Some sacrifices were destined to remain unknown, weren't they?
Guilliman tapped his Personal Terminal a few times in silence. The terminal responded quickly enough, but the image it displayed was still stuck on the confirmation screen for signing a document, unchanged.
Machines did not hesitate. People did.
I have long since grown used to death, Roboute Guilliman thought.
Yes, he had grown used to death and sacrifice. So had the Empire. In this cold galaxy, every minute, every second humanity possessed had been wrested back from brutal reality by the sacrifice of countless people.
So was he supposed to bury their deaths? Was he supposed to fabricate a credible ending? Lost in the Warp?
Doing the right thing was truly too difficult, Father.
Guilliman raised his head and gazed at the portrait of The Emperor on the ceiling of his study. The compassionate deity in golden armor had his eyes half closed, as though he could not bear to look upon these tragedies of the mortal world.
He abruptly laughed—deities, religion, he had actually tacitly allowed them to paint such an image in his study, and for so long at that. What had the original reason been? Ah, he remembered. It had been to keep the people of the Ecclesiarchy from feeling terrified, lest they take all sorts of actions that might affect the stability of the situation.
But he hated religion, didn't he? They all hated religion. Aside from Lorgar, they had all shared one understanding. Religion was humanity's cancer, a thing that had no need to exist.
When had his bottom line begun to sink?
Roboute Guilliman rose in silence and went to the porthole. Behind him, however, a familiar voice sounded. "Politics is your gift, Roboute, but politics is also wearing away your will."
". . .