The First Blast of the Horn

The opening of the battle was heralded by Zhou Beichen's second shot.

This time, he did not aim at Bishop Lot, who seemed impervious to physical harm. Instead, he calmly pulled the trigger. A blazing white beam, like Death calling a name, precisely pierced the eye socket of a frenzied cultist charging at the front with a rusty pitchfork. The cultist's ecstatic expression froze instantly. Red and white matter burst from the back of his head, and he collapsed without a sound.

The signal for slaughter ignited the madness of this blasphemous land.

"For the Four Gods! Purge the false believers!" Twisted cries surged from every direction. Humans and monsters mingled into a filthy tide reeking of stench and frenzy, rushing toward the edge of the dead woods where Zhou Beichen and Lorgar stood.

Zhou Beichen had his back against a dead tree wrapped in fleshy vines, its trunk still twitching faintly. His gaze was as sharp as a hawk's. Months of wandering and fighting for his life had long since forged the trader who once maneuvered through stock exchanges into a qualified warrior. His breathing was steady, his arms unwavering. The laser pistol was no longer an unfamiliar tool in his hands, but an extension of his limbs. He no longer pursued the unrealistic goal of killing Lot in one strike. Instead, he efficiently eliminated the nearest threats.

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

Beams flashed one after another. A mutant covered in pustules leaking green slime, attempting to pounce from the side, was shot through the knee and fell screaming, rolling across the ground; a farmer wielding a crude machete and wearing a fanatical stare was pierced through the chest; a lanky monster hiding in the mist, trying to unleash psychic interference, had barely revealed its vague outline before half its head was blown apart by a single shot.

His shooting was accurate and efficient, like clearing bad assets, coldly reducing the enemy's living forces. Every pull of the trigger wrote off another "investment." His mind raced, calculating the remaining rounds in his magazine, assessing threat priorities, and finding the next optimal target.

Yet the true eye of the storm was Lorgar.

Like a golden reef, he stood firm before the surging tide of filth. Faced with the enemies flooding toward him, he neither dodged nor blocked. There was only the purest, most violent crushing force.

A mutated monster nearly three meters tall, its knotted muscles piled like a mountain of flesh and one arm transformed into a massive bone hammer, roared as it smashed down at him. Lorgar did not even look at it. He merely raised a hand and precisely caught the wrist of the descending bone hammer! The force capable of pulverizing stone came to an abrupt halt in his grip, as harmless as a child's toy. Then his five fingers clenched—

Crack!

A bone-splitting crack exploded, grating on the teeth! The creature's wrist bones and the surrounding muscles were crushed to pulp in his hand! It let out a shrill howl, but Lorgar had already yanked it forward, swung its enormous body like a ragged sack, and viciously smashed it into another group of enemies charging from the side!

Boom!

Flesh and blood flew everywhere! At least five or six fanatical cultists and two smaller mutants were struck by the horrific "human cannonball," their tendons snapping and bones breaking as they were hurled away.

But this was only the beginning.

The golden flames around Lorgar's fists suddenly surged. They no longer merely coiled around them, instead condensing into two blazing, incomparably scorching flaming swords! He moved, so fast that he left golden afterimages behind him as he charged into the densest part of the enemy ranks.

Swordlight flashed. There were no ornate techniques, only the simplest and most direct slashes, chops, sweeps, and upward cuts! Wherever the golden flames passed, flesh, warped growth-armor, and mutated bone blades and claws alike were effortlessly torn apart, severed, and incinerated like butter beneath a hot knife!

A follower of Nurgle attempting to spew venom had barely opened his mouth before a streak of golden swordlight split him in two from head to toe. His filthy organs and venom had not even reached the ground before they hissed away beneath the heat.

A swift mutant, moving with the eerie speed of Slaanesh's blessing, tried to ambush him from behind. Lorgar did not even turn around. With a backhand slash, the golden flames struck like a living venomous serpent, instantly coiling around and engulfing it. Within a second, it had been burned into a curled heap of charcoal.

He was not merely killing. In the midst of battle, he was rapidly understanding, adapting to, and developing his own power.

He discovered that highly compressing and condensing his psychic flames into "flame swords" not only made them more powerful, but actually consumed less energy.

He discovered that he could unleash flames from his palms in the form of shockwaves. Though their range was not large, they could instantly clear out lesser enemies within several meters, making them exceptionally efficient.

He even tried attaching a faint thread of psychic perception to the scattering sparks. Like invisible detectors, those sparks vaguely fed the energy flows and enemy positions across a wider area around him back into his consciousness, giving him an almost godlike command of the battlefield!

The more he fought, the braver he became. The golden flames shifted forms in his hands—at times becoming sharp swords for piercing defenses, at times whips that swept across the field, at times shields to block attacks. Wherever he passed, he left behind a path paved with charred remains and curling smoke. Even the foul, multicolored mist was driven back and purified by that pure flame.

Watching from behind, Zhou Beichen's blood surged, though he clicked his tongue inwardly as well. He knew Lorgar was fierce, but he had not expected him to be this fierce!

Wasn't Lorgar one of the primarchs who wasn't particularly good at fighting? Then again, he was still a primarch.

As he continued firing precise shots at the stragglers trying to circle around Lorgar and charge toward him, he rapidly calculated in his mind. This combat power... how many times would its valuation have to increase? If this were the stock market, he'd absolutely be the leading stock hitting the daily limit!

As Lorgar efficiently "cleared" the field, the number of enemies rushing forward visibly dwindled. The ground was littered with corpses and wreckage in all manner of gruesome deaths. Golden flames still stubbornly burned on some chunks of flesh, crackling as they gave off a scorched odor rather than the stench of rot.

On the high platform, Archbishop Lot, who had watched coldly all along, finally lost the last of his patience. The false "holiness" and "compassion" on his face gradually faded, replaced by offended fury and... an even more burning greed for the power Lorgar had displayed.

"Enough!"

A roar laden with chaotic psychic power erupted like thunder, making Zhou Beichen's eardrums buzz and even causing Lorgar's forward charge to pause slightly.

The next moment, Lot's bloated body drifted weightlessly down from the platform and landed in the open ground not far ahead of Lorgar. The four-colored psychic radiance twisting around him shone brighter than ever, like four distorted neon lights that made him appear like a... dark god descended upon the mortal world.

Ignoring the flames still burning around him and the corpses covering the ground, he stared intensely at Lorgar. His voice once more became seductive, as though the bloody slaughter from moments ago had never occurred.

"Do you see, Son of God? This is the power you were born with! The authority bestowed upon you by the Four Gods! It should have been used to cleanse this world of its true filth—those rigid doctrines, hypocritical beliefs, and... vermin like him." He shot Zhou Beichen a disgusted glance. "All he can do is hide in the rear and scheme!"

He spread his arms as though presenting an infinitely beautiful future. "Join us! Embrace true power and truth! You will no longer be a chess piece bound by fate, but a player standing beside the gods! The order you seek, the living beings you pity, all of it will find its most perfect and complete fulfillment beneath the glory of the Four Gods! That is the true 'Earthly Heaven'!"

Lorgar slowly raised a hand. Golden flame flickered quietly in his palm, casting light over his expressionless face. He looked at Lot, at that twisted four-colored psychic energy. There was not the slightest hesitation in his violet eyes, only cold disgust, as though he were looking at a pile of trash that needed to be cleared away.

"Your 'gods,'" Lorgar said calmly, his voice carrying an unshakable force, "and your so-called 'heaven'..."

The golden flames in his palm suddenly flared!

"...make me sick."

Before his words had even faded, his entire body became a bolt of golden lightning. With unwavering resolve, he charged directly at Archbishop Lot, who was shrouded in chaotic energy!