A few minutes later, which I spent trying to come up with a believable cover story I 'saw' the constellation leave the Warp and re-enter realspace.

Turns out distances are rather fickle and unpredictable in the Warp as I realized that the souls seemingly so close were barely at the edge of the star system. I sat in my comfy chair, taking solace from the embarrassment in its leathery hold.

Right, they couldn't predict where exactly they'd end up so they had to leave the Warp there.

Whatever, not like I had any idea what I'd tell them yet. At the speed they were traveling it'd take more than a week to reach me, now that I think about it I shouldn't rely on their sensors picking up on me either. For a moment there I forgot they didn't have any sensors much better than what we had back on Earth, not sure how the hell they managed to hit stuff in space battles.

Psykers must come in handy, no matter how much everyone may hate them in the imperium. Then again, your neighbor suddenly spawning a demon horde wasn't the best look for them.

With all that being said having a free week wasn't so bad, the governor kept note of most of the genestealer cults' locations around the hive city. This way I had time to go and check if either of those locations had any remaining for me to absorb.

With a last, mournful look at the comfy chair I left. Let's hope I could get back in time.

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I spent seven, boring, soul-numbing, and annoying days going from one location to the next only to find nothing, not even blood to somewhat satisfy my curiosity until I got my hand on a whole genestealer. No sign of fighting either, which could have cued me in on what I'd find at the last location.

The place was deep inside the heart of the city, I haven't seen light since a few days ago and neither did I breathe air that could be called fresh by any meaning of the word. The tunnels were cold and the smell of rust combined disgustingly with mold.

I stalked through these pathways, long forgotten by most previous inhabitants of the city mostly in my humanoid form. My skin was covered by a film of soft chitinous substance that let me use the Lictor's camouflage ability, which hid me from the numerous genestealers ambling about the hideout. The narrow tunnels and cracks suited the more economic form more, rather than the several meters tall murder machine that was the Lictor.

I expected to find maybe a small holdout or a few survivors or even just the leftovers from a fight but they seemed to have hidden themselves from everyone else duking it out above the surface.

This will be fun.

These monsters didn't deserve an ounce of my sympathy, not many people did in this galaxy if I'm being honest but I've already decided to keep myself from killing too many civilians. I know where their souls would end up after I killed them, getting your soul eaten by demons or whatever else found it in the Warp was a fate very few deserved in my opinion.

I wouldn't hesitate though, should anyone prove to be a threat or an obstacle.

Mercy was good and all, but only when my own survival was already assured, no that wasn't quite right. I'd have to thrive to even think about others' well-being. I was so different from everyone else in the galaxy, I wasn't a human and even if I was I think I'd still think like that, dying and getting reincarnated might have influenced me just as much as turning into an eldritch space monster.

The joke's on whoever reincarnated me though, I always loved eldritch space monsters.

Some of the sci-fi stories had humans with basic hard sci-fi tech faced up against incomprehensible eldritch beings from outer space, and while I wouldn't want to be the unfortunate human I was more than happy to be the overpowered monster.

Freedom stemmed from power, especially in this fucked up universe. I was nowhere near strong enough to be free, the countless factions would just stomp me under their boots like the overgrown bug I was, I'd have to change that.

The ship will be the first step and until I can go toe to toe with the strongest beings I'll have to play the game, the game everyone plays in this galaxy. The great game for the fate of the galaxy, between hapless mortals, psychic demigods, and thirsting gods.

Back to the reason why I wasn't already in the process of turning these bald fuckers into biomass, one was that I finally had targets to practice the more telepathic side of psyker powers, and the other was that I caught a glimpse of the patriarch. Of course, there was a patriarch here, why wouldn't there be?

I instinctively knew it could put up a fight even against my Lictor form, unlike Lictors the patriarch was closest to a brood lord. Enhanced physical strength and psychic powers working in tandem to best any foe that would like to kill it.

Its main function was operating the cult and spreading through the world while a Lictor's was infiltration and assassination. If I could get the jump on it'd tilt the odds heavily in my favor, and that's while I'm ignoring that unlike usual Lictors I can combat its psychic powers while its mental attacks would hopefully fail to hit me as I'm not connected to the Warp.

I wasn't relying on that too much though, I had a brain and a tether connecting my body to my soul, it shouldn't be too hard to send a psychic attack through that if the patriarch was skilled enough. If I wanted to kill it I'd have to strike fast and hard, once the cult was decapacitated they'd be easy pickings.

I glanced into the Warp, seeing thin tethers of energy going from one genestealer to another, expanding over the whole cult, like a malicious spiderweb. It was hard to see anything through it, the dark water grew sort of muddy around the web, robbing my sight somewhat.

I knew I could push through, it'd be easy to bring the whole web crashing down if I connected to the Warp. This was just a brood mind, not the actual hive mind which could cast a shadow over sub-sectors.

I didn't do that though, it would have been a waste. Much easier to just murder them and absorb them, let the web come crashing down once I demolished the pillars holding it up, without the cult to power it it'd fade. I suspected killing just the patriarch would weaken it considerably, it should be the strongest psychic being in the cult if not on the planet.

I stalked, knowing that it wasn't needed but my Lictor body's instincts made it hard to go against them and I didn't bother forcing it. It almost moved on its own with me just having to point where I wanted to get, Tyranid bioforms were machines made of flesh, bones, and chitin.

The many cultists, ranging from bald humans to the monstrous first and second-generation genestealers remained non-the wiser as I stalked amongst them. These damp tunnels and crevices carved out of the old ferrocrete foundation of the city made for the perfect setting for a horror movie.

I just hoped I would be the monster of this story and not the Tyranids. Not that I was easy to kill, they would be the meal this time.

The patriarch stayed in an oval hall at the end of the twisting tunnels, now that I had a mental map of most of these tunnels it kind of looked like an anthill. The 'queen' remained at the center, commanding its countless minions.

Along the way, I continued to test my rudimentary telepathy, I couldn't connect my soul to theirs through the Warp like I suspected other psykers could so I had to do it through their body. Tendrils of soul energy connected to the heads of cultists and I felt their minds, it was a disturbing mix of animalistic savagery and harmonic coexistence.

Each mind sang its own tune and the hundreds of cultists made up an orchestra without a single one being out of tune. I didn't push the energy through the tunnel and into their souls, even if I went through an intermediary the effect should be similar to when I connected to the Warp directly.

I was once again made aware of how different my mind is from what it once was, despite feeling a dozen minds at once and comprehending their many incoherent thoughts I somehow understood it all without losing focus. My mind was like a CPU, made up of several cores and each running numerous individual threads with more or less priority.

My mind was constantly conscious of each individual thread of every core but I could also push them to the back of my mind, leaving it for them to report to me anything they deem interesting. This style of thinking, this thought splitting came to me without effort, it wasn't even an instinct telling me to do it, it was like I'd always been capable of it and just now became conscious of it.

I didn't know if it was from my original soul, the new body, or the soul energy but it was extremely useful. I suspected the body though, with it seemingly influencing my soul it was far more than what it appeared initially, for all I knew its hidden functions just needed more energy to start up.

I designated Fear Induction, Memory Manipulation and similar psychic powers I remembered as subsets of telepathy. Yeah, both could be achieved with biokinesis too but telepathy was the go-to for those. It was fascinating, how bending the mind made the matter making up the brain conform to the changes.

I had to focus now though, I had a monster to hunt.

I grinned, my oval mouth covered in jagged teeth under the tentacles covering my face in this form swishing at the motion. I hoped I looked terrifying, unfortunately being invisible at the moment made getting feedback challenging.

Oh well, there will be a next time.