Guilliman looked at the screaming daemon, gaining a vague impression of the Emperor's terror.
What the daemon feared was not him, but the Emperor behind him.
Otherwise, it wouldn't have called him the 'son of the accursed'.
According to Vincent Horne's introduction, Cherubael was a daemon prince.
The Warp is vast, and even the Chaos Gods, known as the Lords of Chaos, only occupy a corner of the Warp's domain.
Many areas still do not belong to the Chaos Gods and are occupied by various daemons.
Since the birth of humanity, religion has appeared, and with it, initial gods.
As time developed, these gods also became more numerous.
The simplest example is Greek mythology, from the first generation of creation gods to the third generation, there were already thousands of gods.
This is just one system.
Taken together, there have been tens of thousands of gods worshipped throughout human history.
Thanks to the nature of the Warp, when people excessively worship a certain concept, it will form a projection in the Warp.
These gods were naturally born.
As humanity developed, beliefs were constantly changing, many gods were forgotten, abandoned, and some would naturally perish.
Others became a different kind of existence, these existences were hungry, constantly craving flesh and souls, and thus were called daemons.
And in the long history of the galaxy, the several million years of human history is just an insignificant little splash.
Before the birth of humanity, many races had already been born, they had their own civilizations, their own beliefs.
Let's take the few races that are still active today.
The Tau disturbing the Empire on the far eastern frontier believe in the so-called greater Good.
The orks under the rule of ork Warlords believe in Gork and Mork.
The eldar believe in Asuryan, Khaine, Cegorach, etc.
The cultural differences between different races are so great, and the gods they create are also completely different.
These gods who have lost their faith will be slowly twisted in the Warp, becoming hateful daemons.
When Slaanesh awakened, tearing apart the material universe and creating the Eye of Terror, the eldar gods also met a terrible end.
Only Cegorach the Laughing God and Isha the Goddess of Life survived.
When the eldar are completely destroyed, Cegorach and Isha, having lost their faith and people, will also become hateful daemons, becoming increasingly twisted.
The origins of daemons are diverse and cannot be simply explained.
Cherubael's origin is unknown.
Even Vincent Horne doesn't know much about the origin of this daemon prince.
In his youth, investigating an incident involving a Chaos tribe, he learned the spells and rituals to control this daemon from a captured daemonic forbidden book.
In ancient times, a daemon tribe came from Chaos to the material universe, ruled seven worlds, and established a kingdom.
After the kingdom was destroyed, the daemon king was buried in a terrible tomb, waiting to be awakened again.
Vincent Horne pursued this matter for hundreds of years, uncovering several large families involved in the forbidden book of death, and finally killed the hidden heretic in the daemon king's tomb, stopping their conspiracy.
Later, he still didn't figure out Cherubael's true origin.
Of course, Guilliman had no intention of listening to the story behind the daemon; everything about daemons carries corruption, and even just listening to their stories could lead to being controlled and manipulated by them.
He just needed to treat this daemon prince as a tool; there was no need to know where the daemon came from.
In fact, many daemons in the Warp have used various means to enter the material universe, then transformed into races in the material universe, creating their own twisted civilizations.
This is also why the Emperor created the Primarchs; without the Primarchs, the Human Empire could not have been established.
The Emperor couldn't fight every single war.
Of course, in the end, the Human Empire almost perished because of the Primarchs.
Some people will blame the Emperor for not caring enough about the Primarchs, treating them as mere tools, which led to such a disaster for the Empire.
Such a thought ignores reality and is extremely foolish and simple.
The things the Emperor has to think about every second are enough to burn out the Empire's most advanced Cogitator computers.
Conquering and ruling a Human Empire spanning tens of thousands of light-years, which can only be maintained by psyker communication and Warp travel, and cannot use artificial intelligence, requires an amount of energy that absolutely exceeds anyone's imagination.
Many people don't even know everyone living in their own neighborhood, and they don't even know what's happening in the next town.
Let alone what is happening on a planet hundreds of light-years away.
The Emperor needed to evaluate the usefulness of each faction to himself, needed to deal with those terrifying xenos, needed to plan the Webway, needed to fight against the gods, and needed to maintain the lie of the Imperial Truth as much as possible.
His time was already infinitely compressed.
However, when he met each Primarch, he took the little time he had to talk to each one, paint a picture of humanity's future for them, and promise them glory and rewards.
He evaluated each Primarch, and then communicated with them using the most suitable attitude.
When they first met, he talked with Lorgar all night, hoping that he would abandon religion and embrace the Imperial Truth, but Lorgar never listened to him, repeatedly ordered, still insisted on preaching.
In the Council of Nikea, after the Primarchs' vote, the use of psyker powers was forbidden, but Magnus secretly violated this order, and finally, in his arrogance, a psyker blast broke the psyker barrier the Emperor had established in the underground palace, causing the Custodes, Sisters of Silence, and Mechanicus armies to be bogged down and die in the Webway.
Angron hated him for not being able to die.
Konrad Curze believed that he brought hope, but made this hope forever unattainable.
The mentally twisted Perturabo thought he was just a tool.
Mortarion always felt that the Emperor looked down on him.
Among the many Primarchs, the Emperor chose the safest path, which was to appoint the one who had been with him the longest, Horus, as Warmaster.
Besides Alpharius who was hidden in the shadows, Horus was the Primarch who had been with the Emperor the longest.
The Emperor personally taught him everything and took him with him on the Great Crusade.
But he never expected that this path had a deep pit.
The Emperor's failure was not that he lacked humanity, but that he believed in humanity, which was his greatest sorrow, and the reason he sat on the Golden Throne enduring suffering.
He thought that Horus, who had been with him the longest, could take over and complete the rest of the Great Crusade, prevent the Chaos Gods from tempting the other Primarchs, and even if there were Primarchs who betrayed, Horus could go and suppress them immediately.
As a result, after being injured, Horus directly chose to betray him.
This is also why the Emperor was surprised; he never thought that the betrayer would be Horus.
He thought that Horus truly regarded him as a father, but it turned out that Horus simply regarded him as a tyrant.
Did Chaos corrupt Horus??
No, Horus chose Chaos.
He tried to covet his father's throne, believing that this galaxy was conquered by him, and naturally should be ruled by him.
Erebus' promise to him was that by sacrificing the Human Emperor, Horus would gain infinite power and become the new Lord of Humanity ruling the galaxy.
Horus, who was already dissatisfied with the Emperor weakening the War Council and relying on the Council of Terra, accepted this deal.
He decided to sacrifice his father and become the new Lord of Humanity.
Compared to the Emperor who still wanted to save Horus in the final battle.
Which of the two was more humane, and which valued the decades of companionship more, is naturally self-evident.
Being injured just gave Chaos an opportunity to tempt Horus.
"It seems you know me, that saves a lot of trouble." Guilliman reined in his wandering thoughts and secretly vowed never to put the power that could determine the fate of the Empire entirely in the hands of one person, no matter how trustworthy that person was.
"What do you want to do?? Son of Anathema." Cherubael said.
"I need information about the Warp, so I came to ask you."
"Then are you going to make a deal with me?" Cherubael heard Guilliman's words and suddenly showed a hint of excitement. A deal meant corruption, and corruption meant degeneration. How wonderful it would be for the son of the Accursed to degenerate.
"I am the Regent of the Imperium, I never make deals with others, whatever I need, others offer it to me." Guilliman walked towards Cherubael, "So I hope you can be sensible, pledge allegiance to me, and then provide me with information."
????
Regent of the Imperium, impressive, demanding my allegiance and life as soon as you show up??
Do you think I'm a minor character as a daemon prince??