Faced with the overwhelming force of the Mechanicus, the tribal families had no choice: they either surrendered or became lifelong servants of the God of All Machines.
Among the Night Walkers—the largest organized faction in the Rebellion Society—this was particularly shocking. Free-spirited night-wandering ghosts, they had lived unconstrained, doing as they pleased. How could they accept dogma, rules, or authority? Yet resistance was futile.
The attention of the Mechanicus' major priests quickly fell upon them. Lana, driving the Mach 5 Sandevistan, obliterated nearly 200 Night Walkers in under a minute. The sheer force of her strike shattered their morale; few could even comprehend what had happened as their comrades were shredded before their eyes.
Even the most unrestrained and unscrupulous of these night wanderers found themselves fleeing.
The other Mechanicus priests joined the fray immediately. With Mach 2 Sandevistan, escaping Night Walkers were swiftly decapitated in the blink of an eye. The remaining believers activated their violent prosthetics, cutting through the crowd in a one-sided massacre. Only the weak and defenseless were spared, kept alive as prisoners.
Of those spared, a small number—those with potential for reform—were allowed to earn their freedom through long, laborious service. The rest were condemned to permanent servitude:
Lobotomized partially,Mind-erased,Fitted with mechanical hemibrains,Reprogrammed and cybernetically enhanced.
They became unconscious, intelligent servants, designed to perform the simplest, most basic functions, their instincts programmed for obedience.
Once the Adeptus Mechanicus crushed the Night Walkers with overwhelming force, resistance in the Badlands ceased entirely. Tens of thousands were brought under control in a single day. Few Mechanicus casualties occurred, and only a handful of company members perished during the campaign.
With the Badlands unified, the priests began traveling to settlements, conducting initiation ceremonies for the newly converted. Mountains of scavenged garbage were offered as sacrifices, transformed into primitive power, granting each initiate a cyber monk template and connecting them to the dimensional network.
Those who truly felt the presence and power of the God of All Machines abandoned their old beliefs, becoming fanatical devotees.
During this process, many cyberpsychopaths—madmen driven to murder by the burden of their prosthetic bodies—were discovered by the priests. Previously unstoppable, these cyber-lunatics were subdued, initiated, and gloriously inducted into the Mechanicus.
Miraculously, many of these once-deranged individuals recovered. Cyberpsychosis often arose from the strain of prosthetic augmentation and the unbearable pressures of reality. Once freed from these burdens, they were simply humans under extreme stress. With a little treatment and the guidance of the Mechanicus, their psychosis naturally dissipated.
These formerly notorious madmen became fervent missionaries, spreading the miraculous recovery and the divine truth of the God of All Machines.
In less than a week, the Mechanicus' holy war had fully subjugated the Badlands. Its domination was total; opposition had no voice.
In a society where cyberpsychosis was considered incurable, the recovery of these cyber-lunatics seemed miraculous. The news spread quickly throughout the Badlands and even into Night City, especially among mercenaries—a group highly vulnerable to cyberpsychosis.
Even without undergoing initiation, many cyber mercenaries purchased divine seals of the God of All Machines, wearing them on their prosthetic bodies or branding them directly onto their enhancements. The results confirmed their faith was not misplaced: while a symbol could not replace initiation, it still attracted cyber aura, and long-term devotion could even birth a machine soul, reducing the strain on their prosthetics.
Meanwhile, to reward Lana for her missionary success, Xiao promoted her to priest (foundation building) and granted her two divine spells: Holy Water Magic and Holy Soil Magic.
Both required the priestly foundation-building level to wield properly.
Holy Water Magic: Condenses and purifies water sources; can pray for large-scale rainfall. The water produced is clean and harmless.Holy Soil Magic: Purifies polluted land, restores fertility, and enables cultivation.
Combined, the two powers allowed believers to access clean water and food, enabling long-term survival independent of corporations.
Upon acquiring these arts, Lana summoned tens of thousands of believers from the Badlands to impart the knowledge. Through their prayers, she connected their original power via the dimensional network to perform Holy Land Magic.
The collective cyber aura, inspired by divine faith, began to purify the corrupted earth.
At the atomic level, the cyber aura consumed all pollutants. Crimson, irradiated, industrially poisoned soil gradually returned to its natural color, becoming soft and fertile. The black soil—rare even on unpolluted Earth—resurfaced, lifting the veil of contamination.
Congregants wept with joy, praying with all their might, even at the cost of their own life force.
Though the act of magic drained the original power from their bodies, the thirty thousand believers persevered, determined to maintain the Holy Land Magic without pause.
⭐ Enjoying the story?
You can read ahead and support the translations by joining my Patreon! Your support helps me update faster and take on more projects. Thank you for reading!
Read up to 50 chapters ahead!
patreon.com/AminaSims