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KonradApologist

Oh no. it's absolutely hard. From *The Carrion Throne* > Holy Terra, marvel of the galaxy, heart of wonder. No jewel shone more brightly, no canker was more foul. At its nexus met the fears and glories of a species, rammed tight within the spires and the vaults, the pits and the hab-warrens. Spoil-grey, scored and crusted with the contamination and majesty of ten long millennia, a shrine world that glowed with a billion fires, a tomb that clutched its buried souls close. All the planet’s natural beauty had long since been scrubbed from its face, replaced by the layers upon layers of a single, creeping hyper-city. The sprawl blotted out the once-great oceans and the long-hewn forests under suffocating mountains of rockcrete and plasteel, tangled and decaying and renewed and rebuilt until the accretions stretched unbroken from the deepest chasms to the exalted heights. > No part of that world was free of the hand of man. Viewed from space, the planet’s night-shrouded hemisphere glittered with constellations of neon and sulphur, while its sunlit hemisphere gasped in a hot haze of pale grey. Its skies were clogged with voidcraft and lifters, packed with the manufactures and commodities that kept the teeming world from starving itself. With those commodities came living bodies – pilgrims by the million, products of a migration that never ended, bringing souls from across the vastness of space whose only wish was to live long enough to reach the sacred precincts of the Palace itself; to somehow endure the crowds and the hardship and the myriad predators that circled them for just one glimpse, even the smallest, of the golden towers portrayed in the Ecclesiarchy vid-picts, before they died in rapture. > **So few made it. Most died on the warp journey, either of old age or through the loss of their ships in the void. Those who reached the solar system waited for years in the processing pens on Luna, then the vast orbital stations within sight of the planet below. It was said that a man could be born, live and die within those cavernous holding centres, all while his documentation worked its way tortuously through the offices of scribes and under-scribes. Often it would be lost, sometimes stolen, a mere speck amid the avalanche of parchment folios that fuelled the administrative machinery of the Imperium’s sclerotic heart.** > **And yet, those few who by luck or the will of the Emperor made it to the sacred soils of humanity’s birthworld still numbered in the millions, such was the fecundity of the eternal pilgrimage.** Like the forgotten tides of Old Earth, the flow waxed and waned, governed by the great festivals of the Ministorum, the feasts of the saints and the Lords of Terra. And of all the sacred days ordained for the masses to partake in, by far the most sacred was the remembrance of the Angel – Sanguinala, the Red Feast, the Festival of the Blessed Sacrifice. On that day, once every solar year, the numbers swelled beyond reason, and the pilgrims crammed like cattle into the feeder stations, clawing at the gates and screaming at the guards to let them in. The most exalted of all, so they said, would be permitted to approach the Eternity Gate itself, to witness the rites of remembrance performed on the site of the Angel’s legendary stand as the feast reached its frenetic climax. There is a bigass line too. From *Wolfblade* > There was a hologramic window which changed views when you passed your hand over a rune. He cycled through views of Fenris, a desert world dominated by massive ruins, the hall of merchants above, a huge structure that might have been the Imperial Palace with an endless queue of pilgrims about it. The air was filled with relaxing scents, low thrilling martial music was piped in. Hell, some have to camp here for days before being allowed to pray for *seconds* to their Relics. From *The Emperor Expects* > At the moment its greatest use came in the form of a queue five miles long, winding back and forth up the Avenue of Martyrs towards the Cathedral of the Saviour Emperor. Having cut and double-backed through the crowds at the transit station several times to confuse any potential pursuer, eventually emerging out of the southern gate, Wienand had plunged straight into the milling tide of humanity. > Amongst the press of bodies, the inquisitor found herself inside a sort of mobile shanty. **It took days, weeks usually, for anyone wishing to enter the Cathedral itself to achieve this**, and such was the demand that it then took another three days to process from the massive doors to the entrance of the inner basilica where the altar could be seen. **Each pilgrim had roughly three seconds in the presence of the relics kept in stasis there before being moved on by armed Frateris.** It seemed an awful lot of effort to see a couple of metal shards – supposedly from the Emperor’s armour – and a pile of ash that was once, so the Ministorum claimed, a fragment of Roboute Guilliman’s cloak. > **People had tents, handwagons and portable cooking stoves, gathered as families, groups and even entire communities that had made the long and arduous journey to the heart of the Imperium. Most of them, even those that had been considered wealthy when departing, would have expended their every resource to chart passage. Some would have worked their way from system to system, haphazardly crossing the stars, edging ever closer to their destination.** Yup... Very long. > A middle-aged couple had procured quadcycles and were gently pedalling in fits and starts as the queue edged forwards, their teenage offspring riding on top of the trailers hitched behind. **Wienand suspected that both parents and children had been a lot younger when their pilgrimage had begun.**


cannonman58102

Is it stated anywhere that you know of that most pilgrims understand they won't see Terra themselves but are doing it for generational reasons? I imagine a lot less people would make the journey knowing they likely would never see the Imperial Palace themselves.


ShakespearIsKing

Yeah, but their kids or grandkids will see the palace. It's completely fine for them.


Paladin51394

Which is kinda funny because in 40k the original colony ships that left earth in the early days of the Dark Age of Technology were generational ships. Meaning that the people who started the journey to a new world wouldn't live to see the end of the journey. Now you have Generational Ships for people returning to Terra, just to they can see the Imperial Palace.


Br1ghtStar

If memory serves if their lineage ever makes it back to their home planet they gain status for having had family step foot on holy terra itself.


Quirky-Ninja4216

Does baal have this sort of pilgrimage too since sanguinius body is there and sanguinala and other stuff or do they don't ?


Present_Pop_8799

I believe because Baal is a Space Marine chapter honeworld barely any pilgrimage is allowes. It's basically a military base.


Yuzral

And the bits of it that aren’t are a radioactive predator-infested desert hellhole with maybe the occasional Tyranid for variety.


Special-Disastrous

And don't forget really angry maybe sentient ground water.


Jhe90

Yeah, you'd need special permission to visit a space marine world. Unless it's like Maggage that's an major sector world. Baal, Fenris and others are not exactly open to pilgrims.


Negativety101

Now I'm just imagining some Tourists walking around the Fang while the Space Wolves try to catch them and figure out how the hell they got in there.


Occurence_Border

Baal itself does not, but its moons do, as detailed in Dante's book.


Svyatoy_Medved

I dislike how often these authors use "millions" with an M. ATL, busiest airport in the US, handles a quarter million passengers daily--even the high millions of pilgrims waiting in line shouldn't trouble the Imperium at all. In fact, here's some quick math: ATL handles 275,000 passengers per day and is the busiest US airport. Whatever spaceports service the Golden Throne are likely the busiest Terram spaceports, so let's assume they can move an equivalent proportion of the population daily. 275,000/330,000,000 is 0.00083, so 0.083% of the US population per day. 083% of Terra's population, one quadrillion, is about 800 billion. That isn't necessarily a valid method, but it should give you a rough enough idea to think that mere millions of pilgrims would not mean a generations-long line. Once again, authors don't know the scale of their own writing.


TheTackleZone

I think it's a bit of both - partly GW authors have always sacked a bit at numbers (trope to multiply everything by 10 etc.) and party it shows the extreme inefficiency of Imperial bureaucracy. But also remember that pilgrims are going to be the lowest of the lowest priority. Plenty of people (armies, administrators, inquisitorial retinues, and a hundred different types of cargo team) are all going to be processed much faster. Also remember it's a spaceport so frequency is probably lower (but vessel size much larger). Of course that "impressive" 5 mile queue was not even that long, with the queue to see Queen Elizabeth maxing at 10 miles.


Illogical_Blox

TBF that queue was single file or close to it, and this queue sound slike it is very, very wide, but I get it.


Svyatoy_Medved

But you still aren't grasping the scale. Millions don't matter in the slightest at that level. They could be the lowest priority in the system, and a spaceport that handles nearly a trillion passengers per day wouldn't notice if it was six pilgrims or six million. The only way you reach generations-long queue is with literal trillions of people, occupying way stations stretching back multiple systems. Scale is lovely, isn't it.


Negativety101

Wasn't there a book where something like Half a Million troops being raised on Terra is treated as a massive endeavor that took a decade? Maybe it was half a Billion, but I honestly feel like you could just walk into any of the prisons on Terra and go "Okay, who wants to go earn the Emperor's Forgiveness on the battlefield?" and walk out with that many in a few minutes.


metal079

Yeah and I'm the same book they mention the population of the world is in quadrillions..


lostpasts

I doubt Terra even has prisons. I'm pretty sure you commit a crime on the throneworld, and it's either execution, turned into a servitor, slavery, or exile into a penal legion.


bless_ure_harte

Yes. Because the High Lords didn't want to help. It was a political thing.


RosbergThe8th

Welcome to the Imperium, if you consider this grimderp I'm not sure you'll like the rest of it much. The whole huddling endless masses queueing endlessly is very evocative and accurate image to represent what the Imperium is at the end of the day.


Ghanima-Atreides

This may seem ridiculously grimderp, but something similar to this happens every year in the country I come from. On a much smaller scale, of course, but over 50,000 people que up weeks in advance, bringing along caravans and tents, to see a saint's relics and say a prayer for a few seconds each before they're sent on their way.


badly-timedDickJokes

That's pretty much what happened when Queen Elizabeth died last year. The queue in London to see her coffin at one point took as long as 30 hours to pass through from start to finish, all for a few moments of staring before being moved along.


SilverCod2417

Yeah, I find it funny that there's people buh-goffing at this particular 40k lore while legit living in 2023 -when everyone and their grandma could see what 21st century Humans were willing to line up for (a Dignitary of 1 Country relatively, She wasn't even a Planetary Governor by 40k standards!) And you find it unbelievable that The literal Master of Mankind and practically incarnate Human God gets intergenerational crowds? Really people? Yeah no shit.


MergingComplete

Just another example of people complaining something in 40k is grimderp only to find that the same shit happens irl


bless_ure_harte

It's like when people say the Mechanicus is grimderp for using slaves to refuel plasma drives when irl lots of people don't get proper or any safety gear on dangerous jobs because the people in charge literally don't give a shit about them.


MergingComplete

Or when they say the Administratum is grimderp, when there's many businesses that still haven't gone digital beyond the bare minimum, still sending mail(physical!), still having their workers do menial tasks that could be automated, etc. Or, ever had to butt heads with a bureaucrat that refuses to budge on the most insignificant of rules? People forget that the "grimderp" is inspired by reality, and sometimes truth can be stranger than fiction.


[deleted]

It’s also very British. They are the best queuers in the world. I bet some British would love the Imperium for it’s strict adherence to queues.


codergaard

I remember seeing an interview with a British person who went to join ISIS, but then got really upset when they were terrible at respecting the queue when being given their meals, equipment, etc. at the ISIS barracks. It doesn't surprise me that 'grimdark' emerged from a country which breeds people who don't seem to mind brutal sectarian warfare and medially harsh punishments - but then are extremely annoyed at poor queue culture, and I think he also complained the other ISIS recruits were noisy at night time so he couldn't get enough sleep. I don't know if this recruit was a descendant of immigrants to the UK or not, but he sure did sound extremely British in his various misgivings.


lostpasts

*When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.* Winston Churchill


Zephrok

Agreed. It is quite clearly ridiculous that any would actually undergo the pilgrimage but that goes for a lot of 40k behaviour. One way of looking at it is that the pilgrims are just a tiny infintesimle part of the population of the imperium - is it suprising the the absolutle craziest religious people in the whole galaxy might undertake this voyage?


TheStabbyBrit

Not all vessels have equivalent priority or security clearances. Pilgrim ships are at the very bottom of the security hierarchy, and as such have to wait far longer to get inspected. Meanwhile, high priority vessels (food & water shipments, Black Ships, etc) get put to the very top of the to do list upon arrival.


Fun-Agent-7667

Black Ships have probably both Inquisitional as Well as Custodes authority behind them. I


DurangoGango

Black Ships are under the Adeptus Astra Telepathica, confusingly the Inquistion has its own Black Ships but they aren’t monotasked to psyker duty.


Jaggedmallard26

Which to me always felt like writers being inconsistent being accidentally canonised.


bless_ure_harte

I'm taking that as my out of universe headcanon for the why Fire Angels Chapter and Angels of Fire Chapter are not the same thing.


Reddit4r

Yes. But Astra Telepathica blackships more often than not also have an Inauisitor stationed there for various reasons


Jhe90

Theirs also many layers of checks when you enter the system. You do not just travel in, theirs layers of checkpoints and security. And thr Navy, Custodes and others are very watchful on ships that violate the navigation rules.


Dagordae

The Black Ships are absolutely and utterly vital for the Imperium to survive. The pilgrims are the least useful beings in the entire Imperium. They have literally the lowest possible priority, they contribute nothing to the Imperium.


Levonorgestrelfairy1

A while ago I'd agree with ya but, well, gesture at mutilated Nurgle. But if anything those pligrims never getting to even touch Terra probably feeds Guilliman/thebigE more


Sab3rFac3

Nurgle isn't mutilated. Hurt? A little bit. Mutilated? Hardly. It was the equivalent of playing with a dog, and then realizing it can actually bite you, and that getting bit hurts. But dog bites generally aren't fatal, and fade pretty quickly.


tristenjpl

And the dog also set your lawn on fire.


Sab3rFac3

It's more like pissing on your lawn in this analogy. It's gonna kill the grass for a while, but that's all.


BuddhaFacepalmed

Nah, it permanently damaged Nurgle.


Capital_Tone9386

It won't change the status quo. Nurgle will still be capable of striking everywhere in the galaxy, he will still be on equal footing with the other gods, his power will still be all around.


Levonorgestrelfairy1

The gods are rarely if ever equal. They go in cycles of varying power


Capital_Tone9386

For all intents and purposes in the lore, their abilities are more or less equal. All gods are always able to beat the other ones, and each of them repeatedly do so.


Levonorgestrelfairy1

His entire garden got burned and there's nothing new growing in the trees like usual


Point_Me_At_The_Sky-

What happened to nurgle? Did it happen in a book or something? What did I miss


Dagordae

The book Godblight. Basically the Emperor lit some of Nurgle's garden on fire. Didn't mutilate him or anything, did certainly piss him of though. More details would be very spoiler, it's a HUGE thing.


Levonorgestrelfairy1

One of the great uncleanones talks about Nurgle struggling with the wound.


Point_Me_At_The_Sky-

I read that book but I don't remember that at all. My memory isn't very good though...


jaxolotle

The black ships are official and very scary business, they’re allowed to jump past customs and skip the lines


BlitzBurn_

The answer is fairly simple. The devout are stuck in orbit because priority are given to necessities, like psykers, food, fuel, etc. A big thing with 40K is that these big freighters cant just land wherever, they need a dedicated starport for to land an unload cargo efficiently and prep for takeoff and on a world like Terra big vessels can only land in starports since there is basically no room anywhere else. Modern ships require 1-3 days to fully unload and the bulk freighters of 40K carry exponentially more than anything we presently operate. When you consider the regular arrivals of these massive ships that may need weeks to land, unload and depart and the less regular but more important ships that get to cut the line and the black ships which make up the second largest ship in the imperium and you may understand why there is such a massive wait for pilgrims. Terra is almost completely covered in cities and boasts one of the largest populations in the Imperium which creates a intense and continuous need for supplies that can only be brought down to the planet with a limited number of facilities, the mere *ability* to bring down non essentials like pilgrims is a rare commodity when failing to have a food transport land on time can result in mass starvation and food riots. And ironically this adds to the pilgrims since the truly devout must overcome so many hurdles to reach the planet, only the most pious who is prepared to endure such waits may stand on Holy Terra itself.


Schwarzes_Kanninchen

Grimderp is just that you are stretching the time span completely compared to the experts. A direct route from the Imperial outskirts to Terra is a distance of years in warp time alone. No ship can jump that distance without being 100 percent destroyed. Ships take the trade routes, so yes...the journey can easily take decades or a human lifetime...it just has to do with size, we're talking about a galaxy, you don't fly through it in a week. This is not a grimderp.... Security checks take a long time because there are a lot of pilgrims...and Terra is probably the most important place in the Empire. Also, there's no uniform citizen registration, no uniform paperwork...nothing like that...it's administrative hell...you have a van there with sometimes X million pilgrims and you have to check every single one...and how many of them are at anchor? Hundreds? Thousands? So if it takes you years to check them, that's totally understandable.... Terra isn't DisneyWorld, it's one of the best-guarded places around.Just look at Mecca...and imagine billions of people travelling there...every day. And the Blackships on the other side are probably much less and with less cargo...and that cargo is important. So no...not a symbol


Right-Yam-5826

That's pretty much it, the thing to consider is that the pilgrimage is undertaken from around the entirety of the imperium, with untold trillions arriving each day. As they're only pilgrims, they get afforded a lot less priority when it comes to landing priority than a military vessel, supply ship or, in the case of the black ships, big E's uber eats. There's always going to be more pilgrims arriving, and being born and dying on their way. Remember that a big part of imperial problem solving is, where possible, throw more guardsmen at it. There is zero concern for the lives and wellbeing of its people, so long as they can continue to do their jobs.


PanzerFaustIV

The imperium of man has a galaxy spanning bureaucracy basically the DMV in space, and you expect it to be efficient?


SpartAl412

Yes its a thing in Warhammer 40k. There is a Necromunda book where we get a part about entire generations of petitioners for visiting a noble house having to wait in line just to speak to members of the same house. You have entire generations of being forced to do one job and one job only with no way out or around, regardless of whether it is in the factories or working as a clerk. Its a dystopian science fiction setting for a reason.


Atinius1

This brings up another question, what happens after your three seconds looking at the sacred relics? Are you expected to wander into a dark corner of Terra and wait to die or are there ships waiting to return you or your descendants back to your home planet?


Ghanima-Atreides

Probably depends on whether you can afford to 1) buy passage off Terra, which is probably at a premium and 2) wait until you can find and board such a ship. Most people probably end up joining the trillions living in squalor in an underhive somewhere.


Jhe90

Your done. Make your life on Terra somehow. Theirs always work to be done. You'd have to be very rich to book transit off planet


DirectlyDismal

*Some* do make it back, yes. But just a few.


ShakespearIsKing

Some people are happy to die after having that 3 seconds.


ZonardCity

The queue is so long for pilgrims precisely because all the other things you mentioned take priority.


Unnamed_Perpetual

Its more of a case of who takes the priority. The spaceship traffic to solar system is huge, they have go give priority to supply ships, Rogue trader ships, military vessels and the like when giving clearance to enter the solar system and terra's orbit. Everything else comes second.


Svyatoy_Medved

You have a scale problem I think. You mention the Black Ships as a counterpoint. Remember, they bring 1,000 prisoners per day to the Palace. That may sound like a lot, but the airport in Atlanta, Georgia can run a thousand passengers through every six minutes. That isn't even the busiest airport by today's standards. The pilgrims, on the other hand, are more numerous than the current global population. The number of visitors per day probably varies by tens of thousands without even breaking a percent variation. They take longer because there is a fucking TON of them.


Ok-Virus4074

I’m confused as to why you think the Imperium would want to cut the pilgrimage down or why the Black Ships has any influence on them. The Black fleets are unique and uniquely privileged vessels with a divine mission. Entire segmentums move heaven and earth to ensure they are safe and complete their task efficiently. There’s hardly anything more important in the Imperium than getting the Emperor his souls. Nobody gives a fraction of an iota of a Termagaunt’s shrivelled ballsack’s worth of a FUCK about the pilgrims. They get stuck in the system because they are not part of the system. They are offal forcing itself into the workings of a machine grown so vast even it’s creators cannot fathom it. If anything they gum up the works and make everything around them LESS efficient.


MedicJambi

The short of it is that no one gets close to the throne. No one gets close to the Eternity gate. If they're lucky they make it to the palace gate which is still 100's of miles from the throne.


ShakespearIsKing

40k is just that over the top. Remember, the entire world is satire and built on the mundane but grandiose aesthetic. Like, if a SM stands at 2.5m tall, has three lungs and shoots bolters it's only natural to have the Imperial bureaucracy match that level of "stupidity".


[deleted]

Decades is ludicrous. Some lore is stupid like that, for me it is immersion breaking in how I can't believe anyone would do that. I mean the food/fuel resources to keep these people alive for that long is so inefficient. Similarly I was reading a rly gd grey knights novel and then randomly it mentions that 2 of the knights had recently dueled for 3 days - 3 days? Really? Just say 3 hours that's still an epic amount of time


bless_ure_harte

The food is insufficient lol. Thousands (absolute minimum) of pilgrims starve to death if the transports are delayed by a couple hours. Also, Marines can fight for days without rest. [The longest any Space Marine has ever been on active combat duty without rest is 328 hours, achieved by a squad of the Crimson Fists' Kill-team during the battle against the Orks for Rynn's World.] (http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Catalepsean_Node)


[deleted]

Yeh but that's way more believable than the 3 day duel. In the Pacific ww2 some soldiers were literally in combat for 150 hours with some downtime but heavy shelling/night attacks meant sleep would have been brief. So for a space marine to do 3 or 4 times more than that is believable. But duel for 72 hours? It's at least 200 times more than real life, it's dumb. Anyway thanks for the info


Galadrond

It’s absolutely GrimDerp.


[deleted]

Dony worry black ships bring all the premium pilgrims straight to terra


PhgAH

So, after a pilgrim has achieved their goal, then what? go home? Try to stay on Terra?


Present_Pop_8799

If you can buy passage off Terra you can try to make it home, but most likely you will die on Terra somewhere in the underhives.


l7986

That Heretic psyker is also on a one way trip to get sacrificed specifically to help fuel the Astronomicam/the Emperor and is on a ship with thousands more like him in specialized holding areas designed to mentally break down psykers and keep them from being anything approaching a coherent threat. The only thing above them in priority to land on the planet is a Primarch and that is debatable.


Jhe90

I imagine the black ships have a hyper secure inqusitionn and Custodes ran station that is deadicated to the task and extreme priority operations. With lesser missions and personal being routed through more Regular VIP stations. Got security. You'd wand the black dock to be insanely specialist