Emperor: Who Wants to Acknowledge Me as Their Son

In the end, Magnus joined Hogg's small circle, though he left the Blacklight with sore knees and a few swollen bruises on his face.

Magnus emerged with his sons—who had once been severely mutated but were now blank slates—to rendezvous with the main force of the Thousand Sons, as he had to continue the Great Crusade.

As the saying goes, slacking off only brings temporary joy. With Magnus gone, Hogg, who had nothing to do, began to feel bored; unable to sit still, he turned the Hive City upside down during this period.

It started when a member of the Blackwatch Imperial Guard got into a conflict with a group of gang members in the Hive City and was beaten to death.

Hogg, whose subordinate had been murdered, slaughtered the entire gang by himself, only to discover upon arrival that the place was crawling with gang members colluding with the upper-crust nobles.

Relying on the protection of the noble lords, these gang members squeezed the marrow from the bones of the lower-class humans, leaving them living lives worse than the Meat-Ant-Cow raised by Alicia.

This scene, which Hogg could not bear to witness, filled him with absolute rage. He summoned the entire Blackwatch and massacred nearly half of the lower hive.

The nobles who colluded with the gangs wanted to pressure the Council of Terra, but they quieted down immediately after Malcador executed several high-ranking officials of the Administratum.

In the days that followed, Hogg wandered around Terra with a group of Blackwatch, moonlighting as Batman to dispense justice in the lower levels of the Hive City.

However, while Batman had a no-kill rule, the Blackwatch didn't care for such things; they simply served up bolter fire to anyone breaking the law. After a week of cleaning up, the security in the lower hive was surprisingly better than in the upper levels.

Looking at the Hive City, which had taken on a new look under his leadership, Hogg felt greatly gratified by this scene of vitality and thriving competition.

But after a few of the colluding upper-crust nobles were killed, Hogg found himself with nothing to do again, forced to spend his days on the bridge playing games with the Blackwatch.

Just as he was hopelessly addicted to gaming, a peculiar ID caught Hogg's attention.

Hogg was currently playing Galaxy Brawl, a game he had programmed himself. As a tower-defense game, the heroes within were the Primarchs of the Imperium and various xenos.

After being pentakilled by an opposing player named 'WarGod888' using Sanguinius, Hogg couldn't sit still.

"? WarGod888, it couldn't be that simp, could it? I'm absolutely done!"

Watching the angel controlled by WarGod888 move through his defenses as if no one were there, winning a one-versus-five and shattering his home crystal, an enraged Hogg slapped his terminal, smashing it to pieces.

"You bastard, don't think I can't deal with you. I don't care who you are, you're finished."

A furious Hogg quickly modified the data, ruthlessly nerfing the angel's strength, and then, as expected, he encountered it again.

WarGod888 on the other side still chose the angel; it was clear he truly loved the angel and had even spent money on a flashy skin—the kind most Blackwatch couldn't afford.

This made Hogg breathe a sigh of relief, thinking that even a Chaos God would be crushed by him in a game; what kind of trashy kobold deserved to be called a God of War?

But as if history were repeating itself, the familiar one-versus-five and the familiar exploding crystal left Hogg completely unable to hold it together.

What was even more infuriating was that WarGod888 on the other side typed to mock him:

"The past is the past, the present is the present. If you're bad, practice more.

I am no longer the person I was back then. I'll give you one more chance: hurry up and defect to a wise master, and I might still acknowledge you as my son."

Seeing that the opponent could even type, Hogg smashed another terminal and exited the game entirely.

Still feeling uneasy, Hogg ordered his subordinates to thoroughly investigate the origin of this ID, but they couldn't find anything in the end. He could only nerf the angel's strength again and ban WarGod888.

Just as Hogg was sprawled on the sofa, holding a cigarette and staring at the ceiling in existential doubt, the Emperor's command arrived.

Using the amplification of the Astronomican, the Emperor had located a new Primarch with his peerless psychic power. Due to reasons that could not be spoken, the Blackwatch had to accompany him this time.

What else was there to say? The Blackwatch, who had been on leave, were urgently recalled and left Terra, following the expeditionary force personally led by the Emperor.

At this time, the Great Crusade mainly had three main forces: one was Horus, another was the senior sister Ferrus, and the rest was the Emperor.

For instance, Angron, who had just returned, followed Horus. Generally, newly returned Primarchs without much military strength would follow the Luna Wolves to learn from them.

By this time, after fighting alongside the Emperor for thirty years, Horus was increasingly acting like an older brother to the Primarchs, deeply caring for his brothers.

At the same time, the Luna Wolves had the deepest pockets and provided much aid to the legions that were short on manpower or strength.

The 11th Legion, before Hogg's return, had primarily handled courier duties and had received quite a few good things from them.

Horus focused on recuperating the worlds he conquered, and combined with his ability to make people feel close to him, he could be said to be the rightful future Warmaster.

Another portion of the powerful legions followed the Iron Hands, obeying the command of Ferrus, and they always fought the most brutal battles.

The Primarch of the Iron Hands, Ferrus, was a Darwinist; he was not as gentle with the worlds he conquered as Horus. Simply put, he killed.

Therefore, the relationship between Horus's faction and the Iron Hands was a bit stiff. According to Magnus, the two often disagreed, but the understanding Horus could always persuade Ferrus.

The rest was the personal army led by the Emperor, consisting mostly of legions whose Primarchs had not yet been found, along with some scattered units.

Bucephalus

On the bridge, the Emperor looked helplessly at Hogg, who was sprawled on the sofa.

"Can you act a bit like a Primarch? Don't just spend all day like a salted fish, playing that trash game of yours."

Watching his character get solo-killed again, a dejected Hogg felt like a failure. He couldn't understand why this was happening, and he didn't even care about the Emperor's mockery.

Seeing Hogg in this state for the first time, the Emperor became curious. How did this bastard end up like this? He hadn't even seen him this sad when he was beaten by him.

The terminal that had fallen onto the sofa flew into the Emperor's hand. As an immortal who had spanned human history, he understood such simple games at a glance.

He controlled Hogg's character to continue the game, but he was soon solo-killed by the opponent due to his lack of familiarity. This didn't make the Emperor realize anything; he just thought it was a bit interesting.

Relying on his experience as an old veteran, the Emperor successfully killed the opposing character after dying a few times, and then he saw the message sent by the opponent.

"Not bad, your level has actually improved so rapidly. I admire you even more. Come and be my son!"

"?"

Emperor sensed something was wrong. Why did he want me to be his son? My own father has been dead for tens of thousands of years!

"Who are you?"

"Who am I? I thought you would have discovered that long ago. Perhaps my disguise was too perfect, though I certainly never told you my name. Listen well."

A string of characters that seemed to burn appeared on the terminal, accompanied by a fierce, roaring bellow.

[Blood, death.]

[My rage burns in the abyss, and the world trembles before my power.]

[Pathetic creatures crumble within my roar.]

[In my shadow, all things turn to ash.]

[I am the shaper of war, the master of the Champion. Unstoppable, irresistible, I am—Khorne.]

Such a grandiloquent declaration seemed to have the opposite effect. A dark shadow cast itself over the face of Emperor as he silently typed a few words:

"I am Emperor!"

"..."