Absolute Silence

Darkness has weight.

Li Wei had seen that sentence in books before and thought it was overly dramatic prose.

But now, walking through this sealed ancient corridor, he felt that the sentence was a damn law of physics.

There was no light here.

The tactical flashlight mounted under his las pistol could only illuminate a fan-shaped area less than five meters ahead.

Thick dust danced in the column of light, every single grain looking like the ashes of some dead creature.

Tap, tap, tap.

The hollow sound of footsteps echoed in the deathly still corridor, even echoing the echoes.

This instead made the surroundings seem even quieter—a deathly silence that was not "the absence of sound," but rather "sound being swallowed up."

Li Wei's palms were covered in sweat, slickly gripping that cold gun handle.

He walked very slowly, every step feeling like he was treading on thin ice.

That Inquisitor told him to keep walking until he saw a "light source," but this damned darkness seemed endless.

If you dare to turn back, my bolter will be more merciless than the monsters inside.

This sentence swirled in his mind like a curse, forcing him to drag those aching legs and continue stepping forward.

Suddenly, Li Wei stopped in his tracks.

It was not because he saw something, but because of that biological, instinctive sixth sense—something was watching him.

Right ahead, in that pitch-black darkness that the flashlight beam could not reach.

Li Wei swallowed hard, his throat dry as a fire.

He tremblingly raised the muzzle of his gun just a tiny bit.

"Who... who's there?" The moment the words left his mouth, he regretted it.

In horror movies, the one who speaks first usually dies the fastest.

No reply.

The air changed, though.

The originally cold and dry air suddenly became humid, viscous, carrying a pungent stench reminiscent of rust and congealed blood.

Immediately after, the light warped.

Li Wei watched with his own eyes as the straight beam of light emitted by the flashlight actually curved as if baked by high heat.

At the edges where light and shadow intertwined, the darkness began to writhe.

It was not a metaphor; it was genuinely writhing.

The shadows on the walls peeled off like living asphalt, converging about a dozen meters ahead of him.

Floating in mid-air in defiance of gravity, they slowly condensed into an irregular humanoid silhouette.

That silhouette had no facial features, only a massive mouth split all the way to its ears, inside which countless pained human faces seemed to be screaming—yet Li Wei could hear no sound.

A Warp Entity.

Or to put it in more common terms: the embryonic form of a demon, or some kind of intense concentration of lingering grievances.

Li Wei's brain went "buzz" and exploded.

This completely exceeded the scope of his cognition.

Was that a ghost?

Tremendous fear made his entire body stiff, his fingers locked tightly onto the trigger, yet he even forgot to fire—or rather, his subconscious told him that physical attacks were completely useless against this mass of shadows.

That shadow entity seemed to sense the presence of a living person.

Its huge split mouth flung wide open, and it lunged at Li Wei with a speed never before seen in this life!

"Aahhh!!!" Li Wei finally let out a crumbling, miserable shriek, subconsciously closing his eyes, burying his head in his hands, and hunching into a defensive squat.

One second.

Two seconds.

Three seconds.

The anticipated tearing sensation never arrived.

Instead, a cracking sound similar to a ladle of cold water poured into a boiling wok echoed beside his ears.

Sizzling—!!!

Li Wei tremblingly opened one eye.

The sight before him left him completely stunned.

That terrifying shadow that had lunged at him stopped about two meters in front of him.

As if blocked by an invisible wall.

No, not blocked.

That shadow was dissolving.

Whenever it tried to approach Li Wei, those black mists that made up its body boiled violently and dissipated as if encountering strong acid.

That originally ferocious and terrifying monster now actually displayed an extremely humanized emotion—pain, as well as panic.

It swirled and twisted frantically around Li Wei, trying to find a breakthrough, but that invisible "field" around Li Wei was like an absolute forbidden zone.

Its mouth, filled with countless human faces, opened and closed frantically, seeming to emit a shrill scream.

Yet Li Wei still could not hear any sound.

Because he was "Silence."

He was the insulator of the Warp.

Wherever he existed, Warp energy would be forcibly "suppressed" back into reality by the laws of physics.

"It... fears me?" Li Wei looked at the scene before him in disbelief.

He tentatively stood up and took a step forward.

That terrifying shadow instantly bolted backwards, as if Li Wei were a glowing red branding iron and it were butter.

Li Wei took another step.

Sizz, sizz, sizz!

The shadow emitted violent fluctuations; that was its form collapsing.

Before Li Wei, this "black hole of the real world," it, which relied on Warp energy to maintain its existence, was being forcibly "formatted."

"Get lost!" Li Wei suddenly surged with an inexplicable courage—or rather, an outburst after being suppressed to the absolute limit.

He raised the gun butt and swung it at that mass of shadows as if shooing away a stray dog.

This was merely a bluffing action.

Yet the effect was like divine punishment.

In the airflow brought by his wave, that mass of shadows completely disintegrated.

Just like a puff of smoke blown away by a gale, it instantly turned into countless tiny black ashes, disappearing into the air.

Even that trace of a fishy stench vanished.

The air once again became cold, dry, and dead silent.

Li Wei breathed heavily, maintaining the posture of swinging his gun, his heart pounding wildly.

He looked at his own empty palms, then glanced back at the spot where the monster had just vanished.

"Am I... the ghost-scare?" A ridiculous notion popped into Li Wei's head.

He finally understood why those soldiers looked at him the way they looked at a monster.

Because in a sense, he defied common sense even more than these monsters.

He was the only "anti-magic field" in this universe full of magic.

Bzz... bzz...

Right at that moment, the communicator that the soldier had previously shoved into him rudely suddenly rang with harsh static.

"Void-1, report status." It was the voice of Inquisitor Gregor, which, even through the communicator, remained as cold as shards of ice.

Li Wei gave a start and hurriedly pressed the call button: "Re... report, sir! Just now, a... a black ghost shadow lunged over, and then... and then it scattered on its own."

The other end of the communicator fell silent for a moment.

Clearly, Gregor was not at all surprised by this outcome, and might even have expected it all along.

"Proceed." Gregor's voice held zero fluctuation. "You have just passed through the outer layer of the 'veil.' By now, you should be able to see that light source."

Li Wei raised his head.

Sure enough, as that blocking shadow dissipated, he saw at the end of the corridor, about a hundred meters away, a faint green light flickering.

That light was not warm; instead, it exuded a bizarre sense of radiation, like a will-o'-the-wisp in a graveyard.

"I see it... what is that?" Li Wei asked.

"That is the cogitator array core of this deck," Gregor said. "Listen to me, walk up to that console. You will find a slot. Plug the data-slate from your waist pouch into it."

Li Wei patted his waist; indeed, there was a metal rod resembling an oversized USB drive, carved with a golden skull emblem.

"Just... plug in a USB?" Li Wei found it hard to believe the mission was this simple.

"Do not ask questions. Obey your orders." The Inquisitor's voice suddenly turned stern. "Also, a warning for you. Although your trait can dispel the echoes of the Warp, it cannot stop physical-layer defense mechanisms."

"If you trigger the wrath of the machine spirit and the automated turrets tear you to shreds, even I cannot save you. Move lightly."

The call ended.

Li Wei looked at the green light in the distance and swallowed a mouthful of saliva.

This hundred-meter journey held no demons or monsters, yet it might be riddled with invisible infrared rays and pressure sensors.

He took a deep breath, clutching that heavy laser gun, and like a guilty thief, tiptoed forward toward that ghostly green core.

As he walked closer and closer, aided by the green light, he finally saw clearly the scene surrounding that "light source."

That was not an ordinary control room.

That was a shrine.

A gigantic machine shrine.

Numerous wrist-thick data cables hung from the ceiling like intestines, connecting to a figure sitting upon a brass throne at the center.

Only when Li Wei drew close did he see clearly—that was not a living person.

That was a mummified corpse.

A corpse wearing long red robes that had long since rotted away, half of its skull replaced by mechanical implants.

Faint green light flickered within its eye sockets, and its withered fingers were jammed tightly into the console's interface, as if it had been trying to transmit some information right before its death.

Behind the corpse, a line of High Gothic was scrawled hastily on the wall in dark red blood.

Li Wei could not read the characters, but he could recognize the symbol.

That was a gear.

Yet the gear was broken.

A strong sense of incongruity welled up in his heart.

Li Wei looked down at the data-slate in his hand, then back at the mummified corpse of the Tech-Priest with its unclosed eyes.

He suddenly felt that what he held in his hand was not a USB drive, but an invitation from the Grim Reaper.