Chapter 167: Sheath-Winged Sanguinius

"Is that Mephiston, the Chief Librarian who looks like a corpse?"

The corners of Zhou Yun's eyes twitched slightly.

Mephiston is one of the most powerful psykers in the Empire.

An infiltration like the one Di Xi and her companions are attempting could never bypass Mephiston's psychic powers.

"Furthermore, my lord, the entire Angel's Fortress has undergone massive changes."

Di Xi gathered her thoughts and said:

"Chapter Master Dante has issued an order; excavations are underway within a radius of several thousand meters around the Angel's Fortress."

"Those ancient structures buried by ten thousand years of wind and sand have been dug up to house the gathering angels."

"They even discovered an ancient and sturdy city wall, which has become the new shield of the Angel's Fortress."

Hearing this, Zhou Yun nodded slightly.

He knew a little about this.

As Guilliman split the old Legions into Chapters of one thousand, the Blood Angels on Baal were no longer enough to fill the Angel's Fortress that once housed the Legion.

Most areas of that ancient fortress had been submerged by ten thousand years of Baal's yellow sand, leaving only the core area.

But as reinforcements from the successor Chapters arrived, Chapter Master Dante ordered the blood thralls to re-excavate the lost parts of the Angel's Fortress.

Old bunkers, towers, meeting rooms, and walls were discovered, and the scope of the Angel's Fortress expanded by several thousand meters.

It is a fortress sufficiently hard and massive; it was the place where the angels once led the Legion, and it is the best place to defend against the swarm's invasion.

But Zhou Yun guessed that the remains of Sanguinius should still be stored in the core area, which had never been buried by the yellow sand.

The old map should still be usable, allowing Zhou Yun to use the Anywhere Door to infiltrate the interior of the Angel's Fortress silently.

"I only need a map of the former core area."

Zhou Yun looked at Di Xi and Old One-Eye and said:

"Clues will also suffice."

Di Xi was silent for a moment before speaking: "My lord, we have only been on this planet for about three months."

"But a group of evil things had already infiltrated Baal long ago, lurking in the desert. They likely possess a map of the interior of the Angel's Fortress."

Old One-Eye was clearly stunned when he heard Di Xi's words, then asked: "Are you talking about Genestealers?"

"Yes, indeed." Old One-Eye nodded: "These guys seem to know Baal very well."

"These bastards previously intended to corrupt the refugees from Ashford, but fortunately, we knew quite a bit about them and followed the clues to discover their tracks."

"However, when the angels arrived to support us and joined us in surrounding them, these damned mutant monsters suddenly disappeared into the desert, leaving no trace."

"We suspect that these Genestealers may have silently infiltrated Baal many years ago, lurking in the desert for hundreds of years, silently and slowly developing their forces, and investigating intelligence within Baal."

"It wasn't until recently, with the swarm approaching, that these guys started to become slightly active, and they happened to be caught by us, exposing themselves."

Listening to the words of Di Xi and Old One-Eye, Zhou Yun pinched his chin and fell into thought.

Genestealers... Indeed, in the upcoming Battle of Baal, Genestealers did appear.

And they cooperated with a Lictor to infiltrate the interior of the Angel's Fortress, attacking the Sarcophagus Hall where new recruits were cultivated as a diversion, taking the opportunity to destroy the void shields of the Angel's Fortress.

They clearly had considerable knowledge of the situation inside the Angel's Fortress.

It seems the Tyranid swarm had been preparing to invade Baal for a long time, perhaps even starting a hundred years ago.

The Genestealers infected by the swarm must have been extremely cautious to lurk silently on Baal, and they collected information extremely useful to the swarm.

They must have a map of the interior of the Angel's Fortress.

And for Zhou Yun, finding them is not difficult. Zhou Yun has the Person-Finding Cane in his hand.

As long as there is enough information, he can easily find anyone.

"Tell me about the information on this branch of Genestealers lurking on Baal, the more specific, the better."

Zhou Yun looked at Di Xi and Old One-Eye and said.

"This matter goes back to when we first arrived on Baal, before we split up."

Old One-Eye said:

"At first, the refugees on Laixi basically believed in Saint Doraemon or Arch-Nun Magda, while among the Ashford refugees, a significant group believed only in Sanguinius."

"We thought this was nothing; whether believing in Sanguinius, Saint Doraemon, the Emperor himself, or the local faith of Laixi, it didn't matter, after all, the ultimate enemy is the same."

"Unless they believe in the twisted cult of the Genestealers."

Di Xi continued for Old One-Eye:

"We were always vigilant against this possibility. My sisters silently lurked beside those believers of Sanguinius and followed the clues to discover one of their small strongholds and a church."

"These Genestealers might not have received information about Ashford from the swarm yet; they didn't understand our abilities and underestimated us assassins of the Death-Worshipping Sect."

"My sisters and I infiltrated their stronghold and church and found that they indeed believe in Sanguinius, just not the Sanguinius in our understanding."

Listening to Di Xi's words, Zhou Yun couldn't help but raise his eyebrows. He seemed to have guessed what would happen next. Genestealers don't just believe in the Four-Armed Emperor; they often iterate their tactics according to local needs and develop new twisted faiths.

For example, on a Forge World, they might develop a Blade Omnissiah; on the Five Hundred Worlds, they might develop a Mother-Swarm Guilliman.

If they happened to invade a Daemon World, there might be things like Copulating Slaanesh, Brain-Worm Tzeentch, Horned Khorne, or Dung-Beetle Nurgle.

The winged figure in the white light in the corner of his eye also twitched his wings slightly; he seemed to be unable to hold it together either.

"The Sanguinius they believe in does not have white wings, but two pairs of coleopteran scale-wings, like flies, wasps, or bees."

"In their doctrine, Sanguinius did not truly sacrifice himself, but fell into a slumber in an insect egg after being seriously wounded."

"When the moment of destiny arrives, the insect egg wrapping the angel will descend from the sky, and Sanguinius will be resurrected from it, spreading its scale-wings."

"At that time, all Genestealers who believe in it will merge into the insect egg of Sanguinius and enjoy eternal happiness with the angel."

Di Xi paused slightly, then said softly:

"They call their faith... Sheath-Winged Sanguinius."

!. Read

"Sheath-Winged Sanguinius."

Mephiston whispered the name of that blasphemous faith.

The Genestealers, having suffered genetic corruption, twisted the pure faith in the Archangel, turning it into a blasphemous heresy to deceive the residents of Baal, tempting them to fall into it and also be corrupted.

Upon learning of the existence of this blasphemous cult, almost every Blood Angel fell into anger.

Right here on Baal, in the hometown of the Gene-Father, on the home planet of the Blood Angels, this group of twisted xenos developed such a blasphemous sect.

And the Blood Angels never noticed.

But Mephiston understood that this was almost an inevitable result.

The swarm clearly had been silently eyeing Baal for a long time.

Among these Genestealers who infiltrated Baal, there must also be powerful psykers; they relied on this to evade the investigation of the Librarians.

And Baal itself is covered by desert; under the vast yellow sand, there are many caves, tunnels, and ancient buildings.

The Genestealers were very careful and expanded their forces very slowly, completely hiding in the desert before this.

It was almost impossible for the Blood Angels to think that such a group of blasphemous xenos was hidden in Baal.

If it weren't for their attempt to corrupt refugees from the Hades System this time, the Blood Angels might not have discovered the existence of this Genestealer sect until the swarm descended, let alone find their settlement.

However, Mephiston predicted through the blasphemous prophecy of the Eight-Faced Monster that the Lictor was about to appear in the Genestealer settlement, and he found the specific location of this settlement.

This place is hidden in the deepest part of Baal's desert, in a complex tunnel system under a sand dune amidst the boundless yellow sand.

These tunnels might be sewage systems from tens of thousands of years ago, and even the Blood Angels had never known of their existence.

Mephiston stood at an entrance to that tunnel system.

The prophecy of the Eight-Faced Monster not only pointed out the location of the Lictor and the Genestealer sect,

but also revealed to Mephiston the identity of that so-called "Saint Doraemon," a candidate for multiple positions in the Warp.

Mephiston chose to investigate the Genestealers first because he believed that Saint Doraemon was clearly more dangerous than the Genestealers.

He still remembered the Eight-Faced Monster whose head suddenly burst in front of him... That xenos wizard, whom the Blood Angels had failed to kill for three thousand years, died with its head bursting just because it mentioned the name of Saint Doraemon.

Even though Mephiston possessed psychic powers far beyond the norm, he did not dare to rashly investigate Him.

A breeze suddenly blew up, and sand mixed with radioactive light hit his unique power armor.

His power armor was unusual, looking like the exposed muscle tissue of a skinned person; every muscle fiber was carved out of ceramite.

The color of Mephiston's power armor was also deeper than what the Blood Angels usually used, like a deep red that was constantly beating, flashing with a bloody light under the scarlet light of Baal's sun.

But Mephiston was not worried about exposure.

As an Astartes, his massive size meant that unless he disguised himself as those demented mutants, any physical disguise he knew of could not cover his identity.

So Mephiston chose to use the psychic powers of the Empyrean; he used his powerful psychic abilities to nest several layers of extremely complex cognitive distortion on himself, ensuring that he would be treated as a companion by those Genestealers and would not attract attention.

Mephiston stepped into the tunnel...

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 168 =====