The landing gear of the final heavy shuttle slammed heavily onto the ground.
The hatch hissed open, and a wave of heat rolled in. Andy was the first to jump off. The texture beneath his feet was incredibly solid—some kind of polymer concrete.
"Move it! Don't just stand there dazing!" Andy's voice crackled through the comms channel.
"Sisyphron, take your men and tally the material losses. That crash landing must have broken a lot of gear. I need to know what's still usable and what's scrap. Keep the precision instruments and raw materials in separate piles!"
Sisyphron gave a dejected acknowledgment and led his band of shrewd businessmen into the cargo hold. Looking at the crates deformed by the emergency braking, their hearts bled; that cargo was "meat" they had fought tooth and nail to snatch away from the mouths of Helios and Kaka.
Andy turned to look at the armed personnel currently forming up.
"Gamma-9, Roger."
"The convoy is still 450 kilometers away. Based on their speed, if they don't hit trouble, they'll need at least five hours."
"Take the heavy escort team to the edge of the city. Find a few high points with clear sightlines and set up fortifications."
"Once the convoy arrives, link up immediately. I don't want any screw-ups at the finish line."
"Understood!" Gamma-9 saluted and led Roger and over a hundred soldiers toward the city outskirts.
Finally, Andy looked at Paul and Magos Saul.
"You two are the technical experts. Take a few people and scout the nearby factory buildings. See if you can find a usable warehouse or a crane that hasn't rotted through."
"The building structures here are still standing, but the equipment inside is likely rusted to dust. Fix what you can; if it's beyond repair, scrap it for parts."
Magos Saul nodded, but his cybernetic eye remained fixed on a collapsed building in the distance, his expression grave.
"Lord Andy, the marks here... are not right." Saul pointed to the sheared section of the building. "The cut is extremely smooth and irregular. It doesn't look like it was caused by an explosion or natural weathering."
"It looks more like it was sliced instantly by some massive, incredibly sharp blade."
"And—the radiation readings are clean. No thermal or plasma residue."
Andy took one look and understood. Since this place was called "Zais" and was a famous war-world in the Heretic Stars, it was bound to be crawling with all sorts of xenos. Aside from a violent demolition crew like the Orks, the most likely culprit for such a mark was a xenos species specializing in biotechnology.
"I know. Tell everyone to stay alert." Andy didn't explain further, simply patting Saul on the shoulder. "Get to work."
Having arranged everything, Andy checked the time. It was 3:00 PM. The local star's light was intense, bathing Horizonburg in a deathly pale glow. The tower stood about 300 meters high, cast entirely from a matte black metal without a single visible seam—perfectly seamless.
In the STC's HUD, the golden signal representing the [Xenos Tech Analysis Station] was located directly beneath the base of this tower.
Andy walked to the main entrance. There was no keyhole or handle, only a smooth electronic panel. He reached out and pressed his palm against it.
A data interface linked instantly, and an identification code that had slept in this database for ten thousand years was activated.
Beep—
[Identity Confirmed: DAOT-7734 Autonomous Engineering Unit.]
[Clearance Level: A.]
[Welcome back, Administrator.]
The door slid open silently, revealing a deep corridor. Andy stepped inside. The interior facilities were remarkably well-preserved; he could even see some dormant cleaning robots parked in the corners. Looking at the layout, this appeared to be a comprehensive frontier research center.
Does that mean the surrounding city was a supporting facility?
"Wait?" Andy saw something in the first-floor lobby that made his heart skip a beat.
A massive glass cylinder stood against the wall, filled with pale blue gel.
[DAOT Universal Ironkin Maintenance Pod].
Now this was a prize! To Andy, this was the equivalent of a gym for Ironkin. His current body was sturdy, but it was an engineering model; he couldn't perform many precision operations, and his reaction speed was limited by hydraulic transmission. If he could fix this pod and restore power, Andy could perform deep hardware upgrades on himself.
He could swap in a stronger reactor, install a faster processor, or even trade this clunky engineering armor for a more agile, lethal combat frame.
"Mark that down. Tell Paul to move this thing back later," Andy noted internally as he continued deeper.
Following a spiral staircase, Andy descended to the fifth underground level. This was the core area of the tower and the final destination of the signal. A heavy blast door blocked his path. Andy swiped his hand to open it again.
The door opened.
A massive circular hall lay before him. In the center, there were no messy monitors or instrument panels—only a large, black, altar-like circular platform. The platform was roughly ten meters in diameter. Its surface wasn't smooth; it was etched with dense grooves and runes.
But—these runes were not human.
Andy leaned in for a closer look. The red ones were Aeldari wraithbone runes; the green ones were Ork totemic marks; the grayish-green ones were Necron pictograms. There were even some twisted, nameless symbols that likely belonged to xenos races long extinct.
In the Golden Age—before there were so many religious taboos or crimes like "Xenos Defilement"—humanity's attitude toward aliens was arrogant and pragmatic. If your tech is more advanced than mine or has unique traits, I'll catch you, tear you apart, strip your tech bare, and make it mine. This platform was designed for exactly that.
It was a universal reverse-engineering platform, compatible with a significant portion of known xenos matter and energy forms in the galaxy.
"I don't fully get it, but let's try it." Andy pulled a piece of Aeldari Wraithbone from his pouch and placed it on the section of the platform engraved with Aeldari runes.
Hum—
The platform activated with a soft chime. Countless black liquids suddenly surged from the previously static black surface. Looking closely, it wasn't liquid at all, but billions of nanobots, nearly invisible to the naked eye. They swarmed over the Wraithbone like a colony of hungry ants.
There was no sound of cutting, no sparks. The incredibly hard Wraithbone, which even a bolter couldn't shatter, dissolved and crumbled at a visible rate under the decomposition of the nanobots.
Seconds later, the bone was gone. In its place, a holographic data stream projected above the platform.
[Sample Analysis Complete.]
[Material Composition: Psychic/Matter Hybrid Polymer.]
[Convertible Tech Paths:]
1. Psychic Resonance Primordial Fluid (Requires psychic drive, not recommended).
2. Warp Energy Conduction Conduit (Requires Geller Field assistance).
3. Type-IV High-Grade Biological Nerve Bundle (High conductivity / Low latency).
Andy looked at the options and chose the third without hesitation. The others required psychic or Warp technology, which he couldn't handle yet. But the third option was exactly what he desperately needed.
Even for Andy himself, while his computing power was off the charts, his physical control was still transmitted via heavy-duty cables and hydraulic signals. There was a delay.
The [Type-IV High-Grade Nerve Bundle] was a bionic miracle. Not only was its conductivity thousands of times better than gold, but it could perfectly simulate biological nerve signal transmission—it could even carry a certain degree of consciousness data streams.
If he replaced the cables inside his body with these, his reaction speed would no longer be limited by hardware. Every thought would instantly translate into motion.
"Execute conversion," Andy ordered.
The nanobots on the platform surged again. Using the specialized material obtained from decomposing the Wraithbone, they began to rearrange and recombine.
A few minutes later, the black tide receded. In the center of the platform lay a bundle of silver-white, incredibly fine cables. They looked like living tissue, their surfaces even exhibiting a faint pulsation.
Andy reached out and picked up the nerve bundles.
[Conversion Rate: 98%.]
[Loss: 2%.]
Only 2% loss! If the Sages of the Adeptus Mechanicus saw this, they'd probably gouge out their own cybernetic eyes and eat them! The Mechanicus usually faced a loss rate of over 30% when processing xenos materials, often destroying the material's compatibility in the process.
Yet this platform performed atomic restructuring at a physical level, perfectly preserving the material's properties while stripping away Warp impurities.
"Sweet!" Andy stuffed the nerve bundles into his pouch, feeling like he'd hit the jackpot. With these, he could upgrade both the exoskeletons and his own chassis later, at least doubling his combat effectiveness.
He prepared to pull out some other xenos junk to test.