179 Bastard! Bastard!!!

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You sat beneath the vast starry sky. A breeze brushed your cheeks, while unknown wild grass and flowers rustled softly beside you. Then came the faint sound of soil shifting, and a weary traveler sat down at your side.

You turned your head. Malcador removed his hood, starlight mottling his silver hair.

"I'm worried."

The old man said,

"I hate The Emperor so much, yet I respect him so much, and fear him so much."

"We're all like that."

You consoled him,

"Try to take it easy."

"No."

Malcador shook his head, making his already dim silver hair seem even hazier.

"People can't all treat him like this—it'll spoil him."

"Someone will eventually see through his hypocritical schemes. You worry too much, Malcador."

"No, no, no."

Malcador denied it, his hand anxiously gripping his staff. That was the price of having one's ideals captured by the Emperor: you would spend the rest of your life beneath the radiance of a sun that never set.

"What confuses people most isn't the hypocritical outer shell he weaves around himself. What truly makes people sympathize with him is that—he's a sincere bastard."

"A sincere bastard."

Malcador enunciated every word, gritting his teeth as though suffering from PTSD.

You saw a bastard, but he was so sincere. He opened his heart to you and candidly told you that he needed you, that this Imperium needed you. Then, beneath his earnest gaze, you surrendered.

He was sincere. He genuinely needed you. That was the truth.

But he was also a true bastard. He watched you walk down a road of thorns without saying a word to stop you.

Because he needed your sacrifice.

Yet you could not bring yourself to curse him, because when you looked back, you suddenly discovered that he had