Fanatical clamor and the collapse of reason intertwined in the air, but as the images on the screen advanced, a deeper, heavier silence once again enveloped the Throne Room.
Lorgar's hymn caught in his throat.
Guilliman stopped his anxious pacing.
Because they saw that "choice."
In the images, the Emperor—who had already touched the realm of the gods and was but a single step away from ascending as "the dark king," a radiant entity possessing the power to instantly erase Horus and even rewrite the laws of the Milky Way Galaxy—stopped.
He looked at his beloved son Horus before him, filled by the Four Chaos Gods and completely reduced to a puppet.
He looked at the azure Terra behind him, the cradle of humanity.
He looked at the endless timeline of the future, where humanity became mindless slaves, suffering in Eternity within His "Divine Kingdom."
[No.]
A simple thought, yet it was like a bolt of lightning cutting through the night of Eternity.
the Emperor refused.
He refused that supreme divine power which was within his reach.
He refused to become the fifth Loki.
He refused that path which seemed like a "guaranteed victory" but meant the "end of humanity."
The golden radiance began to recede, and he forcibly suppressed that terrifying storm of energy back into his body.
He became a man once more. A powerful man, but one with limits after all—one who would bleed, who would be wounded, and who would face Death.
To preserve the future of humanity as "humans," he chose to relinquish the authority of a god and face the wrath of the Four Gods with the broken body of a mortal.
Then came that fatal blow.
Then, ten thousand years of sitting in silence and decaying upon the Golden Throne.
At this moment, all the relief, all the collapse, and all the fanaticism turned into an indescribable... **awe**.
"He... he gave it up."
Sanguinius's voice was trembling; this Great Angel's wings hung limply, and his beautiful face was covered in tears.
"He could have become a god. He could have ruled everything, Eternity and immortality."
"But for us... so that we could still have 'free will,' so that we could still live as 'humans'... he chose to let himself rot on that chair for ten thousand years."
Sanguinius looked toward the throne; this time, his gaze no longer held an attachment to a father, but a sublime respect for a great Martyr.
"This is not the mercy of a god. This is... the sacrifice of a man."
"Greater than a god."
Lion, the lord of the First Legion and the Lion El'Jonson who had remained silent, now slowly knelt on one knee.
His movements were solemn and grave, as if he were performing the most sacred knighthood ceremony.
"If he had become a god, I would only fear his power. But he refused godhood... I admire his will."
Lion's voice was low, like a heavy sword being sheathed.
"Possessing power is not difficult."
"But to possess absolute power and still refuse to use it for the sake of the weak... that is a true king and knight."
"This is the monarch worthy of Lion ElJonson's loyalty."
Lorgar was stunned.
He opened his mouth, wanting to continue his praise, only to find those words had become so hollow.
He wanted a god. But his father's actions told him: being a god is easy; being a true human is the hardest thing of all.
the Emperor's greatness did not lie in his divinity, but precisely in how he firmly chose that fragile, painful, yet hopeful humanity between divinity and humanity.
"He... has been enduring it all along."
Magnus, the Primarch of the Thousand Sons, had a complex light flickering in his lone eye.
As a powerful Psyker, he knew better than anyone how great that temptation was and how painful that suppression felt.
"Those ten thousand years... he wasn't just maintaining the Astronomican, wasn't just suppressing the Webway. He was... fighting himself."
Magnus looked at the withered corpse on the screen and felt a shudder deep within his soul.
"Every single second, that power of godhood is tempting him, trying to burst through his shell."
"And he, with that broken body, used his willpower to construct a cage, locking 'the dark king' firmly inside his body."
"He is using his own pain to buy time for humanity. He is using his own hell to trade for the Mortal Realm."
"How... arrogant. And how... admirable."
Horus Lupercal, the Warmaster of the Imperium who had been silent, finally stepped out from the Shadow.
His gaze was fixed on the father on the screen who had killed his future self.
He saw that determined look.
In that look, there was no desire for power, no anger toward betrayal, only a deep, almost overflowing... love and sorrow.
"Father..."
Horus's voice was hoarse, carrying a hint of a sob.
"Is this the truth you never told us? Is this the burden you had to carry alone?"
"It wasn't that you didn't trust us. You... didn't want us to face such a desperate choice."
"Either become a god and destroy humanity, or remain human and endure eternal damnation."
"You chose for us."
"You chose the hardest, most painful, and longest path for all of humanity."
Horus slowly knelt, his head bowed, his forehead touching the cold floor.
The resentment that had always haunted his heart—about being "abandoned" or "used"—seemed so ridiculous and insignificant at this moment before that figure willing to rot for ten thousand years for humanity.
"I once thought I wanted to replace you. I once thought I could do better."
Horus's shoulders were trembling, a vulnerability the Warmaster had never shown anyone.
"But I was wrong. That crown... that crown woven of thorns, Fire, and Eternity pain... no one but you can wear it. No one."
As the Warmaster knelt, all the Primarchs—whether they had been angry, confused, or fanatical before—bowed their noble heads at this moment.
Even Konrad Curze and Angron stopped their sneering and roaring, falling into a complex silence.
They might still disagree with the Emperor's methods, might still resent his tactics.
But faced with such a guardianship spanning ten thousand years at the cost of self-destruction, faced with a father who could clearly have become an all-dominating god yet chose to die as a shield for humanity... any evaluation seemed superfluous.
Only respect remained.
A respect for an ultimate will that transcended factions, transcended good and evil, and even transcended blood ties.
The hall was silent, with only the faint light of the Astronomican flickering on the screen.
Though that light was faint, though it was teetering, though it used the flesh and blood of a god as fuel...
It... was still shining.
Illuminating that dark, cruel, and desperate 41st Millennium where humanity still struggles to survive.