On the other side, after Odinson left the conference room with his administrative team, he didn’t head straight to the Underhive to round people up.
Instead, he went to the chapter serf quarters and mobilized every off-duty serf to serve as engineering management personnel.
Once the team was assembled, Odinson led them to the Upper Hive.
He pressed his bolter against a noble’s forehead and “earnestly” explained the situation.
The noble immediately experienced a change of heart.
He led Odinson to several of the primary power brokers in the Underhive.
Odinson then pointed his bolter at the heads of these men, sternly lecturing them on the stakes.
He demanded they gather a labor force of at least one hundred million for construction.
Furthermore, he insisted their methods be gentle—if anyone died, the recruiters’ entire families would lose their heads.
The power brokers instantly repented their ways and gave their word.
Under the influence of the civilian factory—or rather, the System—these men lost every ounce of their usual bravado.
They had no intention of cutting corners or deceiving their superiors.
They immediately summoned their subordinates and ordered them to notify every gang in the Underhive to muster a hundred million laborers, emphasizing the need for the young and strong.
They also reiterated the need for a “gentle” touch: if anyone died, the gang members’ entire families would pay with their lives.
These subordinates were scared out of their wits.
They scrambled to notify the leaders of the various gangs, repeating the power brokers’ orders verbatim.
The gang leaders, in turn, were terrified.
Frightened that they might face excommunication or execution by the God-Emperor’s Angels, they immediately distributed tasks to their henchmen, repeating the warnings once more.
And so, the gang members who were usually arrogant and overbearing were now trembling with fear.
They began knocking on doors to call people out, proceeding with extreme caution to ensure no one died, terrified that the God-Emperor’s Angels were watching their every move…
Driven by fear, these gang members were incredibly efficient.
Soon, a massive yet meticulously careful recruitment campaign swept across the entire Underhive.
Hidden behind his “screen,” the Emperor watched the entire process unfold and slowly projected a mental question mark: “?”
As the Master of Mankind, He had a significant say in such matters.
Fear could indeed improve efficiency, but it usually led to the distortion of orders during transmission and execution.
Yet here, not a single person had falsified the “imperial decree,” nor had there even been a minor error in relaying the message.
Something was wrong.
Furthermore, out of so many people from the top down, not one harbored any thoughts of taking a chance.
No matter how overbearing they had been in the past, they were now all terrified of being discovered for poor performance.
Each one walked on thin ice, as if they had always been timid, law-abiding citizens.
The problem was, if you were truly that timid, how could you have survived in the Underhive long enough to reach such a position?
It was impossible!
If fear were truly this effective, He would have thrown His full support behind Curze and Corax back in the day!
This was undoubtedly the work of that unknown power.
It heightened their fear while allowing them to remain rational, leading to this display of superhuman efficiency amidst their terror.
However, He couldn’t see how the power was doing it.
He couldn’t even find a single trace of discordance in these people.
This realization sparked a flicker of dread within Him.
One must remember that He was now a literal racial god of humanity, stalled on the path to true divinity, possessing a sliver of the power of the Chaos Eight-Pointed Star.
Many of these people were even fanatical believers of the Imperial Cult.
Under such circumstances, He was completely unable to detect how that unknown power was influencing them.
How could He be at peace?
If it could influence ordinary people without a trace, would it eventually be able to influence Space Marines, the Custodes, the Primarchs, or even…
Himself?
The thought that His own awakening was linked to this unknown power cast a dark shadow over His mind.
(PS: It actually influenced Her long ago, but the Empress hasn’t noticed yet.
[Chuckle.jpg])
But He was currently weaker than ever before and could do nothing but secretly heighten His vigilance.
The gang recruitment drive also caused a massive shift in the fates of countless individuals.
Underhive, Castor District, Hyena Gang territory.
“Bang!
Bang!
Bang!
Open up!”
The violent pounding on the door and the shouting woke Old John.
He instinctively held his breath, trying to pretend no one was home.
But the gang members outside seemed to know there was someone inside.
They continued to pound on the door and even began trying to break it down.
The door, made of two sheets of scrap iron, naturally couldn’t withstand gang members who came prepared.
Before long, the door was smashed open, and two thugs burst in.
Old John instinctively curled into a ball, covering his head as he prepared for the inevitable beating.
In the Underhive, if you didn’t give these gang members face, a beating was the starting point, with no upper limit.
For someone as disobedient as him, a mere beating might even be considered lucky.
But the expected blows didn’t fall.
Instead, he was hauled up from his bed.
“Sleep, sleep, sleep—is that all you know how to do?!
Didn’t you hear me telling you to open the door?!”
Another gang member paced back and forth, shouting irritably at the now-standing Old John.
“M—my lord, I’m truly hard of hearing.
I really didn’t hear you,” Old John stammered, quickly taking the excuse, though he wondered why the gang members’ tempers were so “mild” today.
The thug who had pulled him up hesitated upon hearing this.
“Hard of hearing, huh?
Can we hand someone like this over?
What if it makes the Angel angry and our whole family pays the price?”
The other thug stopped abruptly.
“Hard of hearing my ass!
I looked into this guy.
When he was hauling crates the other day and heard they were handing out money, he ran faster than anyone!
Hard of hearing, my foot!”
As a well-trained Underhive resident, Old John knew how to take a hint.
He immediately pulled out the Hyena Coins he had just received.
“My lord, these are for you.”
The first thug’s eyes lit up, and he reached for the coins, only to be slapped by the irritable one.
“You want our whole family to meet an early grave?
If he complains to the Angel, not one of us will escape.”
The slapped thug clutched his face, looking aggrieved but not daring to argue.
His previous action had been pure muscle memory, bypasssing his brain entirely.
Now, fear had reclaimed the high ground of his mind, taking control of his muscles.
Old John was bewildered by their behavior.
His hand, holding the money, was stuck in mid-air—he didn’t know whether to give it or pull it back.
The irritable thug tried to explain.
“There’s a big project for you to work on.
A massive one.
You going or not?”
Old John said cautiously, “Um…
can I not go?
I can pay.”
Internally, he was cursing.
“Big project” my ass.
Probably one where you work for free for a noble and end up dead.
This sort of thing had happened more than once or twice.
Whenever a noble wanted to do something big, they snatched up labor from everywhere.
If you were lucky, you brought your own food and worked for free; if you were unlucky, you simply vanished.
Only an idiot would go!
“You little—!” The irritable thug became agitated again.
But the boss had said that if they didn’t bring enough people, their heads would roll!
If the Angel hadn’t specifically said they didn’t want gang members, he would have signed himself up.
Suppressing his anger and fear, he explained patiently, “This isn’t work for a noble.
The God-Emperor’s Angels want to expand the starch factories.
Not only is food provided, but there are extra starch rations and vitamin tablets as wages and bonuses.
I heard that if you’re lucky, you might even be selected for some kind of army to serve the Angels directly.
This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!”
Seeing him take the time to explain so patiently, Old John was skeptical.
One couldn’t believe a single word out of a gang member’s mouth, but they surely wouldn’t have the guts to blaspheme the God-Emperor’s Angels.
And the lure of vitamin tablets made him waver.
They were called vitamin tablets, but they were actually a type of nano-medication that could cure most common diseases.
Even if they couldn’t regrow limbs, to an Underhive resident, they were no different from a miracle elixir.
After all, which Underhive resident wasn’t riddled with ailments?
Having such a thing was like being born again.
Old John hesitated for a long while.
The irritable thug began pacing again, even considering whether to move on to the next house.
Thinking of the stories and the fearsome reputation of the Angels, Old John felt this might be true.
He nodded.
“Alright, I’ll do it.
When do we leave?”
The irritable thug looked delighted, his entire body relaxing.
“Wait for my word.
I’ll head out once I’ve gathered enough people from a few more houses.”
With that, he led the other thug out to the next house.
Old John looked at his broken iron door, then at the Hyena Coins in his hand, feeling that this might actually be for real.
The Emperor, having watched the entire thing: “Speechless.”
This was clearly that unknown power reinforcing the man’s trust in the Astral Claws.
Otherwise, how could a title that usually only appeared in myths make an Underhive resident trust a gang member?
Yet the Emperor still couldn’t find anything wrong.
Everything happened naturally, without the slightest anomaly.
Similar scenes were playing out in thousands of corners across the Underhive, with minor variations.
It made the Emperor feel that this power was actually quite decent toward ordinary people.
While it used fear to make the gangs work, it focused on reinforcing trust for the commoners.
Coupled with the knowledge that Huron truly intended to fulfill his promises, the Emperor’s evaluation of the unknown power ticked up a notch.
Hm, slightly higher than the Chaos Gods.