"Father, this is your room. Mine is next door."
Inside the majestic pyramid of Tizca, Magnus pushed open the door.
The interior layout and furnishings were exactly the same as the bedroom Dorothy had prepared for him back in Nostramo.
Magnus had prepared it all long ago.
He had been waiting for this day.
Magnus's voice was very soft.
"Father, tell me about the 'me' from before."
"Why do you want to hear it? I believe you will never become that person."
"Only the weak fear danger. If I believed I would become him, I would try every means to escape him."
"Precisely because I will not become him, I must learn from his failures!"
Caelan was silent for a long time, then sighed softly.
"I won't pull any punches."
A smile appeared on Magnus's face.
"Please, by all means, don't hold back. Ruthlessly chastise that paranoid giant baby wallowing in self-deception!"
Regarding the root cause of Magnus's' betrayal, there have always been many different opinions.
The most widely known reason is that with the help of the 'Good Spirit', he broke through the Palace's psychic wards with a psychic call.
This led to the collapse of the Golden Throne and the breaching of the Webway portal, forcing Neoth to sit on the Golden Throne to prevent Chaos from entering the material universe.
But Neoth was also unwilling to abandon the Webway project, so he had to commit the Legio Custodes, the Sisters of Silence, and large amounts of the Mechanicus' Secutarii, Cybernetica cohorts, and Titan Legions to the war in the Webway.
He certainly knew the Custodes couldn't win the Webway War.
The demons were endless, while human forces were constantly being depleted.
The Webway War, lasting several years, did not leave a particularly prominent mark in Imperial history, but its brutality, compared to the Siege of Terra, saw the Custodes reduced from the Ten Thousand to barely a tenth.
The Sisters of Silence, Secutarii, Cybernetica cohorts, and Titan Legions also suffered losses in waves.
One reason they persisted in fighting a war they knew they couldn't win was the hope of lasting long enough to bring Magnus back to Terra, to have him take the Emperor's place on the Golden Throne.
If the Emperor could be freed up, the situation would reverse in an instant.
But because the Warmaster Horus falsely transmitted orders, a bloody civil war erupted between the Sixth Legion and the Fifteenth Legion.
Magnus therefore betrayed the Imperium, ultimately causing the Emperor's plan to completely fail.
In reality, however, the foreshadowing for this tragedy had been laid a hundred years earlier.
Magnus had been exceptionally intelligent since childhood.
He remembered his birth and often used his psychic powers to communicate with Neoth.
The problem lay in his attitude towards the Warp.
Magnus was not a fool who unconditionally trusted the Warp.
In fact, he understood its dangers better than anyone.
So he hid the existence of Warp demons from his sons, only calling them 'malevolent entities of the Warp', warning them never to try to communicate with these entities, while never revealing the true nature of demons.
If a son discovered the truth, Magnus would remain silent on the matter.
If the son continued to press, Magnus would resort to forceful threats or exile the son.
When his sons communicated with demons and attempted to summon them, Magnus did not hesitate to disband the Sixth Fellowship, which wanted to do just that.
Magnus understood the dangers of the Warp from beginning to end.
His teachers and his father had also warned him.
But he was too proud, too arrogant.
Magnus returned to the Imperium in 840.M30, but the Fifteenth Legion, after the onset of mutations, only officially rejoined the Great Crusade in 900.M30.
Magnus spent sixty years trying to cure his Legion, but found nothing.
To save his Legion, he ultimately turned his gaze to the Great Ocean.
Because he deeply knew that the vast ocean contained the knowledge he needed to save his Legion.
And the fundamental reason that prompted him to make this decision was that Neoth had done the same.
Neoth denied ever having dealings with Chaos, but Chaos used some means to make Magnus believe Neoth had done so.
This planted the idea in Magnus : 'If Father did it, why can't I?'
Magnus was no fool.
He did not dare face those Great Entities directly.
Initially, he just carefully traveled the Great Ocean.
The Ocean has no concept of time.
No one knows how long he searched the Great Ocean, but his sanity was exhausted by it.
He shouted in the Great Ocean, asking what price he had to pay to gain knowledge and Chaos answered him.
He very unwisely accepted the terms it proposed, claiming he was willing to pay any price.
Perhaps in Magnus 's eyes, the next step would be for Chaos to propose a specific condition, trading some specific thing of his for knowledge.
And he could then weigh whether the deal was worth the cost.
However, he underestimated the danger of Chaos.
Magnus thought he was negotiating terms with Chaos, but in reality, he had already signed his name on a contract of servitude.
When he claimed he was willing to pay any price, Chaos completed the deal in the most insidious way.
Chaos took his right eye.
Magnus mistakenly believed he had paid the price of his right eye to gain the knowledge to save his Legion.
However, this was merely an illusion created by Chaos.
It successfully madeMagnus and others believe that the only price Magnus paid was his right eye, that his soul was still pure.
But Chaos is greedy.
When Magnus claimed he was willing to pay any price, everything about him was the price of that deal.
The price was never his right eye. It was his soul.
It only took his eye for the time being, but it also did not give Magnus the true knowledge to cure the mutations.
It only delayed them.
And the bills kept piling up.
This deal was the beginning of Magnus 's downfall.
He had a vague deal with Chaos, but he had no idea who he had made the deal with.
Until it actively revealed its identity and clarified the details of the transaction.
Only then did he understand that it was the Great Entity he had been trying to avoid.
He thought he had hidden well, always carefully avoiding the domains of the Great Entities.
But he had already sold his soul to Him.
His betrayal was merely a matter of going with the flow, born of self-abandonment.
He imprisoned himself in a pyramid, letting the Sixth Legion slaughter his Legion.
It seemed like his self-isolation destroyed him.
But even if he had bravely faced his mistakes, reconciled with the Wolf King, and returned to Terra together, he would no longer have been qualified to sit on the Golden Throne.
The moment he sat on the Golden Throne, He would immediately collect the price held in deposit.
That would only cause even more catastrophic consequences.
From the moment he made the deal with Chaos, there was no turning back.
His betrayal was inevitable.
Caelan sighed softly.
"He was too arrogant and too naive."
Magnus's confidence in his psychic talent was not unfounded.
As the only psyker among the Primarchs, he could freely explore the Great Ocean.
Psykers using their power must bear the risk of demonic possession, but Magnus's power was already strong enough to easily tear apart any demon that coveted him.
If he hadn't made a deal with Chaos, he could have navigated the Great Ocean without any fear of danger.
But the mutations in his Legion forced him to delve deep into the Great Ocean seeking the knowledge to redeem them.
He thought he was being careful enough, but he still fell for it.
That's why Caelan said he was too arrogant and naive.
You can haggle with Warp demons, but Magnus placed himself on the scales, so he naturally lost everything.
"He was walking a tightrope. At first, he was careful, crawling timidly, every step fraught with peril."
Magnus's voice was very calm, as if commenting on a failed stranger.
"As time passed, he gradually mastered the trick of balance, changing from crawling to striding confidently, his steps becoming steadier."
"At first, he feared every breeze, afraid of being blown into the abyss."
"Later, he found these breezes couldn't shake him, and as long as he got off the tightrope before a storm came, he would be safe."
"So he began to walk boldly, even dancing on the tightrope, intoxicated by his own skill and courage."
"Then, the wind truly came."
"He slipped and fell, but managed to grab the rope with both hands."
"He naively rejoiced at surviving, not falling into the abyss."
"Little did he know, the moment he fell from the rope, he could never get back on it."
"Holding onto the rope with his hands merely delayed his fall."
"But sooner or later, he would run out of strength and eventually fall into the abyss."
"Without the rope's protection, the big hands in the abyss could pull him into the darkness of eternal damnation at any time."
"That was him."
"A very apt metaphor."
Magnus was still too conservative.
Magnus the Red wasn't walking a tightrope; he was walking a tightrope.
All psykers are walking a tightrope.
One misstep leads to falling into a bottomless abyss.
The reason Magnus danced so wantonly on the rope, besides experience, was Neoth's example.
"If the Emperor can dance on the tightrope, why can't I?"
It was precisely this mindset that caused Magnus to completely fall into the abyss.
"Never trust Chaos. Once you get involved with Chaos, there's no turning back!"
Magnus engraved Caelan's warning in his heart.
Tzeentch is not to be trusted.
Little Mag trusted his father's judgment and Magnus the Red's lesson.
Those who trust Tzeentch are doomed.
Only... Little Mag raised his head, looked at his father, and fell silent.
'Can Chaos not be trusted...?'
Magnus asked "Father, do benevolent entities exist in the Warp?"
Caelan answered, "They do not. The Warp lacks the binary opposition of good and evil. How could there be benevolent entities?"
"Even if there are neutral entities in the Warp, how can you tell they aren't demons in disguise?"
If one could truly tell, the Fifteenth Legion of timeline 40K wouldn't have been so badly deceived.
Even if one could tell, Magnus couldn't have discovered it, and not even Neoth could.
Neoth, after all, is not a god.
And Tzeentch, the God of Scheming, acting personally, would hardly leave obvious vulnerabilities.
At the Council of Nikaea, a demon of Tzeentch disguised as Magnus's tutor attended the meeting and plotted schemes right under Neoth's nose.
And neither Magnus, nor Neoth, nor any of the other Primarchs knew anything about it.
Caelan didn't want Magnus to harbor illusions, to pull any more 'guardian spirit' psychic tricks.
But Magnus was actually thinking about something else.
If no benevolent entities exist in the Warp, then who is Claudia? What is her goal?
"Father," Magnus chose his words carefully. "Do you remember my brother Angron's foster mother, that lady Claudia?"
Caelan asked "Claudia. I haven't seen her since I left Nuceria. Did something happen to her?"
Her.
This unusual term made Magnus fall silent.
He wasn't sure if his Father had already seen through His essence.
He was shrouded in mist.
Magnus couldn't fully understand what He was either.
But He was definitely an entity originating from the Warp.
Even if not one of the four Great Ones, probably not far off.
Could such an entity really be as friendly as He appeared on the surface?
Magnus still decided to tell his father the truth, even though it might offend his brother.
His father had a right to know.
"Father, actually..." Magnus opened his mouth, but his voice seemed gripped by some invisible force.
'What's happening?' Cold sweat slid down Magnus's forehead. 'What's stopping me?'
'A contract? A seal?'
'When was it placed?'
Caelan keenly noticed the anomaly.
"Little Mag, what were you going to say?"
Magnus was silent for a long time, then spoke carefully.
"Father, what do you think of Angron's foster mother?"
Magnus frowned in confusion.
'Why could I speak now?'
"Her origins are indeed mysterious, but I believe she's one of us. You can trust her too."
"Don't worry about little Angron. He has the power to protect himself. He can tell who means him harm."
'It's not just that.'
Magnus was forced to remain silent.
He remembered.
It was on Desh'ea. He had made a deal with Him.
He had been fooled again.
Just like the deal Magnus the Red made with Tzeentch, but this time it was reversed.
'What was His true purpose?'
'He was undoubtedly coveting Father.'
'What exactly did He want from Father?'
"So I haven't improved at all," Magnus muttered dejectedly to himself.
He was still so naive, falling into a trap without even realizing it.
Even though he seemed not to have lost anything, how could he know this wouldn't leave some hidden danger?
Magnus recalled the scene when he met Claudia.
He also remembered a question buried deep in his mind.
"Father, I could see the early lives of you and your first few brothers. Who helped me gain those prophecies?"
That was certainly not his own power; otherwise, it wouldn't have stopped so abruptly after meeting Claudia.
It was Claudia who stopped him, but precisely because he was stopped, he could clearly feel that power did not belong to him.
Caelan said, "Tzeentch."
"He is the one who loves to play with schemes and plots the most. Prophecies are usually not so complete, let alone lasting for years."
"If anyone is secretly orchestrating things, it must be Tzeentch!"
Magnus asked "Then what is His goal?"
Caelan theorized, "Perhaps it's to sow discord, or maybe it's part of a larger scheme."
"We don't need to futilely speculate about His schemes. The key is to prevent the scheme from happening."
"If we know nothing about the scheme, how can we prevent it?"
Caelan said, "Just don't spend too much energy speculating about the scheme. That doesn't mean wait for death. We can still try to find clues."
"What His goal is depends on who the scheme is targeting."
Magnus was thinking.
Who was the target?
Him, Father, and the other brothers, they were all part of the scheme.
Tzeentch's scheme might not just target one person; He could target everyone at once, achieving multiple goals.
What about Claudia?
Was Angron's foster mother also part of His plan?
"Little Mag, no matter what you want to do, I just want to tell you: don't let emotions or subjective assumptions influence your thinking."
"You possess a gift none of the other Primarchs have, but your situation is therefore more dangerous than theirs."
"You must face dangers they don't have to face directly, and every thing you come into contact with, every piece of knowledge, could be a scheme or a trap."
"Outsiders can't help you discern. You must learn to think for yourself."
"If you're truly conflicted, you can come to me or Neoth, or any of your brothers. We will all help you."
"I really like your attitude towards psychic powers. Restrain it, control it, don't completely deny it."
"The same applies when dealing with the Warp."
"Don't fully trust it, because it contains lies."
"But don't be overly anxious about gains and losses either. You must find a balance."
"Compromise?" Magnus asked.
"Yes, compromise."
Magnus still had concerns about Claudia, but he felt Claudia stood opposite Tzeentch.
Although it was just his speculation, the clues were very obvious.
Claudia had both openly and subtly warned him to beware of Tzeentch.
This was probably one reason Father trusted her.
Judge the heart, not the deed.
Her heart held no lies towards Angron.
Her deeds had caused no harm.
Even if she had another scheme, she should be arrested after that scheme was exposed, not sentenced to death based on suspicion.
His biological father also had doubts about Claudia, yet he remained silent.
This was truly puzzling.
But since even the Emperor chose to sit on the sidelines and watch the tiger fight, he shouldn't act on his own.
His father had advised him: when conflicted, he could turn to his father and brothers.
He couldn't reveal a shred to Father, and his brothers weren't here.
But he could wait until evening to talk to his other father.
.....
30 Chapters [email protected]/DaoistJinzu