Emperor's Bane

Chapter 734 Coming of Age Ceremony

＋It is time, my child. ＋
+ My Warmaster, my Wolf Shepherd, my Lupercal: It is time to break away from your spiritual world and let me see what kind of transformation my gift has brought to you. Let me see if I can make you more perfect within my current capabilities. +
+Wake up, Horus: more responsibilities are calling its master. +
"..."

In the chaotic darkness, this distant voice was so familiar: even if he had experienced death and reincarnation a thousand times, he would never be able to mistake the owner of this voice, and he would never be able to resist the call of this voice at any time.

This is the voice of the Emperor: his genetic father and master, the only sun in his life.

He was calling upon him, asking the Wolf-God to return to him: a simple command more gratifying than the Warmaster's crown, but at this moment, the Emperor's most loyal son faced a small problem.

How should he go back?
He opened his eyes wide, raised his head, and then looked around in vain. Horus was sure that he had woken up, but the mirror image around him remained unchanged, still as chaotic and dark as before. He couldn't even tell where the Emperor's voice came from.

Calm down, Horus.

The Wolf Shepherd God said to himself.

You have seen more bizarre things in the smoke of the Great Crusade, but in the final analysis, they are nothing more than some science and technology that is ahead of its time, or perhaps they are just tricks created by some psychic wizards: think about what your father said, there are no gods in this world, and naturally there are no more strange powers.

He repeated this three or four times until his heart was finally completely calm. Horus then carefully observed his surroundings: Although he was in darkness, after groping around in confusion for a while, the wolf god discovered that this darkness did not seem pure.

It's... colorful.

Is it colorful black?
To put it simply, it's like staring at a thinker or an electronic screen for too long, then suddenly closing your eyes, and you'll see something like this: although the main body is black, phantoms as bright as daylight are looming behind the darkness, and various colors are as ethereal as smoke, using changing traces to attract the wolf god to move towards them.

Bright red, indigo, dark green, and the already nauseating lavender, mixed with a bit of dazzling silver, seemed out of place: every color seemed to be singing to the Wolf Shepherd God, and their kindness made the Primarch suspicious.

Horus turned around, wanting to better observe the surrounding environment, but found that the scene behind him was completely opposite: unlike the bustle in front of him, the place where Horus walked was so dead silent, there was only pure darkness, so dark that he could not see the way he came.

There, large swathes of black were as heavy as cold and death. The Wolf Shepherd God sensed that at the end of his vision, there seemed to be a conscious black, but it was so lazy and indifferent that it did not show any expression to the Primarch that was so close at hand.

It's like a lump of meat without any self-awareness.

But on the other hand, it was so huge and bloated that even the various noises behind him did not dare to get too close and could only hope from afar that he would stay away from this black.

Away from this thing that made him feel inexplicably familiar.

I don't know why, but Horus just feels this way.
The mountain-like black before him felt so familiar to him, as if Horus was originally a part of it, but had just broken away from it, had his own consciousness, and could move at will.

They were supposed to be one.

Horus looked carefully and saw Terra's shadow in a trance.

This is... ridiculous!
Breathing heavily, the wolf-god took a step forward towards Terra in the darkness, ignoring the increasingly anxious calls from behind: With unprecedented curiosity and courage, Horus tentatively stretched out his finger, and an invisible force accumulated inadvertently.

Ah, this is psychic power.

He realized it belatedly.

Turning his palm over and staring at the warm palm in a daze, Horus finally remembered where he was: his genetic father was performing a difficult operation on him, which would give him unprecedented power, and the price was just an eyeball.

It was not until this moment that an uncomfortable feeling of emptiness came from the position of my left eye.

"..."

Horus was stunned for a moment, and subconsciously wanted to retract his outstretched palm, wanting to touch the hole in his pupil, but he did not stop: so, when the wolf god noticed that the smoke emitted by the darkness had already lingered on his palm, he had no time to react.

"Horus!"

It was the Emperor's voice again: but this time there was more anxiety.

"Father!"

The Wolf God responded immediately. He devoted himself to this wholeheartedly, ignoring the fact that the black in front of him had fallen silent again, and ignoring the angry voices behind him. However, he also overlooked a tiny detail: after the darkness in front of him wrapped around his palm, the golden light of the Emperor appeared in it.

But Horus didn't care, he anxiously awaited the Emperor's response.

No further words came from the Lord of Mankind, but the Emperor had obviously realized where his offspring was: before Horus could utter a second sentence, a powerful force, across space and time, tightly grasped the Wolf God's wrist, trying to pull him out of this dark world.

At the beginning, Horus hesitated for a moment: because a voice in his heart was shouting to him that if he was willing to stay here, if he was willing to go closer to the darkness, he could get more powerful power than he had now.

For no reason, Horus believed this voice in his heart: because although the darkness in front of him was deep and terrifying, Horus did not feel resistance to it. On the contrary, he was so familiar with this darkness, as if they were old acquaintances.

It was as if he came from there.

But the hesitation was fleeting, and when the Emperor's power began to pull at his wrist, the touch was so familiar.

Isn't this the same feeling that happened in Cthulhu more than a hundred years ago when the Lord of Mankind descended from the sky and grasped the hand of the orphan covered in mud and with no hope for his bleak future?
At this moment, Horus put aside all his worries: he might have missed the most powerful force in the galaxy, but when he followed the guidance of the Emperor's light and plunged into the daylight leading to the real universe, a genuine smile bloomed at the corner of the wolf god's mouth.

He finally woke up.

＋Horus, my child.＋
Open your eyes, the Emperor's voice arrives before the clear world.

"Father."

Horus' voice had never been so hoarse.

At this moment, his throat was like a piece of dry land, and he could even clearly feel his flesh cracking. His brain was occupied by the so-called dizziness, and he couldn't even see the scene in front of him clearly. His limbs seemed to have lost contact with his body, and the boundless pain, along with the awakening of consciousness, gnawed at every nerve in his body.

But despite this, Horus still smiled: because he saw the Emperor at his bedside, waiting like any ordinary mortal father for his child to return victorious from the test.

How could he make him worry?
The demeanor full of confidence in Horus' victory, and the hint of satisfaction that quietly leaked out after the dust settled: none of this can be acted out.

Horus was also a father. When his son was undergoing surgery, he once waited outside the operating room like a statue for dozens of hours, just so that his child could see him the first thing he saw after waking up after everything was over. The Wolf God only needed to put himself in the Emperor's shoes to understand the Emperor's mentality at that time.

It is because I have experienced it that I know the emotions at this moment are so real.

The smile continued to spread, and Horus did his best to squeeze out the second sentence.

"I didn't disappoint you, did I?"

+You surprise me, kid. +
The Emperor nodded, and the smile on his face without any embellishment was something that people like Morgan would never see in their entire lives: no matter how hard the Sigillite and the Spider Queen tried, to make the Lord of Mankind find even a hint of naturalness in the background they carefully designed, it was far worse than staying by the bedside of the Wolf God and waiting for a few minutes that were not in the plan.

The Emperor's frown spoke of his worry.

+The operation was successful, and everything I expected came true, except that you woke up a few minutes later than expected. +
“Forgive me: but finding the guidance of your voice is not something that happens overnight.”

Horus blinked, and all his strength was spent. The memories of the past period of time were slowly pouring into his mind, whether it was what he saw and heard when he was unconscious, or the changes on Nikaea not long ago: everything seemed to happen in another world. The Primarch's lips moved. He had too many things to ask his father, but he was afraid that he would not get a true answer, and he really didn't know where to start asking questions: until he found that the Emperor was also looking at him, smiling and waiting for him to release the confusion in his heart.

Horus actually felt a little embarrassed.

"Father……"

＋You have a lot of questions now and want to ask me to clarify them, right? ＋

"You...you know everything?"

The Emperor just smiled and gestured behind him. Horus then noticed that he and his father were not the only ones in the laboratory: the Sigillite shrouded in a black robe was standing almost in the corner, perhaps being pulled in to help.

After receiving the Emperor's order, he saluted silently, then disappeared from the wall: perhaps it was another unknown secret door, but it did not disturb the Emperor and the Primarch's parent-child time.

The old man was quite polite: with everything going so smoothly, even Malcador became more pleasing to the eye.

And as the emperor's household slave, he is also a qualified topic starter, right?

"That's Malcador? Father?"

＋I called him over to help. ＋
After making sure that Horus was no longer seriously injured, the Emperor extended his body center of gravity slightly backwards, assuming a posture more suitable for sitting for a long time and telling stories: he was still very close to the bed of the Wolf Shepherd God, making sure that his light could cover Horus' head and every psychic node in his body.

This is very important: it is like the final sealing work is being done.

"help?"

Horus was confused.

＋Yes. ＋
+...+
+Do you hate him, kid? +

"hatred……"

The word made the Primarch hesitate.

"Not really. But there are indeed too many mysteries surrounding the Master of the Seal. He is like..."

＋Just like he would hide his own little plans from us at any time and anywhere? ＋

"……Correct."

The Emperor smiled.

"Perhaps it is."

"But you must know, my Horus."

+Perhaps the covert actions Malcador was carrying out behind my back, without telling me, were part of a larger plan? What I wanted him to do? +
+ He can hide it from me because my plan requires him to hide it from me: because he is one of the few people in this galaxy who can really hide things from me, so some important things that even I cannot know really need to come from the control of the Master of the Seal. +
＋Whether he is willing or not. ＋
"...?"

Horus did not understand.

But the Emperor began his story.

+ You probably don't know, Horus: In fact, the operation of giving others psychic power is not my original invention, but a new invention that appeared as early as the Dark Age of Technology. Psychic power is such a dangerous and powerful force that there are always too many people who want to occupy their own share, regardless of whether they have relevant experience. +
＋Therefore, whether it is the surgery of giving others their own psychic power or the surgery of depriving others of their psychic power, it has been achieved through scientific methods. Although their invention process is extremely cruel and inhumane, their results are still recorded as ancient heritage: the one who holds the seal is its descendant. ＋
"Makado?"

The Primarch was somewhat incredulous.

"Is he so ancient that he can even be traced back to the Dark Age of Technology?"

＋He himself does not have it, but the inheritance in his mind is indeed like this. ＋
The Emperor's voice grew steady.

＋Listen, my child.＋
+ I know that you personally don't like the Sigillite of the Empire, but I hope you can overcome your emotional impulses and at least learn to respect Malcador, his power, and the past he represents: I know you don't want to do this, my child, but in real life, the things you don't want to do are often the things you have to do. +
"I know this, father."

The Wolf Shepherd God nodded: his next words seemed very insincere.

"I... I don't despise Malcador as others say."

"I still...respect him a lot."

+This is best. +
The Emperor did not ask further questions, but his smile always made Horus lack confidence.

+Do you know why I choose to say these words to you at this time? +
"Because you're leaving?"

Horus stared at his father: after so much time and so many incredible things, even the Wolf God had calmly accepted this.

＋Yeah, I'm leaving. ＋
The Emperor's smile faded: there was a genuine sadness on his face.

＋So it's time for you to grow up. ＋
＋Lupercal, my child.＋
+ You can no longer be as willful as this child, you can no longer accept only the things you like, you can no longer hide under the wings I open for you: you can no longer be content to be a moon revolving around me, relying on refracting my light for a living. +
+ You must become the new sun: you must become the new me. +
＋What I can do, you must do too: because you can do it. ＋
"Father?"

The serious words and heavy responsibilities came upon him, and even the Warmaster of the Empire was caught off guard: Horus looked up at his most beloved Emperor, and those words were clearly the ones he had always dreamed of hearing before, but why did he feel so frightened after hearing them?

"But I..."

＋But you're not ready yet? ＋

When the Emperor asked, Horus realized that he had been abominably silent.

Because it is.

＋It's all right, my child. ＋
The Emperor took his hand, patting it gently to muster new courage.

+ This is also my responsibility. I always wanted to protect you under my wings, even for one more day: until I found that my wings began to be torn and tattered, and you already had the ability to fight the sky, but because of my protection, you have not been able to fulfill it. +
＋Now, it's time to try to undo my mistakes as much as possible. ＋
+My Horus, my Warmaster. +
＋I will sit here and patiently answer every question you raise. ＋
＋Until you have no more confusion. ＋
+ I think: This is probably the coming-of-age ceremony you need most right now. +
"..."

"Perhaps, Father."

The Wolf Shepherd God did not deny it: although he did not desire these from the bottom of his heart.

"Can I ask questions now?"

＋We have to wait a moment. ＋
The emperor narrowed his eyes and gave his son a somewhat naughty expression.

＋Before we begin, I have another mission for you: once you are able to move, I need you to carry it out immediately. ＋
"What's the mission?"

＋Attend a funeral.＋
＋A massive mass funeral that will do you good.＋
(End of this chapter)