““Well, pardon me,” Uptil said, grinning. “You know, when I agreed to come back from Beach** with you, I thought I’d be learning great wonders and notions from your oh-so-famous Empire, which I could take back and share with my people. I’ve been here now, what? Quite a while. It’s like living with flipping savages. You’re superstitious, uncouth, blinkered, arrogant, and you generally don’t smell all that great. You think Africa is full of loaves and pigs. You haven’t even mastered the simple combustion engine.”
“Hey,” said Triumff, “we’ve got Magick…”
The massive autochthon looked at Triumff sadly.
“How many times have I got to explain this?” he asked. “It’s your downfall, my friend. Magick is the cross you’ve crucified your cultural progress on, to borrow an analogy from your myths. Take my word for it. Yours would be a better world without the Arte.”
Triumff shrugged dismissively.
“You saw Beach, Rupert. You saw the way we live. We kicked out the ways of sorcery three hundred years ago, and we haven’t looked back.””
3.5 out of 5
http://thebooksmugglers.com/2009/09/free-reading-triumff-by-dan-abnett-excerpt-3.html
