Inside the Ark Gang's stronghold,
Alexander played with the Pocket Tornado in his hand, watching the Ark Gang members training outside the window.
They were being trained, learning how to use firearms more professionally, how to engage in close combat, and how to fight in urban warfare.
But to be honest, their training was truly...
"Unbearable to watch," Sanguinius commented silently. "They lack more professional training guidance."
Alexander nodded in agreement. In military matters, he was an amateur.
But among the instructors teaching the Ark Gang members, Alexander saw Lager.
The other instructors were also mostly thugs from the Lower Nest.
Reyna probably could only gather this group of people.
"Don't even mention it, Lager might be the most reliable one among them."
Reyna said with a look of distress and exhaustion:
"At least he taught my people how to survive longer on the battlefield."
Alexander had to nod in agreement on this point.
Lager might be useless in other areas, but when it came to self-preservation, in the Lower Nest where the average lifespan was around thirty, the fact that he could walk around with the face of a sixty or seventy-year-old already proved his ability to survive.
Gang after gang in the districts came and went, but Lager always survived in the lower echelons of the gangs.
Extremely useless, but also extremely hard to kill.
Reyna sighed, "How have you considered what I just said?"
She had just told Alexander two things.
One was that the Ark Gang was encountering difficulties in financial allocation.
The other was asking Alexander if he was interested in joining the Ark Gang's management.
"You want to default on your debt!"
"You also want me to work for free!"
Alexander extracted the key points in his own way:
"How dare you? Even the Emperor can't default on my debt and make me work for free!"
Alexander stared at Reyna with wide eyes.
Reyna's expression twitched slightly.
"It's not defaulting on debt, we're not out of money, it's just..."
Reyna pushed the account book in front of Alexander:
"We're also in a difficult situation. Bringing back the Warp Engine, destroying the Warp Engine, and those two issues—the three combined mean the amount of blood coins I need to pay you is already so large that it requires allocation."
"You know, these past few days, I've been reorganizing the entire Ark Gang to adapt it to the tasks bestowed by the Emperor, so there have been some delays in various aspects of allocation."
Reyna, with apology and hesitation, leaned closer to Alexander and said:
"Of course we have the money. This isn't our first collaboration, can't you trust me?"
As she spoke, her gaze drifted to the Pocket Tornado in Alexander's hand.
She had witnessed the power of this small brown gourd; it could unleash a considerably powerful hurricane.
"So, can we put this gourd down for a moment?"
"Time, Reyna," Alexander asked, rubbing his fingers at Reyna.
"If you're in a hurry, come and take over some of the Ark Gang's affairs. I'm currently facing a tangled mess."
Reyna said with a bitter expression.
The Ark Gang's current problem wasn't a lack of money, but rather having money and not knowing how to allocate it.
With the expansion of the Ark Gang, Reyna's management of the gang had already reached its limit.
In addition, she had recently undertaken a large-scale reorganization of the entire Ark Gang, reallocating a large amount of resources previously used for starship construction to other purposes.
This involved countless resources and manpower allocations across multiple Lower Nest districts, and Reyna truly couldn't sort it out in a short time.
She desperately hoped someone could help.
But she only took one look and knew that Alexander had no intention of joining the Ark Gang's management.
After all, just thinking about it made Alexander feel mentally and physically exhausted.
Reyna sighed and said, "I'll pay half now, and the remaining half within a month."
"No choice, money is needed everywhere right now. I plan to dismantle and sell the starship we built to get some money."
"Fortunately, I still have that Upper hive pass you got for me; perhaps I can find a buyer in the Upper hive."
One month...
Alexander's eyes twitched slightly.
It was uncertain if the planet Ashford would even last another month.
As for selling that starship...
Alexander had seen the data of the starship Reyna had acquired.
That vessel, buried in the desolate wasteland outside the hive city, was a Vagabond-class merchant ship built many years ago.
Finding a buyer for that thing would be no small feat.
"How about I do it?" Sanguinius suddenly spoke.
Alexander was stunned for a moment, blinking as he asked in his mind, "What are you going to do?"
"I'll handle these Ark Gang affairs. It's just a small gang's matters; I can finish it in thirty minutes."
Alexander was taken aback. This actually seemed feasible.
Even if Sanguinius was not Sanguinius, he was certainly not a mortal.
Even a regular Astartes would far surpass a mortal in terms of intellect.
The affairs that Reyna couldn't sort out might be very simple in the eyes of Sanguinius.
And the Truth and Falsehood Divination Machine had also confirmed that Sanguinius was trustworthy.
Alexander nodded slightly and looked at Reyna: "Give me all your Ark Gang's data, documents, and forms."
"Really?" Reyna was momentarily stunned, then her eyes lit up with joy: "I'll go bring some over right now, and we can work together—"
"First, I said all of it."
"Second, you're not needed."
Alexander shook his finger and said:
"Third, service for handling affairs also costs money."
"If you can truly handle these matters and redesign a material allocation system..."
Reyna's voice paused. She stood up, opened the door, and led Alexander to the adjacent room:
"You'll find that the Ark Gang actually has quite a lot of money once it doesn't need to build starships."
Reyna opened the door to the adjacent room and gestured inside.
The entire room was filled with a massive pile of documents and forms, like a mountain made of paper.
On the table in the center of the room, there were also several data pads, constantly flashing with complex data.
Alexander's expression remained calm as he walked into the room, with Reyna following closely behind.
She watched Alexander calmly sit down behind the table and pick up the first document on top.
"Aren't you going to use some magical technological creation?" Reyna couldn't help but ask.
"I'm going to use my external brain," Alexander replied with a light chuckle.
He opened the document, allowing Sanguinius to see through his eyes...
"Industrial raw materials from District Six can be transported to local factories via Channel Twelve."
"The transport of steel and pulped wood from District Fifteen will crowd the channels; transportation should be arranged like this..."
"The branch manager in District Thirteen is corrupt, the amount is approximately..."
"The Ark Gang's tax model for the Lower Nest can be changed; protection fees should be collected according to my method..."
"Have Reyna calculate these two forms; the correctly calculated numbers will carry the corruption of the Lord of Change, and she is immune to that..."
Reyna stared blankly as Alexander handled the Ark Gang's documents.
Each document would only stay in Alexander's hand for a few seconds on average before being processed.
And Alexander would quickly point out the problems contained within and tell Reyna how to correct them.
Later on, Alexander even started processing several documents simultaneously, and the unprocessed documents in the entire room decreased at a visible rate.
Reyna couldn't keep up with Alexander's train of thought at all.
Alexander, however, could coordinate with Sanguinius. His reaction speed had been blessed by the Emperor's grim death-will in the Bottom Nest, becoming extremely agile.
Less than half an hour later, Sanguinius looked at the processed documents, shook his head, and said:
"These trivial matters... if Guilliman were here, he'd probably finish them in just a few minutes."
"I've redesigned the Ark Gang's management system. Reyna's previous design was too crude. Using my system will be much more efficient."
Alexander didn't speak, just waved his hand, signaling Reyna to look.
Reyna's body trembled slightly as she incredulously looked at a few of the documents Alexander had processed, then at Alexander's new plan for Ark Gang material allocation, and the entire Ark Gang's management redesign, feeling dizzy.
The vast number of documents that she found overwhelming had been processed by Alexander just like that.
"I was wrong..."
Reyna said, holding her head:
"I used to resent you calling me a fool, but now I understand, I truly am a fool."
"I'm really foolish, truly."
Reyna's eyes were a bit dazed.
"Look, you've shattered the little girl's Dao heart," Alexander glanced at Sanguinius and said.
"How can you blame me—hmm?" Sanguinius' tone suddenly paused.
Bang!!!!
A deafening explosion suddenly rang out in the distance, and an orange-yellow light flashed outside the window.
Explosion.
Reyna rushed to the window at top speed, looking at the raging fire in the distance:
"This is... a factory?"
"A factory exploded?!"
Long tongues of fire shot out from the factory windows.
The entire factory building was burning, and workers were frantically fleeing the structure.
Gorden, draped in a brown cloak, covered his face with a crimson cloth.
He extended one of his three arms, adjusted his cloak, and allowed the workers to escape past him.
These workers were also oppressed; Gordenwould not kill them. Those following Gorden...
Gorden's purpose was not oppression, but resistance.
He was the most exquisite killing weapon born in the cult, a symbol of the entire cult's will to resist.
He was naturally endowed with superhuman sensory abilities and rapidly discharging neurons, which made his reaction speed exceed human cognition.
The nose covered by the red cloth gave him a superhuman sense of smell, and his eyes possessed unique infrared vision.
His inner ears were highly developed, enhancing his balance and coordination.
From his birth, Gordenbegan to receive training from the cult, learning marksmanship from the leader's subordinates.
His shooting speed and accuracy with his three arms were unrivaled throughout Ashford.
He could draw and shoot in just 0.3 seconds.
He was the cult's killing weapon, the most dangerous revolver in the hands of the cult's leader.
He was the liberator, the nightmare of the oppressors.
And today, the oppressors he was to confront were the evil Ark Gang entrenched in this area.
"Damn it! They dared to blow up the factory!"
The angry shouts of Ark Gang members rang out from nearby.
As an important factory, the Ark Gang had obviously arranged for defense personnel.
The hybrid cultists and brothers of the race following Gorden had secretly sneaked in through the pipes.
Gunfire began to erupt.
Ark Gang members, raising their automatic rifles, rushed into the factory and engaged in combat with the hybrid cultists brought by Gorden.
Several Ark Gang members even set their sights on Gorden, raising their guns at him.
Gorden gave them the chance to aim, but not the chance to pull the trigger.
Almost instantly, the heads of those Ark Gang members aiming at Gorden all exploded.
In their last moments, they only saw the smoking Liberator automatic pistols in Gorden's three arms.
The trigger was pulled repeatedly, and each time it fell, an Ark Gang member's head exploded; every shot found its mark.
"Hold on! The cult leader is coming with reinforcements soon!"
The Ark Gang members charged the hybrid cultists and brothers of the race in a chaotic and disorderly manner.
This disorganized formation clearly had not undergone rigorous training.
However, the hybrid cultists and brothers of the race had been trained by the leader from a young age, fighting under the leader's psychic link command, in an orderly fashion.
Gorden raised his Liberator pistol again.
The next moment, the head of the Ark Gang's leader instantly burst.
The Ark Gang members were immediately stunned, and their formation became even more chaotic.
Gorden, through the psychic link, signaled everyone to attack—
"Drop your weapons! Leave cover!"
A sharp voice suddenly pierced through all the hybrid cultists and brothers of the race present.
Almost all hybrid cultists and brothers of the race stood up from behind cover and simultaneously dropped their weapons.
"Shoot!" This time, the sharp voice pierced into the minds of all Ark Gang members.
They almost simultaneously raised their automatic rifles and fired at the hybrid cultists and brothers of the race.
The awakened hybrid cultists and brothers of the race quickly dodged, but many still died under the gunfire of the Ark Gang members.
Gorden moved his infrared-sensing eyes, looking towards the source of the voice.
A woman stood on a high point in the factory, her gaze intensely fixed on all the genestealer.
Gorden immediately understood that she was the Ark Gang's leader... the oppressor of oppressors!
However, this woman was currently hiding in the blind spot of his gun. Gorden needed to move to a position where he could shoot—
Hmm?
Just as Gorden took a few steps,
A man blocked his path.
The man's face was as stern as a Lion in the depths of a forest, his golden hair fluttering with the hot wind inside the factory.
He held a Catachan-pattern M36 Lasgun in his hand.
Gorden determined that this was the person referred to in the intelligence as "Leman Russ"; this face was his commonly used Lion's face.
The intelligence stated that he was extremely skilled in marksmanship!
But Gorden was not afraid!
The three Liberator automatic pistols in his hands were light and small, and their firing speed was extremely fast, capable of drawing and shooting in just 0.3 seconds.
Whereas the Catachan-pattern M36 Lasgun in Leman Russ' hand was too heavy and large; even the most exquisite marksmanship could not keep up with his speed.
Within 0.3 seconds, Gorden's three hands simultaneously completed drawing their weapons and pulling the triggers.
But he did not feel the sensation of the triggers being pulled on his hands.
He stared blankly as his three hands were pierced by three laser beams, turning into ashes and vanishing into the air.