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{{Topquote|The night is dark and full of horror, but the dawn is coming - and it will be glorious. All we must do is survive.|Sgt. Marcus Albus, Mustavaar 3rd Rifles Regiment, 845.M40}}
Welcome to Nobledark Imperium: a fan envisioning of the Warhammer 40,000 universe given a buff to competence and common sense akin to a high-fantasy fiction with many races working together à la Elder Scrolls. Generally speaking, Nobledark deviates less from Vanilla 40k than the writefagging of [[Hektor Heresy]] and [[Imperium Asunder]]; we still have the same xenos races, the same Primarchs (at least in name), and the vast majority of the same Space Marine Legions (and later chapters).  Keep in mind that this is just ''one'' example of Nobledark.  Nobledark is a type of setting like Grimdark is.  You can make your own Nobledark Imperium that is not even remotely like this one (such as the Men of Gold thing).  Just, y'know, not on this page.


== To-do List ==
A brief summary of the deviations and their results, in chronological(ish) order:


*Finish Primarchs
* The Emperor (formerly the Warlord, then the Steward) is a relic from the Dark Age of Technology instead of a bunch of reincarnated Shamans; Malcador was the one who found him and the closest thing he had to a parent.
*Establish timeline and events, and how similar they are to canon 40k
* The Primarchs have all died of battle or age; only three of them (Ferrus Manus, Vulkan, and Magnus) lived to see the Steward ascend to the Golden Throne. However, they were all just regular(ish) humans that the Warlord/Steward found to be worthy of the title, and they still had roles/themes approximating their Vanilla selves (with some changes); for example, Manus was born and raised Mechanicus and given a legion of Super Skitarii © , while Russ and his legion were given the experimental Canis Helix variant of the Space Marine augmentation.
**Origins of Warlord/Steward/Emperor, and his own timeline
* No dickwaving contest over Warmaster, and Steward actually tells everyone about Chaos, so no Horus Heresy. Instead the War of the Beast is given more prominence, with many of the primarch's defining moments taking place therein.
**Unification of Terra
* First contact with the Eldar leads to an alliance that leads a raid into Nurgle's Mansion in the Realm of Chaos to rescue Isha in return for all sorts of technological and psyker goodies. Imperium is not the xenophobic hellhole, many species are Imperial citizens, and the Mechanicum's "dickslapping the big red button" is not prominent. It's akin to a galaxy-wide [[Interex]] done right.
**Great Crusade
* Chaos Gods are pissed, and turbocharge the War of the Beast with Crone Eldar (while Dark Eldar join in for shits and giggles), replacing the Horus Heresy in fucking over the Imperium of Man. Battle of Terra, Sangy dies, etc.
**Rescue of Isha
* Steward doesn't get permarekt because Eldrad Ex Machina, so no Ecclesiarchy (SoB part of secular Ordo Securitas, fulfills a lot of the same functions). Marries Isha at some point because politics.
**War of the Beast (replacing Horus Heresy)
* Legions generally split into chapters within or close to the lifetime of the primarchs (typically shortly after their death).
**Armageddon?
* Goge Vandire is seen to be fit for the Golden Throne; when he goes mad, Steward throws a fit and finally becomes Emperor himself.
**Tyranids? Have they fully arrived yet
* Orks, Necrons, Tyranid vanguard (several millennia early) and DEldar are still doing their thing, as well as Croneworlders being a threat. Few (if any) Primarchs left to help put out fires.
**Other SMs? Only the original legions, or others? Chapters?
* After short indignant protests from both sides, T'au are absorbed into the Imperium after first contact (save for the conservative and xenophobic Farsight Enclaves).
* Tyranid main fleet begins to make galaxyfall.
* Well, shit.


*When is present day?
For more detail on the general nature of the universe and what each of the individual factions have been up to, see [[Nobledark_Imperium_Notes#So_What.E2.80.99s_The_Deal_With_Nobledark_Imperium_Anyway|So What's the Deal with Nobledark Imperium Anyway?]]
*Repercussions of Imperium/Eldar alliance?


NOTE: NEW STUFF IS BEING WORKED ON AND WILL USE THIS AS A HUB PAGE CURRENTLY UNDER CONSTRUCTION. [[Nobledark Imperium Drafts | THE ORIGINAL PAGE IS HERE.]]


==Introduction==
It is the 41st millennium. For more than a hundred centuries the Eternal Emperor and Empress have been joined in their holy union. He, the last relic of a lost age when hope and wisdom ruled the galaxy, still clinging to his purpose of forging a better future. She, the last remnant of an ancient pantheon, a mother watching over dying children brought low by their own hubris. Together, they are the Masters and Guardians of Man and Eldar, the keepers of the Last Alliance, the embodiments of the Imperium to which a hundred sapient species swear their fealty.


== The Imperium ==
At the core of the Imperium is Humanity, its teeming multitudes ever resilient, stubbornly carving out a future amongst the hostile stars. The greatest of Man’s allies are the Eldar, ancient and wise, their shared bond forged in battle and sealed in blood millennia ago. Since then, others have been judged worthy to join in the light of the Imperium, to stand with Men and Eldar as fellows; the industrious Demiurg, enigmatic Tau, countless strains of Abhumans, and many more.


=== A Brief History of the Early Days ===
Yet for all the Imperium’s numbers, it is barely enough to stave off the monstrous forces that would tear it down. United under savage Beasts, the Orkish hordes throw themselves at the great edifice of the Imperium. The Necrons are awakening to a changed galaxy, and seethe at the primitives who would dare harbor their greatest foes, the Eldar. From galactic east the Tyranids have made landfall, and sweep over countless worlds in their hungering tide. In the shadows lurk the Dark Eldar, reveling in the carnage of a galaxy at war. And from the Immaterium, the Chaos Gods brood and plot their eternal vengeance, served by the twisted Chaos Eldar.


Stuff
To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold trillions. It is to live in the last bastion of civilization, as the darkness draws near. These are the tales of those times. Forget the stories of peace and harmony, for they are fables of a gentler time, when the world still made sense. Remember the stories of struggle and defiance, of brotherhood and sacrifice, for those are the ones that truly matter. Peace is a distant dream growing ever fainter, and there is only war as Men and Eldar hold the line for the promise that has been whispered through generations, from father to son, from mother to child: that there is good left in the world, and that is worth fighting for.


<gallery>
==The Road to M41==
Image:Old_Earth_before_the_Unification.png
The Imperium of Man is at war. It has been at war since the day it was created, since an ancient Man of Gold took it upon himself to unite Terra - and the stars beyond - into a single, glorious Imperium. It has not been an easy journey, but nor has it been the debacle it could have been. Perhaps there may even still be hope for the human race.
Image:Old_Earth_after_Unification.jpg
</gallery>


=== Governmental Structure ===
===Unification===
In the depths of the Old Night, the one known as Malcador discovered a relic of the Dark Age of Technology: a Man of Gold. Gifted with intellectual, martial and psychic prowess far beyond any human, his kind had devastated humanity in wars long gone, yet this one would restore it to its former glory. The Man of Gold, returning to Terra to find it a war-torn shell of a homeworld, immediately vowed to dedicate his existence to restoring the race he was created to serve. Thus, he became the Warlord, unifying his world through alliance, war, and every flavour of diplomacy in between. Nations either united under his banner or were conquered by it, and soon a few great leaders distinguished themselves for their achievements in the fledgling Imperium, whether done in the Warlord's name or their own. These men would become his Primarchs.


=== Member States ===
The years passed, and the Warlord looked to the stars. After the alliance with Mars gave the Imperium the material strength to begin reclaiming their former worlds, the Great Crusade began in earnest. Many worlds saw the bright future of the Imperium and greeted the Warlord with open arms. And for those that did not? The Warlord had his Primarchs, who each commanded a legion of elite Space Marines with their own unique brand of warfare. A world with elite armies able to fend off the ferocity of Leman Russ's Vlka Fenryka would be dismantled by the logistical superiority of Roboute Guilliman; one fortified enough to stall the methodical Ultramarines would find themselves with no escape from Mortarion's Death Guard and their horrific plagues; and one with their own arsenal of poisons would see them shrugged off by Ferrus Manus' inhuman Skitarii.


== Notable Planets ==
Closer to home, however, there was a problem; The Warlord had originally been designed to serve humanity, not lead it, and it was a curious irony that the greatest leader in human history did not see himself fit for the role. Nevertheless, he was concerned at how an artificial construct such as himself (though precious few other than Malcador knew of this fact) was shown such reverence across the reclaimed worlds; some worlds' veneration approached worship. Thus, he declared that the Golden Throne of Terra, an ancient artifact discovered that may have predated even him, was the center-piece of the Imperium, and that he would serve as its Steward until a suitable Emperor emerged.


=== Krieg ===
===An Unlikely Alliance===  
In the depths of space, as the Imperium rose, the dying embers of the Eldar Empire spotted a raft of order and sanity they could cling to in a galaxy filled with war and Chaos. After a few violent ''incidents'', a more discreet formal first contact was made; the Steward of the Golden Throne and Farseer Eldrad Ulthran both saw one another as a vital stepping stone to the revival of their respective races' former glory. At the time, the two were both beginning to stall in their ambitions - the remaining Craftworlds were beginning to splinter and rebel from Eldrad's guidance, while the forces of the Great Crusade were facing determined resistance from worlds populated by corrupt abominations instead of mere men.


<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">'''''The Broken World ''''' - or ''The Wretched:''
Although the Steward knew of Chaos, he knew little ''about'' it, for he had been shut down and mothballed in an age where the perils of the Warp were only beginning to manifest, and the great psyker Magnus the Red could articulate little of his own innate, instinctive abilities. The Farseer was only too happy to school the Man of Gold on the intricacies of the warp, and the power available to those who had the gift for it.


Krieg, of the Segmentum Tempestum, Uhulis Sector, at the start of 433.M40 was an entirely different world than what we know in the modern day. Back then, it was a hiveworld with a middling population of 97 billion souls, and a restless aristocracy. A manufacture and trade hub with a surprising knack for technology outside of the Adeptus Mechanicus, interstellar market trends and the subtle shifts of the warp's currents had, over the millenia reduced its prestige and market value- and the attack of Hive Fleet Leviathan led the Administratum to introduce a price ceiling on the products of Krieg to help the war effort. The ruling councils of Autokrats, already impoverished by misfortune (And, truth be told, some serious missteps of their own) were outraged. For them, bound as they were to Krieg itself, the threat of alien invasion was distant, and they saw themselves made slaves to the whole of the sector for the sake of lazy foreigners that couldn't even pay a fair price for their orbital defenses. For that was the specialty of Krieg, big guns. Guns that could be mounted on the planet, and give orbital invaders a beating, and hopefully ward them off. This also made the planet Krieg extraordinarily dangerous to attack. Any attack from above would be costly indeed.
===The Dream Shatters===


<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
===The Dark Millenium===


So, when a grand conclave of Autokrats were called, the attendees freely ruminated and conspired against the Imperium, secure in the shadows of their defenses. The Autokrats agreed that a formal complaint should be lodged to the Imperium. And that if they weren't met properly, that the councils would meet again, and elect a High Autokrat, an office only called for in times of crisis, when the whole of the planet had to act together. On paper at least, the Autokrats were united in their cause; respect, or war.
==The Imperium==
The Imperium, in its millennia of existence, has endured horrors that so easily could have crippled it and crushed its dreams for the future. Yet, in the near future, it faces its most daunting challenges yet - all for mere survival.


However, the Autokrats were a minority in the grand scheme of things. For the vast majority of the planet that labored, lived, and died in the hives, "For Throne and Man," was their byword, and even as the Autokrats fumed in their spires, the factory workers set their shoulders, shook their heads, and redoubled their labors. It was possible that this upset would have remained just that- a grumbling, that would be addressed when the Administratum representatives arrived to hear complaints. An agreement might have been reached, or a display of force on the truculent Autokrats, and Krieg would have returned to normalcy, minus a few belligerent aristocrats.
=== The Primarchs ===
{| class="wikitable"
!|Primarch
!|Aliases
!|Homeland
!|Fate
!|Legion & Successors
!|Attributed Quotes
|-
| style="width: 5%" |'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Horus_Lupercal|Horus Lupercal]]'''''
|style="width: 13%" |''King of Empty Space''
''Steward of the Void''
| style="width: 10%" | None (Void Born Migrant Fleet)
| style="width: 17%"| Natural death between War of the Beast and First Black Crusade, exact date/location unknown.
| style="width: 20%"|Void Wolves
*Black Legion
*Luna Wolves
*Sons of Horus
|style="width: 28%"|''"I am the captain of this migrant fleet, yes, but I am also a businessman. In this place, '''I''' am the one who proposes the deals. Now, get off my ship."''
~To a Chaos "negotiator", date unknown.
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Leman_Russ|Leman Russ]]'''''
|''The Great Wolf''
''The Lapdog''
|Skand, Nordyc territory
|MIA, forests of Fenris 200 years after War of the Beast.
|Space Wolves [Canis Helix]
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Ferrus_Manus|Ferrus Manus]]'''''
|''The Gorgon''
''Ice and Iron''
|Orioc, Antarctic Mechanicus Enclaves
|KIA, defending Hades Hive on Armageddon.
[616.M40]
|Iron Hands [Enhanced Skitarii]
|
''“While Mars stands, the Imperium shall stand; when Mars falls, the Imperium shall fall; when the Imperium falls, the galaxy shall fall”.''<br>
~Ferrus Manus, on the nature of the Imperium.
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Fulgrim|Fulgrim]]'''''
|''Furis Doe''
|Merika
|
|Children of Terra [Mk ? Astartes]
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Vulkan|Vulkan]]'''''
|''The Promethean''
''Vulkan the Invincible''
|Afrique League
|MIA, presumed lost after "Centuries of Silence"
[M37-38?]
|Salamanders [Mk 3 Astartes]
*Black Dragons
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Rogal_Dorn|Rogal Dorn]]'''''
|''The Wall''
|Calbi
|KIA defending Cadia, 1st Black Crusade
|Imperial Fists [Mk ? Astartes]
*Crimson Fists
|"''W...what are you doing soldier? Go back and man the damn wall you idiot, because I sure as hell won't be able to.''"<br>
~The dying words of Rogal Dorn, chewing out the soldier trying to save his mortally wounded primarch's life by pulling him off the battlements of Cadia
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Roboute_Guilliman|Roboute Guilliman]]'''''
|''The Artist of War''
|Europia
|Natural Death.
[014.M32]
|Ultramarines [Mk ? Astartes]
*Mortifactors
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Magnus_the_Red|Magnus the Red]]'''''
|''The Arch-Psyker''
|[[Nobledark_Imperium_Drafts#Ursh|Ursh]]
|Natural Death, date/location unknown.
[Early M36, soon after Age of Apostasy]
|Thousand Sons [Mk ? Astartes]
*Grey Knights (Heavy Influence)
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Sanguinius|Sanguinius]]'''''
|''The Martyr Angel''
|Duscht Jemanic
|KIA dueling The Beast, Battle of Terra.
|Blood Angels [Mk ? Astartes]
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Lion|Lion El'Jonson]]'''''
|''The Black Knight''
|Franj
|MIA, in stasis after dueling Luther around 1st Black Crusade
|Dark Angels [Mk ? Astartes]
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Perturabo|Perturabo]]'''''
|''The Warsmith''
''The Mad Architect''
|Štip-Isar, Macedonia
|"Retired" to Terra, natural death. Date unknown.
|Iron Warriors [Mk ? Astartes]
*Silver Skulls
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Mortarion|Mortarion]]'''''
|''The Vermin Lord''
''The Man Who Would Not Die''
|Gredbritton
|Natural death, Macharius' Rest. Date unknown.
|Dusk Raiders [Mk ? Astartes]
*Death Guard [Post-WotB]
*Black Templars
|''"You think of us as '''scum''', you call us '''vermin'''? Then like vermin we shall fight, with tooth and claw until even the mightiest of enemies is overpowered. We shall scour their lands clean, and leave nothing that can be used against man - '''for vermin always have the last word.'''"''
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Lorgar Aurelian|Lorgar]]'''''
|
|Yndonesic Bloc
|Natural death, date/location unknown. [lived 1100 years]
|Word Bearers [Mk ? Astartes]
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Jaghatai_Khan|Jaghatai Khan]]'''''
|''The Noble Savage''
''The Scarred Khan''
|[[Nobledark_Imperium_Drafts#Ursh|Ursh]]
|Natural death while touring the Imperium, date/location unknown.
|White Scars [Mk ? Astartes]
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Konrad_Curze|Konrad Curze]]'''''
|''The Unforgivable''
|Tordashimya, Pan-Pacific Empire
|Surrendered himself to the Inquisition for trial and execution over war crimes.
[242.M32]
|Night Lords [Mk ? Astartes]
*Carcharodons
|''"I am not a decent man."''
~Only defence given at trial; last known words.
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Angron|Angron]]'''''
|''The Gladiator''
''The Red Angel''
|Nord Afrik Enclaves
|Natural death, shortly after WotB. Location unknown.
|War Hounds [Mk ? Astartes]
*Minotaurs
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Corax|Corvus Corax]]'''''
|''Raven King''
''The Stormcrow''
|Sino
|Disappeared while visiting newly founded chapters when his legion was split, date/location unknown.
|Raven Guard (voluntarily split)
|
|-
|'''''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Alpharius_and_Omegon|I am]]'''''
|''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Alpharius_and_Omegon|The Alpha]]''
''[[Nobledark_Imperium_Primarchs#Alpharius_and_Omegon|and the Omega.]]''
|The beginning,
|and the end.
|Cut off one head,
*And two more
*Shall take its place.
| H█y █d██ r██a█  Do██ ██m█ in██ a█t███us
~[DATA EXPUNGED BY INQUISITORIAL ORDER]
|-
!|Primarch
!|Aliases
!|Homeland
!|Fate
!|Legion & Successors
!|Attributed Quotes
|}


However, the representatives of the Administratum never arrived, and Krieg suffered a further two separate blows.
[[Category:Nobledark Imperium]][[Category:Homebrew Settings]]
 
[[Category:Warhammer Homebrew]]
The fate of the Administratum mission has yet to be revealed. The only clue recovered was a letter from Administrative Senioris Sandos to his wife, noting with pleasure that he might return in time for Sanguinalia celebrations, that he'd secured passage through the webway "With a trustworthy sort." All Eldar guides within the sector capable of granting access to the webway deny ever offering that to a human, much less a lowly bureaucrat. There is a sizable reward still on offer for the missing Administrative, and the Administratum further cautions all citizens that the webway is restricted to a select few- anyone offering them a 'shortcut' should be considered a criminal, and treated as such.
 
As the year passed on, and the Administratum's delegation failed to appear, the Autokrats convinced themselves that this was a calculated slight from the Administratum. For the Autokrats of Krieg, it was obvious that the Imperium had no care for them, and didn't even care to tell them to their face. Krieg is a relatively ancient world, and has had a fiercely xenophobic streak in their culture- and for those Kriegers that believed in the Imperium, and the vision of the Throne, the silence shook them.
 
The issue was further deepened due to the astropathic messaging system- due to Krieg's growing insignificance, they had few astropaths, and those few were held privately by Autokrats. They may well have kept the news of the disappeared delegation quiet. Or assumed that, like any other words from beyond Krieg, any assurances that the delegation had been lost could only be treated as lies.
 
Then there was the Segmentum Tempestum Famine. The Ulthran Cartel had elected to invest in agri-futures- and with that investment came a stampede of Rogue Traders, Demiurge Trade Clans, and savvy planetary governors following the trend. Most notably was the influence of at least one Necron lord. Though indirectly involved in the market, for reasons unknown, a spate of necron attacks were aimed solely at agriworlds in the segmentum for a period of seven years, further aggravating food supplies. The market dried up, and shiftless and dishonest grain haulers meant for hive and forge worlds dependent on their products skimmed from the top to sell to this feeding frenzy. In the chaos of the Hive Fleet Leviathan's invasion, and the subsequent shadow cast by the hive mind blocking out psker communications, the administratum failed to notice until it was too late for the Uhulis Sector. Worlds starved.
 
Krieg was not among them. They wouldn't have the chance.
 
The precise Autokrats immediately detected they were being short changed on loads from their grain haulers. Outraged, they turned their guns on the hauler, and demanded the full load. The grain hauler in question (Records indicate a shiftless layabout "Regnal Ersten" with a forged Writ of Trade as the unfortunate) made excuses. The Kriegers fired a volley upon the orbiting vessel to make clear their dissatisfaction. The Rogue Trader, apparently, then babbled out a series of excuses, culminating in the claim that the Segmentum Command had seized most of the food intended for Krieg.
 
The Autokrats were satisfied with their suspicions confirmed. After finishing off the grain hauler with another volley (Surprisingly, Regnal survived this, and would meet his own gruesome fate far later- but that's another story) the Autokrats met once more, and elected a High Autokrat among their number- as far as they were concerned, they were in a state of war.
 
We have no record of the identity of the High Autokrat. Their position, history, statements, gender, and fate are unknown. The Death Korps of Krieg were thorough in erasing this hated figure from memory. All we know was that there was a High Autokrat, and that this figure would openly declare secession from the Imperium of Man.
 
At this time, seven Astra Militarum regiments of Kriegers had been raised, and were posted on the world. They had been staying garrisoned in case of tyranid attack, and awaiting orders that would have presumably accompanied the Administratum delegation.
 
As part of their duties, they were to gather supplies. This included food for campaign, begrudgingly supplied by the planet.
 
The hivers of Krieg had never been strangers to hunger. It is the same on all hives- due to corruption, inadequate transport capacity, or the simple structure of billions contained in such a small space, malnutrition is rampant. There are always too many mouths, and never enough meals.
 
The hivers of Krieg had known the shock of having the Imperium fail them, and now faced famine. The Death Korps of Krieg stated simply that the population rose in rebellion against the Imperium, and by extension those Imperial Regiments as well, but I feel that this misses a step. To editorialize, I imagine that the High Autokrat (Being a cunning sort) let this stew a few days. Let the rations dwindle, let the people wonder what's going on- perhaps even attempted to rather publicly deny the Imperial Regiments their supplies, and suffered equally public rebuke.
 
The people would hunger, see what happened, and wonder. Wonder why their children cried from hunger, as the soldiers marched and drilled and menaced with bayonet, taking scraps meant for them. The High Autokrat would let that stew, then speak.
 
I know not the High Autokrat's charisma, but I can't imagine the starving need much convincing to seize food.
 
Or perhaps it's just as the Death Korps describe it. The population en masse blindly rejected Imperial Law in madness, and set upon the regiments like savage dogs.
 
There were seven Imperial Regiments arranged at that time, and seven hive cities. There's a fascinating account of the fall of six of these hive cities embedded in the training manuals of the Kriegers. Each city lost held a lesson to them, and each pre-Death Korps regiment that fought and fell had a deadly sin associated with them as reason to how they fell. From each fall, they took a lesson, until one hive remained, Hive Ferrograd, under the command of one Colonel Jurten. If the Kriegers can recognize a hero, they might think of Jurten as one.
 
Ferrograd was the center for manufacture of ammunition- which kept the final of the loyalist Kriegers well surprised. There was an offer of surrender, but the war was bitterly fought already. The only thing you would earn in surrender was a quick death. Colonel Jurten knew that the Imperium was still months out. His forces would starve before the Imperium could arrive. Following that, the Imperium invasion would be costly, if it succeeded- if, and at this, Colonel Jurten feared the most, if the Imperium would even bother coming.
 
By this time, what was once a strangely anthropomorphized civic philosophy had become almost a religious mania. He believed in the Throne, even as the rebels around him ranted and raved about making a new Throne, a proper one on Krieg. Jurten knew that was heresy. And he knew the origin of it. The hubris of thinking the Throne would care. The present armageddon and sorrows sown by all of this was a consequence of that central arrogance- that the Kriegers would get something for loving the Throne. The Throne was to be served. The Throne was not there to serve them.
 
And if Krieg would not serve the Throne, Krieg did not deserve to be.
 
Krieg is a world that has its fair share of technological wonders and secrets. Among the ammunition that Hive Ferrograd produced for the orbital guns were atomics. A terrible amount of them. On the day of the Feast of the Emperor's Ascension, Colonel Jurgen gave the people of Krieg a feast that would never be forgotten. For sixteen hours straight, his collection of guns roared, blanketing the whole of Krieg in nuclear fire. Estimates lodge the amount of nuclear weapons launched in the thousands. An event in the future known as "The Purging." A kill count was kept. As point of pride, the warriors of Krieg estimated that brave Colonel Jurten with sixteen hours, reduced the population from 97 billion down to little more than 780 mlilion.
 
The world had never been a garden world, but I found a portrait of old Krieg once. Sold for a pretty penny. Though dated to the right era, I am not unconvinced it's a forgery, but perhaps that is due to my own horror at the sight of it. It was a poorly painted water color, perhaps by a student, showing the feet of a titanic steel hive towering into the clouds, standing atop harsh and jagged moss stained stone, wind and rain lashing the cliff side, and in the grey and dim light that peeked through the clouds, an animal soaring through the air. At least, I think it is. Might be a smudge on the canvas.
 
Krieg has no towering hives now, just ruins and subterranean warrens. The once proud stones have been reduced to rubble and sand. There is no water on Krieg, save for what's found in canteens and barrack reserves. The clouds are far lower to the ground now, laden with poison and chemical. The only life upon Krieg now are Kriegers. Kriegers, and the horses they grow in vats beneath the surface to ride into battle.
 
Though the Purging was the single greatest use of nuclear weapons in a short span of time upon the surface of Krieg, nuclear weapons would continue to be used. Both sides entrenched, and fought to the bitter, genocidal end in a war that would continue on for a further 500 years. The rebel survivors had gained a psychopathic hatred for the madmen that had reduced their world to ashes, and the loyalists grimly fought in the name of the Throne, knowing that no quarter would be given. They both practiced total war. They innovated, adapted, took on the gas mask, supplemented their meager diets with corpse starch (It's exactly as it sounds), introduced large scale usage of the mysterious "Vitae Womb" technology, and reduced all their beliefs to a fanatic, fatalistic, all encompassing devotion to the Imperium. The only thing for a Krieger is the fight. The duty. The war. Nothing else. For five hundred years, all other Krieger culture was erased. Art, music, literature, all the trappings of a civilian life was crushed by the demand for total war.
 
As Colonel Jurten had feared, the Imperium had more important matters to deal with than just another hive world descending into madness and blood shed. Two expeditions were undertaken to Krieg during this time. The first, a curious rogue trader, was fired upon by automated orbital guns and they beat a hasty retreat. The second, a mechanicus survey fleet, came within range, and did not report being fired upon, but instead reported what seemed to be a complete, genocidal civil war being fought by a population of perhaps a few million, upon a worthless death world. They moved on.
 
In 949.M40, Krieg sent a missive to the Imperium at large stating that the rebellion had quashed, and the Death Korps of Krieg were waiting for orders.
 
Krieg has no governor. Krieg has a Grand Marshal, in charge of recruitment and training of Kriegers. All Kriegers are considered qualifying soldiers. Logic would lead one to expect there has to be some administrative center upon Krieg aside from this Grand Marshal, but the Death Korps of Krieg seem content to hand off most logistics responsibilities to the Departmento Munitorium.
 
Departmento Munitorium officers assigned to coordinate and keep Kriegers in armor and weapons upon Krieg have a very high turnover rate. Few deaths, but from my understanding, psychological burn out is the primary cause.
 
Kriegers are immune to boredom. There are no diversions. There is only labor, training, war, and waiting. Any diversion from these four activities is looked upon with contempt, if not hostility. Kriegers are also remarkably xenophobic. And I mean that in the broadest term possible- fellow guardsmen often find Kriegers uncommunicative, and at times laden with barely disguised disgust. It seems any with a survival instinct are considered lesser men.
 
For aliens, it is worse. Philosophically, the Kriegers came from a point with extreme deprivation. To them, every breath an alien draws is theft. Every acre of space they occupy is one less acre for proper humans to utilize. Every mouthful of food, another mouthful denied to those that better deserve it. In their eyes, the proper place of an alien is at the end of a bayonet. The fact that the Imperium tolerates these is a matter barely tolerated.
 
Yet, for all their lack of social graces, the Departmento Munitorium has embraced the Kriegers. They win wars. Any order given is fulfilled without hesitation, doubt, or regret, even in the face of death. And there are a great deal of them.
 
The Departmento Munitorium has long had a debate between two, rough, major schools of military study- the Reformers and the Macharians. It is no secret that, as the years have gone on, more and more regiments are drilled and equipped in the Cadian style. In the eyes of the Reformer generals, the advantages are obvious- Cadian soldiers are considered the standard by which all others of the Imperium are measured, and standardization and centralization of equipment would only help with logistics in the Astra Militarum. Something as simple as ordering a replacement lasrifle powerpack can lead to tragedy due to different manufacturing standards and usage across the endless worlds. Let there be one set of kit, training, and organization instead of the confusing hodge podge that blunders on through luck and sheer bloody mindedness.
 
The Macharians take their name from Lord Solar Macharius, who famously forged an army from a mass of diverse elements and worlds, making a flexible legion ready for every element. In their minds, trying to force guardsmen to march and act the same is an act of folly, that denies useful specialization and experience. Any attempted reform would take hundreds of years, untold fortunes, and would cause the war machine to grind to a halt even as they are besieged on all sides. Catachans are expert jungle fighters, Valhallans ice worlders, Chem Dogs tunnel fighters, and so on and so forth. Why break what isn't broken?
 
But now, there is a third regiment that is gaining acclaim, one that even the Reformers balk at modeling after. The Death Korps of Krieg.
 
Those that favor the Kriegers, see a model of the future. A guardsman that doesn't hesitate. Doesn't doubt. Doesn't question. Fears nothing, and fulfills every order to the letter. And better yet, there is no end to them. Generals at the strategic level find the Death Korps of Krieg refreshing. Far too often, regiments have generals that don't understand their place, and seek to ask questions or meddle in affairs above them. Refusing orders, 'misinterpreting' commands, engaging in cowardly routs: such are the sins of the common general. Oh yes, on occasion there's one that rises above, heroes that make for stirring propaganda- but let's be honest. Heroes are not what victory is made of. Victory is made of attrition, of materiel, of being willing to fight longer than the other guy. Victory is the stuff Kriegers are made of. They don't need commissars. Their loyalty is beyond question. And they seemingly spring out of the dirt with their wondrous Vitae Wombs. They're practically a new breed of human, and should be welcomed.
 
Though the other factions are uneasy at this new model of guardsman, those in the Departmento Munitorium see the future in the Death Korps. Limitless guardsmen that will not break, grinding down all that oppose the Imperium. The anvil, to the maneuverable hammer of the Astartes. One day, these generals dream, all the guard will be like the Death Korps. Fearless. Unquestioning. Replaceable.
 
The Death Korps of Krieg for their part do not care. They can be found on every front, on every battlefield, wherever a soldier is called to die, a Krieger will march there to take his place. They do not question. They serve.
 
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== The Assassins==
 
The Officio Assassinorum was one of the oldest arms of the Imperial Government, derived from the days when the Emperor was the Warlord, uniting Terra and ending the barbarity and cruelty that reigned rampant over the land. Perhaps it is fitting that, as the Warlord turned from the Steward, and then into the Emperor, that those ancient assassin orders were tamed, and reformed into the Officio Tacitum.
 
The Rebuke at Mount Vengeance is the common story of the Officio Assassinorum's founding. In those days, the Emperor was still the Warlord, and was mired in battles amidst the Salt Spires against a confederation of temples- little is known about them as the archives regarding their history was lost during the anarchy of the War of the Beast (Some wonder if this was Vangorich's objective all along), they were reportedly loathsome foes. Led by their squabbling Temple Masters, mercenary and heartless they took contract against the Warlord. Elusive, technologically advanced, cowardly, and fond of attacking the most vulnerable parts of the Warlord's army and civilian populace, seeking to lure the Warlord into a trap. But the temples would find the Warlord far more durable than any other target they had chosen.
 
Incensed at the atrocities inflicted upon the people under his protection, the Warlord made war on the Salt Spires. Though the temples had gone into hiding, the Warlord was not after them, but instead their water. The assassins were unable to stand against the Warlord and his forces in a direct fight, and were unable to outlast and hide deprived of life giving water. So, they came before the Warlord to seek treaty.
 
The Temple Masters met at Mount Vengeance to pledge allegiance to the Warlord. And at Mount Vengeance they received his full scorn. The Warlord was not content with a mere offer of fealty. For all that those Grandmasters had done to his people, for the lives they had taken, the Warlord would be content with nothing less than their absolute obliteration. Total surrender, or total annihilation. That was their only choice.
 
It is said some of the Temple Masters unwisely struck then. They died. Some fled. They died later. But around the base of the mountains, there were some that stayed still, bowing in total obeisance to the Warlord, recognizing the inevitable.
 
Of those, some that were judged as having committed crimes beyond forgiveness were slain. Others were stripped of rank, and banished into the salt wastes. One was judged pure, and allowed to keep office and title. All of those that surrendered though, were allowed to know their temples would survive, joining the Imperium under the careful eye of Malcador.
 
Thus was formed the Officio Assassinorum. Malcador was pleased with the Warlord's mercy- in spite of the Warlord's fury, he recognized talent. Properly stewarded and tamed, the assassins could serve well. And the exotic technologies they guarded could be incorporated into his own body of knowledge. A few thousand years later though, the assassins gave cause for the Steward to regret his mercy.
 
In 546.M32, the Grandmaster of the Officio Assassinorum attempted to assassinate the High Lords of Terra. Though the events are shrouded in mystery, concealing motive, means, and in a few cases even identity, the event destabilized an already battered Imperium. Called 'the Beheading,' the violence and death was restricted to the halls of the Imperial Palace, and thus prevents an accurate retelling. All that is known is that the Inquisitorial Representative, the Master of the Astronomicon, the Paternal Envoy of the Navigators, and the Fabricator-General of the Adeptus Mechanicus were killed before the Steward was able to stop Grandmaster Vangorich's terror.
 
Naturally, the question comes to mind as to how Vangorich was able to get as far as he did- speculation comes that he bent the considerable resources of the Officio Assassinorum to the task of making his fellow High Lords deaths look like accidents. That perhaps, with the events taking place so close to the War of the Beast, that Vangorich took advantage of the chaos of that dark time. Or maybe it was a blitz, an attempted seizure of government that surprised the Imperium.
 
All sources agree though, that once revealed, Vangorich unleashed the assassins on the whole of the palace, bathing its halls in blood. And that the Steward personally put a stop to Vangorich's killing spree. Permanently. Though some historians wax poetically about an agonizing death or Vangorich being imprisoned in an eternal torture, or whisked away to another time and place to earn redemption, the most reliable statement sourced from the Captain-General of the Adeptus Custodes states simply that the Steward broke Vangorich's neck after an ill judged attempt by the Grandmaster to slay the Steward with a vortex grenade.
 
The Beheading had been undertaken by Vangorich, but the Steward noted with no small distaste that Vangorich's orders had not been questioned or doubted by any of the assassins under his command. Without Malcador to keep an eye on the Officio Assassinorum, it seemed the assassins were falling back on their bad habits. Despite being busy with rebuilding the Imperium, the Steward set aside a day to scour the (Much reduced) assassin ranks- those that were found wanting of moral character were either incinerated or pressed into a penal legion, depending on if they had acted or not. One assassin that the Steward found was of solid loyalty and properly impressed by the psionic bonfire was declared new Grandmaster and told to sort things out, and that if the Steward had to come back that that would mean the end for the Officio Assassinorum.
 
Four thousand years later, the Steward had to come back.
 
Admittedly, the Grandmaster that the Steward put in place had served honorably, loyally, and carefully. Within the temples, long overdue reforms were undertaken, training formalized, and generations of assassins raised to revere the imperium as a whole more than their temple. The Grandmaster, when she felt her time came, passed on to one she felt she could trust, and he continued her work, focusing on material provisions and improving assassin survival rates. When he was lost in a warpstorm, his successor was well chosen, and arranged a more formalized chain of command for the assassins, and so on, and so forth, until the reign of Goge Vandire.
 
Trusted by the Steward to take the throne, Emperor Goge Vandire was, on the surface, the ideal servant of the Imperium. Clever, humble, decisive, intelligent, and intimately familiar with all parts of the imperial government, save the assassins. Naturally, he was curious. He had an amicable meeting with the Grandmaster, who reaffirmed the Officio Assassinorum's loyalty to the Steward.
 
"And to the Emperor?"
"As far as the Steward trusts, the Emperor, yes."
 
Emperor Goge Vandire laughed off that. And the Grandmaster offered a thin smile back. And that was the end of that, the Grandmaster had thought. Emperor Vandire thought the same, but a small part of him remembered that meeting, and saw echoes of it everywhere. All people trusted him because the Steward trusted him. After years of selfless service, after all of his work, after he had been crowned Emperor, and still, still, still, the Steward was not far from people's thoughts or lips. Still, the Steward overshadowed Emperor Vandire, and his every act was judged against a living god. Over the years of Emperor Vandire's reign, and over the course of too many treatments of juvenat and too many hard decisions and imagined slights, it rolled in Emperor Vandire's mind, and what started as a mild irritation became full blown paranoia and suppressed rage.
 
Vandire was talented enough to find an assassin frustrated at her place in the temples, a callidus by the name of Tziz Jarek. Vandire had by this time assumed de facto control of most of the Imperium, and taking the Officio Assassinorum would be the coup de grâce, assuring his complete and total control of the Imperium.
 
Tziz Jarek just wanted the promotion, and made sure to step back out of Vandire's foam and spittle range when he started ranting.
 
The assassination, though textbook perfect, ended up claiming the Grandmaster's body double. Tziz Jarek, unaware of this, used polymorphine to disguise herself as the Grandmaster of the Assassins, and the Assassinorum was Vandire's. The assassins helped prosecute Emperor Vandire's reign of terror at the command of their puppeted Grandmaster, silencing political and military opponents with merciless efficiency. The true Grandmaster meanwhile went in to hiding, gathering loyal assassins from Terra and beyond, recovering and arming from hidden assassin caches that Tziz Jarek could not know of.
 
When the reign of Emperor Vandire was at its end, and he was about to unleash his assassin army on the rebel forces, the true Grandmaster struck at Tziz Jarek and the assassin temple with the gathered loyalist forces. The battle was devastating. The assassin temples had long dormant, forbidden technologies at their disposal, and both sides used them with abandon convinced (rightly) that the victory of the other would result in their complete extermination. Gene sympathetic nerve gases, neutronic warheads, entropic broadcasters, pan-chronal disruptors, all these and more recorded as being used. The event was called the Wars of Vindication, and it would be repeated across the whole of the Imperium as assassin turned against assassin, seeking to purge traitors or evidence of their treachery.
 
When the Steward came to see the Grandmaster, it was to the sight of smoking, hellish ruin.
 
The Grandmaster pointed to a corpse that looked identical to the Grandmaster and stated that the traitor was dead.
 
The Steward was unamused.
 
The Grandmaster offered her life by way of apology, and begged the Officio Assassinorum be spared. The Grandmaster knew the warning passed down from Grandmaster to Grandmaster, and was all too aware of the terrible possibility of the Steward fulfilling his promise. Though bitterly disappointed at Emperor Vandire's reign, and the Officio Assassinorum once more proving vulnerable to tyrants and madmen, the Steward was merciful. The Grandmaster had fought for the Imperium after all. And the Steward was perhaps a touch disappointed with himself, for trusting Goge in the first place. He allowed the Grandmaster to go into exile and gave a final order to the surviving assassins to gather for a new dictum. After he cleaned up the mess.
 
When the Steward, now Emperor spoke on the Officio Assassinorum again, he gave four terse dictates.
 
First, all rebel assassins were to be granted a month window of clemency. They were misled. They could return, and be granted a trial. Any that did not take that offer were to be killed, and a series of bounties offered for their lives. The Grandmaster had done well in documenting those assassins that followed Tziz Jarek. Many fortunes were made assassin hunting in the following years. Though rumors naturally persist of renegades still out there.
 
Second, the Officio Assassinorum was hereby dissolved. The temples were to be disbanded, all masters stripped of office, all survivors to submit to retraining and recertifying, their documentation submitted to the administratum for review, and methodologies revealed for assessment. Those survivors that passed muster would be reintegrated into the new Officio Tacitum. There, they would be under civilian control. No more temples. No more secretive sifus. No more secret handshakes and grandmasters. No more shadowy meetings lit by incense. Everything was to be documented, and monitored by the proper authorities.
 
Third, the Inquisition would have a new Ordo. The Ordo Sicarius to act as a watchdog and oversight committee. These would be the proper authority to watch over the assassins now. They would be empowered to investigate all threats and abuses emerging within the Officio Tacitum.
 
Fourth, if the assassins again threatened the stability of the Imperium, the Emperor would make sure there would be no fourth assassin crisis in the simplest way possible.
 
The Emperor had spoken. There would be no dissent. at least, publicly.
 
The Officio Tacitum is a far more modern organization. Though it primarily is still famed for its assassins, it also produces operatives specialized in sabotage and covert warfare far from home. Agents are typically seconded to Inquisitorial task forces these days, or sometimes sent out to support greater operations of the Astra Militarum. Though rare, there are still the missions sent out of the lone assassin getting the impossible done, but the high risk and high cost of such undertakings has led the Ordo Sicarius to frown on these practices. Far better to have them close by where they can be watched.
 
The temples are far less superstitious and rite drenched now, though the name of 'temple' has stuck to their specializations. Temple Vindicare, Temple Eversor, Temple Culexus, Temple Callidus, and Temple Venenum have all diversified and modernized to the point that agents that have proven their worth and with express Ordo Sicarius permission can even train in these prestigious institutions that have refined murder to an art form. There is no Temple Vanus. That does not exist. The Ordo Sicarius has confirmed this, and will not allow any dispute.
 
Assassin recruits are generally drawn from theschola progenium, or talents from the Militarum Tempestus. Or those that the Sicarius favor.
 
Though the primary headquarters of the temple assassins lies on Terra, across each segmentum there are localized, lesser temples that trainers and talented assassins cycle through to pass on their skills, and more importantly, allow liaison with Segmentum Commands. Ordo Sicarius Inquisitors can generally be found near segmentum command to permit proper coordination if Tacitum assets are needed. With proper Inquisitorial oversight, the assassins are kept well in check, and well out of politics.
 
 
The High Lords of Terra still has a seat for the Grandmaster of Assassins, but it has been left vacant ever since the reign of Emperor Vandire. Few imagine it will ever be filled again.
 
== The Primarchs ==
 
<gallery>
Image:Space_Marine_Evolution.png
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The Warlord in his conquests of Old Earth and Sol created the title of Primarch and awarded it to twenty of his greatest generals that they might become leaders of leaders. This was partly to maintain an ordered hierarchy but also to promote autonomy of his forces. The Warlords long term dream of the time was creating a system of governance so efficient that he would become obsolete. His short term dream of the time was to free up enough time to spend all evening in the pub. Of the twenty awarded that rank only eighteen are by name and deed remembered to history under that most august of title.
 
=== Horus ===
 
- 100% human from Luna, possibly of Void Born stock.
 
=== Russ ===
 
 
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">'''''The Great Wolf''''' - or ''The Lapdog:''
 
Russ was the first to recruit warriors from beyond Sol into his superhuman ranks. The people of Fenris were excellent recruitment stock, even for a barbaric and primitive planet that needed extensive education to learn the discipline necessary in war. Russ himself was from a discontinued line of super soldiers; savage and with heightened senses, the Canis Helix (or Dog Soldier as its detractors often referred to it as) Project proved to be too unstable, even for the best minds in the Imperium. If news of the monsters born from it had become common knowledge on Earth the Warlord's support would have crumbled - but on a distant world as remote and seldom visited as Fenris, the project could not only be buried but begun anew at Russ's behest. After all, any monsters arising from the Project were the problem of a few distant primitives, and certainly not the concern of the glorious Terra. For his part, the Emperor at first claimed no knowledge of the new Dog Soldiers, and even when he did learn of it he trusted Russ's claim of the failure rate as being "well within acceptable parameters", leaving the Fenris and its canine guardians well alone.
 
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
 
 
The Space Wolves, as the legion became known, quickly made up for their questionable origins by serving with great distinction during the Great Crusade, excelling at tracking a target and assassinating them, often in a close-quarters combat. Regrettably, in the wretched days of the War of the Beast, a number of the wolves were tempted down the bath of bloodshed for bloodshed's sake and forsook the Empty Throne of Terra for the one of brass and bone, where the God of War held court instead. Of these oathbreakers no name was cursed more by Russ than that of Skyrar of Caledonia - whom Russ once would have called brother.
 
Some measure of honour would be restored, however, to the ranks broken by turncoats and anointed in blood. Russ's Wolves made great speed back towards Terra, and seeing the home he had left a lifetime ago aflame in war broke the Great Wolf's heart. The wolves threw themselves into the inferno and fought like mad beasts with neither thought of the past or hope for the future; no thirst for vengeance but instead a plea for redemption. Russ himself was there at the Last Roll of Thunder when Arik Taranis, Bearer of Lightning, fell in battle in the great plaza before the Eternity Gate and took up the tattered old Unification banner.
 
When the last of the fires grew cold none would ever again question the loyalty of the Space Wolves. For all that the shattered remnant of a legion was covered in blood and soot, each man felt truly clean.
 
 
 
 
The remains of the Space Wolves retreated to Fenris, licking their wounds, and quietly rebuilding their legion as the Imperium rebuilt itself - for no matter how enlightened or holy it may become, Russ knew that the Throne would always need its tame monsters. But the Great Wolf himself was not to fall in glorious battle, and certainly not to fall to the temptations of the Ruinous Powers. Instead, the legends say, some two centuries later Russ - now an old warrior and the King of his world - simply walked out into the snow, alone. His brothers, friends, servants all followed his tracks into the cold woods of the frozen north but he was never seen again. Some say the Old King is resting, and will return to face the Old Night in the days when hope withers and the stars grow dim.
 
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=== Ferrus Manus ===
 
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%"> '''''The One of Ice and Iron:'''''
 
The unimaginatively named Ferrus Manus was born in the manner of the Mechanicus enclaves of Antarctica - or rather, grown in a jar from anonymous genetic samples. Deemed free of malformation and unwanted deviations in his early development, which were rare and valuable assets in this age where clumsy genetic enhancement created mutants more horrific than radiation or plague ever could, he was permitted to be born rather than recycled. Being born and raised where he was and at the time he was, he had no name at birth, at birth although the markings on his tube did superficially resemble the name Gorgon in an ancient tongue recognised by one of the oldest magi. This was adopted as his unofficial name in his youth; doubly so after it became apparent that he would grow up to be aesthetically displeasing.
 
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
 
 
He was given a basic and general techno-ecumenical education until age 12, after which he began training for full inclusion to the Mechanicus. By age 14 he had managed to achieve the rank of Technician-acolyte, escaping the the fate of Servitorhood that awaited underachievers, but a purely priestly life was deemed an inefficient use of his talents and he was transferred to the Skitarii for training. By his 18th year he was a mechanically augmented soldier of the priesthood tasked with defence of the Nuemyana Port, one of the few places where primitive outsiders were permitted to have dealings with the Terran Mechanicus.
 
As he rose through the ranks of the Mechanicus military, receiving all the augmentations appropriate to his station. He began to see the world in absolute terms, the black and white notions of Weak and Strong; and it was the duty of the Weak to serve the Strong, who in turn were to rule and protect. But it was as if his heart was slowly being replaced with machinery as much as his body was, beginning to see all humanity not a part of the Mechanicus as Weak. Perhaps this was merely conformity, however, as many of the Elder Magi shared similar views, and... '''enforced''' them. Regardless of their attitude to more baseline humans, however, the Enclaves soon came under threat from Hy Braseal. Although hardly a superpower, the nation was close enough, sophisticated enough and organised enough to push the Enclave's off the tip of South America, leaving their former holdings destroyed, irradiated or captured.
 
 
 
 
 
Due to their perceived incompetence in the piecemeal defence of their lands, many of the Elder Magi were deposed by those below, while the new Elders had the few remnants of the old order servitorised. Soon, the ambitious and the popular rushed in to fill the power vacuum at the top of the hierarchy, and at the end of the reshuffling Gorgon found himself as General-Sentinel and Protector of the Northern border, a prestigious yet demanding job that commanded the first line of defense against the Braseali peoples - and would be the first to be servitorised, were they to force their way onto the Antarctic mainland.
 
At this point, in spite of the Mechanicum's preference for function over form, Gorgon ordered for his new cybernetic upgrade to be encased in the toughest alloy known to the Mechanicum. True, it would serve no purpose; although the material was indeed potent armour, his position as General-Sentinel precluded any situation where that would be useful. Instead, it was a surprisingly perceptive move to bolster his stature in the eyes of others; the intimidating size and power of the modifications intimidating both any who sought to mutiny as much as they did Braseali spies. Thus, the Gorgon was no more - in his place there was only Ferrus Manus.
 
Even as he rallied his Skitarii and began to forge them into something stronger, the generals of Hy Braseal had already raised a horde of relatively well disciplined and armed soldiers, and was beginning to lead them into the cold Antarctic enclaves. Salvation came in the form of the Warlord, who sought the advanced technology horded by the Mechanicum. The Elder Magi saw their survival projections in a total war with Braseal jump over tenfold merely by being on friendly terms with the Warlord, and all the way to an astounding 93% were they to accept his offer; which they did without second thought. However, Dalmoth Kyn - the leader of most of South America - and his descendents would never forget how the Warlord had sided with the Mechanicus, forever opening a rift between their people and those of the Imperium. In time, they too would eventually join, but not before a long and bloody war consumed much of the Braseali population.
 
As the Mechanicus Enclaves one by one were assimilated into the Imperium, Ferrus Manus once more found himself rising up the ranks of the military. His existing rank the Mechanicus - who were a few isolated enclaves that had fought valiantly against an entire continent - was prestigious, and his tactical acumen was formidable; as were his legions of cybernetic soldiers who could comfortably overrun any techno-barbarian on the planet and even go toe-to-toe with the Warlord's own biologically augmented warriors. The one who, as the Gorgon, had looked down on all flesh as weak, was now beginning to find a grudging respect for it.
 
 
 
 
Years passed and wars were moved from the surface of Terra to the stars, and his soldiers - now known as the Iron Hands - became renown for resisting the harshest of environments with ease, proving as comfortable in the cold vacuum of space as they were in the sand-blasted remains of Ursh. Thus, although often (and rightly) feared by many, the Mechanicus forces were respected by all and proved to be a key factor in cementing the Terra-Mars partnership, which would be a story repeated at each world they encountered their cybernetic brothers on. Perhaps it was this - securing the mighty forges of mankind - rather than the Iron Hands' martial prowess, that earned the old Gorgon his recognition as a Primarch.
 
During the War of the Beast, however, the Iron Hands lost much of their prestige and reputation by primarily seeking to defend their Forge Worlds instead of the Imperium as a whole. Perhaps this was simply because their primarch had seen how hard mankind would fall if they once again lost the machinery that held its precious Imperium together; or perhaps (as many others claimed), their loyalties lay more with the Fabricator-General of Mars than they did the Steward or Terra. For their part, the Hands never denied the accusations levelled at them, only defending them.
 
 
 
 
Of the primarchs Ferrus Manus was one of only three who lived to see the Steward become Emperor; and he was the last of them to die, meeting his end on the fields of Armageddon before the gates of Hades Hive in the year 616.M40. In truth his health - both biological and mechanical - had been deteriorating for centuries, and although he knew that there was little operational time left for his body he did his best to ensure that neither his Legion nor his Emperor knew of the fact. He took a bloody and glorious toll with him, one worthy of respect from any and all, but his passing marked the end of an era, and although he and the Emperor had never been friends his passing was felt by the flesh-bound of the Imperium just as much as it was by his Mechanicus brethren.
 
</div>
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=== Fulgrim ===
 
- Astartes pattern from Merika
 
=== Vulkan ===
 
Vulkan, son of the Afrique League, First Patriarch of the Prometheans, Defender of the People, Cleansing Flame of Earth and Primarch of the Steward was born in a mud and thatch hut in an arable farming village 8 days walk from Lanbarno, capital of that semi prosperous realm.
 
The nation itself was little more than a remnant of what it once was. At its height some 500 years previously it had been a super power the rival of any other on the Earth at that time with culture and technological knowlage beyond peer. But then the Ursh came and taught them that this was not, nor have it ever, nor would it ever be a time of peace.
 
But all that was history. The realm that Vulkan grew up in knew nothing of that save in dust old tomes of half forgotten lore.
 
Even a peace, a hard fought for peace, had been won against the Despots of Ursh and their vassal states.
 
Of all the peoples on the Earth at that time the had come to the attention of foul xenos. Why they amongst all others? who can say. But there it was.
 
The Dark Eldar were discovering the depths of their needs and thirsts and they found the picking in Afrique League to their liking.
 
It became a hated part of life. Shelters were dug by the prudent and the the foolish were left to die. It was an unhappy time. But maybe it was the xeno raiders and their attentions that made their lands less appealing to invaders.
 
It was in Vulkans 14th summer that he joined the military, against the wishes of his father and mother but with their blessing. It was customary for men to serve and protect the communities they came from for what was good for the people of a nation must surely be good for the nation as a whole.
 
Vulkan's parents had been adamant he not join the warriors because they knew that his job would be to dissuade their tormentors so that they might find a softer village to attack.
 
One such assault was the beginning of Vulkan. The rest of his life had been merely a prelude.
 
A brutal assault that seemed determined to abduct the while village befell Vulkan's home. The scant defenses were little more than tissue paper against razor blades. The pitiful few warriors of the Afrique League were tormented in the manner of a cat with a mouse and as inevitably snuffed out. All bar one. When the village bio-petroleum tank detonated Vulkan was inflamed. But up he rose. clutching his blacksmith fathers hammer, a halo or flame about his head and inferno wings upon his broad shoulders he was risen and he stood before the Archon, the chief tormentor of his people. His heart beat like a blast furnace and his eyes were holes into the hear of the sun and his fathers hammer he brought down hard. The Archon danced around him with inhuman grace, a nimble torture before an enraged giant. In later legends it was said they they danced from sunrise to sunset but in truth there was a death far sooner than that. The Archons blades had been doused in poison most foul but the heat of the flame had cleansed them and although Vulkan could barley land a single blow hid did manage to land one and one was all he needed.
 
The simple smiths hammer struck ard and it struck true and it was said to have been heated by more than burning fuel but by the furnace heat of hate. The Archon lay crippled and in agony at Vulkans feet and he raised that vile man high above his head and brought him down hard over his knee and broke his back and held him up once more and with a dragons roar dared all those who would look to see what ruin had been done before tearing out the raider kings throat.
 
And no more did those creatures come back.
 
When the Warlord came to the Afrique League it was Vulkan who met wit him in old and dying king Shatimuene's place. With the xenos gone it would not be long before Ursh came back and the Afrique League could not endure alone when that day came.
 
As the now chief military commander of his nation and a hero of the people Vulkan was taken into the confidence of the Warlord and in the name of the warlord he claimed back the old Ursh vassal states of Ursh for the Afrique League and built that broken nation back up on freed slaves and a noble sense of retribution.
 
Vulkan was one of the first of the final design of Astartes. All of the major flaws had been solved by that point and for that we can be grateful, the world did not need another Angron.
 
When the last tyrant fell and it came time to bring the Unification to the rest of Sol Vulkan son of N'bel was raised high and called Primarch.
 
When the Great crusade fell it was Vulkan second only to Lorgar who showed that although the Imperium was strong and could be monstrous it could also be noble and capable of true virtue.
 
When the War of The Beast came it was the soldiers of the Fire Lords and and Black Dragons and the Salamanders that dedicated their lives to defense of the people above the defense of the Imperium, or what was good for the people of a nation must surely be good for the Impwerium as a whole.
 
Vulkan did name it back to Terra before the Martyr Angel fell and he could not save his brother primarch, but no blame was laid at his feet as his Legion worked so tierlesly and gave their very lives for the people and always at the thickest of the the fighting, in the heart of the inferno was the Promethean with his hammer.
 
In the years that followed the rebuilding of the Imperium Vulkan's forces remained integrated most strongly with those of the Imperial Army.
 
=== Dorn ===
 
- Calbi born, early model astartes pattern. Desensitization problems.
 
=== Roboute Guilliman ===
 
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">'''''The Artist of War:'''''
 
Guilliman was born to a minor noble house in the great and relatively prosperous realm of Europia. His parents were able to afford him admittance to Parisiorum University, the most prestigious educational institution of that fair nation. By the onset of adulthood he was well versed in the classics of language, mathematics and the basic sciences; but it was in military theory that he truly excelled. Soon he was spotted by a visiting officer, and was quickly transferred to the Avelroi military academy. He was a more than adequate soldier, and a fairly skilled tactician, but it was in the arts of grand strategy and logistical planning that his brilliance was found. During wargames and simulations, his peers often managed to gain the upper hand on Guilliman's forces, flanking or encircling them only to find themselves critically short of materiel and facing positions prepared long in advance, thanks to his unconventional focus on interdicting supply lines. Thus, while he graduated with glowing recommendations from his tutors, he was somewhat resented by his fellow alumni who felt his tactics underhand or cowardly.
 
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
 
 
Shortly after, he was assigned to the southern border where his nation rubbed shoulders - and often warred - with the Nord Afrik. Within a month of his assignment, the area was brought up to peak efficiency and combat effectiveness. Whole swathes of the border defenses were brought back up to standard, often exceeding them, becoming greater and more formidable than they were in the last border dispute; the semi-derelict Jibraltonius border fort seemed to change overnight from a ceremonial headquarters to an impenetrable bastion. And not a moment too soon, as before long the Nord Afrikaanus and their cyber-thrall army commanders were ready for war, instead of the brief raids and pillages that Guilliman's defenses had been blooded against.
 
 
The hordes of Nord Afrik, armed and armoured with most powerful technology they had recovered from the rotting corpse of the old world, charged with ferocity that would've shattered the defences of just years before. They played every hand they could; hit-and-run raids, armoured assaults, wave attacks and attempts at infiltration, yet in the end it did not matter, as their crusade broke upon the hardened shell of Europia. For every of Guilliman's soldiers, there were ten Afrikaanus barbarians - but in turn, there were a dozen shells, plasma charges or lascannon shots for each of '''them,''' and it is said that fresh reinforcements would arrive before their dead predecessors had even hit the ground. The counter-offensive orchestrated by General Guilliman was nothing less than a masterpiece of warfare, facing the Afrikaanus as if on his own home turf. The waves of techno-barbarians were bled white, their counterattacks shrugged off and shattered, their homeland burned to ashes from which nothing could ever recover.
 
 
The customary actions to follow in these conquests was for nations to incorporate the territory of the fallen into their own empire, lording over the few remaining broken people. This would have been the fate of Nord Afrik, too, but for Guilliman's address to the senate imploring them to let that foul place rot. This was perceived as weakness by some, yet his foresight would go on to frustrate the other neighbouring nations who were looking forward to invading a Europeia overextended and weakened by their subjugation of Nord Afrik. For his martial brilliance and wisdom, Guilliman was given the honorific title of Lord, a title that would not normally be bestowed upon him until his fathers death. Furthermore, in the time of relative peace the nation now found itself in, it needed an ambassador - albeit one with enough accomplishment and worth behind him for the leaders of neighbouring realms to sit up and listen.
 
 
It was during his time in the Kingdom of Franj that he met the relatively young Queen Yolande Fouché. The two had little in common at a personal level and neither ever completely trusted each other, but their respective governments deemed it imperative that they marry as a prelude to the unification of the two nations. Franj itself was deeply wounded and only slowly recovering from devastating attacks by the Unspeakable Tyrant of Gredbritton's horrific weapons, and would not survive even the most halfhearted of assaults from any of its neighbors - least of all the Dusht Jemanic, who were looking to settle old grievances. In turn, such an alliance would allow the people of Europia access to the produce of the huge tracts of agricultural land, which were sorely needed as using Nord Afrik as a psuedo-colony to feed their growing population was no longer an option.
 
 
 
 
When The Warlord came before the Senate of Europia, in the modest robes of a scribe, he came with open arms and a warm smile. Unlike elsewhere, the Senate of Europia saw this new "Imperium" as a macrocosm of themselves; their own well ordered nation merely taken to its logical conclusion. Thus, their inclusion was brief and painless, and allowed them representation in the decision and policy processes of such a regime, while the Kingdom of Franj was joined along with them as both realms were nearly dependent on one another at this point.
 
Lord Guilliman quickly rose through the ranks of the new Imperial Army, thanks to his history amongst one of the more civilised realms of the Imperium, as well as his unparalleled logistical prowess. Yet, when it came time for the Warlord to implement his super soldier project on a much expanded scale it was a sad fact that Lord Guilliman was biologically too old and would almost certainly have died during the implantation process. As consolation he was granted some limited gene-forging and rejuvenation procedures that his usefulness might be extended for centuries to come.
 
And down the centuries his usefulness would be proven.
 
 
When the Warlord became the Steward before the Empty Throne and looked to the stars, it was Guilliman amongst his generals who was deemed to be best suited to the task of preparing for interplanetary warfare, a feat considered logistically impossible by many, yet achieved through meticulous calculation and planning. His dedication and adaptability earned Lord Guilliman the title of Primarch, a leader amongst leaders and a legend amongst legends. When the eye of the Steward looked beyond the confines of Sol, he saw Guilliman was was needed more than ever.
 
The Primarch rose to the challenge, reorganising the Imperial Army into a force that seemed able to be everywhere at once yet, to its enemies, was truly endless, and giving the Steward's war machine efficiency more befitting a creation of the Mechanicus.  Whole stellar clusters were brought under the Aquila by the old man of Europia, with wars that could fill a library - the greatest of which, he believed, were the ones not fought. He was and old man. He looked of middle years but he had lived, long long past his time. Memories of loved ones, their faces and voices, had become dim and faded. He had outlived his wife and his children and his grandchildren, his beautiful nation and even the greatest of its monuments. The old man had never relished war like the others, seeing it instead as an intellectual exercise - and by now he was so very tired of it.
 
 
 
 
When the War of the Beast descend like a hammer upon the still fledgling Imperium, it was Guilliman's reforms - from the optimisation of trade routes to the streamlining of military integration and combined arms - that allowed whole sectors to mobilise their forces fast enough to weather the initial shock. His well-disciplined and -equipped legionaries made the Beast and his horde pay for every parsec, every light-year, every '''metre'''. For every slain citizen under his care a hundred deaths were meted out, but all could see that the line was being ground back to the Sanctum Sanctorum of humanity: Old Earth. The Beast and his forces were defeated, just like all the others were, but the legions that struck the deathblow were glorified far more than the one that hamstrung a tide of Ork that would've otherwise swallowed them whole. Guilliman held no jealousy or resentment over that; he was old enough to understand that good men were seldom remembered as long as entertaining monsters, and had resigned himself to that fact long ago.
 
After the slaying of The Beast the Imperium began to rebuild. It was dirty work but it was good work, the Primarch relishing in the opportunity to rebuilding something after so long fighting. Those close to him claimed it soothed his aching soul and reminded him of the miracles he worked on the borders of his homeland, long ago - even when many of his fellow Primarchs outright refused his suggested reforms.
 
Guilliman endured for centuries longer than any thought possible - even himself - but In 014.M32 he began his long, dreamless sleep. His legacy, however, would endure for ages to come; remembered fondly even by those who thought him nothing but a glorified penpusher, and proving that the quiet administrators and quartermasters of the Imperium that they had just as much to be proud of as any other.
 
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=== Magnus the Red ===
 
The story of Magnus the Red can be traced back to the previous Despot of Ursh, a remarkably unfriendly fellow by the name of Ganzorig the Great. Indeed he was great and conquered huge swathes of the Afrique League to add to the already great Empire his uncle left him. One of the contributing factors in his victories was his use of enslaved and potent psykers. For the most part these poor creatures, witch-kin as they were, were not highly valued as people by the Despot despite him being a follower of the dark gods.
 
One of his most prized possessions was a witch by the name of Ada of whom it was said could summon deamons and not so much bind them but direct them. In her youth, before he had discovered quite how valuable she was, he had whored her out to a navigator for imported weapons from far off worlds beyond Sol. That she had a child that she loved dearly was good news for Ganzorig as it gave him a means by which he could control her.
 
Time passed, wars were waged, new lands were conquered and things continued to get worse on Old Earth much as they always had done.
 
In time the son, named Magnus, grew into a man. Like his father he was uncommonly tall and it was soon evident that like his mother he was uncommonly powerful. As such he was press-ganged into the psychic warfare and assault efforts of the Regime. Magnus' aptitudes were in wards and defensive measures and by age 15 could stop artillery fire and had done so on the front lines. By age 20 he could throw up a shield wall that covered almost a mile in either direction and was harder than the finest steel.
 
In his 35th year his mother died on the front lines against the Pan-Pacific Empire and the monsters created by it's mad science. Magnus at the time was half a continent away on the borders of Achaemenidia but he felt her loss. Although Magnus had always been Ganzorig's leash to ensure his mothers obedience so in turn had Magnus been kept obedient lest harm come to his mother.
 
Magnus seemed to vanish and the border was over run by the next morning. A few month later Ganzorig the Great was found burned to death in his bed.
 
Little is known of Magnus' movements in many years and the Ursh Succession war that followed. It is suspected that he fled to the cursed ground of the Himalayan Mountains. A place only whispered in dark legend, the one place nobody was strong or mad enough to conquer and from the fall of the Dark Age Empire to the arrival of the Warlord remained inviolate. It was unknown for sure what was protecting that high place but ████████████████████████████████████Date expunged by order of the Inquisition██████████████████████████████████████████████████and never again they promised on this hallowed ground, and so they faded in midnight clad.
 
Magnus emerged from that strange land some time in his sixties, although how much time in that place had passed was anyone's guess. Due to his inhuman heritage he looked still of early middle years but for his one remaining eye that held reflected horrors enough to last lifetimes. His skin once pale and soft like his fathers was now hardened by years of exposure to something approximating leather and adorned from head to foot in red wards and runes and holy script in some unknown letters tattooed and branded and scared across every inch of flesh. Save for the ragged bite mark that took up one side of his face.
 
By this time the Warlords armies were moving in earnest with expert precision across a dozen fronts, both military and diplomatic.
 
At first the tall man wandered in places he thought beyond the reach of any king or man or beast but as the Warlord progressed his psychic powers grew until Magnus felt them eclipse his own. He traveled to the very furthest reaches of Sibar and buried his talents that he might not shine out from afar.
 
But the Warlord could feel him and he knew it. Rather than wait to be hunted down or chained up as was in his youth Magnus set out for the burning light.
 
At the time the Warlord was busy in the Lands of Skand where the Nordyc people dwelt. The Warlord was trying to unify them into a cohesive nation that he could work with and absorb into the Imperium. Some tribes would remain independent and raid and pirate and maraud across the landscape and they would be crushed for it but his hope would be that this would be minimal in number.
 
Magnus strode into the great wood and thatch hall almost as tall as the doorway, draped in animal skins and weathered and wild looking. The great hall fell silent for a moment until the babbling of conversations returned. He scanned the rows of men and women through the hazy smoky air seated around the tables and staying warm by the great fire pit until he found him, the Warlord.
 
He was seated some way down the bench tearing into a slab of mutton whilst a man in dusty grey robes negotiated with the king in a jovial manner. To the surprise of Magnus the Warlord waved him over and offered him a seat on the bench next to him and poured him a drink.
 
It had not occurred to Magnus that the Warlord meant him no harm, it had always been his assumption that powerful men fought and that was the way of things.
 
In the years that were to follow the Warlord did offer Magnus a place at his side not for his battlefield prowess, although that was formidable, but for the forbidden and ancient lore he had ██████████████ █████ ███████Date expunged by order of the Inquisition███ ███████ although it troubled him greatly.
 
Eventually Magnus did walk the battlefield, but this time at the head of a small army of his own making. A band of psykers like himself, some liberated slaves or other nations and some born free in the Imperium. For the first time since the death of his mother Magnus felt at home. They won much fame and fortune in the wars of Unification primarily against the stain on the map that was Ursh. Though the Warlord trusted Magnus he put upon him the one condition that he have no more dealings from things beyond conventional time and space.
 
The other commanders were unsure of Magnus, he was not fully human and he was witch-kin steeped in forbidden magics and lore. Mortarion and Russ both had a particular dislike of him for this and despised his methods. For all that Magnus became Primarch Magnus the Red but unlike most of his fellow Primarchs he could not recieve any augmentations due to his strangely genes.
 
As the Unification slid gently into the Great Crusade the Legion of the Thousnad Sons held themselves well and despite being the smallest of the Legions in the Imperial Army held themselves as high as any other.
 
As the War of the Beast ground on Magnus' armies found themselves out matched but still unrelenting. The Beast had psykers of his own and the Chaos Eldar made his people die screaming.
 
As the Beast assaulted Old Earth Magnus at last broke his word to the now Steward. He called forth all the old spirits as his mother taught him and shipped up the warp into a howling gale and dashed the Beasts fleets upon impossible shores and almost pity them for where they now were. It was a gamble that was not wholly won for some Imperial ships were lost in the gale, their crews damned and lost forever. He was severely berated by the Warlord for this and they almost came to blows.
 
He was present on Old Earth in those final days of that war confounding and confusing the sorcerers of Chaos and slaying their deamons.
 
Eventually the Steward and Magnus did reconcile their differences though it took many, many years.
 
It was said that the Grey Knights were founded and trained by ancient veterans of the Thousand Sons, although as with all things to do with the history of that order the truth will never be known.
 
Magnus was one of the 3 primarchs that lived to see the Steward crowned Emperor, although only barely. He was as human as the day he was born, however much that was, and longevity treatments can only take you so far. His ashes were scattered to the winds on the tallest Himalayan mountain carried there by the Emperor himself.
 
Even unto the Dark Millennium the Emperor would not allow discussion of what he found in those mountains.
 
Was it wondrous? Terrible? Both? None may know now. Whatever was there was gone by the time Earth was all but unified. A few abandoned villages, some empty temples, a few overgrown fields and no sign of violence.
 
Whatever was there looked and acted like people to fool people, more or less. Whatever was there left of it's own accord.
 
What it is and why anything can never be known though The Warlord found neither joy nor sorrow in its departure.
 
=== Sanguinius ===
 
 
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">'''''The Martyr Angel'''''
 
Duscht Jemanic was an old nation, a once great empire that spanned from the coast of the Atlazia Ocean in the west to the Besivik Ocean in the east, the lightning speed of its war machines crushing nations beneath their tread. Over the centuries its power and borders were slowly eroded by the Ursh hordes in the east and revolts in its Europian provinces, until it was left only with its core territories and forced into a humiliating alliance for survival as part of the Quintuple Alliance.
 
The Duscht were a dour, efficient people, obsessed with genetic purity above all else. In their great iron towers the famed genesmiths delved into the secrets of the human genome, while in the bellies of its ashen factories millions of enslaved “unclean” sweated and died to produce the materials for its armies. It was into this decaying society that Sanguinius was born, only son of the Kaiser.
 
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
 
 
The Kaiser was a cold man, and over the centuries of his life had failed to produce an heir that satisfied his need for perfection. As he grew old, he grew desperate, and in his desperation he summoned his greatest genesmiths to do something never before attempted: to create a human life. To create his perfect heir, he opened the ancestral gene-vaults of House Baal, and sequences were taken from its greatest heroes: genes from generals and warriors for strength and bravery, from diplomats and statesmen for wisdom and intelligence, from courtesans and athletes for beauty and fairness of form. To this blend of genes, the Kaiser, perhaps in a final act of caprice or megalomania, added the genes for a pair of enormous, white wings to grow from the child’s back.
 
With the genome completed, the genesmiths retreated to their towers to perform their ancient biotech rites to attempt to forge the raw genetic material into a living fetus. Nine and ninety failed, ending as twisted, misshapen things, but in the hundredth the genes took hold, and after a year and a day of labor the genesmiths presented the baby boy to the Kaiser. As he wept, the Kaiser named the boy “Sanguinius,” for he was to be the culmination and greatest champion of the Baal bloodline.
 
As the boy grew, he was indeed as perfect as expected: tall and strong, brilliant and wise, golden-haired and beautiful to behold. His tutors were astonished at his genius, and the royal masters of arms soon found themselves outstripped by the stripling boy. Yet the Kaiser was still displeased. For the boy had always been a means to an end: the restoration of the old Duscht Empire, and two factors pulled his dream further and further from his grasp. The first were rumors and rumblings of an upstart nation, led by a feared Warlord, conquering and subjugating those in its path. And the second was something he could never has foreseen, something that surprised and confused and enraged him when he confronted it:
 
Sanguinius had compassion.
 
Indeed, as a boy he had horrified his governesses and caretakers by sneaking out of the palace to play with common children in the street (wearing bulky clothes to hide his growing wings), and infuriated his father by speaking out against cruelty of the nobility and freeing the household slaves assigned to him. His kindness and strength of will drew the masses to him, yet in his gaze there was always a sense of melancholy, a sense that he was looking into the distance at something no one else could see. And it was so, for Sanguinius had dreams.
 
In them he saw the Earth and the suffering of its teeming masses, felt their psychic screams of pain: from a nomad child dying of radiation in the Calbian wastes, raw boils and weeping sores stark against her pale skin, from an old slave in a Duscht factory collapsing under the savage blows of laughing guards, from all the wretched of the Earth crying for salvation. And from far away amongst the inky blankness of the stars he heard similar, fainter echoes as people suffered and died on far-flung planets across the galaxy. Sanguinius wept for them, and for his own powerlessness, and as he did a great, golden figure rose from the darkness, benevolent gaze sweeping over the Earth. It reached its hands down and lifted the masses to the stars, and where there was sorrow there was now hope and opportunity. Yet it was here Sanguinius’ visions diverged: in some, he and the Duscht people were lifted into the stars with the rest of humanity to spread amongst the stars, his heart bursting with joy. In the others, the great golden figure drew his gaze to the cruelty of Duscht Jemanic, to its slave pens and pogroms and purges of the unclean, and Sanguinius felt only cold despair as the great hands turned to fists and ground the Duscht people into dust.
 
Though he was not much older than a boy, Sanguinius vowed this would not come to pass, that he would protect the Duscht people and pledge himself to the service of the great savior, and that he would march across the stars to save the scattered people of Terra no matter where they were.
 
So it was that the Warlord came to borders of Duscht Jemanic during Sanguinius’ seventeenth year.
 
By this time, Sanguinius was the de facto leader, having won over the court with his charisma and strength. The Kaiser was by now decrepit and spent most of his time secluded in his private chambers, emerging occasionally to make wild proclamations and rant about the lost glory of the Duscht Empire. Thus when the Warlord’s herald came to demand the surrender of the Duscht people, it was the boy-king Sanguinius at the head of the Duscht steel legions that came to parley with the Warlord.
 
When Sanguinius stepped into the Warlord’s command tent and saw his face, it took all of Sanguinius’ will not to fall to his knees, for he knew with certainty that this was the great golden man he had dreamed of. The Warlord, noting the young man’s hesitation, is said to have greeted him with a half-smile and asked, “Is aught the matter?” to which Sanguinius simply replied, “I dreamed of you.”
 
The beginning of the negotiations was simple enough, for Sanguinius was already willing to pledge fealty and offer the technology of the genesmiths to the Warlord. Yet when Sanguinius requested mercy for his people, the discussions grew heated.
 
The Warlord was benevolent but possessed of an iron sense of justice, and in his eyes the cruelty of the Duscht people demanded harsh sanction. The specifics are lost to history, but the argument is said to have stretched long into the night, with Sanguinius pleading, protesting, and threatening in turn, and the Warlord impassively countering each rhetorical thrust. Finally, Sanguinius offered his own life in return for mercy for his people, for he declared that as the culmination of the Baal bloodline, the sins of his house were for him to bear.
 
Impressed by the earnest conviction of the young man, the Warlord relented. The Warlord demanded that the slaves were to be freed and the possessions of the nobility were to be seized and distributed among them, and that each house would serve in the Warlord’s armies as penance. Sanguinius himself would be their general, and their duty would be to go where the fighting was thickest and lead the charge. Finally collapsing to his knees from relief, Sanguinius accepted without hesitation.
 
With the secrets and technology of the Duscht genesmiths, the Warlord perfected the final design iteration for his Astartes warriors, the Mark III augmentation pattern, of which Sanguinius and his fellow primarchs to-be Vulkan and Lion El’Jonson were the prototypes. On them, the Warlord ordered the genesmiths to lavish their full expertise and to spare no cost, pushing the boundaries of their arcane knowledge.
 
When the three men emerged they were indeed without any of the flaws and mutations that had plagued the earlier Astartes generations, with strength and abilities far exceeding those of their existing fellows. However, the cost was astronomical and the process too slow to be viable on a large scale, thus for the mass production Mark III pattern the improvements were mostly limited to eliminating the flaws in the Mark II, keeping a roughly similar or perhaps marginally higher level of strength. The prototype Mark III design was archived, and later used for the most elite warriors of the Imperium, the Custodes and the Grey Knights.
 
For the rest of the Unification Wars, Sanguinius and his legion served with distinction, winning fame for their lightning assaults against even the most entrenched of foes, the Astartes descending as streaks of crimson on wings of burning ash and flame as they followed their general into battle. With his purity of spirit and the oneness of their shared vision for humanity, he won the trust and confidence of the Warlord and became a close advisor, making his eventual elevation to Primarch a mere formality. Thus when the Warlord became the Steward of the Empty Throne and proclaimed the Great Crusade, it was the fleets of the IX Legion with Primarch Sanguinius at the helm that were in the vanguard, blazing a trail into the darkness.
 
Sanguinius’ legend grew as he and his legion pacified world after world, a magnificent sight to behold as he soared over the battlefield on immense white wings to slay the enemies’ generals and greatest champions. Yet it was not only for feats of arms that he was revered as the “Angel”. Worlds blighted by mutation that would have been purged by other legions instead found themselves welcomed into the safety of the Imperium by the IX Legion, and broken peoples barely recognizable as human for the first time experienced the warmth of kinship and camaraderie.
 
The IX Legion soon won the moniker of “Blood Angels,” for their nobility of spirit and devotion to the shared blood of mankind. Soon, tales of the great Angel and his warriors spread across the oppressed people of the galaxy, and many rose in joyous rebellion against their alien overlords when the great Angel and his red warriors appeared in the skies above their worlds.
 
Amongst his brother Primarchs, Sanguinius found comrades and friends of his own. Well liked or at least well respected by most of the Primarchs, Sanguinius was particularly close with Horus and Vulkan. In him, “Old Man Roboute” finally had a willing audience for his lectures on strategy and logistics, and Fulgrim found a kindred spirit with an appreciation of art and philosophy, the greatest achievements of man. Sanguinius’ relationship with Angron was complicated, troubled by Angron’s unpredictable madness. On good days, theirs was a friendly rivalry as each legion strove to claim the title of finest assault troops in the Imperium; on others, Angron viewed the Angel as an upstart pretender without respect for his elders and resented the Angel's pity, and they had to be separated lest they come to blows. Curze and Mortarion despised Sanguinius as naïve and foolish, and Sanguinius despised them in turn for obvious reasons, Mortarion in particular for he reminded Sanguinius far too much of his own father.
 
When the Steward with Eldrad at his side first proposed the idea of an alliance with the Eldar to his gathered Primarchs at the Council of Nikaea, Sanguinius was one of the first to speak out in favor, for he believed all sapient beings willing to work towards peace, prosperity, and the good of mankind had a rightful place within the Imperium. Later, he would be part of the great raid on the twisted realms of Nurgle, and nearly perished there in the stinking hellscape.
 
As the raiding party retreated to the portal with Isha in tow, they received word that Eldrad and his council of seers holding the portal open in realspace had come under ferocious daemonic assault, and that the portal was failing rapidly. As the allied forces rushed to the exit, Sanguinius lingered trying to save the lives of several wounded Exarchs and Astartes. It was only through the combined heroics of Lion El’Jonson, Jaghatai Khan, and the Phoenix Lords Asurmen and Baharroth that he survived, as they carved a path through the hordes of slavering monstrosities to drag the Angel through the collapsing portal.
 
The next few years represented the high water mark of the Great Crusade as the Imperium expanded at an unprecedented rate, fueled by their new allies and technology. World after world was brought into the Imperium, and Sanguinius dared to hope that his dream of a gentler future could truly come to pass.
 
Then the War of the Beast came.
 
The hordes of the Orks, Chaos Eldar, and Dark Eldar smashed through the fledging Imperium, plunging it into darkness, and where there was hope and opportunity before there was now only a desperate struggle against extinction. The Blood Angels fought as they always had, leading the attack in the most vicious fighting, the tip of the Imperium’s spear, and inspiring fellow troops through deeds of valor and sacrifice. Many a Warboss, Archon, or Chaos Seer met his end at the blades of a squad of Blood Angels, only for the Astartes to be surrounded and cut down by the enraged foe. The loss of leaders sowed disruption and chaos in the enemy forces, yet for all the Blood Angels’ sacrifice it could only slow the enemy’s inexorable advance.
 
Those within the Imperium who fell traitor learned that Sanguinius was not all kindness, and found themselves hunted without mercy by the vengeful Blood Angels. Perhaps it was because the traitors sought to tear down his cherished dream of a peaceful future, or perhaps it was because they spat on the mercy and acceptance of the Steward that Sanguinius and his Duscht people had sacrificed so much to earn back on Terra long ago. Whatever the reason, he reserved a special savagery for those who turned their backs on the Imperium. It is said that after witnessing the carnage wrought on an entire regiment of Traitor Guard by a single squad of Blood Angels, a shocked Imperial Army general called High Command to ask “Where are the Angels I was promised? Who are these flesh tearers?”
 
And so the war ground on. Peace was a distant dream, and for the Men and Eldar of the Imperium there was only cold, quiet determination, defying a cruel fate in the face of a hateful and malicious universe. Worlds burned, trillions died, and across the galaxy the Blood Angels could be found neck deep in the thickest battles. Many battles were on the most populated worlds of the Imperium, and the Blood Angels would fulfill their devotion to mankind as they fought in rearguard actions to save civilians and evacuees, these valiant defenses all too often becoming last stands.
 
Captain Malakim and his doomed 29th Company became everlasting symbols of this devotion when they gave their lives to the man securing the evacuation of hive-world Ancalagon. Ancalagon had been the greatest world of Subsector Urulok, and the invasion of the world was particularly savage, representing the greatest concentration of Ork and Chaos Eldar forces in the subsector.
The Imperial defenders led by the Blood Angels were inevitably pushed back to the walls of the last hive, with millions of civilians yet to evacuate. Primarch Corvus Corax, commanding forces in a nearby subsector, repeatedly ordered the remaining Imperial forces to retreat and regroup to conserve their strength, yet Captain Malakim refused, for doing so would have doomed the millions of civilians to butchery or enslavement at the hands of the invaders. The Imperial defense held just long enough for the final transports to clear the spaceport, and as the hive walls were overrun the Chaos Seer leading the Chaos Eldar touched Captain Malakim’s mind to taunt him and savor his despair. Yet the alien only found calm and peace, and in response Captain Malakim sent out a final vox transmission.
 
Across the ruined world and the Imperial starships high above the words rang out, “For those we cherish, we die in glory!” Minutes later, enormous explosions visible from orbit erupted across the planet as hidden Cyclonic Torpedoes detonated, remotely triggered by the cessation of the heartbeat of the last Blood Angel defender. The massive loss crippled the Ork and Chaos Eldar forces in the subsector, and the regiments later raised from the evacuees won renown as some of the fiercest in the Imperial Army with their warcry, “Remember the blessed 29th!”
 
Through it all, Sanguinius could be found leading his Blood Angels in the most perilous of missions, or offering a kind word to faltering Guardsmen and a gentle touch to traumatized refugees. He ignored the criticisms that his men’s sacrifices were wasteful and pointless, the sneers that they could have done much more had they only the wisdom to regroup and fight another day. For Sanguinius knew that each civilian saved was another who could fight, build, and carry on the legacy of man, a precious spark of humanity, and that in a war as horrific as this morale and hope were as powerful as any weapon or starship or fortress.
 
Yet his men noticed a change in their beloved Primarch, subtle as it was, a restlessness and grimness he could not always hide. For Sanguinius’ visions were growing stronger, and each night, pounding at his consciousness, he saw his own death again and again. He knew it would be at the hands of a great monstrosity as he stood between it and the Steward, and that his time was growing short. Death held no fear for Sanguinius, but it was the fate of mankind that gave him pause; humanity was balanced on the knife’s edge, extinction a mere slip away. Even if the gentler future of his dreams was realized, Sanguinius knew he would not be there to see it, but he would give everything to ensure it would come to pass.
 
In the last days of the war, as the unstoppable hordes of the Beast, Dark Eldar, and Chaos Eldar converged on humanity’s final bastion, the Primarchs and their legions raced home to Terra to fortify their homeworld for the coming onslaught. Across the soil of Terra, the Men and Eldar of the Imperium prepared for their last stand, standing side by side to shout defiance at the hatred of the galaxy:
 
Here, a squad of Guardsmen drawn from a dozen worlds of the Imperium place sandbags around a hospital in the shadow of a towering Wraithlord, pausing occasionally to marvel at the gleaming colossus;
 
Bonesingers weave armored shells around the frames of hulking Imperial tanks, as nearby techpriests chitter with anxiety;
 
In a long abandoned church a Word Bearer Chaplain preaches to a motley crowd of humans and Eldar, rainbow lights from ancient stained-glass dancing on his brow, fire and ecstasy burning in his breast;
 
A mother comforts her weeping child as they are shepherded onto an evacuation ship under the watchful eye of an Ultramarine, the boy still reaching for the picture he dropped of his fallen father;
 
At the edge of their camp, in an old garden under the light of the stars, a tall Aspect Warrior kisses an astonished guardswomen and smiles at her joy;
 
And far above in the night sky, the greatest fleets of Men and Eldar float amidst the gloom, blotting out the stars with their number, ready to stand and spit light and fire against the coming forces of the dark.
 
Secluded in the great halls in the Imperial Palace, the Steward with his Primarchs and Eldrad with his seers laid their plans for the coming invasion. Agreements were made and bitter arguments were fought. Many of the Primarchs requested the honor of defending the Imperial Palace itself, and the Steward heard them each in turn, from the impassioned pleas of Lorgar to the cold growls of Dorn.
 
Yet when the Steward turned to Sanguinius, expecting a fervent request for the honor from his old friend, he found only tranquility. Sanguinius rose from his seat, and said, “That I shall die before the walls of this palace is beyond doubt. My destiny comes and I go to it with peace in my heart.”
 
The Steward recognized the calm conviction in the Angel’s eyes. It was the same look he had seen so many years ago when he first met Sanguinius as the Warlord in his command tent, and Sanguinius had offered his life for mercy for his people. It was the look of a man who had wholly accepted and welcomed his death for a greater purpose, and would go to it without fear and regret.
 
Moved by his words, the Steward accepted the request. So it was that when the Chaos armada forced its way to Terra and its unending hordes began their assault on the Imperial Palace, they found the proud Blood Angels manning the great walls, with Sanguinius, his elite First Company, and the legendary Custodes defending the Eternity Gate.
 
The Beast was possessed of greater cunning and primal intelligence than most of his species, and began the assault by probing the defense of the palace, looking for a weakness. When none were found, he sent his the masses of his most expendable troops to overwhelm the defense with the crushing weight numbers.
 
But Dorn and Perturabo had done their work well. Automated defense turrets gunned down hordes of Orks before they even reached the firing range of the Blood Angels, and those that survived ended up in carefully designed killing fields with no cover and no escape. Overhead, Ork jets and stormboyz crashed screaming off the palace void shields, or were frozen by stasis fields to be picked off by lance batteries at leisure.
 
Yet for all of Dorn and Perturabo’s defensive genius, the palace was simply not designed to hold off numbers of this magnitude, for who could have predicted a Waaagh comprised of a full half of the Orks in the galaxy? After several days of fighting a flaw emerged: the immense piles of dead Orks were obscuring crucial firing angles for the defensive turrets, and had grown so tall in some places that the greenskins were using them to climb up the previously impregnable walls. The Imperial Palace was too vast to fully hold against so numerous a foe, thus Sanguinius ordered his forces to withdraw to the secondary defensive positions, cunningly designed to minimize the advantage of numbers and to funnel the enemy towards the entrenched elites defending the Eternity Gate. Thus it was the days after the breaching of the walls that the historians consider the true Siege of the Imperial Palace.
 
The first day of the siege consisted of more Orks, though now they included more than just mere boyz. In the Orkish hordes now came nobz and weirdboyz, flash gitz and kommandoz, all roaring for battle and eager to spill the blood of humanity.
 
The first greenskins to enter the Grand Plaza of the Eternity Gate were greeted with a magnificent sight before they were gunned down: the white-winged Angel surrounded by his warriors resplendent in red, while beside them stood the gold-clad figures of the Custodes with their Lord Commander Arik Taranis at the forefront, holding aloft the great Banner of Unification, its length equal to full five Astartes. Behind them, a giant Aquila spread its wings on the massive adamantium Eternity Gate, protecting the Throne Room command center where the Steward and Eldrad commanded the forces of Terra, telepathically linked with thousands of their commanders to coordinate with perfect precision and unison.
 
The two sides met in the middle of the plaza with a resounding crash, howling as their blades sought the blood of their hated foes. Chainswords tore flesh, power klawz ripped bodies, and the dead and wounded were trampled underfoot in the savage melee. Lord Commander Taranis won the greatest deed of the day, slaying the Warboss leading the Orks by impaling him on the Banner of Unification and lifting his still screaming body into the air for all to see, as Sanguinius held off the Warboss’ nob retinue.
 
By nightfall, the tide of Orks slowed, for their poor eyesight would have put them at a great disadvantage against the enhanced Astartes and the Beast would not waste his troops here. As the last Ork died gurgling with a sword rammed through its chest, the defenders found a moment of respite to pray for the dead, celebrate the deeds of the living, and prepare for the next day.
 
The start of the second day consisted of more Orks, though by mid-morning it was clear something was amiss. The Ork forces were in disarray, even for their crude standard of organization, and reports came from the secondary Blood Angel positions that an unknown force was attacking the Orks in the rear. When lithe figures in black cut down the last of the Orks and stepped into the great plaza, it became all to clear: the Dark Eldar had come. In their sadistic greed, they had seen a opportunity to capture the unfathomable prizes of the Steward and Eldrad at the same time, and believing the Blood Angels to be worn down they had come in full force to break the defenders.
 
The Dark Eldar were a deadly foe: Astartes and Custodes died screaming as the enemy weapons inflicted agony that overcame even their enhanced physiologies and mental conditioning. Yet the vile invaders had blundered in their greed and haste: for all their lethal skill and precision, the Dark Eldar were not assault troops, their equipment and tactics unsuited for the grinding attrition of siege warfare, and Sanguinius and his scions quickly showed them their error.
 
With no space to maneuver and dodge in the packed plaza, sculpted, graceful bodies shaped by the finest of Comorragh’s flesh arts were crushed under ceramite and steel as easily as any Ork boy. Three entire Wych cults were eradicated that day, with Sanguinius personally cutting down the three Succubi that led them. As night fell, once again the enemy withdrew, consumed by infighting as the ever-scheming Archons used the chaos to usurp weakened rivals or settle old scores. There was no levity this night for the defenders: their wounds and exhaustion prevented such efforts, and battered armor and weapons required their attention.
 
The dawn of the third day was unusually still, the Orks and Dark Eldar nowhere to be found. For a moment, the defenders wondered if the xenos had retreated to seek an easier target, but when the morning quiet was shattered by the pounding of unholy war drums, eldritch howls, ululating chants, and gibbering laughter, and the xenos’ absence became clear.
 
The dread legions of Chaos crested the great stairway of the plaza in a screeching tide of twisted flesh: hordes of savage Bloodletters, sinuous Daemonettes, and rotted Plaguebearers, howling and eager to feast on the souls of the defenders. Beside them were mobs of cultists, cowardly, wretched things skulking in the shadows of their masters and chanting hymns of praise to their dark gods, hoping to gain a few scraps of favor.
 
Throughout the horde, the defenders glimpsed the Chaos Eldar, impossibly beautiful and perfect, their every movement liquid and effortless, their flawless faces belying the wild and fickle cruelty within. Ceramite gauntlets tightened around the hilt of swords and bolters as the Astartes gazed with hatred on a row of hulking figures, their fallen comrades the Traitor Marines. At their front strode the Arch-Heretic Luther, once honored as First Captain of the Dark Angels and Sword of Caliban, now reviled as the Dark Oracle and First Traitor.
 
Above the teeming corrupted multitude stood the four greatest servants of the Ruinous Powers, looming over their minions: Kairos Fateweaver, the ancient Lord of Change; Scabeiathrax the Bloated, the laughing and virulent Great Unclean One; Zarakynel the Bringer of Torments, the most favored Keeper of Secrets; and the mighty Ka’Bandha, bloodiest of Khorne’s Bloodthirsters.
 
Such a sight could have driven men to madness or despair; this was an army to crush entire sectors and devour the souls of species. Yet the Blood Angels and Custodes raised their blades aloft and shouted warcries and challenges at the dark horde, spitting defiance and insults in the faces of the dark gods. For they had armored themselves in faith and duty, purpose and loyalty, and there were no flaws upon their souls where weakness could take hold.
 
With the mournful blare of warhorns, the daemonic forces broke rank and thundered through the plaza. Astartes and Custodes had only moments to ready themselves before the wave crashed into their ranks. Daemonic hellblades tore through ceramite with unholy strength, impaling Astartes’ twin hearts in a single blow. Blasts of swirling warpfire incinerated men where they stood, armor and all, and still others were melted into puddles of festering ooze by hellish plagues and toxins.
 
Yet for every loss they suffered, the defenders retaliated tenfold. The searing touch of holy promethium and plasma cleansed corrupted flesh, and ancient power weapons sang their songs of death and lightning as the Astartes hewed through the enemy ranks. Vanguard veterans descended from on high, lashing out with bolt and blade and scattering the enemy before them, while Librarians wove great nimbuses of lightning and incinerated scores of demons with a gesture.
 
It is said that only in the crucible of trials and hardship does a man find his true worth, and humanity’s darkest hour also proved its finest. The Blood Angels fought with the fury of humanity itself, and their deeds that day would echo through history, to be sung of in the future even as the embers of civilization smoldered and the darkness drew near.
 
Chief Librarian Sandelon was the first to slay one of the Greater Daemons. As the battle swirled around him, the great librarian found himself facing Scabeiathrax, and without a flicker of hesitation he hurled himself at the massive, bloated daemon. The Blood Angel tore great gouges into the beast’s stinking flesh with his force staff and lances of crimson lightning, skillfully dodging between the beast’s cumbersome counterstrikes. However, for a heartbeat, the librarian was distracted as he turned to parry the strikes of a Chaos Astartes attacking his flank, and the momentarily lull in his defenses was enough: the Great Unclean One skewered Sandelon at the end of its massive, rusted cleaver, chortling to itself as its prey writhed on the end of its weapon. But Sandelon would not die.
 
With his rage and sheer force of will he anchored his soul to his dying body, and grasping the cleaver with both hands impaled himself further, bringing him within striking range of the daemon’s head. With a roar he rammed his force staff through the daemon’s skull, and focused all his pain and rage into a maelstrom of searing lightning through the staff.
 
The greater daemon howled and twisted in pain and fear as it burned from the inside out, slabs of flesh blackening and sloughing from its massive body, until at last it was nothing more than piles of charred, smoking meat, and its soul was sent screaming back into the realms of the warp. Only then did Sandelon close his eyes, a grim smile of satisfaction on his lips, and allow his soul to depart, his ravaged body at last going limp as he left to join his fallen brothers.
 
Elsewhere on the battlefield, Captain Azkaellon of the First Company, famed leader of the Sanguinary Guard, slew a dozen Chaos Lords in succession as they stepped forth to challenge his Primarch while Sanguinius dueled with Luther. Their swords clashed for the better part of an hour, great bursts of light and warp energy erupted from the points of contact between the radiant blade of gold and the cruel blade of black. Finally, Sanguinius found an opening in Luther’s defenses, and with a flourish he disarmed the Arch-Heretic, before severing both the traitor’s arms with a sweep of his burning blade.
 
Zarakynel was slain by Commander Taranis, the mighty Custodes parrying and dashing through the flashing, quicksilver strikes of the Keeper of Secrets. With a single blow of his right hand, the Commander bisected the daemon at the waist, all while firm grasping the Banner of Unification in his left.
 
Yet for all the deeds of heroism performed that day, the greatest was surely the Banishing of Ka’Bandha. The towering Bloodthirster was more akin to a force of nature, its great axe and nine-tailed scourge were streaks of blood as it cleaved through scores of Astartes and Custodes with contemptuous ease, and the Imperial defenders were forced to cede ground to it rampaged across the plaza.
 
Filled with fury at the deaths of so many of his men, Sanguinius rallied his Sanguinary Guard and together they crashed into the path of the berserk daemon. The blades of Astartes and daemon lashed out, slashing and hacking, as Sanguinius and his Guard pressed the daemon. As they fought, a score of the Sanguinary Guard were slain, each a mighty hero the Blood Angels in his own right. Yet not even Ka’Bandha could stand in the face of so many lethal warriors, and it was forced back, bleeding from dozens of wounds.
 
Flapping its great leather wings, it launched itself into the air seeking a respite, but Sanguinius followed, chasing the massive daemon into the sky on wings of white. In the air, they clashed and broke away, seeing greater height before clashing again. The nimbler Angel darted around the heavy Bloodthirster, swooping and twisting, dodging the daemon’s blows and inflicting a dozen more wounds on the beast. Sensing the daemon was slowing, Sanguinius pressed his advantage, and in a blur of speed, he slashed through the daemon’s right wing, sending the beast hurtling down to the plaza far below.
 
It landed with a thundering crash, crushing the granite and gouging a huge crater, and a few seconds later Sanguinius landed with his own crash, driving his boot into the daemon’s head with all the force of his dive. As the daemon struggled to rise, faithful Azkaellon slashed through the daemon’s remaining wing as Sanguinius drove his sword through its throat. With the beast weakened, Sanguinius flung aside his blade and grabbed the Bloodthirster by its legs and throat, and with a heroic burst of strength lifted the beast above his head and dashed him against his knee, tearing the daemon in two with his force. The warriors of Chaos looked on in shock as Sanguinius flung the two pieces of the mighty demon into their ranks, while Ka’Bandha's soul was flung screaming into the warp to beg forgiveness at the feet of Khorne.
 
Though the dark gods had whispered their lies in Sanguinius’ mind for what seemed like hours, only moments had passed in reality, and both the orks and the Imperial defenders were stirring. The horde of Nobz bellowed war chants and smashed their weapons together, raising a crashing din of guttural roars and ringing metal. The Beast itself was still motionless, its eyes surveying the Astartes with malevolent cunning.
 
Around Sanguinius, his men were springing into motion. Captain Azkaellon shouted for reinforcements through his vox receiver, calling for the secondary Blood Angel forces within the Imperial Palace to hurry to the plaza and for the assistance of any other Imperial forces in the vicinity. The few remaining librarians readied their powers, sparks swirling about their temples and fingers, as Astartes and Custodes checked armor and weapons battered from days of combat, adjusted sights, and muttered quiet prayers.
 
The ground shook as the Beast finally began to move. With slow, ponderous steps, it walked out in front of the horde, waving the eager Nobz back as they tried to follow; one Nob foolhardy enough to follow was pulverized into a smear by a casual swing of the Beast’s massive fist.
 
Across the plaza, Sanguinius did likewise, striding out alone against the protests of his men, shaking off Azkaellon as his captain begged him not to face the Beast alone. The Steward in the Throne Room had sensed the presence of the Beast, and as he touched Sanguinius’ mind he knew in an instant that the Angel meant to face the Beast unaided. The Steward urgently ordered his old friend to retreat to the Throne Room so that they might face it together, but Sanguinius refused, for to do so would have endangered the very survival of humanity.
 
The Steward was psychically linked with thousands of his commanders as he orchestrated the Imperial forces across Terra, and it was only through his military genius that they held, the armies of men and Eldar acting in perfect unison as they threw back wave after wave of fouls xenos and the forces of Chaos. Distracting the Steward would imperil all the forces of Terra and the survival of humanity, for even if the Beast were slain, Terra would fall should the rest of the planet be lost. Knowing he could not sway Sanguinius’ decision, the Steward could only powerlessly observe as Sanguinius bade him farewell, and met the Beast in the middle of the plaza.
 
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=== Lion ===
 
- Astartes. Franj born
 
=== Perturabo ===
 
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">'''''The Warsmith''''' - or ''The Troubled Child:''
 
Perturabo of the Macedonian Garrison was not a man truly cut out for the military life, although it is hard to say exactly what sort of life he ''was'' cut out for.
 
Macedonia was an odd case at that point in the constant wars of the Age of Strife. Barely a century and a half ago it had been a conquered territory of the Great Everlasting Tharkian Empire - an empire far less grand than its name would suggest - until the Tharkians were crushed by the relentless expansion of a Despot of Ursh, as so many others of the time were. The Urshii quickly swallowed up the valuable regions of the area, leaving only the ancient nation of Macedonia relatively untouched. By some miracle of cunning, guile, and luck on an incredible scale, Perturabo's grandfather Nestor made it appear that, instead of the meagre garrison it actually held, Macedonia was in fact home to Tharkian strategic reserves far greater than the forces the Urshio had already fought. This, combined with the seemingly unwavering defiance of the Macedonian people, convinced the Despot that conquering the region would overextend his supply lines and weaken his control over the greater Tharkia.
 
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
 
 
With the immediate threat gone the cities began to drift apart and Nestor was old and wise enough to know that he had neither the forces nor the authority to hold them together. He did, however, manage to take and hold the ancient fortress city of Štip-Isar; and many rival groups joined him in seizing a city or hive and expanding from there. Thus, Macedonia ''did'' survive, to some extent, albeit as a collection of squabbling city-states that would only unite against greater outside threats; ironically, not unlike the Classical Greek counterparts who were conquered by the Macedonians themselves in the depths of history.
 
Perturabo's father Nikola had risen to be the petty king of the reasonably well-off fortress city of Štip-Isar after Nestor had passed away, and, recognising how inadequately ''he'' had been prepared for the job, immediately set about the task of trying to train his children in the arts of statesmanship. His daughters were fine women, just as dedicated to the nation as he was, but the other regional powers would have openly scoffed and secretly mocked the entire family if a queen were to rise. Thus the highest they would reach were hasty marriages to shore up the city's few alliances, leaving Perturabo as the heir apparent - albeit one rather psychologically unsound.
 
Countless years later, when Nikola and his nation were a mere footnote in endless halls of historical texts, Perturabo's peers would describe him as a spare Angron, minus the enthusiasm. This was unfair and inaccurate, but it was true that it would have been difficult to find a leader ''less'' statesmanlike than the unfortunate son of Nikola. Perturabo suffered from bouts of quite severe depression, punctuated by occasional flashes of intense rage with little to no warning. Although the rage would flash into incandescence and burn itself out relatively quickly, the depression was far more lingering. Nikola made no effort to hide the disappointment he had for his son, but little did he know that the heir's true talents would be more vital for the nation's survival than Terra's finest diplomats could ever be.
 
For Perturabo - in spite of his constant pessimism, or perhaps ''because'' of it - was supremely gifted at defensive planning. His dreams, haunted as they were by thoughts of his home being crushed by faceless invaders, merely bolstered his resolve to resist. He was not his father, or his grandfather, however; he was not a leader who could call the people to defend their land tooth and nail, for that would require hope and optimism that he himself so sorely lacked. Instead, Perturabo's defensive planning was that of grim determination, of strongpoints and counter-offensives instead of rallies and patriotism, of a hard shell around a softer peoples. Some would have called this paranoia, especially given how the petty skirmishes with other nation-states were the largest wars known for over a generation, but in truth it was uncanny foresight.
 
When the scum of Ursh came back it was as if a mighty hammer had struck the lands, driving all before it. Perturabo - indeed, all of Macedonia - was caught off-guard by the assault; by the time he was made aware of the threat, the most prosperous and powerful of his neighbours were little more than flaming rubble. Desperate for time, the heir withdrew his forces again and again, his generals raging and threatening mutiny for his cowardice, and he later claimed that in all his life he had faced no greater test than keeping his calm and concealing his plans from them (and thus, any possible Urshii spies) until the very last moment.
 
Nestor had fought a war - a war of armies and raiding parties facing each other in pitched battles - but his grandson had to stop a wave of slaughter that bore more resemblance to a swarm of locusts than any coherent fighting force. Isolated strongpoints were ground down horrifyingly quickly by sheer weight of numbers, and Perturabo had soon realised that the only chance he had of stopping the swarm was in a single, united defensive line. Even then, he knew he could not hope to stop the Despot's onslaught, only to give it a bloodied nose and hope it would back off.
The Urshii forces knew none of this, as all they saw were lands held by weak natives and abandoned by their defenders. Just as they were wondering if their grandparents' tales of the effortless conquest of Tharkia had some truth to them, they ran directly into Perturabo's hastily constructed kill zones. Metal, laser and superheated plasma alike rained down on the barbarians as if it were his own spite and pain made manifest, and the Urshii vanguard was left a pile of mangled bodies for their comrades to climb.
 
The Despot's humiliation drove him into such a rage that he eviscerated his own commanders, ordering their replacements to wipe Macedon from the face of Terra. Even with Perturabo's formidable defences and traps, the main Urshii force would raze the land without batting an eyelash - yet the Despot was so blinded by his rage that he was caught completely unawares by the true threat to his power.
 
 
 
 
When the scouts of the Warlord's army first trickled into Macedonia they expected a barren wasteland - or at best, a broken nation at its own throat. Much of their suspicions were confirmed, but amongst the dirt they found a diamond-hard shard of defiance that had prepared for the storm and, amazingly, was still weathering it. It was here, the Warlord decided, that the first (and perhaps the most important) true blow against Ursh would be struck.
 
After the smoke cleared. the plasma burns cooled, the shrieks of wounded finally fallen away into silence, Perturabo discovered that not only had he bloodied the nose of the Despot's assault, but he had broken its back completely. Caught between the swift hammer of the Warlord's armies and the unyielding anvil of the Macedon defence, Ursh's toughest veterans were shattered and scattered to the wind - and even the most zealous of barbarians were were beginning to question if there was a master greater than their own.
 
 
 
 
The Warlord entered Štip-Isar not as a conqueror, but simply as a leader, for he had great respect for the one who turned such a small nation into a devourer of armies. Yet the prince would do something that not a single battlefield or leader had managed so far, or quite possibly since. He ''surprised'' his guest, and not only with his young age (for, compared to his generals, he was little more than a boy), but with his mind. For when the Warlord looked into his psyche, he found something he had never seen before or since - and he wished he had not. It was cold. Bleak. A desolate landscape of steel and bone blasted smooth by an unrelenting gale of numbers, of angles, of shifting probabilities; while above, great roiling clouds of blackness drained away what little light and life lay beneath them. Even this was just a momentary glimpse, for in the blink of an eye he was locked out by an immense iron wall rising from the ground in mere instants, horizons wide and twice as tall. The Warlord found himself simply staring into dead, grey eyes, barred from what lay within by mental defences greater than all but the most powerful of psykers - and built simply from paranoia and distrust rather than to contain any unearthly whispers. But those eyes told him all he really needed to know about the prince. There was no fear there, no awe, and certainly no love. Just endless planning, calculating, searching for weakness.
 
To his credit, the Warlord still saw potential in the mad architect; something that could be put to use, maybe even turned to greatness. After long, distrustful negotiations (for the Macedonians were as wary of his arrival as they were grateful for it), Perturabo was offered a place in the Warlord's armies as a fortification and garrison specialist. For King Nikola's part... the sad truth was that he was glad to see the back of his son. After all, with Perturabo otherwise occupied - or out of the way, depending on your point of view - he now had grandchildren to train in inheriting his responsibilities.
 
Perturabo rose through the ranks of the Imperial Army with neither the speed nor grandeur of the other Primarchs, but he did indeed become great. Other generals captured huge swathes of land or routed vast armies, but it was he who ensured that any forces seeking to recapture their territory or avenge their fallen knew nothing but failure. He was never at the forefront of any battle or campaign, never the glorious conqueror or invincible warrior; and of course, he earned little respect from those who ''were,'' who saw him as an unstable freak barely fit to follow in their footsteps. This, however, suited him just fine, as he much preferred a legacy of impenetrable bastions safeguarded people than any number of songs or monuments.
 
Still, the Warlord quietly took note of his work, of how harmlessly the condescension of both his superiors and subordinates bounced off him, and none were surprised as Perturabo himself was when he was selected for late-stage Thunder Warrior treatment. Soon, as the remnants of the Old Night were finally purged and the dream of Unification began to spread across Sol, malcontents and partisans began to emerge from the woodwork; and it was here Perturabo's worth truly became evident even to his detractors. For old king Nikola's lessons had not, in fact, been in vain, and it was discovered that the Macedonian's lands were impenetrable to assault from within as well as without. For this, he was finally elevated to the lofty title of Primarch.
 
 
 
 
 
In the countless years that followed, the Unification became the Great Crusade; the Warlord became the Steward, and Štip-Isar faded into distant memory. Perturabo, however, did not change. Perhaps he could not. After all, his life had certainly not changed, for it still consisted of day after day of building meat grinders of horrific scale while planning yet-greater ones, all while hoping against hope they would never be needed. Or perhaps, just as was the case in his youth, his works were so brutally efficient because of the hope he - and they - ''lacked.'' But back in his homeland he still had the support of his people; or at least he had his father to soothe and comfort them at every turn. Here, on the frontier worlds, the deal of "harsh work and oppression for you and your children in the name of descendants you will not live to see" would've been a hard sell for Gulliman, or Sanguinius, never mind one as uncharismatic as Perturabo - and the hatred of the people was beginning to wear down even his iron resolve.
 
When The War of the Beast descended upon the worlds under his aegis, his worth was finally proven beyond any doubt. Wretched, base creatures assaulted his people, his fortresses, his worlds in droves - and time and time again they drowned in their own tides of endless green. His warriors manned their battlements and fired from positions prepared centuries ago in an eerie mirror image of the plains of Macedonia so long ago. The doctrine still remained identical, as well. No point would be defended to the last man, for such heroics were costly and unnecessary; instead, the defenders would fight until the back of the assault force was broken before retreating to their next set of positions, buying them precious breathing room while the enemy were forced to bring in a fresh wave of warriors.
 
It would be wrong to say that no worlds under his protection fell, or to say that his methods were flawless. Just as it was against the Urshii, he would never defend an untenable position; civilian conurbations and evacuation points were no exception to this, and his new subordinates labelled him a coward with as much vigour as his old ones had so long ago. But this cold, calculated strategy ensured that his armies lived - and more importantly, rested - to fight another day, where another Primarch would've allowed them to be slaughtered in a vain order to hold the line.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
On venerable Olympia, one of the first colony worlds of the Old Empire brought back into the fold by Perturabo's Iron Warriors, the Primarch nearly met his end. His command headquarters was unexpectedly besieged by a force of Orks that, reinforced by a newly arrived Rok, had broken through a weakened flank, and he insisted he took to the field. Years later, he would claim it was simply a pragmatic decision; after all, as a Thunder Warrior he was fully capable of fighting to earn time for his command staff to be evacuated, all of whom were equally invaluable to the defense of the planet - but for many, this unexpected loyalty was a welcome reminder that there was still a human within the Primarch's iron shell. His psychological one, at least.
 
His physical armour, however, would be sorely tested by the warboss he would face; a great corroding creature of Nurgle's kin, leading the Orks of the Pox Dok in laughter and taunts even as lascannon and bolter blew off chunks of rotting green flesh. The fate of the world and every soul on it was decided in a burning cathedral; and while Perturabo was certainly not the unstoppable juggernaut other Primarchs were, his calculating mind was as much use here as it was fighting on theater or even planetary level. It merged with his Thunder Warrior instincts, making each move carefully planned and each attack predicted ahead of time, until the fight seemed to be a fluid dance akin to that of the Eldar Harlequins.
 
Still, in brute force he was outmatched, and for every hundred blows he saw coming, there was one he simply could not parry or evade in time. The mighty green leviathan and the smaller figure slowly but relentlessly tearing it down - a fitting reversal of their armies' roles - wore each other into the ground, until the Iron Warrior emerged triumphant over the Rust of decay. With the Warboss gone, his legion quickly broke the remainder of the Ork assault, reclaiming swathes of land and beginning the long and thankless task of resecuring it. Scouting parties quickly found their Primarch, slumped in the pews where the faithful once prayed for redemption, and almost as white as the pale stone dust raining down from the ruined cathedral.
 
 
 
 
Perturabo did not see that world retaken; he did not see the organised withdrawals from worlds and sectors almost turn to a complete rout without his immaculate planning.
 
He did not see the Battle of Terra, the desecration of his homeworld.
 
He did not see the death of first Sanguinius, then the Beast.
 
He eventually did awaken, but only after a year spent comatose, while his ruined body was slowly repaired by Thunder Warrior physiology where possible and Mechanicus cybernetics where not. Unbowed and unbroken; Iron within, Iron without. As soon as he was able to, he marched on with his legion, rebuilding worlds and shoring up their defences before moving onto the next. Still, many believed that the Beast's legacy still haunted him and that he blamed himself personally for each loss; for as the years passed he became more and more of a perfectionist, making demands of broken worlds that could not have met them in their prime. Eventually, his most senior Warsmiths agreed by unanimous vote to remove him from active service, after he demanded a planet's population be decimated for a single of its regiments' incompetence. Perhaps, like many others, he did not resist simply because he was grateful.
 
Perturabo's last days were spent back on Old Earth as an architect, away from the battlefield and doing what he loved. Many had forgotten that he could design anything but defensive lines and fortresses; and perhaps he himself had forgotten as well. Over time, the work began to heal him, and in turn he began to heal Olld Earth. The swathes of land destroyed by the Beast were given to him as a blank canvas, and upon them he built structures as grand and magnificent as any in the Dark Age of Technology ever were. Oddly enough, '''this''' would be his legacy to the common man; his military campaigns would be lost to the ages, but his designs would be copied and imitated across the entire Imperium, from his streamlining of Hive City layouts that every planetary governor desperately sought to the glorious palaces on Terra that, well, every planetary governor desperately sought. Such form and function would not be surpassed for millenia to come, and even to this day his influence is visible on almost every Imperial world.
 
Perturabo passed away soon after finishing his plans for the new Imperial Palace; remarking that only now he was able to discover his art, after war had taken all the joy and beauty from it. Some say that he passed with a gentle, childlike smile on his face - for after a thousand years of siege, Perturabo, Prince of Macedonia, Son of Nikola, was finally to be relieved.
 
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=== Mortarion ===
 
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%"> '''''The Vermin Lord:'''''
 
Mortarion was a 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.
 
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
 
 
 
Gredbritton was one of the earlier 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 learned that the Warlord was looking for volunteers for Thunder Warrior conversion, known to be a procedure that carried considerable risks. The Apothocarium and the Biologicus 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 even ''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 22 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 he 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 - no, 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 cowards - 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 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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=== Lorgar ===
 
Lorgar Aurelian was a child born in the theocracy of the Ynsdonesic Bloc and as all children born in that awful place was the result of a state designated union. Unions in that dysfunctional realm in that time usually being decided by perceiving omens be it from smoke patterns or entrails augury despite the degenerate unions that this often created.
 
As with all youths of that nation he was raised in the Kartharanite branch of religion. He was taught that only through suffering was any worth found be it inflicted on the self or on others and that the unbeliever must be cleansed from the world by fire and sword. It was not a faith of kindness that he was raised in.
 
His appointed mentor in matters of religion was Bishop Kor Phaeron of Jakurtana. Had he had any other master then history would have taken a decidedly different path.
 
Bishop Phaeron was secretly a member of the Katholian sect from which the Kartharanite had once sprung and in this more kind and just faith did Lorgar find peace and purpose.
 
The old faith spread through the downtrodden and the hopeless of society despite the brutal and cruel efforts of Cardinal Tang to suppress, contain and exterminate it.
 
Eventually the outrage and animosity of the people for their leaders reached a fever pitch and civil war ensued. As Bishop Phaeron was the highest ranking member of the hierarchy on the side of the people he was looked to for guidance. As the Bishop's right hand man Lorgar soon learned the ways of war. He learned to inspire and comfort. He learned to appeal for calm and how to whip peoples passions to a frenzy. Although not lacking in martial prowess his voice, his cunning and his keen intellect were his favoured weapons.
 
It was maybe just in time that the subversion erupted into open rebellion when it did. The forces of the Warlord were marching down from the North and the Ynsdonesic Bloc was well up on the "Burn it down and start again" list.
 
With the possibility of an unwinnable war on two fronts Bishop Phaeron went to the parlay with the Warlord in person, dressed in only a crude hessian robe, with only Lorgar Aurelian accompanying him.
 
An audience was granted to the Warlord in his tent, at the heart of the enemy war camp, surrounded by genetically modified super soldiers and heavy weapons.
 
Expecting some sort of zealous speech of defiance and martyrdom the Warlord was taken aback some what when the two got down on one knee and swore allegiance.
 
The cared deeply about their faith and the word of their God. But their God cared deeply about the people he had made. Their God would understand if he was to be forgotten but not forgive men who should know better leading children to the slaughter. They would rather their people be free and happy than pious.
 
Moved by their words the Emperor gave them grace time. Should they triumph over their oppressors they would be welcomed into the Imperium as any other member state. Should they would have the harsh treatment of conquest and subjugation.
 
By insurgencies, underhanded tactics, assassinations and a brutal 12 year war the Katholians claimed victory and Cardinal Tang's broken but still living form was dragged before the Warlord as a token of gratitude.
 
It was somewhat of a pyrrhic victory for the people of the Ynsdonesic Bloc. They nation was in a hundred pieces, each swearing loyalty to some tin hat despot with delusions of grandeur, some almost as bad as Cardinal Tang. It would not be long before the fighting for dominance began, to say nothing of annexation from another nation.
 
The forces of the Warlord prepared to march again and again Lorgar begged the Warlord to stay his hand. They were just sheep without a shepherd, lost children in a very dark night. Once more swayed by the strange kind passion in Lorgars voice the Warlord relented.
 
Over the next five years as Bishop Phaeron became Patriarch Phaeron Lorgar went to the isolated and the lost and the scared with open arms and promises of reconciliation.
 
For the most part he was well received and his homeland healed. It was only after the talking was done that those too stubborn or monstrous to come home again were removed. Great pains were taken to minimize casualties but it was not a wholly peaceful end to that bitter conflict.
 
Ynsdonesic Bloc was the first of the old nation states to disband it's own military completely and throw it's own might, such as was left of it, wholeheartedly into the Imperium.
 
Lorgar, now a Chaplain-General in the Imperial Army, was considered too old for conversion from human to superhuman but did receive some discrete genetic modifications.
 
It was a regiment overseen by Lorgar that lead the final assault on the Despot of Ursh's palace that signalled the unification of Old Earth. But Chaplain-General Aurelian considered all of his victories to be nothing but tragedies. The only true victory, he would often claim, was one where no war was to be found. For his valour and astounding levels of inspiring oratory skill he was declared the unlikely Primarch.
 
Of all the Primarchs in the time of the Great Crusade his forces brought more worlds into the Imperium peacefully than any other.
 
They didn't bring more worlds in, oh my no. They were quite slow and their tardiness was no end of frustration to the now Steward. But Lorgar was tolerated because the worlds he claimed were brought into the Imperium whole and undamaged and contributing.
 
In the War of the Beast Primarch Aurelian and his Legion struck back with an unexpected force. Many of the other war leaders of the imperium considered his Legion to be full of pacifists and weakness. Like many of the damned in the armies of the Beast they had mistaken the olive branch for a white flag and they were punished hard for it.
 
Across the breadth and depth of the burning Imperium, to the aid of human or xeno, the Word Bearers could be found holding the line and inspiring others to hold the line. Where they strode despair turned to hope and weary hands held firm blessed weapons and shaky voices roared the old battle hymns.
 
Lorgar and his forces were on Old Earth when Sanguinius died and ever afterwards Lorgar blamed himself for not fighting hard enough to have saved his brother Primarch.
 
Lorgar lived and served for many years. He eventually died of old age at near eleven hundred years old. A small but modest shrine was erected at the Jakurtana Seminary that is sometimes visited by Word Bearer chaplains even into the Dark Millennium.
 
=== Khan ===
 
- Former military commander of Ursh. Early Astartes.
 
=== Konrad Curze ===
 
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%"> '''''The Unforgivable:'''''
 
Konrad Curze was a man that could politely be described as driven, and accurately be described as ''a frothing at the mouth lunatic.'' Of all the Primarchs appointed, none were more questioned than he.
 
He had grown up in the final days of the Age of Strife in the rambling under city Tordashimya in the Pan Pacific Empire, along with all of the horrors and excess that this entails. To say that this had an effect on the deepest levels of his mind would be a woeful understatement, and he saw the fledgling Imperium as only existing as a means of imposing some sort of order and some basic justice on a world that was in dire need of both and he saw it as his duty to make it happen. Sadly his means of doing so were as crude and brutal as those who he sought to bring to justice; after all, the quickest way to gain obedience is through fear, and and the easiest way to rebuild a society is to behead it and tear apart the body.
 
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
 
 
 
Despite - or, some whisper in hushed tones, ''because of'' - the Steward's insistence that he change his tact, Curze became stubborn and resentful; his predations becoming ever more brutal. Realising the futility of bringing to heel, the Steward instead directed him instead to the worlds of no hope, worlds so broken that they could never be brought into the Imperium. Worlds he couldn't make worse. It was on one of these worlds, Nostramo, that the Night Haunter found some strange joy. If he could bring a world such as this, so broken, so unspeakably wretched, as this to the light of civility then he would be vindicated before the whole galaxy. If a world so cursed by both gods and men could be rebuilt, there was nothing that could not be.
 
The subjugation of that world was the harrowing stuff of nightmares. The Dark Eldar could barely have done better to make every day-cycle a new nightmare; indeed, some claim that they were there to simply soak up the suffering as a welcome break to their long campaigns of torture and enslavement. But in time Curze, now infamous as the Night Lord of Nostramo, was vindicated. His people took control of every position of authority, while the malcontents were quickly ''disappeared'', often winding up dead and mutilated along with their families and friends, whether man, woman, elder or child. Hideous as it was, order was brought - and order began to spread, as for each world his legion inflicted unspeakable horrors on, ten more surrendered without raising arms. Hideous, brutal examples were made of the worst, but through them the more virtuous were saved.
 
 
 
 
Soon enough, the dark whispers of Chaos began to tempt his mind, the fallen Eldar of the Crone Worlds assailing his dreams with tantalising offers of untold riches and endless power. Yet every offer was found wanting; every envoy cut down, every promise met with scorn. They had made the mistake of assuming that one such as Curze had become would revel in their depraved debaucheries, without considering that he would find them every bit as repulsive as other, better, people found him. He was a monster, this was true, but he was a monster who ripped and tore and tortured in the name of order; by the Emperor he was the ''Imperium's'' monster and nobody else's.
 
Some, of course, fell. Younger soldiers who had maybe joined the cause for glory, for strength, or even for mere self-gratification. But the vast majority of them were, like their Primarch, disgusted by the offerings of Chaos, horrified by the fall of their battle brothers, and insulted at the implication that they and the forces of Chaos served the same ends. For the entirety of the War of the Beast, the Lords of the Night could be found sowing discord and misery amongst the fleets and the armies of damnation. For every horror the invaders committed more was inflicted upon them, and for every innocent killed by the Ruinous Powers the Night Lords would swear vengeance on a dozen daemons.
 
Few of that despised Legion ever fought on the soil of Old Earth, and never were they allowed to forget this. But because of their actions the forces of damnation were weakened and poorly focused with one eye always over their shoulder. Even if their military successes had counted for naught; even if they had not managed to save a single soul, '''they had made Chaos fear ''them'''''. And that was an achievement beyond all others.
 
 
 
 
In the aftermath of that war, many small provincial worlds and systems tried to strike out on their own, away from the light of the Throne, often being brought back by force. None of Curze's worlds, however, had ever tried to secede - after all, they knew both sides of the Imperium's protection, and had seen first hand the wrath that the Night Lords could unleash. If that was what they would to in ''defence'' of the Imperium, what they would do to willing turncoats did not bear thinking about.
 
In his later years, Curze was well aware that he had become everything he had despised in his youth, and he sometimes derived black humour from this; that he had finally rediscovered across the galaxy what he had first learned in his youth on a small Terran kingdom: that the ends do not, and cannot, justify the means. In the year 243.M32 he had himself tried and executed for war crimes as the ultimate testament that none were beyond judgement. He had deemed himself to have outlived his usefulness, and to some extent he was right; although the Imperium could tolerate a useful monster, it should have no love for one.
 
</div>
</div>
 
=== Angron ===
 
Angron was a slave pit fighter in what was left of the Nord Afrik Enclaves.
 
He was liberated quite early on in The Warlords campaign. Signed on to join the Thunder Warriors.
 
Rose through the ranks and earned great fame and respect. Munched loved by his men due to his tendency to lead from the front and getting stuck in where the fighting was thickest.
 
Was one of the older generation of TW with all the damage and flaws this brought with it.
 
Due to his astounding aptitudes he was promoted to the rank of Primarch and given command of a batch of the new Astartes model Space Marines.
 
Plagued by health issues despite attempts to repair his faulty upgrades. Refused the retirement offer that many TW took to make lives for themselves. He wouldn't have been able to deal with a peaceful life.
 
Survived all the way to the end of The War of the Beast but not much longer. Died peacefully in his sleep. Probably the oldest TW.
 
Kharn the Oathsworn took over, new type of super soldier for a new era.
 
He didn't live a happy life, but given the nature of his childhood he could have lived a worse one and a statue of him stands outside the gate of the Carthisisa Hive Cathedral.
 
=== Corax ===
 
- Bania, astartes.
 
=== Alpharious & Omegon ===
 
"I am the Alpha and Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End." these are the last known records of the primarchs ‘’Alpharius and Omegon’’. All documents and records were deleted by inquisition, Those that were thought to be associated with the primarchs disappeared and all that was left was a parchment with those words and a small wax stamp beneath depicting the lernaean hydra of old terran mythology. Now the only way to learn about the individuals and their legacy is by eyewitness accounts and rumours that have gone under the inquisitions watchful gaze.
 
One eyewitness report tells of two figures clad in dark robes standing next to the warlord and his war council, they describe that the figures were much shorter than the other in the council.
It is unknown if these are the individuals known as Alpharius and Omegon because other reports say that they were tall men fighting battles and cutting down enemies. It is now even known if they are two persons and might in fact be one individual. This comes from a witness that said to have met a man dressed in the clothes of a highly revered official that presented himself as ‘’Alpharius Omegon’’. All that is known that there was at one point one or more individuals called Alpharius and Omegon. But what is known is that he or they had a large part in the counterintelligence and espionage of the unification war. They were said to be masters of infiltration and were supposedly to have a deep network of agents and assassins so that the mysterious individuals could act at multiple places at once. This Network is thought to become what we now know as the inquisition.
 
 
‘’Cut off one head and two shall take it’s place.’’
-Last words spoken from a prisoner before committing suicide.
 
A popular theory about the origins of the mysterious individuals, is that they were the members of the even less known ██████████ that were a secret society of old terra. It’s thought that that they joined the warlord after seeing the potential power that they could have they sent their most loyal and brightest two members to help the warlord in his endeavours.
 
‘’You search the darkness, while we hide in the light. You see not the serpent lying in wait, you see only a brother. We witnessed your beginning and we will be your end.’’
-Said to be whispered to an imperial official before her assassination.
 
Another theory is that they originate from ███ ████ a group of Xenos set on destroying the ‘’primordial annihilator’’ and thus sent their best human operatives to aid the warlord and his future plans.
 
‘’Cut the head off the snake and the body will die shortly after’’
-thought to be a direct quote from either Alpharius or Omegon.
 
Alpharius and Omegon are thought to be major members in the creation of the inquisition and that after the alliance with the eldar their influence has only increased. Acting as puppet masters, they are thought to be behind both the starting of wars and the ending of them, doing as they see fit for the better of the imperium.
 
It was around ████ that all records and documents of Alpharius and Omegon were deleted. Theories say that they had died and that their successors order the purge of information surrounding the primarchs so that their legacy and actions can be forgotten. Other theories say that the warlord declared them traitors and therefore got rid of all evidence of their existence.
But yet to this day there are whispers about legions of men and women walking among us, executing the orders of their puppets masters, killing the corrupt, eliminating the foe from the inside and bearing the brand of the hydra
 
‘’Hydra Dominatus’’
-Alpharius and Omegon the Beginning and the end
 
== The Craftworlds ==
 
=== ALAITOC ===
 
A Craftworld of contradictions, Alaitoc is both highly-regimented and highly liberated-. The reason for this is that while the majority of the Craftworld's population are highly dedicated to Eldar ideals, a sizeable minority seek freedom from their home's stifling environment. As such, its relations with the greater Imperium are also as contradictory.
 
Officially, Alaitoc is only marginally allied with the Imperium. While they do send small tithes of soldiers as needed, the still-proud Eldar of Alaitoc refuse to have any more dealings with mon-keigh than is strictly necessary. Their troops, even those of the lowest ranks, are notorious often treat non-Eldar of any rank with breathtaking disdain fit to rival any three hive princes one could name. An exasperated Saint Macharius was once heard to remark "Better a thousand armies of the Beast's cultists at my rear than a single Alaitoc Farseer at my side!"
 
The same cannot be said however, for the Rangers that Alaitoc regularly sends out, albeit unintentionally. Freed of their stifling homes, many eventually find solace in the familiar, though not as restricted, environments of other Craftworlds. More notorious however are those Rangers who find Imperial life to their liking, and in a strange, yet peculiarly Eldar way, often find themselves as obsessed with non-Eldar life as an Exarch on their path, sometimes even combining two or more cultures in their quest for freedom and reinvention. Even the most seasoned galactic traveller must take pause when they find themselves meeting "Fio'La Bork'an Rialieath, Magos Prime of Forge Alpha."
 
===BIEL-TAN===
 
As one of the Imperium's most militiarized Craftworlds, Biel-Tan Aspect Warriors are the ones most often seen on both the battlefield and in Imperial media, with the gruff, battle-hardened Biel-Tan warrior being a staple of Imperial entertainment. Of the major Craftworlds aligned to the Imperium, the Biel-Tan are perhaps one of the most fanatical in expanding Imperial borders, seeing in the Imperium a chance to recreate the Eldar Empire of old. This has sometimes caused friction even within the Imperial military, as Biel-Tan officers regularly advise all-out offensives regardless of the state of the greater army.
 
One notable aspect of Biel-tan's society is the surprising amount of regard they hold for the inhabitants of Tallarn, a desert world. During the War of the Beast, a large cultist army sought ancient relics long-buried beneath Tallarn's surface. With Imperial forces being in disarray at the time, many Imperial authorities wrote offf Tallarn as lost, and prepared for an assault from that side, Cursing their new allies and their own kin for their cowardice, the Eldar of Biel-Tan rushed to Tallarn, determined to sell their lives as dearly as possible.
 
However, upon arrival they found the devastated Tallarni not waging a desperate war, but holding onto a bloody stalemate despite being outnumbered and outgunned. When the ferocious Eldar fell upon the cultist forces, the Tallarni were quick to take the advantage. Though their once prisitine farmworld had been turned into a vast desert, they had managed to win the respect of the Eldar. Though today the Craftworld maintains a careful distance, both socially and physically, from their adopted planet, they do make short visits in small numbers to carefully shepard the desert warriors. Most adult Tallarni that the 'djinns' of their childhood stories are really the Imperium's major alien ally, but even their oldest generals often show more than the usual respect humans give one of the elder race.
 
=== IYANDEN ===
 
In official records and Imperial propaganda, Iyanden is one of the most successful examples of Imperial-Eldar relations in history, a friendship won in blood and iron. And while this may be believed by the rank and file of both peoples, the truth is a little more complex than that.
 
Even after the marriage between the Steward (as he was still known at the time) and Isha, the Craftworld of Iyandem refused to be part of the alliance. They saw the evil that lurked in the hearts of men, and lambasted the idea of chaining their entire race to the barely-tamed, barely-evolved pseudo primates that had the gall to call itself a sentient species. Even so, they knew that angering said wild beast would only prove detrimental, so they made a deal- they would of course honour any request the Imperium would make of them, on the condition the Imperium never made any such request. Though the High Lords took great offence at this snub, they also knew that antagonizing Iyanden would risk the rest of the alliance, and so quietly backed down.
 
And so matters were left, Iyanden being an island of isolation in the middle of the Realm of Ultramar. Though they opened their docks for limited trade in late M36, they only did so for the handful of Rogue Traders who managed to find their home. Even then, it was only for what few luxuries the Craftworld could not provide, and would be safe for those on the Path to consume.
 
Then the Hive Fleets came.
 
Isolated as they were, Iyanden was almost engulfed by the Shadow in the Warp when they managed to send their distress signal. Even so, it said that only by miraculous guidance from the Eternal Emperor and Empress did Prince-Admiral (later Saint) Yriel manage to find the beleagured Craftworld (indeed, it is officially recorded as the Saint's first miracle). Though the rescue effort was a success, the Craftworld was left devastated, with many of its population reduced to soulstones. Even worse, the Imperial fleet that had saved them could barely spend enough time for rest and repairs, as the chitinous tide threatened to drown Ultima Segmentum. No ship could be spared to defend Iyanden, not even the most grievously wounded ones guaranteed to die pauper's deaths in the void.And so it was that Iyanden found itself making another unfair deal. They offered to make themselves a mobile dock for the Imperial Navy, on the condition that there would always be ships provided for their protection.
 
Today, Iyanden is so integrated into the Navy organization of Ultima Segmentum that it is officially designated a void station colony instead of a Craftworld. Sailors from a hundred member races, from a thousand times more worlds, mingle every day in bustling streets where once Eldar took quiet walks. So many ships orbit the Craftworld that at times they block the stars. And while many of the younger races and Eldar youth see this as a great thing (some even proclaim Iyanden's colours of blue and gold, the same as the Imperial Navy's, to be a sign of divine intervention), older Eldar simply sigh, and mourn the lost purity of their home as yet another casualty of the Tyranids, and they fear what the outsiders might bring in.
 
=== SAIM-HANN ===
 
The Craftworld of Saim-Hann are an anomaly in the Imperium's dealings with the Eldar. In the early days of alliance negotiations, the Eldar Seers negotiating with the High Lords insisted almost every Craftworld be given proper due and respect, even prideful ones like Biel-Tan and Iyanden. Almost every Craftworld- save for Saim-Hann. When Imperial authorities tried to find out the reason for this surprising reticence, they found out just why the Seers let them carry out the fact-finding mission in the first place.
 
The Saim-Hann were wild, more wild than even the humans were used to. In many of their dealings, the Eldar displayed a surprising lack of respect for Isha, calling her 'soft-bodied' and throwing the word 'gentle' like an insult. Negotiations quickly degraded, and would have broken down had not the Saim-Hann Farseer in charge of his side's negotiations noticed one of the humans taking a swig of the drinks the Eldar gave them ("You think us barbarians, mon-keigh?" one of them is reputed to have asked. "Perhaps you are right- but we are not savages."). Unlike the other Imperials present, who only took polite sips with grimaces on their faces, this giant Imperial seemed to actually enjoy his drinks. Seeing the chance for a bit of fun, the Farseer said that he would sign whatever deal the Imperials wanted, if that one man could outdrink the Farseer amd his council.
 
"Wasn't like I could say no, right?" Leman Russ later remarked. "I managed to outdrink the Steward while he still walked among us, I could outdrink a bunch of prissy Eldar," he would add, endearing him and his Wolves even further to Saim-Hann.
 
His terms were surprisingly lenient, though it did include a proviso that the Eldar stop by the Fang for a drink once in a while. Even long after Russ's disappearance, Saim-Hann warbands often stop by Fenris, and the halls of the Fang echo with tales of ribaldry and derring-do, all equal in their magnificence and unbelievability.
 
=== ULTHWE ===
 
One of the last Craftworlds attempting to escape the Eye of Terror, Ulthwe was instead doomed to forever orbit the afterbirth of Slaanesh, pulled dangerously close to the Eye by gravitational fields. Ever since then, the Eldar of Ulthwe have fought against Chaos, though it is not a fight they face alone. The stalwart warriors of Cadia can often be found back-to-back with Ulthwe Eldar, and their Kasrkin train alongside Aspect Warriors and Exarchs.
 
Like Biel-Tan, Ulthwe has found itself admiring the humans with whom they shed blood together, even moreso since they've been doing so since the Eye of Terror was formed, before even the alliance. These ties have only grown stronger since; it is said that the average Cadian will know how to strip his gun before they are 10 and learn to swear in Eldar by 15. Despite the facetiousness of that claim, it is true that Cadians are generally adept in both Eldar customs and language at amazingly young ages, with only the highest reaches of both being beyond human grasp as they require subtle psychic signals only Eldar are capable of. Many Ulthwe Eldar even prefer the harsh utilitarianism of Imperial equipment as opposed to the grace of Eldar technology, and it is not uncommon to see Ulthwe Guardians wearing adapted flak armour and fatigues on campaign. In exceptional circumstances, Ulthwe Eldar have even served directly in the Cadian Guard, often to great acclaim- the career of Farseer-Colonel Taldeer of the Cadian 412th (later the 1st Kronus Liberators) is the most well-known example, one that is often compared to the career of Commissar-Colonel Gaunt.
 
Incidentally, the most Eldar-human couplings on record are those between Ulthwe Eldar and Cadian humans, and while no children have been recorded as resulting from these unions, many such married couples assure those who ask delicately that it is not due to lack of trying.
 
== Timeline ==
Mid to Late M29 Warlord arises on Old Earth. Divides nations of Earth into two lists. One one side are the ones worth inclusion to the Imperium and on the other the ones that need to be destroyed and their lands divided amongst more worthy men.
 
Begins global unification using diplomatic means when possible and brute force when not possible.
 
Late M29/Early M30 First use of early model Thunder Warriors
 
Early to mid Refinement of Thunder Warriors.
 
Old Earth unified (Except for Hy Brasil). Warlord sets up the Throne of Earth and refuses to sit in it instead becoming the Steward of the Empty Throne. The Throne stands waiting for a worthy individual to become Emperor.
 
Steward looks towards the sky and is inspired to take the Unification to the other planets of Sol. Appoints 20 generals the title of Primarch to be his leaders among generals.
 
Sol is unified in a sequence of assimilations, partnerships and short brutal wars of conquest.
 
Steward sets up High Lords of Terra to run the day to day affairs of the Imperium. Long term goal is to make the Imperium self-governing and then fade away again. Short term gaol is to get be able to spend all evening in the pub.
 
Warp storms subside enough for large scale warp travel to become viable.
 
Steward looks to the stars and the dream of Unification burns again.
 
Steward is contacted by Eldrad "fist fight with Skarbrand and won" Ulthuran. The two of them concoct a fiendish plan to break in to Nurgle's mansion and steal Isha back. Eldar send a band of the most fearsome ninja clowns and the Imperium sends its most brutal nutters. Steward leads the expedition. Isha is rescued.
 
Isha is rescued. Imperium earns the eternal hate of the Chaos Gods. Eldar petition Stewards for inclusion into Imperium. Steward agrees in exchange for Webway access. Eldar are reluctant due to potential damage to webway. Compromise is reached that Inquisition can have unlimited access and the Eldar will upgrade the Astronomican.
 
Chaos Gods direct the Crone World Eldar to manipulate the orks into unifying under the banner of a warboss know as The Beast. The Beast and all his Boyz are directed towards Old Earth and other key worlds of the Imperium. Dark Eldar join forces with the Crone Worlders for the promise of plunder and slaves.
 
Primarch Sanguinius dies in the ruins of the Eternity Gate of the Imperial Palace.
 
Steward about to be pummelled into fine red paste by The Beast. Eldred Ulthuran smashes through the wall and joins in the Beast beating festivities and he and the Steward beat The Beast is a savage brawl.
 
As payment for saving his life the Steward owes a favour to Eldrad. Eldrad immediately call that favour in demands that the Steward marry Isha so that the union of Human and Eldar can never be broken.
 
Imperium Recovers over time. Most of the Primarchs die off in battle or simply by time. The title is never given to another; relic of a past age.
 
Chaos forces usually from the Eye of Terror periodically form Black Crusades to try and topple the Imperium. Imperium stays strong.
 
Eventually at about the turning point of M35 and M36 a great man by the name of Goge Vandire arises to be the head of the Administratum. Steward believes that he has found a worthy man to sit upon the Empty Throne of Earth. Emperor Vandire is an asset to the Imperium. Steward steps down and fades into the shadows of some distant world and disappears for some time.
 
Goge Vandire goes nuts.
 
Inquisitor Sebastian Thor raises rebellion against him and causes the Great Civil War. Steward is rediscovered with the High Priestess of Isha sitting at the bar of a tropical beach resort on some backwater nowhere planet. Apparently having been on that beech for the last ~150 years.
 
After 10 years of devastating war Goge Vandire is slain and Sebastian Thor bullies the Steward into sitting on the Throne of Earth and becoming Emperor. 3 of the old Primarchs survive long enough to be present at the ceremony.
 
Due to substantial Demiurg assistance in the war the new Emperor permits the space traveling craftsmen membership to the Imperium, to the grumbling of the elder. Imperium becomes open to the idea of accepting other "lesser" peoples into the fold.
 
Late M36 and the first scouting fleets of the Tyranids are sailing through the Imperium. Connection with gene-stealers is made. Scouting fleets eventually slain and it is believed for a time that they are defeated.
 
Mid M37, Hive Fleets have arrived. A few are slain eventually and at great cost over the next handful of centuries. Most shatter into splinter fleets and terrorize huge swathes of the Galaxy for a long, long time.
 
At about the M38 mark the Necrons start to rise from their half-death into mechanical unlife. Up till the end of the Dark Millennium there is a gradual and unstoppable increase in Necron activity.
 
Mid M38. Tau expeditionary forces encountered for first time. Contact made. Fledgling Tau Empire is unaware of the scale of the wars across the galaxy or the vastness of the Imperium. Refuses all efforts at inclusion.
 
Late M38. Tau have a serious Artificial Intelligence rebellion after ignoring the repeated warnings of the Mechanicus. Dark Eldar take advantage of this time of weakness to use their failing Empire as slave raiding grounds despite the Tau themselves being "bland". Still refuse inclusion to Imperium when offered.
 
Mid M38 and Tau have recovered their old Empire bounds and are once more expanding their borders. Historians note passing similarities to the expansion of early Imperium.
 
Mid to Late M38. Series of crippling wars with the Hive Fleets and pyrrhic victories leaves the Tau once more vulnerable to Dark Eldar raids, and raid they do. They finally accept the offer of inclusion to the Imperium.
 
Mid M39. Ethereal Council of the Eastern Fringe is once more pressing for closer relations with the greater Imperium. Fire Warrior general by name of Farsight believes that too much of the ideologies of the Greater Good have already been compromised by outside influences. Demands return to old ways.
 
Political turmoil and minor skirmishes that the Tau believe are real wars erupt across the eastern fringe. Largely the Imperium fails to notice. Or care.
 
Farsight and friends carve out their own Enclave and defy the Imperium. Ethereals furious at this breach of Tau honour. General Shadowsun swears a blood oath against Farsight.
 
M40. Necrons awakening increases. Silent King spotted. Silent King tries to rebuild old Necrontyr Star Empire. Silent King wishes to find a way to reverse the biotransferance. New rebellions against The Silent King erupt on both scores.
 
Some of the more minor and "eccentric" Necron Lords seek refuge in the Imperium. Emperor eventually agrees on the logic that it's better to have them in here pissing out than out there pissing in. Necron Lords, inhumanly powerful and prideful as they are, swear to obey their new liege so long as he never actually orders them to do anything.
 
Eldar are livid at the inclusion of the Necrons. Some craftworlds consider trying to leave the Imperium.
 
Mid M41. Brain Boys spotted. Any talk of abandoning ship stops abruptly. Nobody wants to jump off the boat, no matter how many vermin are in it, when the alternative is sharks.
 
Late M41. The Hive Fleets were just a vanguard. The Tyranids are assaulting the entire eastern galactic edge in such numbers that they blot out the stars.

Latest revision as of 08:36, 22 June 2023

"The night is dark and full of horror, but the dawn is coming - and it will be glorious. All we must do is survive."

– Sgt. Marcus Albus, Mustavaar 3rd Rifles Regiment, 845.M40

Welcome to Nobledark Imperium: a fan envisioning of the Warhammer 40,000 universe given a buff to competence and common sense akin to a high-fantasy fiction with many races working together à la Elder Scrolls. Generally speaking, Nobledark deviates less from Vanilla 40k than the writefagging of Hektor Heresy and Imperium Asunder; we still have the same xenos races, the same Primarchs (at least in name), and the vast majority of the same Space Marine Legions (and later chapters). Keep in mind that this is just one example of Nobledark. Nobledark is a type of setting like Grimdark is. You can make your own Nobledark Imperium that is not even remotely like this one (such as the Men of Gold thing). Just, y'know, not on this page.

A brief summary of the deviations and their results, in chronological(ish) order:

  • The Emperor (formerly the Warlord, then the Steward) is a relic from the Dark Age of Technology instead of a bunch of reincarnated Shamans; Malcador was the one who found him and the closest thing he had to a parent.
  • The Primarchs have all died of battle or age; only three of them (Ferrus Manus, Vulkan, and Magnus) lived to see the Steward ascend to the Golden Throne. However, they were all just regular(ish) humans that the Warlord/Steward found to be worthy of the title, and they still had roles/themes approximating their Vanilla selves (with some changes); for example, Manus was born and raised Mechanicus and given a legion of Super Skitarii © , while Russ and his legion were given the experimental Canis Helix variant of the Space Marine augmentation.
  • No dickwaving contest over Warmaster, and Steward actually tells everyone about Chaos, so no Horus Heresy. Instead the War of the Beast is given more prominence, with many of the primarch's defining moments taking place therein.
  • First contact with the Eldar leads to an alliance that leads a raid into Nurgle's Mansion in the Realm of Chaos to rescue Isha in return for all sorts of technological and psyker goodies. Imperium is not the xenophobic hellhole, many species are Imperial citizens, and the Mechanicum's "dickslapping the big red button" is not prominent. It's akin to a galaxy-wide Interex done right.
  • Chaos Gods are pissed, and turbocharge the War of the Beast with Crone Eldar (while Dark Eldar join in for shits and giggles), replacing the Horus Heresy in fucking over the Imperium of Man. Battle of Terra, Sangy dies, etc.
  • Steward doesn't get permarekt because Eldrad Ex Machina, so no Ecclesiarchy (SoB part of secular Ordo Securitas, fulfills a lot of the same functions). Marries Isha at some point because politics.
  • Legions generally split into chapters within or close to the lifetime of the primarchs (typically shortly after their death).
  • Goge Vandire is seen to be fit for the Golden Throne; when he goes mad, Steward throws a fit and finally becomes Emperor himself.
  • Orks, Necrons, Tyranid vanguard (several millennia early) and DEldar are still doing their thing, as well as Croneworlders being a threat. Few (if any) Primarchs left to help put out fires.
  • After short indignant protests from both sides, T'au are absorbed into the Imperium after first contact (save for the conservative and xenophobic Farsight Enclaves).
  • Tyranid main fleet begins to make galaxyfall.
  • Well, shit.

For more detail on the general nature of the universe and what each of the individual factions have been up to, see So What's the Deal with Nobledark Imperium Anyway?

NOTE: NEW STUFF IS BEING WORKED ON AND WILL USE THIS AS A HUB PAGE CURRENTLY UNDER CONSTRUCTION. THE ORIGINAL PAGE IS HERE.

Introduction[edit]

It is the 41st millennium. For more than a hundred centuries the Eternal Emperor and Empress have been joined in their holy union. He, the last relic of a lost age when hope and wisdom ruled the galaxy, still clinging to his purpose of forging a better future. She, the last remnant of an ancient pantheon, a mother watching over dying children brought low by their own hubris. Together, they are the Masters and Guardians of Man and Eldar, the keepers of the Last Alliance, the embodiments of the Imperium to which a hundred sapient species swear their fealty.

At the core of the Imperium is Humanity, its teeming multitudes ever resilient, stubbornly carving out a future amongst the hostile stars. The greatest of Man’s allies are the Eldar, ancient and wise, their shared bond forged in battle and sealed in blood millennia ago. Since then, others have been judged worthy to join in the light of the Imperium, to stand with Men and Eldar as fellows; the industrious Demiurg, enigmatic Tau, countless strains of Abhumans, and many more.

Yet for all the Imperium’s numbers, it is barely enough to stave off the monstrous forces that would tear it down. United under savage Beasts, the Orkish hordes throw themselves at the great edifice of the Imperium. The Necrons are awakening to a changed galaxy, and seethe at the primitives who would dare harbor their greatest foes, the Eldar. From galactic east the Tyranids have made landfall, and sweep over countless worlds in their hungering tide. In the shadows lurk the Dark Eldar, reveling in the carnage of a galaxy at war. And from the Immaterium, the Chaos Gods brood and plot their eternal vengeance, served by the twisted Chaos Eldar.

To be a man in such times is to be one amongst untold trillions. It is to live in the last bastion of civilization, as the darkness draws near. These are the tales of those times. Forget the stories of peace and harmony, for they are fables of a gentler time, when the world still made sense. Remember the stories of struggle and defiance, of brotherhood and sacrifice, for those are the ones that truly matter. Peace is a distant dream growing ever fainter, and there is only war as Men and Eldar hold the line for the promise that has been whispered through generations, from father to son, from mother to child: that there is good left in the world, and that is worth fighting for.

The Road to M41[edit]

The Imperium of Man is at war. It has been at war since the day it was created, since an ancient Man of Gold took it upon himself to unite Terra - and the stars beyond - into a single, glorious Imperium. It has not been an easy journey, but nor has it been the debacle it could have been. Perhaps there may even still be hope for the human race.

Unification[edit]

In the depths of the Old Night, the one known as Malcador discovered a relic of the Dark Age of Technology: a Man of Gold. Gifted with intellectual, martial and psychic prowess far beyond any human, his kind had devastated humanity in wars long gone, yet this one would restore it to its former glory. The Man of Gold, returning to Terra to find it a war-torn shell of a homeworld, immediately vowed to dedicate his existence to restoring the race he was created to serve. Thus, he became the Warlord, unifying his world through alliance, war, and every flavour of diplomacy in between. Nations either united under his banner or were conquered by it, and soon a few great leaders distinguished themselves for their achievements in the fledgling Imperium, whether done in the Warlord's name or their own. These men would become his Primarchs.

The years passed, and the Warlord looked to the stars. After the alliance with Mars gave the Imperium the material strength to begin reclaiming their former worlds, the Great Crusade began in earnest. Many worlds saw the bright future of the Imperium and greeted the Warlord with open arms. And for those that did not? The Warlord had his Primarchs, who each commanded a legion of elite Space Marines with their own unique brand of warfare. A world with elite armies able to fend off the ferocity of Leman Russ's Vlka Fenryka would be dismantled by the logistical superiority of Roboute Guilliman; one fortified enough to stall the methodical Ultramarines would find themselves with no escape from Mortarion's Death Guard and their horrific plagues; and one with their own arsenal of poisons would see them shrugged off by Ferrus Manus' inhuman Skitarii.

Closer to home, however, there was a problem; The Warlord had originally been designed to serve humanity, not lead it, and it was a curious irony that the greatest leader in human history did not see himself fit for the role. Nevertheless, he was concerned at how an artificial construct such as himself (though precious few other than Malcador knew of this fact) was shown such reverence across the reclaimed worlds; some worlds' veneration approached worship. Thus, he declared that the Golden Throne of Terra, an ancient artifact discovered that may have predated even him, was the center-piece of the Imperium, and that he would serve as its Steward until a suitable Emperor emerged.

An Unlikely Alliance[edit]

In the depths of space, as the Imperium rose, the dying embers of the Eldar Empire spotted a raft of order and sanity they could cling to in a galaxy filled with war and Chaos. After a few violent incidents, a more discreet formal first contact was made; the Steward of the Golden Throne and Farseer Eldrad Ulthran both saw one another as a vital stepping stone to the revival of their respective races' former glory. At the time, the two were both beginning to stall in their ambitions - the remaining Craftworlds were beginning to splinter and rebel from Eldrad's guidance, while the forces of the Great Crusade were facing determined resistance from worlds populated by corrupt abominations instead of mere men.

Although the Steward knew of Chaos, he knew little about it, for he had been shut down and mothballed in an age where the perils of the Warp were only beginning to manifest, and the great psyker Magnus the Red could articulate little of his own innate, instinctive abilities. The Farseer was only too happy to school the Man of Gold on the intricacies of the warp, and the power available to those who had the gift for it.

The Dream Shatters[edit]

The Dark Millenium[edit]

The Imperium[edit]

The Imperium, in its millennia of existence, has endured horrors that so easily could have crippled it and crushed its dreams for the future. Yet, in the near future, it faces its most daunting challenges yet - all for mere survival.

The Primarchs[edit]

Primarch Aliases Homeland Fate Legion & Successors Attributed Quotes
Horus Lupercal King of Empty Space

Steward of the Void

None (Void Born Migrant Fleet) Natural death between War of the Beast and First Black Crusade, exact date/location unknown. Void Wolves
  • Black Legion
  • Luna Wolves
  • Sons of Horus
 "I am the captain of this migrant fleet, yes, but I am also a businessman. In this place, I am the one who proposes the deals. Now, get off my ship."

~To a Chaos "negotiator", date unknown.

Leman Russ The Great Wolf

The Lapdog

Skand, Nordyc territory MIA, forests of Fenris 200 years after War of the Beast. Space Wolves [Canis Helix]
Ferrus Manus The Gorgon

Ice and Iron

Orioc, Antarctic Mechanicus Enclaves KIA, defending Hades Hive on Armageddon.

[616.M40]

Iron Hands [Enhanced Skitarii]

“While Mars stands, the Imperium shall stand; when Mars falls, the Imperium shall fall; when the Imperium falls, the galaxy shall fall”.
~Ferrus Manus, on the nature of the Imperium.

Fulgrim Furis Doe Merika Children of Terra [Mk ? Astartes]
Vulkan The Promethean

Vulkan the Invincible

Afrique League MIA, presumed lost after "Centuries of Silence"

[M37-38?]

Salamanders [Mk 3 Astartes]
  • Black Dragons
Rogal Dorn The Wall Calbi KIA defending Cadia, 1st Black Crusade Imperial Fists [Mk ? Astartes]
  • Crimson Fists
 "W...what are you doing soldier? Go back and man the damn wall you idiot, because I sure as hell won't be able to."

~The dying words of Rogal Dorn, chewing out the soldier trying to save his mortally wounded primarch's life by pulling him off the battlements of Cadia

Roboute Guilliman The Artist of War Europia Natural Death.

[014.M32]

Ultramarines [Mk ? Astartes]
  • Mortifactors
Magnus the Red The Arch-Psyker Ursh Natural Death, date/location unknown.

[Early M36, soon after Age of Apostasy]

Thousand Sons [Mk ? Astartes]
  • Grey Knights (Heavy Influence)
Sanguinius The Martyr Angel Duscht Jemanic KIA dueling The Beast, Battle of Terra. Blood Angels [Mk ? Astartes]
Lion El'Jonson The Black Knight Franj MIA, in stasis after dueling Luther around 1st Black Crusade Dark Angels [Mk ? Astartes]
Perturabo The Warsmith

The Mad Architect

Štip-Isar, Macedonia "Retired" to Terra, natural death. Date unknown. Iron Warriors [Mk ? Astartes]
  • Silver Skulls
Mortarion The Vermin Lord

The Man Who Would Not Die

Gredbritton Natural death, Macharius' Rest. Date unknown. Dusk Raiders [Mk ? Astartes]
  • Death Guard [Post-WotB]
  • Black Templars
 "You think of us as scum, you call us vermin? Then like vermin we shall fight, with tooth and claw until even the mightiest of enemies is overpowered. We shall scour their lands clean, and leave nothing that can be used against man - for vermin always have the last word."
Lorgar Yndonesic Bloc Natural death, date/location unknown. [lived 1100 years] Word Bearers [Mk ? Astartes]
Jaghatai Khan The Noble Savage

The Scarred Khan

Ursh Natural death while touring the Imperium, date/location unknown. White Scars [Mk ? Astartes]
Konrad Curze The Unforgivable Tordashimya, Pan-Pacific Empire Surrendered himself to the Inquisition for trial and execution over war crimes.

[242.M32]

Night Lords [Mk ? Astartes]
  • Carcharodons
 "I am not a decent man."

~Only defence given at trial; last known words.

Angron The Gladiator

The Red Angel

Nord Afrik Enclaves Natural death, shortly after WotB. Location unknown. War Hounds [Mk ? Astartes]
  • Minotaurs
Corvus Corax Raven King

The Stormcrow

Sino Disappeared while visiting newly founded chapters when his legion was split, date/location unknown. Raven Guard (voluntarily split)
I am The Alpha

and the Omega.

The beginning, and the end. Cut off one head,
  • And two more
  • Shall take its place.
 H█y █d██ r██a█ Do██ ██m█ in██ a█t███us

~[DATA EXPUNGED BY INQUISITORIAL ORDER]

Primarch Aliases Homeland Fate Legion & Successors Attributed Quotes
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