The Hormagaunt's bone blade stopped just short of Butcher's neck.
Rena turned her head, her compound eyes fixed on Lynn. "Hiss..."
Lynn's Adam's apple bobbed. He knew he had to offer a reasonable explanation.
"We don't know where the purified water is stored. We need a guide.
"And I need his help to get more resources for you."
His voice remained steady.
Rena tilted her head at an angle no human could possibly manage, light flickering in her compound eyes as she analyzed his words.
In just a few seconds, cold sweat had soaked Lynn's back. He stood ready to activate forced Dialogue at any moment.
At last, Rena spared Butcher and turned toward the depths of the factory.
Butcher collapsed to the floor, his worldview utterly shattered.
This tax officer could actually command these terrifying Xenos?
Was he a heretic? A daemon? Or something even more terrifying?
Only when Lynn kicked him did he snap out of his overwhelming terror. He did not even dare look Lynn in the eye.
"Where is the purified water stored?" Lynn's voice was icy.
Trembling, Butcher struggled for a long while before pointing in one direction.
"M-my lord, this way. The underground warehouse."
It was a concealed underground warehouse built at a later date.
Besides several large sealed barrels of purified water, there were several iron cages holding "live cargo."
More than a dozen men and women in ragged clothes, their faces sallow and emaciated, had nothing but terror left in their eyes.
The situation was worse than expected.
The purified water reserves were limited, and there was no functioning water purification equipment.
More troubling still, through their bond, Lynn could faintly sense Rena's surging, intense hunger for "pure biomass."
These living people, untainted by prosthetics or psychoactive drugs, were more enticing to her than those barrels of water.
He immediately forced [Dialogue] to activate.
Corrosive saliva dripped constantly from Rena's mouthparts, eating through the metal floor.
Lynn agonized inwardly.
He knew that once his mental power ran out, this "live cargo" would have no chance of survival.
He took one last look at the desperate eyes inside the cages. A trace of complicated pity flickered in his eyes, but resolve quickly replaced it.
"Go ahead, Rena. Consider it an extra 'gift' from this operation."
He ended the [Dialogue] state himself.
This time, neither the Hormagaunt nor the Termagant approached.
Rena would have this "feast" to herself.
Even the savage Butcher felt his stomach churn at the sight of that efficient, horrifying feeding, nearly vomiting.
Lynn watched the entire process without expression.
He knew perfectly well that if he let them go, his secret with the Tyranids could no longer be concealed.
As for Butcher, a wild dog scared out of his wits, Lynn had plenty of ways to tame him into a useful tool.
Rena absorbed every last bit of the "pure biomass."
She raised her head and let out an unprecedented piercing hiss, filled with satisfaction and release!
The crystallized wound on her forelimb suddenly burst apart, turning into a cloud of purple dust.
Fresh, crimson biomass writhed in the exposed wound, no longer bearing any trace of crystalline erosion.
New carapace grew, spread, and hardened at a speed visible to the naked eye.
[System notification]: Bound target "Rena" has used a large quantity of pure biomass to forcibly flush out psychic contamination! Crystallized wound purification progress: 6/10! Condition recovering! Affinity change: +15! Current affinity: -28!
In the water purification plant's underground warehouse, the air was thick with the smell of blood.
Mixed with the pungent odor produced by evaporating Tyranid acid, it formed a nauseating, sweet stench of blood.
His gaze swept over the stains being consumed by the creep. More than a dozen living people had once been there.
Lynn's breathing paused almost imperceptibly, but only a momentary ripple passed through the depths of his eyes.
"They saw Rena. If I let even one of them go, word would spread.
"The Adeptus Arbites, the Inquisition, even other Genestealer Cults would come flocking.
"When that happened, they wouldn't be the only ones to die."
After offering himself a few words of inward justification.
He closed his eyes and observed a second of silence in his mind for those indistinct faces.
But knowing the underlying logic of the Warhammer universe, he did not dwell on it for long.
And now, that trembling "cost" in the corner had to be converted into "profit."
His gaze turned cold and sinister as he looked at Butcher.
Butcher lay slumped beside a rusty pipe, a puddle beneath him giving off the rank stench of urine.
His face was as pale as a corpse, his lips trembling incessantly.
His eyes were unfocused, and he kept muttering something unintelligible over and over.
Lynn walked to a corner of the warehouse where discarded industrial equipment lay piled.
He pried open the remains of a rusty fungal culture tank and used his dagger to scrape a thick layer of dark green mold, dotted with eerie fluorescent spots, from its inner wall.
The sticky mycelium gave off a mixture of rotting wood and chemical reagents.
He kneaded it, finally rolling it into three wet, slippery, sticky "spore sacs" the size of fingernails.
He walked up to Butcher and crouched.
"Look at me." Lynn's voice was quiet, but carried an unquestionable chill.
He pressed the cold barrel of his Laspistol beneath Butcher's chin, forcing that terror-stricken face upward.
Butcher's pupils focused, meeting Lynn's eyes.
Contrary to what Butcher had imagined, those eyes held no fanaticism, none of a Cultist's madness.
There was only a bottomless calm, as though he were appraising prey.
Yet that calm chilled Butcher more than any madness could.
"You've seen the power of our 'brethren,'" Lynn said without any emotion.
The word "brethren" drove like an icicle into Butcher's now-fragile nerves.
"Clean, efficient, absolutely obedient. That is the direction of evolution."
A rattling sound came from Butcher's throat, as though he wanted to beg for mercy but could not form a complete word.
"You should have become biomass to nourish evolution." Lynn held a "spore sac" before Butcher's eyes.
Under the pale light, that disgusting green seemed to pulse faintly as though alive.
"But I'm giving you a chance. Swallow this 'linking spore' and become an 'extended limb' of the network.
"This is a blessing, and a contract."
Butcher was already on the verge of collapse, but it was not enough.
Just then, a Hormagaunt glided silently to Butcher's side.
It raised its sharp bone blade, a glistening drop of pungent acidic saliva gathering at the tip.
Under Butcher's terrified gaze, that drop of saliva fell onto his cheek with a drip.
"Sss!"
A faint sound of corrosion rang out, accompanied by Butcher's agonized scream.
White smoke instantly rose from his cheek as the acid ate a coin-sized, charred wound into his skin.
The searing pain bored into his brain like a red-hot iron rod.
"This is a 'genetic mark.'" Lynn's voice followed him like a shadow, rising above the screams.
"To remind you who you belong to. Now, swallow it."
The combined torment of pain and fear destroyed the last shred of Butcher's will.
Trembling, he took the "spore sac," closed his eyes, and stuffed it into his mouth, forcing it down with regurgitated blood and stomach acid.
The sickening, slimy mass slid down his throat, as though something alive really had burrowed inside.
"Very good." Lynn put away the other two "spore sacs."
"Don't let me discover any betrayal. It will take only one day..." He paused, lowering his voice further.
"You'll become an empty shell, a breeding ground for hatching new 'brethren.'
"Is that what you want?"
"N-no. Master, spare me."
Tears and snot streamed down Butcher's face as he kowtowed repeatedly, his forehead striking the metal floor with dull thuds.
"Then remember your new identity." Lynn stood, looking down at the man at his feet.
"You're the new head of the Anvil Society.
"Within three days, gather whatever useful remnants of the Sharktooth Gang remain, and recruit wretches who can no longer survive and know how to keep their mouths shut. No more than fifty in total.
"You have only one objective: follow my orders."
"Understood?"
"Understood! Understood!" Butcher nodded repeatedly.