I wonder how conversations about the Emperor's apotheosis would go in the 41st millennium

[diadems]

After Roboute Guilliman was revived, he said to the Emperor: "Did Horus not say you sought godhood? He built his rebellion on that claim. Oh how he would gloat and laugh at the state of the Imperium now."

 

And Guilliman and other returned Heresy-era Loyalists don't have to imagine Horus gloating, for there are plenty of other Heresy-era Traitors around who would be happy to gloat as well.

 

So I wonder how conversations between the Loyalists and the Traitors about the concept of the Emperor's apotheosis and its relation to the rebellion would go in the 41st millennium, and how do you think they would go?

 

I guess one major point would be that the Traitors inadvertently brought about the Emperor's apotheosis by crippling him and taking him out of the picture, and also by taking out many of the Loyalist Primarchs and creating a situation where the remaining ones would leave, especially that of Corax, leaving the Imperium void of proper leadership and the masses free to venerate the Emperor as a god.

 

And also that the Imperial Cult swelled and rose as a result of the Horus Heresy war, it would never have become so huge without the war.

Edited January 14 by diadems

[Karhedron]

I think the line was from Guilliman's inner monologue and was in relation to Lorgar.

 

The irony of Horus rebelling to try and prevent the 40K universe but ultimately being the direct cause of it is a major point of the HH series.

[diadems]

On 1/15/2026 at 12:41 AM, Karhedron said:

I think the line was from Guilliman's inner monologue and was in relation to Lorgar.

 

The irony of Horus rebelling to try and prevent the 40K universe but ultimately being the direct cause of it is a major point of the HH series.

 

i think the main point is that Horus made the idea that the Emperor was trying to achieve godhood the public focus of his rebellion

 

but then i think that rather paradoxically you get less and less of a sense of that as the novel series goes on

 

and hmm, the irony being a major point of the series, is that actually so? like, it may be a plot element of major consequence logically-speaking, but i think that contrarily the authors only bring it up sparingly throughout the series

[Brother Anderson]

There is a cracking part of one of the black legion books where some traitors go back to the Imperium for the first time, realise Lorgar got what he originally wanted and are absolutely beside themselves with laughter iirc.

[diadems]

9 hours ago, diadems said:

 

i think the main point is that Horus made the idea that the Emperor was trying to achieve godhood the public focus of his rebellion

 

but then i think that rather paradoxically you get less and less of a sense of that as the novel series goes on

 

and hmm, the irony being a major point of the series, is that actually so? like, it may be a plot element of major consequence logically-speaking, but i think that contrarily the authors only bring it up sparingly throughout the series

 

hmm maybe one of the issues with the HH series is that there aren't really any scenes of either side really trying to press their case against the other

 

to show that diplomacy can't succeed and only war can decide the issue

Edited January 17 by diadems

[grailkeeper]

The only time realistically this could happen is when a Csm is about to kill a loyalist and is monologing. He'd have to feel a certain amount of safety to gloat. If the roles are reversed I don't see loyalist bringing it up.

 

It would be interesting to have a 40k equivalent of Rick's cafe in Casablanca. A neutral venue where enemies have to deal with each other civilly. 

[SpecialIssue]

On 1/18/2026 at 11:11 PM, grailkeeper said:

The only time realistically this could happen is when a Csm is about to kill a loyalist and is monologing. He'd have to feel a certain amount of safety to gloat. If the roles are reversed I don't see loyalist bringing it up.

 

It would be interesting to have a 40k equivalent of Rick's cafe in Casablanca. A neutral venue where enemies have to deal with each other civilly. 

 

The loyalist would never even think to bring anything of the sort up as he's been thoroughly brainwashed to be almost incapable to think of disloyalty to Imperium or the Emperor, or think of them in a negative/questioning light. This stringent brainwashing/induction is a major point as to why there have been so few Adeptus Astartes rebellions since the Heresy over the 10,000 years since, and was implemented by Guilliman as part of the Codex reforms; unless that lore has changed.

 

Even if a CSM was to gloat, the very ideas and implications of what he says would skip harmlessly off the cauterised mind of a loyalist - who is unable to grasp the basic concepts of the Emperor not being good, or bad outcomes resulting from him. Let alone the 10 millennia of time meaning that all this information should have really all turned to dust in 99.99% of the Imperium (modern publications and fans are increasingly treating the Heresy like it was 100, 500 or 1,000 years ago - its 10,000. The modern Imperium should really have less memory about the Heresy than we have about the city of Ur 8,000 years ago). The Imperium at large, even the most learned Inquisitors, should really have no idea or way to find out what the CSM is talking about.

 

It is another irony/tragedy that the CSMs and renegades are often more human than their loyalist counterparts, who have necessarily given some of that up for purity; I think CSM would at first be surprised by the first Codex loyalist he encounters, and might even pity the glassy-eyed fanatics they face in the wake of the Heresy, while strengthening his own personal cause for rebellion from the corpse-emperor.

Edited January 20 by SpecialIssue

[Xenith]

On 1/20/2026 at 2:27 PM, SpecialIssue said:

fans are increasingly treating the Heresy like it was 100, 500 or 1,000 years ago - its 10,000. The modern Imperium should really have less memory about the Heresy than we have about the city of Ur 8,000 years ago)

 

Agree, but it's not just fans, GW themselves are writing in-40k universe with clarity about stuff that happened in the heresy, I'm sure there was something about twin alpha legion primarchs in a book or WD and an in-universe source knew ahrimans first name, something only really seen in heresy literature.

 

Perhaps Guilliman has taken time to scribe all his memories of the era? Though a true recollection might cause a schism. 

[phandaal]

On 1/20/2026 at 8:27 AM, SpecialIssue said:

Let alone the 10 millennia of time meaning that all this information should have really all turned to dust in 99.99% of the Imperium (modern publications and fans are increasingly treating the Heresy like it was 100, 500 or 1,000 years ago - its 10,000. The modern Imperium should really have less memory about the Heresy than we have about the city of Ur 8,000 years ago).

 

I think about this often and have brought it up here before, but this seems to not register with most people. Along with the sheer scale of the Imperium and the galaxy itself (a million worlds spread out across a galaxy of a hundred billion star systems), people would be far more focused on what had happened in the last 200-300 years on their continent, planet, maybe their star system. Stuff like the Horus Heresy should be more legendary to them than even our oldest histories.

 

Even for a Space Marine Chapter from the 1st or 2nd Founding, they would have enough "modern" history (i.e., from a single millennium preceding modern 40k) to fill entire libraries. The Horus Heresy would be almost as ancient to them as to baseline people, despite the average Marine living significantly longer.

 

Edited January 30 by phandaal

[diadems]

On 1/19/2026 at 7:11 AM, grailkeeper said:

The only time realistically this could happen is when a Csm is about to kill a loyalist and is monologing. He'd have to feel a certain amount of safety to gloat. If the roles are reversed I don't see loyalist bringing it up.

 

so how do you think the conversation would go

On 1/20/2026 at 10:27 PM, SpecialIssue said:

 

The loyalist would never even think to bring anything of the sort up as he's been thoroughly brainwashed to be almost incapable to think of disloyalty to Imperium or the Emperor, or think of them in a negative/questioning light. This stringent brainwashing/induction is a major point as to why there have been so few Adeptus Astartes rebellions since the Heresy over the 10,000 years since, and was implemented by Guilliman as part of the Codex reforms; unless that lore has changed.

 

Even if a CSM was to gloat, the very ideas and implications of what he says would skip harmlessly off the cauterised mind of a loyalist - who is unable to grasp the basic concepts of the Emperor not being good, or bad outcomes resulting from him. Let alone the 10 millennia of time meaning that all this information should have really all turned to dust in 99.99% of the Imperium (modern publications and fans are increasingly treating the Heresy like it was 100, 500 or 1,000 years ago - its 10,000. The modern Imperium should really have less memory about the Heresy than we have about the city of Ur 8,000 years ago). The Imperium at large, even the most learned Inquisitors, should really have no idea or way to find out what the CSM is talking about.

 

It is another irony/tragedy that the CSMs and renegades are often more human than their loyalist counterparts, who have necessarily given some of that up for purity; I think CSM would at first be surprised by the first Codex loyalist he encounters, and might even pity the glassy-eyed fanatics they face in the wake of the Heresy, while strengthening his own personal cause for rebellion from the corpse-emperor.

 

well i was quoting Guilliman, and he's revived from the 30k era

[diadems]

23 hours ago, phandaal said:

 

I think about this often and have brought it up here before, but this seems to not register with most people. Along with the sheer scale of the Imperium and the galaxy itself (a million worlds spread out across a galaxy of a hundred billion star systems), people would be far more focused on what had happened in the last 200-300 years on their continent, planet, maybe their star system. Stuff like the Horus Heresy should be more legendary to them than even our oldest histories.

 

Even for a Space Marine Chapter from the 1st or 2nd Founding, they would have enough "modern" history (i.e., from a single millennium preceding modern 40k) to fill entire libraries. The Horus Heresy would be almost as ancient to them as to baseline people, despite the average Marine living significantly longer.

 

 

The 10,000 years was originally introduced by Rick Priestley in the original 40k, Rogue Trader, and it represents a long age of degeneracy under the Emperor's reign after he brought an end to the Age of Strife, though I'm not sure why a clever bloke such as the Emperor had allowed such degeneration to occur. Though by the later stages he can't prevent it due to his body having degenerated as well. This is before the Horus Heresy was introduced.

[phandaal]

20 hours ago, diadems said:

The 10,000 years was originally introduced by Rick Priestley in the original 40k, Rogue Trader, and it represents a long age of degeneracy under the Emperor's reign after he brought an end to the Age of Strife, though I'm not sure why a clever bloke such as the Emperor had allowed such degeneration to occur. Though by the later stages he can't prevent it due to his body having degenerated as well. This is before the Horus Heresy was introduced.

 

This is not relevant to the topic of your thread.

 

Edit: Still not relevant to your thread topic, but I went back and checked my copy of Rogue Trader out of curiosity. Rick Priestly mentions there that the Emperor's ascension to the Golden Throne 10,000 years before the present day was such an unimaginably long time ago that no one but him even remembers the details of how it happened, and maybe the Emperor himself no longer even remembers. Rick understood that such a long amount of time in a place as vast as the Imperium would turn pretty much anything into a forgotten legend.

 

Also, and I actually did go and look at the magazine page itself for this one to be sure - page 53 of White Dwarf 96 from December 1987 (same year as Rogue Trader) has this to say:

 

Quote

The Raven Wing’s exact origins are lost in the history of the First Crusade (circa thirtieth millenia - about ten thousand years ago). Indeed little is known of the Dark Angels during that time. The Chapter’s early history was removed from all Imperial records following the Horus Heresy and the banishment of the nine “treacher-legions” to the Eye of Terror. The reason for the erasure is now known only by the Emperor himself.

 

So there you have it. In all versions of 40k, the Horus Heresy, and really everything that happened 10,000 years before the present, was mostly-forgotten ancient history.

Edited February 1 by phandaal