Late at night, Gaius stared listlessly at his computer screen.
"Is it really this hard to make a good game nowadays? If you can't innovate, at least stitch something together! I'd even settle for a well-made copy!"
He glanced at the game icons on his desktop but felt no urge to click on any of them.
"I'm only 20. Am I really suffering from 'gaming impotence' at such a young age?"
Gaius slumped in defeat.
Holding onto a last sliver of hope, he opened a gaming forum again. But as the page loaded, his screen began flickering.
The webpage, along with all the game icons, turned into chaotic strings of garbled code.
"A virus? I didn't download anything sketchy!"
Before he could press the restart button, the computer screen suddenly burst into a flash of blinding white light.
As his consciousness began to fade, the only thought in his mind was:
"Wait, is this one of those epilepsy warnings from game disclaimers? Am I actually getting hit by this?"
Gaius felt his soul being torn from his body and sucked into a bizarre vortex of light and shadows.
Inside this tunnel, he glimpsed grotesque visions of a rotting garden, a labyrinth built of crystal, a world of fire dominated by a massive brass throne, and a lavish palace echoing with moans and wails.
The moment he recognized these scenes, Gaius nearly wept. How could he not know what they represented?
As he passed through, the masters of these realms seemed to sense his presence, their gazes locking onto him.
"Nurgle, Tzeentch, Khorne, Slaanesh... I just finished Space Marine 2, and people joked that agreeing to the EULA meant actually getting isekai'd into 40k to work for the Emperor. That wasn't a meme? Oh, come on!"
Deeper he fell, until he saw it—a dark, icy sun, its glare growing unbearably bright. Then, he reached the end of the tunnel.
"It hurts... so much..."
Gaius opened his eyes. He found himself in a solemn hall, its walls covered in strange energy conduits and inscribed runes.
A flood of foreign memories crashed into his mind, sending waves of agony through his skull.
"I... I am Gaius Mongert... a captain responsible for frontier development of the Mongert Rogue Trader Dynasty. I came to take the test for inheriting the title of Rogue Trader?"
Struggling to stand while processing these memories, a searing pain in his abdomen sent him crashing back to the ground.
He looked down. Blood gushed from a gaping wound in his stomach.
'What the hell? What kind of hellish start is this? I just got here and I'm already dying?!'
Panic set in as he felt his life slipping away. If he died here, would it be permanent? Desperately, he scanned the empty hall but found nothing to help him.
With trembling hands, he pulled out a handheld vox-unit from his coat, but only static answered his calls.
Blood loss blurred his vision. Just as he thought death was inevitable, a voice echoed in his mind:
[Welcome to the Warhammer Universe]
[Current Psychic Crystals: 1000]
[Available Game Modules to Load: (0/1)]
[A second module may be loaded upon securing control of an entire planet.]
A list of games appeared, every single one installed on his PC.
"DOOM, Star Wars, StarCraft, Stellaris, Space Marine 2, Warframe, Warhammer Fantasy, Warcraft, Titanfall..."
His mind raced, but survival came first. One phrase flashed through his thoughts:
"The medic's here~"
"StarCraft it is! Doesn't matter, just save me!"
He selected StarCraft 2 without hesitation.
[StarCraft Module Loaded]
[Store Unlocked]
[SCV: 50 Psychic Crystals]
[Marine: 100 Psychic Crystals]
[Medic: 200 Psychic Crystals]
[Reaper: 200 Psychic Crystals]
Without a second thought, Gaius summoned a Medic.
As the crystals were consumed, a white light shimmered, materializing into a woman clad in a white CMC-405 combat suit.
"Humans can use Protoss warp tech now? How does that even work?"
The moment she fully manifested, the Medic rushed to his side.
"Don't move! Your injuries are severe!"
A feminine voice rang from her helmet as she raised a medical device, releasing a beam of green light.
Nanobots flooded into Gaius's body, administering painkillers before rapidly repairing his damaged tissues. His wounds, both internal and external, closed at a visible pace.
Stunned, Gaius realized something: in-game mechanics were overriding reality. Medics in StarCraft didn't heal this effortlessly, they needed surgical tools. But under this system, they functioned exactly as in the game.
"If that's the case, then Barracks, Factories, and Starports would work the same way. A single Barracks could be equivalent to an STC template for the Mechanicus!"
This was the true power of the game module—reality bent to game logic. Of course, he'd need to test it further.
With the Medic's help, Gaius stood up, fully healed. Now, he could finally take stock of his surroundings and sort through his new memories.
This hall housed the most sacred relic of his dynasty—the Warrant of Trade. The runes and energy conduits lining the walls were anti-psyker and anti-Chaos wards, painstakingly installed over generations with the help of Ecclesiarchy priests, Mechanicus adepts, and even Inquisitors.
Only those of Mongert blood could enter.
The hall itself was located within the dynasty's flagship, the Golden Ram. He had come here to undergo the succession trials, but someone clearly didn't want him to succeed.
And they were still outside.
Curious, Gaius approached the Warrant of Trade.
An ancient parchment rested within a stasis field, untouched by time.
[I do hereby reaffirm, by my will and the authority vested within this document, that the bearer of this Warrant shall stand as a paragon of mankind, unyielding in adversity, a light in the darkness.]
"A real Warrant of Trade... and I'm a potential heir."
Aside from nearly dying at the start, this wasn't a bad deal. At least he wasn't an Imperial Guardsman or some underhive wretch. As a Rogue Trader, he'd have far more freedom—even dealings with xenos wouldn't immediately earn him a bolt round from the Inquisition.
After all, the Warrant permitted interaction with aliens... as long as it didn't harm humanity.