Welcome to Nuceria

A spherical device resembling a drone flew above Qin Xa and circled him.

Energy seemed to be gathering in an opening beneath the sphere. Qin Xa felt the hairs on his body stand on end, as though he were near an electric field.

Clearly, if things did not go smoothly next, the drone would unleash some sort of energy weapon.

"Tasha! Tasha?"

Once they were within a hundred meters, the leader poked his head out from behind the shield-bearers and stared at Qin Xa while shouting something incomprehensible.

This was not High Gothic.

However, the Imperium of Man was vast. Ordinary people on some worlds communicated in local languages, and there was nothing strange about that.

Qin Xa remained silent, standing where he was as he observed them and considered his options.

He was not surprised to find that these people did not recognize his massive body. The Imperium was too vast; not everyone on every world had seen an Astartes.

But there was certainly one thing these people would know: the Imperium's aquila emblem.

With that in mind, Qin Xa swiftly drew the Double-Headed Eagle Emblem on the ground with his foot, then watched the reactions of those before him.

If they were Imperials, they would understand what this symbol meant. From the many tales they had heard as children from priests holding aloft double-headed eagle scepters about the "angels of the God-Emperor," they would infer the origins of the nearly three-meter-tall giant before them.

But things did not go so smoothly.

The nearly hundred people looked at the symbol on the ground in confusion, unable to recognize what it represented.

Their leader soon raised his head. Half puzzled and half contemptuous, he smiled and shouted something Qin Xa did not understand.

It was an order. Immediately afterward, everyone spread out and raised their weapons.

These people appeared to possess a respectable level of technology, but their weaponry was not impressive. Nearly all of them carried staff-like weapons that discharged electromagnetic energy. Only the leader's obvious tranquilizer gun counted as ranged firepower.

"Strange." Qin Xa scrutinized the people before him. "Your weapons do not look like combat equipment... They look more like tools for capturing something."

No one before him could answer. Their languages were mutually incomprehensible, leaving only battle.

The drone overhead suddenly released some kind of energy attack, but Qin Xa had already darted aside before it appeared.

His evasive movement was so fast that mortal eyes could not react to it. Only the leader could.

The observer on the leader's head seemed to have taken effect. Before his mind could process it, his body reacted first, accurately predicting Qin Xa's evasive trajectory as he fired a tranquilizer dart from the gun in his hand.

Qin Xa was mildly surprised by the astonishing accuracy of the shot, yet casually caught the incoming dart between two fingers.

The dart shattered at once, releasing a cloud of gas.

"Are you joking?" Qin Xa hurled the dart fragments in his hand at the drone overhead. After it burst apart, he stared at the people before him. "Even the miasma of a Death World would probably have no effect on me. You think your native tranquilizer gas can affect me?"

Naturally, no one understood either sentence. After watching him warily, they all realized that the man before them would not be easy to handle.

Everyone grew serious and quickly surrounded Qin Xa.

These people had clearly received rigorous combat training. Some took out objects resembling grenades, some switched their staffs to a charged mode, while others adjusted them to a setting that could gather a sphere of electricity.

Qin Xa did not know what technology those strange melee weapons employed. The weapons in their hands were as peculiar as their wielders.

"Hu-ha! Hu-ha! Hu-ha!"

The people let out sounds like battle cries, wildly swinging their staffs and hopping about.

Those carrying shields also drew out staffs. As they shouted, they struck their shields, concealing the figures of their companions behind them, seemingly trying to confuse their opponent through these movements.

By ordinary standards, these people were well-trained and brimming with fighting spirit.

But through the eyes of an Astartes, they looked like a pack of senile idiots slowly performing meaningless actions.

"Ah!"

A furious shout rang out behind Qin Xa as a burly shield-bearing warrior suddenly lunged at his back.

Qin Xa could easily evade merely by identifying the direction of the sound.

Similar probing sneak attacks came from every direction over the next three seconds. Qin Xa dodged them all with ease, doing nothing but evade.

Only after these people had tested their opponent and found him difficult to handle did they cautiously retreat a step, preparing to employ another tactic.

"It seems you really cannot provide any useful information." Qin Xa sighed helplessly and gave up on obtaining information from them.

When Qin Xa took a deep breath, the scorching sand abruptly cooled, and frost spread across the ground.

Whenever a Psyker began using psychic power, this sudden drop in temperature would occur.

This phenomenon, which violated the laws of thermodynamics in the material universe, represented the Immaterium's erosion of reality.

The sudden chill made all the uninvited guests wary and astonished. They did not attack rashly, as though they were assessing something.

Qin Xa stepped forward with his left foot, spread his legs apart, raised his right hand toward the sky, and lowered his left hand to point at the ground.

"I'll make you fly!"

The moment his words fell, a shockwave appeared without warning around Qin Xa's body and abruptly spread outward.

One moment, the crowd had been hopping about and uttering incomprehensible cries. The next, they were sent flying backward. Every body shattered as it flew, ultimately becoming sprays of blood and flesh and chunks of debris soaring into the sky.

Splat—

Splat—

Chunks of something fell from the sky and struck the ground with sickening sounds.

Qin Xa swept his gaze around with a complicated expression, straightened himself, and let out a regretful sigh before walking toward the convoy.

Just one step from the vehicle belonging to the convoy's leader, Qin Xa's foot suddenly gave a strange little "slip." He swiftly steadied himself and looked down, casting a startled, confused gaze at his left foot.

His left foot was still intact, but it felt as though half of it were missing.

"No... that's impossible..."

A "theory" surfaced in his mind, one he considered the only possible answer: the tranquilizer gas released by the tiny dart the leader had fired earlier had begun to take effect.

There had not been much tranquilizer gas, and the dart itself had been tiny, not even larger than a .17-caliber bullet.

Such a small dart, one that had not even been propelled by gunpowder into the skin before releasing its contents, contained enough tranquilizer gas to gradually anesthetize an Astartes?

What was this?

Gas exhaled by Nurgle, one of the Four Gods of the Immaterium?

After a brief moment of thought, Qin Xa immediately rushed to the vehicle, tore off its door and tossed it aside, then searched inside for anything that could answer his many questions—or an antidote to the tranquilizer gas.

The moment his hand touched a book, that uncontrollable ability of prophecy emerged.

His vision instantly shifted above an arena.

Many gladiators fought within the arena.

People like the ones he had just killed were trading captives with the arena's overseer.

And atop the arena's crimson sand, a burly boy with a youthful face desperately dodged sulfuric acid surging toward him from every direction.

Qin Xa suddenly understood everything, including these people's intentions and what the tranquilizer gas inside that dart had been.

But it was already too late to sort it all out.

"So..."

With half his body beginning to lose control, Qin Xa shrugged, smiled helplessly, and muttered to himself.

"Welcome to Nuceria?"

As the final syllable left Qin Xa's mouth, a dull thud followed. His head smashed a dent into the hood, causing the entire antigravity hovercar to sink before bouncing back up.