Editing Nobledark Imperium Primarchs (section)

== Mortarion ==

<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%"> '''''The Vermin Lord:'''''

Mortarion was born in the abject squalor of the slums of Gredbritton, in the aftermath of the fall of the Unspeakable Tyrant. His life was certainly not made any easier by the fact that his mother was the fallen Tyrant's daughter; and that many whispered that his unknown father was the Tyrant himself — and given the sheer depravity of that individual, these accusations were hardly baseless. When the hysteria was beginning to die down, his mother did her best to hide their shared heritage and instead made ends meet as a maintenance skivvy and lay-technician of the great Tintajus Hive, the capital of that broken nation. They never truly advanced in wealth or power — although perhaps this was shrewdness on his mother's part, as those of the upper hive would be more likely to recognise them — and as such Mortarion seemed almost permanently sickly, growing up pale and gaunt from lack of sunlight and food. 

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Gredbritton was one of the earliest nations brought into the Imperial fold — being part of a greater union of nations went some way to restoring order, as well as bringing strength and prosperity it had not seen since the nation itself had ruled great swathes of Terra. Like so many young men with no hope, Mortarion joined the regiments of the Imperial Army — not out of some sense of patriotism or desire to bring other realms into the Imperium, but simply for the promise of at least one meal a day, a pair of trousers he didn't have to share, and perhaps even some money to send home to his family.

He served with merit (if not distinction) until he was in his 22nd year, in spite of recurring bouts of old childhood illnesses. At some point in this year he had learned that the Warlord was looking for volunteers for Thunder Warrior conversion, known to be a procedure that carried considerable risks. The Apothecarium and the Biologis warned both him and the officials administrating the project that his physical imperfections would likely render Mortarion little more than a twisted nightmare — yet neither side yielded. The project's overseers were unwilling to turn away one of the few volunteers they could find, least of all one so eager; and for his part, the would-be Thunder Warrior reasoned that his body was already almost constantly betraying him, and that both success and failure would finally bring him the respite he so desperately sought. At first he volunteered, then requested, then ''demanded'' that they tear his body apart and put him back together, as the payout his family would get for his "death" in this manner would set his mother and younger sisters up for life.





By some strange twist of fate he ''did'' survive. Perhaps even the biotechnicians had failed to realise how far they had refined their own process — certainly, the success rate was easily an order of magnitude higher than it was when Angron was "upgraded" — or perhaps the trauma of the procedures was shrugged off by a body that had spent twenty-two long years steadfastly refusing to die. In any case, Mortarion fought as hard as any other in the name of the Imperium and its Warlord, earning rank after rank based on sheer weight of victories. These victories were costly, the battlefields brutal — for Angron was no tactical genius, and would often dismiss inventive but untried tactics and strategies in favour of the certainties of more proven ones. 

Thus, while his superiors prized his methodical successes over the less reliable tactics of the more creative leaders, his men held no love for him, only a grudging respect. The latter was cemented in place by his willingness — nay, his ''insistence'' — to lead from the front, forcing his way into the thickest fighting and risking death alongside his men. They saw great victories against the savage men of Ursh and the organised and equipped armies of Achaemenidia with equal ease, only stumbling when facing the Gyptoussian sorcerers — who dabbled in things that should not be dabbled in. Indeed, it was in those desert campaigns that Mortarion developed a fear, almost a hatred, of all psykers. Never again in his long life would he employ them or even accept their advice or aid, even when it might have been advisable to do so.

Mortarion soon developed a reputation for being invincible, and while this struck fear into his enemies, it merely frustrated his subordinates. He would charge into battle alongside his soldiers, yet he would far outlast them even under the most withering fire; returning from the field of war alone, with shredded armour and spent weapons, sporting wounds that would have felled a lesser Thunder Warrior.




When the forces of the Steward looked to the rest of Sol, Mortarion's forces were assigned primarily to garrison duty due to the costly nature of his method of warfare. In these engagements they held themselves with distinction, as they would make an enemy's assault on them far costlier. By the time Sol was subjugated and the galaxy lay before the Imperium, the Emperor had named him Primarch for his sheer tenacity and list of victories. It was revealed in later years, however, that the Warlord/Steward disapproved greatly of Mortarion's methods of warfare — at least, according to a few unnamed insiders from the Imperial Palace. Mortarion had, by methods undisclosed, obtained the entire stockpile of biological and chemical weapons owned by his late grandfather and father. He had also obtained the ancient library of Gredbritton, the contents of which were hastily handed over to the Warlord's Sigillite.

When taking a city or hive, the Dusk Raiders would prefer to besiege if first, firing artillery rounds filled with a dozen godforsaken contagions over (or through) the walls and waiting a few months. When the time came for them to enter the city, anything that was still alive would be shredded with bolt, plasma and promethium; the only considerable obstacles in their way being the sheer number of dead bodies filling the hive. Only Curze's methods were deemed more detestable, but unlike his fellow primarch's claims that the horrors he committed were for the greater good he simply pointed out that a conventional assault would likely have similar civilian casualties, but would also take a heavy toll on his own legion. The Warlord was never satisfied with this defence, but the results of his campaigns were undeniable.

He would go on to take this method of warfare off-world; after all, the need to kill and conquer in the most efficient way possible was even greater when precious supplies had to be ferried across the depths of space. Many whispered that he was his father's son — but this was not the case. For while the Unspeakable Tyrant had done such things in the name of gods too terrible to contemplate, Mortarion did them in the name of his warriors, and so that they may live another day. For all that ''they'' hated ''him'', he did not hate his own men; although few would have believed that had he told them.





At the onset of the War of the Beast, the Dusk Raiders were quickly established as the dirty, dirty hands of the Imperium. Instead of fighting heroic yet costly rearguards to save evacuees as so many others did, they would bombard worlds with flesh-eating diseases and exsanguination virii the minute they were lost. This, contrary to their detractors, was not to punish those left behind but instead to deny the enemy potential slaves — or food, for that matter — while leaving most material assets intact. Hundreds of billions, maybe even trillions, died from these proto-Virus Bombs, and it did not stop the enemy or even slow their expansion; it was only beginning to chip away at the rate at which the expansion accelerated. Yet this was still more than most other legions could achieve against the sheer size and speed of the Beast's initial assault, and it was done while preserving Mortarion's valuable warriors; indeed, it was then that they earned their moniker of the ''Death Guard'', for the ruination that followed on worlds they failed to defend was as if they were the guardians of the Reaper himself.

Many of Mortarion's fellow Primarchs, Sanguinius and Vulkan in particular, publicly decried these attacks, but he did not care. They called him a traitor, and he did not care. They called him a coward, a monster, and he did not care. They spat on his legion's banner; Dorn in particular calling his warriors detestable cravens — and only then did he warn the man who fought only from his precious entrenchments to mind his choice of words, lest one of the Unspeakable Tyrant's lost weapons suddenly "appear" in the skies over his beautifully crafted defensive lines. For his Legion were not cowards, and any who would make such a claim had not seen the mechanical determination with which they fought. Any who would make such a claim had not seen the way they ground the Beast's forces down into pieces, then into dust, breaking the back of the enemy's assaults so that other, more heroic, ''better'' men might earn the glory of beheading them.


When the smoke had cleared and the Steward and Eldrad stood over the corpse of The Beast, the remains of the Imperium cheered for years, for decades. The Death Guard did not, for they were pushing its borders outwards; rebuilding their legion and continuing their endless, tireless crusade. Never mind how the mighty Dorn and his warriors would not take one step back. The Death Guard would never cease marching forward, into the Dark Millennium and beyond. The only time they would ever falter would be to honour their primarch's passing, on the distant western fringe world known as Macharius' Rest. Where sickness, assassination attempts, Thunder Warrior surgeries and treatment, and thousands of Orks had failed, time had won its final victory. Members of the Dusk Raiders, the Death Guard, and every crusader who had ever fought alongside them made the pilgrimage to the edge of the Imperium, to pay their grudging respects to the Man Who Would Not Die.


''"Even our '''allies''' believe us nothing more than scum, than vermin to be crushed underfoot. Then let us fight like them; with tooth and claw, dragging down the mightiest of enemies with our dying breaths. Let us scour their lands clean with pestilence, and leave nothing that can be used against man — '''for vermin always have the last word'''."''

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