This Is Not a Flashlight
**Location:** Plenty III, Northern Hemisphere Landing Site (Rotting Wheat Field Area)
**Time:** 15 minutes after the start of the landing operation
"Glug… Six… Pus… Seven… Ulceration…"
The sound did not emanate from a single throat, but rather from countless creatures submerged in a swamp, groaning in unison.
It was a counting cadence that drove sanity to the brink of madness.
The rotting green forest was violently pushed aside, and those hidden in the shadows finally revealed their true forms.
They were not the previously known, chaotic, howling zombies of Nurgle.
They were Nurgle Carriers.
These one-eyed demons possessed swollen green# Chapter 26: This Is Not a Flashlight
**Location:** Plenty III, Northern Hemisphere Landing Site (Rotting Wheat Field Area)
**Time:** 15 minutes after the start of the landing operation
"Glug… Six… Pus… Seven… Ulceration…"
The sound did not emanate from a single throat, but rather from countless creatures submerged in a swamp, groaning in unison.
It was a counting cadence that drove sanity to the brink of madness.
The rotting green forest was violently pushed aside, and those hidden in the shadows finally revealed their true forms.
They were not the previously known, chaotic, howling zombies of Nurgle.
They were Nurgle Carriers.
These one-eyed demons possessed swollen green skin and a single horn protruding from their skulls. They wielded rusty plague swords, green bile flowing continuously from their weeping wounds.
They stood in a crooked yet strangely orderly formation, their murky, single eyes fixed on the living souls before the drop pod, while their withered hands counted the number of diseases bestowed upon them by the Plague Father and the pustules blooming on their bodies.
Behind them, the earth trembled.
Several plague toads, each as large as a rhinoceros, leaped high from the mud.
Their backs were covered in pulsating pustules, their enormous mouths gaping open to reveal serrated yellow fangs and tongues covered in barbs.
"For the Emperor! Fire!"
Sergeant Varo roared, his fighting spirit undiminished.
As a veteran Ultramarine, he assessed the gravity of the situation in a fraction of a second.
"Bolters, single shots on the carriers! Heavy weapons, suppress the toads! Don't let them breach the lines!"
*Rat-a-tat-tat—! Boom! Boom!*
A net of fire instantly formed around the drop pod. The Astartes' boltguns roared, while the Ultramar auxiliary forces' laser rifles and plasma guns wove a dense web of fire.
However, the battle did not go as smoothly as expected.
In fact, it was deteriorating rapidly.
Cato Sicarius wielded his finely crafted power sword, cutting into the enemy ranks like a blue lightning bolt.
A flash of cold light, and limbs of Nurgle Carriers flew through the air.
But he discovered that this blade, normally sharp enough to cleave ceramite, now seemed to be cutting through a thick layer of invisible grease. Every swing was accompanied by immense resistance.
Even more terrifying was the vitality of those demons.
A Nurgle Carrier was blasted in half by Varo's explosive rounds, its blood splattering everywhere. But it did not fall, nor did it stop its nauseating counting.
"…Seven… Regeneration…"
The flesh at its wound site writhed wildly, countless flies swarming out, knitting the shattered, rotting flesh back together.
In an instant, it raised its rusty sword again, as if it had never been wounded.
"They're regenerating!" Varo roared. "These monstrous things are endless!"
For the mortal auxiliary soldiers, however, the situation was one of despair.
The air itself was a weapon.
An Ultramar auxiliary soldier clad in flak armor was firing furiously when suddenly, he looked at his laser rifle in horror.
The brand-new gun, less than three months old and meticulously maintained, was now rapidly covered in reddish-brown rust.
*Sizzle… Snap!*
When he pulled the trigger again, the laser rifle didn't fire the death beam; instead, it emitted a shrill, overloaded screech before the barrel exploded.
"My gun! My gun's ruined!" the soldier cried out in terror, dropping his weapon and staring at the corroded holes in his gloves.
This wasn't just a physical phenomenon; it was a conceptual curse from Nurgle, the chef of the "members-only restaurant"—
Entropy and decay.
In Nurgle's realm, nothing remains intact. Steel rusts, gunpowder gets damp, and even hope molds and festers.
"Damn it!"
Sicarius kicked away a plague toad that tried to cling to his leg; the toad's skin was incredibly slippery, even slightly corroding the paint on his power armor.
"The Warp concentration here is too high! Conventional weapons are failing!"
Commander Cole, the Imperial Guard Commander, remained a golden Grim Reaper, each swing of his halberd accompanied by flashes of disintegrating force, annihilating the demons. The Imperial Guard's weapons, designed by the Emperor himself, were capable of resisting this level of corrosion.
But he was alone.
Even if he could kill a hundred per second, a thousand demons were surging towards him.
"Hold on! Do not retreat!" Cole's cold voice echoed through the communication channel. "For the Holy Warriors!"
Eileen hid behind the drop pod's hatch, her hand tightly gripping her short sword.
She watched the scene unfold before her.
She saw those brave mortal soldiers, their weapons malfunctioning, forced to draw their bayonets, only to be overwhelmed by the tidal wave of demons.
She saw Sergeant Varo's bolt pistol begin to smoke, requiring manual bolt-action to clear the obstruction with each shot.
A powerful sense of fear and helplessness gripped her heart.
"Old Huang! Old Huang!" Eileen screamed in her mind, her voice urgent. "Come out! Like last time! Help them! Otherwise, we'll all die!"
She wanted that "golden self" to appear. She wanted that omnipotent golden light to burn all this filth to ashes.
However, this time, the voice that was always there at her beck and call was surprisingly calm, even somewhat cold.
[No, Eileen. Not this time.]
"Why?! Are you going to watch them die?!"
"If I take over your body, I can instantly burn everything within a ten-thousand-kilometer radius to ashes."
Old Huang's voice was deep and serious, echoing deep within her consciousness.
"But, Eileen. My power is too great for you. Although your body has been enhanced, your soul is still mortal."
"Every time I completely take over you, divinity will wash over your soul like a flood. This time, you might forget how to cry; next time, you might forget who Robert is; the time after that… you might not even remember who you are."
"You will become a vessel that only glows, a golden Living Saint without emotion. You will not be able to taste the sweetness of pudding, nor feel the warmth of that big guy Varo holding your hand."
Eileen was stunned.
Forget Old Joe? Forget Robert? Forget the taste of pudding?
"To be yourself, to live as 'Eileen' and not 'the Nth Living Saint of the Empire,' this power must be mastered by yourself."
Old Huang's voice softened, like encouraging a toddler.
"I'm only responsible for supplying you with fuel. As for how to drive, where to drive, how to rescue these people… that's your business. Go, give it a try. Don't always think of me as a god. I'm not a god."
Eileen bit her lip until she tasted the rusty, metallic taste of blood.
She didn't want to become like that. She wanted to live, to live as a human being with flesh and blood.
She watched as a plague toad slipped through the defenses, its gaping maw lunging at a mortal soldier who had lost his weapon. The soldier desperately raised his arm to block.
"Get out of the way!!"
Eileen burst from behind the hatch.
She didn't scream in fear like before, nor did she lose control in anger.
She stood on the rotting earth, taking a deep breath, even though the air was thick with stench.
She closed her eyes, feeling the warm, golden river flowing through her veins.
"I am Eileen. I'm going to… clean up this disgusting filth!"
She snapped her eyes open.
There was no terrifying, star-like light, nor the deafening thunder.
In Eileen's eyes, the brown irises were instantly replaced by two intricately rotating golden halos. She opened her arms, as if to embrace this hellish scene.
*Whoosh—*
A visible, pure golden ripple, spherically radiating from her, instantly spread outwards.
The radius expanded to 50 meters.
This wasn't a large area, but on the battlefield, it was enough.
This was the "Domain of Order."
A miracle occurred.
The soldier, about to be devoured by the plague toads, his eyes wide with terror, suddenly felt a warm current envelop his entire body.
The rusty, broken laser rifle in his hand suddenly began to heat up.
*Crack—Sizzle.*
The thick layer of reddish-brown rust covering the gun barrel and receiver, like sand dried by a fierce wind, instantly peeled away, crumbled, and scattered.
This revealed a brand-new, gleaming metallic gun barrel beneath.
And it wasn't just the gun.
All the mortal soldiers within this golden realm felt the suffocating pressure on their chests vanish.
The burning sensation in their lungs was replaced by coolness, and their arms, which had trembled with fear, regained their strength.
"This… this is..." The soldier stared at his hand in disbelief.
Meanwhile, the Astartes felt it even more acutely.
Sergeant Varo, who had just been cursing the damned corruption, suddenly heard a crisp mechanical click as his bolt pistol reset.
The Machine Spirit's rage was soothed, and the filth within the chamber was instantly purified.
Even more miraculous was the ammunition.
When Varo pulled the trigger again…
*Bang!*
The gun no longer spewed ordinary promethium fuel, but a dazzling ball of golden flame.
The fired bolt, trailing a long, meteor-like golden tail, traced a golden trajectory through the air before precisely piercing the chest of the regenerating Nurgle Carrier.
"For the God-Emperor!!" Varo roared.
*BOOM—!!!*
This attack was no longer a simple explosion.
Golden flames exploded at the demon's wound. The Nurgle's psionic energy, capable of regenerating flesh and blood, was like snowflakes encountering boiling water before this domineering golden flame.
"Awooo—!! Seven… no… zero…"
The infected creature let out a piercing scream. Its prized regenerative abilities had failed.
Its body rapidly carbonized and disintegrated in the golden flames, finally turning into a lifeless pile of black ash, drifting away in the wind.
"It's effective! This isn't just appeasement!"
Sicarius keenly sensed the change in the battle. His power sword was now enveloped in a golden aura.
"She's suppressing the laws of the Warp! She's recreating order here!"
Sicarius swung his sword, a golden sword aura sweeping out, instantly turning three Nurgle walkers that tried to surround him into ashes.
"Everyone! Converge on the Holy One! Fight in her light!"
Astartes and the mortal auxiliary forces swiftly tightened their defenses, establishing an impregnable circular position around Eileen.
Within this golden circle with a radius of 50 meters, this was no longer the decaying wasteland of Nurgle's Garden; it was an extension of Holy Terra, an inviolable domain of order.
Eileen stood at the center, her arms outstretched.
She felt like a "Wi-Fi base station" operating at full power.
Countless streams of data (Astartes' faith, mortal courage) converged upon her, transformed into that golden power, and then channeled back into the battlefield.
"Go back to your cesspool!"
Eileen gritted her teeth, sweat beading on her forehead.
While the power was immense, the consumption was staggering. She felt her meager reserves burning rapidly, hunger expanding like a black hole in her stomach.
But she didn't stop.
With the blessing of the golden light, the situation instantly reversed.
No more jammed guns, no more unkillable monsters.
Every laser beam pierced the fly shield, every bolt round claimed a demon's life.
Five minutes later.
With Sergeant Varo's final, precise headshot, the last gigantic plague toad turned to ash in golden flames.
The battlefield fell silent.
Only heavy breathing and the hum of power armor radiators remained.
The surrounding ground was littered with black ash—the corpses of demons completely purified.
The golden halo in Eileen's eyes slowly faded, returning to their original brown.
That feeling of omnipotence vanished, replaced by an intense, almost overwhelming dizziness and hunger.
Her legs buckled, and she fell backward.
But she didn't hit the ground.
A strong, powerful arm caught her steadily.
It was Sicarius.
The honorable Company Captain knelt on one knee, letting Eileen lean against his breastplate.
He removed his helmet, his resolute face displaying undisguised praise and respect.
"Well done, Ms. Eileen."
Sicarius's voice was deep, not speaking to a little girl, but to a comrade-in-arms.
"You are the beacon on this battlefield. Without your protection and guidance, our honor would have nowhere to rest."
Eileen weakly opened her eyes, looking at Sicarius, then at the mortal soldiers around her who were gazing at her with worship and awe.
She wanted to say something cool, like "It's nothing" or "For the Emperor."
But in the end, only one sentence escaped her lips:
"Uncle Cato… do you still have that tactical supply chocolate? I'm starving..."
Sicarius paused for a moment, then burst into laughter.
"Yes! Plenty!"
He pulled a handful of chocolates and a tube of high-energy nutritional paste from his utility belt and stuffed them all into Eileen's hand.
"Eat up. This is your well-deserved after-school reward."
In the distance, the rotting wheat field still swayed in the wind, but the suffocating oppressive feeling seemed to have dissipated somewhat with the laughter.
But this was just the beginning.
Old Huang hummed softly in Eileen's mind, seemingly satisfied with her performance.
[Not bad. You held the broom quite firmly. But don't get too excited, this is just an appetizer. The real filth… is yet to come.]