The Suffocation of Prosperity

If the Bottom Hive was a hell where deathly silence intertwined with mad screams, then this—the mid-level residential district of Atalos Hive City—was a gigantic anthill so noisy it could drive one insane.

Everywhere he looked was steel.

Enormous metal walkways overlapped like spiderwebs, connecting countless residential towers that rose as high as mountains.

Countless massive holographic projections floated in the air. Golden skulls and eagle insignias dozens of meters tall flickered through the smoke, while loudspeakers endlessly broadcast mechanical slogans: "Labor is prayer! Obedience is virtue! For the Emperor, devote every hour of your life!"

"This stench is way too strong..." Li Wei was nearly choked by the mixture of machine oil, sweat, and cheap perfume.

He pulled tight the faded military overcoat stripped from a corpse, hid his Autogun beneath it, lowered his head, and blended into the crowd.

The streets were packed with people.

Tens of thousands of people were crammed onto the narrow walkways like sardines.

Yet Li Wei realized that even among the crowd, he was an "outsider."

Wherever he passed, the tightly packed crowd instinctively parted like the Red Sea, opening a narrow gap for him.

Passersby frowned and avoided him, their eyes filled with inexplicable disgust and irritation.

"Get lost, you bad-luck freak."

"Don't shove me. What the hell is that smell on him...?"

Li Wei did not get angry. Instead, he raised his collar even higher.

In a place where skull-headed drones—Servo-skulls—filled the sky, this trait of being "despised by everyone and not worth a second glance" was actually the best camouflage.

He had two major problems now.

First, he had no money. The few coins in his pocket probably would not even buy a cup of water in the Mid Hive. Second, the Data-slate in his coat.

He found a corner and, under the dim light, took out the "Data-slate" he had brought from the ruins once more.

A skull insignia marked with an "I" was engraved on its metal casing.

"I know this symbol..." Li Wei stared at the insignia, recalling the terrified expression on his roommate's face when he played games. "The Inquisition. Those lunatics seem to specialize in killing their own people. They blow up planets at the drop of a hat."

There had to be something good inside, or... some huge secret.

"But where can I sell it?" Li Wei looked at the maze-like streets around him, utterly lost.

He was not local. He had no idea where the black market was.

But he had a modern person's Logic—find a pawnshop, or somewhere that repaired electronics.

Places like that usually took all kinds of random junk.

After wandering through the alleys for half the day, he finally spotted a shop in a dark corner with a sign that read: "Broken Tooth Jack's Scrap Shop—Buying Sacred Scrap Metal at High Prices."

A gear with a bite taken out of it was painted beside the sign. This place looks shady as hell, Li Wei muttered inwardly before pushing the door open.

Jingle.

The shop was piled high with rusty mechanical arms and electronic waste.

Behind the counter sat a fat man who was half human, half machine.

His left eye was a huge red bulb—an augmetic eye—while his right arm was a sophisticated multifunctional mechanical claw.

"If you're selling scrap, go weigh it at the back door." The owner did not even look up, busy fiddling with an electronic heart that was still beating.

Li Wei walked up to the counter. As he approached, the owner's red augmetic eye suddenly crackled and flickered several times. The owner abruptly looked up, and extreme discomfort appeared on the human half of his face, as though he had smelled something foul.

"Stop." The owner's voice was hoarse. "Don't come any closer. Your magnetic field... makes me sick. What do you want to buy? Spit it out, then get lost."

Without wasting words, Li Wei pulled the USB-like device from his coat pocket, revealing only one corner bearing the skull insignia marked with an "I."

"Boss, buying?" Li Wei lowered his voice. "Good stuff."

The owner's mechanical eye focused instantly.

The moment he saw the skull insignia clearly, his entire body jolted as if electrocuted. His mechanical claw jerked violently, nearly severing his own fingers.

"The Inquisition..." The owner sucked in a sharp breath, his face turning deathly pale.

He shot a terrified glance toward the entrance, then quickly pressed a button beneath the counter like a thief.

Click. The shop's rolling shutter automatically descended, and a "Closed" sign was hung outside.

"Are you insane?!" the owner roared in a low voice, spraying spittle everywhere. "You dare walk around the streets with something like this? Are you trying to send the entire district to the pyre?"

Li Wei was startled by his reaction.

He knew the Inquisition was powerful, but he had not expected a single symbol to scare a local tough guy this badly.

"Fortune favors the bold." Li Wei forced himself to remain calm, copying a line from a movie. "I won't ask the price, and you don't ask where it came from."

The owner stared fixedly at Li Wei. His augmetic eye spun wildly, seemingly assessing whether this skinny-looking young man was an Inquisition trap.

But the nauseating Soulless aura around Li Wei made him think he was more likely a desperate fugitive who did not know when to quit.

"I need to inspect the goods first." The owner extended his mechanical claw, his voice trembling. "What if it's just an empty shell? Taking this risk wouldn't be worth it."

Li Wei hesitated.

He was not sure whether plugging it in would make it explode or trigger some alarm.

But he had no other options now. He could only gamble.

"Check it. But be careful. Don't damage it." Li Wei handed over the Data-slate.

The owner pulled out a data cable from beneath the counter and connected it with extreme care.

A filthy screen nearby lit up.

It did not explode.

Lines of dark red code and images appeared.

The image showed a human anatomical diagram. But the person had a huge bulge on their forehead and had even grown a third arm.

There were also comparison charts resembling DNA helices, covered in red "WARNING" labels.

[TOP SECRET // Ordo Hereticus]

[Target: Genestealer - Infection Confirmed]

[Infected Area: Atalos Hive City - Upper Noble District]

Li Wei leaned over for a look.

"Genestealers?" He frowned. "That name sounds familiar... Aren't they those... aliens that make hybrid babies?"

He vaguely remembered his roommate saying that these things loved infiltrating human society, turning entire families into bald freaks, then summoning a Tyranid swarm to eat the planet.

But the owner's reaction was ten thousand times more intense.

"The upper... noble district..." The owner looked as though he had seen the end of the world, his fat trembling all over. "It's over... We're all finished. Those big shots... those nobles... are actually lackeys of the bugs?"

He yanked out the data cable and threw it onto the counter as if it had burned him.

"This is a bomb!" the owner shrieked. "It's worse than a bomb! If this information is true, the whole Hive City will be purged! The Inquisition will burn this planet into a glass ball!"

Li Wei's heart skipped a beat.

He understood the phrase "burned into a glass ball."

Exterminatus.

In other words, what was in this Data-slate was enough to bury the entire planet with it.

"Uh... then this thing must be worth a lot, right?" Li Wei asked tentatively.

The owner raised his head and looked at Li Wei with a complicated expression.

There was fear, despair, and... suddenly erupting greed and murderous intent.

"Worth a lot? This thing could buy half the Mid Hive." The owner's voice turned sinister. "But you can take the money and still not live long enough to spend it."

His mechanical claw quietly moved beneath the counter.

Li Wei had been watching his movements the entire time.

He might not understand black market rules, but he understood human nature.

When it came to world-ending secrets, silencing someone forever was always the optimal choice.

"Kid, you're a new face." The owner revealed a savage smile. "And you're a Soulless everyone hates. No one would care which gutter you died in."

Just as the owner was about to pull out a sawed-off shotgun.

Li Wei moved.

He did not draw his gun—it was too slow.

He stepped forward, pressing his body almost against the counter.

He unleashed his "disgusting" aura at full power.

"Buzz!" The distance was too close.

The shop owner's half-human, half-machine brain suffered a devastating blow instantly.

That overwhelming sense of rejection aimed at the soul made him feel as if a hand had reached into his skull and stirred it around.

"Bleurgh!!" The owner screamed, and the gun he had just touched fell to the floor.

His mechanical eye began spinning madly from logical corruption, while his mechanical claw twitched out of control and even pinched his own flesh.

Li Wei grabbed the owner by the collar with one hand, snatched up a screwdriver from the counter with the other, and pressed it directly against the owner's good eye.

"I may not understand your rules." Li Wei looked at him coldly, enduring the reek of machine oil coming off him. "But I know that if I shove this in right now, you'll die horribly."

"Don't! Don't kill me! Bleurgh..." The owner begged while dry-heaving. "I was wrong! I can't handle this thing! I really can't!"

"Who can?" Li Wei demanded. "Give me a name. Someone who dares buy this and can afford it."

The owner shook all over, tears and snot streaming down his face. "The guild... Only the guild would dare buy it..." "In the upper levels... the Pleasure District... there's a manager named Valorian... He's been looking for this kind of intelligence on the black market for a long time..."

"Valorian." Li Wei memorized the name. "Where is he?"

"The Gilded Rose club... That's his territory..."

Li Wei released him, then casually grabbed the bag of money sitting on the counter.

"This is compensation for the emotional damage from you trying to kill me."

He pocketed the Data-slate again and turned to leave.

At the door, he stopped and looked back at the owner, who was still twitching.

He pushed the door open and vanished into the packed crowd.

As he walked down the street, Li Wei's palms were drenched in sweat.

Everything he had done just now had been a bluff.

He finally understood what he was holding.

"No wonder the Inquisitor wanted to blow that place up." Li Wei looked at the holographic projections of the glamorous noble districts overhead, a chill running through him. "Those lofty big shots might not have been human for a long time."

"And I'm going to do business with those monsters?"

Li Wei gave a bitter laugh and touched the money pouch in his pocket.

"For a ticket off this planet, for getting the hell out... I'm doing it."