A Cheat in Installments

"Mills, can you take me to see your brothers?"

"Of course. The old captain sent me to find you today."

Old captain?

Han Mingxuan had just started to get up when Sevatar stepped in front of him.

"Uncle, this man is dangerous."

"Relax, Sevatar. If this big guy wanted to make a move, we'd all be done for."

The two were taken to a residential resettlement area, where the rooms were generally larger than those nearby.

Clearly, they had all been prepared for people of sturdy build.

"Captain, I've brought him."

"Thanks, Mills."

Han Mingxuan entered the room. It was a simple dwelling built from scrap metal sheets, with one lamp and three beds.

"Hello, Mr. Han."

Looking at the veteran before him, Han Mingxuan was certain.

This was a player from the Emperor's beta test.

A veteran of the Thunder Warriors.

But there was something unusual about this veteran.

He was a little too lucid.

"Do you know why I sent for you?"

"Why?"

"Because of this."

The old captain removed a necklace from around his neck. A brush hung from it.

It was... a calligraphy brush.

It was a perfect match for the empty brush rest in his mind.

How did he know?

There was a Chinese character meaning "tranquility" on the brush rest, and the same character was on the shaft of this brush.

Yes, it was a Chinese character.

"Looks like I did find the right person after all."

"Do you have any liquor?"

"Of course, but I hope your story isn't too old and tired."

"Hahaha, of course not."

In fact, the old captain didn't start with the beginning of Terra's Unification Wars. He only talked about his years on Nostramo.

"We've been on Nostramo for so many years I've lost count. Our bodies are flawed, after all. We're lucky enough not to go mad."

"Since coming to Nostramo, my brothers and I have rarely gone mad. Heh, the Emperor really has blessed us."

"But I know it all started over a year ago, when I picked up this brush."

Over a year ago.

Right around the time he had transmigrated.

"We'd just finished working in the mining hive that day. That night, I felt something was wrong with my mood, and I knew that madness was coming over me again."

"But for some inexplicable reason, I touched this brush to my forehead."

"Then, miraculously, I came to my senses. Since then, whenever one of my brothers started going mad, I used this brush to calm him down."

"Of course, I don't know exactly what this brush does."

"I don't recognize the writing on it, either. Maybe it's a language from somewhere on ancient Terra."

"Then, a few months ago, when Quintus Hive City on Nostramo began to change, the brush started moving on its own."

"At first, I thought it was Warp sorcery. We dealt with those bastards often enough during Terra's Unification Wars."

"But I was wrong. When the brush moved on its own, I felt a peace and serenity I'd never known before."

"Then I saw your name, Han Mingxuan."

"At first, it was written in the same ancient Terran script as the writing on the brush shaft. I couldn't read it."

"Then it gradually changed into High Gothic, then Low Gothic, and finally even the symbols used by gangs across this planet."

"You're the owner of this brush, aren't you?"

Han Mingxuan took the brush and examined it carefully.

It was an ordinary wolf-hair brush, just right for writing small regular script.

"Yes."

Han Mingxuan passed him the liquor.

"My name is Kamon." After taking a drink, Kamon gave his name.

Just one name, nothing else.

"Originally, I didn't want to give you this brush too soon, but time won't wait for us. Our bodies can't hold out anymore."

"If I could live a little longer, I might have kept this brush with me. That peace and serenity are hard to give up."

"Kamon, bring your brothers and come with me."

"We risked our lives for the Master of Mankind, but we were abandoned. Now we don't want to risk our lives for anyone. We just want to lie down and wait for death."

Han Mingxuan paused, standing there in a daze.

"The young men who joined later really are better than old timers like us. They're precise and deadly, and they don't go mad at the drop of a hat. Apart from being a little weaker, there's nothing wrong with them."

"Lay down your arms and return to the fields, old soldier."

"Lay down my arms and return to the fields? What does that mean?"

"It's an idiom from ancient Terra. It means you can finally rest."

"Rest? What a luxury."

Even after the Unification Wars ended and they were abandoned, the Thunder Warriors' war had never ended.

Their bodies were aging, and their minds would go mad from time to time. They were fighting themselves, and rest was simply too hard to come by.

"Then what do you think you are?"

"The first war machines, the abandoned, unstable elements, sacrifices for the Imperium's peace, obsolete old men."

"You're also a person, aren't you?" Han Mingxuan asked.

"A person?" Kamon froze, and the flask in his hand fell to the floor.

"Hahahaha! Hahahaha! You really are different!"

"I knew you were no ordinary man when you transformed all of Quintus Hive City into this in a dark universe like this!"

Kamon laughed loudly, tears streaming down his face.

"Yes, you're right. I... suppose I'm a person."

"Then, in the last days of your life, wait for death quietly and peacefully, like a person."

When Han Mingxuan and Sevatar left the Underhive, a group of towering giants followed behind them.

There were fifty of them in all!

Every one of them bore scars, and strange, complicated emotions churned in every pair of eyes.

In the Upper Hive District, the return of Han Mingxuan and the giants shook the entire district.

Looking at the fifty three-meter-tall giants, all the nobles marveled.

Just how many contingencies had the Father of Night left in the depths of the Hive City?

How did he even have genetically modified humans this far beyond the norm?

How much more was there in the depths of the Hive City that they didn't know about?

"Sevatar, make arrangements for old Kamon and the others' daily needs."

"Also, I need some peace and quiet for a while. Unless I say otherwise, I won't see anyone."

"Yes, Uncle."

Then Han Mingxuan locked himself in his study.

"Fucking shithole! Could you screw me over any harder?! Fuck!"

Han Mingxuan had always thought the other half of his cheat was in the Warp.

And where had it been? In the hands of the Thunder Warriors.

It really had sent him on a wild goose chase!

Of all the people who had transmigrated to Warhammer, who the fuck got their cheat in installments?!

Did it have to mess with him like this?!

After venting, Han Mingxuan looked at the small-script brush on the desk.

If the book in his mind was only a repository of knowledge, then this brush was the key.

From now on, his brush would truly be like a blade.