Lost amidst the endless temples, fortresses,
and hive acrologies that have long since covered Holy Terra, there can be found a lone mountain. Upon its harsh granite face have been carved
the stern visages of four warrior kings, to which countless pilgrims now offer sacrament. Who these men were that the Imperium of Man
should choose to honor them in such a way, upon the divine soil of the throneworld itself,
has long since been lost to the ages. They are venerated simply as nameless heroes,
and that is enough for the faithful. The notion that such figures might predate
the Imperium itself died upon the lips of historical scholars who perished millennia
ago and if any thought to assert such claims now, they would surely be executed for heresy. Yet this lone mountain is in truth, one of
the last surviving links between the Imperium and the ages of mankind that came before. A few across the Imperium have unlocked the
secrets to an unnaturally long life. Some among their number can remember the fiery
nightmare of the Horus Heresy when the Imperium was nearly split asunder. Fewer still might have even seen the unrivaled
glories of the Great Crusade, or the terrible and mysterious “Dark Age of Technology”. Perhaps, there may even be a blessed few who
have persisted for so long that they might share firsthand accounts of how mankind first
spread across the galaxy, how industry was brought to Mars, or give names to those four
kings, carved onto the face of a lone mountain. But across the million worlds of the Imperium
of Man, there is but a single soul that can undeniably be said to have witnessed these
events and so much more. A single soul that spans the eternity of mankind’s
existence. A single soul that connects humanity both
to its past, and to whatever future it might have remaining. He is the Master of Mankind by the will of
the gods and master of a million worlds by the might of his inexhaustible armies. He is a rotting carcass writhing invisibly
with power from the Dark Age of Technology. He is the Carrion Lord of the Imperium, for
whom a thousand souls die every day, for whom blood is drunk and flesh eaten. Human blood and human flesh – the stuff
of which the Imperium is made. He is the God Emperor of Mankind. In life, the Emperor was the perfection of
mankind, a manifestation of the ultimate potential of his species. There was no field in which he did not excel,
no physical or mental test in which he exhibited anything less than transcendent talent. He was a peerless statesman, military leader,
philosopher and scientist. Seemingly immortal, he was able to craft his
mind and body across countless lifetimes, but his experience accounts for only a fraction
of his ability. The Emperor was a psyker, able to draw power
from the extra-dimensional realm known as the Immaterium. His capabilities here were likewise unequalled,
and there were few beings to have ever existed across reality that demonstrated his same
level of control or raw psychic strength. In death, the Emperor is a shattered wreck,
more corpse than man, yet clinging to life through both his own inexorable will, and
the wondrous forgotten technologies of the Golden Throne. His physical body is a frail, withered husk,
a prison of flesh. For ten thousand years he has sat immobile
and silent. Only his mind endures, yet locked in an eternal
battle against the ruinous powers within the Immaterium. So long as he remains, there is hope for the
galaxy. Yet should he fall, all reality would be lost
beneath a tide of demonic madness and despair. How a being such as the Emperor first came
to walk among mankind is likely beyond human understanding. There are many within the Imperium who would
claim that the Emperor has always existed in some form, and to suggest otherwise is
the highest form of heresy. Countless trillions have been put to death
for interpreting the Emperor in a fashion outside of the sanctioned Imperial Cult, and
to think a reputable account of his origins might be found in such a regime is to invite
madness. And yet records within the Library Sanctus
appear to shed light on his beginnings, though none but the Emperor himself can say for sure
to what degree such stories reflect reality. According to ancient texts, the being that
would become the Emperor was born some 50,000 years ago in a long forgotten region of Terra. Some accounts claim he was intended to be
the first and greatest of a new race of human psykers, a collective reincarnation of extinct
shamans, sorcerers and wise-men who had guided humanity during prehistoric times. For thousands of years before becoming the
Emperor, he guided and watched humanity develop. He travelled the glove, assuming countless
names and identities. Sometimes adopting the persona of a great
leader or advisor, a crusader, religious leader or even messiah. More often however, he remained an unknown
contributor to events, influencing their outcomes in a way that did not betray his involvement. Whatever his actions, all were ultimately
in the service of humanity, guiding his race along a path of survival that he alone could
see. As more and more humans were born with the
same ability to shape the powers of the Immaterium, the Emperor realized he would need to take
a more direct and open role in mankind’s affairs than ever before. The collapse of the Age of Technology brought
about a time of ruin and without the Emperor’s guidance, mankind would perish. The Emperor’s first appearance in modern
Imperial Records is as one of the many petty warlords who struggled for control of Terra
during the 30th millennium. His brilliant campaigns against the other
techno-barbarian warlords of the planet set him apart however, as did his use of genetically
engineered warriors. Through his creations, most notably the superhuman
Thunder Warriors, the Emperor reunited the planet, but only at terrible cost. The last casualties of the Unification Wars
were the Thunder Warriors themselves, struck down by the Emperor’s superior creations,
lest their growing corruption tarnish everything they’d fought to achieve. Yet the Emperor’s greatest ambition were
the Primarchs, 20 superhuman beings whose genomes had been designed using his own genetic
code as a foundation. Once matured, they would be his greatest generals,
diplomats and statesmen. The power of the Emperor however had been
recognized by the malevolent entities of the Immaterium, and seeking to disrupt his plans,
they cast out his 20 sons across the galaxy. In the absence of his generals, the Emperor
instead worked to craft his armies. Using genetic samples derived from each of
the Primarchs, the Emperor raised legions of new superhuman warriors, the Astartes,
and began his reconquest of the Solar System. Through expert diplomacy, the Emperor forged
a crucial military and political alliance with Mars, cementing the foundation of the
Imperium of Man. With the industry of Mars, alien slavers were
cast off the moons of Saturn and Jupitor, and the Emperor turned his eyes towards the
greater galaxy. The Great Crusade has achieved a legendary
status within the Imperium, surpassed only by the Emperor himself. The reports of victories and triumphs over
xenos races, heretics and lost human dominions are so numerous as to be essentially endless. It was an era of rebuilding, reunification,
and the rapid redevelopment of technologies long thought lost. The Emperor sought to unite all humanity under
his banner and ensure human supremacy across the galaxy. With each new world brought under Imperial
Compliance, his resources grew, accelerating the process nearly exponentially. But the Great Crusade also brought the Emperor
back into contact with his lost sons, and not all had grown to be the men he had intended
them to be. The galaxy they were cast into was one of
brutal terrors and cruelty. While all among the Primarchs had become expert
statesmen, powerful warriors and wise philosophers, many exhibited very human failings; fear,
hate, arrogance and jealousy. Yet the Emperor remained confident enough
in their abilities to turn the Great Crusade over to their care, and in particular, his
favored son, Horus Lupercal. The Emperor returned to Terra to personally
oversee the construction of th eImperial webway. This was his ultimate goal, a new means of
faster than light travel that would forever free mankind from its reliance on the Immaterium,
and protect it from the depredations of Chaos that lay within. But the ruinous powers of the Immaterium had
long since realized the threat to their existence posed by the Emperor and moved to thwart his
ambitions. Through their manipulation of the Primarchs,
the Chaos Gods convinced nine among their number to betray the Imperium. Horus himself had become their greatest prize
and together with his brothers launched a decisive strike against the work of their
father. The tragedies of the Horus Heresy are without
number, yet none so cruel as its final turning point. As the Imperial Palace on Terra burned at
the hands of the Chaos legions and demonic hordes, the Emperor confronted Horus aboard
his flagship the “Vengeful Spirit”. The battle between the Emperor and Horus was
like nothing the universe had ever seen, before or since. The powers unleashed were simply beyond comprehension. The Emperor had confronted Horus as a means
to end the conflict in a single stroke, but according to legend, found himself unable
to kill a son he still truly loved. It is said Horus tore off one of his fathers
arms, shattered many of his organs, and still the Emperor refused to deliver a killing blow. From what accounts survived, it appears that
it was only when Horus casually and cruelly flayed a man alive who attempted to intervene,
that the Emperor realized his son was truly lost. The Psychic energies that destroyed Horus,
tore his soul from reality in a manner that blotted the archtraitor from all existence. It was an act of destruction so final that
not even the powers of the Chaos Gods could save or revive their fallen champion. But the act had come too late, the Emperor
was mortally wounded. His final instructions to the loyal son that
found his crippled body described how to modify the Golden Throne. It had been intended to form the heart of
the Imperial Webway, now it would be an arcane form of life support, holding together the
Emperor’s crumbling body. Through his will, the Astronomicon would be
projected, a psychic beacon allowing travel through the immaterium and the survival of
mankind. For ten thousand years the Emperor has persisted
atop the Golden Throne, his spirit guiding an Imperium that has become a grim mockery
of his original intentions. In the Great Crusade, the Emperor brought
to the Imperium a materialistic, atheistic faith based on reason and science, rejecting
all vistages of irrationality and superstition. Now, superstition and irrationality rule over
all, with the Emperor’s true values derided as heresy and witchcraft. The Emperor fought to purge all forms of religious
faith, and break the power it had always had over humanity. Now, the Emperor himself is venerated as a
god, worshipped by countless souls as humanity’s divine protector. The Emperor’s ultimate goal was to rid humanity
of the influence of the ruinous powers. Now the fates of both have intertwined to
such an extent that it may be impossible to ever reverse. With his ascension to the status of a deity,
the nuances of his personality and character have been lost. Was the Emperor a loving father to his sons
and all humanity? Or a cold and calculating tyrant whose brutal
methods tarnished his eventual triumphs? The truth is likely somewhere in between,
but now impossible to know for certain. Regardless, the being who today sits atop
the Golden Throne is likely far different than the man who was interned within it. With each passing year, it is said that the
power of the Golden Throne grows weaker, and the Astronomicon it projects across the galaxy
diminishes with it. Only the greatest tech-priests of the Adeptus
Mechanicus know the truth, the Golden Throne is failing and well beyond their ability to
repair. The Emperor is dying, and his fate may be
inevitable. The emergence of the Great Rift is yet another
mortal wound. The Imperium has been severed in two and tens
of thousands of worlds are now caught upon the very gates of hell. Titanic warp storms roar across the galaxy,
and everywhere, civilizations are tormented, enslaved and altogether destroyed by demonic
legions. Many have proclaimed this to be the Time of
Ending. In such a dark and terrible era, the followers
of the ruinous powers are jubilant. They ridicule the servants of the Imperium,
deriding the God Emperor as a corpse lord, carrion god, a false god. But the four ruinous powers of Chaos; Khorne,
Nurgle, Slaanesh and Tzeentch have another name for the Emperor, not one born out of
mockery, but one perhaps, out of fear. They know him as the Anathema for there is
no greater embodiment of universal order, and even in his ruined state, no more potent
foe of Chaos. The Chaos Gods believe themselves to be on
the cusp of their ultimate triumph, but even they cannot ignore the unprecedented events
taking place across the galaxy. Even as untold worlds are swept beneath a
tide of demonic madness, the influence of the Emperor is exerting itself upon the mortal
plane in ways never seen before. While the Emperor in life admonished those
who named him a god worthy of adoration, in death, he has become this and possibly, something
more. The worship of countless trillions has undoubtedly
had an effect on the power of the Emperor, rippling across the Immaterium in ways impossible
to truly understand. The few individuals privileged enough to enter
the Golden Throne have come back with the unshakeable feeling that even as his mortal
body fails, his spirit and will have only grown in power. The Ruinous Powers of Chaos have faced mortal
champions and armies, only to corrupt them, manipulate them or else drown them in a tide
of blood and death. They have faced the progress of technology
and the power of science, only to pervert their use into crafting ever more grotesque
augmentations for their followers. They have faced rival gods, only to consume,
shatter, or imprison every rival pantheon set against them. But in orbit of Holy Terra as the galaxy burned,
they faced the Emperor, only to witness their greatest champion, one imbued with all their
power, struck down so completely as to be beyond even their ability to save. The Chaos Gods fear the Emperor not for his
champions or armies, his promises of science and technology, or even his ability to wield
the powers of a god. They fear the Emperor because he has become
something more, something that for ten thousand years has endured all the fury and corruption
they could muster without hesitation. They fear the Golden Throne is no longer keeping
his decrepit body intact, but rather constraining his ever growing abilities. They fear that one way or another, should
the Emperor ever rise from his internment, he will do so not as a man, not as a god,
but as a kind of power that reality has never seen.
