Warhammer Cultivation: Cultivating the Tao Te Ching in the 40K Universe

Warhammer Cultivation: Cultivating the Tao Te Ching in the 40K Universe

Author: Aoki no Mu

Synopsis: A young man transmigrates into the Warhammer universe, only to find himself amidst the steel torrent of the Great Crusade.

While others conquer the galaxy with explosive guns, he silently recites the Tao Te Ching amidst mountains of corpses and seas of blood.

Whispering of a warp god? Directly refine it into true essence!

Emperor's genetic modification failed? The Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic reshapes the physical body!

While the Primarchs fought to the death, he pulled out "The Art of War" and taught the Four Gods tactics!

"Your Majesty, you are conquering the galaxy in the wrong way."

Facing the supreme golden throne of mankind, he smiled like a harmless Eastern monk.

[Guaranteed to be over one million words]

Chapter 1 Awakening in the Time of Iron and Blood

"boom--!!!"

The deafening roar, like thunder at the dawn of creation, savagely yanked Lin Chen's consciousness out of a state of chaotic warmth.

Immediately following was a sharp, piercing noise, like a thousand fingernails scraping across a blackboard at the same time, stabbing his eardrums and making his soul tremble.

He tried to open his eyes, but his eyelids felt as heavy as lead.

He tried to cover his ears, but his limbs felt like they were filled with mercury and wouldn't obey his commands.

His senses were returning one by one, but the messages they brought back were utterly unfamiliar to him.

First is the sense of smell.

A thick, pungent smell of blood mingled with the scorching metallic odor, the acrid stench of ozone, and a strange, cloying sweetness from… rotting flesh being roasted. The smell brutally assaulted his nostrils, making his stomach churn. It was no smell he recognized—not the disinfectant of a hospital, nor the exhaust fumes of a city; it was a primal, savage stench, belonging to slaughterhouses and battlefields.

Then there's touch.

He lay there, the ground beneath him cold, hard, and slightly slippery and sticky. Something sharp and angular seemed to be pressing against his back—perhaps gravel, perhaps… something else entirely. Fine dust particles filled the air, settling on his skin and causing a slight itch.

Fragments of consciousness began to piece together, and the last images of memory surfaced in the mind.

His name is Lin Chen, a young PhD from the 21st century. A few years ago, a PhD might have been a prestigious title, but now, the hard work of making a living and pursuing a career has left him with almost no leisure time.

He had only one hobby left: an almost pathological love for a fictional universe called "Warhammer 40." He was staying up all night reading the latest leaked lore book, lamenting the tragic fate of the human empire in that dark universe, when suddenly his heart clenched with pain, and then... and then this is what happened.

“…Where is this place?”

A hoarse, weak voice came from his own throat, carrying the naivety unique to a young man, and it was not his own voice at all.

This discovery struck him like a lightning bolt, cleaving through the fog in his mind. Lin Chen suddenly opened his eyes.

What came into view was a scene of purgatory that he would never forget.

He was lying in the ruins of a huge temple made of steel and rock. The sky above him was not the sky, but a dome that seemed to have no top, covered with intricate pipes and gear reliefs. But now, a hole had been torn in the dome, and dark red, smoke-polluted light poured down from the opening like blood-red tears.

Where murals and sculptures once graced the walls of the hall, only charred marks and jagged bullet holes remain. Massive pillars lie collapsed, their broken sections exposing the grotesque steel skeletons.

Red and black smoke drifted slowly in the air, making everything seem so unreal.

And among these ruins lay corpses.

The corpses were bizarrely shaped. Some wore tattered leather armor, had strange, circuit-like tattoos on their bodies, and were clutching crudely made automatic rifles or chainsaw axes.

Their deaths defied the imagination of any civilized world.

One corpse was cleanly severed at the waist, yet its upper body remained in a charging posture, its internal organs dragging on the ground like squeezed-out tubes; another's chest was completely dented, as if struck head-on by an invisible giant hammer, with broken ribs piercing its heart; even worse, as if crushed by a giant treadmill, flesh, leather armor, and bones were mixed into an indistinguishable, dark red carpet that smelled of burnt flesh.

“Barbarians…”

Lin Chen's lips moved silently, a term he had only read about in background stories, now transformed into the most direct and bloody reality.

The perpetrator of this massacre was not far away.

That was... an angel clad in golden armor, a killing angel.

He was nearly three meters tall, wearing a heavy suit of powered armor. The layers of terracotta armor plates reflected a dark golden luster in the smoke and dust. Thick energy cables and servo systems connected to his joints, and the power backpack on his back emitted a deep, heartbeat-like hum. The surface of the armor was covered with star-shaped cracks left by explosive guns and hideous scars from chainsaw swords.

He wasn't wearing a helmet, revealing a face with features as sharply defined as an ancient Terran sculpture. That face showed no human emotions, only a cold, focused intensity that transcended weariness, and a chilling indifference to the surrounding death.

In his hand he held a massive chainsaw sword that was still buzzing, its blade stained with brains and bone fragments, dripping the rhythm of death back onto this scorched earth.

Creations of the Emperor, superhuman warriors modified with the most advanced genetic technology. They are extensions of the Emperor's will, embodiments of death walking among mortals!

I... have been transported to the world of Warhammer 40,000? Not the M41 (41st millennium), which, though dark, was at least orderly, but this chaotic era filled with blood and fire?

Lin Chen, no, now it should be the owner of this body—Hector Kane.

He felt a chill run up his spine to the top of his head, making his whole body feel cold.

He knows the future of this world.

He knew of the Horus Rebellion, of the Emperor's silence, of the slow, desperate decay that lasted ten thousand years. He knew that the "best and worst" era of the human empire was about to arrive, and he, a mortal powerless, stood at the very beginning of this history, like an ant that could be crushed at any moment.

Fear, immense fear gripped his heart.

Just then, a sharp buzzing sound exploded in the depths of his mind without warning.

"what--!"

Hector groaned in pain and clutched his head with both hands.

It wasn't the sound of the physical world, but a noise that acted directly on the soul. Countless chaotic, malicious sounds echoed in his consciousness. There were mad roars, seductive whispers, desperate cries, and ecstatic laughs... They were like a school of sharks smelling blood, frantically assaulting his fragile mind.

This is the whisper of the psionic sea! This body, Hector Kane, is that of an undiscovered, unregistered, and untrained wild psionicist!

What does it mean to be a wild psionicist?

It means a walking time bomb, always on the verge of being possessed by demons! It means an excellent beacon to attract warp predators!

The thought had barely formed when the noise in his mind grew even more violent. Hector's vision began to blur, and he seemed to see invisible, distorted shadows gathering in the air around him, staring greedily at him, as if they were about to tear through the veil of reality and drag his soul into an endless abyss.

He's going to die. He just transmigrated and he's going to die, dying in one of the most classic Warhammer deaths: being killed by the warp.

The instinct for survival overcame fear. In the final moments before his consciousness was completely submerged, deep within Lin Chen's soul, the memory of his 21st-century self flickered like a candle in the wind.

He remembered who he was, his hometown, and the culture that was so out of place in this bloody world.

In his despair, some words inexplicably surfaced in his mind. They were sentences he had been forced to memorize by his grandfather when he was a child, sentences that were already etched into his bones. They were also words he had painstakingly studied in the sea of ​​books during his academic journey.

Almost instinctively, in his mental world, he roared out a passage with all his might:

"The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao. The name that can be named is not the eternal name."

When the first syllable rang in her consciousness, a miracle occurred.

The violent noise that was trying to tear his soul froze for a moment.

Hector perked up and continued his "silent recitation":

"Nameless, it is the origin of heaven and earth; named, it is the mother of all things. Therefore, one should always be without desire in order to observe its mystery; one should always have desire in order to observe its manifestations."

As the opening lines of the Tao Te Ching flowed through his mind, an indescribable and profound feeling arose within him.

If his original spiritual world was a dilapidated house leaking from all sides, letting the storms of the subspace pour in, then at this moment, these ancient Eastern characters are like invisible craftsmen, automatically repairing this dilapidated house.

"The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao," like a stabilizing force, laid the foundation at the core of his consciousness.

"The beginning of the nameless world" seemed to distinguish between the pure and the impure, opening up a small "pure land" in his chaotic mind.

The insane entropy and chaotic subspace energy still assaulted him. But they could no longer penetrate unimpeded; instead, they were blocked and filtered by the boundaries of this "pure land."

Those impurities filled with malice and madness were rejected, while an extremely weak but pure energy, like a clear mountain spring, slowly seeped into his spiritual world.

This energy was gentle and tranquil, carrying a sense of emptiness and nothingness. It flowed through Hector's consciousness, calming his agitation and bringing peace.

He continued reciting:

"These two originate from the same source but have different names; they are both called profound. Profound and yet more profound, the gateway to all wonders."

As the last sentence fell, the pure energy that had seeped in had coalesced into a faint, warm current. This current did not linger on the spiritual level, but instead flowed slowly into his body along some mysterious trajectory.

He could "see" the airflow passing over his injured back, and a tingling warmth emanated from the wound caused by the rubble, the pain rapidly subsiding.

What's this?

Lin Chen, or rather Hector, stared in astonishment at this unbelievable scene.

His soul, this soul from the 21st century, is itself a unique "filter." Those ancient classics, those texts containing Eastern philosophical thought, become the operating program of this "filter."

It can transform the violent and dangerous subspace psionic energy in this universe into a substance that it can understand and absorb, similar to the legendary "qi" or "spiritual power"!

This is not simple psychic energy; it is energy refined and tamed through the concept of "Tao"!

So that's what my cheat code was all about!

It's not some system, nor some divine skill manual, but rather the treasures of civilization passed down for thousands of years in my mind!

Hector felt a surge of elation, but the tranquility brought on by the Tao Te Ching quickly calmed him down. He knew this was not the time to be happy.

He slowly and carefully sat up from the ground, trying not to make any noise.

The Space Marine not far away had finished "cleaning up" the battlefield. He slammed his massive chainsword on the ground, making a heavy metallic clang, then pulled a piece of black, unidentified jerky from a leather pouch at his waist and roughly tore into it to replenish his strength.

Hector held his breath and quietly surveyed his surroundings.

He found himself lying behind a pile of corpses, in a well-hidden spot. The Space Marine didn't seem to have noticed him, the survivor.

Play dead? Wait for him to leave?

Or...show yourself on your own?

Hector's mind raced.

If this seemingly unharmed "suspected barbarian remnant" were to suddenly jump out, he would likely be cleaved in two on the spot.

But hiding forever isn't a solution. Soon, the Empire's sweeping forces will arrive, and as an unregistered person with no identity record, my fate will be equally precarious. At best, I'll be sent to some labor camp to spend my life in constant uncertainty.

Just as he was hesitating, footsteps came from the entrance of the ruins.

"Captain! Sector A has been cleared! Three remaining individuals were found and have been 'purged' on the spot. One fragment of the Standard Template Construction (STC) has been seized!"

An equally tall Astartes entered, his armor stained even more blood, and his tone carried a hint of excitement.

The captain, leaning on his sword, didn't even look up, but said in a muffled voice, "Understood. Are there any survivors in Sector B?"

“No more, Captain. The dissidents here… are tenacious, but also fragile.”

"Hmm." The captain nodded, swallowed the last bite of jerky, and straightened up. "Notify the officials in the State Council that they can come in and clean up the mess. We're going to the next target."

The two giant warriors turned and walked heavily out of the hall.

Hector's heart pounded, and a crazy idea formed in his mind: Opportunity! This was his only chance!

He quickly analyzed the pros and cons: they had just finished a fierce battle, were exhausted, and were at their lowest point of vigilance. More importantly, they seemed poised to leave, which would likely hand the place over to the bureaucracy—meaning an order was being established.

He had to carve out a legitimate identity for himself in this narrow gap where savage force had left and cold order had taken hold! He was taking a gamble! He was betting that they would choose the easiest way to deal with a seemingly harmless survivor—handing him over.

He took a deep breath, and with all his might, let out a weak but clear cry:

"...Help...help me..."

The footsteps stopped suddenly.

The Space Marine captain whirled around, his hawk-like gaze instantly locking onto Hector's location. His eyes were filled with scrutiny and murderous intent, as if he were looking at a dead man.

Hector's heart leaped into his throat.

Did he bet right or wrong?

He forced himself to stand up from behind the pile of corpses, raising his hands high. He deliberately made himself appear weak, his body trembling slightly, and his face contorted with a mixture of fear and pleading.

He was dressed in the most common civilian clothing of the time—rough linen clothes, stained with dust and other people's blood from hiding, but not damaged. He looked like an innocent, unlucky fellow caught up in the fighting.

Captain Astartes narrowed his eyes, scrutinizing the suddenly appearing boy. He was thin, pale, with black hair and black eyes—a typical Terran. His eyes were filled with fear, yet… there seemed to be an unusual calm within them.

"A survivor?" The later Astartes was somewhat surprised. He raised his slug gun and pointed it at Hector.

"Put down your gun, Castor," the captain said in a low voice. "He's unarmed and poses no threat whatsoever."

His gaze lingered on Hector for a good ten seconds, as if trying to discern something. Hector could feel an invisible pressure enveloping him, not just an imposing aura, but a scrutiny mixed with the experience of killing and the instincts of a genetically modified organism.

He dared not circulate the Tao Te Ching again, fearing that these warriors, who were extremely sensitive to psychic energy, would notice something amiss. He could only rely on the little strength he had just recovered to stand firm and appear as an ordinary teenager.

Finally, the captain seemed to lose interest.