As Adam's words fell, everyone's reactions varied.
Lucia almost immediately believed Adam's words, her face revealing an irrepressible joy.
As if she had expected it, Sibylla showed no particular reaction.
As for Leonardo, when he heard this fantastical news, his first reaction was disbelief.
If the Warp Daemons could really be dealt with so easily, and eradicated completely, why would they still be such an endless scourge to the Imperium of Man as they are now?
However, Leonardo quickly seemed to recall something, and the doubt on his face gradually dissipated, replaced by thoughtfulness.
The Warp Daemon that had possessed the Chaos Space Marines earlier reacted extremely violently when facing death by plasma.
And just now, the Slaanesh Daemon Prince even attempted suicide rather than die by Adam's hand.
In this way... it seemed there was indeed corroborating evidence.
"You... you have the ability to completely eradicate daemons?"
Leonardo coughed a few times as he spoke with difficulty.
Even though his body was still being corroded by Slaanesh's poison, which was extremely difficult for even a Custodian's will to endure, he still managed to utter the sentence.
"Naturally, I think that's obvious."
Adam said, his gaze sweeping over Leonardo and Lucia, his mind stirring slightly.
The next moment, the injuries and corrosive curses on both of them vanished as if time had reversed.
Freed from the burden of fatigue and injuries, Leonardo's superhuman brain immediately became active, and many previously overlooked details coalesced one by one, surfacing in his mind.
"Lord Adam, based on the previous battle, am I to understand that..."
He chose his words carefully, speaking slowly with a hint of caution, "...you need to acquire souls by killing to enhance your abilities?"
"Exactly."
Given the clear demonstration just now, this was something that couldn't be hidden, and Adam had long been mentally prepared for it, so he readily admitted it.
Since his promotion to Level 3 Reality Warper, he felt much more confident.
Hearing Adam's words, the other three exchanged glances, a strange feeling simultaneously rising in their hearts.
Needing a large number of souls... wasn't this just like the Chaos Gods?
As soon as this thought emerged, the three, with their rich experience in fighting Chaos, immediately associated it with many ominous things, such as blasphemous acts like "Blood for the Blood God, Skulls for the Skull Throne."
However, these thoughts did not linger in their minds for long and were quickly dispelled.
"The God-Emperor has His own considerations; there must be a profound meaning, and we only need to obey."
After a while, it was Sibylla who spoke this time, asking a crucial question:
"Has your current growth reached its limit?"
Adam shook his head: "No. I have only just successfully met the requirements for one advancement, but the next stage will be even more demanding than before."
"How many souls are needed?"
"...Approximately, one billion."
Adam focused his perception for a moment, then answered seriously, "It requires the consumption of one billion human souls."
Noticing the subtle and strange expressions on the three's faces, he immediately emphasized:
"Souls, souls equivalent to one billion ordinary humans, with no other special requirements. And it doesn't have to be human; the souls of other Xenos or daemons are perfectly acceptable."
"This... this requirement is too simple, isn't it?"
Even Sibylla, who called herself a Puritan Inquisitor, was greatly tempted by this and pressed further: "You mean, by sacrificing one billion souls, you, a being whose combat power is already close to that of a Primarch, can further increase your strength?"
It was like having a red button placed in front of them.
Pressing it meant one billion Imperial citizens would disappear, and the reward would be the return of a loyalist Primarch.
For any Imperial citizen, whether Astartes, Battle Sisters, or Inquisitor, the thought of "I'd smash that button right now" would definitely arise.
Not pressing it would be un-Imperial.
"No, don't be happy too soon."
Adam shook his head, pouring cold water on their enthusiasm: "If I want to complete the next stage of advancement, besides the number of souls, there's another very troublesome condition that gives me a bit of a headache."
"What condition?"
Everyone's hearts tightened.
"One billion souls is indeed not too difficult."
Adam explained, "Just completely ending that Slaanesh Daemon Prince earlier provided me with an amount equivalent to one hundred million human souls in one go. If I were to support some larger battlefields next, gathering the remaining amount wouldn't be too difficult."
"However, the other requirement is not so simple."
He changed the subject, "The next promotion also requires me to obtain something—Authority."
Sibylla and the other two exchanged glances, clearly not understanding the true meaning of these words.
What exactly was Authority?
"Never mind, I have my own plans for this; you don't need to worry," Adam sighed and said.
If his previous process of elevating his Reality Warping Ability from Level 1 to Level 3 was a form of 'Completion,' then the path of advancement ahead could be called 'Reality Ascension.'
In Foundation terminology, 'Ascension' refers to the process of moving from a mortal state to divinity. If Adam wanted to reach the level of a Level 4 Reality Warper, indistinguishable from a living deity, he would have to acquire 'Authority,' an ability related to gods, giving him the 'authority' over the laws of the universe.
However, of course, in the extraordinary world of Warhammer, Adam, based on his past knowledge and observations, deduced that there were roughly two avenues he could pursue:
One was the Warp, and the other was the real world.
For example, Warp minor gods, including the Warp essence of Primarchs, or the gods of the material world—star god shards—these were all within the range of options, as long as he could obtain one of them, the path to advancement would be unimpeded.
In Adam's view, if he were truly eager to advance, the simplest and most brutal approach would be to immediately go to Macragge in the Ultima Segmentum and stab to death the famous local tourist attraction, the blue man who had been sleeping in a stasis field for ten thousand years, Robert Guilliman, Lord of the Thirteenth Legion.
Of course, this was the worst of all options, and Adam would basically never choose it.
After a brief contemplation, he quickly thought of a war between the Imperium of Man and the Necrons that would occur in the future.
925.M41, the World Engine War.
Iograniya, the World Shaper.
Once a god of matter and form, Iograniya's fractured essence was chained within a labyrinth of necrodermis matrices and gravitic seals. Through it, the Necrons exercised dominion over reality itself.
Worlds did not merely fall before the Engine—they were rewritten. Fortress-lines were inverted into sinkholes, hive cities crystallised into brittle monuments, and planetary mantles were torn open to feed the machine's inexhaustible hunger.