"Betrayal, isn't that your daemons' specialty?" Guilliman asked.
"You will not deceive and control me like this, Son of the Anathema!"
Cherubael shrieked.
However, Guilliman showed no mercy; he punched the daemon again, sending it crashing into the wall and letting out a mournful scream.
Then, with a single sword stroke, he severed one of Cherubael's arms.
The power of the Anathema was harming Cherubael's daemonic essence.
It was like a searing scar, tormenting him incessantly.
When Guilliman was about to inflict more wounds upon him,
Cherubael yielded, screaming in terror, "My master!"
Under Guilliman's gaze, Cherubael revealed the true name of a daemon who might know the current state of the Warp.
He also provided a ritual to bind the daemon.
This was his price for Guilliman's forgiveness.
Throughout the long years, as a daemon prince, Cherubael had always managed to acquire some useful information.
The true name of a daemon was not something unimaginable to him.
"That's more like it," Guilliman retracted the Emperor's Sword and turned to Eisenhorn, "Can you summon the daemon he spoke of, Inquisitor?"
"With the full true name and ritual, it is not difficult," Eisenhorn replied.
For a daemonhunter, knowledge about daemons was a mandatory subject of study.
With Eisenhorn's assistance, a daemon not aligned with the Chaos Gods was summoned.
Accompanied by a chilling aura and a nauseating smell of sulfur,
A hideous daemon with twin horns on its head, covered in black feathers, and possessing cloven hooves, was summoned.
Before the daemon could speak, Eisenhorn used the ritual to confine it within a daemonhost.
"Mortal, you have angered me!" the summoned daemon shrieked.
"You talk too much," Guilliman grabbed the daemon's head and slammed it into the ground.
The daemon shrieked.
With its shriek, terrifying fluctuations appeared in the Warp, attempting to obliterate everyone in the dungeon.
But Guilliman did not let it succeed.
The power of a Primarch was so terrifying, enough to tear apart even Titans.
The daemon was overwhelmed by the power of dominance and the Emperor's power emanating from Guilliman, and the Emperor's Sword was used to carve words of humiliation onto its body.
Facing the invincible Primarch who had the ability to end its existence, the daemon yielded.
"Ask, son of the Anathema, I can answer five of your questions, and I will tell you everything I know."
The summoned daemon let out a mournful sound.
It spoke with overlapping voices, black tears of pain streaming down its face.
Being enslaved by a human and subjected to the Emperor's power caused it double pain.
"Tell me, where are my traitor brothers?" Guilliman inquired.
"Lorgar, Perturabo, and Fulgrim are in the Eye of Terror," the daemon said, "Mortarion is in the realm of the Plague Lord, and Angron fights for the Lord of War and Blood on the Eternal Battlefield."
"What about Magnus?" Guilliman keenly asked about the most insidious of the traitor primarchs.
"He has left the Eye of Terror, and no one knows his whereabouts.
It is said he will move against his brother, and that is you, son of the Anathema; you are the only active son of the Anathema," the daemon gasped, the immense pain driving it mad and causing it to convulse.
Guilliman fell silent.
Mortarion hasn't made his move yet, and Magnus is already coming?
What will he do, throw himself into the Maelstrom like in the original timeline?
"How should I control it?" Guilliman looked at the bound Cherubael and asked in a deep voice.
"Carve the scriptures of the Anathema into its heart, and it will submit at your feet and serve you."
"No!" the daemon let out a mournful cry.
"Is what he said true?" Guilliman asked inwardly.
"True
Your father's prayer has the potential to kill that daemon.
Only your will can spare it from death.
If it does not wish for eternal oblivion, then it can only submit at your feet."
Receiving the answer from the auxiliary AI, Guilliman then asked Eisenhorn.
After confirming there were no issues, he began to act.
He cut open the daemon's chest and carved the Imperial Creed's hymns praising the Emperor onto the location of its heart.
"I need to obtain more information, daemon.
Do not disappoint me, or you will return to eternal oblivion."
Having said that, Guilliman sent it back to the Warp.
"Seal it up and send it to the Macragge's Glory.
I need to obtain more information about the Warp from it.
Eisenhorn, you are responsible for guarding it.
If necessary, kill it."
Guilliman looked at Eisenhorn and made arrangements for Cherubael.
Guilliman stayed on the planet Talassa for two weeks.
He then left with Eisenhorn and the golden sarcophagus containing Cherubael, preparing to head to the Konor system.
Before leaving, he declared Covenant as the Grand Inquisitor, responsible for reviewing the plans of other Inquisitors and having the authority to demand explanations from them for their actions.
Otherwise, Covenant would have the right to suspend them from all duties.
Covenant would report directly to him, regularly submitting all information for the Primarch's review.
Guilliman knew that the Inquisitors had made many contributions over the long ten thousand years, thwarting many conspiracies.
However, as the years passed, the Inquisitors, wielding immense power, also began to gradually become corrupted.
They used various means to amass vast wealth, engaged in various heretical activities in secret, and even intentionally cultivated heresy only to then eliminate it, thereby gaining honor and greater power for themselves.
Daemon hunters like Eisenhorn, who maintained their integrity, had instead become anomalies.
After rectifying the chaotic oversight system of the Inquisitors and incorporating it into his reform plan, Guilliman departed.
The flaws in the Inquisitorial system had accumulated for a long time and could not be cleared up quickly, nor could they be drastically changed all at once, to avoid excessive blood loss for the Imperium.
It required a gradual approach, combined with new systems and new ideas for correction.
Standing on the deck of the Macragge's Glory,
Guilliman pondered the path ahead.
Mortarion and Magnus would move against him, and he must prepare corresponding countermeasures.
Magnus was skilled in psyker powers; that was his only advantage.
As for his schemes and such, there was no need to mention them; they only appeared supposedly profound due to the asymmetry of information between the Warp and the material universe.
To put it bluntly, this fellow was a bit smart, but not by much.
Magnus' threat lay in his psyker powers and the asymmetry of Warp information.
Like in the original plot, he would strike unexpectedly just as he emerged from the Warp, throwing them into the Maelstrom.
Who could endure such a thing?
Guilliman didn't know when this fellow would launch his attack, otherwise, he could formulate a plan.
As for Mortarion, things were better.
Aside from spreading plagues, this fellow couldn't think of any other tricks.
Plagues couldn't be launched as a sudden attack, which gave Guilliman time to react.
The only trouble was Magnus.
"Information is severely lacking," Guilliman sighed.
Humanity was always in a disadvantaged position when fighting against the Warp.
And the biggest problem in fighting the Warp was the fear of corruption.
The most disgusting thing about the Warp was one point:
If you don't fight, you suffer.
If you fight, you still suffer.
Just the point of corruption was completely unsolvable.
"Resurrect the Webway project?" A thought arose in Guilliman's mind.
The Emperor had basically used every available method.
Establishing a collective human consciousness?
Isn't the Emperor doing that now?
Establishing a new religion to fight back?
Isn't the Imperial Creed doing that?
The only thing left was the plan to establish the Webway to isolate humanity from the Warp, which was not fully implemented.
Guilliman thought for a moment and then dismissed it.
The Chaos Gods would not allow him to do that; as soon as he showed the desire to repair the Webway, they would immediately unite.
If he lost, would he have to sit on the Golden Throne?
If he didn't, a second Eye of Terror would explode, and by then, the whole world would belong to the daemons.
Learn from the Protoss in StarCraft and establish the so-called Khala connection.
Forget it, if one gets corrupted, everyone gets screwed.
The Khala connection wasn't safe either; in the later stages, it was invaded and almost led to the entire Protoss race being controlled.
If humans did this, they would die even more miserably.
Guilliman thought and thought, but couldn't come up with a good way to counter the corruption of the Warp.
Just then, Phicris walked over.
"My lord, latest news.
The Glaus family of the Natal system has issued a declaration, claiming that your reforms to the Imperial system are invalid and that they will only abide by the system left behind by the Holy Emperor."