I'm a magnetic field madman

With a piercing howl that echoed beyond the realm of mortal comprehension, its scorching flames burned away Fugrim's skin, muscles, and bones, and finally his soul!

The Primarch of the Ascended could not escape, and in order to plot against the God-Emperor, he had to extricate his soul from Slaanesh's domain.

Now, he can no longer return to the Dark Prince's palace; before the power of the God Emperor, he has nowhere to escape.

The headless Felus remained silent. He grasped the remnants of Forgrim's soul and, step by step, walked through the burning door.

Only a faint, almost imperceptible murmur echoed in the air.

I forgive you, brother...

180. Lord of Darkness

What are the conditions for becoming the Lord of Darkness?

It's not only emperors who can become the Dark Lord; in fact, if Horus had won the final battle on the Soul of Vengeance, he could have become the Dark Lord as well.

In fact, the Four Gods' scheme was extremely ruthless. If Horus killed the Emperor, they would gain a weak and insane Dark Lord... If the Emperor won, he would also be forced to join their ranks in a weakened state.

But even Tzeentch didn't expect that the Emperor and Slaanesh would be so aware—both were gods who had made collective sacrifices to their races, yet one happily devoured all life, while the other willingly became fuel for all humanity.

The cursed one was the incomplete Dark Lord, who ultimately led the Emperor to a result that even the Four Gods could not have foreseen.

The original Dark Lord symbolized nothingness; he would ascend to become the fifth god in the warp, filling it with the concept of nothingness, after devouring the souls of all humanity. However, the Cursed Ones, in their millennia of hatred for chaos, excessively amplified this concept.

He has ascended from the King of Nothingness to the King of Pure Destruction!

When such a human ruler completes his ascension, he will undoubtedly become something that fights against chaos to the bitter end, regardless of the cost.

Ultimately, the stirred-up subspace is destined to become unbalanced and collapse... and the gods will also face a rebirth in the reshaping of the universe.

Undoubtedly, even an extreme regime like Khorne would not be happy with this outcome.

The annihilation of all things is a result that no chaotic evil god would be happy to see.

Therefore, the Emperor will not die, and even if the Four Gods could, they are doing their best to delay the outcome.

But if that happens, will another Dark Lord be born?

The answer is—yes.

The most important prerequisite for becoming the Lord of Darkness is that your existence must be inextricably linked to humanity.

The former emperor was not qualified to be promoted to the Dark Lord. As an immortal being, he had experienced death in human history, but he was still himself.

But when he launched the Great Crusade, stepped onto the stage, conquered the galaxy, and became an idol worshipped by countless humans, he could no longer die.

Similarly, Horus once fulfilled this condition. He was a warmaster, a god of wolves; in the eyes of all participants in the Great Crusade, he was a being second only to the Emperor, the second greatest figure in the entire empire…

By the later stages of the Great Crusade, the faith in Horus was almost as strong as that of the Emperor.

Faith is a way of connecting beliefs, and it is also the simplest way for the soul to connect with other things on the highest level.

Ultimately, the ascended Dark Lord can only kill those who have faith and those associated with him—just as Slaanesh's ascension did not take away those Eldar who were virtuous and did not offer sacrifices to her.

Therefore, the Chaos Gods are not worried about Horus's ascension to the Dark Lord, because at most he will just be a second Slaanesh. He'll simply blow Terra into a second Eye of Terror and then replicate the story of the Eldar's great fall.

And now, at this very moment, while the Emperor exists, a Dark King has been "born".

When the emperor stepped into the final trap prepared for him by the Chaos Gods, he understood everything.

What appeared before him was a familiar scene, a familiar place.

The monotonous salt marshes churned into a sea of ​​color: coats of arms, flags, soldiers, tanks, and titans.

Even a hundred hands cannot point clearly, and a hundred eyes cannot see everything. The Martian Mechanics leveled the entire continent, moved mountains and filled seas, and reshaped the planet's surface, all to prepare for the grandest ceremony in this great expedition.

Ah, listen, how familiar that sound is. The roar and howl of hordes of war machines. The soldiers, with their fervor and pride, shout their victory to the sky.

From a distance, the Titan's footsteps sounded like rare, rhythmic rumbles of thunder.

The massive engines of a battle group are like a terrifying storm, capable of uprooting an entire city.

Here, their numbers must be multiplied by three, and then by three more. These Martian behemoths strode past the army, their ankles teeming with millions of soldiers.

Their enormous footprints have even created new landforms on this plain.

The Shadowmoon Wolves led the procession, their armor painted a noble pearl white, unlike the rusty green that covered them after they fell to become the Sons of Horus.

Following closely behind were countless formations of soldiers from various legions. Not all of them possessed the gifts from the Primarch, but amidst the sweltering heat of the desert, they stood proudly beneath their fluttering battle banners.

The Primarchs were of different natures and appearances. They were far apart and ascended the magnificent viewing platform.

Their altitude allows them to look down on even the Führer and Warbringer Titans, not to mention other war machines.

Primarchs, fierce warriors, each a masterpiece of the Emperor's genetic technology, basked in, or endured, the organized cheers of the soldiers below the high platform.

One by one, they walked onto the stage, saluting the neatly arranged formation, enduring, bearing, and enjoying it all.

Angron, weapon raised high, was echoed by the thunderous roar of his soldiers, who celebrated his might. He seemed to have become once again the gladiator Angnius, the invincible King of the Red Sands, inspired by the cheers and shouts in the arena of Nukelia.

Loka Aurelion, the Emperor's herald, spread his arms wide... stirring up an ever-growing roar from the millions of loyal souls below.

He was a brilliant agitator, garnering waves of admiring shouts.

Finally, it was Saint Gilles' turn. The emperor's son with eagle wings, the living symbol of the newborn empire.

At this moment, he was sentimental, resentful, and somewhat unwilling. The cheers he received were the loudest, while the thousands upon thousands of men and women gathered below seemed too distant…

They could not see how their almost pious faith flickered uneasily in the eyes of the angels.

Nevertheless, when people called to him and pleaded with him, he drew his longsword and saluted the people lined up on the plain.

Witnessing him spread his wings sent the soldiers' throats hoarse with cheers. A feather fell and drifted slowly in the wind.

The imperial army that possessed it regarded it as a sacred relic, and the pattern of white feathers would be forever embroidered on its battle flag as a symbol of their honor.

One by one, the Primarchs appeared on the stage. Finally, the long-awaited Lord of Humanity stepped into the spotlight of the world.

This familiarity silenced the Emperor, stirring his thoughts. This was the beginning of change; from this moment, he declared his withdrawal from the Great Expedition…

He wanted to return to the palace to accomplish a greater task that was more important to humanity—to shape the web.

This might have been a mistake; at that time, he was too eager to free humanity from the limitations of warp travel...

He was so eager to create something for humanity that could be freed from the influence of the evil gods before the eternal war of the gods ended.

But, one might ask, has the Spirit Race, which possesses the Net Path, ever escaped the influence of the evil god?

If the Eldar, who possess the great and wondrous creations of the Ancient Saints, are in such a state, can humanity's fragile web truly bring about a rational and beautiful era?

The emperor turned and gazed at his children, knowing full well that half of them would betray him.

But Horus, his most valued son, was undoubtedly the one whose departure ultimately led to Horus's downfall.

He didn't really see them as sons, did he?

He remembered telling his own guards, Ra, that these creatures who called themselves his sons were fodder he had given them in the name of honor…

These things are actually no different from the so-called gods that humans worshipped in the primitive era.

When the emperor faced his royal guard, he looked down on his sons, including Horus and Saint Gilles. He considered these beings, who were worshipped as gods, to be objects of his disgust.

He foresaw the great rebellion, foresaw the inevitable internal turmoil and division that would occur within humanity...

But he did not foresee the final outcome, because of his excessive arrogance—Angron was right, the Emperor was a lunatic, a schizophrenic arrogant bastard, a joke that ultimately lost everything because of that arrogance and arrogance!

Because the emperor was an absolute Machiavellian, someone who viewed all things as fools and tools, and who needed to be saved by himself.

So what would have happened if he hadn't announced his departure from the front lines, hadn't announced his withdrawal from the Great Expedition?

The emperor thought this, and so he did it—

At the ceremony in Ulanor, he announced that he would not return to Terra and that he would hand over the entire empire to Guilliman, Sanguis, Leon, and Macado.

He entrusted them with the importance and necessity of the Internet, allowing them to shape the future of humanity.

And he continued to lead the Great Expeditionary Force, along with Horus, on expeditions.

The cheers of the celebration crowd seemed to tear the sky apart. No soldier could help but be happy that the emperor was by their side, and even Horus's face was filled with joy.

But what happened after that?

In the blink of an eye, the victory celebration in Ulano vanished without a trace. Two heartbeats later, the Emperor stood on a rocky shore, the cold salt water washing over his ankles.

Standing before him was a cliff hundreds of meters high—its surface was extremely steep, with loose and cracked rocks constantly breaking off from the cliff and falling into the water not far away, splashing out white sprays.

This is the "present". And above the cliff top lies the "future"...

The emperor climbed to the top of the cliff with some difficulty, and what he saw was a scene that had not changed much.

The great rebellion still broke out, but it originated in the opposite direction from Terra.

Guilliman replaced Horus as the main corruptor of Chaos. On his way back to Terra, he encountered a similar fate to Horus—this time, in order to save his mother, Lady Yodon, he was corrupted by Chaos.

Sanguis, too, succumbed to the choice of whether to save his children, tormented by bloodlust and dark fury, and was forced to become a puppet of chaos. As for Leon, he was ultimately corrupted and degraded by everything in Caliban.

Some loyalty turns into betrayal, while some betrayal turns into loyalty.

Because the Emperor was by her side, Loja was not fooled by those two scumbags, Arebas and Colfalen. Even though she was still confused, she still stayed by the Emperor's side.

Horus was the same; even though he was pierced by his nemesis's blade this time, he was not sent to the Temple of the Serpent by Abaddon.

There's not much to say about this story, as the subsequent developments seem to have been largely the same.

The expedition, personally led by the Emperor, reached its climax when he activated the two Blackrock Fortresses to forcibly stitch together the Eye of Terror...

But then Terra exploded and a new Eye of Fear tore open beneath their feet, causing everything to take a sharp turn for the worse.

The tide of battle turned in an instant, and the original great rebellion took a turn for the worse... And in the very end, everything became a desperate battle between the Emperor and Guilliman, who was blessed by the Four Gods, on the Glory of Macragge.

The Emperor once again ascended the throne to suppress the rift, but this time he was going to suppress the unstable Eye of Fear, and he boarded the black glass prototype machine he had obtained from White Scar.

Terra is gone, but Kadia has become the new Terra.

Fate did not seem to have undergone any dramatic changes.

The emperor returned to the cliff once again.

He gazed down at the calm sea, having just experienced the possibility of another timeline... but this only strengthened the Emperor's resolve.

The emperor had long understood a principle, just as he had told Ra ten thousand years ago.

If you choose your destination, but all you can see is your destination, you may not see the man-eating monsters underwater, nor the capricious sea breeze.

Where will the wind take you? East? West? South? North?

Will it throw you off the ship, or simply tear it to shreds and sail away? There might be hidden reefs underwater, which you'd never discover until they've worn down your hull.

Even if you manage to reach the shore after overcoming countless hardships, you might only be greeted by the dark muzzles of guns from the residents on the shore.

Fate has countless possibilities, but for those who manipulate the threads of fate, they can guide it to a fixed outcome—

The emperor loathed all of this; he preferred to accept the complex and chaotic fate rather than endure a world led to inevitable outcomes.

The Emperor remained unmoved, which perhaps angered the one who created the timeline.

Thus, it was shattered, and a possible timeline was annihilated, replaced by a new scene.

In the vast tunnel, the demon flew through the clouds. Something was tempting its senses, rubbing against its skull.

A being steeped in violence and carnage. Ah, the desolate Eldar city, it must be hidden there.

Just as when they arrived, there were no signs to let the other imperial armies know whether they had left.

Around the retreating army, the Eldar towers grew increasingly ethereal, eventually swallowed by the mist. But these towers could not serve as markers to indicate whether people were still within the City of Wonders.

Have they already traversed this obscure network and entered a place they've never been before?

Minute by minute, second by second, for the men and women fighting here, the passing of time has long lost its meaning due to the unreliable timing.

One tunnel after another, fighting and retreating endlessly.

An almost endless number of enemies were striking the 10,000-man squad and the Silent Sisters relentlessly.

Every tunnel and branch leading to the Imperial Palace was filled with rebels, war machines, and warp creatures.

Only by hiding behind the wreckage of chariots and Titans could the defenders get a brief respite. The war had finally shed all its pretense; at least inside the city, they could still pretend it was a closely fought siege.

Now, people finally see clearly that the enemy's army is as vast as the ocean of Terra... and they are nothing more than a withered leaf adrift in the waves.

The attacks never stopped at the rear of the ranks. Even a single capillary could harbor rebels and their demonic reinforcements.

The enemy arbitrarily bypassed the Empire's rearguard and deeply embedded themselves in the retreating column.

The Imperial Guard and the Silent Sisters nearly bled themselves dry, yet they still couldn't save the place.