"Do you have any objections?"
These five words were like five red-hot steel nails, ruthlessly hammered into Valerius's skull.
His brain, that logic machine precisely assembled from the imperial codex and wartime regulations, emitted an overwhelming wail at this instant.
Objections?
An Imperial Commissar, what objections could he have against a... an unknown entity that appeared out of thin air, displayed miracles, and claimed to take this planet as its own?
His thoughts were tearing wildly between two extremes.
On one side, the scene before him that could not be explained by logic, a scene bordering on the divine. The light that dispersed the smoke, the power that annihilated attacks, the tranquility that soothed the pain in his soul.
On the other side, the cold and absolute truth he had spent his life defending—any miracle not officially certified by the Empire is a heretic! Any powerful force not authorized is witchcraft!
Loyalty, at this moment, became his only lifeline.
Loyalty was the only solid reef he could grasp in the ocean of his cognitive collapse.
Valerius suddenly raised his head, and in his eyes, slightly dim due to blood loss, flames reignited.
That was not a fire of Hope, but a raging flame of judgment that would burn everything incomprehensible to ash.
"heretic!"
He roared hoarsely, the word seemingly draining all the air from his lungs.
He used all his strength to raise the heavy Bolter again; the muzzle swayed slightly due to his trembling arm, yet it remained locked onto Leticia's flawless face.
"No matter how holy you disguise yourself!"
His voice, distorted through the loudspeaker, spread across the dead-silent battlefield.
"You cannot hide your blasphemous nature!"
Leticia watched him quietly, her pure black eyes devoid of ripples, as if watching a clumsy play whose ending she had long foreseen.
Behind her, Fogremia's purple eyes flashed with a cold, offended anger.
A mere mortal, daring to point a weapon at her Goddess?
Valerius ignored this.
He moved the muzzle away from Leticia and pointed it sharply at the Astra Militarum Soldiers who were still standing frozen nearby.
"All units!"
His roar, like a whip, lashed fiercely against the nerves of every soldier.
"Open fire!"
The soldiers' bodies shuddered violently.
They looked at the high-and-mighty, cold-as-iron Political Commissar, then at the black-haired girl standing in the light, holy as a painting.
On one side, the "purification" from the Political Commissar's Bolter that would descend immediately.
On the other side, the "deity" who had just pulled them back from the line of death, looking like an angel.
Their faith, their reason, their survival instinct were torn to shreds at this moment.
"Do you want to disobey the Political Commissar's order, soldier?!"
Valerius's muzzle was aimed at a young soldier closest to him, whose eyes were the most conflicted.
The soldier's face turned instantly pale; he gritted his teeth, his body trembling uncontrollably.
He did not want to fire.
His soul was screaming in resistance.
Yet the hand holding his lasgun, under the influence of day-after-day harsh training and discipline indoctrination, made the most instinctive reaction.
He pulled the trigger.
The first red laser beam, like a tear of blood, tore through this holy silence.
With the first, came the second, the third.
Fear ultimately overcame awe.
"Fire! Fire! Purify this witch!"
"For the Emperor!"
The remaining Astra Militarum Soldiers emitted chaotic shouts, mixed with despair and self-hypnosis.
Countless laser beams, mixed with physical projectiles spewed from autopistols and Bolters, formed an airtight, crimson web of death from all directions, covering Leticia.
This firepower was enough to instantly melt a Leman Russ Tank into molten iron.
Valerius stared fixedly at Leticia.
He was expecting.
Expecting to see her scream, burn, and turn to ash under the Empire's fury.
That would prove his choice was correct.
That would prove the imperial codex was still the only indestructible truth in this universe.
However, nothing happened.
Facing that attack capable of destroying everything, Leticia did not even twitch an eyelid.
Fogremia, behind her, moved.
It was an understated movement.
She just elegantly raised her right hand, wearing a silk glove, her five fingers slightly spread, as if to catch a gentle spring rain.
Hum—
No light shield, no barrier, no explosion.
Only a layer of invisible, imperceptible force field, centered on Leticia, instantly expanded.
The web of death woven from light beams and projectiles, the moment it hit this force field, was like hitting an absolute wall stretching across the end of time and space.
Time seemed to slow down.
Valerius watched helplessly.
Watching those spinning, whistling Bolter rounds, at a distance of three meters from the girl's body, eerily come to a halt.
They were like insects preserved in amber, maintaining the kinetic energy and posture from when they were fired, yet unable to advance even a fraction further.
Watching those scorching laser beams capable of vaporizing steel, the moment they touched that void, be silently deflected, twisted, and then extinguished quietly like torches thrown into the deep sea.
Then, those stalled bullets began to decompose.
They did not explode; instead, starting from the outermost metal casing, inch by inch, they turned into the most primitive, shimmering metal powder, falling down with a rustling sound.
The whole process was terrifyingly quiet.
No roar of energy collision.
No screech of tearing metal.
Only a kind of absolute, crushing, almost contemptuous... nullification.
The attack lasted for ten full seconds.
Then, after the soldiers emptied their last magazine, it stopped abruptly.
The battlefield fell once again into a silence deeper and more suffocating than before.
The smoke dissipated.
Leticia was still standing in place, unscathed.
Fogremia elegantly withdrew her hand, as if she had just brushed off an unsightly speck of dust that had fallen on the Goddess's hem.
Not to mention injuries.
Even the hem of Leticia's black dress did not ripple in the slightest from that violent storm of firepower just now.
The Bolter in Valerius's hand clattered to the ground.
His resolute face, carved from granite, shattered completely at this moment.
Shock?
No.
This word was no longer enough to describe his mood at this moment.
It was...
It was the bewilderment and trembling from the deepest part of the soul, the feeling a primitive man would have when throwing his sharpest stone spear with all his might at the sun, only to find the spear turning to fly ash in mid-air, when faced with a higher life form.
His lifelong faith, the world he understood, the order he relied on to survive...
At this moment, were completely shattered and ground into dust by the black-haired girl before him, in the gentlest and yet most cruel way.
The soldiers were also stunned.
They looked at their weapons still smoking in their hands, then at the unscathed, holy figure; many of their hands began to tremble violently, and then, one by one, they threw away their guns.
Some even knelt on the ground, began to beat their own heads fiercely with their fists, and let out painful whimpers.
They had attacked... a god.
This thought, like the most vicious curse, began to spread in their hearts.
Leticia's gaze finally moved away from Valerius's twisted face.
She surveyed the messy battlefield, looking at those Imperial soldiers who were either dazed, terrified, or broken.
Then, she parted her red lips slightly.
Her voice was not loud, but it clearly reached everyone's ears, carrying a just-right casualness, as if she were asking about the weather.
"Is this the Imperial way of hosting guests?"
Valerius's body shook violently; he opened his mouth but could not make a sound.
And at this moment, from another direction, came a discordant commotion.
It was those Cultists.
They had just recovered from that holy pressure and the Astra Militarum's attack.
They did not understand divinity or force fields.
They only saw the simplest, most direct scene—these Imperial idiots were actually attacking that new woman who looked the most powerful!
The exceptionally tall Cultist leader climbed up from the ground.
In its turbid compound eyes, a gleam of greed and ecstasy intertwined.
"Idiots... are killing each other!"
Its voice, like two pieces of sandstone rubbing together, was full of beastly excitement.
"Catch her!"
It pointed its huge mechanical claw, modified from a mining exoskeleton, at Leticia.
"Present this gift to the great The Spider Mother!"
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