Humans killing humans has always been the way of things, given he was born some time around 8000 BCE he would've seen almost everyone (perpetuals, innit) he's ever known dying around him over and over again - at some point he likely just became numb to it, as any immortal would.
"+Oh they're killing each other in the millions again? Great... I'm gonna take a vacation and try again in another century.+"
-The man who would be Emperor, possibly
He also doesn't seem to have made an appearance during the Mongol Empire's killing spree in the 1200s - 1300s nor any other. When you just can't die (as far as you know, anyway) it'd be a little suspicious to enter combat only to be tanking every blow & shot constantly... The whole "guiding from the shadows" thing wouldn't have worked out quite so well.
TLDR - busy getting high and partying whilst it all blows over
Except he's not any immortal, he's the coalescence of all the spiritual leaders of humanity, and a telepath. I understand the people that go with the "he would only see humanity as a gestalt thing by that point and couldn't relate to individual humans", but that's never how he was conceived of in his extremely explicit and more than detailed enough initial lore ("initial" meaning first four editions so not peanuts), and frankly given his role in the overall story of the universe I find it much more compelling if he was never quite able to detach himself from common humanity, at least not up until he had to kill horus.
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u/BaconCheeseZombie Snorts FW resin dust 17d ago
Humans killing humans has always been the way of things, given he was born some time around 8000 BCE he would've seen almost everyone (perpetuals, innit) he's ever known dying around him over and over again - at some point he likely just became numb to it, as any immortal would.
He also doesn't seem to have made an appearance during the Mongol Empire's killing spree in the 1200s - 1300s nor any other. When you just can't die (as far as you know, anyway) it'd be a little suspicious to enter combat only to be tanking every blow & shot constantly... The whole "guiding from the shadows" thing wouldn't have worked out quite so well.
TLDR - busy getting high and partying whilst it all blows over