Life at the Schola Progenium was harsh and monotonous. Everything here was designed to mold children into the Imperium's most loyal, resilient, and ruthless tools. Every day brought endless prayers, study, and brutal military training. Any hint of individuality was treated as the seed of "heresy" and mercilessly crushed.
For any normal child, this place was hell.
But for Liu Zhipeng, this place... was nothing short of heaven.
He discovered that the Schola Progenium's oppressive, dehumanizing educational system was the perfect "amplifier" for his two passive abilities.
Every child here was an orphan who had lost everything to war. Their hearts were filled with trauma, confusion, and a thirst for revenge. They were the abandoned, the most vulnerable, the ones most desperately in need of "care" and "guidance."
The ability Grandfather's Watch and Love made Alexander the warmest light among these "desperate souls."
In the mess hall, he would share his already meager portion of meat with a roommate whose growth had been stunted by malnutrition. During brutal wilderness survival training, he would carry a girl who had twisted her ankle and was crying that she wanted to give up through the final ten kilometers of mountain trails. Late at night, he would softly hum the lullabies praising the Emperor that his mother had once sung to him, soothing companions who woke from nightmares crying for their parents.
He never asked for anything in return. His generosity seemed to spring from an instinct as natural as an elder brother's.
Before long, he became the undisputed heart of their class. The others unconsciously gathered around him, sharing their pain and the tiny scraps of warmth they found in him.
Meanwhile, the ability Heretic Leader made him their spiritual pillar.
"The instructors tell us to hate the enemy. They're right," he told the companions gathered around him after a simulated tactics lesson. "But why should we hate them? Not because of orders. Not because of doctrine. Because they took everything from us! They killed our parents and burned our homes! That hatred is our most precious, most sacred treasure! It is the flame of vengeance the Emperor bestowed upon us!"
"Don't suppress it! Don't fear it! Embrace it! Feel it! Let that flame burn in your hearts! Every punch, every shot, every breath should be for vengeance! That is the greatest tribute we can offer our lost loved ones! That is the ultimate expression of loyalty to the Emperor!"
His words were like a key, unlocking the shackles buried deepest in these children's hearts.
The Schola Progenium taught them to obey, to suppress their feelings, to become cold machines of war. Alexander, however, told them that their feelings, their pain, and their hatred were their most powerful weapons.
The theory sounded somewhat "unorthodox," but it aligned perfectly with their deepest desires.
They began throwing themselves into training with near-fanatical fervor. In every sparring match, they imagined their opponent was the enemy who had murdered their families; with every shot, they pictured the target as the head of a Chaos Daemon. Their performance improved by leaps and bounds. Their eyes no longer held the confusion of orphans, but the resolve of avengers.
Naturally, Alexander's "out-of-line" behavior also attracted the instructors' attention.
Their class was overseen by an old Commissar named Imran. One of his eyes and half his face had been replaced with machinery, while his remaining eye always gleamed with razor-sharp scrutiny.
He summoned Alexander to his office.
"Cadet Lawrence," the old Commissar said, his voice like two stones grinding together, "I've read your training reports and ideological assessments. Excellent. Perhaps... too excellent."
"You're very popular with your peers. They call you 'Elder Brother.' They're willing to follow you, even more readily than they obey their instructors. Do you know that, in a Commissar's dictionary, 'Cult of personality' means the same thing as 'treason'?"
Imran fixed his lone eye on Alexander, searching his face for the slightest trace of fear or guilt.
But Alexander merely met his gaze calmly.
"Sir, I have never believed they worship me. What they worship is 'hope.'"
"Oh?" A cold sneer tugged at the corner of Imran's mouth.
"We're all orphans, sir. We have nothing. Only two things keep us alive: hatred for the past and hope for the future," Alexander replied, neither servile nor arrogant. "The Schola has taught us how to hate, and that's good. But I believe hatred alone isn't enough. Hatred can burn a person to ashes, but hope can turn those ashes into burning steel."
"All I've done is share with my 'brothers and sisters' the little warmth of 'family' and 'protection' that my late parents gave me. I tell them we're not orphans. We're a new family. We fight for one another, and for the 'father' we all share-the Emperor. If you consider that kind of 'hope' a 'cult of personality,' then I have nothing more to say."
Imran fell silent.
His mechanical eye flickered rapidly, analyzing every sentence Alexander spoke for flaws in logic and every microexpression for authenticity.
But the analysis found nothing.
The young man's words were watertight. Every word rested upon absolute loyalty to the Imperium. He had even elevated his conduct to the unassailable heights of "political correctness" by invoking "the Emperor's family."
"...Well said, cadet." Only after a long silence did Imran's voice, like metal grinding against stone, sound again. His flickering mechanical eye stopped scanning, and a barely perceptible trace of complicated emotion seemed to enter his cold gaze. "Hope is a double-edged sword. It can forge steel, but it can also invite rust. Your theory is dangerous, but... effective."
He picked up a heavy, black-bound book from his desk, its cover embossed with an Aquila.
"This is the Imperial Commissar's Handbook, first edition. It contains more than regulations. It also records the lessons countless old men like me paid for with blood and lives." Imran pushed the book toward Alexander. "You're clever, Lawrence. Cleverness is the third most important thing on the battlefield."
"What are the first two, sir?" Alexander asked.
"First, make the people around you believe you fear death less than they do. Second," Imran tapped the handbook with his metal finger, "make them believe your death, or theirs, has meaning."
"You seem to have mastered the second without anyone teaching you. Now I want you to write me a report presenting your 'family theory' more systematically, in the Imperium's official language." The old Commissar leaned back in his chair. "Don't disappoint me, cadet. The Imperium needs tools, but a thinking tool that knows how to sharpen itself will always be worth more than a hammer that does nothing but rust."
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