Faith on the Wasteland

Every day on Colchis was like this.

At noon, the desert took on a sickly orange-red hue, as if the earth had been skinned alive and was slowly rotting beneath the blazing sun.

The hot wind carried grit, endlessly lashing the lonely little chapel crudely pieced together from rusted metal and stone.

Zhou Beichen stood behind the pulpit, the fibers of his coarse linen robe chafing against his sensitive skin.

By his reckoning, he had been transported here for nearly half a year now.

Zhou Beichen had originally been a stock trader. That day, he had been battling fiercely on the Shanghai–Shenzhen Stock Exchange, only to be sent flying head-on by a speeding truck the moment he got off work. In his dazed state, he seemed to have seen that the driver behind the wheel was a "golden, gleaming Indian."

Still, this planet was called Colchis. He had basically never heard that name before, but judging by its wasteland aesthetic, perhaps it was some backdrop from the Star Wars or Dune universe. He had asked around, and the people here knew nothing of any Emperor. They worshipped a faith called the Covenant Church, something Zhou Beichen had never heard of.

Coincidentally, the original owner of this body also seemed to be named Zhou Beichen. He had no idea why this universe had such an Eastern name, but before long, he accepted it—he had already been transported to another world, so what was impossible anymore?

This place was indeed poor, but as a priest, the original owner of this body had received considerable respect on this deeply religious planet. At the very least, he lived much better than most people here.

Now, it was time for the daily prayers required of a priest.

He spread his arms. Below him were dozens of faces, numb and rough, carved by poverty and windblown sand. Sunlight stabbed through a crack in the dome like a sharp sword, illuminating the vague "divine statue" behind him, welded together from discarded parts.

"Brothers and sisters!" His voice trembled with carefully calculated fervor. "Suffering is His trial, and poverty is the staircase to salvation! Hold fast to your faith, and He will surely bless us in this forgotten land!"

His words were smooth and compelling, the result of repeated practice. He watched a faint spark of hope rekindle in the eyes below, but his heart was an icy wasteland.

God?

As a stock trader, he did not believe in such things at all. What he truly believed in was the underlying code that drove human behavior—fear and greed.

In his previous life, he had watched the flashing red and green curves in the securities trading hall drive countless people mad with ecstasy or despair. That was the truest miracle in the world.

So-called faith was merely a high-risk investment product with an extremely long return cycle...

When the sermon ended, the believers left behind negligible donations, mostly crude homemade food or a few water filter cartridges, then silently dispersed. Zhou Beichen counted the offerings, a faint, imperceptible sneer passing across his lips.

The return rate was far too low. Maintaining this shabby congregation could barely keep him alive on this damned planet.

Then, on that stormy night, everything changed.

At the time, he had been repairing the broken metal panels around the chapel as usual.

The sky—that eternally orange-red sky—was suddenly torn apart by a blaze of white light.

The radiance was so dazzling that it briefly overwhelmed even the light of Colchis's twin suns.

It was not a meteor, because it did not fall. Instead, as though gently supported by some invisible force, it slowly descended into the depths of distant Crater Mountain.

A powerful premonition seized Zhou Beichen.

Whatever it was, getting his hands on it definitely would not be a bad thing. According to local law, objects that fell from beyond the heavens generally belonged to the first person to discover them.

He practically stumbled and crawled back to the chapel, grabbed his best equipment—an old but still functional environmental protection mask and a crudely made laser pistol loaded with a pitiful few energy shots—and set off unsteadily toward where the light had vanished.

Inside Crater Mountain, a newly formed impact site was still radiating intense heat. Molten rock flowed slowly like dark red blood.

At the very center of the crater lay an object that clearly did not belong to Colchis, perhaps not even to any known civilization in this star system.

It was a metal capsule of intricate construction. Unextinguished energy patterns still flowed across its surface. Its style was archaic yet precise, carrying an inhuman, majestic beauty.

Zhou Beichen's heartbeat suddenly quickened. He cautiously approached. The metal capsule seemed to sense a living being nearby and released a faint hiss of depressurization as its lid slid silently open.

There were no high-tech weapons or treasures inside as he had expected. There was only a quiet infant.

The baby was wrapped in a strange silver fabric, his eyes closed and his breathing steady.

He was remarkably strong and perfect, with fair skin, utterly unlike the skinny, filthy infants native to Colchis.

And on the baby's tiny chest rested a metal nameplate engraved with unfamiliar symbols. There was only one word Zhou Beichen could barely decipher with his language assistance tool:

Lorgar

Lorgar!

Fuck!

The wind howled through the crater like the wailing of countless dead souls.

Zhou Beichen stood beside the capsule, looking down at the infant who had fallen from the sky, his mind racing.

Every detail repeated and connected rapidly in his mind. Colchis, the Covenant Church...

Fuck, I really ended up in the Warhammer Universe!

But then, inspiration struck.

A thought flashed through his mind like lightning: back in the pre-Qin era, the great merchant Lü Buwei had encountered the Qin royal grandson "Yiren," held hostage in a foreign land. Lü Buwei had asked his father, "How many times the profit from farming? How many times the profit from jewels? How many times the profit from establishing the ruler of a state?"

The answer was obvious. This was a "rare commodity to be hoarded"!

This infant before him, Lorgar, was he not the most worthwhile "rare commodity" to invest in within this savage universe?

Even in the Warhammer Universe, as long as I controlled a Primarch—at the very least, gave him a normal education—I could survive.

He took a deep breath and suppressed his turbulent emotions. The shrewdness and fanaticism of a speculator gradually faded from his face, replaced by a gentle, almost sacred compassion. He reached out and lifted the infant with utmost tenderness.

The baby stirred in his arms and opened his eyes. They were incomparably clear eyes, tinged with a faint violet hue, quietly reflecting Zhou Beichen's carefully assumed face of a loving priest.

"Poor child..." Zhou Beichen's voice was low and magnetic, trembling just enough. "What kind of great power could have abandoned an innocent, holy being such as you in this barren land?"

Holding Lorgar, he turned toward the direction of the ruined little chapel. Though separated by his mask and layers of rock, he could see nothing.

In a tone almost like a chant, he softly spoke to the infant in his arms and to this cold, indifferent world, as though making a sacred proclamation:

"Do not be afraid, lost lamb. From this day forth, I shall be your shepherd in this world."

"Your arrival is no accident. This must be the will of God."

This time, I've struck it rich... Hehehe.