Chapter 67: You, just go in peace!

In the First District, on the wide street,

Zhou Yun, along with many believers who had entered the First District waiting to receive the baptism, leaned against the wall of a building,

while Jeanne, her brow furrowed tightly and her forehead covered in sweat, curled up in Zhou Yun's arms.

Since entering the First District, Jeanne had begun trying to use her precognitive ability to probe the secrets of the Gene-Stealer Patriarch.

What exactly did that herald of the Great Devourer, the chthonic demigod of the swarm crouching in the shadows of the Underhive, want to do?

Previously, Jeanne had been too far from it to see anything but the dark Warp shadows coiling around it.

Now that Jeanne and the Gene-Stealer Patriarch were in the same First District, close enough, the future she could see had become clear.

Jeanne seemed to shrink slightly beside Zhou Yun, as if in pain.

Zhou Yun reached out, hugged Jeanne tighter, and gently stroked her hair.

"Is your child sick?" a somewhat hoarse woman's voice sounded.

Zhou Yun looked toward where the voice came from.

He saw a middle-aged woman with a yellowed face, her head wrapped in a scarf, sitting beside Zhou Yun while holding a child.

"Is it a fever?" The middle-aged woman gently reached out and touched Jeanne's forehead: "So much sweat."

"She started feeling unwell after entering the First District; perhaps she caught a chill on the way."

Zhou Yun stroked Jeanne's hair, putting on an expression of heartache for the child as he spoke.

"You fathers just aren't careful enough."

The middle-aged woman couldn't help but shake her head, took a piece of synthetic cloth from her pocket, and wiped the sweat from Jeanne's forehead.

Then, from a deep pocket in her clothes, she carefully took out a small bottle, less than half full of purified water, and stuffed it into Zhou Yun's hand:

"Let the child drink more water; it's all clean water."

Zhou Yun nodded slightly to thank the woman.

He silently placed the water into his fourth-dimensional pocket, confirmed the water was fine, and then fed some to Jeanne.

"Sigh, it doesn't matter if we suffer; it's the children who suffer."

The woman looked at the child in her arms with heartache and spoke quietly while sitting beside Zhou Yun:

"You look like you're from the Underhive too, judging by your clean clothes?"

Zhou Yun merely nodded slightly; the woman sighed and began to talk incessantly:

"My husband and I are devout followers of Hua Di Huang, but after having a child, sigh, everything changed."

"People around us insisted this child was a mutant. We are devout Ecclesiarchy believers; how could we give birth to a mutant?"

"They all went mad. They killed my man and wanted to burn my son. I held the child and ran, ran, and kept running until I got here."

As she spoke, the woman lowered her head, took out another bottle from her clothes, and began feeding the child water.

Zhou Yun glanced over and saw the child in the woman's swaddling clothes.

The child had bony protrusions on its forehead and possessed chitinous armor like an insect on its body.

It was a human-shaped insect through and through.

It was a Gene-Stealer.

Gene-Stealers inject corrupted genes into a host's body, causing them to conceive and give birth to blasphemous offspring.

The host themselves also comes under the control of the offspring, becoming a blasphemous kin of the Gene-Stealers.

This woman was in exactly that situation.

"I got into the Administrative Building; there are many followers of the Four-Armed Shenhuangde Sect inside, and their mutation levels are very high."

A small insect by Zhou Yun's ear vibrated its wings, transmitting Mong's voice:

"I have entered the Administrative Building; there aren't many followers of the Four-Armed Shenhuangde Sect inside."

"They are leading a group of people underground; the Patriarch should be there."

Hearing Mong's words, Zhou Yun nodded slightly.

Taking advantage of this moment, he began to observe the Gene-Stealers outside.

There weren't many Gene-Stealers outside either.

What attracted Zhou Yun's attention most were several Gene-Stealers cloaked in heavy robes, as if hiding their appearance.

Zhou Yun vaguely saw deformed claws, pincers, and a third arm beneath their robes.

Hybrid Mutants!

They were Hybrid Mutants.

They were Gene-Stealers with deeper mutations; their Tyranid genetic code was more active than others', granting them terrifying weaponized limbs and acid glands.

And such Gene-Stealers are only born under the stimulus of the Hive Mind when a Hive Fleet approaches.

The Hive Fleet is already very close.

Zhou Yun stared at the few Gene-Stealers, his brow unable to help but furrow.

Too few.

Why are there only so few Gene-Stealers?

Didn't Mong and Marquet say earlier that the Gene-Stealers had already started expanding anxiously?

After expanding for so long, there are only this many people.

Moreover,

Zhou Yun looked at the woman beside him with some strangeness.

This woman and her child were clearly already infected by Gene-Stealers and had already received the baptism.

Why were they also mixing into the line, following everyone else to the underground of the Administrative Building to receive the Patriarch's baptism?

Wait.

A guess arose in Zhou Yun's heart.

But there is no precedent for this; how is it possible?

"Zhou Yun."

The small insect by Zhou Yun's ear fluttered its wings, transmitting Meng Ge's voice:

"I am about to enter the underground area; I should see the Gene-Taker chieftain very soon."

"The number of Gene-Takers on the way isn't very large; I think our chances of victory are high."

"... Meng Ge."

Zhou Yun's mouth twitched; he lowered his voice and said:

"I have a guess; if this guess is true..."

Stopping here, Zhou Yun paused; he recalled Jeanne's warning,

to always be wary of Chaos.

"... Never mind, go ahead and rest assured." Zhou Yun said to Meng Ge.

"Ah?"

In the underground area of the Administrative Building, Meng Ge blinked his eyes in confusion.

He did not understand what Zhou Yun meant by those words.

Meng Ge followed the layers of spiral stairs, walking bit by bit into the Administrative Building's underground along with the crowded flow of people,

and after passing through a door, the scene before his eyes made Meng Ge startle.

Before his eyes, in the underground of the Administrative Building, there actually existed a huge subterranean palace.

The subterranean palace was vast, over a hundred meters deep and more than twenty meters high, supported throughout by heavy and coarse pillars made of metal.

Hanging from the pillars were scorching promethium lamps; an orange-yellow light with a hint of blue illuminated the surroundings.

And the first thing Meng Ge saw in this subterranean palace was that metal Gao Ta at the far end of the palace.

The Gao Ta was built from black-gray metal, layered and stacked, covered with complex cables and components like dense script.

At the upper-middle position of the Gao Ta, there was a ring three or four meters wide; within the ring lay profound darkness, and occasionally streaks of lightning filled with spiritual power flashed across.

A door! It is a door!

It is a Warp Engine!

The Warp Engine; the door that Malgit and he had sought so bitterly is right here!

As long as, when that Gene-Taker chieftain infects him, he corrupts the chieftain's gene sequence in return, he can control the entire First District...

Meng Ge's gaze fell upon that Xenos Demigod crouching beneath the Warp Engine.

Today's chase-reads increased by seven hundred... If I had known this, I wouldn't have reported for serialization; I would have waited until Monday to fight for the next round.

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(End of this chapter)