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Black Brethren of Ayreas - Warband Badge: This warband typically adopts the symbol of the Black Legion, incorporating elements of the Legion badge of the former Sons of Horus with the eight-pointed Star of Chaos. |
Black Brethren of Ayreas - Sources: Imperial Armour Volume Seven - The Siege of Vraks - Part ThreeImperial Armour Volume Thirteen - War Machines of the Lost and the Damned, pg. 43 |
Black Carapace - Black Carapace: The Black Carapace, also known as the Interface, is the last and one of the most important of all the 19 gene-seed organ implants a Space Marine Neophyte will receive as he is transformed from a normal, adolescent human male into a transhuman Astartes.This neuroreactive, black, organic, fibrous material is implanted directly under the skin of the Neophyte's torso. Points are then cut through the carapace by an Apothecary using surgical tools that allow a Space Marine to directly interface his central nervous system with his Power Armour's cybernetic systems and with the interfaces of certain Adeptus Astartes vehicles.After a few solar hours, the material hardens and invasive synthetic fiber bundles that will serve as connection points for neurons grow inward and interlink with the newly created Astartes' central nervous system.Note that a Space Marine needs the Black Carapace to use his Power Armour to its maximum capabilities, but Power Armour technology in general does not require this implant in order to function. The Sisters of Battle, for example, as well as some Inquisitors or wealthy Imperial functionaries such as Rogue Traders, also wear Power Armour into battle.However, since their central nervous systems are not linked directly to their armour's Machine Spirit (artificial intelligence) as a Space Marine would be, movement is cumbersome in comparison to the surprising grace and natural movement afforded by Astartes Power Armour, and the suit is likewise less capable of efficiently providing bio-monitoring and auto-treatment functions.Also, while driving or piloting Space Marine armoured vehicles such as Rhinos and Predators, a special spinal interface plugged into Astartes Power Armour through the Black Carapace provides the Space Marine, known as the "Custodian" of the vehicle, with an intuitive "feel" for its systems and controls, literally making him a part of his vehicle. |
Black Carapace - History: The prototype genetic template for the Black Carapace was designed by the Terran geneticist and director of the Imperial Biotechnical Division Amar Astarte.But this initial design was flawed and had to be perfected by another legendary scientist named Ezekiel Sedayne who had been alive during the Age of Strife. Sedayne ultimately replaced Astarte as the director of the Biotechnical Division.Ezekiel Sedayne's mind was later digitally combined with that of Archmagos Dominus Belisarius Cawl during the Horus Heresy through the use of Cawl's "soul-merging" technology. This was why Cawl would dimly remember working alongside the Emperor in the creation of the Space Marine gene-seed organs, particularly the Black Carapace, thousands of Terran years later. |
Black Consuls - Black Consuls: The Black Consuls is a Loyalist Space Marine Chapter that was a Second Founding Successor or Primogenitor Chapter of the Ultramarines. An ancient tome of knowledge known as the Mythos Angelica Mortis lists it as one of the 20 Chapters of Astartes founded to make up the Astartes Praeses -- an ever-vigilant Space Marine task force assigned to guard the regions of the Imperium surrounding the Eye of Terror.Known as the least compromising of the Primogenitor Chapters, and brooking no deviation from the tenets laid down in the sacred Codex Astartes, the members of this Chapter, whose history is rich with battles won, are stern and uncompromising, with a history of xenophobia and unusually brutal combat tactics for an Ultramarines Successor Chapter.The Black Consuls were recorded as having been annihilated at the Siege of Goddeth Hive in 455.M41 by elements of the Word Bearers and Iron Warriors Traitor Legions. At the same time, Imperial records indicated that a force of Black Consuls was still operating in the Jericho Reach as part of the Achilus Crusade.Yet, it is very rare indeed for every one of any Chapter's battle-brothers to be present at any given battle, even if their homeworld is under attack. Individual squads were more than likely detached to perform special duties or serve as part of a composite Space Marine force attached to a larger Imperial Crusade.Individual officers were also likely undertaking consular duties, conversing with their opposite numbers in brother Chapters in order to coordinate larger scale strategy. Some Black Consuls battle-brothers may have been undertaking duty in the Deathwatch, while in the case of the Black Consuls and other Primogenitors, individuals or small groups were probably engaged on a pilgrimage to the Shrine of the Primarch on Macragge.Following the start of the Indomitus Crusade in the wake of the resurrection of the Chapter's Primarch Roboute Guilliman in ca. 999.M41, the Black Consuls were returned to full strength with the introduction of Primaris Space Marine reinforcements upon its homeworld of Cyclopia. They now serve as stalwart guardians of the Imperium in the Segmentum Pacificus. |
Black Consuls - Chapter History: The Black Consuls is a Primogenitor Successor Chapter of the Ultramarines. The Black Consuls was originally the 77th Chapter of the Ultramarines Legion, and it was founded by their first Chapter Master Arrias Cordos, also known as the "Bane of Lorgar."As true sons of Roboute Guilliman, they have appeared numerous times throughout the long history of the Imperium, ever ready to stand in defiance of the enemies of the Emperor.The battle-brothers of this Chapter were known to have made regular pilgrimages to the Shrine of the Primarch on Macragge before Guilliman's resurrection, and several past Black Consuls Chapter Masters were counted amongst the most valued counselors to the Master of Macragge.The Black Consuls fought alongside their Progenitor Chapter on hundreds of occasions as well as other Ultramarines Primogenitor Chapters and many other Space Marine units.The Black Consuls was originally a fleet-based Chapter whose space-borne fortress-monastery, the Noctis Obscurum, was destroyed nearly a millennium ago in the 40th Millennium by Drukhari saboteurs.With the destruction of their star fort, the Black Consuls relocated groundside to the planet Cyclopia in the Calixis Sector of the Segmentum Obscurus and avenged their dishonour in a 300-standard-year xenocidal purge that spanned fifteen star systems and collapsed an entire sub-dimension of the Webway.The Black Consuls' last recorded action before their supposed destruction was during the Siege of Goddeth Hive in 455.M41, where the Chapter was believed to have been annihilated when Chaos Space Marines of the Iron Warriors Traitor Legion detonated the hive's nucleonic stacks and vaporised much of the northern continent.A definitive account of the Chapter's disappearance has yet to be chronicled, although the White Consuls suspected their brother Chapter might have been entirely wiped out by a substantial force of Word Bearers Traitor Marines. Even if the bulk of the Black Consuls were annihilated, some of the Chapter's battle-brothers undoubtedly survived, scattered across the width and breadth of the Imperium while assigned to various detached duties.Imperial records show that a small force of Black Consuls were operating within the Jericho Reach following the launch of the Achilus Crusade in 777.M41. Due to the vagaries of Warp travel and communication, it took several solar decades for word of the Chapter's reported demise to reach those of its Astartes serving in this isolated sector of the galaxy's Eastern Fringe.Upon hearing the foreboding news, the remaining Black Consuls took council and every battle-brother was allowed to speak. When they concluded the gathering they agreed that a single Astartes of their number would be despatched to investigate the truth of the Chapter's fate and bring back word to his brothers.The remainder of the Black Consuls would continue to fight on, fulfilling their binding oaths to serve the crusade until the messenger returned. Nearly 250 standard years have passed, and still no word had reached the remaining Black Consuls as to the true fate of their Chapter in the early 9th century of the 41st Millennium.The Black Consuls continued to fight the enemies of Mankind within the Jericho Reach as part of the Achilus Crusade, even as their numbers dwindled due to attrition.While they had yet to learn of their Chapter's true fate, many battle-brothers of the Black Consuls were resigned to the fact that they might very well be the last of their Chapter. These warriors continued to fight to the death, determined that the history of their Chapter would be one that ended in glorious battle.But since the events that occurred centuries ago during the Siege of Goddeth Hive, there were several unconfirmed reports of Black Consul's strike cruisers launching sudden, deadly interventions across the Segmentum Pacificus that had been filtering back to Terra. |
Black Consuls - Indomitus Crusade: During the recent events of Abaddon the Despoiler's 13th Black Crusade, the long-standing Fortress World of Cadia was destroyed. With Cadia's fall and the loss of the network of Necron-built Cadian Pylons that had long prevented the Eye of Terror from naturally expanding into the Materium, the Warp rift began to expand exponentially across the width of the known galaxy. This tear in reality, known as the Great Rift, effectively rent the Imperium in half.The beleaguered forces of the Imperium increasingly found themselves overwhelmed as the power of Chaos and the xenos hordes grew unstoppable. Whole sectors of the Imperium lost contact with Terra, while others reported the onslaught of rabid greenskin hordes, aggressive T'au fleets or undying Necron hosts, seemingly driven to conquest in the face of the expanding Warp Storm fronts.Heretic Chaos Cults and rogue psykers rose up in the billions, and every Imperial world now seemed set to burn in the fires of unending war. But all was not lost, for upon the Ultramarines' homeworld of Macragge during the Ultramar Campaign of ca. 999.M41, the genius of Archmagos Dominus Belisarius Cawl combined with the power of Ynnead, the Aeldari god of the dead, to resurrect the Primarch Roboute Guilliman from his millennia-long, deathless slumber.Guilliman had anticipated the need for a new breed of hero for this, the darkest age in the Imperium's history. He knew that the galaxy would need warriors resilient enough to stand against the Forces of Chaos as the Imperium found itself poised on the brink of annihilation. To that end, for 10,000 standard years, Archmagos Cawl had been working upon improving the Adeptus Astartes themselves.The result were the Primaris Space Marines of the Ultima Founding, a more powerful corps of transHuman warriors, more potent than even the original Astartes. New armies were raised in breathtaking numbers and new and terrible weapons were developed whose fury even the worshippers of the Dark Gods would be unable to withstand.Gathering a great new armada, composed of elements of the Adeptus Custodes, the Silent Sisterhood and a vast war host of Primaris Space Marines from many newly founded Chapters, the lord commander of the Imperium launched his Indomitus Crusade.Guilliman decreed that those Chapters who had suffered the keenest losses and the highest rates of attrition fighting against the myriad foes of Mankind would be the first to receive these newly created and genetically superior Astartes.The Black Consuls were one such Chapter, and so their sorely depleted ranks were finally replenished with hundreds of newly-created warriors of the Ultima Founding.Once again the Black Consuls were able to take the fight to the Great Enemy directly. This stalwart Chapter continues to steadfastly defend the Segmentum Pacificus even as the Great Rift unleashes new daemonic horrors upon Mankind. |
Black Consuls - Notable Campaigns: The Cleansing of the Orbstar (Unknown Date.M31) - The Cleansing of the Orbstar was a campaign that took place within the Orbstar System and saw the forces of the Word Bearers Traitor Legion cleansed from the system by the newly-formed Black Consuls Chapter. Afterwards, the Black Consuls' Chapter Master Arrias Cordos, who had led them to victory, became known as the "Bane of Lorgar."Fate of the 4th Company (651.M37) - A battle-brother of the Deathwatch bearing no Chapter device arrived at Watch Fortress Erioch, located within the Jericho Reach. This Astartes called himself Hail, and was the lone Space Marine occupant of the rapid strike vessel Unquiet Angel. Hail claimed that he had learned the location of the remains of the vanished 4th Company of the Black Consuls Chapter, a force lost in its entirety a millennium before. Hail sought the aid of the Deathwatch Space Marines of Watch Fortress Erioch in seeking them out. Following a meeting of the Chamber of Vigilance, a Kill-team joined Hail aboard the Unquiet Angel. Hail lead the Kill-team to a massive Space Hulk drifting in open space at the edge of the Phaegis System. The Kill-team boarded the vessel and succeeded in recovering the banner of the Black Consuls 4th Company and a number of other Black Consuls relics, despite being assaulted by scores of Warp Ghouls and other foul creatures. In gratitude for the eventual recovery of their fellow battle-brothers' remains some decades later after a conveyor ship despatched from Erioch reached their homeworld, the Black Consuls renewed their oaths to the Deathwatch and pledged to send three times the previous number of Astartes into the Deathwatch's service than the Chapter had before.Baliaris Majoris (Unknown Date.M38) - The Black Consuls fought on Baliaris Majoris against the worldwide uprising of a powerful Chaos Cult. In the end they proved victorious and burned the heretic prophetess Constanze as justified retribution.By the Dying Light (477.M39) - Daemonic servants of Tzeentch created Warp rifts inside each of the twin suns of Haark. Soon, the leering faces upon the stars drove the entire population of the system insane, but the Daemons' incessant bickering triggered a duel-nova event. With the fate of the system now measured in hours, the Black Consuls Chapter sent in Strike Force Ultra Varnor to recover sacred relics from the time of their Founding. Captain Varnor and his brothers braved both daemons and madmen in the burning cities of Haark to collect the relics, narrowly escaping into the void only moments before the stars died spectacularly.Destruction of Noctis Obscurum (Unknown Date.M40) - The Black Consuls was originally a fleet-based Chapter whose space-borne fortress-monastery, the Noctis Obscurum, was destroyed nearly a millennium ago by Drukhari saboteurs. With the destruction of their star fort, the Black Consuls relocated groundside to the planet Cyclopia in the Calixis Sector of the Segmentum Obscurus and avenged their dishonour in a 300-standard-year xenocidal purge that spanned fifteen star systems and collapsed an entire sub-dimension of the Webway.Siege of Goddeth Hive (455.M41) - The Black Consuls were recorded as being annihilated at the Siege of Goddeth Hive. The Chapter was believed to have been exterminated when Chaos Space Marines of the Iron Warriors and Word Bearers Traitor Legions detonated the hive city's nucleonic stacks and vaporised much of the northern continent. Their current status remains unknown. According to Chapter Master Cymar Xydias of the White Consuls, the Black Consuls were indeed wiped out during this campaign, and a Word Bearers Traitor Legion Infernus-class Battleship known as the Crucius Maledictus was known to have been present during their destruction, making this Traitor Legion the primary culprit in the Black Consuls' demise.Achilus Crusade (777.M41) - Imperial records show that a small force of Black Consuls were operating within the Jericho Reach following the launch of the Achilus Crusade.13th Black Crusade (999.M41) - The Black Consuls sent 4 full companies to aid in the defence of Kasr Trunch on Cadia before its fall to Abaddon the Despoiler. |
Black Consuls - Chapter Combat Doctrine: The Black Consuls are well known as the least compromising of the Primogenitors and brook no deviation from the tenets laid down in their Primarch's epic tome. Their stern approach to the Codex makes them worthy inheritors of Roboute Guilliman's legacy.The Black Consuls are notable for having the entire Chapter commence campaigns with a massed Drop Pod landing. Such an assault is a thing of terrible beauty, with a hundred or more Drop Pods descending like screaming harbingers of doom. |
Black Consuls - Notable Black Consuls: Chapter Master Arrias Cordos - Arrias Cordos was the first Chapter Master of the Black Consuls. A veteran of both the Great Crusade and subsequent dark days of the Horus Heresy, Arrias was a former legionary of the Ultramarines Legion's 72nd Chapter. He would survive the desperate battles of the Heresy and go on to become the first Chapter Master of the newly created Black Consuls following their inception during the Second Founding. During one of his Chapter's first campaigns in the early 31st Millennium, Cordos would lead his Chapter to victory in the Orbstar System against the hated Traitor forces of the Word Bearers Traitor Legion during the Cleansing of the Orbstar campaign. This earned him the accolades of his warriors and the moniker "Bane of Lorgar." Following his death, his Power Axe, Lorgar's Bane, would become a treasured relic of the Black Consuls.Captain Estrus - Captain of the Black Consuls' 3rd Company, Estrus led the combined forces of the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Companies against the rebels of Hive Thuram on Suracto.Captain Vanem - Captain of the Black Consuls' 4th Company.Chaplain Mortem - Chaplain of the Black Consuls.Apothecary Mordinian - Apothecary of the Black Consuls.Standard Bearer Aeorum - Standard Bearer of the Black Consuls' 3rd Company.Codicier Levi - Librarian of the Black Consuls. |
Black Consuls - Chapter Relics: Lorgar's Bane - Lorgar's Bane was a master-crafted Astartes Power Axe wielded by the Black Consuls first Chapter Master Arrias Cordos. Some believe that the relic was lost during the disastrous campaign of the Black Consuls on the Hive World of Yearsli, where the majority of the Black Consuls were killed. Over 100 Chaos Space Marines from the Word Bearers Traitor Legion have met their end at the razor edge of this Power Axe, named Lorgar's Bane for its bloody work. It resides for the moment in the vaults of the Deathwatch's Watch Fortress Erioch, but as the stories of the Word Bearers assault on the Black Consuls spread, some wonder if it will be brought against its ancient foes once more. |
Black Consuls - Chapter Colours: The Black Consuls primarily wear black power armour. The Aquila or Imperialis on the chest guard is gold.The white squad specialty symbol -- battleline, close support, fire support, Veteran or command -- is indicated on the right shoulder pauldron.A black High Gothic numeral, indicating squad number, is stenciled in the centre of it.The Black Consuls proudly adhere to the tenets of the Codex Astartes by wearing their company colour on their shoulder pauldron trim, i.e. White (1st Company), Yellow (2nd Company), Red (3rd Company), Green (4th Company), etc. Black Consuls Sergeants sport red helms per ancient tradition. |
Black Consuls - Chapter Badge: The Black Consuls' Chapter Badge is the profile of a large, white, left-facing eagle's head centred on a field of black. The style of the image is the same used by the White Consuls, although the colour scheme is completely different. |
Black Consuls - Canon Conflict: There seems to be some confusion in canon as to whether or not the majority of the Black Consuls Chapter was largely annihilated at the Siege of Goddeth Hive in 455.M41 and by whom.Different sources report that the destruction of the hive city's nucleonic stacks were achieved by the Iron Warriors or the Word Bearers Traitor Legions, with a Word Bearers battleship being present as well; either the Crucius Maledictus noted above or the Infidus Imperator, the flagship of Kor Phaeron, which was believed destroyed at the Battle of Calth nearly 10,000 standard years before.The 8th Edition Warhammer 40,000: Rulebook, however, mentions that the Black Consuls contributed four companies to the defence of Cadia during the 13th Black Crusade. This would mean that the Chapter either was NOT annihilated at Goddeth Hive or somehow reconstituted itself after the fact.As the Chapter received reinforcements of Primaris Space Marines once the Indomitus Crusade began, it does seem that the Chapter had suffered extensive losses, though it had not been wiped out in its entirety at Goddeth Hive. |
Black Consuls - Sources: Adeptus Astartes: Successor Chapters (Limited Release Booklet), pg. 15Codex Adeptus Astartes - Space Marines (8th Edition), pg. 30Codex: Space Marines (9th Edition), pg. 46Codex: Space Marines (8th Edition) (Revised Codex), pg. 26Codex: Space Marines (7th Edition) (Digital Edition), pg. 110Codex: Space Marines (6th Edition), pp. 8, 32, 99Codex: Space Marines (5th Edition), pp. 8, 24Codex: Ultramarines (2nd Edition), pp. 9, 41Warhammer 40,000: Dataslate - Space Marines Strike Force Ultra (Digital Edition)Deathwatch: Honour the Chapter (RPG), pg. 129Deathwatch: Know No Fear (RPG), pg. 7Deathwatch: Rites of Battle (RPG), pg. 57How to Paint Space Marines (2004)Insignium Astartes, pg. 60Dark Creed (Novel) by Anthony ReynoldsRogue Trader Timeline (RPG Download)Storm of Damocles (Novel) by Justin D. Hill, Ch. 12Unthinking Justice (Short Story) by Andras Mill WardWarhammer 40,000: Rulebook (8th Edition), pg. 161 |
Black Crusade - Black Crusade: A Black Crusade is a military campaign unleashed upon the Milky Way Galaxy when the forces of Chaos manage to unite under the leadership of a powerful Champion of Chaos.They then launch a massive offensive from their base within the great Warp rift called the Eye of Terror against the worlds of the Imperium of Man.The term can also sometimes be used for other incursions by the mortal and daemonic servants of Chaos out of the smaller Warp rifts that exist across the galaxy.Commanding one of these campaigns is often considered the greatest reward that can be bestowed upon a mortal servant of the Chaos Gods. Successfully achieving the stated objective of one of these lesser Black Crusades can result in the ultimate reward: ascension to the rank of Daemon Prince.The most devastating Black Crusades have been led by the Warmaster of Chaos and commander of the Black Legion, Abaddon the Despoiler, the self-proclaimed heir of Horus, who has led multiple Black Crusades against the Imperium.Each of these Black Crusades actually had a larger, secret purpose known to Abaddon which was intended in ultimately paving the way for a final, massive assault upon the Imperial Fortress World of Cadia and unleashing a plan for the final victory of Chaos known as the "Crimson Path." The most recent of these campaigns was the 13th Black Crusade in 999.M41, the largest and most successful of them all which succeeded at almost all of Abaddon's goals.The 1st Black Crusade occurred in the late 31st Millennium, five standard centuries after the end of the Horus Heresy. Utilising the region of calm space around the Eye of Terror known as the Cadian Gate, Abaddon led the combined forces of the Chaos Space Marine Traitor Legions against scores of Imperial worlds, and was responsible for millions of deaths in the first solar week alone.Multiple worlds were lost before the Imperium could launch an effective counterassault, and although the Black Crusade was ultimately defeated, the Imperium was forced to heavily fortify the surrounding Cadian Sector, transforming Cadia itself into a Fortress World.Over the course of the intervening ten thousand standard years, the forces of Chaos under the command of the Despoiler have launched a further twelve Black Crusades. Millions of other attacks have been made on the worlds of the Cadian Gate by Daemon Princes and lesser Chaos warlords, but the title of Black Crusade is reserved for the times when Abaddon or another powerful Chaos Lord is able to unite all of the forces of Chaos located within the Eye of Terror in the pursuit of one goal -- the destruction of the Imperium of Man, the greatest bastion of Order in the galaxy.The 41st Millennium saw two major Black Crusades. The 12th Black Crusade, also known as the Gothic War, began in 139.M41 and lasted until 160.M41. It represented Abaddon's attempt to capture the ancient xenos artefacts called the Talismans of Vaul by the Aeldari, but known to the Imperium as the six Blackstone Fortresses. The Aeldari allied themselves with the Imperium to defeat the Chaos forces, and were successful, although Abaddon escaped with at least two of the Blackstone Fortresses.The 13th Black Crusade began in 999.M41, and resulted in the largest mobilisation of both Imperial and Chaos forces seen since the Horus Heresy. Despite the valiant defence of millions of Astra Militarum soldiers, Space Marines and the Sisters of Battle of the Adepta Sororitas, it was not enough.The Fortress World of Cadia fell after Abaddon's Black Fleet unleashed a massive assault. Though the Blackstone Fortress Will of Eternity was deactivated through a combined assault of a Space Wolves fleet and an attack by the Imperial Fists' mobile fortress-monastery Phalanx, Horus used the Blackstone Fortress as a makeshift missile, sending it careening into Cadia's surface. The tectonic upheaval of this kinetic strike shattered the forces of the remaining Imperial defenders, leading them to abandon the world.The fall of Cadia also destroyed the Necron-built Cadian Pylons that had long held the Warp rift of the Eye of Terror in check. This, combined with the growing instability of the Immaterium as the power of the Dark Gods waxed, led to the eruption of the Cicatrix Maledictum, the Great Rift, in 999.M41. It divided the territory of the Imperium in half and dimmed the light of the Astronomican on the side of the rift cut off from Terra known as the "Dark Imperium."In response to the assault on Cadia, the Imperium had stripped the garrisons along its far Eastern Fringe to reinforce the Cadian Gate, which resulted in a full retreat of the forces of Chaos from the Cadian Sector and produced the current stalemate.However, this weakening of Imperial defences hastened the onslaught of the Tyranid Hive Fleet Leviathan and the latest expansion of the T'au Empire until it was brought to a halt in the Zeist Campaign.At the present time Abaddon's forces are preparing their next major line of attack in the wake of the birth of the Great Rift and the division of Imperial space between the Imperium Nihilus and the Imperium Sanctus. |
Black Crusade - Launching a Black Crusade: A Heretic's steps on the path to glory are inevitably shaped by their attitude towards the Chaos Gods, and especially their patron (or lack thereof). This is as true when their footsteps shake the galaxy as it was when they first set out in service of the Ruinous Powers. A Warmaster serving Khorne does so by bringing about a Black Crusade that drowns the galaxy in the blood of open war, while one serving Tzeentch advances his forces according to an inscrutable agenda that can no more be opposed than it can be understood. Each of the Chaos powers directs their servants towards a unique path of conquest fitted to the particular gifts and stratagems they favour. No less deadly are the campaigns plotted by the unaligned, for anyone who can claim the title of Warmaster without a Dark God’s backing must be a power in their own right. |
Black Crusade - Dedicating the Crusade: Much like a Compact, a Black Crusade can be dedicated to one of the four Chaos Gods. However, the Dark Gods are jealously protective of the work of their champions. As such, a Black Crusade can only be dedicated to the Chaos God to which the Warmaster (if it has one leader) or the majority of the heretics (if they share leadership) are aligned. If the Warmaster is unaligned or the heretics do not have a common alignment across the majority of their group, then the Black Crusade cannot be dedicated to a specific god. A Black Crusade need not be dedicated to one god in particular, but an aligned Warmaster risks slighting his dark patron by failing to glorify it through his dread works:Tide of Blood (Khorne) - A Black Crusade dedicated to Khorne is a brutal campaign of slaughter across countless worlds, leaving little behind but gore-soaked soil and mountains of piled skulls.Campaign of Subversion (Slaanesh) - A Black Crusade dedicated to Slaanesh barely resembles a traditional war at all. Although planets fall before the invading presence of the Warmaster’s hosts, they do so thanks to the subversive influence of cultist networks and the allure of witch-spoken words rather than marching armies and fired bombardments.Advance the Inevitable (Tzeentch) - A Black Crusade dedicated to Tzeentch appears to pick its targets at random, as the Architect of Fate allows his champions to strike not only at current strongholds of his enemies, but at their futures as well. Seemingly insignificant targets become lynchpins in a battle plan spanning time as well as space.Triumph of Decay (Nurgle) - A Black Crusade dedicated to Nurgle fights not only with weapons and armies, but with one of the most basic principles of the universe -- entropy. The vanguard of such a war effort is not soldiers or ships, but plague, despair, and decay. The warhosts of Nurgle play the long game in battle, knowing that all things crumble in time. With a little help from plagueships, and some judicious sabotage, the enemies of the Fly Lord starve in their fortresses as they find their supply lines become a vector for new corruption. |
Black Crusade - The Dread Host Gathers: Although the favour of the gods is important to a Black Crusade, no Warmaster can hope to do battle in the material realm without armies and fleets. The heretics might have been able to assemble such resources over the campaign, or they might need to call in debts and leverage their reputations to gather them. Even if the Warmaster already commands armies and fleets thanks to the heretics’ previous adventures, it is possible to bolster his Black Crusade further before its onset. Forces for a Black Crusade are handled abstractly. For example, planetary battles are won using hosts, which can represent anything from warbands of Traitor Legionnaires or regiments of renegade Imperial Guard to teeming hordes of barbarians from a world such as Xurunt in the Screaming Vortex. Guidelines on acquiring these abstracted forces (collectively referred to as Crusade Forces) are presented below, whether in terms of representing existing assets or acquiring them through aggressive recruitment for the Black Crusade:Fleets and Landing Fleets - Fleets are used for one of two purposes -- to wage Naval Conflicts and to deploy forces to new territories. Existing naval assets controlled by the heretics can potentially grant them fleets at the start of a Black Crusade. A fleet typically consists of at least one powerful capital ship and a small number of frigates or destroyers to escort it. Landing Fleets have fewer warships and may lack capital ships entirely, but require bulk transport vessels to ferry troops and munitions.Hosts - The meat and drink of a Black Crusade are the mighty warrior-hosts used to wage planetary war. They may be elite forces of Chaos Space Marines or ravening barbarian tribes, but they all share an appetite for blood and destruction. Existing military assets controlled by the heretics can potentially grant them Hosts at the start of a Black Crusade. Some particularly powerful assets may count as multiple Hosts. In general, a Host can be a few veteran squads of Traitor Legionnaires, several hundred disciplined and well-equipped soldiers such as renegade Guardsmen, or a thousands-strong rabble armed only with improvised weapons and unholy zeal. A small group of armoured fighting vehicles or even Daemon Engines could also count as a Host .Cults - Cults within the Imperium can be used to weaken the defenders through sabotage and corruption. They prey on supply lines and weaken the resolve of planetary populations.Cabals - The strength at arms of a Warmaster’s forces may be supplemented by the powers of the Warp if he has access to Cabals with which to call them down. Cabals are groups of sorcerers, wyrds, and ritualists who wield the power of Chaos to assist the battles of the Warmaster’s Hosts.Lieutenants - While the Warmaster’s will binds his forces together with a common goal, he cannot inspire, terrorise, and maintain discipline across every battlefield. For that, the Warmaster requires Lieutenants. Lieutenants are subordinate champions of Chaos who have sworn service to the Warmaster in exchange for a share of the plunder and the glory of his Black Crusade. |
Black Crusade - Letting The Galaxy Burn: Even the greatest Warmasters cannot assault the whole of the Imperium at once. The crumbling edifices of the Corpse-Emperor sprawl across the entire galaxy, protected against total destruction as much by the vastness of space as by any efforts of their deluded guardians. Most Black Crusades begin as assaults against a single sector -- even the infamous wars launched by Abaddon the Despoiler typically started by besieging the region of space known as the Cadian Gate. |
Black Crusade - Shadow War: The Calixis Sector: To the eyes of many among the Screaming Vortex’s most ambitious leaders, the Calixis Sector is a fruit ripe for plucking. Its military resources are tied up between a distant war in the Jericho Reach and a civil war in the region now known as the Spinward Front. The Sector is the birthplace of an Imperial Saint, but has far fewer able defenders than its status might otherwise provide due its remote location and difficult current situation. However, the most canny warlords are also aware of two assets available to the Imperium in this region that could tip the balance of any conflict -- the Calixian Conclave of Inquisitors and the Storm Wardens Chapter of the Adeptus Astartes. Neither force is suited to protracted warfare, especially with much of the Storm Wardens’ strength on Crusade in the Jericho Reach. However, Inquisitorial or Space Marine strike forces are capable of precisely targeted raids with devastating effects. |
Black Crusade - The Dark Beyond: The Koronus Expanse: Those who pass for ambitious among the followers of the Corpse-Emperor see the Koronus Expanse as a priceless gem, but its value is considerably less to the followers of the Dark Gods. Where Rogue Traders and missionaries see the region’s untapped worlds as a great bounty, most warlords in the Screaming Vortex are more interested in toppling empires and seizing plunder than claiming an uncontested prize. Still, thwarting the Imperium’s expansion is a worthy goal, and the Expanse also hosts many xenos species known to provide excellent sport or whose death pleases the Ruinous Powers. Between Rogue Traders, Orks, Eldar, and the mysteries of the galactic halo, there are enough challenges in the Koronus Expanse to temper even a Black Crusade. |
Black Crusade - A Clash of Crusades: The Jericho Reach: By passing through the twisting passages of Warp-scarred space, it is possible to travel from the Screaming Vortex to the distant Jericho Reach and emerge in the Chaotic vortex of the Hadex Anomaly. Here, countless lives are lost attempting to reclaim the fallen might of the once-great Jericho Sector. The Imperium has deployed the mighty Achilus Crusade to retake the region, which some Warmasters might take as a challenge to match with a crusade of their own. Kill-teams of Deathwatch Space Marines, Tau colonists, and a swarming Tyranid Hive Fleet combine with the teeming ranks of the Imperial Guard and elite detachments from the Adeptus Astartes to make the Jericho Reach an almost impossible target—but the followers of Chaos know that the greater the opposition, the greater the glory there is to be had in conquest. |
Black Crusade - List of Black Crusades: 1st Black Crusade (781.M31) - Abaddon the Despoiler made many blood pacts with the Dark Gods in the wake of Horus' defeat during the Horus Heresy. In 781.M31, Abaddon made his first attempt to launch a new offensive against the Imperium of Man following the Horus Heresy and initiated the 1st Black Crusade, also known as the First Battle of Cadia. The 1st Black Crusade marked the first assault by the forces of Chaos upon that Fortress World. Following the relative success of this deadly incursion across the Segmentum Obscurus, the Ruinous Powers grant Abaddon the means to further increase his already formidable power. On the world of Uralan, by the will of the Dark Gods, Abaddon recovered the Daemonsword Drach'nyen after battling his way through a haunted labyrinth to the great inner chamber where the blade had languished in stasis for millennia. The howling sword contained the bound essence of a dangerous Warp entity who had the power to rend reality apart wherever the weapon strikes. After the recovery of the malefic sword, Abaddon's power swelled to inhuman proportions and he was recognised as Horus Lupercal's true successor amongst the Traitor Legions, the new Warmaster of Chaos Undivided.2nd Black Crusade (597.M32) - Abaddon places a terrible curse upon the worlds of the Belis Corona Sector, infusing them with the touch of the Warp. Meanwhile, his fleet attacks the sector's Imperial shipyards, destroying dozens of Imperial Cruisers being constructed or repaired. Before the Imperium can muster its strength to fight back, the Despoiler retreats into the Eye of Terror, his works complete.3rd Black Crusade (909.M32) - The Despoiler sends the Daemon Prince Tallomin against the Cadian Gate in a reckless and bloody frontal assault. The daemonic horde that follows in Tallomin's wake accounts for the destruction of millions of lives and draws in Imperial Guard regiments and Space Marine Chapters from across the Segmentum Obscurus. Eventually, warriors of the Space Wolves manage to send Tallomin howling back into the Warp. Under the cover of the attack, Abaddon leads a dedicated strike force to desecrate the Shrine World of Gerstahl, breaking the ancient seal on the Imperial saint's tomb and utterly destroying his remains whilst the Imperium's attention is elsewhere.4th Black Crusade (001.M34) - Also known as the El'Phanor War, during this Black Crusade the Black Legion besieges the great Citadel of Kromarch. Abaddon leads the charge against the adamantium gates of the famously unbreachable citadel upon the world of El'Phanor. Only one in ten of Abaddon's spearhead reach the gates before they are trapped by Heavy Bolter fire. Utilising his Daemon Sword Drach'nyen, the gates of the citadel prove harder than diamond, but they split apart like cordwood before Abaddon's dolorous blow. In an orgy of violence, the Traitor Legions and their daemonic allies fall upon Kromarch and his kin, extinguishing their ancient line forever.5th Black Crusade (723.M36) - Abaddon scours the Elysia Sector, raiding hundreds of worlds and causing untold death and destruction. On Tarinth, the Despoiler lures the Warhawks and Venerators Chapters into the ruins of Kasyr Lutein where he traps them between the daemonic hordes of Khorne and the forces of the Black Legion. In a bitter last stand, both Loyalist Chapters are utterly destroyed, their skulls taken by the ancient Daemon Prince Doombreed, whose existence precedes that of the Imperium itself, to be mounted upon the mighty throne of Khorne.6th Black Crusade (901.M36) - The Sons of the Eye were a splinter warband of the Black Legion, founded and commanded by the infamous Chaos Lord Drecarth the Sightless, the Blind Butcher of Irridous VII. Drecarth was a former Battle-Brother of the Sons of Horus who had fought alongside Abaddon during the Great Crusade and the Horus Heresy that followed. Always jealous of the Primarch Horus' favour for the Despoiler, the Sons of the Eye considered Abaddon a usurper. During the 6th Black Crusade launched in 901.M36, Abaddon visited his wrath upon Drecarth the Sightless and his treacherous warband. Abaddon aided the Sons of the Eye in an assault on the Forge World of Arkreach, fighting side-by-side with them until the Adeptus Mechanicus defenders were finally crushed. The triumphant Abaddon then slowly killed Drecarth, impaling him with the Talon of Horus, even as the Despoiler made him watch every member of the Sons of the Eye bow before their new master.7th Black Crusade (811.M37) - The 7th Black Crusade was launched by Abaddon in 811.M37. At this time, the forces of Chaos spewed forth from the great Warp rift past Cadia and then disappeared. This event is what earned this conflict its informal name of the Ghost War. The following years saw a game of hide-and-seek played between the forces of Chaos and the Imperium of Man which spread confusion, paranoia, disinformation and deceit across the galaxy. Raids became commonplace in far-flung areas but eventually the servants of the Dark Gods returned to the Eye of Terror, having caused great difficulty for the Emperor's Loyalists but having proven unable to significantly degrade Imperial defensive capabilities at that time. During this conflict, when the Blood Angels Space Marine Chapter battled against the forces of Chaos at Mackan, Abaddon singled them out with implacable fury. He led a band of Khornate Berserkers into the teeth of the Blood Angels' Devastator positions. Even the Blood Angels' own Assault troops could not dislodge the frenzied warband and recapture the bodies of their comrades. But there is an obscure reference to the Blood Angels being saved by an unidentified Space Marine Chapter of mysterious origin. Written within the The Canticle of Cassandria Lev - Vol. CVI, the eponymous Sainted Sisters' highly mythologised and oblique account of the wars of the 7th Black Crusade, is found mention of a "grey-clad" Space Marines Chapter who came from "The outer night" to aid the Imperium, and whose "Jagged maw did swallow the stars ... and whose ... black gaze did mirror the void of oblivion." In the course of the canticle this Chapter's ships set upon Abaddon's forces following the disastrous defeat and routing of the Blood Angels at Midian and attacked the pursuing forces as Saint Lev writes: "...fell upon the servants of the skulled-one with great fury from the darkness, unseen as the beast that lurks beneath the black waters, death for death, blood for blood...thus were the Sons of Sanguinius bought respite, and did turn back upon their pursuers and so were the damned traitors of the false gods driven unto their ruin." Images of these events can be found upon the walls of the Cemetery World of Hypasitis created to house the honoured dead of that war, depicted in repeated fresco and bar relief. Curiously, the faces of the intervening Space Marines depicted there are obscured with featureless disks of black obsidian. Given the largely unknown history of the star-faring Carcharodons Chapter, accounts of their activities can only be constructed from recorded historical incidents and fragmentary records that are believed to have involved the Carcharodons on balance of evidence. This notable engagement is listed by Imperial savants as a "[Special] Probable Encounter/Recorded Sighting" of this notorious and mysterious Space Marine Chapter. After their rescue at Midian, the full might of the Blood Angels Chapter fell upon a vast Black Legion warband on the world of Mackan. Although the conflict ultimately ends in the near-extinction of the Blood Angels at the hands of Abaddon the Despoiler and his primary lieutenants -- the Sorcerer-Lord Iskandar Khayon and the swordmaster Telemachon Lyras -- the Blood Angels Reclusiarch Thalastian Jorus becomes one of the few Imperial heroes to ever land a blow against the Warmaster of Chaos. With his Chapter devastated, the Chaplain endures weeks of hardship in the wilderness and the constant trials of keeping his crazed warriors undetected on Mackan. When the time is right, Jorus leads his Death Company in a lightning raid behind enemy lines, butchering the unprepared sworn warriors of the Despoiler’s honour guard, and allowing the Reclusiarch to lock blades with Abaddon himself. It is said the Chaos Warmaster still bears the scars of that battle, even three standard millennia later. Whatever the truth of the matter, it is known that the Despoiler honoured Jorus once the war was over -- perhaps in mockery, or perhaps with nothing but sincerity. After Mackan, thousands of Blood Angels corpses were desecrated, their gene-seed ruined beyond recovery. Of all the Chapter, only a handful of bodies were left undefiled: Reclusiarch Jorus and his Death Company, clad in their battered and broken black ceramite, seated in makeshift thrones made from the armour of those Black Legion warriors they had killed on that fateful night.8th Black Crusade (999.M37) - Abaddon the Despoiler completes a complex ritual of death in the name of Tzeentch, the Changer of Ways. On worlds throughout the Segmentum Obscurus, Imperial citizens are slaughtered in precise numbers and esoteric rituals. Only when the Inquisition finally breaks the code of damnation is the Imperium able to bring an end to the Black Legion's rampage across the Segmentum in time with these mysterious attacks, but not before countless worlds have been saturated in death.9th Black Crusade (537.M38) - The 9th Black Crusade was launched by Abaddon in 537.M38. Intending to bring about the demise of the naval fortress of Cancephalus, Abaddon lead his forces against the heaving populations of the nearby world of Antecanis. Monarchhive, the hive city that served as the seat of Antecanis' Imperial Commander, was besieged by Abaddon's vanguard. The Black Legionaries burned and butchered their way through the lower levels, whilst Abaddon himself stormed its inner sanctums. The hive populations were slowly destroyed by the slaughter. By the time the forces of the Imperial Guard arrived from Cancephalus to reinforce the desperate survivors, Abaddon and his favoured Legionaries had already left orbit, dropping a dozen Cyclonic Warheads onto the ruins of Monarchhive in a last gesture of contempt. The seventeen-year-long war that ensued robbed both Antecanis and Cancephalus of their most precious resource -- manpower. Without the fleets of Cancephalus to stop him, Abaddon is able to ravage the rest of the sector at will. During this time, the Lamenters Chapter is recalled along with a number of other Crusading Chapters by the High Lords of Terra to help deal with the rising threat of incursions from the Eye of Terror. But the Lamenters' fell reputation for suffering bitter reversals and dark turns of fate worked against them during their defence of the Hive World of Corillia from a Chaotic attack. The superstition-bound Mortifactors Chapter refused to fight alongside the Lamenters, abandoning the planet rather than serve besides fellow Astartes they consider cursed. Unwilling to desert the Hive World's population, the Lamenters held out alone against the Black Legion's onslaught for six standard weeks, suffering horrendous losses until the Ultramarines and White Scars led a battle group that broke though the Chaos warfleet to relieve Corillia. Reduced to barely 200 surviving Battle-Brothers by their sacrifice, the Lamenters were deemed lost when their fleet disappeared into a Warp Storm soon afterwards, only to reappear more than a standard century later on the edge of the Segmentum Solar, having slowly battled their way back from the outer void.10th Black Crusade (001.M39) - This Black Crusade is also known as the Conflict of Helica, and was a joint campaign carried out by Abaddon and the Daemon Primarch Perturabo. Both the Black Legion and the Iron Warriors struck against the worlds of the Scarus Sector's Helican Sub-sector. While the Black Legion attacked the capital world of the sub-sector, the Hive World of Thracian Primaris, the Iron Warriors focused their own assault against the Iron Hands Chapter to fulfil an old blood debt. In a series of bitter sieges, the Iron Warriors burned the Medusa System's outlying worlds and pushed the Iron Hands to the brink of destruction. Only when the Loyalist Chapter received heavy Imperial reinforcements did Abaddon and the Iron Warriors retreat back to the Eye of Terror, taking with them valuable information about Medusa's defences for use at a later date.11th Black Crusade (301.M39) - In 301.M39, Abaddon the Despoiler launched his 11th Black Crusade out of the Eye of Terror. In an attempt to break through the cordon of Warp Storms surrounding the Eye into Imperial space, he employed a captured daemon to navigate. The effort proved fruitless, and instead the daemon warped the Black Fleet directly into the path of the Orks of WAAAGH! Murgor. In the ruins of the Cardinal World of Relorria, the Black Legion brought the Orks to battle, Bolter rounds and Chainswords tearing into the green-skinned xenos. After months of bloody warfare, Abaddon decided to leave Relorria to its fate and the Black Legion returned to the nightmare realm of the Eye of Terror -- but not before the Warmaster of Chaos filled the holds of his Black Fleet with a multitude of captured Orkoid specimens for later experimentation.12th Black Crusade (139.M41) - Better known as the Gothic War, this Black Crusade was fought for control of the Gothic Sector in the Segmentum Obscurus between the Chaotic forces of Abaddon the Despoiler and the defenders of the Imperium. Abaddon lead his great fleet into the Gothic Sector, capturing two of the prehistoric xenos-built star forts known as the Blackstone Fortresses. Under Abaddon's control, the might of the Blackstone Fortresses is used to destroy entire worlds in the Gothic Sector during this campaign. The Despoiler's fleet is driven back at great cost, though Abaddon escapes with the Blackstone Fortresses into the Eye of Terror. The vast engines of destruction emerge once more into the material universe during Abaddon's 13th Black Crusade over eight hundred standard years later.13th Black Crusade (999.M41) - The 13th Black Crusade of Abaddon the Despoiler that began in 999.M41 resulted in the largest clash between Imperial and Chaos forces seen in the Milky Way Galaxy since the Horus Heresy ten thousand Terran years before. Abaddon raised the greatest army in service to the Chaos Gods since the time of Horus, and intended to bring an end to the Long War by driving on Terra, slaying the Emperor of Mankind upon His Golden Throne and at last completing the task the Traitor Legions had begun millennia before. The campaign began with a massive assault by the forces of Chaos out of the Eye of Terror into the sectors of the Segmentum Obscurus directly adjacent to the Cadian Gate. Fighting erupted on dozens, if not hundreds, of worlds within this region of the galaxy, with the ultimate objective of Chaos the seizure of the Cadia System and the Fortress World of Cadia at its heart. This victory would remove the last major bastion preventing Abaddon from unleashing his full force upon the Imperium of Man's defences and assaulting Terra for the second time in ten thousand standard years. The forward elements of the Black Fleet of Abaddon were ultimately forced to retreat from the Cadia System by the combined forces of the Imperial Navy and the Necrons. With the withdrawal of the Chaos warfleet, the Imperial defenders of Cadia, led by its new Lord Castellan, Ursarkar E. Creed, were able to defeat the remaining servants of the Ruinous Powers who had made planetfall in the initial assault on the Fortress World. But this victory proved to be no more than a brief respite. Abaddon launched a second, far larger assault on the Cadian Gate that unleashed the full daemonic fury of the Eye of Terror directly upon an already-battered Cadia. Though the arrival of some unexpected Imperial reinforcements prevented Abaddon from personally sealing his victory by crushing Cadia's defenders, and led to the destruction of the Blackstone Fortress Will of Eternity, the Despoiler unleashed a brutal contingency plan. He had the massive fragments of the Will of Eternity hurled from orbit like an artificial asteroid onto the surface of Cadia. The strike destroyed what remained of Cadia's faltering defences and the network of Necron-built Cadian Pylons that had long prevented the Eye of Terror from naturally expanding into the Cadian Gate. Within only solar hours, most of Cadia was in the process of being consumed by the Immaterium when the tectonic instability caused by the impact of the Blackstone Fortress finally caused Cadia to tear itself apart. By that time, the few surviving Imperial forces had evacuated the planet, harried by the ships of the Black Fleet. The 13th Black Crusade had been a triumph for the servants of the Dark Gods, and the Eye of Terror began to slowly expand without limit, opening Abaddon the Despoiler's coveted Crimson Path to Terra and creating the Great Rift. Yet a handful of Imperial heroes had successfully escaped the fall of Cadia with the aid of the newborn Eldar faction known as the Ynnari through a Webway gate found on the ice moon of Klaisus in the Cadian System. Together, these Imperials -- the so-called Celestinian Crusade -- would forge an uneasy alliance with the xenos that would offer a new hope for the servants of the Emperor in their fight against the waxing power of the Archenemy -- the resurrection of the Primarch Roboute Guilliman.Black Crusade of Jihar the Lacerator - This Black Crusade was launched in 599.M37, shortly before the 7th Black Crusade of Abaddon the Despoiler. It was led by the Chaos Lord of Slaanesh named Jihar the Lacerator, a member of the Emperor's Children Traitor Legion. His Black Crusade encompassed a small fleet of Heretic Astartes who managed to slip through the Imperial defences of the Cadian Gate unnoticed to spread discontent and instigate revolts through the region of thirty Imperial planets known as the Gloom Worlds to the galactic southwest of the Eye of Terror. He was ultimately slain on the world of Hyrik V by the efforts of the 13th Mordant Regiment of the Astra Militarum. Without his leadership, his Black Crusade swiftly collapsed into infighting and ultimately was destroyed by Imperial forces.Black Crusade of Von Mallas - This was a Black Crusade fought between 113.M38 and 955.M39 in the Segmentum Tempestus and Segmentum Pacificus. Launched by the Heretic Chaos Lord known as Von Mallas, his Chaos Cults took advantage of the local discontent with Imperial authorities in the region as a result of the massive military expenditures constantly demanded by the Segmentum Command to unleash a series of major rebellions and uprisings against Imperial rule. The Imperium brutally put down the rebellions, but Von Mallas' own Black Crusade managed to cause further bloodletting throughout the region. The Heretic's call for rebellion against Imperial tyranny eventually made it all the way to the Orpheus Sector, and resulted in the outbreak of major revolts on the Orphean worlds of Colkasth and Epirus. Though the rebels were eventually defeated, their actions reduced the Agri-world of Epirus to a wasteland, causing famine throughout the planets of the sector in the days before the start of the Orphean War. |
Black Crusaders - Black Crusaders: The Black Crusaders is a little-known Loyalist Space Marine Chapter of unknown Founding and genetic origin.The Black Crusaders were known to have been involved in an Imperial campaign in which they attacked an Ork enclave on the planet of Guilus II, and they were the first Space Marines to encounter the Grot Bomm Launcha. |
Black Crusaders - Notable Campaigns: Battle of Grot Town (Unknown Date.M41) - Led by Brother-Captain Marcus Heilbron of the Black Crusaders, Imperial forces first encountered Grot Bomm Launchas at the Battle of Grot Town during the lamentable campaign against an Ork enclave on the planet of Guilus II. The enclave had an unusually high ratio of Gretchin to Orks in the local Greenskin population (hence the name). The Orkoid defenders were no match for the attacking Space Marines and Imperial Guard forces, but under the direction of their Mekboyz, the Gretchin came up with several devilishly fiendish defences. The Space Marines were attacked by swarms of Gretchin suicide bombers, each one strapped with as much dynamite as he could carry. Booby traps using primitive but effective blunderbuss-style shotguns attached to tripwire and pitfalls full of starving Squigs were all nasty surprises for the attackers. At the height of the battle the Grot Bomm Launchas were fired at the Space Marines' armoured column as it moved to attack. Heilbron's Land Raider, leading the way, was hit and destroyed by the first salvo of bombs. Heilbron himself was killed in the attack. Since the battle the idea of using Grot Bomm Launchas has proliferated throughout Ork Kultur. |
Black Crusaders - Notable Black Crusaders: Captain Marcus Heilbron - Heilbron was the Force Commander of the Imperial attack on Grot Town by Black Crusaders and Astra Militarum forces, the first to encounter the Grot Bomm Launcha. Killed in battle by the same Grot Bomm Launcha salvo that destroyed his Land Raider. |
Black Crusaders - Chapter Colours: The Black Crusaders' Chapter colours are not listed in current Imperial records. |
Black Crusaders - Chapter Badge: The Black Crusaders' Chapter badge is not listed in current Imperial records. |
Black Cube - Black Cube: The Black Cubes are five ancient weapons of mass destruction created millions of Terran years ago to serve as weapons between several of the first sentient species to inhabit the Milky Way Galaxy. Only five of these weapons were created or have been encountered so far by Imperial forces.Whatever their original origin, the Black Cubes were Chaos artefacts whose powers could only be activated through the use of a blood ritual. Once initiated, the weapons' activation phase typically took a standard Terran day to complete and the device could not be deactivated due to the dangerous build-up of potent Warp energies.A Black Cube possessed the power to completely transform a target world's climate, transmuting its atmosphere into toxic fumes that were inimical to all forms of life, unleashing horrific cyclonic winds that could rip apart any solid structure above ground or increasing the ambient heat to the point that all of a planet's oceans would boil.In short, a Black Cube was a weapon of pure planetary destruction that could scour all life from a target world. During the Great Crusade, during the Imperial Compliance of the world of Nurth, the Chaos-tainted human rebel group known as the Echvehnurth, who were holding off the elite Imperial Army forces of Lord Commander Teng Namatjira, possessed a single Black Cube and chose to unleash its powers in a final, suicidal attack.They felt they had no other choice as the Imperial forces were bolstered by the addition of the powerful Astartes of the Alpha Legion, who quickly moved the world towards Imperial Compliance. Unwilling to be conquered, the Nurthene rebels unleashed the power of a Black Cube during their final offensive against the Imperials and used their own deaths as the sacrifice required to activate the weapon. The resulting destruction transformed Nurth into a Dead World uninhabitable to either its inhabitants or the Imperium. |
Black Dragons - Black Dragons: The Black Dragons are a Loyalist Space Marine Chapter created during the "Cursed" 21st Founding from Salamanders gene-seed.The Chapter was censured by the Inquisition due to the mutation of the Black Dragons' gene-seed, which causes certain Astartes of the Chapter to develop blade-like outgrowths of bone on the head and forearms.Some Black Dragons afflicted in this way sharpened these bone growths and sheathed them in adamantium for use in close melee combat.These Black Dragons are then grouped together into specialist Jump Pack-equipped Assault Marine squads known as "Dragon Claws" within the Chapter. |
Black Dragons - Chapter History: Little is known of the Black Dragons in official Imperial records but they have been noted in several classified resources as belonging to the 21st Founding (the so-called "Cursed Founding") of the 36th Millennium.The Chapter was founded just prior to the Age of Apostasy, a time of internecine warfare and bloodshed on a galactic scale, the like of which had not been seen since the dark days of the Horus Heresy. The Imperium was nearly destroyed during this time by the whims of the insane and renegade High Lord Goge Vandire.During the 21st Founding, the Tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus sought to "improve" the character of Astartes gene-seed by perfecting and removing the existing, identified deficiencies through various methods of bioengineering. The result was the Founding of a series of Astartes Chapters who have a long history of being plagued with rampant mutation and Chaos corruption.None can tell the number of Cursed Founding Chapters that are in existence, as all records of their creation have been expunged from Imperial archives. It did not take long before the flaws inherent in the Black Dragons' altered gene-seed manifested themselves.While their parent Chapter has not been confirmed, the Magos Biologis of the Adeptus Mechanicus believe that the Black Dragons' gene-seed originated from the Salamanders Chapter. Those that have been witnessed in battle appear to possess distinct abilities and mutations.The Black Dragons were censured by the Inquisition due to the mutation of the Chapter's gene-seed, which causes certain Astartes of the Chapter to develop blade-like outgrowths of bone on the head and forearms and to grow long, poisonous fangs.These obvious physical mutations make long-term cooperation with other (less tolerant) Imperial bodies impossible. The Black Dragons is a Chapter which pushes the Inquisition to the limits of tolerance.Although they have fought alongside Imperial forces in conflicts as recent as the Third War for Armageddon, they rarely remain part of a standing force for long.Only the turmoil that swept the Imperium in the wake of the birth of the Great Rift and the start of the Noctis Aeterna after 999.M41 has halted the latest Inquisition investigation of the Black Dragons. |
Black Dragons - Notable Campaigns: Bone Curse (232.M40) - The Haemonculi of the Hex Coven learned of the aberrant Cursed 21st Founding of the Adeptus Astartes, and were taken by one Chapter in particular -- the Black Dragons, whose corrupted gene-seed forced sharp protrusions of bone to grow out from its warriors' skeletons. Striking a bargain with the piratical Duke Sliscus, the Hex attacked the Chapter as it was purging the Donorian System of the monsters that had spilled into Imperial space. A vicious hit-and-run war erupted across the space lanes, fought within the Adeptus Astartes warships and without. Though the resultant war cost Sliscus several of his prized starships, the Covenites that boarded the cavernous Imperial flagship captured a dozen of the most mutated Black Dragons in the Chapter and bore them back to Commorragh. Over the course of an agonising three-Terran-year period -- during which no fewer than eight breakout attempts were thwarted -- the Hex's Haemonculi took turns to experiment upon the slab-bound Space Marines. Soon enough they had isolated and synthesised the curse lurking in the Black Dragons' genetic patterns. The resultant osseovirus was distilled, weaponised and -- in one particularly memorable experiment -- reintroduced to its host in a concentrated form. The twisted bone "dragon" that hatched from the unlucky donor's flesh was hung above the Coven's Chamber of Whispers.Cleansing of Cable (Unknown Date.M41) - The Black Dragons, under the command of Captain Zartath, were responsible for purging the minor world of Cable from the Chaos Cultists known as the Reincarnated Supplicants. Captain Zartath's Astartes herded the cultists along a fiery crevasse, known as the Leap of Destiny, before giving them the choice to face them in battle or to jump to their own death. All the traitors chose to jump rather than face the Black Dragons.Death of Antagonis (Unknown Date.M41) - When the Curse of Unbelief broke out on the planet of Antagonis, the Black Dragons answered a plea for help from Inquisitor Werner Lettinger, to combat the plague of undeath that threatened to engulf the planet. Despite their presence and the assistance of an Order Militant of the Adepta Sororitas, the planet had to ultimately be declared Perdita and evacuated, before being scoured of Nurgle's taint by an Exterminatus order.Third War for Armageddon (998.M41) - When the infamous Ork Warlord Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka led the largest Ork WAAAGH! against the Hive World of Armageddon, he began the massive conflict known as the Third War for Armageddon between the Greenskins and the forces of the Imperium. The Black Dragons committed 9 out of their 10 Companies to the Imperial efforts to repel the massive Ork invasion.Indomitus Crusade (ca. 999.M41 - ca. 111.M42) - The 4th Company of the Black Dragons under the command of Captain Jorn Tanna was assigned to the Indomitus Crusade Fleet Tertius' Battlegroup Haephestus. |
Black Dragons - Chapter Mutation: One of the many gene-seed zygotes Black Dragon neophytes are implanted with is the Ossmodula. This small organ has a complex function within the body of a Space Marine.It monitors and secretes hormones affecting epiphiseal fusion and ossification of the skeleton while engineered hormones encourage the forming bones to absorb ceramic-based chemicals administered in the Astartes' diet.Two Terran years following implantation, the neophyte's long bones will have strengthened considerably and there will have been a general increase in the overall size of the recipient's skeleton.Extreme ossification of the chest cavity caused by growth of ribs forming a solid mass of interlaced bone plates provides a Space Marine with an armoured layer to protect his secondary heart and lungs.But the Ossmodula zygote of the Black Dragons functions in an abnormal way as the result of a mutation of its DNA, causing the growth of bony crests on the head, and blade-like protuberances from the forearm and elbow.Like the Death Company of the Blood Angels, Black Dragon warriors afflicted with such mutations are formed into a separate fighting unit within the Chapter.Known as the "Dragon Claws," they sharpen these additional protrusions to a killing edge, and sheath them in adamantium to turn them into deadly close-combat melee weapons. The mandible bone and teeth of a Black Dragon Astartes are also unusual, as their canines grow overlong and become pronounced like fangs.Their mouths, both inside and lips, are usually black in colouration. So too, their tongues, which taper to a sharp point like a dagger.This level of mutation in an Astartes Chapter strains the tolerance of the Inquisition and there are many recorded instances of other Space Marines Chapters (notably the Dark Angels and Marines Malevolent) refusing to fight alongside the Black Dragons.Some Chapters, such as the Marines Malevolent, would hunt down and execute what they regarded as deviations from the Emperor's genetic design, a template that had regrettably been diluted over the millennia since its initial perfecting.None now existed who could restore it, and so there were those amongst the Adeptus Astartes regarded as "cursed", although some Chapters did not ostensibly count themselves amongst these puritans, there were still some for whom the presence of such an obvious mutant element amongst their ranks was not only distasteful, but was also dangerous. |
Black Dragons - Heretical Practices: It has been rumoured that the Black Dragons' Apothecaries deliberately encourage the mutation which results in rampant ossification growth, going so far as to knowingly implant genetically aberrant gene-seed zygotes into some Neophytes.This is exceptionally dangerous, and the practice is strictly forbidden by Imperial edict, but old traditions die hard as the sheer ferocity of the Dragon Claws is much valued by the Black Dragons' Chapter Masters. |
Black Dragons - Genetic Tithing: Every Chapter of the Adeptus Astartes is required to send 5% of its gene-seed's genetic material to the Adeptus Mechanicus on Mars. This "tithe" serves two purposes: enabling the Adeptus Mechanicus to monitor the genetic health of each Space Marine Chapter, and storing Adeptus Astartes gene-seed with a view to founding new Chapters as needed by the Imperium.The Adeptus Mechanicus has on several occasions threatened the Black Dragons with military action unless it complies with this decree and even when the Chapter has submitted genetic data, its veracity has often been considered suspect as each sample provided has passed the most stringent genetic purity checks without fail.Without being able to prove anything, many Mechanicus adepts believe that the Black Dragons submit genetic material culled from other, more pure, sources.How this can be possible is unknown and the Adeptus Mechanicus is eager to fully investigate the medical practices within the Black Dragons Chapter. |
Black Dragons - Notable Black Dragons: Captain Volos - Current Captain of the Black Dragons' 2nd Company. Captain Volos led a purging campaign against the vile Drukhari of the Desolate Sigh Kabal aboard the Universe-class Mass Conveyer Absolution. Volos led his twenty men against the minor Kabal while also trying to secure the human-hostages that were aboard the vessel. Eventually, circumstances turned against the Black Dragons when they lost contact with their flagship and were ambushed by Drukhari from all sides as they proceeded through the ship. Volos' salvation came in the form of a mortal-female who proposed to lead the marines into the atmospheric control chamber, from where she would unleash pure oxygen throughout the ship. Volos gave Dreadnought Nithigg an order to protect the mortal on her way to the atmospheric control chamber, while Volos and the rest of his men would lure most of the Drukhari away from Nithigg and the mortal. Volos and his men sustained losses while making their way to the ship's bridge, where Volos then clashed with the Kabal's Archon. At that moment, the ship turned into a blazing torch, as pure oxygen flooded the ship and was ignited by Nithigg's Flamer. Through the sacrifice of the ship's human population, Volos and his men survived and claimed victory over the sadistic Drukhari.Captain Zartath - Former captain of the Black Dragons Chapter, Zartath had been captured in battle by the cruel Drukhari and forcibly taken to the Volgorrah Reef to live out a miserable life as one of the slave warriors in the Drukhari's cruel games and hunts. His time in captivity -- which according to him had lasted for six standard years -- irreparably damaged his sanity, leading him to forget his rank and sacred duty to the Emperor. Concerned only with his own survival and that of those who had gathered around him, Zartath devolved into a merciless killer, a far cry from the noble form of a Space Marine. Tracked and hunted, Zartath eventually faced the baleful ruler of the Drukhari but was defeated. When elements of the Salamanders' 1st Company, the Firedrakes, launched a daring rescue mission led by Vulkan He'stan to save the Salamanders taken prisoner and retrieve the Sigil of Vulkan from the famed Chaplain Elysius, the grateful Chaplain convinced his brothers not to leave the Black Dragon behind. At this point, Zartath was considered, at best, a rogue element, and at worst as a deserter and quite possibly a traitor (for unknown reasons, relationships between the Salamanders and Black Dragons have always been tense). Although Zartath demanded to be allowed to board an Imperial starship immediately so he could rejoin his Chapter, his physical state was such that it required medical treatment. Zartath was subsequently imprisoned on Nocturne, where he awaited his fate. Believing in his possible restoration, Chaplain Elysius taught him the tenets of the Promethean Cult, the teachings of Vulkan and the rites of self-cremation, which allowed Zartath's sanity to recover enough to be liberated. With no means to contact the Black Dragons and direly pressed by the situation at hand, Zartath was introduced into the Salamanders as an honourary brother and used as a scouting specialist; the Black Dragon proved far superior to the other Chapter Scouts in tracking illusive prey. This quality led Captain Agatone of the Salamanders' 3rd Company to request Zartath's aid in the quest for the fugitive Brother Tsu'gan who had left his Chapter for obscure motives. It was during this quest that Zartath was eventually reunited with elements of his former company, the survivors of his Command Squad called the "Wrath," who had been tracking him for years. Yet this reunion did nothing to improve the relations between the two Chapters as the Black Dragons had boarded and conquered the Salamanders' vessel, the Forge Hammer, and at least one Black Dragon had been killed in the process.Apothecary Thorast - Apothecary within the "Wrath", Captain Zartath's former Command Squad. The one-eyed Thorast was the most level-headed of the "Wrath", the one who seemingly was unaffected by his Chapter's genetic deviations and was thus considered with some regards and nobility amongst the small group of survivors.Apothecary Urlock - Apothecary Urlock was led by Captain Volos of the 2nd Company on their operation to eradicate the foul xenos that took over Absolution, an Imperial conveyer.Chaplain Massorus - Chaplain Massorus was the spiritual leader of Captain Volos' taskforce aboard the Absolution.Chaplain Vai'tan Ushorak - Vai'tan Ushorak was a Chaplain of the Black Dragons Chapter who fell to the corruption of Chaos and turned Renegade. He later served as a mentor to the Renegade Salamanders Librarian Nihilan in the ways of sorcery. Ushorak was slain when a strike force composed of the Salamanders' 3rd Company, under the command of Captain Ko'tan Kadai, caught up to Ushorak and the warband of Chaos Space Marines he had gathered around himself on the Cemetery World of Moribar while they were hunting Nihilan. While Ushorak delved into the secret crypts beneath the sepulchre world, the Salamanders and the Renegade followers of Ushorak fought savagely through the crematoria of that ash-blanketed world. At the height of the fighting, Ushorak was plunged into the central furnaces at the heart of the planet, while Nihilan tried to save his mentor but failed and was horribly burned in the process, barely surviving his horrific wounds. Eventually, from the tattered remnants of Ushorak's followers, the newly christened Chaos Sorcerer Nihilan forged the Dragon Warriors warband, determined to exact vengeance on the Salamanders and the people of Nocturne. The vengeful Nihilan was particularly determined to gain vengeance against Kadai, and proceeded to engineer the heroic Salamanders officer's downfall as revenge for his own horrific wounds. Nihilan also sought the sorcerous knowledge required to resurrect his mentor from the dead, no matter the cost.Captain Jorn Tanna - Jorn Tanna commanded the 4th Company of the Black Dragons when it served as part of the Indomitus Crusade Tertius Fleet's Battlegroup Haephestus.Epistolary Rothnove - Rothnove was part of an operation that was executed by Captain Volos of the 2nd Company. Rothnove would prove himself to be useful against the xenos' powerful projectile-weapons.Sergeant Urgaresh - Sergeant Urgaresh was the leader of the "Wrath" and appointed subsequent leader of the surviving Black Dragons following Captain Zartath's disappearance and capture by Drukhari. For an unknown number of years, Urgaresh maintained unit cohesion, restraining his more feral brothers descent into savagery. Urgaresh strongly believes in his cause and adheres to a strict code of honour which has kept him far less feral than his squad comrades, although he is by far the most afflicted by his Chapter's mutations. It was Urgaresh who took command of the Fist of Kraedor and tried to commandeer the Forge Hammer, leading the assault on the Salamanders' frigate and that would later reveal the true identity of Zartath. Following their reunification with their true leader, Urgaresh ordered his brothers to stand down and be taken prisoner by the Salamanders under Captain Adrax Agatone.Ghaan (KIA) - Ghaan bore the title of Vexillary -- or Standard Bearer -- of the "Wrath", Captain Zartath's former Command Squad. By far the oldest within their little group of survivors, Ghaan was a member of the "cursed Astartes" that boarded the Salamanders' Frigate Forge Hammer and the only member of the Black Dragons to be slain. While still onboard their own vessel, the Fist of Kaedor, Ghaan was hit several times by the Lightning Gun of one of the Mechanicum's Thallax. Though mortally wounded, Ghaarn would go on and fight for his brothers, dying shielding them from harm and on his feet, a true warrior's death.Hakeem - Black Dragons-survivor and member of the "Wrath", infiltration specialist, Hakeem has been the most affected by the spiritual imbalance of his Chapter.Kor'Be (KIA) - Kor'Be was amongst several battle-brothers captured alongside Captain Zartath by the Drukhari and imprisoned on Volgorrah Reef. Kor'Be was the last Black Dragon alive except for Zartath himself by the time a group of Salamanders and Chaplain Elysius were taken prisoner. At some time in his grevious six-year-long struggle for survival, Kor'Be was captured and horribly disfigured by his captors, the Drukhari having surgically removed his bone-blades, teeth and tongue before releasing the diminished Kor'Be to the Reef. Kor'Be met his destiny valiantly fighting the gathered Wyches of Helspereth, the deadly consort of the Archon An'scur which ruled the Reef.Skarh - Black Dragons-survivor and member of the "Wrath."Toharan (KIA) - Traitor Black Dragon who formed the Disciples of Purity sect within the 2nd Company. Toharan was slain by his former battle-brother and close friend Volos at the conclusion of the Antagonis campaign.Nithigg (Dreadnought) - Entombed into the walking sarcophagus of a Dreadnought after his mortal wounds on a cursed moon, Nithigg would continue serving his Chapter for long after his "death". In Captain Volos' raid on the Drukhari aboard the Absolution, Nithigg was instrumental in escorting a human-female to the ship's atmospheric control chamber, from where he would unleash hell on the usurping Drukhari by flooding the ship's corridors with pure oxygen and then igniting it into a firestorm. |
Black Dragons - Chapter Fleet: Fist of Kraedor (Hunter-class Destroyer) - The Fist of Kraedor was the small Escort-craft upon which the surviving members of the "Wrath" Command Squad went searching for their missing Captain Zartath. It is unclear how long this search truly lasted as time flows differently within the Warp -- of which the Webway is a part--- and reality. By the time the Fist of Kraedor was found adrift and investigated by the crew of the Salamanders' Frigate Forge Hammer, the vessel had been drifting in the void for quite some time, the surviving members of the "Wrath" having been placed in cryogenic sleep for an extended period of time. Little better than a floating wreck, the Fist of Kraedor was swiftly abandoned by the Black Dragons, who sought to take control of the Forge Hammer instead. It is however unclear if the Fist of Kraedor originally belonged to the Black Dragons' Chapter Fleet or was indeed taken by force by the "Wrath". As random as their encounter with the Forge Hammer might seem, the Fist of Kraedor was precisely angled to close with the Salamanders-vessel undetected, Sergeant Urgaresh having somehow gained the information that Captain Zartath had been retrieved by the Salamanders and being held captive on the Forge Hammer.Argent Blade (Strike Cruiser) - The Argent Blade fought in the Indomitus Crusade. Under the command of Captain Jorn Tanna, it took part in the Drennox Cleansing as part of that crusade's Fleet Tertius' Battlegroup Haephestus. |
Black Dragons - Chapter Appearance: Black Dragons battle-brothers are known to display a variety of tattoos and scars on their arms, which hint at the less than salubrious backgrounds these warriors may have had before their indoctrination into the Adeptus Astartes.The terrifying mutations that their enhancement have wracked on their bodies have become almost a badge of honour for these Space Marines, and they now modify their armour to allow them to use these retractable blades in combat. |
Black Dragons - Chapter Colours: The Black Dragons primarily wear black power armour. The Imperialis or Aquila on the chest guard (often substituted with a dragon variant) is white.The white squad specialty symbol -- battleline, close support, fire support, Veteran or command -- located on the right shoulder pauldron designates a battle-brother's assigned combat role.A white High Gothic numeral stenciled on the right knee plate indicates squad number.The colour of the left knee plate indicates company number in accordance with the Codex Astartes -- i.e. white (1st Company), yellow (2nd Company), red (3rd Company), green (4th Company), etc. |
Black Dragons - Chapter Badge: The Black Dragons' Chapter badge is a profile of a white stylised dragon head facing forwards, centred on a field of black. |
Black Dragons - Sources: Adeptus Astartes: Successor Chapters (Limited Release Booklet), pg. 16Codex Adeptus Astartes - Space Marines (8th Edition), pg. 58Codex Armageddon (3rd Edition), pg. 32Codex: Space Marines (8th Edition) (Revised Codex), pg. 58Haemonculus Covens - A Codex: Dark Eldar Supplement (7th Edition) (Digital Edition), "The Chronicle of Endless Woe"Chapter Approved: The Fourth Book of the Astronomican, "The Cursed Founding" by Andy Hoare, Graham McNeill and Phil Kelly, pp. 4-9White Dwarf 260 (UK), "Index Astartes: The Cursed Founding"Firedrake (Novel) by Nick Kyme, Chs. 11, 12, 14, 18Nocturne (Novel) by Nick KymeRebirth (Novel) by Nick Kyme, Chs. 6, 10Death of Antagonis (Novel) by David AnnandaleThe Tribute of Flesh (Short Story) by David AnnandaleThird War for Armageddon Worldwide Campaign - Forces Disposition, Imperial Forces: Black DragonsBlack Library Blog: The Art of AntagonisWhite Dwarf 35 (July 2019), "Indomitus Crusade Fleets," pg. 45Warhammer Community - When is a Dragon Not a Dragon? More Often Than You’d Think… |
Black Feast - Black Feast: The Black Feast is a warband of Chaos Space Marines that splintered from the World Eaters Traitor Legion. The Black Feast are a cannibalistic sub-sect of the World Eaters who devour the bodies of the fallen after battle as a final mark of disrespect for their weakness. Most recently, during the 13th Black Crusade, this warband fought alongside the monstrous Butcherhorde, a conglomeration of multiple World Eaters warbands led by the infamous Khârn the Betrayer, who led them in the slaughter of the Imperial world of Amethal in the Diamor System against the valiant defence of the Blood Angels Space Marine Chapter. |
Black Feast - Notable Campaigns: Diamor Campaign (999.M41) - The Diamor Campaign took place during Abaddon the Despoiler's 13th Black Crusade within the Diamor System. Initially led by the Chaos Lord Kranon the Relentless, his Renegade Chapter, known as the Crimson Slaughter, spearheaded the attack on the Imperial world of Amethal on behalf of Abaddon in order to obtain something the Despoiler desired. Due to the madness and unpredictability of Kranon, the execution of the invasion instead fell upon the Black Legion's Chaos Lord Xorphas. The Black Feast would later join the monstrous Butcherhorde alliance, comprised of a coalition of multiple World Eaters warbands and led by the infamous Khârn the Betrayer. This Khornate host descended upon Amethal with but a single goal -- to take the heads of the most worthy and mightiest of the heroes of the defending Blood Angels. The resultant slaughter weakened the barrier between the Immaterium and the material realm to such an extent that the Blood Angels were forced to call for aid from the daemon-hunting Grey Knights Chapter. |
Black Feast - Warband Colours: The Black Feast warband wears the usual blood-red colour on their battle-plate, typical of most Khorne Berzerkers, which denotes their allegiance to the Blood God Khorne. They edge their armour with black trim, while their icons, gauntlets and weapon casings are also black. |
Black Feast - Warband Badge: The Black Feast warband's icon is reminiscent of their original Legion icon -- a world being devoured by a monstrous black-coloured maw, centred on a field of blood red. |
Black Guard - Black Guard: Black GuardLoyalistSpace MarineChapterRaven GuardSecond FoundingOverkill or half-measures are not concepts which the Black Guard understand, and they are known to leave vast, cratered ruins in the wake of their many victories.Much of this Chapter's history has been lost to the passage of time. |
Black Guard - Origins: The Black Guard's origins lay in the dark days of the Horus Heresy with Gherith Arendi, the commander of the Raven Guard Primarch Corvus Corax's honour guard, the Shadow Wardens. Arendi was believed slain during the Drop Site Massacre on Isstvan V, but ultimately rejoined the XIXth Legion after the liberation of Scarato.Unaware of the events that had transpired back on Kiavahr and in the Ravendelve, Arendi was met with much distrust and scrutiny that he was a Traitor, but was eventually cleared of all suspicion. But Arendi kept a dark secret to himself until confronted by Corax -- that he had callously used other Loyalist survivors of the Salamanders and Iron Hands Legions as bait to seize a shuttle and escape the surface of Isstvan V.Through rumours he had heard and suspicions he harboured, Arendi led the Raven Guard to the prison world of Carandiru, a campaign which would become known as the "Day of Vengeance." Disobeying his initial orders, Arendi decided to divert his complement of Astartes to rush to Corax's aid, who had been captured by the Traitors' new secret weapons, the genetically-altered Legionaries known as the "New Men," who were created by the Emperor's Children Chief Apothecary Fabius.Arendi's timely arrival probably saved his primarch's life, a favour the Ravenlord immediately returned when he spared Arendi the pain of being crushed to death by the last survivor of the "New Men." Having fought side-by-side in battle and saved each other's lives, a new relationship of trust was established between the primarch and his former bodyguard.To show his favour, Corax named Gherith Arendi as the commander of the newly-commissioned "Black Guard," a Raven Guard Veteran unit which was formed from the Shadow Wardens, and Arendi commanded those forces during the Battle of Yarant.Following the end of the Horus Heresy, the Raven Guard Primarch Corvus Corax welcomed the decision to split the Space Marine Legions into individual Chapters, for he knew that the Ultramarines Primarch Roboute Guilliman's vision for protecting the future of the Imperium was necessary.It was a future the Raven Guard would face alone, however, for Corax later disappeared into the Eye of Terror, consumed by guilt for the tragic deeds he had committed to save his Legion during the Horus Heresy. When the Raven Guard Legion was partitioned at the end of the Heresy, three new Chapters were created.These were the Black Guard, the Revilers and the Raptors. Gherith Arendi was the natural choice to lead the newly-formed Black Guard Chapter created from his unit as its first Chapter Master following the Second Founding in 021.M31. |
Black Guard - Degeneration: A handful of centuries after Corax's disappearance, the gene-seed of the Raven Guard began to deteriorate, perhaps a side effect of accelerated gene-harvesting techniques employed in ages past. Several organs unique to Space Marines no longer functioned as they should, and the Apothecaries' endeavours to compensate for the genetic damage met only with failure, a degeneration affected the Astartes of the Black Guard. |
Black Guard - Notable Campaigns: Doom Gorge (990.M41) - The Black Guard's 3rd Company defended the world of Doom Gorge against a splinter fleet of the Tyranid Hive Fleet Kraken. The Tyranids were wiped out by the massed battery of the Chapter's Thunderfire Cannons, under the command of the Black Guard's Master of the Forge Germanicus. Under his expert control the battery annihilated three successive waves of Tyranid bio-creatures as they attempted to force their way through the narrow gorge. Once the Tyranid attack had been broken, the battery provided supporting fire for the Black Guard's counterattack, leading to the complete destruction of the Tyranid battle force. Black Guard casualties were minimal.13th Black Crusade (ca. 999.M41) - During the 13th Black Crusade elements of the Black Guard aided the unsuccessful defence of Cadia from the forces of Chaos.Charadon Campaign - Chromyd Front - Dryoch's Reach (Unknown Date.M42) - The Death Guard Traitor Legion invaded the Chromyd System as part of their larger campaign in the Charadon war zone. On the planet of Dryoch's Reach, Strike Force Krenzig of the Black Guard and Strike Force Vorgha of the White Scars conducted a guerrilla war among the hab-block-sized termite mounts and steep-sided ravines of the Dereen Canyon. They were able to frustrate the advance of multiple Death Guard vectoriums, which allowed the nearby hive city to withstand horde attacks from Nurglite Chaos Cultists. Ultimately, however, the world of Dryoch's Reach fell to the Chaos forces. |
Black Guard - Chapter Combat Doctrine: Master of the careful ambush, the Black Guard deploys massed batteries of Thunderfire Cannons and Vindicators to annihilate its enemies in an instant. |
Black Guard - Notable Black Guards: Chapter Master Gherith Arendi - Commander of the Raven Guard Primarch Corvus Corax's honour guard, the Shadow Wardens, during the Horus Heresy, Gherith Arendi was ultimately rewarded for his service by Corax with command of his own Veteran unit, the "Black Guard," drawn from the Shadow Wardens. Later, during the Second Founding, the Black Guard was chosen as the core of one of the Raven Guard's Successor Chapters of the same name, and Arendi was the natural choice to serve as the Chapter's first master.Master of the Forge Germanicus - Germanicus is the Black Guard's Master of the Forge who led the successful defence of the world of Doom Gorge from an attack by a splinter fleet of Hive Fleet Kraken in 990.M41. |
Black Guard - Chapter Colours: The Black Guard primarily wears white power armour. The helm, shoulder pauldrons, greaves and gauntlets are black.The Aquila or Imperialis worn on the chest guard is red.A red squad tactical symbol -- battleline, close support, fire support, Veteran or command -- on the right shoulder pauldron designates the Astartes' tactical specialty.A white Low Gothic numeral is stenciled on the centre of the squad specialty symbol which indicates squad number.The colour of the right knee plate indicates which company an individual battle-brother belongs to, in accordance with the dictates of the Codex Astartes -- i.e., White (1st Company), Yellow (2nd Company), Red (3rd Company), Green (4th Company), etc. |
Black Guard - Chapter Badge: The Black Guard's Chapter badge is a white circlet outlining a red roundlet which is bisected diagonally by a white lightning bolt. This is centred on a field of black. |
Black Guard - Sources: Adeptus Astartes: Successor Chapters (Limited Release Booklet), pg. 16Codex Adeptus Astartes - Space Marines (8th Edition), pg. 53Codex: Space Marines (3rd Edition), pg. 47Codex: Space Marines (5th Edition), pg. 8Codex: Space Marines (6th Edition), pp. 8, 149Codex: Space Marines (7th Edition) (Digital Edition), pg. 138Codex: Space Marines (8th Edition) (Revised Codex), pg. 46Codex: Space Marines (9th Edition), pg. 69Codex: Tyranids (5th Edition), pg. 22Codex: Ultramarines (2nd Edition), pg. 9Codex Supplement - Raven Guard (8th Edition), pg. 47 (Image)The Gathering Storm - Book One - Fall of Cadia (7th Edition), pg. 99Imperial Armour Eight - Raid on Kastorel-Novem, pg. 104Liber Apocalyptica: Forces of the Space Marines (PDF), pg. 40Ravenlord (Novella) by Gav ThorpeCorax (Anthology), "Weregeld," by Gav ThorpeWhite Dwarf 460 (January 2021), "Flashpoint: Charadon," pp. 16-20Games Workshop Liber Apocalyptica - Forces of the Space Marines (Article) (Dead Link) |
Black Inculpators - Black Inculpators: The Black Inculpators is a Codex Astartes-compliant Loyalist Space Marine Chapter of unknown Founding and origin. Almost nothing is known about this Chapter in Imperial records. |
Black Inculpators - Chapter History: The Black Inculpators were created at some point after the Second Founding. In 2455.757.M40 they were one of the twenty Chapters contacted by the Adeptus Ministorum envoy Balthazar van Heppel, who wanted to write a report on the Space Marines' religious beliefs for the ecclesiarch. |
Black Inculpators - Chapter Colours: The Black Inculpators primarily wear black power armour. The Aquila or Imperialis on the chest guard is silver.A white, open-faced squad tactical specialty symbol on the right shoulder pauldron designates squad type -- battleline, close support, fire support, Veteran or command.The white High Gothic numeral centred on the squad specialty symbol designates squad number. The colour of the shoulder plate trim indicates company number in accordance with the dictates of the Codex Astartes -- i.e. white (1st Company), yellow (2nd Company), red (3rd Company), green (4th Company), etc. |
Black Inculpators - Chapter Badge: The Black Inculpators' Chapter badge is a stylised white sword centred on a field of black with the tip pointed downwards. A five pointed star caps the sword's pommel at the top. |
Black Iron Core - Black Iron Core: A Black Iron Core is proscribed Imperial technology that was once used exclusively amongst the Battle Titans of the Legio Xestobiax that allow a Titan's crew to use the spirits of the dead to help pilot and animate their god-engine, much like Craftworld Aeldari Ghost Warriors and Titans.This technology allows a Titan to be effectively piloted with a smaller crew and to respond more rapidly and efficiently to the course of events on the battlefield, though at the cost of sometimes bizarre and unexplained phenomenon.Developed on the distant and isolationist Forge World of Zhao-Arkhad, the use and development of Black Iron Cores directly violates the Crimson Accord of Mars and has been declared heretek by the wider Adeptus Mechanicus.During the Great Scouring of the early 31st Millennium, the Metalican Mechanicum Assay Teams officially purged both Zhao-Arkhad and its Legio Xestobiax of this practice. Despite this action, surviving examples of Xestobiax Titans bearing Black Iron Cores would be rediscovered upon Zhao-Arkhad in the late 41st Millennium.It is unknown if this technology is still used by the Dark Mechanicum or other Renegade factions of the Adeptus Mechanicus. |
Black Iron Core - History: Located at the very border of the Segmentum Tempestus, at the time of the Great Crusade the Forge World of Zhao-Arkhad had spent millennia in isolation from the wider Mechanicum and other human worlds. Continuously attacked by xenos raiders, the increasingly desperate Arkhadian Tech-adepts considerably deviated from the tenets of the Cult Mechanicus and began to study and use captured xenos technology to guarantee their own survival.The god-engines of the Iron Vigil benefitted from its parent Forge World's seeming acceptance of the illicit study of various psykana and other related disciplines of half-forgotten and ill-understood lore from the Age of Strife, as well as the strange artefacts scavenged from the hulks of Eldar Titans felled in combat by the Titan Vigils of the Legio Xestobiax.As such research had never been officially censured within the Arkhadian forge-fanes, even prior to their isolation, the largest of its fanes dedicated its study to this forbidden knowledge while the smallest offered their services through more traditional production capacities.The arrival of the Thousand Sons Legion on Zhao-Arkhad during the Great Crusade served to kindle the curiosity of these larger forge-fanes in these forbidden technologies and, in particular, the interest of the Arkhadian Eminarii sect under the command of the brilliant Forge-Domini Tacticus Proctor.Forge-Domini Proctor did not shirk from directly violating the sacred warnings of the Cult Mechanicus. His first success was the creation of a perverted fusion of human and machine, creating hybrid Battle-Automata (robots) whose Cybernetica Cortexes were augmented through synthetically mapped neural networks whose base materials were the cortexes of emergent human psykers.These Eminarii hybrid Battle-Automata benefitted from almost pre-cognitive levels of response to threat stimuli which considerably strengthened the defences of the Arkhadian forge-fanes. It was only after this success that Magos Proctor would start development of the Black Iron Core.In essence, a Black Iron Core tries to emulate the Wraithbone cores at the heart of Eldar Titans, which are themselves believed to be far more powerful versions of the simple Spirit Stone carried by most Asuryani warriors. Through intense study of those xenos Titans vanquished and scavenged by the Legio Xestobiax, Magos Proctor developed a psycho-reactive material that largely surpassed the standard Mind Impulse Unit used to pilot Imperial Titans.The Black Iron Cores seemed to channel the knowledge and experience of fallen Titan crew-members with far more reliable results than the crude foresight displayed by the Eminarii Battle-Automata, allowing the crew to harness a level of skill, co-ordination and tactical prowess that transcended the training of any single Princeps.This new technology allowed the Legio Xestobiax to operate its Titans with less crew than its counterparts from other Legions of the Legio Titanica. Yet the use of Black Iron Cores and the psychic energy they generated also had its drawbacks. Examinations of fallen Legio Xestobiax god-engines and captured pict-records of their crew would reveal that these altered Titans were prone to a variety of bizarre phenomena.These included: mass hallucinations of the crew, violent and unexplainable poltergeist activity and even temperature variance within the Titan's hull, especially within those compartments relatively close to the Black Iron Core's operation. In addition, when the Titan's reactors were offline the Black Iron Cores would exert a steady energy drain upon their surroundings, including any biological life forms present.It has been suggested that the benefits provided to the Legion's Titans by the Black Iron Core technology were partially responsible for the defeat of the lauded Legio Mortis during the Burning of Prospero, yet evidence would suggest that at least in the case of the Prosperine Vigil of the Legio Xestobiax, Magos Proctor -- now promoted to the rank of Forge-Domini of the Arkhadian sub-forge placed on Prospero -- continued to enhance the capacities of the Black Iron Cores available to his Titans.Rumours have it that with the tacit agreement of the Thousand Sons Legion, Proctor delved into even darker arcana, perhaps even into lore concerning daemonic possession and the creation of Daemon Engines, which would become increasingly frequent amongst the Traitor Titan Legions during the Horus Heresy. |
Black Knight - Black Knight: A Black Knight or Ravenwing Black Knight is a member of the Dark Angels Space Marine Chapter's elite 2nd Company, known as the "Ravenwing," who serve with others of their elite ilk as a heavily armed shock cavalry force. Mounted on powerful, heavily customised Mark IV Raven Pattern Assault Bikes, they bring swift death to their foes. They have managed to survive in the Ravenwing long enough to learn to take the doctrines of mobile warfare to the next level of mastery.The Ravenwing Black Knights are the 2nd Company's greatest warriors, elite fighters who style themselves after the monster-hunting knights of old Caliban. They speed towards the foe, swinging their deadly Corvus Hammers with such force that the spiked end can puncture even the thickest armour.Whether deployed on their own, or forming a Veteran core in the centre of a larger Ravenwing spearhead, the Black Knights are the ultimate weapon of the Grand Master of the Ravenwing. Although Dark Angels rarely recount battle deeds or heroic tales unless doing so addresses some special need, the Black Knights' Ravenwing brethren often cannot hold their tongues as they speak in wonder about the fighting prowess of their company's elite Battle-Brothers. |
Black Knight - History: If a Battle-Brother has served long enough in the Ravenwing and can pass the Seven Rites of the Raven -- brutal ceremonies that test not only his skill, but also the extremes of Chapter loyalty -- he will be inducted into the esteemed ranks of the Black Knights, the Inner Circle of the 2nd Company. There, after taking part in the long and solemn ritual that culminates in the Vow of the Beastslayer, they will learn the real reason behind their hunt for Heretics and the truth about their Chapter's history.Ravenwing Black Knights ride to battle atop Mark IV Raven Pattern Space Marine Assault Bikes, powerful machines outfitted with deadly Plasma Talons. To signify their exalted status, Black Knights carry Corvus Hammers, which are patterned after an ancient Calibanite weapon used to hunt the Great Beasts. The Black Knights' riding skills are supreme, and they can drive at top speed through almost any impediments to close on their foes.During this approach, their Plasma Talons tear gaping holes in the enemy lines before they literally ride over their prey, cracking armour and sundering flesh with their Corvus Hammers as they go. Against more formidable opponents, those Black Knights trained in the use of the Ravenwing Grenade Launcher fire a salvo of specialised Rad and Stasis Shells, which can make even the most potent of enemies more vulnerable to a sustained assault.A Ravenwing Black Knight is a vengeful killer who will not rest until he has run his prey to ground. If his Plasma Talons do not kill the foe, the razor-sharp bill of his Corvus Hammer surely will. Ravenwing Black Knight Squads are often led into battle by a Veteran Astartes and longtime member of the Black Knights known as a Ravenwing Huntmaster who bears an ancient Power Weapon that is drawn from the armouries of The Rock. |
Black Knight - Ravenwing Command: Ravenwing Command Squads usually consist of experienced Ravenwing Black Knights who form a swift and highly-mobile bodyguard around a mounted Chapter officer, or execute other specialised missions on their own. These squads usually include several other Chapter specialists -- an Apothecary to tend to the wounded and recover the fallen's gene-seed on far-flung scouting missions, an Ancient, and the Ravenwing Company Champion wielding a deadly blade of Calibanite origin. These may individually join a detachment of Ravenwing or group together to form a bodyguard or command group. All are proven Black Knights, steeped in the secrets of the Chapter.A Ravenwing Apothecary will use his bike to traverse vast distances to quickly tend to the wounded. They are skilled riders as well as medics, and have earned their brethren's utmost trust. Many such Apothecaries have been seen steering their bikes one-handed while they effect emergency surgeries upon a fellow Ravenwing Biker, even while moving at great speeds.The Ravenwing Ancient carries one of the company's sacred standards, and beneath the shadow of that fluttering banner the black-armoured warriors of the Ravenwing bring death to the foe. They also form a rallying point, and can be found at the very forefront of the devastating bike charges.The Ravenwing Company Champion is called upon to defend the 2nd Company's honour during ritual combat, and tasked with cutting down the most formidable of opponents in battle. Like all the Chapter's Champions, the Ravenwing Champion is gifted a deadly Blade of Caliban -- an ancient Power Sword whose heritage can be traced back to the early days of the Chapter.When a Ravenwing Command Squad rides to battle, they form a rallying point for one of the most fearsome fast strike forces in the galaxy. Beneath the fluttering shadow of their standard, the black-armoured Astartes of the Ravenwing bring death to the enemies of the Emperor. |
Black Knight - Unit Composition: 2-4 Ravenwing Black Knights1 Ravenwing Huntmaster |
Black Knight - Wargear: Power Armour (Any pattern)Mark IV Raven Pattern Assault BikePlasma Talons - Mark IV Raven Pattern Assault Bikes have their twin-linked Bolters replaced with a weapon unique to the Chapters of the Unforgiven, the Plasma Talon. With a range between that of the Plasma Pistol and Plasma Gun, the Plasma Talon gives the Black Knights a significant boost in firepower.Ravenwing Grenade Launcher - Ravenwing Black Knights employ specialised Grenade Launchers adapted to fire even at the high speeds at which they race across the battlefield. These Grenade Launchers fire specialised shells beyond the standard Frag and Krak shells that utilise ancient technologies. The Rad Shell spreads radiation-contaminated fragments across a broad area that have a debilitating effect on a foe, while the Stasis Shell is capable of momentarily freezing the space-time continuum in a localised area, slowing the reaction times of any of the enemy nearby to the Ravenwing's assault.Frag GrenadesKrak GrenadesBlade of Caliban - Blades of Caliban are relics and each has its own honourable heritage. Only the Champions of each company, having performed heroic and faultless duty, earn the right to wield one of these ancient Power Swords in battle.Corvus Hammer - On Caliban the thick forests made tall lances impractical, so the ancient knights of the Dark Angels' lost homeworld developed a unique military pick, which consisted of a hammerhead modified to provide additional power during impact. Its beak-like spike proved ideal for puncturing monster scales and armour alike. The bike-mounted warriors of the original Dark Angels Legion adopted this weapon design and these ancient weapons are still maintained by the Black Knights of the Dark Angels and its Successor Chapters.Power Sword or Power Maul (Optional replacements for Ravenwing Huntmaster's Corvus Hammer)Melta Bombs (Ravenwing Huntmaster only) |
Black Legion - Black Legion: The Black Legion, formerly known as the Sons of Horus and before that as the Luna Wolves, is a Traitor Legion of Chaos Space Marines that is the first in infamy, if not in treachery, whose name resounds as a curse throughout the scattered and war-torn realms of Humanity. The Black Legion was one of the 9 First Founding Legions of Space Marines who turned Traitor to the Imperium during the Horus Heresy in the early 31st Millennium.The Black Legion, at that time still known as the "Sons of Horus," became the primary instrument of its primarch, the Warmaster Horus, to overthrow the Emperor of Mankind and seize control of the Imperium in the name of Chaos.Such are the crimes of the Black Legion in the 41st Millennium that it is easy to forget that the past was very different, and that there was a time when its Astartes and their perfidious master Horus were lauded above all of the other warriors of the Legiones Astartes, and were considered the most favoured servants of the Emperor.Born as the XVIth Space Marine Legion on Terra, the Black Legion would first rise to greatness under the name of the Luna Wolves. Before the dark days of the Horus Heresy they fought at the Emperor's side on Terra and through the early years of the Great Crusade. They were as stalwart and indefatigable as any of the servants of the Emperor and their actions exemplified what it meant to be a warrior of the Space Marine Legions.Brutal, ruthless and unwavering but also honourable, and once loyal beyond question, the history of the Black Legion is the history of the ambition of the Imperium itself, and the flaws that broke its founder's dreams of unification and glory for all Mankind asunder.The Black Legion is now one of the Traitor Legions of Heretic Astartes who are united in the pursuit of the single purpose of overthrowing the Imperium. They oppose the infighting that consumes so many of their brethren amongst the other Traitor Legions, for the Astartes of the Black Legion are the greatest servants of Chaos Undivided. They are always brought together in great numbers to work the will of their Warmaster of Chaos, Abaddon the Despoiler, the heir of Horus. Whenever the entirety of the Black Legion is called to battle, it marks the beginning of another one of Abaddon's Black Crusades against the Imperium of Man.The Black Legion is the only one of the Traitor Legions to have changed its name following the Horus Heresy. The XVIth Legion was originally known as the Luna Wolves during the Great Crusade. In honour of Horus' great achievements during the latter years of that era after the Imperial victory over the Orks during the Ullanor Crusade in 000.M30, the Emperor suggested that the Legion be renamed the "Sons of Horus".Horus, at first reluctant to aggrandise himself in this way, eventually instituted this change following a conversation with Primarch Sanguinius in the wake of the Luna Wolves' inability to avoid war with the Human/xenos hybrid civilisation known as the Interex. After Horus' treachery and final defeat at the Siege of Terra during the Horus Heresy, however, the Legion was renamed once more as the "Black Legion" by its new Chaos Lord, Abaddon the Despoiler. The new name was chosen after the Astartes of the Sons of Horus painted their power armour black in grief at the death of their primarch and shame at their failure to overthrow the False Emperor and seize control of the galaxy in the name of Horus and the Ruinous Powers.The Black Legion are at once the inheritors of the most glorious legacies of the Great Crusade, and the vilest treacheries of the Horus Heresy. Their primarch was the Warmaster Horus himself, once celebrated as the greatest of the sons of the Emperor, and later despised as the basest of Traitors. Of all the infant primarchs scattered to the corners of the galaxy before the process of their creation was completed, Horus grew up closest to Terra.The world of Cthonia had been settled in the very earliest days of Mankind's exploration of the stars, its hugely rich natural resources ruthlessly exploited until they were all but played out. Thus, Horus grew to maturity amongst the anarchic gangers that populated the post-industrial nightmare of a world honeycombed with long-extinct mines and dominated by decaying hive city spires. It was from the hyper violent gang-scum of Cthonia that many of the earliest inductees into the Space Marine Legions were taken, and it was there that the Emperor found the first and most beloved of His lost gene-sons in 801.M30.For thirty standard years, the Emperor and Horus fought the opening campaigns of the Great Crusade side by side, the primarch learning at the foot of his sire. When at length the Emperor detected that another of the primarchs was close at hand and departed to locate him, Horus was left at the head of his master's hosts, entrusted with the command of the conquering Imperial armies.Horus was well-suited to the task, and the lessons he had learned in the previous three Terran decades served him well. As one by one the primarchs were united with their sire and their brothers, Horus came increasingly to be regarded as the greatest of their number, the first among equals.While many of his brother primarchs and the Astartes Legions created in their image were gifted in particular fields of military endeavour, Horus was a natural leader, his greatest genius his ability to meld seemingly divergent allies into a coherent whole. This skill was not only of use on the battlefield, for it carried over into contacts with the peoples the Great Crusade met.It was Horus' way to treat with the populations of newly-contacted worlds according to the traditions of each, and this highly successful doctrine was repeated in each of the expeditionary fleets. Tragically, it might also have been the cause of the primarch's fall, and with him fully half of the Space Marine Legions.In the aftermath of the greatest of the nascent Imperium's victories to date, the defeat of the largest Ork empire ever encountered, Horus was granted the title of "Warmaster," commander-in-chief of all the Emperor's armies. So great was the victory that his Legion, originally called the Luna Wolves, was later renamed the Sons of Horus.The Emperor returned to Terra to oversee the next phase of the creation of His interstellar empire, but on the moon of the Feral World of Davin, Horus was struck down by a malady devised by the Nurglish Chaos artefact known as the Anathame that was sufficiently virulent to affect even a superhumanly resilient primarch.At some point during his treatment or recovery, Horus was inducted into one of Davin's warrior lodges, the Temple of the Serpent Lodge, and it is likely that during that process, he was corrupted in some manner that led to his eventual downfall. Horus emerged from his illness changed, and the practise of establishing Warrior Lodges spread throughout the Legions. With it, apparently, spread whatever Chaos taint had corrupted the Warmaster, and the fate of the galaxy was sealed.As the pre-eminent primarch, Horus had always enjoyed the confidence of his brothers, even when internecine rivalries had caused disputes. It appears that through a masterful series of manipulations and deceptions, Horus subverted the loyalties of those primarchs personally closest to him, whilst simultaneously diverting or undermining those others, such as Rogal Dorn, Roboute Guilliman and Sanguinius, who would oppose his treachery.The Warmaster's plans were impossibly well-coordinated, each of the primarchs experiencing a turn of fate or a precipitating incident that determined which side they would take in the ensuing galactic civil war.Imperial scholars have long debated how many and which of these events were directly brought about by Horus' machinations and which were sheer coincidence. Others still must surely have been the work of the Ruinous Powers themselves, turning their unknowable attentions upon the domains beyond the Empyrean and exerting their will upon them.Whatever the case, events reached a head according to the Warmaster's strategy when he virus-bombed the remaining Loyalists in the nascent Traitor Legions on the world of Isstvan III, an act so dire that five entire Astartes Legions were despatched to call him to account for his apparent rejection of all the Great Crusade stood for.It was at Isstvan V that the Warmaster finally revealed his true colours. The first wave of the Legions sent to confront Horus made planetfall, only to discover themselves in the midst of treachery. Faced with overwhelming odds, the Salamanders, Raven Guard and Iron Hands -- later known as the Shattered Legions -- attempted tolink up with the second wave, only for the true extent of the Warmaster's treachery to be fully realised.The second wave, consisting of the Word Bearers, Iron Warriors, Alpha Legion, and World Eaters turned upon their embattled brothers, and the result was the infamous Drop Site Massacre, one of the darkest moments not only of the Horus Heresy, but of the entire history of Mankind.The ensuing civil war pitched the whole Imperium into anarchy and chaos. It was not only the Legions aligned to Horus that rebelled, for the Warrior Lodges and the Chaos taint in general had spread far and wide by the time of the Drop Site Massacre.The Imperial Army was split almost in half, regiment fighting regiment and fleet fighting fleet. The Titan Legions of the Mechanicum, the ancestors of the Adeptus Mechanicus, were equally affected, and soon fully half of the Emperor's hosts were engaged in bitter conflict with the other. Barely a single world was untouched by a war that accounted for countless billions of lives and that culminated in the Warmaster's assault on Terra itself.As events neared their tragic conclusion, those Legions not committed to the defence of Terra raced through the Warp,converging on the homeworld of Mankind in such numbers that the Traitors, massed to assault the Imperial Palace, would be defeated. At the last, Horus lowered the shields of his battle barge, effectively inviting the Emperor to teleport aboard and confront His treacherous gene-son.In the battle that followed, Horus was slain at the hand of his sire, his soul psychically annihilated so that not a shred of its essence remained. But in defeating the primarch, the Emperor had suffered such wounds that only His ascension to the life-sustaining Golden Throne could keep death at bay.Even as Rogal Dorn carried the Emperor's body from the Warmaster's battle barge, the Traitor hosts began their fighting withdrawal, and in the anarchy and confusion Horus' body was recovered by his Legion. Having fought their way clear of the Sol System and fled for the Eye of Terror, the Sons of Horus established themselves upon a world that was at once the tomb of their lost primarch and a fortress from which they would launch further attacks both upon their fellow Traitor Legions and against the smouldering Imperium.Bereft of their glorious primarch, the Legion floundered, and in desperation turned to each of the Chaos Gods in turn in their search for renewed power, inviting daemonic possession and the ever more costly blessings of the Warp.All the while, the Legion suffered the jealous attacks of their former allies during the so-called Legion War. At length one such rival, the remnants of the Emperor's Children, stole the body of the slain primarch from the heart of its tomb and spirited it away, some say with the purpose of cloning it in order to create a new and still greater Warmaster.The salvation of the Sons of Horus came when one of its greatest captains, Ezekyle Abaddon, led an attack on the Emperor's Children that destroyed the body of the primarch and in so doing ushered in a new age for the Legion.The Traitors changed their name once more, this time in reference to the fact that their armour was now adorned black, calling themselves the Black Legion. Through his actions, Abaddon re-invigorated the Legion, reviving the old notion that none could stand in their way and that they would one day inherit the galaxy itself.He prepared his warriors now for what he called the "Long War," a campaign fought across ten thousand standard years to accomplish what Horus could not -- the conquest of Terra and the death of the False Emperor.When the warbands of the Black Legion and their allies gather under the wrathful banner of the Chaos Lord and Warmaster of Chaos now called Abaddon the Despoiler, the words of Horus are ever heard upon their lips -- let the galaxy burn. |
Black Legion - The Wolves of Terra: In the time when the Emperor's eye first began to fall beyond Terra, He raised new armies to fight His Great Crusade. He drew these new troops in part from the forces that had already unified Terra during the Unification Wars of the late 30th Millennium, from willing Terran volunteers like those who comprised the XVIth Space Marine Legion who were implanted with the gene-seed of their missing primarch Horus like all the Astartes of the First Founding.These recruits were also drawn in part from the Emperor's subjugated enemies, and together they represented the first generation of Space Marines. Like most of the embryonic Space Marine Legions, the XVIth Legion drew all of its first recruits from the Terran population.Though it is difficult to be certain based on the existing Imperial records from this lost time, there are indications that many of the XVIth Legion's early intake came from the hunter clans of the Jutigran Bowl and the Samsatian sub-plate slums. Perpetual conflict and the harshness of life on the desolate margins of Terran society had given these people the hard edge of ruthlessness and independence that would serve a Space Marine well.The XVIth Legion made war with abrasive aggression. Perhaps through the influence of their genetic heritage or the use the Emperor put them to, the Space Marines of the XVIth Legion became synonymous with sudden and overwhelming shock assaults. To the XVIth Legion fell the swift prosecution of battle and the bloody termination of campaigns.Their attacks were preemptive as often as they were part of an existing conflict, their forces either the first deadly threat unleashed by the Imperium or preserved to enact a final, killing blow.The First Pacification of Luna was perhaps the most famous of these early victories for the XVIth Legion, but the breaking of the Coriolis Enclaves and the Five Winter left scars in the collective consciousness of Terran society that persist even now.In the Capridian Sinks, it is still common for traders and gamblers to refer to the Legion's ancient number of sixteen as "the counting of the wolf."It is said that the Astartes of the XVIth Legion were unleashed to begin and end wars their enemies did not even know they were fighting. They would come out of the night or in the dawn, carried in the holds of Stormbirds and Storm Eagles, flanked by squadrons of escorting Lightning Crows. Those who witnessed such attacks say that the XVIth Legion were fighting eye-to-eye with the enemy before the thunder of their first volley of missiles and shell-strikes had faded.The warriors who fought these battles were of a character wholly in keeping with their reputation. Proud, little given to humour or empathy, nor to mysticism or even the ritual of the military elite, they were a breed apart from the true human forces that had fought at their side. Their aggression was clear in their every action, but so was the strength of the control that held it in check, and the needs of that ancient age easily accommodated such a belligerent and cantankerous attitude.At some time the notion of the Emperor sending His "wolves" to break intractable or potential enemies took root in the consciousness of the new-born Imperium of Man, with the Pacification of Luna in the late 30th Millennium -- considered by many the first battle of the Great Crusade -- its apocryphal source.The XVIth Legion embraced the epithet "Luna Wolves" they earned after this first campaign with relish. The wolf's head became a common icon for the Astartes of the XVIth Legion, the link being somewhat abstract, as the Terran animals once called wolves had been almost extinct for millennia, largely relegated to existence as gene-stock for engineered bio-weapon beasts on Terra itself, though the name remained synonymous in most Terran dialects with controlled savagery.The wearing of pelts of such augmented canid predators increasingly marked out the field commanders and officers of the Luna Wolves. The XVIth would not be the only Space Marine Legion to bear such a title and embrace this imagery as their own, but they were the first. |
Black Legion - Cthonia: The Luna Wolves were the first Space Marine Legion to begin recruiting from another world beyond Terra. In this case, the new pool of aspirants was found amongst the adolescent Human males drawn from the violent hive city gangs inhabiting an ancient former Mining World that had devolved into a Feral World called Cthonia.Cthonia was located in one of Terra's closest neighbouring star systems in the Segmentum Solar and was within reach of voidcraft that could travel at only sublight velocities before the invention of the Warp-Drive. As a result, Cthonia had been colonised, built upon, tunnelled and mined since the dawn of Human interstellar space travel millennia before the beginning of the Dark Age of Technology.Due to this unusually long period of exploitation by Mankind, all of the world's natural resources had been stripped away and used up centuries before, and the ancient mining technology had long since been rediscovered and removed by the Tech-adepts of Mars. The planet that remained was largely useless and abandoned, completely riddled with catacombs, crumbling industrial plant and exhausted mine-workings. |
Black Legion - Horus Lupercal: Horus, the true primarch of the Luna Wolves, was the first of the primarchs to be recovered by the Emperor, having been cast in his gestation capsule through the Warp much closer to Terra on Cthonia than the others by the Ruinous Powers, and he was found at a much younger age. Whereas the early history of many primarchs is extensively if unevenly documented, the same cannot be said of Horus.Contradiction and omission tarnishes all accounts of Horus' formative years. It is clear that the Emperor did find Horus on Cthonia in 801.M30 and also that he took command of the XVIth Legion very early in the Great Crusade. Beyond these manifest facts, agreement between the early Imperial sources is decidedly lacking, some even placing Horus on Cthonia as a foundling. Like many of his superhuman brethren, these sources say that the young primarch thrived in Cthonia's harsh environment, learning his first lessons in war and killing from Cthonia's tech-barbarian kill-gangs.Another source claims that Horus returned to Terra itself. It is said that Horus grew at the Emperor's side, learning from his gene-father even as they took back the Sol System and forged the alliances between the techno-barbarian nations of Terra and with the Mechanicum of Mars that created the Imperium of Man.Other highly creditable claims state that the Emperor found Horus, the first of His lost sons, but neither source specifies where, or the location of this finding. Surrounded in many standard millennia of myths and allegory, the truth of Horus' origins will more than likely never be fully known.As a result, however it came to pass, Horus was for many standard years the Emperor's only son, and there was a great affinity between them. The Emperor spent much time with His protege, teaching and encouraging him. Horus was soon placed in command of the XVIth Legion, which had already come to be known as the Luna Wolves -- 10,000 Astartes created from his own genetic code.With these superhuman warriors to lead, Horus accompanied the Emperor for the first thirty standard years of the Great Crusade that had begun in 798.M30, and together they forged the initial interstellar expansion of the young Imperium of Man. |
Black Legion - A Human Harvest: By the time the Great Crusade began in 798.M30, Cthonia's mines were long spent, but it had a resource that the new Imperium needed more than metals and jewels: hardened fighters and born survivors in their millions; a lean and hungry people of killers with no illusions about the horrors of the universe. Cthonia, relatively close to Terra in the void, and with whom some minor intermittent contact had been maintained even through the Age of Strife, had its murderous and strife-torn population marked by one of the first expeditionary fleets to leave the Sol System.To fuel the growth of the early Space Marine Legions, the Imperium took full advantage of the bounty of Humanity that Cthonia provided. At the time of the First Founding, Cthonia already helped provide the necessary flesh for the Selenar gene-wrights of Luna to fuel the growth of the early Legiones Astartes. One report talks of so-called Imperial "recruitment squads" harvesting tens of thousands of Cthonian gangers and shipping them away, chained together in the holds of prison-shuttles, to the geno-laboratories of Luna's Selenar gene-wrights.The majority were impressed as troopers for the Great Crusade's Imperial Army regiments, but the finest specimens were taken for induction into the Space Marine Legions. On Luna these chosen sons of Cthonia were reborn as the transhuman Astartes of the XVIth Legion.It was more common for the first Space Marine aspirants to be adolescent volunteers taken from the peoples of Terra, and later in the crusade, after the rediscovery of the primarchs, from Feral or Feudal Worlds discovered along the way. Yet, after the usual psycho-hypnotic indoctrination and mental conditioning process, the Luna Wolves created from the young men of Cthonia emerged as excellent and ferociously powerful Space Marines. |
Black Legion - A Legion Reborn: With the induction of the genestock from Cthonia, the XVIth Legion was remade. For the Terran Space Marines who already constituted the core of the Legion, their new brothers brought with them their own customs, attitudes and modes of thought, the ingrained inheritances of a thousand generations of callous violence and the ruthless pursuit of survival that the indoctrination practices of that time could modify and perhaps suppress but not entirely erase. In truth, this was perhaps the point for the Cthonians' inclusion within the Legion.As the Terran Legionaries fell in battle, their voices and the more ordered military traditions they had been trained in became fewer and fainter within the XVIth Legion. The marks of change were many and subtle, not overwriting the Legion's culture entirely but bringing a unique character to what had gone before. Examples of this change came slowly.The topknots and mohawks commonly sported by Cthonian ganger head-hunters became common throughout the ranks of the Luna Wolves as both additions to their armour and as personal decoration. After being wounded in battle by a worthy foe it was common for a Luna Wolf Astartes to honour the valour of his fallen enemy by making a deep scratch in the ceramite across his helm's eye socket. Perhaps most tellingly, the Cthonian word for cutting the throat of an enemy gang-killer in single combat -- aebathan -- became a common term in the ranks to describe the completion of a campaign.The personal charisma and reputation of a commander within the Legion came to apply to the Astartes under his command, as if the ways of the Cthonian gang lords now informed the Luna Wolves' own understanding of leadership. This applied particularly to the Luna Wolves' Primarch Horus Lupercal after his rediscovery by the Emperor, as his cult of personality was universal within the Legion and all Luna Wolves came to revere the Lupercal to an extent that would ultimately prove their undoing.The strength of the Luna Wolves in battle did not change or weaken after the inclusion of the Cthonians; if anything the Legion seemed to become even more potent over time. The Legion strove to maintain the required flexibility needed to allow them to fight any war or enemy they might encounter on their own terms, but where possible the application of sudden and overwhelming force was usually their favoured form of attack, and that of their primarch.As a doctrine this became bound up with the Legion's savage ferocity that was born of Cthonian blood, and wielded with ferocious intelligence and the matchless tactical instinct of Horus. A star system targeted for Imperial Compliance would often fall to the Legion in a single engagement: Luna Wolves warships would cut in from the system's edge, forming a spear formation that would break into many smaller blade tips to strike at the target system's planets, moons and void stations.Orbital bombardment and simultaneous mass orbital drops would break the enemy's strength and will to resist. Tactical threats were systematically identified, isolated, outflanked, encircled and destroyed with merciless precision and close-quarter savagery which spoke of apex pack predators splitting a herd and gutting its members with lightning fury. The Imperial Army troops that followed in the Luna Wolves' wake often had little to do but scrape suddenly Compliant worlds clean of the leavings of battle. |
Black Legion - Sons of Victory: The Luna Wolves' approach to the Great Crusade was direct and brutal, and their results were often inelegant if unmistakably effective. Though it proved bloody, the XVIth Legion's progress was undoubtedly swift and laurels of victory were heaped upon the Luna Wolves and above all upon their primarch Horus, the most beloved son of the Emperor.Time and again, the Luna Wolves would break resistance on a world and move on to the next campaign with barely a backward glance. The character of the Luna Wolves' tenacity and ruthlessness was displayed during the initial Imperial conquest of the Sol System. They prosecuted battles with the same savage mentality and ferocity displayed during the gang-wars of Cthonia where prisoners were simply unwanted mouths to feed.War was a matter of identifying the strength and leadership of the enemy, isolating it and then obliterating it. In the same way that a gang leader's eyes would find a rival and their knife would quickly follow, so the Luna Wolves conquered entire star systems. Brutal it might have been, but to the Space Marines of the Luna Wolves it was a matter of necessity; wars were either brutal and short or they became long and wasteful. Driven by the energy of the Great Crusade, the XVIth Legion's methods fitted the needs of the early Imperium's rapid expansion.The Luna Wolves waged war during the Great Crusade for over 200 standard years until the dawn of the 31st Millennium, pushing back the darkness which had swallowed Mankind during the Age of Strife with fire and blood. Their victories were manifold and Horus' generalship was legend, and so it was that the respect of their brother Legions rose to almost unrivalled heights.Across tens of thousands of battles the Luna Wolves were rarely defeated. In every mode of deployment they excelled, whether as the spearhead of a star cluster-sized assault or as an individual squad supporting a grand formation of the Imperial Army. Other Space Marine Legions, sometimes hostile to the interference of their fellow Space Marines, would request campaign placement amongst the Luna Wolves and welcome it in return.Much of the Luna Wolves' reputation was the reflection of the qualities of their primarch. Horus Lupercal's charisma and unequalled record of victories, as well as his known closeness to the Emperor, lent him a measure of respect unrivalled among his brother primarchs.Horus demonstrated an almost preternatural talent for wielding the relative strengths of the other Legions to their best advantage on a strategic level. Horus was said by some to be without peer as a commander and a ruler within the Imperium, surpassed only by the Emperor Himself. Certainly he was rare amongst the primarchs in that Horus commanded the respect and the loyalty of all, and backed it up with strategic and tactical genius.Others commanded larger Legions, saw more deeply, excelled beyond Horus in certain crafts of warfare and lore, or perhaps drew greater fraternal affection from his Astartes, but only Horus could hold every view and ideal of Mankind in his mind simultaneously. Even the most personally difficult and aggressive of primarchs like Angron and Konrad Curze are known to have deferred to Horus on many matters. |
Black Legion - Triumph of Ullanor: Though the Luna Wolves had won many victories in their years of ceaseless conflict, one would eclipse all others and see them reborn once again. The greatest of the nascent Imperium's victories during the high point of the Great Crusade came in the form of the defeat of the largest Ork empire ever encountered to that time.The Ullanor Crusade of ca. 000.M30 was a vast Imperial assault on the Ork empire of the Overlord Urrlak Urruk. The capital world of this Greenskin stellar empire, and the site of the final assault by the Space Marine Legions, lay in the central Ullanor System of the galaxy's Ullanor Sector. The crusade included the deployment of 100,000 Space Marines, 8,000,000 Imperial Army troops, and thousands of Imperial starships and their support personnel.The Ullanor Crusade marked the high point of the Great Crusade's vast effort to reunite the scattered colony worlds of Humanity. The Orks of Ullanor represented the largest concentration of Greenskins ever defeated by the military forces of the Imperium of Man before the Third War for Armageddon began during the 41st Millennium. Following the defeat of the Orks of Ullanor due to the strategic brilliance of Horus Lupercal, the Emperor of Mankind returned to Terra to begin work on His vast project to open up the Aeldari Webway for Mankind's use.In His place to command the vast forces of the Great Crusade He left Horus. In the aftermath of this Ullanor Crusade, Horus was granted the newly-created title of "Warmaster," the commander-in-chief of all the Emperor's armies who possessed command authority over all of the other primarchs and every expeditionary fleet of the Great Crusade. Before returning to Terra to oversee the next phase of the creation of His stellar empire, the Emperor suggested to Horus that he rename the XVIth Legion the "Sons of Horus", in honour of their primarch and to show his preeminent place amongst the other primarchs.Horus initially declined this honour, not wishing to be set above his brothers, and so his Legion continued as the Luna Wolves for a little while longer. But Horus and the other primarchs never came to terms with the Emperor's absence. Their hurt feelings over His seeming abandonment of the Great Crusade to pursue a secret project whose purpose He chose not to reveal to His gene-sons laid the seeds of jealousy and resentment that would ultimately blossom into the corruption that began the Horus Heresy. |
Black Legion - Warmaster: During the Great Crusade, it became apparent that the Primarchs were far from the perfect specimens of Humanity they were intended to be. Although each Primarch was physically and mentally god-like compared to a baseline mortal human being, they harboured the flaws of vanity, egotism, hunger for power, jealousy, arrogance, insecurity and all the other sins of the human character. As the Imperial Warmaster, Horus took over command of the Great Crusade, and accepted his new duties with earnest dedication.However, there was much dissension in the ranks of the Primarchs and other parties in the Imperium over the Emperor's decision to withdraw from the campaign and return to Terra as well as to reorganise the political administration of the Imperium under the control of a Council of Terra headed by His regent, Malcador the Sigillite. Only a handful of the Primarchs, amongst them a scheming Lorgar, remained steadfast beside the Warmaster during this period of conflict.Horus also disagreed with many of the decrees passed by the newly established Council of Terra, a ruling body of Imperial nobles and bureaucrats, which were intended to shift the burden of taxation and administration onto the newly-conquered Imperial Compliant worlds.Even worse, Horus came to believe in his heart that he was failing his father, and was deeply wounded that the Emperor had revealed to none of the Primarchs, not even His most favoured son, why He had secluded Himself upon Terra and the truth behind His secret Imperial Webway Project. These seeds of bitterness, resentment and frustration grew, and would soon bear deadly fruit. |
Black Legion - Fall to Chaos: It was on the moon of the world of Davin that Horus' fate was sealed. This was the second time his Legion had been posted to this world; after the previous visit sixty standard years earlier the Luna Wolves had adopted the native Davinite institution of Warrior Lodges. Though these lodges had begun as simple fraternities of warriors, their secretive nature handed Lorgar, the Primarch of the Word Bearers Legion and his First Chaplain Erebus, the tool they needed to manipulate Horus towards the service of the Chaos Gods.Lorgar and his Word Bearers originally came from Colchis, a world defined by religious fanaticism. They had long worshiped the Emperor as a god. The Word Bearers had sought to spread their Cult of the Emperor to every world they added to the Imperium. But the Emperor deeply disliked and mistrusted organised human religion, blaming it for much of the darkness that had plagued humanity's history.The Emperor openly and publicly refuted His alleged divinity and banned religious worship in His empire, and demanded that His subjects accept the "Imperial Truth" -- that science, reason and logic alone presented the tools required to create a better human future. Lorgar did not suffer the Emperor's reprimand or views on religion well after his XVIIth Legion had been humilated by the Ultramarines Legion on the direct orders of the Emperor at the world of Khur.Angered and wounded that the Emperor would not accept his devotion and worship, Lorgar began what became known as the Pilgrimage of Lorgar to discover the truth of divinity in the universe. This quest ultimately culminated in Lorgar turning to the service of the Ruinous Powers of the Warp -- Dark Gods who were all too willing to accept the devotion of one of humanity's Primarchs. Before long, the Word Bearers Legion had been almost entirely corrupted by the Chaos Gods, and Lorgar and the XVIIth Legion's First Chaplain Erebus were tasked by the Ruinous Powers with corrupting all of their fellow Space Marines -- starting with the greatest of them all, the Warmaster Horus.During a battle against Chaos-spawned undead on Davin's moon, whose Planetary Governor, Eugen Temba, a former Imperial Army commander, had been corrupted by the forces of the Chaos God Nurgle, Horus was poisoned by a xenos blade dedicated to Nurgle known as a Kinebrach Anathame that had been stolen from the human civilisation of the Interex by Erebus after Horus and the Luna Wolves of the 63rd Expeditionary Fleet had made a disastrous first contact with them.Erebus gifted the weapon to the Chaos-corrupted form of Temba who the Warmaster had left behind on the Feral World of Davin sixty Terran years before. Temba had turned to the worship of Nurgle in the interim, being transformed into a bloated mutant and killing off most of his Imperial Army garrison in the process, transforming them into undead Plague Zombies that the Luna Wolves were forced to mow down in waves.Horus personally faced off with the Nurglite mutant that had been Temba aboard the grounded ruins of his Imperial Cruiser. In the course of that battle, the potent living metal of the Chaos blade wielded by that plague-infused monstrosity left Horus with a bleeding, toxic wound in his shoulder that his Legion's Apothecaries could not heal despite all the advanced technology available to them.Sixty standard years earlier, when the Luna Wolves had brought about the successful Imperial Compliance of Davin, they had entrusted a detachment of the Word Bearers, under the command of its First Captain Kor Phaeron, to shepherd the people of Davin into the light of the Imperial Truth. At the suggestion of First Chaplain Erebus, the XVIth Legion had adopted the native Davinite institution of "Warrior Lodges".Though these lodges had begun as simple fraternities of warriors, their secretive nature handed Lorgar and Erebus the tool they needed to manipulate Horus. Once formally introduced, these Warrior Lodges would infiltrate and eventually corrupt the various Space Marine Legions into turning against the Emperor.After the Warmaster was struck down on Davin's moon, Erebus saw his chance to further the designs of Chaos. The First Chaplain persuaded the Sons of Horus' Warrior Lodge to allow a group of Davinite shamans to heal Horus. In truth, these shamans were secretly a coven of Chaos Cultists known as the Serpent Lodge that had long been active on Davin at the temple dedicated to the Chaos Gods they called the Delphos. Desperate to save their beloved Primarch, the Warrior Lodge brothers acquiesced to Erebus's suggestions.During the dark rituals that followed within the temple, Horus' spirit was transferred from his body into the Immaterium. There, he bore witness to a nightmare vision of the future. He saw the Imperium of Man as a repressive, violent theocracy, where the Emperor and several of His Primarchs (but not Horus) were worshipped as Gods by the masses. While this vision of the Imperial future granted by the Chaos Gods was a true one, it was ironically an outcome largely created by the Warmaster's own actions. The Dark Gods portrayed themselves as victims of the Emperor's psychic might, and claimed that they had no real interest in the happenings of the material world.Magnus the Red, the sorcerous Primarch of the Thousand Sons Legion, had also travelled into the Warp via sorcery to try and stop Horus from turning to Chaos. Magnus explained that the Warmaster's vision was only one among many possible futures, but one that Horus alone could prevent. Horus, already jealous and resentful of the Emperor, proved all too receptive to the Ruinous Powers' false vision.The Chaos Gods' pact with Horus was simple: "Give us the Emperor and we will give you the galaxy." Driven by his jealousy, desire for status and power and anger at what he saw as his father's abandonment of him, Horus accepted the Ruinous Powers' offer. They healed his grievous wound and filled him with the powers of the Warp.Renouncing his oath to the Emperor, Horus led his Legion, renamed the Sons of Horus, into worship of the Chaos Gods in the form of Chaos Undivided. He then sought to turn many of his fellow Primarchs to the service of Chaos, and succeeded with Angron of the World Eaters, Fulgrim of the Emperor's Children and Mortarion of the Death Guard, who were the first of many to follow, along with many regiments of the Imperial Army and several Titan Legions of the Adeptus Mechanicus.Magnus the Red, the Primarch of the Thousand Sons Legion, foresaw Horus' actions through his Legion's own use of forbidden psychic sorcery. Magnus then attempted to forewarn the Emperor of the impending betrayal of His favourite son. However, knowing that he would have to find a means of quickly warning the Emperor, Magnus used sorcery to send his message to the Emperor. The message penetrated the potent psychic defences of the Imperial Palace on Terra, shattering all the psychic wards the Emperor had placed on the Palace -- including those within His secret project in the Imperial Dungeons, where He was proceeding with the creation of a human extension into the Webway.Refusing to believe that Horus, His most beloved and trusted son, would actually betray Him, the Emperor instead mistakenly perceived the traitor to the Imperium to be Magnus and his Thousand Sons, who had long suffered from a near-debilitating run of mutations because of the instability of Magnus' own genome and were known to have practiced the sorcery that had been expressly outlawed in the Imperium by the Council of Nikaea.The Emperor ordered the Primarch Leman Russ, Magnus' greatest rival, to mobilise his Space Wolves Legion and the witch hunters known as the Sisters of Silence and take Magnus into custody to be returned to Terra to stand trial for violating the Council of Nikaea's prohibitions against the use of psychic powers within the Imperium. While en route to the Thousand Sons Legion's homeworld of Prospero, Horus convinced Russ, who had always been repelled by Magnus' reliance on psychic powers, to launch a full assault on Prospero instead, even though Magnus had been entirely willing to face the Emperor's judgment once he realised he was being manipulated by the entities that called the Immaterium home. |
Black Legion - Betrayal at Istvaan III: In the days that followed his miraculous recovery, Horus' officers detected a change in his character. The Warmaster proceeded to use the Warrior Lodge present in the XVIth Legion to begin to subvert his officers and their Astartes to the service of the Dark Gods and to build support for his plan of rebellion against the Emperor.He had already taken up the Emperor's old offer made at the Ullanor Triumph on the advice of Sanguinius and renamed the XVIth Legion the Sons of Horus to subtly hint at his position as the first-among-equals among the Primarchs. He now moved to further consolidate his authority.Horus was now allied body and soul to the Ruinous Powers of Chaos, and he had a new vision for the Imperium with himself rather than the Emperor at its head. Renouncing his oath to the Emperor, Horus led his Legion into worship of the Chaos Gods. He then sought to turn many of his fellow Primarchs to Chaos.Horus was master diplomat and manipulator, and he knew exactly which psychological buttons to push in some of his brothers to get them to agree to his idea of rebellion against the Emperor. His first efforts succeeded masterfully with Angron, Fulgrim and Mortarion, who were the first of the 8 other Primarchs and Space Marine Legions that would follow Horus and his Astartes into betrayal.The majority of the Sons of Horus, already fiercely loyal and proud of Horus, had no hesitation in following their Primarch's lead wherever he chose to go. They secretly renounced their oaths to the Emperor and supported Horus' ambitions and his new gods of the Warp. The Chaos corruption spread to every Imperial Adepta with which Horus had dealings, including a portion of the Mechanicum, and from there to the Adeptus Titanica and the Legio Cybernetica, eventually creating the splinter-faction of the ancient Mechanicum called the Dark Mechanicum and unleashing the terrible civil war between Loyalist and Traitor Mechanicum factions known as the Schism of Mars.The other Primarchs Horus knew as well as any men since they were his gene-brothers, and he was already well practiced at motivating them. Appealing to their pride, martial prowess, and courage, whilst playing upon past grudges and favours against the Emperor and the other Primarchs, the Warmaster ultimately gained the loyalty of fully half the Primarchs and their Space Marine Legions.He convinced them to first rid their Legions of any remaining Loyalists during the Battle of Istvaan III and next nearly destroyed three full Loyalist Legions during the Drop Site Massacre on Istvaan V. |
Black Legion - The Horus Heresy: The terrible galactic civil war that followed and lasted for nine Terran years of genocidal death and destruction on a scale never before witnessed by Mankind, called the Horus Heresy by later generations, was the most terrible conflict in the history of the Imperium, and came close to shattering it forever. This conflict quickly became a terrible war of escalation and retaliation. The Legions struck desperate blows against each other across the length and breadth of the nascent Imperium.By the time Horus had carved a bloody path to Terra, the Sons of Horus stood at the head of a vast army of Traitor Space Marines. In a battle the likes which the Imperium has never seen since, Horus' armies fell upon the Emperor's Imperial Palace and Abaddon was granted the honour of leading them into battle. This was to be the zenith of the Sons of Horus' power. Never again would the Legion gather in such strength or grandeur on the field of battle.In the cauldron of war, Abaddon led the 1st Company and the hulking, black-armoured Terminators of the Justaerin into the Emperor's Palace, smashing through the loyalist defenders. Their Chainfists and Power Swords dripped with gore, any who dared stand against them were torn apart. Everywhere, the fires of the Heresy burned out of control; Titans traded blows over the ruined walls of the palace and great warships filled the sky with dazzling lance fire, raining bombardments upon friend and foe alike.Horus watched the battle unfolding below from the shrouded bridge of his flagship, the Vengeful Spirit. On flickering holo-charts, the Warmaster saw his armies trapped against the inner walls of the Emperor's palace, Loyalist reinforcements arriving with every passing solar hour. Through the vista panes of his bridge, he could see that the battle in Terra's orbit was also turning against his fleet. Horus knew time was running out.In his arrogance and anger, the Warmaster made one last gambit, lowering his ship's Void Shields so that Emperor could teleport aboard and face him personally. He was not to be disappointed. In an incandescent blast of light, the Emperor teleported onto the Vengeful Spirit seeking out His traitorous son. The battle between the two great warriors exchanging titanic ringing blows even as their psychic selves struggled in the Warp. For all his rage and anger, Horus could not win -- though before the Emperor obliterated His son's soul, Horus delivered a mortal blow to his gene-father.Abaddon was climbing over the heaped corpses of broken Imperial soldiers when he felt the psychic howl heralding the death of his Primarch. Every Son of Horus knew at once that their Warmaster had fallen, thousands of warriors pausing in battle to look up into the burning sky. The news spread like a contagion through the Traitor Legions, and the assault that had come so close to success began to collapse.Abaddon immediately teleported back onto the flagship and arrived at his master's side in time to rescue Horus' body. With a cry of deepest pain and anguish, Abaddon vowed vengeance against his father's killer. Tearing free the Lightning Claw from Horus' arm, he fixed it to his own, symbolically taking up his Primarch's debt of blood against the Emperor.Realising the battle for Terra was lost, Abaddon moved to save the XVIth Legion from annihilation. He fought his way through the remaining loyalists aboard the Vengeful Spirit and cleared the ancient vessel of resistance, the mortally wounded Emperor already borne back to Terra by the Imperial Fists' Primarch Rogal Dorn. Laying claim to the Vengeful Spirit, Abaddon and the Sons of Horus broke orbit and fought their way free of the battle and escaped into the void. |
Black Legion - Rise of the Black Legion: Following the dire events of the Horus Heresy during the final epic Siege of Terra and the death of the Warmaster Horus aboard his flagship, the Vengeful Spirit, First Captain Abaddon and the surviving Sons of Horus broke orbit over Terra and fought their way free of the battle and escaped into the void.A time of Imperial reprisal and retribution known as the Great Scouring followed, and countless worlds were put to death by the Loyalists for siding with Horus, their corpses left as a warning to others. Those Traitor Legions that remained in the Imperium were hunted mercilessly and hounded across the stars by pitiless Loyalists. Abaddon and the remaining Sons of Horus took refuge in the Eye of Terror, choosing to plunge into that maelstrom of madness rather than face extinction at the hands of the Emperor's vengeful warriors.The Sons of Horus managed to reach the Eye of Terror with the bloodied survivors of the Scouring, but the once mighty XVIth Legion was reduced to a fraction of its former size. Led by only a few remaining captains, the Legion struggled with its loyalty to their fallen Primarch and the cold reality of their defeat at the hands of the Emperor and His lackeys.Bereft of their glorious Primarch, the Legion floundered, and in desperation turned to each of the Chaos Gods in turn in their search for renewed power, inviting daemonic possession and the ever more costly blessings of the Warp. All the while, the Legion suffered the jealous attacks of their former allies. As the Traitor Legions turned upon one another, the Dark Gods subverted and manipulated their new playthings, reshaping the Legions for their own ends and the never-ending war between the gods.Ezekyle Abaddon abandoned the Legion; broken by the death of Horus and sick of war, he wandered alone into the Eye of Terror. Meanwhile the Sons of Horus carried the body of their Primarch, preserved in stasis, further into the Eye, ignoring the wars that raged around them. On the Daemon World of Maeleum, a graveyard world of steel and rust, the Sons of Horus raised a fortress, Lupercalios, fashioning a mighty citadel from the wrecks of decaying vessels lost to the Warp with the aid of the thousands of slaves they had taken from the worlds of the Imperium. Surrounded by living darkness and the bones of dead Warp-dragons, it was fashioned from the wrecks of decaying vessels long lost to the Warp, with each spire and tower made from the jagged prow of an ancient voidship. The Legion interred Horus' body within a great tomb, where many fell into worship of their fallen demigod.Horus' body hung suspended in a spiralling chamber of bone-white stone, bathed in flickering golden light, his perfect form looking down upon his sons. Reaching up as far as the eye could see, the deeds of Horus were carved into the arching crypt walls, each one depicting a great battle or glorious victory. Each day, the worshippers would gather in the shadow of their Primarch and offer up their oaths anew, unable and unwilling to find a new leader. With their Primarch dead and their Legion on the verge of extinction, the Sons of Horus stagnated. Like many of the other Traitor Legions, the Sons of Horus suffered from incessant daemonic attacks during the early years within the Eye of Terror. There was a never-ending supply of daemons to fight off, and many fell to the uncontrollable influence of Chaos, losing their mind and bodies to possession by these insidious Warp entities.Some within the Legion argued that the Sons of Horus should offer their allegiance to a single power rather than deal with the daemons of many gods. Most, however, warned that the XVIth Legion should never bow to an outside power again; they remembered too well the yoke that the Emperor had placed around the neck of their Legion, and were wary of letting another master hold such power over them again. The martial pride of the XVIth Legion also meant that they would never completely accept a master who did not come from their own ranks, be it the Emperor of Mankind or even a God of Chaos.Lupercalios, the Monument, was a mausoleum to the XVIth Legion as much as a stronghold. It was where the body of their Primarch had been interred after the Terran Breaking. Few of the other Legions were permitted anywhere near the Sons' last bastion. It also served as a fortress from which they would launch further attacks upon both the Imperium and their fellow Traitor Legions. All the while, the XVIth Legion suffered the jealous attacks of their former allies amongst the Forces of Chaos as the brief unity between the Dark Gods and their servants during the Heresy once more broke down into the normal state of internecine rivalry, unleashing the Legion Wars.Some captains suspected that it would be but a matter of time before they and their Battle-Brothers were drawn into the wars between the Traitor Legions, and so they pushed for the Sons of Horus to replace its losses by increasing the Legion's gene-seed stocks. These same captains knew that any fortress, no matter how grand, could not hope to hold back a determined Space Marine assault, and called for more warriors to be found. Unfortunately, the majority of surviving captains were convinced that the Warp would provide all the power they needed, if only they could master the methods of merging daemon and Space Marine.The wars between the other Legions who had sided with Horus during the Horus Heresy raged across the Eye of Terror even as the Sons of Horus ignored the events happening around them, and continued to raise their fortress ever higher, worshipping the corpse of their Primarch. The Sons of Horus had remained largely apart from these conflicts; however, jealous eyes now turned their way. Traitorous forces gathered against them and conspired to rob them of the remains of Horus to further vile and selfish ambitions.The Primarch Horus' body, with its potent genetic information and biological secrets, was a great prize indeed. In a sudden assault, the remnants of the debased Emperor's Children, having grown vastly in power after firmly cementing their terrible pacts with Slaanesh, easily smashed their way through the defences of Maeleum and into the central chambers of the Sons of Horus' stronghold. They stole the body of the slain Primarch from the heart of its tomb and spirited it away, some say with the purpose of handing it over to the dark Apothecary Fabius Bile who intended to clone it in order to create a new and still greater Warmaster of Chaos to restore the Traitor Legions' unity and fortunes.Their fortress in ruins and their Legion decimated, the Sons of Horus stood on the brink of vanishing forever from the galaxy and fading into cursed memory. The XVIth Legion devolved into in-fighting amongst themselves, giving in to dark despair or uncontrolled rage. The divisions between the Legion's captains turned into bitter bloodshed and murder, as order completely collapsed.The salvation of the Sons of Horus came when one of its greatest captains, Ezekyle Abaddon, returned from his Dark Pilgrimage in time to watch the battle from afar. It was in that moment that he saw, with cold clarity, that it was Horus' failure that had led the Legion here, to them tearing each other apart in the blood-soaked ruins of Maeleum.Abaddon swore that he would succeed where Horus had failed in overthrowing the "Corpse-Emperor" and proclaimed himself the new Warmaster of Chaos. Finally, sickened by how far the Legion had fallen, he stalked through the ruins hunting down his fellow captains, cooling his rage with their final screams. In the end, Abaddon alone remained of the Legion's leaders, demanding obedience from his brothers.Some saw Abaddon as Horus' rightful and legitimate successor and fell at his feet willingly, while others simply recognised his raw strength and bowed their heads to his might. A few turned their back on Abaddon, and were either cut down by their brothers or managed to escape into the Warp. With his Legion brought to heel, Abaddon turned his attention to the clones of Horus; he commanded his warriors to extinguish all trace of their former Primarch and free themselves from his shadow.He then personally led an attack on the Emperor's Children that destroyed the body of the Primarch Horus and all his clones, and in so doing, ushered in a new age for the XVIth Legion. He had the Sons of Horus repainted their viridian Power Armour black, the colour of mourning and of vengeance, and cast-off the XVIth Legion's former moniker of the Sons of Horus.From then on, they became known as the "Black Legion." Through his actions, the Despoiler had reinvigorated the Legion, reviving the old notion that none could stand in their way and that they stood first amongst the Traitor Legions, destined by the will of the Dark Gods to one day inherit the galaxy itself.When the warbands of the Black Legion and the other Forces of Chaos gather under the wrathful banner of Abaddon the Despoiler to unleash yet another of their Black Crusades to overthrow the False Emperor, the words of Horus are heard upon their lips -- let the galaxy burn. The Long War for control of the galaxy by Chaos and the Black Legion had begun. |
Black Legion - A New Champion: His control of the Legion secured, Abaddon started expanding the ranks of the Black Legion, consumed by the desire to launch an assault against the Imperium. Word spread across the Eye of Terror that any Space Marine who bowed before the Despoiler would be granted a place in his Black Legion and a part in his grand plan for revenge against the False Emperor.Many of the other Traitors mocked and derided Abaddon for his arrogance. However, the endless wars and corruption of the Warp had sown disillusion in the hearts of others and the promise of a place in a Legion led by a warlord determined to continue the war against the Imperium with its greater purpose appealed to a great number. The insulting defeat at the hands of the Loyalist Space Marine Legions was still fresh in the minds of many of the Chaos Space Marines, and they hungered for a chance to spill the blood of their former brothers.Other Traitor Legionaries cared not whose blood they spilled, only that Abaddon could lead them to worlds where they could tear piteous screams from the dying and crush the corpses of their foes underfoot. The legend of Abaddon was also spreading, and those Traitor Marines who respected only strength, cruelty and dark majesty already marked him out as a Chaos warlord to rule all others.Abaddon soon earned an enduring reputation among the Traitor Legions for the terrifying vengeance he visited upon those who betrayed him. Some Traitor Legionaries and daemonic warlords attempted to use the Black Legion for their own ends, infiltrating its ranks with false promises of loyalty. Others attempted to whisper promises in the ears of those that had sworn fealty to the Black Legion and tried to turn them against the Despoiler. In the end, the heads of all those Chaos Champions and Chaos Lords adorned Abaddon's trophy rack, their warbands destroyed and their fortresses torn down stone by stone. Eventually, only the very foolish or terminally insane would break their oath to Abaddon the Despoiler.The new Warmaster was a master of manipulation and knew just what combination of fear, greed and vanity would sway the minds of both men and daemons. Warlords would come before Abaddon merely to verify this Champion of Chaos and his Black Legion for themselves, but found themselves scorching their armour black and joining his cause. As the numbers of the Black Legion swelled, Abaddon ravaged the worlds of the Eye of Terror with his fleet, claiming more warriors and slaves for his cause. This time, the Despoiler was careful not to create such an easy target for his foes, and the Black Legion remained a fleet-based formation, slipping like shadows across the Warp. Aboard the Vengeful Spirit Abaddon led his war against the other Traitor Legions, their allies and their enemies, creating an army to rival any force in the galaxy.Such is the nature of the Traitor Legions that no individual warlord could ever rule over all of them, but Abaddon hoped to one day unite them toward a single goal as Horus had done before him. The Black Legion could only hope to destroy the Emperor and His Imperium with the help of the other Traitor Legions, combining to brush aside the armies ranged against them and launch a single massive assault on Terra. This was Abaddon's dark dream and the path that would shape his destiny for centuries to come. |
Black Legion - The Black Crusades: In 781.M31, five standard centuries after his retreat from Terra, Abaddon returned to Imperial space at the head of a host of Traitors and daemons. It was the Imperium's first encounter with the newly founded Black Legion and the return of a brutal and bitter enemy many had thought lost to the graveyard of history.Since the Great Scouring, Abaddon had remained within the Eye of Terror, rebuilding the Black Legion as a vengeful reflection of its former glory. At last, the Black Legion and the other Traitors returned to realspace, the first chapter in their Long War against the Emperor ready to be written in the blood of Imperial worlds.Through alliance, threats and promises, Abaddon was able to muster the largest force of Traitor Legions seen since the Horus Heresy and took the Imperium by surprise. Worlds close to the Eye of Terror fell into mayhem and chaos as Legions descended from the sky and daemons tore their way into reality. Only Cadia, with its formidable defences, stood firm, its brave regiments fighting from the towering gates and bastions of their cities.To counter the invasion, the Imperium was forced to divert many of the newly-formed Space Marine Chapters of the Second Founding from war zones across the Segmentum Obscurus. The Traitor Legions basked in their return from the Eye of Terror, bathing in the blood of innocent worlds and filling the holds of their voidships with slaves. On a dozen planets, the Black Legion proved worthy of their fallen Primarch and the martial prowess of the ancient Luna Wolves.Abaddon had chosen his generals well, and each competed for glory as the Legion tore a bloody gouge across the stars. Zagthean the Broken led his Black Legion warband in an orgy of violence and excess on the Agri-World of Valesia. For his own dark pleasure, the warlord constructed a vast maze of thorns from the world's blood-rose orchards, blinding his prisoners and loosing them within its twisting tunnels, before hunting them down at his leisure. Countless inhabitants spent their final terrifying hours listening desperately for the sounds of pursuit, their flesh bleeding from dozens of thorn cuts and their lungs filled with the sickly sweet scent of the blood-rose.Not to be outdone, Eralak and his company of Raptors brought a bloody nightmare to the floating hive cities of Melphia. Killing millions in their rampage, Eralak's warband sent dozen of cities falling from the sky as he tore out their complex suspensor arrays and vented their plasma reactors onto the farms and fields below. Fashioning giant floating gallows from the remaining, ruined cities, the warlord hanged millions of Imperial citizens, their swaying corpses forever doomed to drift across the skies of Melphia, a terrible reminder of the power of the Black Legion.The Black Legion's greatest achievement was not only its brutal victories, but also the unity it had managed to forge among the Traitors and their daemonic allies. Even though the Traitor Space Marines, daemons and Heretics turned on each other once Imperial resistance had been crushed, in the presence of the Black Legion, they gave grudging respect. This was the Legion of fear and domination Abaddon had wrought, and it was to be an ominous sign of things to come for the Imperium.In what would become a festering thorn in the side of the Imperium, the Traitor Legions, often led by the Black Legion or even Abaddon himself, would repeatedly spill out of the Eye of Terror to burn and pillage entire sectors. In the light of dying stars and flaming cities, the Black Legion would indulge their hatred of the Imperium, indiscriminately killing the servants of the False Emperor and tearing down anything they saw as a symbol of the Corpse-God.During these so-called "Black Crusades", whole star systems would be destroyed in conflicts that would drag on for standard decades or centuries until, as suddenly as they had appeared, the Black Legion would retreat into the Eye of Terror, their holds filled with slaves and plunder. The Segmentum Obscurus suffered terribly in these endless wars against the fallen Space Marine Legions, but in truth nowhere was safe from their treacherous reach. This was something the Black Legion proved time and again as it cemented its infamous reputation among the armies of the Imperium as a pitiless foe. |
Black Legion - The Folly of Drecarth: When Abaddon ascended to command of the Sons of Horus, not every warrior of the XVIth Legion swore allegiance to him. Many of the Traitors clung to their worship of Horus as a god, believing that he would one day return to lead them and punish those who had forsaken their oaths.Others considered the Horus Heresy to be the end of their subservience to gods and masters; the Emperor and their Primarch were the last overlords they would ever bow down to and they saw no reason to make an exception for Abaddon. Most of these Renegades were gradually lost to the Warp, disappearing into the Eye and vanishing from record, though some prospered and would return to be a thorn in the side of Abaddon.One of these splinter warbands was the Sons of the Eye, led by Drecarth the Sightless. A former Battle-Brother of Abaddon's, Drecarth had been one of Horus' captains, escaping in the chaos after Maeleum fell. Abaddon had heard whispers of Drecarth's escape and treachery from his cabal of Chaos Sorcerers, who also claimed that an old ally would one day rise to subvert the Black Legion, twisting its loyalty with the memory of the dead Primarch. So, under the guise of truce, Abaddon made a pact with the Sons of the Eye and allied with them during the 6th Black Crusade in 901.M36. Abaddon wanted to make an example of the Sons of the Eye, a dire warning to anyone who would consider challenging his power, but he needed to set the stage for his vengeance just right so that none would ever doubt his resolve.During the 6th Black Crusade, Abaddon besieged the Imperial Forge World of Arkreach, offering Drecarth and his Sons of the Eye an equal share of the plunder. For solar months, the two forces of Chaos Space Marines fought side-by-side against the defences of the Adeptus Mechanicus, bombarding their great forge cities from space.Finally, the Traitors stood triumphant in the smouldering ruins of the great manufactoria, dead littering the ground. As Drecarth extended his hand in greeting, Abaddon grasped it with his own, only to thrust the claws of the Talon of Horus into his fellow Chaos Space Marine's gut. Drecarth lived long enough to see the Sons of the Eye bow to Abaddon and be reabsorbed into the Black Legion before the Warmaster of Chaos tore out his skull and spine. Thus did Abaddon deliver a dire warning to any who dared challenge his power. |
Black Legion - The Tower of Silence: As the bloodshed of the 1st Black Crusade reached its frenzied heights, cities burned and worlds were stripped of people to feed the dark desires of the Traitor Legions. Leaving his Black Legion to continue their brutal reprisals and raids against Imperial worlds, Abaddon pursued his own plans. Using the howling souls unleashed into the Warp by so much death and destruction, he made a secret daemonic bargain. In payment for the feast of despair, pain and anguish Abaddon had created with hisBlack Crusade, the Dark Gods gifted him with knowledge of the secret location of the Tower of Silence on the world of Uralan.Cloaked in the shadow of the Eye of Terror, Uralan was whispered of in daemonic lore as a place where the gods themselves locked away their secrets. Following strands of fate unravelled by his cabal of Chaos Sorcerers, Abaddon had discovered a concealed path through the Warp and across the shifting sea of worlds beyond to reach Uralan without needing to breach the Cadian Gate. With a cadre of the Black Legion's elite warriors, each one a brutal veteran of a thousand battles, Abaddon set foot on Uralan and entered the Tower of Silence. Almost at once, the tower's guardians set upon them, ancient constructs of dark energy that shifted and flickered, their claws tearing at the ragged edges of his warriors' souls.After the bitter battle, Abaddon climbed down into the mirrored heart of Uralan. There, Abaddon wandered the massive haunted labyrinth for what seemed an age, fighting off the spirits of the dead that threatened to add him to their ranks. Eventually, Abaddon made his way towards the centre of the labyrinth where a shard of shifting darkness hung suspended in the air.Reaching out into the void, Abaddon felt the cold hilt of a blade meet his palm and he pulled it into reality; the Daemonsword Drach'nyen took terrible shape before his eyes. After the recovery of the malefic sword, Abaddon's power swelled to inhuman proportions and the new Warmaster of Chaos become nigh unstoppable. Whole cities were burned in sacrifice to the every-hungry daemons of Chaos, and entire armies were torn apart by gibbering Warp entities. Abaddon's power swelled to inhuman proportions as the Gods of Chaos rewarded him lavishly and he undertook acts of fiendish bravery which horrified those who stood against him. |
Black Legion - Black Legion Ascendant: Infused with the might of Chaos, the Black Legion grew in power and glory during the 1st Black Crusade. Under the command of Abaddon, they seized ever more victories and triumphs. It was a glorious time for the XVIth Legion, as the bloodshed and death of the Crusade washed away some of the memories of the Horus Heresy and their great defeat before the gates of the Emperor's Palace. However, despite the reckless carnage and terrible destruction it caused, eventually, the 1st Black Crusade ended.Responding to the deadly peril, the Imperium had gathered its newly founded Space Marine Chapters and Titan Legions and sent them against the Traitors. Even so, scores of worlds had been silenced forever and millions of slaves were dragged screaming back into the Eye of Terror. Abaddon had tested the defences of his enemies and vastly increased his power with his newly acquired Daemonsword Drach'nyen. He also took to using the title of Warmaster of Chaos, rising to claim all that Horus had once possessed. None within the Black Legion argued Abaddon's right to the title, the 1st Black Crusade proof of his right to lead.For the Black Legion, their first foray out of the Eye of Terror had done much to restore their position among the Traitor Legions, fostering a new grudging respect for the black armoured warriors and their self-proclaimed Warmaster. If nothing else, Abaddon had proven that the Dark Gods favoured him, something not even the Daemon Primarchs could ignore. Conflict still sputtered and flared between the Traitor Legions, but they now had a new purpose, something they had almost forgotten in the half millennia since the fall of Horus.In the wake of the 1st Black Crusade, a time of constant raiding of Imperial space began. Abaddon was content to give a Black Legion warlord and his warband of Chaos Space Marines the chance to make a name for themselves, allowing them the freedom to strike where and when they would. He fostered this independence on one condition: the atrocities they committed must be done in the name of the Black Legion and at cost to the Emperor. |
Black Legion - Notable Campaigns: Starting with the 1st Black Crusade, thirteen times has Abaddon the Despoiler led the Black Legion in a grand assault against the Imperium. Every time, the Despoiler and his hordes have achieved a great victory, slain millions of Loyalists or completed some obscure objective before vanishing back into the Eye of Terror. At the close of the 41st Millennium, Abaddon led his 13th Black Crusade in the final conquest of Cadia, emerging stronger than ever before at the head of a vast army of Traitors, Heretics and daemons. |
Black Legion - Age of Betrayal, M30-M31: First Pacification of Luna (703.M30) - This early Imperial campaign was the first operation mounted by elements of the early Space Marine Legions beyond the skies of Terra. The Unification Wars were still raging across the surface of Mankind's birth world. Luna was the bastion of a conglomeration of resurrectionist gene-cults whose members believed that human nature was both fractal, fractured and transcendent. Each of these Selenar gene-cults clung to a different set of archetypes. Every cult member was a product of creation by the Selenar gene-wrights according to formulae crafted in the Dark Age of Technology. Resurrected in body time and time again they sought to distill the true personification of a single human archetype. In their subterranean complexes the cults were powerful, insular and resistant to the Imperial Truth. The Imperials would have normally dealt with these insular cults in the usual matter they handled all of the other Terran factions and techno-barbarian states that refused to accept the rule of the Emperor of Mankind -- by obliteration. The fact that the Selenar gene-cults had something that the growing Imperium needed complicated that position. The Selenar returned the Imperial entreaties for alliance with silence. As the threats of the Imperium soon began to outnumber its offers, the Selenar cults began to gird themselves for war. So it was that the Emperor finally ordered Luna to be pacified by the sword, their superstitious beliefs cast down before the Imperial Truth and their gene-craft yoked to the needs of the Imperium. To this task the Emperor set the three of His newborn Space Marine Legions most suited to this purpose on what some Imperial chroniclers name as the first true battle of the Great Crusade. The combined force of the VIIth, XIIIth and XVIth Legions (later named the Imperial Fists, Ultramarines and Luna Wolves) lifted from the surface of Terra in a scattering of rocket flame. The as yet unnamed XVIth Legion had been chosen to serve as the Space Marine force's vanguard, and had brought its full strength to bear. Cutting power to their assault craft, the Astartes of the XVIth Legion drifted silently towards Luna through the void like arrows fired into the night. As the smaller wave of assault craft belonging to the VIIth and XIIIth Legions approached the airless world, the Selenar defensive weapon systems embedded in Luna's surface lashed the oncoming Imperial force. The XVIth Legion's assault craft, unlooked for and unseen, struck their targets like a dagger in the night. Within six hours of the first shot being fired, Luna had been pacified and brought into Imperial Compliance, the first off-world conquest of the Imperium of Man. Faced with annihilation, the surviving Selenar cultists bent the knee instead, their surrender communique transmitted to Terra calling for the Emperor to "call off his wolves". Broken and humbled, the enslaved gene-wrights of Luna would help forge the next generation of Space Marine who would carry out Mankind's conquest of the stars. As for the XVIth Legion, they had earned their name -- the Luna Wolves.Hunting of the Ak'Haireth (Unknown Date.M30) - An alien menace known variously as the Ak'Haireth, or "Bone Drinkers" in the vernacular, were fungoid, predatory and parasitic life forms which acquired their sentience from operating as physically interwoven gestalt "blooms". Their existence was fuelled by the slow and agonisingly painful siphoning of nutrition from living animals, primarily human bone marrow. Given to no technological creativity of their own, the Ak'Haireth operated at the edge of the western Segmentum Solar, inhabiting the scavenged void ships of other species and raiding isolated colonies and Feral Worlds unable to resist their predations. Initially encountered in the early years of the Great Crusade, the Ak'Haireth had been subjected to extermination pogroms carried out both the Luna Wolves and the VIIIth Legion (not then yet formally known as the Night Lords) which had been thought to have been successful. However, a cowardly species, the Ak'Haireth had been wont to flee if not cornered in battle, and over time it became apparent that some marrow-blooms of the foul xenos had hidden themselves and survived. By 986.M30, reports of attacks against isolated outposts and shipping in the region of the stellar wastes near Olmec indicated that the Ak'Haireth were again dangerously growing in strength and number. The Alpha Legion, only a handful of years previously united with their Primarch, was assigned the order for the xenocide of the species before it could spread further, and in a successful campaign that lasted three years, the Bone Drinkers were all but wiped out.Fall of Reillis (Unknown Date.M30) - For the first thirty years after his discovery, Horus Lupercal and the Emperor had many occasions to fight alongside one another. At the fortified city of Reillis, a human settlement unwilling to accept the Imperial Truth, the defenders used secret tunnels to infiltrate behind the besieging Imperial army and hundreds of enemy shock troops swamped the Imperial command encampment. Unprepared and unarmoured, the Emperor and Horus fought back-to-back until a plasma blast stunned the young Primarch and sent him staggering to the ground. The Emperor stood over His fallen son and refused to give ground until reinforcements arrived to drive their attackers back.The Gorro Hollowing (Unknown Date.M30) - Within the Telon Reach was an Ork empire that rivalled that centred on Ullanor, and at its heart was the scrap world of Gorro. The Ork tech-caste, the Mekboyz, dominated the Orks of Gorro and had made the world their own. The dominant tech-caste on Gorro seemed to be fascinated by a form of plasma technology never encountered before or since. Capable of generating destructive yields of terrifying potency, these plasma weapons had done much to blunt the Great Crusade's advance across the Telon Reach. The Emperor decreed that Gorro must be destroyed. When a thousand-strong fleet of warships dropped out of the Warp above Gorro it was the Emperor Himself who gave the order to begin the assault. Horus, ever the dutiful and favoured son, stood at the Emperor's side and watched as tens of thousands of assault craft spread out from the fleet. The Luna Wolves teleported into the scrap layers beneath the planet's surface, forced to hollow out Gorro from within due to the planet's high resistance to orbital bombardment. In the vanguard was the Emperor and by His side was Horus and a guard of black-armoured Justaerin Terminators from the Luna Wolves' 1st Company as well as the golden-clad warriors of the Legiones Custodes. As the Space Marines attacked, the Ork resistance they faced was nearly overwhelming. The Orks of Gorro were huge and augmented with scavenged bionics. Some stood taller than Dreadnoughts and their weaponry burned through Power Armour easily. At the height of the battle, the fury of the Orks split the Emperor from His guards. Alone He slew hundreds of them until a blast from an Ork plasma weapon weakened His defences and one of the Ork leaders seized Him. The creature's strength was so great that it took hold of the Emperor and buckled His armour. As the creature's grasp closed to throttle the Master of Mankind, Horus stormed through the press of battle and cut the Ork's arms from its body with a single blow. Together father and son led their forces deeper into the vast sphere of scrap until they reached the centre of Gorro. The Emperor worked to collapse the self-sustaining plasma sphere that powered much of the world's scavenged Ork technology and that contained a Warp-fold envelope, so that Gorro would implode into the Warp. The Emperor proved successful, and without its power source, the scrap world collapsed in on itself. A hollow skin of rusted metal around an empty void was all that remained to mark the death of the great Ork empire of Gorro. Horus had returned the favour of the Emperor saving his life on Reillis. This incident helped to forge an unusually close bond between the Emperor and His gene-son, closer than that between any of the other Primarchs and their father.War in the Shedim Drifts (Unknown Date.M30) - During the war in the Shedim Drifts against the marauding Eldar of Craftworld Mór-ríoh'i, a vast Imperial force comprised of no less than four Titan Legions which consisted of the Legio Atarus, Legio Mortis, Legio Fureans & Legio Osedax, was assembled and placed under the overall command of Commander Horus Lupercal and his Luna Wolves Legion. The apocalyptic battle which raged upon the planet's surface saw a full demi-Legio of the Legio Atarus encircled and all but destroyed. The Lupercal had cruelly used them, without their foreknowledge or consent, as a ruse to divert the strength of the enemy away from the direct defence of their craftworld while his Legion undertook a surprise assault against it. The war of the Shedirn Drifts was a great victory for Horus and all those of the Imperium who fought in the campaign gained glory because of it, but at the expense of the Legio Atarus, an injury that the Firebrands would not forget.Castigation of Terentius (Unknown Date.M30) - When the forces of the Great Crusade first entered the Ordoni Cluster, they encountered the formidable warlord Vatale Gerron Terentius. Observing the forces arrayed against him, Terentius was forced to take the path of survival and surrendered to the Imperium. The Imperium had need of men like Terentius, and the Great Crusade gave him opportunities and riches such as he had never dreamed. Given a small fleet of warships and a handful of Imperial Army regiments, Terentius grew his forces by conquest. For five decades he rose in power and reputation, conquering worlds around the Halo Stars in the name of the Emperor. At the height of his powers, he had the ear of Malcador the Sigillite and the countenance of several Primarchs. When he finally turned against the Imperium, many were shocked. Terentius began to conquer already Compliant planets, his contra-Crusade conquering system after system in his own name, rather than for the sake of all Mankind. Soon he had entire fleets of warships, tens of millions of soldiers and the loyalty of a hundred human-settled worlds. Ringed by fortress worlds, this rebel human empire began to eat up Imperial worlds around the Halo Stars. The Imperium responded by sending Horus and his Luna Wolves Legion to not only break the Renegade but to demonstrate to any others who harboured similar ideas within the Imperial forces the inevitability of a betrayer's defeat. Horus elected to not only use his Legion to complete the task at hand but sent personal requests to his brother Primarchs for support which saw substantial strength from the Night Lords, Iron Hands, and the Alpha Legion joined to the might of the Luna Wolves. Soon the rebel forces were fragmented, driven by tales of culled worlds. It is said that it was at the very moment that Terentius realised he could not win that the Luna Wolves came for him. As they dropped from the Warp within weapons' range of Terentius' warships they annihilated half of his command fleet in one fell swoop. Horus himself teleported onto the bridge of Terentius' flagship along with 50 of the Luna Wolves 1st Company's elite Justaerin Terminators and slaughtered all they found there. Terentius died unrepentant, ending his life impaled upon Horus' Talon. With Terentius dead, his rebellion crumbled as the castigation continued with renewed fury. Horus, his pride slighted by Terentius' decision to betray the trust the Primarchs and the Emperor had once put in him, is said to have ordered the Night Lords to decimate every world within Terentius' rebel empire. The power of the Iron Hands and elements of the Ordo Reductor were brought to bear on every structure on Terentius' bastion worlds. Soon the rebels of his realm were slaughtered, their cities smashed to dust, and his homeworld's very air laced with toxins. Once the castigation was complete, Horus sent the gold-dipped skull of Terentius to Terra with the ironic warning carried on the lips of the messenger who bore it, "So perish all traitors".Compliance of Molech (869.M30) - The Luna Wolves took part in the massive Imperial Compliance campaign on the newly discovered Knight World of Molech, which was led by the Emperor Himself, and included multiple Legiones Astartes, including the Dark Angels, Emperor's Children and the White Scars, as well as thousands of troops of the Imperialis Auxilia and assets from the Mechanicum and Legio Titanicus. After achieving victory, Cyprian Devine of House Devine was named Planetary Governor of Molech. In the presence of several of His Primarch sons, the Emperor led them to a Warp portal hidden underground, where He proceeded to enter into the Realm of Chaos to parley with the Ruinous Powers. When He finally returned, the Emperor appeared aged, but much more powerful. He then suppressed His sons' memories of Molech and stationed a large garrison force comprised of nearly 100 Imperialis Auxilia regiments, three Legio Titanicus cohorts, and detachments from two Space Marine Legions to protect the secrets of the Warp portal on Molech.The Keylek Genocide (921.M30) - Early in the Great Crusade the Luna Wolves encountered the hostile alien reptilian race known as the Keylekid on the world of Keylek. The grotesque Keylekid were greatly skilled in the arts of combat, and rose against the XVIth Legion angrily the moment the 63rd Expeditionary Fleet made contact. This genocidal campaign proved to be a long, bloody, and miserable affair for the Luna Wolves. At this time Horus was referred to simply as "The Commander" by the Astartes of his Legion.Compliance of 63-8 (Davin) (941.M30) - The Feral World of Davin, codified as Sixty-Three Eight (63-8), was the eighth world brought into Imperial Compliance by the XVIth Legion's 63rd Expeditionary Fleet some 60 standard years before the start of the Horus Heresy. The indigenous feral warriors of this world briefly attempted to resist being conquered by the Imperium, but were forced to surrender as they were overwhelmingly outmatched militarily by the Astartes. The warrior tribes were allowed to remain mostly intact as they had impressed Horus with their courage on the battlefield and their willingness to learn to adapt to Imperial culture. The military campaign was brief, and the Luna Wolves departed after the surrender of the Davinites, taking with them their concept of the Warrior Lodge, which was quickly adopted throughout the Luna Wolves fleet. A detachment of the XVIIth Legion, the Word Bearers (then known as the Imperial Heralds), under the command of First Captain Kor Phaeron was left to shepherd the people of Davin into the light of the Imperial Truth. The Imperial governorship of the planet was given to Commander Eugen Temba of the Imperial Army, a close friend and confidante of Horus. Long after the 63rd Expeditionary Fleet departed the star system, the new Planetary Governor soon found that the inhabitants of Davin's moon refused to comply with Imperial rule. This would eventually result in Governor Temba and his Imperial garrison force being struck down by a sorcerous attack unleashed by Davinite shamans of Chaos on Davin's moon, an attack that would twist their perceptions away from their oaths of fealty to the Imperium, succumbing to the corrupting influence of the Plague God, Nurgle. Unknown to the Imperials, the entire population of Davin had long been servants of the Dark Gods of the Warp. The corruption of Temba and his Imperial Army garrison forces would ultimately necessitate the return of the Luna Wolves Legion 60 years later, and lead to the eventual corruption of Horus.Compliance of Darrowmar (Unknown Date.M30) - The Luna Wolves fought alongside the Night Lords Legion in bringing the world of Darrowmar into Imperial Compliance.Compliance of Tethonus (Unknown Date.M30) - The Luna Wolves fought against a xenos-adversary whose identity is not recorded in existing Imperial records while bringing the world of Tethonus into Imperial Compliance. This Compliance action was a long siege of the xenos fortress-states on Tethonus. Horus had tasked the masters of the Forge World of Diamat to create continental siege machines; vast artillery pieces that could devastate the most powerful fortifications. But the war machines took much longer for the forge masters to complete than planned. By the time they were finished, the campaign on Tehonus had been over for more than a standard year and a half, and Horus had moved on to other conquests. So the weapons were put into a depot on Diamat for the day when he would come to claim them. Fifty standard years later, Horus would reveal his perfidy at Istvaan III, and would send raiding forces to claim these siege engines for later use in his attempt to overthrow the Emperor of Mankind.Assault on Dahinta (Unknown Date.M30) - On the world of Dahinta, the Luna Wolves fought against a race of self-aware machines called the Overseers, who were led by the artificial intelligence known as the Archdroid. One of the Emperor's longest-standing commands was that no sentient machines could be allowed to exist, for they had nearly caused the extinction of Mankind when they had rebelled against their human overseers during the Dark Age of Technology. Despite heavy casualties amongst themselves, the thinking machines were wiped from the face of Dahinta by the savagery of the Astartes. Only after the campaign had ended was the full truth learned: the Overseers had been created by a vanished offshoot of humanity that had settled Dahinta, perhaps during the Age of Technology. The Overseers had cared for their lost masters' crumbling cities long after they had become extinct or left their homeworld behind.Battle of Gyros-Thravian (Unknown Date.M30) - The Battle of Gyros-Thravian was a massive joint Imperial Compliance action carried out by three Space Marine Legions, composed of the Luna Wolves, Death Guard and Imperial Fists against the extremely powerful Ork Warboss Gharkul Blackfang, one of the most powerful Ork warlords ever encountered up until that time. Despite the strength arrayed against the vile Greenskin, it were the Imperial forces who were soon on the verge of defeat. It was then that the Emperor Himself, aboard His flagship Bucephelus, came to the aid of His sons. He personally led a force composed of 1,000 Legio Custodes into the heart of the mighty Ork horde. Blackfang was confronted by the Emperor and killed atop his Gargant while the Custodians proceeded to lay waste to the rest of the Greenskin horde. The Custodians accounted for the slaughter of the Orks, slaying over 100,000 of the savage xenos, with the loss of only three Custodians. Following their momentous victory, the Emperor commemorated the Custodians' sacrifice by engraving the names of the three fallen Custodians into His own personal Power Armour.Pacification of Schravaan (Unknown Date.M30) - This was a joint Imperial Compliance conducted by the Luna Wolves, Iron Warriors, Imperial Fists, and the Emperor's Children Legions against the xenos Badoon on the world of Schravaan. The Iron Warriors won a great victory when they stormed the final refuge of the Badoon. They breached the defences and held while the other Legions carried the city beyond. During the following victory feast, Horus proclaimed Perturabo the greatest master of siege warfare in the Great Crusade. Fulgrim, the Primarch of the Emperor's Children then inquired to his brother Dorn whether he thought even the defences of the Imperial Palace could resist the Iron Warriors, in which Dorn replied that he regarded the defences as being proof against any assault if well-planned. Perturabo flew into a rage and unleashed unfounded accusations against his brother. After this the two rarely spoke, and neither Legion would serve again in the same campaign for the remainder of the Great Crusade.Compliance of Krypt (Unknown Date.M30) - The Compliance of Krypt was a relatively short campaign conducted during the Great Crusade by both the Luna Wolves and the Death Guard Legions against the Orks upon the frozen plains of the world of Krypt. Fighting together for more than a week across the frozen surface of the planet, the Space Marine Legions turned the blue ice dark with xenos blood. The Luna Wolves' Captain Garviel Loken and his 10th Company are known to have fought alongside Death Guard Battle-Captain Nathaniel Garro and his 7th Great Company at this time.Pacification of Zaramund (970.M30) - A joint-Compliance campaign that was conducted by the Luna Wolves and a contingent of Death Guard led by First Captain Calas Typhon and a contingent of Dark Angels led by Luther, the acting Regent of Caliban. Following their victory, a celebration was held, but soon the festivities were marred when an enraged Lion El'Jonson arrived to rebuke Luther for disobeying his orders to remain on Caliban.Disovery of Primarch Alpharius Omegon (ca. Late-970s.M30) - Extant accounts state that Alpha Legion Primarch Alpharius was discovered accidentally by the Luna Wolves when they were lured into a trap after receiving a distress beacon from one of their own battleships. When they went to assist, Horus' own flagship came under attack by an unknown enemy, and a single assassin broke into the flagship and fought his way clear to Horus' command chamber. Horus himself was forced to confront him, but thankfully, did not slay his attacker but recognised him instead as his lost brother; Alpharius. Unfortunately, the validity of this account is considered highly suspect.Tyrade System Compliance (ca. 998.M30) - The Luna Wolves served alongside a detachment of the Vth Legion, the White Scars, during the Imperial Compliance of the Tyrade System. This action occurred seven years before the Battle of Istvaan III and the start of the Horus Heresy.Compliance of Melchior (ca. 999.M31) - The Imperial Compliance of Melchior was a joint campaign that was carried out by both the XVIth Legion and the Blood Angels Legion. The world was the last bastion of the xenos known as the Nephilim -- hulking entities of roughly humanoid shape who were smooth like carvings of soapstone, with abstract shapes approximating arms and legs. Their dome heads emerged from their shoulders without a neck, and an array of olfactory slits and eye-spots ringed the surface of their skulls. In the light, the Nephilim looked like objects crafted of blown glass, their semi-transparent flesh glowing in the bright day. The Nephilim possessed an unhurried, careful agility like that of sea-going creatures seen through the walls of a glass tank. They moved deceptively slowly through air as if they were swimming in water, but they could move fast if they wished, darting and spinning, becoming difficult to hit. The alien giants, mocking humanity's great dream of peace and unity, had left a trail of destruction behind them that had claimed a hundred worlds before they had come to rest upon Melchior. Sagan, the DeCora Spine, Orpheo Minoris, Beta Rigel II; each of these planets had been denuded of all human life, populations herded into empath-chapels as big as mountains and then slowly consumed. Even their name, Nephilim, the name of the fallen seraphs, was a name taken from ancient human mythology -- that of Terra, Caliban and Barac. The true horror of it was that the Nephilim used those they preyed upon to do their soldiering for them, snaring the pliant, the lonely, the sorrowful with their ideal of an attainable godhood. They plied their victims with stories of eternal existence for the faithful, of endless sorrow for the agnostic; and they were very good at it. Perhaps the xenos really believed that what they were doing was somehow taking their victims closer to a form beyond flesh, to an afterlife in an eternal heaven-state; it did not matter. With their advanced technology they implanted bits of themselves into their thralls to further their communion. They cut their own flesh and made living masks to mark their devotees. The Nephilim controlled minds, either through the transmitted power of their will or through the weak character of those they chose. They were an affront to the Emperor's hope for the creation of the rationalist, secular galaxy outlined by the Imperial Truth. They represented not only an offence to the purity of a precious human ideal but in their insidious cuckoo-nest displacement of those who foolishly gave them fealty. For what the aliens fed upon, what the Scout Marines of the Blood Angels and Luna Wolves had seen and reported back, were the very lives of those who cherished them. The empty chapels were piled high with stacks of desiccated corpses, bodies that had been aged years in only hours as all living essence was siphoned from them. The Primarchs of the Legions were disgusted as the true understanding of the enemy they faced was revealed. The Nephilim fed on adulation. In the strategium of his flagship, the Vengeful Spirit, Horus showed his brother Sanguinius, the Primarch of the Blood Angels, the plan that he had conceived to break the will of the Nephilim. Horus wanted the Blood Angels to march shoulder-to-shoulder with their cousins, cowing the aliens with the sight of an army of thousands of powerful Astartes rolling without pause to the gates of their last bastion. And then through those gates, over the battlements, not stopping, not pausing to parley or hesitate. "Like the ocean these things sprang from", Horus had said, "we will roll over the aliens, drag them down and drown them." The sheer bombast of the plan was its greatest strength, but Sanguinius had not been easily swayed to it. This blunt, brute-force approach was better suited to their more intemperate brother Primarchs, to Leman Russ or to Angron. Sanguinius felt that neither he nor Horus were so artless, so focused upon the target to the detriment of all else, but in the end he agreed. When the time came to enact their audacious plan, Horus and his Luna Wolves met the xenos army on the sparkling white plains of the Silver Desert. Before open hostilities began, Horus attempted to parlay with the Nephilim one final time, but the overconfident xenos refused to capitulate, casually informing the humans that they could not win. Horus informed the xenos commander that it had made a grave error, for it would be the Nephilim who would fall. The Luna Wolves would be the anvil upon which the xenos would break, and the Blood Angels would be the hammer. With lightning speed, the heavens screamed as a rain of ceramite Drop Pods tore through the outer atmosphere of Melchior and fell like flaming meteors towards the Silver Desert. Falling with them were Stormbird and Thunderhawk assault gunships that turned and wheeled through the air towards the gargantuan Nephilim encampment, carrying company upon company of the IXth Legion. The speed of their assault was the key to victory; the alien invaders and their zealots had successfully been drawn out to confront the massed forces of the Luna Wolves, leaving the defences on their flanks thinned and permeable. But the xenos giants were not slow in their thinking, and the moment they understood that they had been duped, they would attempt to regroup and fortify. The Blood Angels did not allow that to happen. The Nephilim were broken and cut down, their cohesion shattered by the brutal deep strike. Caught between the brutal fury of two Space Marine Legions on Melchior's shining sands, the Nephilim were finally put to the sword.Ullanor Crusade (ca. 999.M30-000.M31) - The Ullanor Crusade was a vast Imperial assault on the Ork empire of the Overlord Urrlak Urruk during the Great Crusade of the early 31st Millennium. The capital world of this empire, and the site of the final assault, lay in the Ullanor System of the Ullanor Sector, which had long been under the dominion of Urrlak Urruk's Greenskin pocket empire. The Crusade included the deployment of 100,000 Space Marines, 8,000,000 Imperial Army troops, and thousands of Imperial starships and their support personnel. The Luna Wolves spearheaded the assault into the heart of Urlakk's fortress-palace. During the height of the assault, Horus and a retinue of Luna Wolves Terminators from the elite 1st Company came face to face with the massive Ork Warlord and a retinue of 40 Ork Nobs. Horus charged into the Nobs, hacking them apart with his Lightning Claws until he finally faced the Ork Overlord himself. Urlakk was simply no match for the Primarch's skill and unnatural power. First crippling his enemy, Horus hefted Urlakk's broken body out onto the roof of the Greenskin's palace and threw it screaming from the battlements to fall far below amongst the horde of Orks still assaulting the lower levels. Seeing their leader defeated sent a panic through the Greenskin forces, which started to fall back from the Terminators. But the fleeing mobs found they had nowhere to run, as the outer walls had been breached by the attacking Luna Wolves, and the day turned into a slaughter. In the Overlord's chamber, Horus found every Ork and Terminator dead, apart from the gore-drenched First Captain of the 1st Company, Ezekyle Abaddon, who was surrounded by crushed Ork bodies. The Ullanor Crusade marked the high point of the Great Crusade's vast effort to reunite the scattered colony worlds of humanity. The Orks of Ullanor represented the largest concentration of Orks ever defeated by the military forces of the Imperium of Man before the Third War for Armageddon began during the late 41st Millennium. Following the defeat of the Orks of Ullanor, the Emperor of Mankind returned to Terra to begin work on His vast project to open up the Eldar Webway for Mankind's use. In His place to command the vast forces of the Great Crusade He left Horus. Horus was raised to the rank of Imperial Warmaster and given command authority over all of his fellow Primarchs and every Expeditionary Fleet of the Great Crusade. But the Primarchs never came to terms with the Emperor's absence. Their hurt feelings over His seeming abandonment of the Great Crusade to pursue a secret project whose purpose He chose not to reveal to His sons laid the seeds of corruption that would ultimately blossom into the Horus Heresy. Yet the Emperor sent word from Terra that in honour of the great victory at Ullanor, the Luna Wolves should henceforth be known as the Sons of Horus, in honour of their Primarch's singular deeds, though Horus, with typical humility, chose not to rename his Legion at this time.Subjugation of the Akum-Sothos Cluster (ca. 000.M31) - The Aukum-Sothos Cluster, which had been brought into Compliance by the Luna Wolves early in the Great Crusade, mysteriously rebelled against Imperial rule due to the actions of controlling xenos. Horus had formulated a plan to cast down these so-called Unsighted Kings, the xenos-possessed leaders of the insurrection, in a lightning war that would purge the afflicted population while retaining the cluster's highly developed infrastructure for future re-population. The Warmaster's plan called for the bulk of four Legions -- the Luna Wolves, Space Wolves, Iron Warriors and Raven Guard -- to converge on the heavily fortified lair of the Unsighted Kings before a final, overwhelming assault was launched. Despite his misgivings, Corax complied, and assigned the majority of his Terran-borne veterans of the old XIXth Legion, especially those who readily agreed to the Warmaster's plans, as the assault's vanguard element. At the height of the battle, with the assault companies decimated and the attack faltering in the face of overwhelming fire, Corax himself led the forlorn hope, his battle cry firing the Legion to such efforts that the breach was carried and Gate Forty-Two taken. The honour of slaying the Unsighted Kings was claimed by Horus as Warmaster and at the moment of their execution, the xenos' hold over the population was dispelled. The Akum-Sothos Cluster was delivered and Horus' prize was reclaimed. The cost was terrible however, thousands of Raven Guard, the bulk of them Terran-born, had given their lives before the shattered walls of Gate Forty-Two.Compliance of 63-19 (001.M31) - The Imperial Compliance action of the world codified as Sixty-Three Nineteen (63-19) took place in the 203rd year of the Great Crusade. Forced off course by a Warp Storm, the Luna Wolves' 63rd Expeditionary Fleet discovered a system of 9 planets orbiting a yellow sun quite by accident. After entering the system they were contacted by a technologically-advanced human society based on the third planet. This world was ruled by a self-appointed "Emperor of Mankind" who claimed to be the predestined ruler of all the scattered remnants of humanity across the galaxy. He invited a delegation from the Imperial fleet to treat and pay fealty to him. The Warmaster sent his most favoured commander, Captain Hastur Sejanus and his Glory Squad to meet with this supposed "Emperor". Though initial negotiations appeared to proceed smoothly, they irrevocably broke down when the Astartes Captain dared to suggest that there was another, true Emperor of Mankind. Perceived as an insult, Captain Sejanus and his men were taken by surprise during a diplomatic parley and cut down. The death of Horus' favourite son and Mournival member would open an emotional chink in the Primarch's psyche that would later be exploited by First Chaplain Erebus of the Word Bearers Legion upon the Feral World of Davin during Horus' corruption by Chaos in the Temple of the Serpent Lodge. Though intensely grieved by Sejanus' death, Horus miraculously did not order an immediate retaliatory strike. Instead, he mobilised an Astartes "speartip" unit to stand by and prepare for a planetary assault. Horus then attempted to negotiate a second time by despatching Maloghurst and another contingent of Luna Wolves, but this mission also ended in disaster when Maloghurst's Stormbird was shot down and presumed lost. A great fleet of over 600 warships rose up from the planet's atmosphere to meet the 63rd Expeditionary Fleet, throwing down a challenge. The Warmaster responded in kind. The great naval battle that ensued is not recorded in detail in the existing Imperial records of this time, but eventually the Imperial fleet ultimately prevailed. The massive ground assault spearheaded by the Luna Wolves was led by First Captain Ezekyle Abaddon, as well as a half-dozen Titans which provided ground support while Assault Craft provided close-air support. The Luna Wolves were eventually able to close and penetrate the capital city's defences. The Luna Wolves fought their way inside the Imperial Palace until they came face-to-face with the supposed "Emperor". The false Emperor offered to surrender to the Imperial forces, but only to their overall acting commander, not his subordinate captains. The request was transmitted to the fleet, but Captain Garviel Loken of the 10th Company quickly realised that this was merely a ruse to draw Horus down to the Throne Room to be assassinated. 1st Company Captain Kalus Ekaddon, commander of the Catulan Reaver Squad, swiftly killed the man he believed to be the false Emperor. Then the true false Emperor revealed himself, striking with deadly force against those Luna Wolves that were present, and nearly succeeded in neutralising both Loken, Ekaddon and the other members of the Catulan Squad. He was only stopped by the timely intervention of the Luna Wolves' Primarch, as Horus teleported directly into the Throne Room and slew the false Emperor with a single, well-aimed Combi-Bolter shot to the head. The main part of the campaign was concluded with the death of the false Emperor. With the death of their leader, the main resistance on 63-19 collapsed, although there were some elements of the world's military forces that continued to wage a guerrilla war around the planet as well as three other worlds within the system. These resistance elements were eventually expunged through the efforts of the 63rd Expedition's attached Byzant Janizars Imperial Army regiment over the next few months. The last pocket of serious resistance to Imperial Compliance occurred in the Whisperhead Mountains located in the southern hemisphere. This last pocket of resistance would eventually be excised by Captain Garviel Loken's 10th Company over a period of three months. These hold-outs made their final stand within a formidable fortress carved out of the rock of one of the range's highest peaks. When the 10th Company fought their way inside the mountain fortress they discovered what appeared to be several primitive religious fanes or shrines. The Luna Wolves presumed that they were somehow connected to this region's superstitious worship of a being referred to as Samus. This being turned out to be a minor daemonic Warp-entity who had dwelled on and interacted with the inhabitants of 63-19 for many millennia. During the ensuing battle Samus possessed the body of one of the 10th Company's sergeants and was able to eliminate over a dozen Astartes and a number of Remembrancers that had accompanied the Luna Wolves before being cut down by the combined Bolter fire of Captain Loken and Sergeant Nero Vipus. The two Luna Wolves fired over 90 Bolter rounds into the possessed sergeant's body and then incinerated the remains with a Flamer. This was the first recorded incident in Imperial history of its military forces encountering the malefic powers of Chaos. The entire course of events was classified on the orders of the Warmaster, in order to hide the fact that an Astartes had turned on his fellow Battle-Brothers and that it was possible for the supposedly invincible Astartes to be corrupted by the malignant powers of Warp-entities, who were themselves a well-kept secret of the Imperium. Overall governorship of the world after it was brought into Imperial Compliance was given to General Rakris of the Byzant Janizars, while the adaptation of the cities and infrastructure of the world to Imperial standards was given over to Peeter Egon Momus. 63-19 was the first world that the newly-arrived Remembrancers of the 63rd Expedition added to their own records of the Luna Wolves' exploits.Compliance of 140-20 (Urisarach/"Murder") (ca. 001.M31) - The Death World of Urisarach (officially codified as One-Forty-Twenty but unofficially dubbed "Murder" by the Astartes who fought there) was the twentieth world encountered by the 140th Expeditionary Fleet, a contingent of the IXth Legiones Astartes, the Blood Angels, commanded by Captain Khitas Frome. Unable to translate the warnings from the orbiting satellite beacons placed in orbit of the world by the advanced human civilisation known as the Interex that warned approaching starships to stay away from Urisarach as a dangerous xenos species had been quarantined there, Captain Frome ordered his fleet's entire contingent of three companies of Space Marines to begin landing operations to investigate and bring the planet into Imperial Compliance. Due to the extreme atmospheric turbulence present on the world, all of the Blood Angels' assault craft attempting to land on the planet became scattered and were thrown far off-course, leaving the Imperial landing parties isolated from one another. The turbulent atmosphere also affected Vox (radio) communications and made it difficult for the Imperial forces to coordinate their movements. Ground teams soon started sending garbled transmissions to the fleet's vessels in orbit, reporting that the planet was inhabited by an extremely hostile intelligent arachnoid species, later dubbed the Megarachnids. The Megarachnids were an old enemy of the Interex civilisation, who had exiled the surviving members of the species to the world they called Urisarach as an act of mercy rather than committing xenocide as was standard policy for the Imperium. The Interex stripped the Megarachnids of their interstellar travel capabilities. To keep the aliens isolated on their new homeworld, the Interex constructed weather control devices that created powerful atmospheric disturbances and interfered with radio communications in the shape of large "trees" across the planet to deter vessels from landing on the Death World. As reports of horrific combat from the surface continued, the xenos were described as too numerous and formidable to defeat without reinforcements. Not long afterwards, the Blood Angels made urgent distress calls requesting immediate reinforcements and extraction. The last transmission received by the fleet of the 140th Expedition came from Captain Khitas Frome himself, who noted through clenched teeth, "This. World. Is. Murder." This name stuck, becoming the Imperium's informal appellation for Urisarach. A company of Astartes from the IIIrd Legion, the Emperor's Children, arrived in response to the Blood Angels' distress calls. They made the same mistakes during the initial assault as the Blood Angels, and their landing parties were scattered by the planet's powerful atmospheric disturbances. The company took heavy casualties but just as the Emperor's Children were about to be overwhelmed, a relief force of newly-arrived Luna Wolves Astartes from the Warmaster Horus' own 63rd Expeditionary Fleet began to land through the breach in the atmosphere. The Megarachnids assaulting the Emperor's Children were scattered and a full-scale Space Marine assault on the hostile xenos of Murder began in earnest. Ten companies of Luna Wolves, the remnants of the Emperor's Children's company, tens of thousands of Imperial soldiers drawn from the Imperial Army's Byzant Janizars, and several Legio Mortis Titans proceeded to level entire swathes of the grass stalk forests and destroy every one of the atmosphere-altering "trees" they encountered, which steadily eroded Murder's atmospheric barrier. The Warmaster Horus, who commanded the Imperial assault from his flagship Vengeful Spirit in orbit, was very pleased with the progress being made. Some consideration had been paid to initiating a withdrawal from Murder now that a proper landing zone was available to allow an easy extraction of the troops, when an unexpected visitor suddenly arrived. The Primarch Sanguinius had come to Murder to inspect the dead of his original Blood Angels landing force that had been wiped out early in the campaign. With tears in his eyes Sanguinius asked his brother Horus if he would join him in a campaign of vengeance against the foul xenos. The Warmaster replied: "Yes, let us murder Murder." Adding 5 companies of Blood Angels to the Imperial invasion force, Sanguinius fought alongside the Warmaster against the aliens. Thousands of Megarachnids poured out of the forests and canyons of Murder in an endless wave. Despite never retreating from the Imperial assault, the Megarachnids only continued to lose ground. By the sixth month of the campaign it seemed the Megarachnids would soon face extinction, when a fleet deployed by the Interex arrived in-system to determine who had assaulted the Megarachnids' reservation world. Finding contact with the highly-advanced humans of the Interex to be a more pressing issue that needed to be dealt with, the Warmaster ended the campaign against the xenos of Murder. The Megarachnids had been saved from extinction for a second time by their old enemy. Imperial records do not indicate the final fate of this savage species once the Horus Heresy began.Interex Compliance (ca. 002.M31) - The Interex were a highly advanced civilisation of humans that maintained a close alliance with various xenos races, including the ape-like Kinebrach. In many ways their technology was even more highly advanced than the technology employed by the Imperium at its height. Their world of Xenobia was first encountered by the 63rd Expeditionary Fleet during the Great Crusade. The Interex were devoted to fighting the menace of Chaos (referred to by them as "Kaos") and were therefore highly suspicious of the Imperium's intentions, as they believed that the interlopers from Terra might be servants of the Ruinous Powers. While Horus and his Mournival were treating with the leaders of the Interex, First Chaplain Erebus of the Word Bearers, who had been accompanying the Warmaster as part of his entourage and who was already a secret follower of the Chaos Gods like most members of his XVIIth Legion, infiltrated the Hall of Devices on Xenobia, a museum that contained various artefacts and weapons drawn from the history of the Interex and their allied alien species. His objective was to steal a highly valuable and deadly Kinebrach blade known as an Anathame, a Chaotic artefact sacred to the Plague God Nurgle. After claiming the blade, Erebus rigged the building to explode to make good his escape. Feeling betrayed by the Imperials, who they took for agents of Chaos for stealing a known Chaotic artefact, the Interex's troops immediately attacked the bewildered forces of Horus, sparking a deadly confrontation. The Warmaster was evacuated off-planet by his Astartes as the Luna Wolves unleashed their full might upon the Interex. The Anathame would later play a pivotal role in the corruption of Horus by the Dark Gods upon Davin's moon. The Interex were later destroyed by an Imperial campaign and all of their worlds were brought into Imperial Compliance.Battle of Davin's Moon (004.M31) - Sixty Terran years after the world of Davin was brought into Imperial Compliance, Horus was influenced by the Word Bearers' First Chaplain Erebus to return to the feral planet. He informed the Primarch that the Imperial Governor of the world, Eugen Temba, had turned from the light of the Emperor, and foresworn his oaths of fealty to the Imperium. According to Erebus, Temba had found the inhabitants of Davin's moon unwilling to comply with Imperial rule, and so the Planetary Governor had led an occupying force to the moon in an attempt to bring the wild tribes of the moon into the light of the Imperial Truth. But during the parley with the tribesmen, Temba and his men were struck down by a sorcerous attack that twisted their perceptions away from their loyalty to the Imperium, and they succumbed to the temptations of power and immortality offered by Chaos and more specifically by the Plague God Nurgle, who claimed Davin's moon -- and Temba -- for his own. Horus personally led a combined assault force of Luna Wolves, an Imperial Army regiment of Byzant Janizars, and a detachment of Titans of the Legio Mortis onto the moon's surface. They soon discovered the wreck of Temba's flagship, the Glory of Terra, which was now a ruined derelict. The mass grave of rotting bodies of the Imperial Army garrison left on Davin were found in the nearby swamp, wearing the remnants of the uniforms of the 63rd Expeditionary Force. They seemed to confirm that Temba and all his men had perished, but this was not the case. The corpses of the Imperial Army troops were reanimated through the power of Nurgle as Plague Zombies that emerged from the swamps and attacked the Imperial forces en masse. The Luna Wolves and Byzant Janizars cut down the reanimated corpses. After this confrontation, the Warmaster led a speartip assault of Astartes into the derelict flagship. The bloated, mutant form of the Nurgle-corrupted Imperial Governor was discovered deep within the rotting vessel by Captain Verulam Moy of the 19th Company. Temba attempted to convert the Luna Wolves captain to Chaos, but Moy refused, and so the corrupted Planetary Governor cut him down. Horus arrived shortly thereafter to confront the Chaos-corrupted Temba, whose long-deceased body was now grossly enlarged, swollen with the corpulent putrescence of Nurgle. During their confrontation, the Warmaster discovered that Temba's corrupted form was immune to most forms of conventional injury. Horus also noted that Temba seemed to posses preternatural swiftness for a being so bloated and bulky, as well as formidable skill in swordsmanship. Horus fought like never before, his every move needed to parry and defend. Eugan Temba had never been a swordsman, so where his sudden, horrifying skill came from Horus had no idea. This was most likely due to Temba being armed with the stolen Kinebrach Anathame, the xenos chaotic weapon that had been secretly stolen only scant weeks earlier from the Interex's Hall of Devices on Xenobia by the scheming Word Bearers First Chaplain Erebus. The Anathame was a tailored weapon, a blade of sentient metal dedicated to Nurgle that had been crafted by the Kinebrach metallurgists, using a technique now utterly forbidden by the Kinebrach's Interex allies. When such a blade was selected for use against a specific target, it became that target's nemesis, utterly inimical to the very molecular being of the chosen target. During the vicious battle, Temba stabbed the fell blade into the Warmaster's shoulder where his Power Armour had been torn away. Though in agony, Horus managed to finally subdue his foe and mortally wound him. As the corrupting power of Nurgle fled his ravaged and decaying body, Temba was wracked with guilt over what he had done. Before dying, he attempted to warn Horus against the power of the entities that lived in the Warp. Temba prophesised that only Horus could avert a grim future of never-ending war, where the Emperor was trapped in living death and Mankind was held in bondage to a nightmarish hell of bureaucracy and superstition. The spark of life finally fled Eugen Temba and he died, his soul consumed by the Warp. The wounded Horus was found by his Astartes and taken back to his flagship in orbit of Davin. Soon the Warmaster fell ill from the effects of the Anathame and was struck down by a mysterious malady sufficiently virulent to affect even his superhumanly resilient immune system. His mysterious illness was even beyond the skills of the Legion's Apothecaries to cure, and so, in desperation, Horus was brought to the surface of Davin to be "healed" in the Temple of the Serpent Lodge. First Chaplain Erebus had convinced the Sons of Horus to bring their Primarch to the Davinite priests, in direct violation of the Imperial Truth. The secret sect on Davin was really a Chaos Cult, and using sorcery (which had been outlawed by the Emperor at Nikaea) the cultists managed to warp the mind of the Warmaster against the Emperor by playing on the seed of jealousy and resentment that he felt for his father after the Emperor had left the Great Crusade behind to return to Terra. Magnus the Red, the Primarch of the Thousand Sons Legion, used his own potent command of sorcery to intervene and unmask Erebus, revealing his manipulations, but Horus' corruption by the power of Chaos Undivided could not be stopped as he gave in to his feelings of jealousy, egotism and bitterness. The Warmaster emerged from the Temple of the Serpent Lodge fully healed, but subtly changed in both mind and body, as he was now infused with the power of Chaos. Once Horus fully recovered, he finally took up the Emperor's offer to rename the Luna Wolves after himself as the Sons of Horus. He then schemed with the Astartes of his Legion's Warrior Lodge, aided and abetted by Erebus, to overthrow the Emperor and purge the XVIth Legion of its remaining Loyalist elements. Horus intended to unleash the greatest betrayal in human history in pursuit of his own mad ambition.Destruction of the Auretian Technocracy (004.M31) - Shortly after Horus' miraculous recovery on the Feral World of Davin, the newly renamed Sons of Horus encountered the human civilisation of the Auretian Technocracy on the world of Aureus during the Great Crusade. This human society had been founded during Mankind's early exploration of the stars during the Dark Age of Technology and had evolved along lines very similar to that of the Imperium, and more particularly to that of the Mechanicus of Mars. Horus and a contingent of Sons of Horus Astartes met with the Technocracy's leader, the Fabricator Consul, who represented the human government in its diplomatic talks with the Imperium. During their initial discussion aboard the landing bay of the Vengeful Spirit, Horus learned that the Auretian Technocracy made use of highly-coveted, lost Standard Template Construct (STC) technology. Upon learning this, the Warmaster turned his Combi-Bolter upon the Fabricator Consul and summarily executed him. He then ordered his men to annihilate the Fabricator Consul's personal guard who were known as the Brotherhood and who made use of Power Armour and weapons very similar to those of the Space Marines. Unknown to most of the Astartes within the Legion, the rot of corruption had begun to spread throughout the Legion shortly after Horus made his dark bargain with the Ruinous Powers. The official explanation for the Sons of Horus Legion's grievous actions against the Technocracy stated that the staff brought by the Fabricator Consul aboard the XVIth Legion's flagship possessed a weapon which he planned to use to assassinate the Warmaster. This prompted the resulting conflict with the Auretian Technocracy which lasted for over six bloody months. The World Eaters fought alongside the Sons of Horus on the Technocracy's homeworld of Aureus, and their Primarch Angron personally lead the final Imperial assault on the Iron Citadel held by the Brotherhood of the Auretian Technocracy. When the blood-maddened warriors of the World Eaters' Assault Companies stormed a breach in the walls, the Brotherhood detonated explosive charges that buried the warriors under thousands of tonnes of rubble. Angron tore his way free and butchered the remaining warriors of the Brotherhood with his monstrous chain-glaive. Ephraim Guardia, the Senior Preceptor of the Brotherhood Chapter Command and Castellan of the Iron Citadel, died in the first seconds of Angron's attack. The campaign had been a brutal one, as the Brotherhood made use of highly advanced power armoured suits similar to those employed by Legiones Astartes, but they were eventually defeated and their technology was requisitioned by the XVIth Legion. Horus would use the seized Auretian STC databases to entice a faction of the Adeptus Mechanicus to turn against the Emperor and join his rebellion. These Traitors would eventually form the core of what became the Dark Mechanicus and their treachery would unleash the terrible civil war within the Mechanicus that became known as the Schism of Mars.Cleansing of Ariggata (004.M31) - This was an Imperial Compliance action that was carried out jointly by the Luna Wolves, the Ultramarines and the World Eaters Legions against the world of Ariggata. A technologically advanced world, Ariggata had been isolated from the rest of humanity for many centuries, and when Imperial envoys arrived bearing word of the Emperor and the Imperial Truth, they were executed in a bloody gesture of independence. The military might of Ariggata was formidable, and thus the honour of its pacification fell to the Warmaster Horus and two other Space Marine Legions under his command. Most of the planet was quickly conquered, except for the massive fortress within which most of the leaders of the planet cowered. Eager to be on his way, Horus commanded Angron, the Primarch of the World Eaters, to take back the citadel and kill only the leaders. Eagerly, Angron led the assault. However, the fortress was heavily defended and the casualties were horrendous, a dozen World Eaters falling for a meter of land. Eventually, a ramp of corpses led up to a single breach in the wall, and the Astartes of the World Eaters Legion plunged in. Filled with rage over their fallen brothers, they were merciless. By the time the Ultramarines arrived, the battle was all but over. The inside of the fortress was filled with the dismembered and mangled corpses of the defenders, for not one soul had been spared the vengeful fury of the World Eaters. It was an absolute slaughter, the fortress having been transformed into an abattoir of human blood. The Ultramarines were disgusted by this savage behaviour and reported the World Eaters' growing barbarism to the Emperor. But Horus, already corrupted by the tempations of Chaos, knew that the World Eaters' savagery would make service to Khorne a good fit for the Legion -- and particularly for its rage-fueled Primarch.Istvaan III Atrocity (005.M31) - The Imperial Planetary Governor of Istvaan III, Vardus Praal, had been corrupted by the Chaos God Slaanesh whose cultists had long been active on the world even before it had been conquered by the Imperium. Praal had declared his independence from the Imperium, and had begun to practice forbidden Slaaneshi sorcery, so the Council of Terra charged Horus with the retaking of that world, primarily its capital, the Choral City. This order merely furthered Horus' plan to overthrow the Emperor. Although the four Legions under his direct command -- the Sons of Horus, the World Eaters, the Death Guard and the Emperor's Children -- had already turned Traitor and pledged themselves to Chaos, there were still some Loyalist elements within each of these Legions that approximated one-third of each force; many of these warriors were Terran-born Space Marines who had been directly recruited into the Astartes Legions by the Emperor Himself before being reunited with their Primarchs during the Great Crusade. Horus, under the guise of putting down the rebellion against Imperial Compliance on the world of Istvaan III, amassed his troops in the Istvaan System. Horus had a plan by which he would destroy all of the remaining Loyalist elements of the Legions under his command. After a lengthy bombardment of Istvaan III, Horus dispatched all of the known Loyalist Astartes down to the planet, under the pretence of bringing it back into the Imperium. At the moment of victory and the capture of the Choral City, the planetary capital of Istvaan III, these Astartes were betrayed when a cascade of terrible Life-Eater virus-bombs fell onto the world, launched by the Warmaster's orbiting fleet, unleasing the event known later as the Istvaan III Atrocity. Captain Saul Tarvitz of the Emperor's Children, however, was aboard his Legion's flagship Andronius and discovered the plot to wipe out the Loyalist Astartes of the Traitor Legions. He was able, with help from Battle-Captain Nathaniel Garro of the Death Guard who was in command of the Death Guard frigate Eisenstein, to reach the surface of Istvaan III despite pursuit and warn the Loyalist Space Marines of all four Legions he could find of their impending doom. Those that heard or passed on Tarvitz' warning took shelter before the virus-bombs struck. The civilian population of Istvaan III received no such protection: 12 billion people died almost at once as the lethal flesh-dissolving virus called the Life-Eater carried by the bombs infected every living thing on the planet. The psychic shock of so many deaths at one time shrieked through the Warp, briefly obscuring even the glowing beacon of the Astronomican. The Primarch of the World Eaters, Angron, realising that the virus-bombs had not been fully effective at eliminating all the Loyalists, flew into a rage and hurled himself at the planet at the head of 50 companies of World Eaters Traitor Marines. Discarding tactics and strategy, the World Eaters Traitors worked themselves into a frenzy of mindless butchery fed by their growing allegiance to the Blood God Khorne. Horus was furious with Angron for delaying his plans, but Horus sought to turn the delay into a victory and was obliged to reinforce Angron with troops from the Sons of Horus, the Death Guard, and the Emperor's Children. Fortunately, a contingent of Loyalists led by Battle-Captain Garro escaped Istvaan III aboard the damaged Imperial frigate Eisenstein and fled to Terra to warn the Emperor that Horus had turned Traitor. On Istvaan III, the remaining Loyalists, under the command of Captains Tarvitz, Garviel Loken and Tarik Torgaddon, another Loyalist member of the Sons of Horus, fought bravely against their own traitorous brethren. Yet, despite some early successes that delayed Horus' plans for three full months while the battle on Istvaan III played out, their cause was ultimately doomed by their lack of air support and Titan firepower. During the battle the Sons of Horus Captains Ezekyle Abaddon and Horus Aximand were sent to confront their former Mournival brothers, Loken and Torgaddon. Horus Aximand beheaded Torgaddon, but Abaddon failed to kill Loken when the building they were in collapsed. Loken survived and witnessed the final orbital bombardment of Istvaan III that ended the Loyalists' desperate defence. To prove his worth and loyalty to Lord Commander Eidolon of the Emperor's Children -- and thus to his Primarch, Fulgrim -- Captain Lucius of the 13th Company of the Emperor's Children, the future Champion of Slaanesh known as Lucius the Eternal, turned against the Loyalists that he had fought beside because of his prior friendship with Saul Tarvitz. Lucius slew many of them personally, an act for which he was then accepted back into the Emperor's Children Legion on the side of the Traitors. In the end, the Loyalists retreated to their last bastion of defence, only a few hundred of their number remaining. Finally, tired of the conflict, Horus ordered his men to withdraw, and then had the remains of the Choral City bombarded into dust for a final time from orbit.Drop Site Massacre of Istvaan V (566.006.M31) - The world of Istvaan V was the location of the infamous Drop Site Massacre where the Traitor Legions of the Warmaster Horus redeployed following the virus-bombing of the Traitor Legions' own Loyalist members at Istvaan III at the start of the Horus Heresy. Upon learning of the terrible atrocity Horus had committed, the Emperor deployed seven Loyalist Legions of Space Marines to bring Horus to account for his actions. The Iron Hands, Salamanders and Raven Guard made up the first wave of the attack, but were pushed back by the superior tactics of Horus' maddened Chaos Space Marines. During the course of the first wave of the attack, the Sons of Horus contingent fought on the defensive, limiting themselves to the core and most heavily defended bastions, and driving the Imperial Army before them into the Loyalists' guns. There was, however, one notable exception to this; their Reaver and Assault companies who deployed to counter the strike units of the Raven Guard in the maze of ravines and rock falls that flanked the walls of the Urgall Depression. The Loyalist reserves were called in during the second attack wave, but the four Space Marine Legions comprising them -- the Iron Warriors, the Alpha Legion, the Word Bearers and the Night Lords -- had also secretly betrayed the Emperor and were prepared to follow Horus and swear themselves to Chaos. Once the tide of the battle turned, the Sons of Horus attacked in force against the reeling and wounded Loyalists, with Horus himself taking to the field to lead them. The three Loyalist Legions were almost annihilated in the resulting crossfire but several thousand survivors from each Legion managed to escape off-world, though they were too decimated to play much of a further role in the defence of the Imperium from Horus' betrayal. The ensuing civil war pitched the whole Imperium into anarchy and chaos. It was not only the Legions aligned to Horus that rebelled, for the Warrior Lodges and the taint in general had spread far and wide by the time of the Drop Site Massacre. The Imperial Army was split almost in half, regiment fighting regiment and fleet fighting fleet. The Titan Legions of the Mechanicus, were equally affected, and soon fully half of the Emperor's hosts were engaged in bitter conflict with the other. Barely a single world in the Imperium was untouched by a war that lasted for seven standard years and cost countless billions of lives before finally culminating in Horus' assault on Terra itself.The Manachean War and the Dark Compliances (007-009.M31) - His treachery revealed at last, the Warmaster began his relentless advance on Terra, forcing his Dark Compliance of countless regions across the northern Imperium to provide his forces with a resource base to fight what would now become a protracted and relentless war. Foremost among his targets were the Manachean Commonwealth, the Coronid Deeps and their surrounding regions, where a particularly savage campaign was conducted by the Sons of Horus and Death Guard which brought the economically vital worlds of the Manachean Commonwealth to fuel the Traitors' cause. This wider campaign also placed the fleet anchorage of Port Maw under the Warmaster's talon and saw the stubbornly Loyalist Forge Worlds of Lucius and Mezoa isolated and besieged, while the Traitor-aligned Forge World of Cyclothrathe began to carve out its own pocket empire in the region.The Burning of Ohmn-Mat (008.M31) - The Forge World of Ohmn-Mat in the Ultima Segmentum fell into a state of civil war as its Synod Magos were split in their support for Loyalist and Traitor causes, drawing in contingents of Sons of Horus Dark Compliance forces and Iron Hands Istvaan survivors as the conflict escalated. Ohmn-Mat was destroyed in the conflagration and its fires still rage till the present.The Dagonet Incident (008.M31) - The hidden clade-masters of Terra, with the direct approval of Malcador the Sigillite, despatched their most potent assassins as the first Execution Force to the recently fallen world of Dagonet in an attempt to strike down the Warmaster. They were unsuccessful, but from their failure Terra learned much of the new and dreadful powers wielded by its foe.Second Battle of Paramar (008 or 011.M31) - The Sons of Horus provided a large garrison force alongside the Word Bearers and elements of the Dark Mechanicum's Traitor Titan Legions that defended the strategic world of Paramar V from a Loyalist attempt to retake the planet from Traitor forces during the Second Battle of Paramar.The Battle of Arissak (009.M31) - Having pursued the numerous attack cells made up of Iron Hands, Salamanders and Raven Guard survivors of Istvaan V, Captain Tybalt Marr of the Sons of Horus finally brought them to battle, destroying the massed fleet of Shadrak Meduson's so-called "Shattered Legions" force at Arissak.Destruction of Dwell (009.M31) - Horus arrived upon the world of Dwell, a world settled during the Dark Age of Technology by settlers from the nearby Knight World of Molech. The Warmaster was intent upon utilising the ancient repository on Dwell that contained information that would lead him in search of the Emperor's power back to Molech, where he had unknowingly taken part in that planet's Imperial Compliance campaign decades earlier, and had his memories suppressed by the Emperor. Shortly after the infamous campaign on Istvaan V, the Sons of Horus were also forced to recoup their losses. Another change, forced on the XVIth Legion, was the loss of the Mournival. With the deaths of two of their former brothers, the Loyalists Garviel Loken and Tarik Torgaddon on Istvaan III, there were openings available to those that might be deemed worthy. Captain Horus Aximand approached First Captain Ezekyle Abaddon with the proposition to select two new members to fill the vacancies. They argued over who they thought would be worthy to join a newly reconstituted Mournival. After much debate, they both finally came to an accord, agreeing on suitable replacements. These would be Falkus Kibre, the commander of the Catulan Reaver Squad and Sergeant Grael Noctua. With rumours of the infamy of Horus' actions in the Istvaan System spreading across the nearby systems, a series of ferocious repercussive combats had flared through the Momed, Instar and Oqueth Sectors. The instigator was a leader of the Iron Hands Legion's "Iron Tenth", a warleader of the Sorrgol Clan named Shadrak Meduson. He had marshalled the Loyalists against the approaching Traitors of the 63rd Expeditionary Fleet. The Iron Hands warleader and his formations had come too late to stand with his Primarch Ferrus Manus at Istvaan V. He had gathered 58 full battalions of the Imperial Army about him -- warhosts from the Momed Voidhives, along with a flotilla of siege hulks from Nahan Instar, a half-broken cadre of Salamanders Astartes, some Mechanicus claves, and a White Scars raid-force rerouted from a return voyage to the Chondax war front. The world of Dwell, with its fortified cities, orbital batteries, ship schools, and eight million pinnacle-grade fighting men, would be the cornerstone of Meduson's defensive line. The Iron Hands warleader positioned himself at the Mausolytic Precinct which was situated on a high plateau overlooking Tyjun and the Sea of Enna. The Sons of Horus launched a planetary assault against Dwell, butchering the regular human Loyalist defenders, but were caught by surprise when they encountered the ad hoc Loyalist Astartes force that had secretly fortified the system. When the Sons of Horus assault units breached the fortifications, Horus Aximand slew Meduson's second-in-command, the Iron Hands Lieutenant Bion Henricos, but "Little Horus" was then attacked by a White Scars kill-formation disguised as statues. Meduson's co-commander, Captain Hibou Khan of the White Scars, led the Loyalist counterattack against the Traitors, but they were quickly driven off with the arrival of Sons of Horus reinforcements. One of the White Scars managed to gravely wound Aximand by slicing off his face. The XVIth Legion's Apothecaries managed to reattach Aximand's severed face, but the muscle grafting left a wicked scar which made him look more brutal. It set the character of the face differently, altered the seating of the muscles so that his appearance now matched the growing corruption within his heart. Somehow, the wrongness, the imperfection, made him seem even more like Horus, not less. Having escaped death at Arissak, one of Shadrak Meduson's surviving Shattered Legion attack cells launched a daring assassination attempt on Warmaster Horus at Dwell. With his brother-Primarchs Fulgrim and Mortarion at his side, Horus prevailed, but having had the true threat revealed to him, he granted Tybalt Marr permission to take any action he deemed appropriate to eradicate the so-called "Shattered Legions".Battle of Molech (009.M31) - Horus led both the Sons of Horus and the Death Guard Legions in the invasion of the Fortress World of Molech. Having recovered some of his memories in regards to the earlier campaign that took place decades earlier, Horus uncovered the truth about the hidden subterranean Warp portal that led into the Realm of Chaos. Wanting this power for himself, he launched a massive strike on the unsuspecting world. During the height of the conflict, the Knight House Devine turned against the Imperium and joined the invading forces, betraying the defenders to their deaths. A force of the elite Knights-Errant, a secretly founded Order of Loyalist agents, was dispatched to Molech by Malcador the Sigillite to prepare the way for a direct assault by the Space Wolves against the Warmaster's flagship. After his sojourn through the portal into the Realm of Chaos, and winning the full blessings of the Ruinous Powers, Horus was nigh unstoppable, and only a handful of Knights-Errant managed to effect their escape to bring news of his redoubled strength back to Terra.Siege of Terra (014.M31) - As the events of the Horus Heresy neared their tragic conclusion seven years after the fateful betrayal at Istvaan III, those Loyalist Legions not committed to the defence of Terra raced through the Warp, converging on the homeworld of Mankind. The Traitor Legions also massed above Terra to assault the Imperial Palace. The Siege of Terra was the final confrontation of the Horus Heresy that raged on Terra itself between the forces of Chaos led by the Warmaster Horus and the Loyalist armies of the Imperium of Man led by the Emperor of Mankind Himself. The Loyalist forces ultimately proved victorious in their defence of the Imperial Palace, though only just barely, and Horus was ultimately slain by the full psychic powers unleashed by the Emperor on the deck of his massive Battle Barge the Vengeful Spirit, though the Master of Mankind was mortally wounded and had to be interred within the cybernetic life support mechanisms of the advanced psychic augmentation technology known as the Golden Throne. The outcome of the Siege of Terra shaped the destiny of humanity for the next 10,000 standard years. The Traitor hosts began their fighting withdrawal, and in the anarchy and confusion Horus' body was recovered by his Legion from his flagship. Having fought their way clear of the Sol System the XVIth Legion fled for the Eye of Terror where the Sons of Horus established a world that was at once the tomb of their lost Primarch and a fortress from which they would launch further attacks both upon their fellow Traitor Legions and against the smouldering Imperium. Thus began the Long War of the Forces of Chaos to overthrow the Corpse Emperor. With Horus slain, First Captain Ezekyle Abaddon emerged as the Warmaster's heir, commanding both the Sons of Horus and what remained of the splintering Forces of Chaos. Soon known as Abaddon the Despoiler, he renamed the Sons of Horus the "Black Legion" and declares himself the new Warmaster of Chaos Undivided. Highly favoured by the Chaos Gods, Abaddon intends to complete the task begun by Horus and see the Emperor slain and the Imperium ground beneath the boots of the XVIth Legion.Slave Wars/The Legion War (Unknown Date.M31) - Using slaves captured from their campaigns against the Imperium during the Heresy, the XVIth Legion was able to build a massive fortress on the Daemon World of Maeleum and entombed the corpse of their slain Warmaster Horus within it. However, not long after, the Eye of Terror Slave Wars erupted and the Emperor's Children Legion launched a devastating surprise assault on Maeleum, devastating the Sons of Horus' fortress and stealing Horus' corpse in an attempt by the corrupted Apothecary Fabius Bile to clone the dead Warmaster of Chaos and restore the fortunes of the Forces of Chaos in the wake of the Imperium's victory. It was at this time that Abaddon the Despoiler returned to lead his forces to recover Horus' corpse. Following the successful defeat of the Emperor's Children and the shattering of that once-proud Space Marine Legion into gibbering, hedonistic warbands, the Sons of Horus recovered the corpse of their former leader. Abaddon returned it to Maeleum where he had it destroyed so that no further attempts to clone Horus could ever be attempted. At the same time, he came to the epiphany that Horus was dead because Horus had been a weak fool, unable to complete his task of slaying the Emperor and taking control of the galaxy in the name of the Dark Gods. Abaddon swore that he would succeed where Horus had failed in overthrowing the "Corpse-Emperor" and proclaimed himself the new Warmaster of Chaos. He had the Sons of Horus repaint their viridian Power Armour black, the colour of mourning and of vengeance, and cast-off the XVIth Legion's former moniker of the Sons of Horus. From then on, they became known as the Black Legion. The Black Legion then abandoned the ruins of the Sons of Horus' fortress and left Maeleum behind, choosing to become a fleet-based Legion with scattered holdings all across the Eye of Terror.The Black Legion Rises (Unknown Date.M31) - Ascending to dominion of the Sons of Horus, Abaddon embarks on a quest to slay the clones Fabius Bile has crafted from Horus' remains. Destroying the Primogenitor's hidden laboratories and the abominations he created, Abaddon leaves behind no trace of his gene-father. With the final and utter destruction of Horus, Abaddon renames his Legion the Black Legion. |
Black Legion - Age of Retribution, M32-M39: The Long War Begins (ca. early M31) - Swearing to succeed where his forefather Horus failed, Abaddon takes up the mantle of the Warmaster of Chaos and begins the Long War anew. Thirsty for revenge, the Chaos Space Marines strike out against the Imperium from the depths of the Eye of Terror. The Adepts of the Administratum are horrified to find that the number of their invasions consistently increases with every passing solar decade.1st Black Crusade (ca.781.M31) - Abaddon the Despoiler, the self-appointed heir of Horus and the new Warmaster of Chaos Undivided after Horus' death, makes his first attempt to launch a new offensive against the Imperium of Man following the Horus Heresy when his forces initiate 1st Black Crusade and the First Battle of Cadia. This attempt fails and the Forces of Chaos are unable to penetrate the Cadian Gate that will allow them to take control of the only truly navigable pathway out of the Eye of Terror and into Imperial space. For the next 10,000 standard years, Abaddon will bend all of his efforts to finding a way to complete what Horus began and launch a Chaotic war that will conquer Terra and eliminate the Corpse Emperor. These massive assaults become known as "Black Crusades" to the people of the Imperium. However, on Uralan, Abaddon recovers the Daemon Sword Drach'nyen after battling his way through the haunted labyrinth to the great inner chamber where the blade has languished in stasis for many Terran centuries. The howling blade contains the bound essence of a dangerous Warp entity who has the power to rend reality apart wherever the weapon strikes. After the recovery of the malefic sword, Abaddon's power swells to inhuman proportions.The Tormented Mine (027.M32) - Faenroc the Forgotten of the Black Legion discovers a world formed from Warp-infused iron ore. He constructs a vast mine to harvest its wealth for Abaddon, the Warmaster of Chaos. Slaves prove too fragile to work the mine as the ore mutates them uncontrollably, while some mine shafts secrete fluids that dissolve the workers within. Faenroc remedies this problem by binding daemonic entities to his mining machines in a ritual that involves the mass sacrifice of the entire mortal workforce.2nd Black Crusade (597.M32) - During the 2nd Black Crusade, Abaddon places a terrible curse upon the worlds of the Belis Corona Sector, infusing them with the touch of the Warp. Meanwhile, his fleet attacks the sector's Imperial shipyards, destroying dozens of Imperial Cruisers being constructed or repaired. Before the Imperium can muster its strength to fight back, the Despoiler retreats into the Eye of Terror, his works complete. The Imperium, focusing on the war in space, musters a naval force to fight back. Entrusting his flagship to his Sorcerers, the Despoiler then teleports to the Inquisitorial stronghold of Nemesis Tessera. He topples its hexagrammic "Eldritch Needles," ravaging the black stone with sustained Melta fire before withdrawing. The Inquisition later find that a critical vault cell has been opened and its daemonic prisoner -- the legendary nemesis for which the planet is named -- is missing.The Traitorous Eye (Unknown Date.M32) - Drecarth the Sightless forms the Sons of the Eye out of those Sons of Horus who refused to join Abaddon after the Heresy. In the Battle of the Keening Deep, the Sons defeat Voslok and his World Eaters, claiming their fortress and hurling their skulls into the soulfires that rage beneath the planet's crust. Drecarth personally wrests Voslok's daemonic axe from his grip during the battle, turning the weapon upon its former owner.3rd Black Crusade (909.M32) - The Despoiler sends the Daemon Prince Tallomin against the Cadian Gate in a reckless and bloody frontal assault during the 3rd Black Crusade. The daemonic horde that follows in Tallomin's wake accounts for the destruction of millions of lives and draws in Imperial Guard regiments and Space Marine Chapters from across the Segmentum Obscurus. Eventually, warriors of the Space Wolves manage to send Tallomin howling back into the Warp. Under the cover provided by the attack, Abaddon leads a strike force to desecrate the Shrine World of Gerstahl, breaking the ancient seals on the eponymous Imperial Saint's tomb and destroying his remains while the Imperium's attention is directed elsewhere. This act of supreme violation banishes the saint's spirit, thwarting the prophecy that he would one day rise again as a Living Saint whilst weakening the planet's psychic defences.Zaraphiston's Penance (Unknown Date.M32) - The Thousand Sons Sorcerer Zaraphiston travels deep into the heart of the Eye of Terror at the behest of Tzeentch, where he is granted the power of prophecy. Gifted with a profound understanding of the millennia to come, Zaraphiston pledges his loyalty to Abaddon the Despoiler.4th Black Crusade (001.M34) - Also known as the El'Phanor War, during the 4th Black Crusade the Black Legion besieges the great Citadel of Kromarch. Abaddon leads the charge against the adamantium gates of the famously unbreachable citadel upon the world of El'Phanor. Only one in ten of Abaddon's spearhead reach the gates before they are trapped by Heavy Bolter fire. Utilising his Daemon Sword Drach'nyen, the gates of the citadel prove harder than diamond, but they split apart like cordwood before Abaddon's dolorous blow. In an orgy of violence, the Traitor Legions and their daemonic allies fall upon Kromarch and his kin, extinguishing their ancient line forever.The Nightmare Well (Unknown Date) - Zagthean the Broken pillages Helosian in the Agripinaa Sector. Taking the Convent of Alabaster Maidens prisoner, he exposes them to the energies of the Warp, triggering their latent psychic gifts. Zagthean then uses Warp-tech to fuse the maidens into a single entity, before using the resultant abomination as a living Warp portal to unleash a daemonic invasion.The Ragged King (Unknown Date) - Imperial Cruisers orbiting the Feral World of Skyrro destroy the Traitor vessel Talon of Rage. A single Black Legionary escapes the ship's destruction and makes his way down to the surface of the world. Skyrro's indigenous populace come to worship the Chaos Space Marine as a god whom they hail as the "Ragged King," and are gradually turned to the service of the Ruinous Powers through his influence. It takes the Imperial Guard more than a solar decade to destroy the Legionary's Chaos Cultist armies and reclaim the world for the Emperor.5th Black Crusade (723.M36) - During the 5th Black Crusade Abaddon scours the Elysia Sector, ordering the destruction of specific cities, shrines and temples across dozens its worlds. Each act of violation shatters the Warp-seals that had held psychic mutation stable in that region of space. On Tarinth, the Despoiler lures the Warhawks and Venerators Chapters into the ruins of Kasyr Lutien where he traps them between the daemonic hordes of Khorne and the Black Legion. In a bitter last stand, both Loyalist Chapters are completely destroyed, their skulls taken by the Daemon Prince Doombreed to be mounted upon Khorne's throne.6th Black Crusade (901.M36) - The Sons of the Eye were a splinter warband of the Black Legion, founded and commanded by the infamous Chaos Lord Drecarth the Sightless, the Blind Butcher of Irridous VII. Drecarth was a former Battle-Brother of the Sons of Horus who had fought alongside Abaddon during the Great Crusade and the Horus Heresy that followed. Always jealous of the Primarch Horus' favour for the Despoiler, the Sons of the Eye considered Abaddon a usurper. During the 6th Black Crusade, launched in 901.M36, Abaddon visited his wrath upon Drecarth the Sightless and his treacherous warband. Abaddon aided the Sons of the Eye in an assault on the Forge World of Arkreach, fighting side-by-side with them until the Adeptus Mechanicus defenders were finally crushed. The triumphant Abaddon then slowly killed Drecarth, impaling him with the Talon of Horus, even as the Despoiler made him watch every member of the Sons of the Eye bow before their new master.Antecanis Massacre (165.M37) - The Black Legion is known to have participated in the Antecanis Massacre alongside other Chaos Space Marine warbands, most notably The Purge.The Tournament of Blood (Unknown Date.M37) - Displeased with his Chosen, Abaddon pits them against each other. For eight solar days, the Chosen fight in the gore-spattered holds of the Vengeful Spirit until only one of them remains. Impaling the victor on the Talon of Horus, Abaddon seals a pact with Khorne, gaining a powerful daemonic ally in the form of the Bloodthirster Hakk'an'graah.The Prison of Madness (Unknown Date.M37) - Abaddon conducts experiments on captured Loyalist Space Marines, torturing them with repeated visions of a future in which the Imperium falls to Chaos. Despite the psycho-indoctrinated mental resilience of the Adeptus Astartes, such is the ring of truth in these prophecies that those who do not take their own lives are left as soul-blasted husks that eventually swear allegiance to the Despoiler.7th Black Crusade (811.M37) - The 7th Black Crusade was a Black Crusade launched against the forces of the Imperium of Man, led by the infamous Chaos Champion Abaddon the Despoiler and his Black Legion, which emerged out of the Eye of Terror in 811.M37. At this time, the Forces of Chaos spewed forth from the Eye of Terror past Cadia and then disappeared. This event is what earned this conflict its informal name of the Ghost War. The following years saw a game of hide-and-seek played between the Forces of Chaos and the Imperium of Man which spread confusion, paranoia, disinformation and deceit across the galaxy. Raids became commonplace in far-flung areas but eventually the servants of the Dark Gods returned to the Eye of Terror, having caused great difficulty for the Emperor's Loyalists but having been proven unable to significantly degrade Imperial defensive capabilities at that time. During this conflict, when the Blood Angels Space Marine Chapter battled against the Forces of Chaos at Midian, Abaddon singled them out with implacable fury. He led a band of Khornate Berserkers into the teeth of the Blood Angels' Devastator positions. Even the Blood Angels' own Assault troops could not dislodge the frenzied warband and recapture the bodies of their comrades. But there is an obscure reference to the Blood Angels being saved by an unidentified Space Marine Chapter of mysterious origin. Written within the The Canticle of Cassandria Lev - Vol. CVI, the eponymous Sainted Sisters' highly mythologised and oblique account of the wars of the 7th Black Crusade, is found mention of a "grey-clad" Space Marines Chapter who came from "The outer night" to aid the Imperium, and whose "Jagged maw did swallow the stars ... and whose ... black gaze did mirror the void of oblivion." In the course of the canticle this Chapter's ships set upon Abaddon's forces following the disastrous defeat and routing of the Blood Angels at Midian and attacked the pursuing forces as Saint Lev writes: "...fell upon the servants of the skulled-one with great fury from the darkness, unseen as the beast that lurks beneath the black waters, death for death, blood for blood...thus were the Sons of Sanguinius bought respite, and did turn back upon their pursuers and so were the damned traitors of the false gods driven unto their ruin." Images of these events can be found upon the walls of the Cemetery World of Hypasitis created to house the honoured dead of that war, depicted in repeated fresco and bar relief. Curiously, the faces of the intervening Space Marines depicted there are obscured with featureless disks of black obsidian. Given the largely unknown history of the star-faring Carcharodons Chapter, accounts of their activities can only be constructed from recorded historical incidents and fragmentary records that are believed to have involved the Carcharodons on balance of evidence. This notable engagement is listed by Imperial savants as a "[Special] Probable Encounter/Recorded Sighting" of this notorious and mysterious Space Marine Chapter. After their rescue at Midian, the full might of the Blood Angels Chapter fell upon a vast Black Legion warband on the world of Mackan. Although the conflict ultimately ends in the near-extinction of the Blood Angels at the hands of Abaddon the Despoiler and his primary lieutenants -- the Sorcerer-Lord Iskandar Khayon and the swordmaster Telemachon Lyras -- the Blood Angels Reclusiarch Thalastian Jorus becomes one of the few Imperial heroes to ever land a blow against the Warmaster of Chaos. With his Chapter devastated, the Chaplain endures solar weeks of hardship in the wilderness and the constant trials of keeping his crazed warriors undetected on Mackan. When the time is right, Jorus leads his Death Company in a lightning raid behind enemy lines, butchering the unprepared sworn warriors of the Despoiler's honour guard, and allowing the Reclusiarch to lock blades with Abaddon himself. It is said the Chaos Warmaster still bears the scars of that battle, even three standard millennia later. Whatever the truth of the matter, it is known that the Despoiler honoured Jorus once the war was over -- perhaps in mockery, or perhaps with nothing but sincerity. After Mackan, thousands of Blood Angels corpses were desecrated, their gene-seed ruined beyond recovery. Of all the Chapter, only a handful of bodies were left undefiled: Reclusiarch Jorus and his Death Company, clad in their battered and broken black ceramite, seated in makeshift thrones made from the armour of those Black Legion warriors they had killed on that fateful night.8th Black Crusade (999.M37) - Abaddon the Despoiler completes a complex ritual of death in the name of Tzeentch, the Changer of Ways. On worlds throughout the Segmentum Obscurus, Imperial citizens are slaughtered in precise numbers and esoteric rituals. Only when the Inquisition finally breaks the code of damnation is the Imperium able to bring an end to the Black Legion's rampage across the Segmentum in time with these mysterious attacks, but not before countless worlds have been saturated in death.The Ark of Damnation (Unknown Date.M38) - Flesh Tearers Terminators board the Space Hulk Soul of Damnation as it drifts dangerously close to the core worlds of the Scelus Sub-sector. In the depths of the hulk, they uncover a stasis chamber containing a single casket. Inside is an ancient warrior of the Luna Wolves dating from the time of the Great Crusade. When told of his Legion's fate, the ancient Space Marine is filled with rage and takes one of the Flesh Tearers' craft before disappearing into the void.The Feast of Daemons (Unknown Date.M38) - The Black Legion ravages the Desert World of Sanisor, staining its dune oceans red with blood. In the Warpwind Canyons, the Chaos Space Marines erect a towering steel-framed device with a sail-like membrane of flayed skin. The creatures of the Immaterium are drawn to the world to feed on the soul-stuff caught in the nightmarish construction. When the Cadian 232nd Expeditionary Force land on Sanisor, they find it crawling with daemons like flies on a corpse.9th Black Crusade (537.M38) - As part of a wider strategy to disable the naval fortress of Cancephalus, Abaddon leads his 9th Black Crusade against the heaving population of nearby Antecanis. The seat of the world's Imperial Commander, Monarchive, is besieged by Abaddon's vanguard. Black Legionaries butcher their way through the lower levels of the hive, whilst the Despoiler himself storms its inner sanctums. By the time Astra Militarum from Cancephalus arrive to reinforce the surviving defenders, Abaddon and his forces have already left the planet's surface. As a gesture of contempt, the Black Legion drop a dozen Cyclonic warheads onto the ruins of Monarchive. The seventeen-year-long war that ensues eventually robs both Antecanis and Cancephalus of their most precious resource -- manpower. Without the fleets of the naval fortress to stop him, Abaddon is able to ravage the sector at will, and his Sorcerers are free to conduct the rituals required to weaken the walls of reality in that region of space with impunity.The Forgotten Company (Unknown Date.M38) - Almost eight standard millennia after it was sent, an astropathic distress signal reaches the Black Legion's Sorcerers from a lost company of Luna Wolves. Abaddon travels to the planet located at the coordinates in the message to find his ancient brothers have become a twisted parody of his original Legion, perverting their own gene-seed with primitive rituals and dwelling among the native inhabitants. Expecting no mercy from Abaddon's forces for their transgressions, the debased Luna Wolves are surprised when he welcomes them into the Black Legion as long-lost brothers.10th Black Crusade (001.M39) - The 10th Black Crusade is also known as the Conflict of Helica, and was a joint campaign carried out by Abaddon and the Daemon Primarch Perturabo. Both the Black Legion and the Iron Warriors struck against the Helica Sector. While the Black Legion attacked the capital, Thracian Primaris, the Iron Warriors focused their own assault against the Iron Hands Chapter to fulfil an old blood debt. In a series of bitter sieges, the Iron Warriors burn the Medusa System's worlds and push the Iron Hands to the brink of destruction. Only when the Loyalist Chapter receives heavy reinforcements do Abaddon and the Iron Warriors retreat, taking with them valuable information about Medusa's defences.The Daemonic Shipyard (Unknown Date.M39) - Deep within the Eye of Terror, Abaddon discovers an ancient shipyard drifting through the Warp. Amongst its rusting gantries and crumbling manufactorum towers, the Warmaster of Chaos finds a half-constructed vessel, vast in scale and terrible in its design. His Warpsmiths examine the ship, marvelling at its dark majesty, and promise that, when complete, it will be the doom of worlds, a true Planet Killer, the Krukal'Righ in the ancient tongue of the Black Legion's lost homeworld of Cthonia.11th Black Crusade (301.M39) - The Despoiler's fleet becomes lost in the Warp while seeking to use a daemonic guide to pass through the Warp Storms blocking access to Imperial space, finally returning to realspace in the path of WAAAGH! Murgor. In the ruins of the Cardinal World of Relorria, the Black Legion brings the Orks to battle, Bolter rounds and Chainswords tearing into the green-skinned xenos. After solar months of bloody warfare, Abaddon decides to leave Relorria to its fate and the Black Legion returns to the Eye of Terror -- but not before the Warmaster of Chaos fills the holds of his fleet with captured Ork Weirdboyz. In conjunction with a coven of his most powerful Sorcerers, he uses the volatile psychic energies of the Greenskin abductees in a daemonic hybridisation ritual that weakens the fabric of reality across the Relorrian System.Fall of the Savage Swords (Unknown Date.M39) - The Chapter Master of the Savage Swords mistakenly believes the Imperial Planetary Governor of Hyboras has stolen an ancient relic blade belonging to his Chapter. Caught up in their wrath and righteous retribution, his Space Marines commit a series of atrocities on the world. Only when their Chapter Master sits on the governor's gore-stained throne does he realise the extent of his folly, but by then it is too late. When the Black Legion arrive to push the world over the brink of disaster, the Savage Swords have already fallen to the worship of Khorne. It does not take much for Abaddon to persuade them to join him. |
Black Legion - Age of Apotheosis, M40-M42: The Hungering Prince (Unknown Date.M40) - Glutgora, a Daemon Prince of Nurgle, invades the Agri-world of Pilentos with a massive force of Black Legionaries. While the Chaos Space Marines crush every vestige of Imperial resistance, Glutgora gorges itself on the weave-worms of the planet's sprawling silk farms. Insatiable in its hunger, the Daemon Prince consumes everything and everyone in its path, swelling to immense proportions with the meat of worm and man. Eventually, Glutgora bursts in a tide of festering organs and rancid effluvia, and a million Nurglings crawl out from its corpse. The planet is declared Perditas by the Inquisition and quarantined indefinitely.The Penumbra Prophecy (Unknown Date.M40) - Abaddon is guided by the visions of Zaraphiston to an Eldar Crone World. In the ruins of an ancient Wraithbone city littered with skeletons, the Sorcerer leads the Warmaster of Chaos to a room where a tapestry of flayed skin covers the walls from floor to ceiling. Upon its surface Abaddon reads a prophecy that reveals the secrets of six weapons of immense power.12th Black Crusade (139.M41) - Better known as the Gothic War in Imperial space, the 12th Black Crusade was fought for control of the Gothic Sector in the Segmentum Obscurus between the Chaotic forces of Abaddon the Despoiler and the defenders of the Imperium. Abaddon lead his great fleet into the Gothic Sector, capturing two of the prehistoric xenos-built star forts known as the Blackstone Fortresses. Under Abaddon's control, the might of the Blackstone Fortresses is used to destroy the star Tarantis, consuming several of the system's closest worlds in the process and ravaging the Imperial fleets sent against the Black Legion. The Despoiler's fleet is driven back at great cost, though Abaddon escapes with the Blackstone Fortresses into the Eye of Terror. The vast engines of destruction emerge once more into the material universe during Abaddon's 13th Black Crusade over eight hundred standard years later, one of which is responsible for the destruction of the Fortress World of Cadia.The Iron Labyrinth (777.M41) - A Chaos fleet spearheaded by the Black Legion cuts a path into the worlds of the Cadian System. With the aid of the Imperial Fists, the Astra Militarum manage to break the Chaos forces at the Battle of the Iron Labyrinth, driving them back to the Eye of Terror. However, what their enemy's seemingly reckless thrust so far in-system achieved remains a mystery to the Imperial commanders.The Skull of Ker'ngar (Unknown Date.M41) - Abaddon travels to the Maiden World of Ildanira, seeking the artefact known as the Skull of Ker'ngar. Though initially confounded on the planet's surface by Eldar snipers from Craftworld Alaitoc, he orders all cover around his position to be levelled by orbital bombardment. Eldar reinforcements react swiftly to drive the Despoiler back, but not before he secures his prize.The Pilgrimage of Dark Lament (Unknown Date.M41) - Struck by a vision of Abaddon, millions of Imperial pilgrims abandon their worship of the God-Emperor and turn their voidships toward the Eye of Terror. After a long and perilous journey in which thousands perish, the pilgrims finally reach worlds held by the Black Legion, where they are immediately enslaved. Even as they fall beneath the lash of their new masters, the pilgrims give thanks to the Warmaster of Chaos.Pandorax Campaign (959-961.M41) - In the Demeter Sector, Abaddon led an alliance of Traitor Legions, including his own Black Legion and the Death Guard, in an invasion of the Imperial Death World of Pythos in the Pandorax System, the location of an ancient hidden gateway to the Warp. Another piece in his dark design to bring an end to the Long War, the Warmaster of Chaos fell upon the world with a small force of Daemon Engines and infernal war machines. In the space of a few bloody solar days the major hive cities were overrun and the local Planetary Defence Forces crushed beneath the might of the combined Traitor Legions. Only a small contingent of Catachan Jungle Fighters, the CLXXXIIIth Catachan Regiment of the Imperial Guard, managed to escape the destruction, trekking through the world's inhospitable jungle to the relative safety of the nearest mountain range. Abaddon commenced the complex rituals and sacrifices that would open the Damnation Cache, a portal between realspace and the Warp, breaking open seals that had remained untouched since the time of the Horus Heresy. Heeding the impassioned cries for salvation from Pythos, the entire Dark Angels Chapter, led by Supreme Grand Master Azrael himself, came to the defenders' aid. Supporting these Space Marines were Grey Knights dispatched from Titan to deal with the escalating daemonic incursion and the dire peril that the Damnation Cache posed. Both Imperial forces smashed through the Traitor Legion blockade around Pythos, in an epic void battle that pitted the finest warships of the Imperium supported by The Rock, the Dark Angels' mobile Fortress-Monastery, against the ancient vessels of the Traitor Legions. After the Chaos warfleet was finally driven from orbit and back into the void, the Space Marines were able to send their troops down through the atmosphere, bringing war to its ruined hives and hostile jungles. Failing to allow this distraction to draw him away from the awakening of the Damnation Cache, Abaddon sent an alliance of Legions to hold the Loyalists at bay. Before either the Dark Angels or the Grey Knights could stop him, Abaddon finally opened the portal to the Warp, daemons spilling out across Pythos. The ensuing conflict devastated the world as reality itself bent and buckled under the raw power of the Empyrean. The unleashed energies created rampant psychic phenomena, and Space Marines fought under boiling skies of blood and in rolling clouds of keening spirits. All across the Demeter Sector, latent psykers were awakened to full and terrible awareness and rebellions sprung up like cancerous boils on dozens of Imperial worlds in the region. After a long and bitter struggle, a squad of Grey Knights managed to reach the Damnation Cache and close the Warp portal. Starved of their daemonic allies, the Traitor Legions were forced onto the defensive and finally into retreat. Abaddon's forces left Pythos, escaping the vengeance of the Imperium once again, but the world had been irrevocably tainted by the touch of the Warp, its once proud cities and vast wilds twisted into a nightmarish hellscape. Before the portal was closed, however, Abaddon took with him a rogue psyker, rumoured to be of prodigious strength and the bearer of a unique gift that would aid the Warmaster of Chaos in his forthcoming 13th Black Crusade. This conflict is remembered in Imperial records as the Pandorax Campaign.Second Aurelian Crusade (Unknown Date. M41) - Just when all seemed to be returning to normal in the Sub-sector Aurelia of the Korianis Sector, the Warp opened up and spat out the former capital world of the Sub-sector and ancient homeworld of the Blood Ravens Chapter of Space Marines, the Ice World of Aurelia. Home to the Blood Ravens' ancient Fortress-Monastery of Selenon and many loyal citizens of the Imperium, the planet was corrupted by a Great Unclean One, a Greater Daemon of Nurgle, known as Ulkair. Former Chapter Master Moriah had attempted to destroy the daemon but failed, and the weakened daemon was imprisoned in the depths of Keep Selenon by Azariah Kyras, at that time a Librarian of the Blood Ravens. Yet the daemon's influence proved too strong and eventually the shaken Kyras fell to the taint of Chaos. Aurelia itself was swallowed by the Warp and its existence in the sub-sector that had been named after it was all but forgotten. Yet the ice-encased world returned to realspace in the late 41st Millennium bearing the foul hordes of Chaos, a warband of Chaos Space Marines from the Black Legion led by the Chaos Lord Araghast the Pillager and the former Word Bearers Dark Apostle Eliphas the Inheritor, who had been resurrected by the will of the Dark Gods so that he might seek the destruction of the Blood Ravens, now as a member of the Black Legion. Captain Gabriel Angelos and Force Commander Aramus rallied the Blood Ravens Astartes of the 3rd and 4th Company to face this threat, but no sooner did they join combat than the Eldar and the ever present Orks rose up to cause trouble along with the heretical soldiery of the Hive World of Meridian's noble House Vandis. Before long the entire Sub-sector was embroiled in fresh combat against multiple foes with the Forces of Chaos causing havoc at will. As the Blood Ravens scrambled to respond to these threats even more dire circumstances came to light as the Space Hulk Judgment of Carrion returned to the Sub-sector. Determined to recover valuable intelligence and ancient advanced technology from the Space Hulk to aid them against the foul servants of Chaos, the Blood Ravens under the command of Sergeant Aramus assaulted the Judgment of Carrion only to discover the bodies of fallen Blood Ravens from the 4th Company, formerly members of an expedition led aboard the Space Hulk by Apothecary Galan. As the forces of Sergeant Aramus investigated the Hulk they were shocked to find evidence of Galan's corruption by the powers of Chaos, but the truth of the matter was far more insidious. As Sergeant Aramus and Captain Angelos desperately fought to keep control of the Sub-sector and unlock the secrets of both the Judgment of Carrion and the lost planet Aurelia, they were interrupted by the arrival of Apollo Diomedes, the Captain of the Blood Ravens Honour Guard and the right hand of the Blood Ravens' Chapter Master and Chief Librarian Azariah Kyras. Diomedes ordered all Blood Ravens forces to stand down, an order both Angelos and Aramus promptly ignored. As Diomedes got increasingly sterner in his orders Aramus and Angelos continued to resist the forces of the Black Legion, with whom the Chapter had recently avoided open conflict for an unknown reason. Eventually Sergeant Aramus discovered the Chaotic corruption of Sergeant Avitus. As the Devastator Sergeant became a lackey of the tainted Apothecary Galan and his patrons within the Chapter. As his investigations continued, Sergeant Aramus discovered to his horror that the source of corruption was none other than Chapter Master Kyras himself, who had fallen under the sway of the Greater Daemon Ulkair on Aurelia and spread his taint to Galan aboard the Space Hulk Judgment of Carrion. Kyras escaped the doomed planet Aurelia aboard the Space Hulk and had returned to the Chapter with his dark seed of corruption when he met with Galan's expedition. Daring open conflict with Captain Diomedes' forces in their base-camp on Calderis, Sergeant Aramus attacked Apothecary Galan, slaying the Traitor and his tainted bodyguard of Terminators, a battle which ended in a confrontation with Captain Diomedes himself. Reluctant to accept the corruption of his political patron within the Chapter, Diomedes found himself torn but let Sergeant Aramus and his comrades leave Calderis and continue their operations against the Black Legion warband of Araghast the Pillager. The Battle of Aurelia culminated in the death of Eliphas the Inheritor, who seized control of the warband by betraying Araghast and leaving him to the mercies of the Blood Ravens earlier in the fighting. Despite Eliphas' machinations, Sergeant Aramus was able to re-seal the Daemon Ulkair in its icy tomb within Keep Selenon on Aurelia. Even with this victory, Chapter Master Kyras declared Captain Gabriel Angelos a Renegade and Traitor to the Chapter and Sergeant Aramus found himself faced with the knowledge that the Chapter Master was a corrupt agent of the Chaos Gods. Diomedes and Aramus returned to the Chapter to bide their time while Angelos fled Kyras' wrath. When the time was right the 3rd Company was determined to return and join with Aramus and Diomedes to cleanse the Chapter of the insidious taint that lay like a malignant cancer at its core.The Promethean War (980.M41) - The Salamanders fight an urban war against the Black Legion on Heletine. The Order of the Ebon Chalice arrives to reinforce the Space Marines, and together they push forward, but their advance is halted by the Daemon Prince Gralastyx. Saint Celestine appears suddenly, storming through the Chaos hordes and slaying Gralastyx, before vanishing once more.Raid on the Moons of Drathorian (998.M41) - Chaos Space Marines belonging to the Black Legion attack and pillage a space refinery used to extract Promethium from ore mined on the moons of Drathorian in the Acteron Sector. The refinery is completely destroyed in the attack. How the Black Legion came to be so far from the Eye of Terror and the purpose of the Chaos Space Marines' raid continues to be the subject of Inquisitorial investigation.Diamor Campaign (999.M41) - The Chaos Lord Xorphas of the Black Legion invades the planet Amethal alongside the World Eaters of Khârn the Betrayer and the Crimson Slaughter. An alliance of Blood Angels and Adeptus Mechanicus forces repels the invaders, but as the planet is consumed in a rising tide of carnage, the ancient "daemon cage" that forms the planet's interior has its structural integrity breached. The Chaos invaders are driven off, but the damage has been done. Within the solar year, a nearby Warp Storm breaks the daemon cage entirely, plunging the system into Warp-haunted mayhem and adding to the empyric tempest raging across the galaxy.Siege of the Fenris System (999.M41) - With the aid of the Tzeentchian trickster known as the Changeling, the Daemon Primarch of the Thousand Sons, Magnus the Red, gathers his Sorcerers and, at the head of several war sects of Rubricae, visits his revenge upon the beleaguered world of Fenris, homeworld of the Space Wolves. At the same time, through the use of a sorcerous ritual, Magnus succeeds in transporting his Daemon World of Sortiarius out of the Eye of Terror and into orbit above the husk of his ancient homeworld of Prospero.The 13th Black Crusade (995.999.M41) - The armies of Chaos invade Cadia and its many surrounding worlds of the Cadian Gate. The forces of the Dark Gods read like a roll call from epic battles of the ages. Always in the vanguard are the Black Legion, followed by the Death Guard, World Eaters, Alpha Legion, Thousand Sons, Night Lords and other Legions from the annals of the blackest days. Renegade Space Marine Chapters long thought extinct renew their assaults on the Imperium of Man. Before them run scabrous Chaos Cultists, deranged mutants and traitorous scum in numbers too great to count. Behind them march daemons of all the Ruinous Powers, the nightmares of mortals made real, led by their infernal overlords. After a gruelling campaign with a death toll that spirals into the trillions across the Segmentum Obscurus, Abaddon the Despoiler succeeds in tearing down the strange xenos-built pylons that for thousands of Terran years had held the Cadian Gate as a stable region of space. Cadia falls soon thereafter, and a wave of Warp Storms roars into being across the length of the galaxy. Astropaths everywhere fear to open their minds to receive or broadcast messages, for the Immaterium rings with mind-splitting peals, possibly the sound of the myriad tears ripping open in the barrier between the material universe and the Warp, or perhaps the laughter of the Dark Gods...Guilliman Awakes (ca. 999.M41) - Strange events, the appearance of the ancient Archmagos Belisarius Cawl and a cryptic alliance with a mysterious Aeldari faction known as the Ynnari conspire to awaken the Ultramarines Primarch Roboute Guilliman from his millennia-long slumber in a stasis chamber during the Ultramar Campaign of the 13th Black Crusade. The Primarch is immediately embroiled in battle as a Chaos assault by the Black Legion attacks Macragge as Abaddon attempts to prevent his return.The Great Rift Opens (ca. 999.M41) - Reality tears itself apart from the Hadex Anomaly at the core of the Jericho Reach in the Eastern Fringe, to the furthest star system of the Segmentum Obscurus. From that hole come Warp Storms not seen since the Age of Strife, cutting off the galactic north from Terra. The initial period, known as the Noctis Aeterna -- or the Blackness -- is terrible indeed. For a time, all Warp travel is impossible and the far-spread planets of the Imperium are isolated, with no travel or astropathic communication between them. A chain reaction of Warp cataclysms rips across the Imperium, plunging its worlds into disaster and awakening the dormant powers of latent psykers across the galaxy. Worlds in their hundreds fall before the ensuing Chaos onslaught. The pulsing Cicatrix Maledictum -- the Great Rift -- spreads like an impenetrable curtain, robbing entire systems of the holy light of Terra. Countless civilisations are lost to daemonic incursions as the galaxy burns.Crippling Terror (Unknown Date.M42) - Thousands of Imperial planets lying along the edge of the Great Rift are evacuated as the tapestry of Warp Storms threatens to consume them. On the Forge World of Raeddon, the Adeptus Mechanicus Tech-priests gather their most sacred manufacturing relics in preparation of shipping them off-world. But before the frigates are loaded and launched, an armada of Black Legion warships emerges from the Warp, forming an impenetrable blockade around the planet. Before long, hordes of Chaos Space Marine shock troops descend upon the Forge World. The bulk of its Skitarii defenders are deployed to guard the basilica logisticum where the Mechanicus have stored their invaluable archeotech. However, the Chaos forces do not even attempt to lay siege to this complex. Instead, they conduct a series of devastating orbital bombardments on the planet's spaceports, obliterating their static Lascannon arrays before sending in waves of ground troops to mop up the remaining Skitarii. With Raeddon stripped of its transport capabilities, the Black Legion armada recedes, leaving the Tech-priests and their precious relics untouched as the Warp Storms envelop them.Blacker Pastures (Unknown Date.M42) - The rampant advance of the Hounds of Abaddon through the Bellicose Stars comes to a grinding halt when they are met by the Imperial Fists on Gandor's Providence. The sons of Rogal Dorn deploy numerous squads of Primaris Space Marine Intercessors, creating a series of heavily defended redoubts across the surface of the Agri-world. Rather than allowing themselves to become bogged down in a prolonged siege, the Hounds of Abaddon withdraw to wreak destruction elsewhere.Gods from the Warp (Unknown Date.M42) - After a solar months-long battle in the Aralest System, the forces of the Imperial Navy are all but wiped out by a massive war fleet comprising several Black Legion warbands. The few remaining Imperial forces retreat to Everwatch Stanchion, the heavily-fortified orbital docking platform above Aralest VII, to consolidate their strength. Meanwhile, on the planet's surface, Imperial Governor Melachron Indis marshals his Planetary Defence Forces and prepares for invasion. As the Black Legion ships approach, dozens of Chaos Cults emerge from amongst the indentured populace of Aralest VII. These deluded fanatics do not see the Chaos Space Marines as invaders, but rather as saviours who have emerged from the Great Rift that burns across the sky day and night. Indis is forced to expend his troops in bloody fights deep inside the hive cities to prevent the planet from falling to the savage cultists before the Black Legion even arrive. These battles do not go in the governor's favour, for with each passing solar hour, more and more members of the citizenry join in the anarchic uprising. Indis and the remaining fragments of his armies barricade themselves inside the spire of Aralest VII's capital hive and pray to the Emperor that the naval garrison on Everwatch will soon be able to send them aid. Their prayers are not answered. The Black Legion, having captured Everwatch Stanchion several solar days earlier, dislodge the platform from its orbit and send it plummeting down to the planet's surface, directly towards the capital city. The explosion created by the colossal impact leaves only a crater where the hive city once stood, and the ensuing quake is felt across the planet. This display of raw power is the final proof the Chaos Cults need. No one on Aralest VII now doubts that the warriors of the Black Legion are indeed gods. |
Black Legion - Pre-Heresy: First as the Luna Wolves and later as the Sons of Horus, the XVIth Legion maintained much of their Legion structure as it had existed since the wars for Terra and Solar Unity, which had adhered closely to the Terran pattern laid down by the Imperial Officio Militaris before the Space Marine Legions' unification with their Primarchs.The smallest formation within the Logos Terra Militia, and therefore within the Luna Wolves, was the squad. This consisted of a group of Luna Wolves under the command of a Sergeant. Squads varied widely in both size and specialisation, with the majority of the units ranging between 10 to 20 Space Marines within the XVIth Legion. Conversely, very specialised squads such as reconnaissance units or those that might have suffered heavy casualties, might only consist of a handful of Space Marines in active service.The specialties and wargear of squads in the Luna Wolves included all of those generally found in other Legions, including those designated Destroyer and Seeker units, who were shunned by some and existed in lesser quantities. The Luna Wolves also maintained considerable resources in terms of armour and vehicles, with tithed industrial worlds they had brought into Imperial Compliance and good relations with the Mechanicum ensuring a steady supply of munitions and materials for the XVIth Legion, which spent such political coin readily.Even Horus, a generalist and a pragmatist, upon being given command of his Legion is thought to have adopted new squad formations after having seen their effectiveness in other Legions. For example, it is noticeable that until the Lactrical Onslaught the number of Storm Shield-equipped Breacher Squads was relatively low in the XVIth Legion. The contributions of such units amongst the forces of the Imperial Fists cannot have escaped his notice.After the annihilation of the Lactrical, the number of such squads in the ranks of the Luna Wolves rose noticeably. Other anecdotal evidence of this adaptability and willingness to embrace new weapons of warfare can be found in Horus' vocal backing of the Tactical Dreadnought Armour project, with the result that his Legion was one of the first and most widely equipped with Terminator Armour and at the forefront of the development of tactics for its use in assaults.The XVIth Legion showed a preference for the use of Tactical Squads. Squads configured in this form within the Luna Wolves and later the Sons of Horus outnumbered all other squad types combined throughout the Great Crusade. Horus remarked on several occasions that there were few challenges of war that could not be met by, or did not require, the use of such units.The presence of Tactical Squads designed to be held in reserve and unleashed once a weakness in an enemy line had been identified, trained in fire saturation and carrying additional close combat weaponry for use in overrunning enemy positions -- the so-called Despoiler Squads -- shows again the dominance of the place of the Tactical Squad in Horus' tactical thinking. Such was the effectiveness of this tactic that its use was copied by several different Legions, such as the White Scars and Iron Warriors, who field Despoiler Squads of their own.The heart of the Sons of Horus Legion was the company, which served as the Legion's principal military division. Made up of a grouping of squads under the leadership of an officer with the rank of Captain, the company was the base currency of campaigns and battles. There was no fixed strength for a company within the Luna Wolves and the Sons of Horus.While other Legions codified and enforced strict limits on the size of similar formations, this was not the case amongst the Sons of Horus, which had begun in more regimented form, but had become increasingly ad hoc in structure and disposition over time. Company strengths as small as 36 and as large 972 Astartes were recorded by datafactors during the XVIth Legion's action against the Dasim Patrimony, for example.The configuration of squad types within a company varied as widely as its strength. Some were comprised almost exclusively of Tactical Squads with a few Support Squads. Others were an eclectic mix based on the varied requirements of different campaigns and the will of Horus. By way of example, the 17th Company, known as the Hesperus Guard, had a standard strength of 205 Space Marines at the time of the virus-bombing of Istvaan III. Tactical Squads made up half this strength numerically, with the Legion placing in general great importance on the use of Tactical Squads in every deployment.The rest consisted of two veteran units, three reconnaissance units, a heavy support squad and multiple batteries of support weaponry. The elite 1st Company showed even greater variation. Small in number, it contained two distinct sub-formations: the Justaerin Terminator Squads and the Catulan Reaver Assault Squads. Both sported the black armour worn only by this elite company and each was led by a Captain under the overall command of the Legion's First Captain, Ezekyle Abaddon. Used in combination, the 1st Company exemplified Horus' predilection for precise and overwhelming attacks against strategic targets.In other Space Marine Legions a company would form part of further layers of hierarchical military organisation, variously referred to as battalions, cohorts, chapters, regiments or by any number of other titles. Horus seems to have preferred to avoid this extra layer of fixed organisation, which eroded over time in the Legion and was largely academic by the time of their transition to become the Sons of Horus.Instead of a formal structure, Horus would group companies and individual units together as required for the execution of a particular campaign. The commander of such a formation would usually be a senior Captain. If the formation was especially large, then other Captains would take on the role of lieutenants to the overall force commander until the completion of the campaign. These formations rarely had formal titles, but the Sons of Horus commonly referred to formations intended to prosecute a rapid assault as "Speartips."In eschewing formality and fixed structure above the basic level of the company, Horus demonstrated his pragmatism and his preference for waging war with careful precision. Within the Luna Wolves and the Sons of Horus, squads also commonly had their own honorific or epithetic titles rather than simple numerations: the Illuminators Prime, Death Makers, Jerrok's Reavers, the First Sons, and similar appelations, while some were named for the Sergeant or Chieftain that led them if their leader's own reputation was strong enough alone.Many of these titles betrayed the culture of Cthonian gang honours and the tradition of reputation and internecine warfare from which they had sprung. This culture had grown steadily stronger over the years within the rank and file of the XVIth Legion's intake of Neophytes.The exact disposition of the Sons of Horus at the time of the Istvaan III Atrocity is uncertain. Given the accounts of the battle on Istvaan III following Horus' treacherous bombardment from those that survived it, it would seem likely that the culled Loyalist elements of the XVIth Legion represented something approaching a third of the Sons of Horus' entire force.Records, tainted as they may be, place the Sons of Horus at a fighting strength of approximately 130,000-170,000 Space Marines in the period leading up to the Istvaan III Atrocity. Although the figure may have been higher, this estimate would also tally with more general assessments of the Sons of Horus Legion being in the upper quarter of the Legions in terms of the Space Marine manpower available to them.The XVIth Legion's Great Crusade fleet was likewise accorded to be among the greatest under any single commander's flag, with in excess of one hundred capital ships and perhaps three times that figure in smaller Cruisers and Escorts under Horus' direct command. Taking into account likely losses from the ground war that followed the virus-bombing of Istvaan III, and elements of the Sons of Horus Legion not in the Istvaan System at the time, it would follow that Horus began his war of betrayal with around 70,000-110,000 Space Marines of his own Legion at his disposal, with considerable evidence present in Imperial records that the latter figure is the more accurate.Heavily engaged on the surface of Istvaan III during the Istvaan Atrocity, it is estimated that some 30,000 of the Sons of Horus' Legionaries were dead or unaccounted for in the aftermath of that battle. It has been theorised by some analysts that as a consequence of the initial difficulties encountered with the purging of the Terrans from the Legion's ranks, and the unexpected cost in lives and materiel the battle had entailed, Horus was deliberately cautious with the use of his Legion during the later Drop Site Massacre.In this it is thought that he hoped perhaps to preserve as much of the Sons of Horus' strength as possible for the intended push on Terra that was planned to follow, or perhaps he simply meant to have others blood themselves in his cause while destroying the Loyalists. |
Black Legion - Sons of Horus Armoured Formations: At the time of the Warmaster's advance on the Coronid Deeps, his Legion's armoured forces had been replenished substantially, having been severely depleted during the conflicts at Istvaan III and Istvaan V. In part this was because the Sons of Horus, and to some degree all of the Traitor Legions, had been able to salvage a treasure trove of war machines and materiel from the wreckage laid out upon the sands of the Urgall Depression in the wake of the Istvaan V Dropsite Massacre.It was also because the Warmaster's lieutenants ensured that, as the Traitor armies progressed, the efforts of the Dark Mechanicum and the brutal tithe extracted from the worlds they subjugated were first set to the supply of Horus' own above all others. This ensured that the latest and most powerful Legiones Astartes war machines, such as the Falchion and Sicaran, quickly replaced lost or damaged war machines of older patterns still in the Legion's service. |
Black Legion - Legion Command Hierarchy: As with all of the Space Marine Legions, Horus' command as Primarch over his own Legion was absolute. Beneath Horus were his Captains, beneath them were the squad Sergeants, and where a formation of squads came together for a purpose, the informal rank of "Chieftain" was given to the Sergeant granted field command authority, a matter not always of seniority, but rather selection of the best or most suited Astartes for the task at hand; an approach which fitted well within the Legion's pragmatic and sometimes impulsive approach to warfare.Beneath these non-commissioned officers were the rank-and-file Battle-Brothers of the Luna Wolves and the Sons of Horus. This simple hierarchy belied the truth of matters when applied in practice within the XVIth Legion. Within each rank, prestige and personal reputation counted for much within the brotherhood of Space Marines.There were distinctions between those who fought with the Legion for longer, between those who had fought in different campaigns, between those who had received certain honours, and between ordinary squads and those who formed a Captain's Honour Guard. Beneath the surface of this simmered other divisions, not easily visible to the outsider, divisions of blood and origin, divisions that the mere act of becoming a Space Marine should have washed away, but for the Sons of Horus did not in many cases. These hidden divisions would eventually bear bitter fruit.The rank of Captain within the Legion also held subtle variations of authority. Generally those in command of a lower numbered company outranked those in a higher numbered company, while those who had once had overall command of a campaign were considered superior to those officers he had commanded during that action. At the top of this informal but very real hierarchy of Legion officers were those Captains who served as Horus' closest advisors and in particular the First Captain of the Legion who commanded the elite 1st Company and also served as his Primarch's principal field officer and second-in-command.The senior-most Captains comprised the Legion's Mournival, the quartet of Astartes who served as Horus' closest advisors and companions within the XVIth Legion and who existed outside the regular command structure. Before the outbreak of the Horus Heresy, the final Mournival of the Sons of Horus included Captains Garviel Loken, Horus Aximand, Tarik Torgaddon and Ezekyle Abaddon. The Mournival served as an advisory body to Horus in both military and political matters, but in truth its members held no formal power above that of the other company Captains.Held together by Horus' personal charisma and brilliance as a leader, the command structure of the Luna Wolves and then the Sons of Horus proved highly effective, adaptable and resilient. Combined with the XVIth Legion's skill in rapidly concluding campaigns, it allowed the Legion to flow from one victory to another, forming and reforming to meet each new challenge.Each Son of Horus knew his capabilities and the capabilities of those around him, both by given rank and personal repute, capabilities that were enshrined in a hierarchy determined by deeds rather than the demands of military or ceremonial formality. Effective as it was, one cannot help but notice the importance of personal prestige and the pack-like sorting of authority as a hallmark of the XVIth Legion, and upon occasion the source of some conflict and vendetta within the ranks, a seed of the terrible division to come.As the character of the Legion was an echo of its Primarch, so one can perhaps see the flaw of the father in the pride of his sons. So it was that when Horus fell from grace, so too did his gene-sons, and their faults, long-sleeping, multiplied and grew to consume them: pride, ambition, the desire to be greater than any other and the savagery and merciless will to make such dark dreams manifest. |
Black Legion - Specialist Ranks and Formations: The Mournival - The Mournival were Horus' most trusted advisors and confidants. Consisting of four chosen Captains of the Legion, the Mournival existed outside the rest of the XVIth Legion's regular command structure. Together the Mournival functioned as the soul of the Luna Wolves, and later the Sons of Horus, supporting their Primarch and steering the Legion's temperament and decisions. The Mournival had many important responsibilities, which included making sure that the Legion and its Primarch lived up to their standards of moral excellence and the Emperor's vision of the Imperial Truth in prosecuting its duties and helping the Primarch devise strategies for more effectively carrying forth the Great Crusade. The Mournival on occasion even provided Horus the means to posture politically as a means to save face or present a certain united front when in the presence of the XVIth Legion's Imperial allies and enemies alike. Horus relied on the Mournival to balance his decisions with questions and different perspectives. In this way the four Captains served as a combination of counsellors, confidants and naysmiths. It is known that there was an element of ritual to the bond between the Mournival brothers: meetings of the Mournival took place in moonlight, a different phase of the moon was graven on the helm of each brother, and its oaths of brotherhood were made over the reflected image of a moon. The origins of the Mournival are unclear, although there are parallels with the rites of brotherhood amongst the Jutigran clans of Terra and the ritual practice of the Selenar gene-cults of Luna, who were integral to the early integration of many Cthonian Neophytes into the XVIth Legion. Whatever the Mournival's origins, its existence within the Legion certainly lies in in the early decades of the Luna Wolves' history, and it is known to have persisted for a time even after the Istvaan III Atrocity, though by then it had lost any meaningful check upon the actions of Horus and continued to exist solely due to tradition. The last members of the Mournival before the XVIth Legion fell to Chaos included Captain Horus "Little Horus" Aximand (Half Moon), First Captain Ezekyle Abaddon (Full Moon), Captain Garviel Loken (New Moon) and Captain Tarik Torgaddon (Gibbous Moon).Justaerin Terminator Squads - The Justaerin Terminator Squads were one of two distinct sub-formations found within the XVIth Legion's elite 1st Company. Led by the Legion's First Captain, the black-armoured Justaerin were the pride of the XVIth Legion. Tasked with forming the "point of the spear" of the Legion, they went where the fighting was thickest, their attack directed usually at destroying the heart of an opposing target or conducting the decapitation strike of an enemy force. Early proponents of the use of Tactical Dreadnought Armour, many of the Justaerin entered combat as Terminators, relying on the resilience this gave them to smash aside any resistance and close in for the kill.Catulan Reaver Assault Squads - The Catulan Reaver Assault Squads were the other sub-formation present in the XVIth Legion's elite 1st Company. They too, sported the signature black armour which denoted their specialisation in harrowing actions and hit-and-run tactics. They were led by a Captain under the overall command of the Legion and the 1st Company's commanding First Captain. They also made extensive use of Terminator Armour, taking advantage of its additional protection and ability to smash aside any opposition. Used in combination, these two elite sub-formations of the 1st Company exemplified Horus' predilection for precise and overwhelming attacks against strategic targets.Reaver Attack Squads - Reaver Attack Squads were an evolution of the Despoiler and Assault Squads found in the order of battle of the Luna Wolves, epitomising in many ways the Sons of Horus' way of warfare. Heavily influenced by the tactics of the seething and incessant tribal warfare of Cthonia, Reaver units specialised in lightning-swift assaults which maimed and disabled a foe, striking down leaders, mercilessly cutting down any who were weak or isolated, and sowing panic and disorder in any who remained.Despoiler Squads - The Tactical Squads known as Despoiler Squads were designed to be held in reserve and unleashed once a weakness in an enemy line had been identified. Trained in fire saturation techniques and carrying additional close combat weaponry for use in overrunning enemy positions, the so-called Despoiler Squads showed the dominance of the Tactical Squad in Horus' tactical thinking. Such was the effectiveness of this tactic that its use was copied in several different Legions.Destroyer Squads - Considered dishonourable by some Legions who made little use of them or eschewed them altogether, Destroyers were equipped with and expert in the use of otherwise proscribed and forbidden weaponry. Alongside certain factions of the Adeptus Mechanicus, only Destroyer cadres had the license to use these weapons in the forces of the Imperium by the Emperor's command. Rad-weapons, bio-alchem munitions and the burning horror of Phosphex were amongst the forbidden weapons in a Destroyer Squad's dark arsenal, weapons which irrevocably tainted the ground upon which they were used. Marked by their fire-blackened and chem-scalded armour, Destroyers were often shunned and deemed somehow tainted by their fellow Battle-Brothers in many Legions and were considered at best a necessary evil, although the effectiveness of their relic-weapons in cracking especially difficult enemy defences could not be denied.Seeker Squads - Seeker Squads were comprised of a specialised force of Space Marines whose principal task on the battlefield was to identify an enemy's command structure, its warlords, officers, priests, demagogues, whatever form they took, and slay them with a well-placed bolt round while the battle raged round them. The Alpha Legion is said to have first crystallised the use of this tactic and squad configuration, which had with the Emperor's approval spread to the other Legions, although its use sat poorly within the combat doctrine and martial culture of some like the Space Wolves. Equipped with special issue ammunition to assist their efforts, Seeker Squads were primarily composed of the finest shots within the Legion, as a Seeker strike force often only had a small window of opportunity to take down its targets at close range, rather than enjoying the luxury of distance.28th Armoured Assault Company ("The Back Breakers") - During the Warmaster's invasion of the Coronid Deeps, the armoured formations of the Sons of Horus were deployed across multiple war zones. In particular, the 28th Armoured Assault Company (known by the informal cognomen of the "Back Breakers" for their use as a heavy assault attrition unit) claimed battle honours at Lascal and Tara canis, broken up into smaller, ship-based battlegroups, before taking part en masse in the final destruction of Hive Ilium on Manachea. In this conflict, the Sons of Horus deployed an enormous range and variety of armoured formations, maintaining a fluid command structure that allowed them to operate as a highly mobile reserve capable of reinforcing successful breakthroughs and delivering the final, crushing blow to a collapsing enemy defence. In particular, as the bulk of the Legion committed to the assault on Hive Ilium penetrated the hive city's dense environs, it split fluidly into multiple smaller strike groups. Each of these was assigned a squadron of tanks or an individual super-heavy tank to force a way through the heavier choke points and city nexuses, crushing defended positions and engaging enemy armour even as the Sons of Horus infantry counter-attacked any enemy that attempted to outflank the war engines and bring melta weaponry to bear. At some point during the Great Scouring, the 28th Armoured Assault Company ceased to exist in its established form, but from its remnants the Sarissan Iron Pact arose. This Renegade Warband is still heavily mechanised and consists of Spartan Assault Tanks, Land Raiders and a small number of Land Raider Achilles. Much of their infantry consists of Chaos Terminators.Luperci - The Luperci (or "Brothers of the Wolf" in Cthonian) was a special formation of Sons of Horus that consisted of Possessed Chaos Space Marines. Formed with the assistance of the Word Bearers, the Luperci were essentially a mirror formation of the Word Bearers' formation of the Gal Vorbak possessed Chaos Space Marines. The Luperci were created following the events of the Dropsite Massacre on Istvaan V, and were first deployed during the Battle of Molech. |
Black Legion - Post-Heresy: After the death of Horus at the Siege of Terra, proper hierarchical structure within the XVIth Legion's squads and companies disintegrated, as was common in most of the Traitor Legions as the more deleterious effects of Chaos manifested themselves with the end of the unity between the Forces of Chaos. Those Sons of Horus who survived the Heresy formed into warbands of Chaos Space Marines of varying size and composition, led by individuals known as Chaos Champions.These Champions were either ranking officers of the Sons of Horus during the time of the Heresy, or newly emerged leaders who had won great favour with the Ruinous Powers through their violent and blasphemous deeds. When circumstances dictated, several warbands would rally together under the banner of a greater Chaos Champion, or even Abaddon himself as the Warmaster of Chaos Undivided, usually in preparation for a major raid or incursion into the Imperium. The entirety of what remains of the Black Legion only gathers when Abaddon has managed to successfully unleash a new Black Crusade.The overriding belief of the XVIth Legion's Astartes prior to the Warmaster's demise was in the ultimate superiority of Horus over all other beings in the Imperium and, by association, themselves as his genetic progeny. In continually seeking to prove themselves as the greatest of the Space Marine Legions, they did indeed achieve the most in terms of the sheer numbers of worlds brought into the Imperial fold during the Great Crusade, although much effort had to be expended by other Imperial forces to completely pacify these new worlds after the XVIth Legion had moved on to the next target.The Sons of Horus' defeat and exile dealt a crushing blow to the collective ego of the Legion. This has fuelled the current Black Legion's almost fanatical intensity to restore unity amongst the Forces of Chaos in the Long War and drive on Terra to eliminate the Corpse Emperor and regain their place of primacy -- no matter the cost.The Black Legion has recruited countless warbands of every stripe to their cause over the past 10,000 standard years -- though some of these still claim autonomy, they have all bent the knee to Abaddon the Despoiler as the Warmaster of Chaos, and all wear some variant of gold and black in honour of their adopted faction.Many Black Legion warbands worship one of the Chaos Gods above the others, adorning their black battle-plate with icons, trophies and the favoured colours of their patron in the hope of attracting more divine favour -- and perhaps ascending beyond the Black Legion to claim mastery of their own fate as Daemon Princes. Many Traitor Legionaries are counted amongst these hosts, for Abaddon's strength as a leader is impossible to deny. |
Black Legion - Specialist Formations: Aphotic Blade - After he assumed control of the XVIth Legion, Abaddon formed from the Black Legion's ranks a personal bodyguard called the Aphotic Blade and known as the "Bringers of Despair" by their enemies, among other dark titles. Selected from the strongest and most vicious of his Terminator elite, these fearsome warriors are a terrifying sight, their arrival announcing the presence of the Despoiler himself.Hounds of Abaddon - The Hounds of Abaddon are a special formation of Chaos Space Marines found within the Black Legion who are wholly dedicated to the service of Khorne. Within the ranks of the Black Legion, the greatest of the Traitor Legions which serves Chaos Undivided, there still exist thousands of devotees of the Blood God Khorne. These Khornate Berserkers are always at the forefront of the Legion's assaults, charging and howling into the fray. These formations are known as the Hounds of Abaddon, who revel in close combat, where they can spill the greatest volume of blood for their god, using razor-toothed Chainaxes, wicked Lightning Claws or even their own mutant fangs. Though the Hounds are not a single unified warband within the Black Legion, they are led by Urkrathos, the current Lord Purgator of the Chosen of Abaddon and commander of the Legion's Black Fleet. Urkrathos claims all followers of Khorne within the Legion as his own and directs them according to the will of Abaddon the Despoiler, the Legion's Warmaster.Bringers of Decay - The Bringers of Decay are a special formation of Chaos Space Marines found within the Black Legion who are wholly dedicated to Nurgle. The Plague God has a strong following within the Black Legion; his putrid touch is evident throughout the ranks of its warriors. Under the dominance of the Chosen of Abaddon lieutenant Skyrak Slaughterborn, the current Lord Corruptor, the Nurglites have converted many to their cause. In battle, the Bringers of Decay are Abaddon's plague carriers and heralds of contagion, often appearing before other warbands of the Legion to sow infection and sickness amongst the foe. This could also be why many other warbands of the Black Legion will have little to do with the Bringers of Decay, repelled by the blessings of the Plague God they bear, and the pervasive stench that follows them.Children of Torment - The Children of Torment are a special formation of Chaos Space Marines found within the Black Legion who are wholly dedicated to the service of Slaanesh. Hundreds of followers of the Pleasure God have sworn their allegiance to Abaddon the Despoiler and joined the ranks of the Black Legion. Under the guidance of warlords such as Devram Korda, they are comprised of multiple powerful warbands which comprise this hedonistic collective. These devotees of the Prince of Pleasure bow to Abaddon, for he grants them unending opportunities to wallow in the pleasure provided by the anguish of his mortal victims, and feed upon their gushing lifeblood. Even though they are devotees of Slaanesh, the Children of Torment are despised by members of the Emperor's Children, who see them as traitors to the Daemon Primarch Fulgrim and lapdogs of a lesser Warmaster.Sons of the Cyclops - The Sons of the Cyclops are a special formation of Chaos Space Marines found within the Black Legion who are wholly dedicated to the service of Tzeentch. The Sons of the Cyclops are the smallest of the formations dedicated to a single Chaos God within the Black Legion. Consisting of the followers of the Lord of Change, including Chaos Sorcerers and their attending Rubricae, the Sons of the Cyclops hold an amount of power completely disproportionate to their diminutive numbers within the Black Legion. This is because of the many favours Abaddon the Despoiler lavishes upon the Sons of the Cyclops' leaders; powerful psykers and sorcerers like Zaraphiston and Ygethmor the Deceiver. Gifted seers and diviners, they make up the core of Abaddon's closest and most trusted advisors, peering into the future and guiding the multiple components of a Black Crusade toward Abaddon's ultimate goals.The Tormented - The warband known as The Tormented regroups all the Possessed Chaos Space Marines counted amongst the Black Legion's ranks into one formation. Those members of the Black Legion who take further steps on the road to power and merge their soul with a daemon, inviting a Warp-entity into their flesh and drinking deep of the Neverborn's corrupted power, forsake their allegiance to their former warband and join the ranks of The Tormented. Since their cataclysmal inception during the defence of the corpse of Horus on the Daemon World of Maeleum, the ranks of the Tormented have swollen and their influence grown. Each Battle-Brother of The Tormented has a dark reflection in the Warp, the twinned sentience of the daemon sharing the corrupted Astartes' mind. These daemons, unsurprisingly, have their own agendas and will act upon those when the opportunity arises, making the warband as a whole a rather unstable and unpredictable tool of war, yet none can deny their horrific visciousness in battle. The most powerful of the Possessed Legionaries are granted the honour of serving as Navigators on the Black Legion's warships, as the blasphemous mingling of Materium- and Immaterium-born minds grants a Possessed the perspective to guide a ship through the Warp with a speed and precision no other can hope to match.The Oath-Broken - Those that dare betray the Warmaster seldom live long enough to regret their mistake, and those who do quickly come to regret their folly bitterly as their bodies and souls are subjected to the most abject of agonies. The Oath-Broken are no true traitors to Abaddon, but merely those who failed in their assigned tasks, or got badly mauled on the battlefield and crippled by horrendous wounds. Failures and cripples invariably lose the fickle attention of their mortal and immortal masters alike, and without the blessings of the Powers of the Warp to mend their limbs or knit their broken bodies together with mutations, the Oath-Broken are forced to fashion their own crude replacements: blades sutured to stumps, xenos appendages crudely grafted into empty sockets and ragged armour patched with whatever material the Eye of Terror deems to provide. And yet, woe to the fool who underestimates these dregs of the Black Legion, for an Oath-Broken's desire to again bask in the glories that only Chaos can provide is only equal to his hatred of any who still do.Sarissan Iron Pact - The Sarissan Iron Pact is a large sub-faction within the inner circle of the Black Legion that operates directly under the command of Abaddon the Despoiler. The Iron Pact can trace its origins to the Sons of Horus and the Luna Wolves before them, when they served as the 28th Armoured Assault Company in the Legion of the Primarch Horus himself. Ordo Malleus archives state that this company was present throughout many of the Warmaster's campaigns during the Horus Heresy, and was particularly active in the northern war zones of the Segmentum Obscurus. The 28th Comprised a core of squads including Terminators and Breacher Squads, all mounted in a variety of tanks, including a speartip of Spart Heavy Assault Transports. At some point during the Scouring, the 28th Armoured Assault Company was dissolved or ceased to exist in its established form, but from its remnants arose the Sarissan Iron Pact. This group sided with Abaddon in the conflicts that sundered his Legion and by its end had been rendered down to a kernel of Spartans and Land Raiders, supported by a small number of surviving Land Raider Achilles'. The squads that were once part of the 28th fractured and split during the Scouring, leaving the Iron Pact as a cadre of highly experienced vehicle crew in command of several dozen of the heaviest assault transports ever constructed. The Despoiler calls upon the services of the Sarissan Iron Pact when his inner circle of Chosen Terminator squads are tasked with launching all-out assaults upon the most heavily defended positions. They are also highly effective in operating in the most hazardous of environments, for the Spartan in particular was constructed to transport infantry through war zones alight with ravening plasma. Thus, no world is immune from the wrath of Abaddon the Despoiler. |
Black Legion - Thrice-Cursed Traitors: In the long, dark solar decades after the death of their Primarch, the Sons of Horus fragmented. When Ezekyle Abaddon proclaimed himself the new master of the XVIth Legion in the ruins of Maeleum, there were those who turned their back on the Despoiler.These Legionaries either remained true to the memory of Horus or forsook all masters, before vanishing into the depths of the Eye of Terror. Most would disappear from history forever, but some returned to challenge the Black Legion, or in time rejoin its ranks. They are known to the Black Legion as the Thrice-Cursed Traitors:Sons of the Eye - The Sons of the Eye were a splinter warband of the Black Legion. They were led by the infamous Chaos Lord Drecarth the Sightless, the Blind Butcher of Irridous VII. Drecarth was a former Battle-Brother of the Sons of Horus who had fought alongside Abaddon during the Great Crusade and the Horus Heresy that followed. Always jealous of his Primarch Horus' favour for the Despoiler, the Sons of the Eye considered Abaddon a usurper. When Drecarth broke from Abaddon he had his warriors make a cut across the Eye of Horus sigils they wore on their armour, a symbol of the blindness of Horus that had led his Legion to destruction. During the 6th Black Crusade launched in 901.M36, Abaddon visited his wrath upon Drecarth the Sightless and his treacherous warband. Abaddon aided the Sons of the Eye in an assault on the Forge World of Arkreach, fighting side-by-side until the defenders were finally crushed. The triumphant Abaddon then slowly killed Drecarth, impaling him with the Talon of Horus. As Drecarth died painfully, the Despoiler made him watch every member of the Sons of the Eye bow before their new master.Wolves of Horus - The death of Horus left many veteran Legionaries of the Sons of Horus craving a return to the halcyon days when the XVIth Legion was known as the Luna Wolves. The Wolves of Horus chose to relive those early times, and venerate their dead Primarch by bearing his name.True Sons - Even after Horus' death, his Legion worshipped him as a god, bowing down to his tomb on Maeleum and making daily oaths of loyalty. The warband known as the True Sons never broke with these traditions, even after the destruction of the Primarch's body in the wake of the Slave Wars. Covering their armour in the symbol of the Eye of Horus, the True Sons build effigies of Horus wherever they go, bowing down to them before symbolically burning them. |
Black Legion - Chosen of Abaddon: Rather than a single force with a single leader, the Black Legion would become a mighty host of many warbands and warlords. Within this host, all would swear complete allegiance to Abaddon, and through an inner circle, he would lead them with absolute dominion.These favoured lieutenants became known as the Chosen of Abaddon. The Chosen were his favoured generals, standing above all others and enacting his dark will; a warped shadow of the Luna Wolves' Mournival in which he had once served.Nowhere in the galaxy can a more feared and merciless collection of tyrants be found, always eager to put entire worlds to the sword in the name of Chaos. The last recorded deployment of a full Officio Assassinorum Execution Force was against the so-called Chosen of Abaddon. These four individuals were so hated by the Imperium of Man that an entire team of Assassins infiltrated Abaddon's flagship.This was an extraordinary event, for it is rare for even one Assassin to be sent to deal with a threat. Abaddon learned of the impending attack and laid a trap for the Assassins, slaying all four and protecting his Chosen.The Chosen bear an assortment of titles, reflecting their role in a past Black Crusade or honouring particular acts of cruelty for which they are infamous. Their numbers are ever-changing, for Abaddon has little tolerance for failure amongst those who serve him. These four titles include: |
Black Legion - Lord Ravager: The Lord Ravager leads the invasion fleets of the Black Crusades and is the admiral of the Black Fleet. It is he who first makes landfall on the surface of an Imperial world about to be ravaged by the Black Legion. The Lord Ravager is always a devotee of Khorne.The Lord Ravager leads Abaddon's ground forces and is always found in the vanguard of the assault.Threxos Hellbreed - Threxos Hellbreed is the current admiral of the Black Legion's Black Fleet and also the new master of the Hounds of Abaddon warband. He replaced the former Lord Ravager, Urkrathos, after that Daemon Prince's death on Cadia. Hellbreed has won great favour with his patron, Khorne, due to his skills at launching ship-to-ship ambushes. He has earned a reputation for initiating spectacular boarding actions.Urkrathos - Within the ranks of the Black Legion are those who are bloody-handed servants of Khorne. Though not a single unified warband within the Black Legion, they are collectively known as the Hounds of Abaddon. Urkrathos, also sometimes called Urkanthos, the former Lord Ravager of the Chosen of Abaddon and commander of the Legion's Black Fleet, claimed all followers of Khorne within the Legion as his own and directed them according to the will of Abaddon. Ironically, Urkrathos, who had become a Daemon Prince after pleasing his patron, the Blood God Khorne, was temporarily slain during the 13th Black Crusade on Cadia itself. He fell just before Cadia's destruction at the siege of Kasr Kraf combatting Saint Celestine and her two Geminae Superia, the Living Saint's protectors, the former Adepta Sororitas Canonesses Eleanor and Genevieve of the Order of Our Martyred Lady. Urkrathos had previously killed both in combat before their resurrection by the power of the Living Saint to serve as her eternal honour guard. |
Black Legion - Lord Deceiver: The Lord Deceiver is a powerful Chaos Sorcerer whose esoteric visions of the Warp guide the Black Crusades from star system to star system, so that they might always find their prey, no matter where they hide. The Lord Deceiver is always a devotee of Tzeentch.Ygethmor the Deceiver - Ygethmor the Deceiver, known also as the "Twice Damned" and the "Purgator of Corrialis", is a formidable Sorcerer Lord of the Black Legion. He currently serves as one of Abaddon the Despoiler's lieutenants and a member of his personal retinue, the Chosen of Abaddon as well as one of the commanders of the Sons of the Cyclops warband. Ygethmor is the current Lord Deceiver, whose visions of the Warp lead the Black Crusade from star system to star system. During the 13th Black Crusade in 999.M41, the Officio Assassinorum sanctioned the deployment of an assassin team to eliminate Ygethmor, amongst other notable targets in service to the Archenemy. Whilst scrutiny of their field records is impossible, at least seven Assassinorum agents are known to have failed in the attempt to take the life of the Deceiver. Ygethmor led the assault of the forces of Chaos during the campaign known as the Fall of Medusa V in an attempt to become a Daemon Prince. This effort failed and Ygethmor was slain by the blade of the Asuryani Autarch Elarique Swiftblade of Craftworld Alaitoc, and those Champions of the Dark Gods who had followed him were left to their fates on the dying world as Medusa V was consumed by an onrushing Warp Storm. However, death rarely represents an end to the service of a Chaos Lord, if the Dark Gods still have use for him. The galaxy may yet suffer the tread of Ygethmor the Deceiver once more. |
Black Legion - Lord Corruptor: The Lord Corruptor is tasked with instilling fear and hatred amongst the Chaos Space Marines of the Black Legion.It is he who spreads fear and corruption before the Black Fleet, and also keeps the lesser warlords of the Legion in line through brutality and terror.He is always a devotee of Nurgle.His trophy rack is adorned with the skulls of failed servants of the Despoiler.Skyrak Slaughterborn - The Chosen of Abaddon lieutenant named Skyrak Slaughterborn, the current Lord Corruptor, leads the warbands of Nurgle within the Black Legion into battle. Collectively known as the Bringers of Decay, they spread their disease and corruption throughout the realms of Mankind. Skyrak is known to have led the large warband of Chaos Space Marines known as the Slaughterkin in the assault on Cadia during the 13th Black Crusade. |
Black Legion - Lord Purgator: It falls to the Lord Purgator to ensure that every man, woman and child left alive on a world conquered by the Black Legion is dragged in chains into the hold of the Legion's starships, and that no edifice remains undedicated to the Dark Gods.The Lord Purgator is always a devotee of Slaanesh.Devram Korda - Devram Korda, also known as "The Tyrant of Sarora," is a servant of the Chaos God Slaanesh, the Prince of Pleasure. A former Veteran sergeant of the Sons of Horus Legion, after the events of the Horus Heresy, he rose to prominence and became a Chaos Lord. He became infamous for his blasphemous actions on the doomed world of Sarora, where he distilled the life essence of the citizens of the planet's largest hive city for a single vial of a sorcerous elixir which made him virtually invincible. He eventually became the current Lord Purgator, the individual who ensures the constant flow of slaves into the Black Legion's pens from conquered worlds and raises new edifices to the glory of the Chaos Gods upon them. Korda also commands the Chosen of Abaddon and is one of the leaders of the Children of Torment warband. In the closing days of the 13th Black Crusade in 999.M41, Devram Korda returned to his master's side, bringing with him two individuals (later identified as Skyrak Slaughterborn and Urkrathos) who had journeyed to the centre of the Eye of Terror. Together with the Chaos Sorcerer Ygethmor the Deceiver, they presented Abaddon with the Heart of Chaos, a powerful artefact that Zaraphiston, a Chaos Sorcerer and rival Chaos Lord of the Despoiler, had long claimed could not exist. |
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