Warhammer Survival Guide

Chapter 45 Asset Preservation

Lowe stared at the deep red reading, his brow furrowed.

This is unreasonable.

The back garden of filth is usually a muddy, cold swamp, which nourishes fungi that prefer low temperatures.

However, the heat here is too high, exceeding the limits that the human body can withstand.

This abnormally high temperature points to only one possibility.

"high fever".

Lowe retrieved a disturbing entry from his memory bank.

Among the many plague sequences, there exists a rare one called "tar fever," also known as "boiling blood disease."

The core pathogen is *Nargentodoxa cuneata*, a variant strain that combines industrial pollution with subspace putrefaction.

It originated from a refinery.

Cultivated by Nurgle followers using a mixture of industrial waste and plague spores, specifically targeting human populations in highly polluted environments.

The body temperature of a host infected with this plague will exceed the boiling point.

The blood will burn like magma, eventually turning the host into a walking, high-temperature biochemical bomb.

If the Ninth Granary is full of this stuff, then there's no need for zombie guards there at all.

Because every inch of air and every drop of condensation could be filled with deadly viruses that could scald your lungs.

That place will be a pressure cooker that could trigger a plague at any moment.

If we rush in now with these new recruits who have just had a full meal, they'll probably be cooked alive by the heat and poison gas before they even see the enemy.

Luo Wei put down the red pen in his hand, and did not immediately order an attack as usual.

He was a clerk, not a berserker.

He only fights well-prepared battles and only engages in profitable transactions.

"It seems we can't rush off to our deaths."

Lowe turned to Father Alpha and said:

"Alpha, I need you to adjust the production line in the repair shop. Stop manufacturing makeshift plate armor; even the thickest steel plates can't stop the high-temperature virus."

"I want you to find all the industrial thermal insulation suits in your inventory. If you don't have them, make them on the spot using asbestos and lead-lined fabric. In addition, all breathing masks must be equipped with double-layer activated carbon filters."

"This will take time, Advisor," Father Alpha calculated. "At least six standard Terra days."

"Then I'll give you seven days."

Lowe picked up the communicator and connected to Buck's channel.

"Buck, inform your 'Armed Scavenging Team' to cancel their leave plans for tomorrow. For the next week, I need you to conduct heat resistance and chemical protection training for them."

"Turn the heating pipes up to the maximum and have them run inside wearing full protective suits. If anyone faints, they're eliminated."

"The place we're going to is a giant oven," Rowe said coldly and rationally. "I don't want to bring a bunch of turkeys that are cooked before they even get to the table."

Finally, Rowe added, "Find out all the flamethrowers in stock; that's the best remedy for 'fever'."

"Fight poison with poison, extinguish fire with fire."

After making all these arrangements, Luo Wei looked at the red circle on the map again.

Seven days.

This is the maximum amount of time he can squeeze out.

Hopefully, the area where the Ninth Grain Depot stores core supplies won't get scorched in these seven days.

……

afternoon.

The air purifier in the manager's office is running at full capacity.

Despite this, it still cannot completely mask the suffocating smell of "state religion" in the air.

The smell of aged myrrh, inferior oils, and expensive incense.

This has a unique flavor to the state religion.

In an agricultural world like Abundance II, this flavor usually symbolizes two things:

Divine redemption.

An expensive bill.

Luo Wei sat behind his desk, his hands clasped under his chin, watching the guest sitting opposite him.

Father Simon.

This representative of the State Church was, at this moment, like a lump of over-fermented dough, squeezed into the leather sofa that originally belonged to Case.

His ten fingers were covered with all kinds of rings.

There were brass rings inlaid with inferior rubies, and silver rings engraved with scriptures.

As he picked up his teacup, the metal rings clinked together, making a crisp, annoying sound.

"Praise be to the God-Emperor, and praise be to you, Advisor Lovi."

Father Simon took a sip of hot tea, let out a satisfied sigh, and the fat on his face jiggled.

"The miracle you created at the Seventh Granary can be smelled even in parishes hundreds of kilometers away, with a reassuring aroma of burning chromium. This is the scent of civilization, proof of the divine emperor's protection."

Luo Wei remained expressionless.

"Father, if you've only come to praise the heating system, you can go to the boiler room. There are more servants there. My time is precious; every second is for fuel that's burning."

Father Simon was not embarrassed by this retort.

Instead, he gave a greasy, tolerant smile, like an elder looking at a naughty child.

"Ah, the impetuousness of youth. But that's precisely why you're so successful."

Father Simon put down his teacup.

He skillfully pulled out a parchment scroll from his wide sleeve.

He spread the scroll out on the coffee table.

It was listed with a long string of names and numbers, densely packed together.

"Advisor, regarding the minor dispute you handled this morning," Father Simon's finger slid across the scroll, finally stopping at a few names, "the three young men you sent to the suicide squad were actually devout believers."

The names of the three thugs from the Rust Gang.

"This is the 'List of Lost Sheep Donors'," Father Simon explained with a smile.

"Although they may have some flaws in worldly morality, and be somewhat impulsive and reckless, their contributions to the church on a spiritual level are undeniable."

"Over the years, they have assisted the church in eliminating many heretical ideas and have also donated a lot of materials for the repair of shrines."

Luo Wei glanced at the list.

The so-called donations are nothing more than a share of the protection money collected by the gang.

"So?" Luo Wei asked back.

"So, I think maybe we can punish them in a different way."

Father Simon leaned closer and said:

"Excessive harshness will disrupt the underlying ecological balance, consultant. Water that is too clear has no fish; in the granary's sewers, rats are needed to eat the dirtier stuff."

"If you kill all the rats, who will help you deal with all that filthy garbage?"

This was a test.

It was also a typical, warhammer-like political game.

The priest was implying to Lo Wei that he should not only know how to use the light, but also how to use the darkness.

Lo Wei took a quill pen from the drawer, twirled it between his fingers, and asked, "Father, what do you think I'm doing this for?"

"For order? For justice?" Father Simon tentatively replied.

Luo Wei shook his head.

His dark eyes held a coldness that the priest found unfamiliar. "It's for preserving the value of assets."

Father Simon paused for a moment.

"You see them as believers, as rats, or as partners."

Rowe continued, "But in my eyes, they're just bad debts. The three dead soldiers, on the other hand, are my fixed assets."

"If my assets are being worn down at the front, and someone is secretly taking parts from them, causing the assets to depreciate, that is a serious management accident."

"This has nothing to do with justice, nothing to do with morality. It's purely... cost control."

Father Simon remained silent for a moment.

He re-examined the young man before him.

He originally thought that Lowe was just a lucky clerk with a little bit of cunning, or an overly enthusiastic idealist.

However, he now has to overturn his previous judgment.

This way of thinking, which calmly breaks down human lives into data and assets, is not only cold-blooded but also reveals an absolute rationality.

Such people are far more difficult to deal with than those who are simply brutal villains.

"It seems I underestimated your awareness," Father Simon sighed, putting away the list.

He stopped being hypocritical and began to offer meaningful criticism.

"Looking at you now reminds me of your mother, Advisor," Father Simon said slowly. "That poor woman, Martha. May the God-King protect her soul."

Luo Wei paused for a moment as he twirled his pen.

This is a dangerous sign.

In this world full of secrets, when someone starts talking about your past, it usually means they're revealing their hand.

In Luo Wei's mind, fragments of the original owner's memories surged forth.

It was a cramped room that was always filled with the smell of soap and the sound of coughing.

The mother, Martha, was a factory worker who had worked in the laundry room of the logistics department for twenty years.

Her hands were red, swollen, and ulcerated from being soaked in strong alkaline detergent for a long time, and her fingerprints had long been worn away.

"I remember that day, she died at her workstation, her lungs wheezing like a broken bellows," Father Simon recalled. "It was severe chemical pneumonia, compounded by long-term malnutrition."

"According to regulations, she should receive a pension, as well as the savings she hid under the bed, which are for you so that you can go to a vocational school."

A sly glint flashed in the priest's eyes. "But in the end, it seems you didn't get the money."

Of course, Lo Wei remembered.

The money was taken by the so-called "community mutual aid association".

The reasons are high-sounding:

Funeral expenses, interest on debts incurred before death;

And the "prayer fee" that must be paid so that Martha's soul can rest in peace.

The person who was responsible for notarizing all of this and who advised young Lowell to "learn to submit to fate and not be blinded by greed" was none other than Father Simon, standing before us.

He took half the money as payment for the prayer.

"You cried very hard back then," Father Simon sighed. "You were too young then to understand how the world works. The so-called rules are that big fish eat little fish, and little fish eat shrimp."

"The Rust Gang was the predecessor of that mutual aid society; they were part of that ecosystem."

"You want to disrupt this ecosystem now, just like you did back then when you wanted to get that money back... That's unwise."

He is making a silent threat.

He was implying to Loewy:

I know your background.

I know you are an orphan with no connections.

I know the scars deep inside you.

You should also know how deep the roots of these forces are!

The atmosphere in the office instantly became tense and oppressive.

Luo Wei put down his pen.

There was no anger, no sadness, not even a ripple in his eyes.

It's like an auditor discovering a bad debt from twenty years ago while checking accounts.

A bad debt is a bad debt.

No emotions are needed, just a balance.

"Father, you've misunderstood something. I'm not targeting them out of revenge."

"Revenge is an inefficient emotional release and a meaningless waste of energy."

He walked to the window and looked down at the busy granary below.

"I'm targeting them because I'm now the manager here. And they've become redundant code that hinders efficiency."

Lo Wei turned around.

Back to the light coming from the window.

His face was hidden in the shadows.

"You just said that the sewers need rats to eat the dirtier stuff. That theory is correct to some extent."

"However, if the rats start gnawing through the pillars supporting the granary and start stealing the seeds, then they are no longer scavengers, but pests."

"As for my past..." Lowe walked up to Father Simon, placed his hands on the table, and looked down at him.

"The past was a bad debt that has already been written off. There's no point in dwelling on bad debts, but I will make sure that the new accounts don't have any more mistakes."

Upon hearing what Rowe said, Father Simon's smile froze.

All the weapons he used to attack Lowe's psychological defenses missed their mark.

This young man has no weaknesses.

He has removed his Achilles' heel and replaced it with steel.

"I will not release those three youths," Luo Wei issued his ultimatum.

"Not only that, they will be assigned to the first echelon of suicide squads to scout out the most dangerous places."

"This is the only remaining value they have as 'liabilities'."