Ascension to Demonhood

"Stand up. I am not worthy of your kneeling."

Wang Ming looked at the mortals kneeling before him and spoke. His voice seemed imbued with psychic resonance, causing all the kneeling mortals to instantly stand up.

By the time the starport personnel had recovered their senses, the auxiliary troops and the Transcenders had already moved all sorts of equipment and supplies into the starport.

This starport resembled an orbital space station. Once everything was arranged, the Transcenders took the human auxiliary troops aboard local hive transport vessels and headed toward the planetary surface.

"Sigh~, as expected..."

Wang Ming sat inside a transport crate parked within the starport. He looked at the parchment in his hand detailing local anomalous events and let out a long sigh.

"An entire city vanished in an instant, a village lost all contact, and not a single PDF soldier sent to investigate has returned."

Reading the contents of the parchment, Wang Ming instantly realized that these tricks were undoubtedly the handiwork of Chaos.

"Let's go to the village first. Wu Xuan, bring the Krieg brothers with you and come along. Stop by the armory on the way and have the three Krieg brothers put on Terminator power armor."

Wang Ming opened his communication terminal and spoke to Wu Xuan. He intended to take these four eccentric companions to see what Chaos was actually up to.

The other Transcenders had already departed to fight on various battlefields. The explicit enemy this time was a horde of Orks wreaking havoc on an ice world, while the hidden enemy lurked in the shadows—Chaos.

The Orks were already extremely troublesome; adding Chaos to the mix made things infinitely worse. Moreover, this was not a threat that could be met with a straightforward head-on confrontation; it was the kind of menace that operated behind the scenes.

"Such is the impermanence of life, the unpredictable twists of fate."

Wu Xuan hung suspended inside the missile launch silo of the transport aircraft, lamenting the unpredictable nature of his existence.

"Wu Xuan, just to be safe, you go on ahead and conduct some reconnaissance."

Wang Ming's voice transmitted directly into Wu Xuan's mind through the internal communication systems of the combat automaton.

"Boss, can we negotiate this? If all else fails, an orbital drop is fine too. Does it really have to be like this?"

Wu Xuan stared at the slowly opening launch silo and struggled as he questioned Wang Ming.

"Keep it up, go check it out first. A combat automaton's combat capability can quickly clear out a combat zone. The Emperor protects, my brother."

Bai Qi, one of the three Krieg brothers, spoke to Wu Xuan at that moment. He thoroughly enjoyed the operation of this living missile.

"Keep at it, Wu Xuan. I've already ordered the Tech-Priests to prepare your next body in advance."

Wang Ming told Wu Xuan that he had already instructed the Tech-Priests to ready Wu Xuan's next combat automaton shell. The moment Wu Xuan died, his consciousness would be resurrected near the Transcenders guarding the ship, and he could head straight to the Tech-Priests for surgery.

"Is this really non-negotiable?"

Wu Xuan made one last desperate struggle.

"Non-negotiable. Stop talking. Off you go~"

Wang Ming nodded at the pilot and delivered his final words to Wu Xuan.

"I..."

Before Wu Xuan could finish his sentence, he was propelled out of the launch silo amidst a burst of plasma fire.

"Ah..., I hear the call of my lord! The plan of my lord has begun!"

In the village, Salasel and a group of Slaaneshi Space Marines crawled out from the snow. In dreams of boundless indulgence, they beheld the revelation of Slaanesh; the Prince of Pleasure's grand design had commenced.

"Thud!"

Just as Salasel struggled to its feet, a massive object plummeted from the heavens, landing squarely on top of it. Salasel, a Space Marine blessed by Slaanesh, had its entire lower body crushed into a pulp of flesh and bone by this colossal mass.

"Where is this?"

Wu Xuan climbed up unsteadily; the recent impact had nearly scrambled his brains.

"What the hell! What did I just land on?"

Looking down at the remnants of Salasel beneath his feet, Wu Xuan thought with astonishment.

"Ah~, ah~, ah~"

Suddenly, a series of moans echoed from beneath his feet, giving Wu Xuan a major scare.

"Holy shit! It's still alive!"

Hearing the groans, Wu Xuan instantly deployed his power sword and unleashed a frantic flurry of hacks and slashes downward upon Salasel.

"Oh, oh, oh~, use more force, chop me to pieces~"

Contrary to expectations, instead of the anticipated screams of agony, a chorus of delighted moans reached Wu Xuan's ears. The twisted nature of the sounds was enough to give his metallic chassis goosebumps.

"Emperor's Children?"

Wu Xuan realized it in an instant. Such extreme perversion could only belong to the followers of Slaanesh among the Emperor's Children.

"Correct guess! Oh~, hurry up and keep cutting me~"

Hearing Wu Xuan's words, Salasel grew even more excited. Gazing at the Imperial Aquila emblazoned on Wu Xuan's chassis, it reveled in the extreme anguish of having its body shredded by a power weapon.

"What a total freak."

Seeing that Salasel was still stubbornly alive despite being carved into several pieces by the power sword, Wu Xuan activated his shoulder-mounted cannon, preparing to deliver a plasma blast directly to its head.

"Bang, bang, bang..."

Just as Wu Xuan was about to roast its head with plasma and silence those disgusting noises forever, a string of bolter rounds struck the exact same spot on his armor with pinpoint accuracy. Although it failed to breach the armor, it successfully caught Wu Xuan's attention. Wu Xuan instantly shifted his target and looked toward the attacker.

The moment a Slaaneshi Space Marine brandishing a bolter appeared on Wu Xuan's optical sensors, a tangible shockwave of sound slammed directly into him, blasting Wu Xuan flying backward.

As Wu Xuan was sent airborne by the sonic blast, a figure darted swiftly toward Salasel, whose upper body was all that remained. Dragging Salasel along, the figure bolted toward the gathering cluster of Slaaneshi Space Marines who had now rallied.

"Noise Marines..."

Wu Xuan quickly picked himself up. Surveying the pack of various bizarrely shaped Slaaneshi Space Marines before him, he activated every single weapon system integrated into his chassis.

Defensive fields flared to life, intercepting incoming bolter shells and sonic waves. The shoulder-mounted cannons automatically locked onto targets one by one, dispatching searing plasma spheres toward the Slaaneshi Space Marines. Micro-missile launchers whirred, unleashing a swarm of micro-missiles that danced joyfully through the air toward the enemy.

"Sigh~, they're here after all. Can't they just let me sleep a little longer?"

Hearing the commotion outside, Lu Xiaoxia emerged from a residential dwelling. She watched as the Emperor's Children were slaughtered like chickens, hesitated for a moment, then pulled her blanket tighter around herself and retreated back indoors.

"Are you kidding me? That's clearly a Man of Iron. Not touching that with a ten-foot pole. Too dangerous, way too dangerous. Back to sleep."

The very instant Lu Xiaoxia laid eyes on Wu Xuan, she knew this contraption had to be a Man of Iron. Although it bore the Imperial Aquila, judging by its terrifying combat prowess, it was undoubtedly a relic from the Dark Age of Technology. She certainly didn't believe she could stand a chance against such a machine.

"I'll just let the Emperor's Children deal with it. I'm not getting mixed up in this. None of this concerns me right now anyway. Back to sleep."

Lu Xiaoxia crawled back into bed, wrapped herself tightly in the blanket like a burrito, closed her eyes, and adopted a firm attitude of non-interference.

"Chosen Lady! Stop sleeping! Do something useful! Save us!"

Just as Lu Xiaoxia was beginning to drool in her sleep, a thunderous roar suddenly pierced her ears.

"Fiddlesticks and flora! Don't drag me into this!"

The moment she heard that shout, Lu Xiaoxia leaped straight out of bed. She instantly realized that the loud bellowing would undoubtedly draw the Man of Iron's attention straight to her. This was genuinely fatal.

"Oh, an ambush after all?"

Hearing the shout from one of the Emperor's Children, Wu Xuan hurriedly toggled his thermal-imaging optics and began scanning the surrounding buildings. Sure enough, a humanoid heat signature was detected inside a nearby residence.

Disregarding the surrounding Emperor's Children entirely, Wu Xuan unleashed a torrent of concentrated firepower toward the thermal signature. A Chaos Chosen was far more dangerous than these standard Chaos Space Marines.

The combat automaton's terrifying firepower erupted at full capacity. Lasers, plasma, melta beams, and missiles rained down upon the dwelling, obliterating the building from the ground in an instant and reducing it to a patch of vaporized ash.

Gazing at the empty, flattened terrain visible through his sensors, Wu Xuan contentedly redirected his weapon barrels back toward the Emperor's Children.

Amidst the ruins, Lu Xiaoxia lay prone on the ground while the air around her warped violently. She had just used psychic powers to manifest a defensive field akin to a miniature void shield around herself, deflecting the majority of the damage into the Warp, while simultaneously shrouding her presence in psychic stealth.

Clutching the severed head of an Emperor's Marine, Wu Xuan used his power sword to lop off another. At this point, only two Emperor's Children remained breathing.

"Keldar, are you certain you want to do this?"

Salasel, reduced to a mere upper torso, lay beside Keldar's boots, surveying the intricate runes surrounding them as it posed the question.

"Do you have a better alternative?"

Keldar stared at Wu Xuan, who was slowly marching toward them, and countered Salasel's question.

"No. Though, I honestly thought you'd hold out on your principles forever."

Salasel replied, its tone dripping with sarcasm and bitter jealousy.

"Prince of Pleasure, Slaanesh, I accept your previous invitation. I offer my soul and flesh, along with those of my dearest companion Salasel Carkins, entirely to the Supreme Prince."

Keldar proclaimed into the void, channeling its psychic might to activate the ritual circle inscribed upon the ground.

With a sound of boundless, decadent indulgence echoing through the ether, every corpse of the fallen Emperor's Children and mortals strewn across the ground vanished. Keldar and Salasel dissolved together amidst a burst of violet radiance.

Observing the sudden shift in the environment, Wu Xuan sensed that something major was about to unfold. He locked all weapon systems onto the exact spot where the two Emperor's Children had vanished, ready to unleash a barrage upon whatever Chaos entity might emerge.

As the purple glow gradually faded, two slender silhouettes materialized in the place of the two vanished Space Marines.

"Are those demons?"

Wu Xuan focused on the two slender figures. Their contours were captured clearly by his optical sensors, revealing delicate yet ambiguously dual-gendered physiques.

"Holy crap, did they just achieve daemonhood?"

Wu Xuan thought with astonishment as he looked at the two daemons. Despite his surprise, he flicked the power blades housed in both wrists and charged directly toward the newly ascended Emperor's Children.

"Oh~, magnificent. This feeling is truly extraordinary. I'm higher than I've ever been~"

Salasel reveled in the sensations of its newly ascended daemon form, speaking to Keldar beside it. It felt as though its existence had reached the absolute zenith, having fulfilled its ultimate ambition of becoming a true daemon prince of Slaanesh.

Meanwhile, Keldar experienced a complex whirlwind of emotions as it regarded Salasel and its own transformed state. Slaanesh had always taken a keen interest in this particular Emperor's Marine—one who accepted blessings without ever truly worshiping the Dark Prince. Keldar had once relished remaining free from Slaanesh's direct grip. Yet now, in order to save its old friend Salasel, it had ultimately surrendered itself. How deeply ironic and laughable.

"Oh~, my dear Salasel, I finally understand your feelings. To experience this~, this is the very purpose of existence~"

Standing beside Salasel, Keldar immersed itself in the exquisite euphoria of daemonhood, addressing its companion. The rationality it had maintained for ten thousand years had vanished completely, replaced entirely by unbridled hedonism and ecstasy.

"Boss, Boss, come down here quickly! Two Emperor's Children just achieved daemonhood on the ground."

While charging toward the two daemons, Wu Xuan used his comm-link to report the ground situation to Wang Ming, simultaneously feeding the real-time visual feed directly to Wang Ming's terminal.

"I'm almost there. Hold them off for now."

Watching the feed transmitted by Wu Xuan, Wang Ming opened the transport's hatch and spoke into his comms.

"Understood."

Acknowledging the order, Wu Xuan closed the distance to the two daemon princes. The power blades hummed with the crackling energy of a disruption field as he brought them down in an overhead strike toward the pair.

Keldar watched the descending power blade, lifting a single hand. Violet psychic energy flared within its palm. Now elevated to a daemon prince, its sight pierced straight through the metallic chassis of the combat automaton to perceive the human brain resting within.

Keldar was absolutely certain that a sentient human piloted this machine—it was no mere "wetware." Given that the machine had previously identified the presence of a Slaaneshi Chosen based on a mere remark by an Emperor's Marine, it undoubtedly possessed higher consciousness.

Earlier, under the assumption that psychic powers might prove ineffective, Keldar had refrained from using them. But now, realizing there was a living mind inside, psychic manipulation could definitely yield results.

Lifting its hand with absolute confidence, Keldar unleashed a wave of psychic luminescence. The moment the psychic ability washed over him, Wu Xuan was struck by a bizarre sensation. He felt as though his metallic hull was suddenly reacting like organic flesh—an utterly absurd phenomenon.

Beyond that, Wu Xuan felt something even stranger: his rigid metal body was turning alarmingly limp. Yes, a combat automaton was turning into jelly, causing him to collapse directly onto the ground.

While from Wu Xuan's perspective, he had collapsed because his body suddenly went completely soft, from the perspective of the two daemon princes, it looked as though a massive block of iron had simply crashed straight down into the dirt.