this world for a week.
More precisely, one standard Terran week.
He had more or less figured out the situation he was in.
Fu Qinghai was currently in the Warhammer 40K universe.
Warhammer 40K was a popular culture IP created by the British company Games Workshop. Its first tabletop wargame had been released in 1987, and it was a long-established, distinctive franchise with a huge following both in China and abroad.
Fu Qinghai had, of course, heard a little about it.
He had spent a week trying to recall the Warhammer 40K games he had played and novels he had read in his previous life, hoping to work out a way forward based on his current circumstances.
He was now on a colony planet called "Cheslatan." The Imperium had first discovered this uncivilized world, uninhabited by any intelligent life, during the Great Crusade. Its Imperial designation was 17-974.
That meant it was the 974th planet discovered and conquered by the 17th Expedition Fleet. "Cheslatan" was the name given to it by its colonists.
Though it was an uncivilized world, Cheslatan was neither too close to nor too far from its star. It had surface water, an oxygen-rich atmosphere, and a dry, pleasant climate. It was a rare, Terra-like planet. Even without considering the minerals that might lie underground, its existing conditions made it well suited to becoming an Agri World.
The Imperium's administrative departments could build biological farming facilities directly on the planet, without paying the enormous cost of altering its surface environment.
The only drawback was that Cheslatan lay on the edge of Segmentum Obscurus, a little far from the densely populated systems where humanity was active.
So, after surveying the planet's natural environment, the 17th Expedition Fleet from the Blood Angels Legion exterminated a species of large, lizard-like creatures that, by the Space Marines' assessment, might pose a threat to human survival. They then notified the nearest Hive World to send a colony ship to planet 17-974, left behind a few unfortunate administrators, and hurried off to the next world waiting to be conquered.
Levant Hive, the nearest Hive World to Cheslatan, began sending colony ships there. But after the first ship completed its long Warp voyage and reached the planet, a violent Warp Storm suddenly began to engulf the entire sector. Astropathic Communication with the Hive World was cut off, and no word ever came from the colonization fleet that followed.
One colony ship and its more than six thousand colonists were left stranded on this remote, uncivilized planet, all alone in the distant reaches of space.
It had been two years.
Fortunately, the Space Marines had thoroughly cleared away all the potential threats on the planet. With the climate suitable for human life, the first colonists had settled there, though anxious and unsettled by the prolonged raging of the Warp Storm.
Inside a simple little house built of ochre-colored concrete, Fu Qinghai got out of bed and walked over to the full-length mirror, looking at the figure reflected in it.
He was a handsome young man with black hair and black eyes, his features bearing a strong resemblance to his previous self. His skin was fair, his nose straight, and his eyes deep-set. Compared to someone of traditional East Asian appearance, there was also a hint of mixed heritage about him. He had a broad frame, stood over six feet tall at just seventeen, and had the faint outlines of muscles despite never having trained.
A handsome, clever young man with a quick mind, a strong body, and great potential—more charismatic than Johnny Chan, with a face that rivaled Daniel Wu's and a physique that outclassed Takuya Kimura's.
In the Warhammer 40K universe, there was one simple, universal term for someone like him—
A mortal.
A creature that could die by the billion in any one of the Imperium of Man's countless localized conflicts.
In the Warhammer 40K universe, the galaxy was dark and cruel.
"A-Luo! A-Luo, come eat!" a familiar, cheerful voice called from outside.
A short-haired girl with blue eyes bounced in. She didn't so much as blink at Fu Qinghai's bare chest, but grabbed his arm and pulled him toward the door. "Come on, let's eat."
Snapped out of his thoughts, Fu Qinghai hurriedly grabbed a shirt from the bed, only to be dragged out of the room by the girl.
As he stepped outside, the metal door behind him closed automatically. Now dressed, Fu Qinghai found himself on an ochre-colored street where people strolled in twos and threes, occasionally lifting their face coverings to shield themselves from the fine dust carried by the wind.
The climate on Cheslatan's main continent was a little hotter and drier than in most places on Earth. Its vegetation wasn't particularly lush, but by the standards of the galaxy, this was already an exceptionally livable climate.
The girl led Fu Qinghai to a low building where food was handed out. They collected their standard rations, found a corner, and ate while listening to the girl chatter about what had happened at the outpost while Fu Qinghai had been unconscious.
Since the first colony ship had carried a great deal of large-scale pioneering equipment rather than a large population, the outpost's mere three thousand inhabitants were insignificant compared to the planet's resources. Life there was relatively comfortable.
With no new bureaucrats arriving, the handful of administrators originally sent by the Expeditionary Fleet had become the outpost's highest-ranking officials. The ship's captain, stranded there with the rest, counted as one of its officials as well. Together, they had established a temporary system of governance.
No, it was already more than just "comfortable." At that moment, Cheslatan was practically a paradise in the cruel galaxy, an earthly Eden!
As mentioned earlier, the Warhammer 40K universe was dark and cruel. Most people lived far worse lives than humans had in the ancient days of Terra, and the Imperium of Man constantly faced attacks from alien creatures and the mysterious forces of the Warp.
Ordinary people on Hive Worlds and Forge Worlds either died fighting on the front lines against heretics and Xenos, perhaps without ever earning any recognition or even having their names remembered, or worked themselves to death in the lightless, polluted depths of a Hive City, subsisting their whole lives on Corpse Starch produced by the recycling system.
Compared to those two miserable fates, the isolated colonial outpost on Cheslatan, cut off by the Warp Storm, was a refuge in the cruel galaxy.
For now.
Unlike the bewildered people in the colonial outpost, Fu Qinghai knew exactly why the sudden Warp Storm had lasted so long.
The supreme military commander of the human Expeditionary Force—the Primarch and Warmaster Horus—had rebelled in the final stages of the Great Crusade, before it was even complete. Half of the Space Marine Legions had joined the rebellion.
The Chaos Gods in the Warp had seized the opportunity to raise Warp Storms, severing communications and travel between the various parts of the Imperium and the Space Marine Legions.
Fu Qinghai's new identity after his reincarnation was Locke. He had no surname, just one simple word.
It was a typical name for someone from the lower levels of a Hive City, as painfully plain as his orphaned past. He had won the chance to emigrate by drawing lots, thanks to the Planetary Governor's great generosity.
Of course, it was also possible that Levant Hive had reached the limit of its population capacity.
The blue-eyed girl was named Feiyi. She was an orphan too, but unlike Locke, who had boarded the colony ship as an orphan from the Underhive, Feiyi had once had parents: a pair of botanists who had lived in the middle levels of Levant Hive. The Imperial government had assigned them to study the plants and animals of a new world, but they had fallen ill and died during the exploration of the colony world.
During the long voyage on the colony ship, Feiyi's family had been very kind to Locke, who was an orphan. The two of them had ended up relying on each other at the colonial outpost. They were both orphans, but there was another reason they had stuck together—Feiyi was unpopular.
For no reason anyone could explain, everyone at the colonial outpost except Locke found the girl annoying and didn't want to be near her.
Recalling this, Fu Qinghai found it baffling. How could anyone dislike such a beautiful, kind-hearted girl?
With her ethereal yet slightly wild beauty and a height close to five foot seven at just fifteen, Feiyi could have become an Instagram beauty influencer with a million followers back on Earth, even without any particular talent. She wouldn't have needed Photoshop or makeup, either. She'd have had a bright future in modeling as well.
But Fu Qinghai didn't dwell on it. He had a more pressing problem to consider.
How could he get involved in the main storyline of humanity and the entire galaxy—the Horus Heresy?
Unlike in the previous universe, this time Fu Qinghai hadn't received a beginner's gift package that let him choose his side freely. He had been randomly assigned to the Emperor's faction.
Not bad. At least it was a faction he could win with his feet up, as long as no other Reincarnators interfered.
But when he remembered that the Reincarnators in the previous universe had even dared to target Iron Man—and had nearly succeeded—Fu Qinghai couldn't bring himself to feel relieved. How could there not be Reincarnators interfering?
Fu Qinghai concentrated, opening his attribute panel in his mind.
[Name: Fu Qinghai (True Name)
Reincarnation Number: 60731920
Race: Human (Void-born Human)
Height: 184 cm
Weight: 75 kg
Ability: Tony Stark Electronic Soul Backup (17% complete), bound to brain
Reincarnation Equipment: None
Assimilation Points: 124
World Anchor: X1
Reincarnation Lives: X2]
His name hadn't changed, and he had one fewer Reincarnation Life. The words "True Name" in parentheses gave him plenty to think about. Remembering fantasy novels he'd read in his previous life, he wondered if a "true name" might have something to do with certain magical rituals or curse techniques.
His species had changed, from an Earth-born human to a Void-born Human. Unlike with Earth-born humans, when Fu Qinghai focused his thoughts on the words "Void-born Human," an explanation appeared:
Over the course of humanity's long exploration of the universe, humans had gradually adapted to the microgravity environment and radiation of space. They had gained a degree of resistance to cosmic rays, and their tolerance for extreme acceleration had also increased.
It was a reasonable change. Fu Qinghai knew that ordinary humans couldn't spend long periods in space. In his previous life, research institutions had found that long-term exposure to the low-gravity environment of outer space could lead to all kinds of chronic illnesses. It affected eyesight and thinking, and caused genetic mutations, osteoporosis, muscle weakness, and a buildup of cerebrospinal fluid, among other things.
"Tony Stark Electronic Backup (17% complete), bound to brain."
And this was the reward Fu Qinghai had earned by sacrificing one life in the previous universe.
It was also why, as soon as he'd awakened in this universe, he'd been knocked unconscious by the pain.
A week ago, once Fu Qinghai had figured out what the new thing in his brain was, he'd been unable to contain his ecstatic excitement.
He knew that in the Marvel storyline, Iron Man had once made an electronic backup of his own brain. After the original Tony died, a data-based Tony Stark would often appear as a blue holographic projection and take part in the later events. At his most powerful, he had even come close to destroying the universe.
But those events had taken place mainly in the Marvel Ultimate Universe, Earth-1610, and other parallel universes. In the Marvel Cinematic Universe's storyline so far, Iron Man had never electronically cloned himself. So at first, Fu Qinghai hadn't made the connection.
Unexpectedly, Tony Stark had already begun planning to make an electronic backup of his brain in 2013 of the MCU. Perhaps it was also a result of the post-Battle of New York anxiety, and had been developed alongside the Ultron program.
As far as he could tell, the electronic cloning project was still far from complete, only 17% done. Yet when Fu Qinghai's thoughts reached into it, he discovered that it already contained a vast ocean of knowledge.
That was easy enough to understand. From Fu Qinghai's perspective, it would be very easy for Iron Man to back up his knowledge. Wouldn't he just need to build a database of knowledge files? Even a third-rate programmer could do that. Knowledge was dead, after all. No matter how vast it was, it was still just data.
But that wasn't artificial intelligence, much less an electronic soul. The real challenge of this electronic soul-cloning project was to digitize and clone Iron Man's feelings, personality, likes and dislikes, and the choices and judgments he would make in different situations. That was the core of this piece of black technology.
Fu Qinghai guessed that when the electronic soul backup was finally complete, knowledge and logic would account for no more than 30% of its data. The remaining 70% would be a copy of Iron Man's personality and emotions.
After all, there were countless intelligent people in the Marvel universe. What made Iron Man who he was wasn't simply his knowledge.
It seemed that Tony Stark hadn't yet found a way to solve the problem, so he had shelved the project for the time being.
As for how a hard drive's data port had connected to Fu Qinghai's brainstem, that was probably something the miraculous Reincarnation World could take credit for.
Fu Qinghai sent his thoughts into that vast sea of ideas, and fragments of knowledge surfaced and vanished in his mind.
It was a strange experience, like trying to recall a fragment of a memory, but unlike a memory, it wasn't hazy. Fu Qinghai could clearly feel that there was a whole ocean in his brain, cool and refreshing. Bubbles occasionally burst out of it, but when he tried to focus on one, to chase after it, it vanished.
Fu Qinghai gave up.
He felt a little discouraged.
What was the point of this? It said he had 17% of Iron Man's electronic backup in his brain, but that hadn't made him 17% Iron Man.
Fu Qinghai took a bite of his food and sighed, looking around in confusion.
Suddenly, he spotted a Servitor standing by the street not far away.
It was a squat, human-shaped creature, with nearly half its flesh replaced by various agricultural machines. It stood motionless at the roadside, staring blankly ahead, its back hunched as if the mechanical arms bolted onto its body were about to crush it.
Servitors weren't people. They were flesh-and-machine laborers, stripped of most of their brain function to serve as substitutes for artificial intelligence. They came from cloned organs grown in vats or from criminals, and were the foundation of the Imperium of Man's workforce.
That was why Fu Qinghai had used the word "standing" in his thoughts.
It had taken Fu Qinghai some time to get used to seeing Servitors as machines like fridges or washing machines, rather than as living people.
As he stared at the Servitor, a bubble suddenly burst in the unfamiliar sea of thought in his mind.
"Servitor laborer, mechanical-augmetic humanoid. Additional modification to hands: shallow drilling arms. Additional modification to left shoulder: high-powered floodlight. Additional modification to waist... Preliminary analysis: modifications exceed original load capacity; output insufficient... Possible modifications: 1. Remove shoulder... 2. Modify... 3. ..."
As Fu Qinghai watched, a jumble of information flashed through his mind. He had known nothing about how Servitor laborers were made, but the more he looked, the more convinced he became that something was wrong with this one. This part was off, that part wasn't working. He could improve it—and he felt a vague urge to take the machine apart and study it.
He shook his head, dismissing the impractical idea.
The outpost's officials seemed kind toward the people, but that was only because they needed to ensure the colonists survived. With communications and transport cut off, every person was valuable.
But the Servitors and all the large-scale pioneering equipment at the outpost belonged to the Imperial government. Fu Qinghai couldn't just take one and tinker with it. He was an uneducated Underhive pauper, not a Tech-priest of the Adeptus Mechanicus.
So that was it... Fu Qinghai thought, beginning to understand the "Tony Stark Electronic Backup (17% complete), bound to brain" ability.
He'd known it. A superpower connected to Iron Man couldn't be useless. He just needed to figure out how to use it.
Who would have thought that the alloy hard drive he'd pulled out on a whim would turn out to be Iron Man's electronic backup?
No wonder a mere hard drive had cost an enormous 7,012 Assimilation Points to assimilate... Fu Qinghai suddenly wondered if he was the legendary lucky one.
As the saying went, "If you want to get rich, bet big. Win, and you're living the high life; lose, and you'll start a new life in another world." Fu Qinghai thought happily.
"Hey, hey, A-Luo!" A slender little hand waved twice in front of Fu Qinghai's face. "Why are you grinning at the Servitor? Is your head still not right?"
"Uh..." Fu Qinghai collected himself and snapped out of it. "What were you saying?"
"I was saying something terrible happened at the outpost yesterday!" Feiyi said in a tone that suggested she was sharing a world-shaking secret.
"What happened? How bad was it?" Fu Qinghai asked casually.
"Do you remember what caused you to pass out?"
"Didn't you tell me I got hit on the head by a rock that fell from the sky?" Fu Qinghai asked, glancing at Feiyi in confusion. He wondered why she kept bringing up such rotten luck.
"Right. Later, Calvin and Zephyr figured out that a ship had crashed about two hundred kilometers from the outpost. That day, there had been lots of bits of metal and rocks falling from the sky. They even punched holes in some of the roofs at the outpost."
Calvin and Zephyr were the colonial outpost's administrators.
"Including the piece that hit your head," Feiyi added.
Why was she bringing that up again? "Then what? Didn't Calvin take a group to investigate? They came back and clamped down on information. They didn't say anything, and they wouldn't let anyone from the outpost go near the crash site."
Fu Qinghai already knew what happened next.
Feiyi lowered her voice. "I heard that the night before last, Cedric and his gang sneaked off to the ship."
"Oh?" Fu Qinghai paid closer attention.
"After Calvin and the others first went to inspect the crash site, rumors started going around the outpost that it was a warship from the Expeditionary Fleet. Nobody knew why Calvin had ordered the residents to stay away. Cedric and his gang had been going on about treasure-hunting inside the ship and finding weapons. They kept saying that if they got their hands on a bolter, they'd be set for life."
Cedric's group was made up of young people aged sixteen or seventeen, a bunch of juvenile delinquents. Some of them were orphans. If they'd been kids of the same age on Earth, they might have been no more than unruly teens who lacked discipline. But these youngsters had grown up in the Underhive, so the term "brats" couldn't begin to describe them. The filthy streets of the Underhive were full of drugs, guns, bloody murders, and violent gangs. Compared to African child warlords who could start a rebellion with nothing but an AK, all they lacked was an environment in which they could start a rebellion.
Cedric and his gang had often teamed up to bully Locke—that is, Fu Qinghai. Perhaps they were jealous of Locke's good looks, or perhaps for some other reason. Either way, bullies didn't need a reason to pick a fight. And just as she had when her parents were alive, Feiyi had always bravely stepped in front of Locke to protect him. It wasn't because Feiyi was good at fighting, of course. Cedric's gang just found her annoying and didn't want to go near her.
"Then this morning, only one of them came back. It was Ladrall. He was covered in blood, his face was pale, and he was out of his mind with shock. He kept muttering about a demon, a white demon, and he was badly injured. He died not long after he got back!"
Feiyi's tone was hard to read; she sounded either frightened or secretly pleased. After all, Cedric's gang often gave Locke trouble and had caused no shortage of problems for the colonial outpost.
Hearing this, Fu Qinghai narrowed his eyes.
Even if he didn't consider getting involved in the main storyline, the colonial outpost on Cheslatan could only serve as a temporary refuge. No matter who won the Horus Heresy, this place would sooner or later fall under the rule of one faction or another.
Worse still, before the Imperium of Man returned, the planet could be found by one of the alien species at the edge of the galaxy. That would spell certain doom for the weak colonial outpost.
So, whatever the reason, Fu Qinghai couldn't just hide here and hope for the best. Sooner or later, he would have to consider how to leave.
And the ship that had crashed half a month ago offered an opportunity.
"A demon, a white demon?" Fu Qinghai murmured. The information was too vague.
Fu Qinghai furrowed his brow, deep in thought.
A Warp entity manifesting in reality?
Setting aside the enormously complex sacrifices and rituals that would be needed for a Warp entity to break through the barriers and enter the real world, if some kind of Warp creature really was on the ship, Ladrall would never have made it back. Creatures that didn't obey the laws of the real world were difficult even for powerful Space Marines to hurt.
Besides, Calvin, the colonial outpost's administrator, had gone to investigate with a group of people.
Right, he could just ask Calvin directly and see if he could get anything out of him indirectly.
"Let's go!" Fu Qinghai took Feiyi's hand and stood, heading for the outpost officials' residence.
"Where are we going?" Feiyi asked, confused as Fu Qinghai led her along.
Before you continue