Slaughter Them All, Slaughter Them All

Iron Hammer put his gas mask back on and took out the long-range detector, planning to pick away at his ore as he walked.

Big Sister Sister could even use her power armor to help him mine. Nice.

Lin En would provide the light.

Perfect.

The plan was flawless.

It sounded like the opening to some RPG game.

So now, only one last problem remained.

Iron Hammer suddenly stopped and turned around.

He took the gas mask off again and hung it from his belt, revealing his young, freckled face.

Iron Hammer scratched the bridge of his nose. His gray-blue eyes looked at Lin En, and he hesitated awkwardly before asking, "Um... do we have enough supplies?"

Lin En froze. "Supplies?"

"Food. Water." Iron Hammer's voice grew quieter, as though he was embarrassed to mention such basic needs. "I don't have any food left on me. The rations I brought when I came out were eaten up long ago after I got trapped in the cave. I've just been surviving on groundwater these past two days."

Then his stomach rumbled loudly.

Iron Hammer's ears turned red. He pressed a hand over his stomach and said embarrassedly, "It did that by itself."

He was hungry.

Lin En looked at Cecilia, who looked back at him innocently.

Cecilia was just as broke as he was.

She had only brought three days' worth of rations when she set out. She had indeed found Iron Hammer within fifteen days, but by then, she was out of food too.

"You two haven't eaten anything these past few days?"

Iron Hammer lowered his head and kicked at a pebble. "We ate some wild rock mushrooms. There are things like that in the underground caves of Istvaan III—gray ones growing on the rock walls. They don't have much nutrition, but they can keep you going for a while."

Cecilia said nothing, but Lin En noticed her right hand unconsciously press against her stomach.

Lin En took a deep breath.

Fuck, why were they so pathetic?

Lin En took off his backpack and poured out all the supplies inside.

Three packs of rations, three protein blocks, and three water pouches.

For the three of them, it would be a struggle to make them last two days.

The cultists had chased him for fifteen days. He had already eaten through most of the supplies he'd stolen from them.

It would take about another half month to get out of this underground cave system. They needed more supplies.

On this planet, where there was nothing but cultists, supplies had only one source: the cultists' warehouse. They had to rob them again.

"We have to steal again," Lin En said.

"We have to steal again," Cecilia said.

The two sighed at the same time.

They had only just escaped.

Those psykers were really too hard to deal with. Cecilia couldn't beat them alone.

Iron Hammer crouched nearby, looking at Lin En and then Cecilia.

Well, there was no helping it if they didn't steal.

This time, they would be more careful and see if they could steal the supplies without fighting again.

The three of them quietly snuck back.

Iron Hammer brought up the cultists' cave system map on his data slate and found a mining tunnel branch closest to the cultist camp. Hunched over and holding their breaths, the three of them crept through the darkness to the edge of the camp.

Lin En crouched behind a rock, poking half his head out to look into the camp.

They had stolen all the previous supplies. He wondered whether the cultists' new shipment had arrived yet.

The good news was that it had. The bad news was that the cultists were guarding their supplies like hawks this time.

The original storeroom had been abandoned. This time, the cultists had simply erected a new tent in the open space at the center of the camp, piled with wooden crates and metal barrels. The crates were exactly like the ones Lin En had stolen before—ration crates.

Cultists from every direction watched over the supplies in the tent.

There was open ground all around the tent. Even a fly would be spotted crossing it, let alone several living people.

Several new ropes and iron chains had appeared on the ground, stretching from the center of the camp deep into the tunnels. Cultists held these ropes and chains as they moved about the camp, as if patrolling—or casting a net.

They had learned their lesson.

Lin En pulled his head back and said to Cecilia, "Sister, this looks pretty difficult."

Cecilia had also seen the situation around the supplies from the other side of the rock. She fell silent.

It really was difficult. The cultists had surrounded the supplies so tightly that there wasn't even a gap.

Without provoking a conflict, there was absolutely no way they could steal the cultists' supplies.

Big Sister Sister said nothing, but her expression already gave the answer.

Cecilia glanced at Lin En, then at Iron Hammer.

"We can't steal them."

There were simply too many cultists. Even if she could rush out and instantly kill a few, there were still hundreds left.

She had been injured when she saved Lin En last time. Moving supplies this time would only be harder.

Iron Hammer crouched nearby, lowering the brightness of his data slate to its minimum as he drew several circles on the map.

"The supplies are in the middle of the camp, with patrols on all sides. Their shift changes overlap, so there's no opening. Unless they faint on their own, we can't sneak in."

Sad.

Today, all three of them were sad frogs.

The cultists' dark red light swayed through the tunnel behind them, while their footsteps rustled across the gravel.

Cecilia suddenly spoke. "Um... I want to discuss something with you."

"Hm?" Lin En and Iron Hammer both obediently looked up at her.

Cecilia wore silver power armor, with her power sword sheathed on her back and her bolter at her waist. She said hesitantly, "...Can we stay here a little longer?"

"Hm?"

"I want to eliminate these cultists." Cecilia's voice gradually grew firm. "I can ambush them every day, steal a little supplies each time, kill a few, then leave. Give me some more time, and I'll definitely be able to wipe them all out."

Lin En looked at her. Her slit pupils gleamed gold in the darkness, filled with determination.

Mm...

That... could work.

Everyone had a responsibility to eliminate cultists.

They had no other options anyway, and Big Sister Sister's plan to pick them off one by one was not a bad idea.

But then Lin En realized that, with Thirty Days, he was the ultimate bait.

Lin En's mind began turning.

He had Thirty Days. Thirty Days said that he could last thirty days in battle against any enemy.

He wasn't meant for fighting. He was meant for taking hits... no, he was meant to be bait.

He could lure these cultists out and lead them beneath Big Sister Sister's sword.

Or, if Iron Hammer knew how to set traps, he could lure the enemies into Iron Hammer's traps, then Cecilia could charge out from the side and deliver divine judgment from above to the cultists.

They could fight them in small groups instead of all at once—take out a few at a time, run after each fight, come back to lure more in, then strike again.

A game strategy for clearing mobs.

Day by day, wave by wave, they would wear them down. One day, they would kill every last cultist.