The primary mission of Lox's exploration fleet was not to exterminate xenos. Their destruction was merely a matter of habit.
A species that had only just learned to use tools and cook food with fire was terribly fragile. Their entire population could be wiped out without even resorting to particularly serious military measures.
After all, this was a planet suitable for carbon-based life. From the moment it was discovered, it had become a valuable asset of the Five Hundred Worlds.
It would belong to the Imperium of Man, a new world added to the Five Hundred Worlds under Guilliman's command.
And the xenos squatting here would be completely exterminated. Aside from a string of records in the exploration fleet's log database, no one would ever know that blue-skinned xenos had once been born here.
The Biologis sages of the Adeptus Mechanicus captured dozens of xenos specimens with tractor beams. They also commissioned the White Scars to capture xenos from different regions of the planet, then conducted extensive dissection studies on their respective laboratory tables.
Dissection was the most efficient and direct way to understand a species. Their unique organs and tissues could reveal the secrets of their genes, allowing their characteristics to be uncovered through the most rational means.
The findings surprised everyone even more. These blue xenos possessed body structures highly similar to those of humans. They had four fingers on each hand, hooves instead of feet, and exceptionally rough, resilient skin evolved to withstand their harsh environment.
Unlike human sweat glands, this skin could not evaporate water to carry away heat. Their sense organs for smell, absent from their unusually flat faces, had actually grown inside their mouths rather than being exposed to the open air.
What surprised Lox was their long, broad visual organs. They were all