"C'mon, are you just jealous of how handsome I look?"
Zhou Yun made a few more adjustments to his majestic lion face, trying to make it look more like the cocky expression he remembered from Lion El'Jonson.
Still, it didn't quite have the right feel.
After all, Zhou Yun had never seen the Lion's face himself, only pieced it together from old illustrations, miniatures, and text descriptions.
Close, but not perfect.
"Tsk, doesn't feel handsome enough… maybe I should mold a phoenix instead."
"Phoenix? You mean Fulgrim?" The winged figure in the white light froze for a second, then seemed to realize Zhou Yun meant the Emperor's Children Primarch.
That Primarch, once called the Purple Phoenix of the Imperium before his fall, now the decadent daemon prince of Slaanesh.
The winged figure shuddered slightly, as though recalling some very dark memories.
After a long pause, he sighed. "Consider it a plea… the Lion's face is fine. Please don't."
Hearing the figure's resentful tone, Zhou Yun couldn't help but laugh softly.
He had no intention of molding Fulgrim's face.
Though Fulgrim had once single-handedly raised humanity's average beauty across the entire galaxy, he was now a walking nightmare of Chaos corruption.
If Zhou Yun molded that face, he feared he'd get corrupted by the Warp the very next second.
"Fine, but you're going to teach me how to make this face more like the real Lion."
Zhou Yun glanced at the winged figure in the white light.
"…Fine, raise the corner of your eyes a little… shorten the chin a touch…"
The figure nodded reluctantly. "Right, and the ears, just like that… more and more like him now…"
At first he had resisted, but as Zhou Yun shaped his features closer to the Lion's, the figure seemed to grow interested, giving serious guidance.
"That's it. That's exactly how Lion looked." He sounded almost wistful.
Zhou Yun looked at the mirror and the cold, stern yet regal lion face staring back at him. He couldn't help clicking his tongue.
No wonder Lion wasn't popular among his brothers.
Even ignoring his personality, just this face alone looked like the whole world had violated his father. Dark, forbidding, and utterly humorless.
It gave the impression that anyone daring to crack a joke would immediately catch an uppercut to the jaw.
Zhou Yun put the can of karada nendo (body clay) back into his dimensional pouch and then put on the chōnōryoku bōshi (psychic power hat).
The hat, with its comical white-gloved mechanical right hand on top, looked like a gag prop.
But as he donned it, Zhou Yun could feel strange, new senses awakening, allowing him to do things he couldn't before.
He focused on a soda can in the corner of the room.
The mechanical hand on his hat pointed at it, and the can floated into the air.
Then, with a squeeze of his mind, the can crushed itself with a pop.
"That's nenriki (telekinesis)… now for…"
Zhou Yun took a deep breath, focused, and his figure flickered—instantaneously appearing by the door.
shunkan idō (teleportation).
He checked his arms and clothes. Good, the clay disguise and his garments had come along for the ride—he wouldn't be teleporting out of his clothes.
Finally…
He concentrated on his eyes.
The walls and floor became translucent.
Peering down, he could vaguely see the maze of pipes and corridors of Sector Eight buried below.
His eyes ached slightly, and a wave of fatigue swept through him.
He shut his eyes and canceled the tōshi (x-ray vision).
After testing all three abilities, Zhou Yun found his mastery of telekinesis and teleportation satisfactory, but x-ray vision still drained him and required focus.
Fortunately, x-ray vision wasn't something he'd need to keep on all the time anyway.
With that, Zhou Yun pulled out the naniwa (anywhere ring).
The local gang had cordoned off the entrance to Sector Eight, but he didn't need it.
As long as he knew what lay below, he could simply use the naniwa to slip in.
He placed the ring on the floor and stepped through.
Deep underground, in the dim tunnels of the buried Sector Eight, two gang members were patrolling, lho-sticks lit and flashlights in hand.
"What's the boss even looking for? We've been stuck in this dump for days." The one on the left muttered.
The stale air of the century-buried sector made him uncomfortable enough to make small talk.
"I heard the squad leader say they're after an old PDF arsenal," his companion answered with a shrug, puffing on his lho-stick. "Apparently full of guns and ammo."
"Found it yet?"
"They found it. But the whole warehouse is buried under rubble—can't get in yet."
"Figures. Still, beats working topside."
The left one took a deep drag on his smoke. "This place might be stuffy, but all we gotta do is wander around. Way easier than up in the hive."
His partner nodded.
The hive was already a cesspit. Without a governor, it was a cesspit of a cesspit. Everyone who survived here had their own brand of ruthlessness.
Even gang members had to watch for other gangs, desperate civilians, angry worker mobs, internal betrayals… oh, and the cultists and heretics lurking in the dark.
One wrong move and you ended up a corpse in the street.
Compared to that, this quiet, buried ruin was paradise.
Sure, the air was musty and it was pitch dark…
But nothing tried to kill you. "Feels like flying," he said to his companion.
Then he felt the floor falling away.
Huh? Why am I actually flying? the gang member thought, dumbfounded as he floated into the air alongside his friend.
Then, as if two invisible hands took hold of them, their foreheads smashed together.
(End of Chapter)
[Check Out My P@treon For +20 Extra Chapters On All My Fanfics!!][www.p@treon.com/euridome]
[Thank You For Your Support!]