There were no unnecessary words, no arguments, and no hesitation throughout the entire process.
A woman holding a child cried and screamed like a madwoman when she was diagnosed with COVID-19, saying that she was not sick and trying to rush to the right.
The two apostles on guard immediately stepped forward, one pressing down on the shoulder, the other raising his hand and delivering a precise Lasgun to the center of the forehead.
The body was dragged to the room on the left, along with the child, the movements so swift it seemed like they had done it thousands of times before.
Dominic watched expressionlessly.
At the bottom level of the Hive City, this level of harshness is not considered excessive.
In the face of a plague, indecisiveness will only kill more people.
What bothered him even more was something else: everyone in the queue was at least ten meters apart from one another.
There were dedicated apostles maintaining order beside the procession; whispering and touching were forbidden.
This rule of "maintaining social distancing" is even more standardized than what is written in the Imperium Epidemic Prevention Manual.
Moreover, there seems to be some explanation for this distance; could it be a safe distance that this sect determined itself?
Moreover, there were several rudimentary ventilation devices in the corner, sucking air out of the house with a whooshing sound.
White lines are painted on the ground at intervals to mark waiting, inspection, and triage areas.
The entire process is rigorous, efficient, and even scientifically rigorous.
This is highly unusual.
The local religious sects in the Lower City either rely on mystical rituals to bewitch people or on coercion by force; how could they be so well-organized?
This doesn't resemble a heretical cult at all; it's more like a well-trained Ecclesiarchy epidemic prevention force.
He walked around the entire monastery, his doubts growing stronger.
This is essentially a secondary receiving station.
People diverted from the front lines will undergo a second screening here, and only those who pass the screening will be sent to the actual safe isolation zone.
There was no procedural error whatsoever; it was even more thorough than the Imperium's official epidemic prevention team.
But something just felt off.
Incense, emblems, sermons... everything is cloaked in the shell of Ecclesiarchy, yet its core always subtly veers in an unknown direction.
Like a masterpiece copied so perfectly, only upon closer inspection do you discover hidden patterns beneath the paint.
Just then, Dominic felt a sudden burning sensation in his chest.
It felt like a red-hot iron was pressed against his skin, burning him so much that he frowned sharply and instinctively raised his hand to press against his chest.
That was a sacred pendant he wore close to his body.
The pendant contained the finger bone of a Living Saint, wrapped in twelve layers of parchment inscribed with Purity Seal.
Each layer of talisman paper can withstand one relatively weak instance of Warp corruption and erosion.
This was a family heirloom passed down through generations, and he had only seen it get hot twice in his life.
One instance was encountering Chaos Space Marine boarded in Warp, and the other was facing the corruption of a Slaanesh champion vanguard.
And now, it's actually on fire.
The burning sensation lasted only a few seconds before quickly subsiding.
Dominic touched the pendant through his clothes; it had regained its warmth, but he could feel that the outermost layer of talisman paper had completely burned to ashes.
He looked up and saw two apostles leading three unsteady infected people toward the room on the left.
Although those people looked no different from ordinary civilians, the fact that they could cause the talisman to burn said it all.
I see.
Dominic understood.
There was indeed an aura of Warp corruption emanating from the Nurgle Infected in this monastery.
However, these infected individuals were immediately screened out and sent to the incinerator for disposal as soon as they appeared.
Therefore, the corrupting aura disappeared as soon as it appeared, and the sacred object only triggered a warning once.
He glanced around briefly and noticed that in just ten minutes, half of the twenty-odd people who stepped forward went to the crematorium on the left.
An infection rate of 50/50.
This number made his heart sink.
The epidemic in the Lower City was much more serious than he had anticipated.
This "Plague Cleansing Cult" was able to accurately identify infected individuals one by one despite such a high infection rate, demonstrating an astonishing level of efficiency.
Staying any longer carries the risk of exposure.
Dominic gestured for the two Sisters of Silence to retreat, but his eyes were searching for something.
He needs some evidence.
But all of these apostles were bald, wore masks, and were completely covered from head to toe, so that not a single hair could be found.
Skin fragments are even harder to find; their movements are clean and efficient, leaving not even a trace of blood.
Dominic's gaze fell on an apostle standing guard in the corner.
The man's gray robe was torn at his left wrist, revealing a small patch of skin underneath.
At his feet was a small, curled-up piece of dry, hard skin, like cracked and peeling skin.
You only get one chance.
Dominic shifted his feet slightly, his figure sliding past the shadows.
He deliberately knocked over an empty metal bucket next to him.
A soft clanging sound rang out sharply in the empty room.
The apostle turned his head instantly, his gaze sweeping over them.
However, their Psychic Power senses swept across the empty corner, finding nothing. The shielding field of the sapphire ring perfectly concealed the three's presence.
Just as the apostle turned his head, Dominic's fingertips swiftly brushed across the ground, picking up the tiny flake of skin from his fingertips.
His movements were as fast as a phantom.
The apostle stared for a few seconds, found nothing amiss, and then turned back to continue his guard duty.
Dominic and his two companions quietly retreated to the ventilation duct entrance and crawled out the way they came.
Dominic only let go of her fingers once she was back in the alleyway outside.
He carefully sealed the tiny piece of skin into a vacuum sampling tube.
The skin had an abnormal grayish-purple tinge and a hard texture, unlike the skin flakes of ordinary humans.
"Interesting," he muttered to himself, putting the sampling tube away.
"Let's go, to the next place."
An hour later, they stood at the entrance to an abandoned street deeper into the Lower City.
This place is a completely different world from the orderly monastery.
The buildings on both sides of the street were dilapidated, and the windows were dark and empty, like the eye sockets of a dead person.
Muddy sewage flowed on the road, with rotting garbage and unidentified pieces of meat floating on it.
In the distance, low growls could be heard from time to time, and swaying figures appeared and disappeared in the thick fog.
Those were zombies infected by the plague, irrational and only knowing how to devour the living.
The entire street was designated as an infection hotspot; even the air was filled with visible gray mold, and the smell of it was sticky and fishy.
In the middle of the street, a defensive line composed of sandbags, steel plates, and automatic machine gun turrets stood as a stark barrier separating this hellish place.
The twin-mounted automatic heavy machine gun was mounted behind a steel plate, its cold muzzle pointed deep into the street.
The machine guns will automatically fire as soon as any zombies get close, accurately blowing their heads off.
The spent cartridges clattered and fell to the ground, piling up into a small, brass-colored mountain.
Behind the defensive line was a temporary camp surrounded by barbed wire.
Survivors kept running out of the alleyways, crying and rushing toward the defensive line.
The apostles at the camp entrance will quickly conduct the first round of screening; those who pass will be let in, while those who fail will be blocked outside and left to be torn apart by the zombies.
This is the front line of the Plague Cleansing Cult, the place where the first branch split off.
Most infected individuals will be screened out directly here, while the remaining individuals will be transferred to temporary bases like Monastery No. 331 for secondary screening before being sent to safe zones.